When US President Donald Trump alleged a “conspiracy” by the Joe Biden administration to influence the 2024 Lok Sabha elections by spending $21 million on voter turnout in India, sections of the mainstream media were quick to amplify the BJP’s claims about the opposition indulging a foreign hand.
A fact-check by The Indian Express citing US federal spending data now suggests that the amount was actually sanctioned for Bangladesh, not India. The report’s findings also raise serious questions about the kind of coverage that had followed Trump’s remarks.
While there were several media outlets that amplified the BJP’s and Trump’s allegations without caveat, one stood out for allowing misinformation to be funded by the taxpayer.
On DD News, ‘a big game’
#PooraSach | Donald Trump has made a big claim, alleging that the Joe Biden administration conspired to influence India’s 2024 elections. He stated that $21 million was spent to boost voter turnout in India.
— DD News (@DDNewslive) February 20, 2025
This raises questions—was the money used to help Congress and the… pic.twitter.com/fNfwh8M21e
Parroting the BJP allegations, DD News’ Prakhar Shrivastav on his prime time show Poora Sach on Thursday implied that the “revelations” made by Trump insinuate that the Biden administration had hatched a plot to defeat the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2024. “Aaj hum aapko batyenge aapko ke kaise 2024 ke chunavon mein ho raha than ek bahut bada game, jiske baare mein tab PM Modi ne bhi aagah kiya tha (We will tell you today how there was a big game during the 2024 elections which PM Modi had then warned about).”
A ticker on the show read, “America mein kisne rachi Modi ko harane ki koshish? (Who in America hatched a plan to try and defeat Modi?)” as “Trump ne phoda ‘bomb’ Congress ki udi neend” flashed across the screen.
The controversy over the said amount first erupted after the Elon Musk-headed US Department of Government Efficiency on February 16 announced that it had “cancelled” the USAID funding of “$21 million for voter turnout in India”. Citing this said funding, the BJP had accused Congress of using foreign influence to manipulate the outcome of the 2024 general elections.
On Friday, The Indian Express reported that $21 million was granted through USAID in July 2022 for a project called Amar Vote Amar (my vote is mine) in Bangladesh, and that India had not received any funding via the Consortium for Elections and Political Process Strengthening through USAID since 2008.
“Each federal grant comes with a specific place of performance — the country where it is meant to be spent. According to the official open data source of US federal spending, there is no USAID funded CEPPS project in India since 2008,” it further reported.
Newslaundry had earlier tracked 42 segments of DD primetime show Do Took and found many of them to be in violation of the channel’s responsibilities as outlined by its governing body, Prasar Bharati, whose 20-point programme code explicitly prohibits content that contains attacks on religions or communities or visuals or words contemptuous of religious groups or which promote communal attitudes.
This is not the first time for wild theories to emerge about the opposition being hands in glove with external powers. Watch.
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