English
News Delhi: A lot of misinformation and fake news have flooded social media ever since coronavirus hit India. Now, a news report published in a Hindi newspaper has claimed that the Central government is planning to remove 5 lakh employees in order to cut expenditures amid the coronavirus crisis.
The news report further stated that the employees in the Ministry of Railways and Indian Ordnance Factories Service are likely to be sacked and that they would also receive a lesser amount of pension. The picture of the report has gone viral on many social media platforms, triggering panic in many.
However, the Press Information Bureau (PIB) conducted a fact check on this report and found out that the government has put forward no such proposal. Issuing a clarification, PIB debunked the fake news and asked netizens to beware of such misleading information.
In a tweet, PIB wrote, ”Fake news. The government is not considering any such proposal. Beware of such reports. The news report is baseless and wrong.”
दावा: एक न्यूज़ रिपोर्ट में दावा किया गया है कि केंद्र सरकार 5 लाख केंद्रीय कर्मचारियों को नौकरी से निकालने की तैयारी कर रही है।#PIBFactcheck: फेक न्यूज़। सरकार ऐसे किसी प्रस्ताव पर विचार नहीं कर रही है। कृपया ऐसी फैलाई जा रही ख़बरों से सावधान रहें। pic.twitter.com/afXmMkapmh
— PIB Fact Check (@PIBFactCheck) June 11, 2020
Yesterday too, PIB debunked one such rumour that claimed India will be locked down again post-June 15.
The Press Information Bureau launched this fact-checking arm in December 2019, to curb misinformation and fake news prevalent on the internet. It claimed that its objective was “to identify misinformation related to government’s policies and schemes that are circulating on various social media platforms”.
