#FactCheck-AI-Generated Video Falsely Shows Samay Raina Making a Joke on Rekha
Executive Summary:
A viral video circulating on social media that appears to be deliberately misleading and manipulative is shown to have been done by comedian Samay Raina casually making a lighthearted joke about actress Rekha in the presence of host Amitabh Bachchan which left him visibly unsettled while shooting for an episode of Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) Influencer Special. The joke pointed to the gossip and rumors of unspoken tensions between the two Bollywood Legends. Our research has ruled out that the video is artificially manipulated and reflects a non genuine content. However, the specific joke in the video does not appear in the original KBC episode. This incident highlights the growing misuse of AI technology in creating and spreading misinformation, emphasizing the need for increased public vigilance and awareness in verifying online information.
Claim:
The claim in the video suggests that during a recent "Influencer Special" episode of KBC, Samay Raina humorously asked Amitabh Bachchan, "What do you and a circle have in common?" and then delivered the punchline, "Neither of you and circle have Rekha (line)," playing on the Hindi word "rekha," which means 'line'.ervicing routes between Amritsar, Chandigarh, Delhi, and Jaipur. This assertion is accompanied by images of a futuristic aircraft, implying that such technology is currently being used to transport commercial passengers.
Fact Check:
To check the genuineness of the claim, the whole Influencer Special episode of Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) which can also be found on the Sony Set India YouTube channel was carefully reviewed. Our analysis proved that no part of the episode had comedian Samay Raina cracking a joke on actress Rekha. The technical analysis using Hive moderator further found that the viral clip is AI-made.
Conclusion:
A viral video on the Internet that shows Samay Raina making a joke about Rekha during KBC was released and completely AI-generated and false. This poses a serious threat to manipulation online and that makes it all the more important to place a fact-check for any news from credible sources before putting it out. Promoting media literacy is going to be key to combating misinformation at this time, with the danger of misuse of AI-generated content.
- Claim: Fake AI Video: Samay Raina’s Rekha Joke Goes Viral
- Claimed On: X (Formally known as Twitter)
- Fact Check: False and Misleading
Related Blogs
%20(1).webp)
Before you take that next sip of your chai latte at Starbucks, you're about to see Artificial Intelligence (AI) in your tea. Yes you heard it right, but relax, you don't need to put the cup down, because it's not blended in like a new masala and nobody's adding AI as an ingredient. But AI will be deciding how much stock gets ordered, when the machine needs a service call, how the whole backend of your favourite coffee chain runs.
Here's what's actually going on. Starbucks has been quietly building its own AI to replace the systems Oracle, Microsoft, and IBM used to run for it, for the services such as inventory, equipment management, even the point-of-sale software every outlet depends on. In short: Starbucks decided it does not want to outsource its backend anymore. It wants to build the brain itself.
Sounds fascinating on the surface. A coffee company doing its own AI R&D, right? Except dig one layer deeper, and it stops being cool and starts being a conundrum. Here's the actual link: companies like Starbucks are Indian IT's bread and butter. This is literally the business model, global companies pay Indian IT firms like TCS, HCL, Infosys, Wipro to run exactly this kind of backend work: inventory systems, equipment management, point-of-sale software, IT infrastructure. That's what pays the salaries of roughly 6 million people employed by India's outsourcing industry.
However, recently, this workforce has been shrinking rather than growing. TCS, the largest player in the industry, reported just 0.4 percent revenue growth in the quarter after stripping out currency fluctuations, its slowest expansion in a year, while its workforce shrank by around 3 percent over the past year to about 594,000 employees. At smaller rival HCL Technologies, sales actually slipped 0.5 percent quarter on quarter. Company wide, TCS let go of over 23,000 employees in FY26 alone, citing its pivot toward an AI first services model and reduced bench requirements per client engagement, with a steep net decline of over 11,000 employees in the most recent quarter alone.
AI's impact on India's IT industry and workforce
India's IT sector employs close to 6 million people, and a large share of that workforce has built careers around exactly the kind of work now being absorbed by AI: inventory systems, equipment monitoring, point of sale software, and other repetitive backend operations. As more global clients explore building these capabilities in house, the demand for large teams doing routine maintenance work is likely to shrink. This does not mean mass job losses overnight, but it does suggest a shift in what kind of talent gets hired and retained. Entry level, process driven roles may see slower growth, while demand rises for professionals who can design, audit, and govern AI systems rather than simply maintain legacy software. For India's IT workforce, the challenge is less about competing with AI and more about repositioning around it, moving up the value chain before the shift forces the decision.
Beyond One Coffee Chain ~ The Real Shift in Global Outsourcing
Starbucks isn't an isolated case; it's a visible example of a much wider recalibration. For two decades, the operating assumption in enterprise software was that building complex, mission-critical systems in-house was too slow, too risky, and too expensive compared to buying from established vendors. AI-assisted coding is chipping away at that assumption. What used to require large, specialised engineering teams and years of development can now be prototyped and iterated on far faster enough that even a company whose core business is coffee, not code, can seriously consider building its own enterprise software stack.
However it is also worth noting that this transition isn't frictionless. Starbucks itself had to walk back an AI-powered inventory-counting tool earlier this year after it produced inaccurate counts, reverting stores to manual counting. Building in-house AI systems is not automatically smoother or more reliable than buying proven software; it just shifts the risk and the learning curve onto the company doing the building.
Disruption and Opportunity, Side by Side
None of this means Indian IT companies can afford to sit still. The Starbucks example offers a legitimate signal that repetitive, well defined, automatable work, especially when powered by in house built AI, genuinely poses some risk or not. But it cannot be seen only through the lens of the industry's obituary. It would be premature to call this a broader decline in terms of IT professionals, companies, or jobs.
The same earnings season also brought TCS's expanded AI mandate with ABB and HCL's $1.14 billion AI driven contract in Europe. Demand has not disappeared, it appears to be evolving from routine maintenance work toward AI native, higher value engagement.
Whether this becomes a meaningful structural shift or simply another cycle the industry eventually absorbs remains to be seen. What seems clear for now is that the path forward depends less on resisting the shift and more on how quickly the industry chooses to embrace it.
Conclusion
AI is a double-edged sword. While it challenges the old model of outsourcing via a maintenance and staff augmentation play, it also provides new, high-value services opportunities around AI integration, data infrastructure, and governance-areas where the scale, domain expertise, and global delivery experience that Indian IT has amassed over three decades is essential. Whether India's IT majors will move fast enough to upskill, re-skill, and reposition to ride this wave before the opportunity heads somewhere else, is the question to watch, rather than the survival of one vendor or contract.
Sources
- Bloomberg Opinion - Andy Mukherjee, "You Can't Spell Chai Latte Without AI, and That Will Hurt India.” bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2026-07-14/you-can-t-spell-chai-latte-without-ai-that-will-hurt-india
- Yahoo Finance / Vlad Schepkov, "Starbucks Working on AI Tools to Replace Microsoft and IBM Software – Report," July 9, 2026. finance.yahoo.com/technology/ai/articles/starbucks-working-ai-tools-replace-105954159.html
- Livemint - Andy Mukherjee, "As Starbucks Mixes AI in Chai Latte, What Must IT Players Do?" Mint Curator.
livemint.com/opinion/online-views/andy-mukherjee-india-it-industry-starbucks-ai-tc-hcl-tech-artificial-intelligence-oracle-microsoft-ibm-11784118723454.html - Metaintro, "TCS and Infosys Face an AI Reckoning" https://www.metaintro.com/blog/tcs-infosys-ai-reckoning-millions-it-jobs-2026
- LayoffTrends, "IT Layoffs India 2026 — TCS, Infosys, Wipro, GCC Jobs" https://layofftrends.com/india.html
- NiftyTrader, "Hiring Slows at India's Top IT Firms — Net Headcount Falls in 9MFY26" https://www.niftytrader.in/markets/hiring-slows-at-indias-top-it-firms-net-headcount-falls-in-9mfy26-what-it-signals-for-the-sector/
- TCS official newsroom, "TCS and ABB Sign Multi-Million, Multi-Year Deal to Transform Global Network Operations with AI," tcs.com/who-we-are/newsroom/press-release/tcs-and-abb-sign-multi-million-multi-year-deal-to-transform-global-network-operations-with-ai
India is the world's largest democracy, and conducting free and fair elections is a mammoth task shouldered by the Election Commission of India. But technology is transforming every aspect of the electoral process in the digital age, with Artificial Intelligence (AI) being integrated into campaigns, voter engagement, and election monitoring. In the upcoming Bihar elections of 2025, all eyes are on how the use of AI will influence the state polls and the precedent it will set for future elections.
Opportunities: Harnessing AI for Better Elections
Breaking Language Barriers with AI:
AI is reshaping political outreach by making speeches accessible in multiple languages. At the Kashi Tamil Sangamam in 2024, the PM’s Hindi address was AI-dubbed in Tamil in real time. Since then, several speeches have been rolled out in eight languages, ensuring inclusivity and connecting with voters beyond Hindi-speaking regions more effectively.
Monitoring and Transparency
During Bihar’s Panchayat polls, the State Election Commission used Staqu’s JARVIS, an AI-powered system that connects with CCTV cameras to monitor EVM screens in real time. By reducing human error, JARVIS brought greater accuracy, speed, and trust to the counting process.
AI for Information Access on Public Service Delivery
NaMo AI is a multilingual chatbot that citizens can use to inquire about the details of public services. The feature aims to make government schemes easy to understand, transparent, and help voters connect directly with the policies of the government.
Personalised Campaigning
AI is transforming how campaigns connect with voters. By analysing demographics and social media activity, AI builds detailed voter profiles. This helps craft messages that feel personal, whether on WhatsApp, a robocall, or a social media post, ensuring each group hears what matters most to them. This aims to make political outreach sharper and more effective.
Challenges: The Dark Side of AI in Elections
Deepfakes and Disinformation
AI-powered deepfakes create hyper-realistic videos and audio that are nearly impossible to distinguish from the real. In elections, they can distort public perception, damage reputations, or fuel disharmony on social media. There is a need for mandatory disclaimers stating when content is AI-generated, to ensure transparency and protect voters from manipulative misinformation.
Data Privacy and Behavioural Manipulation
Cambridge Analytica’s consulting services, provided by harvesting the data of millions of users from Facebook without their consent, revealed how personal data can be weaponised in politics. This data was allegedly used to “microtarget” users through ads, which could influence their political opinions. Data mining of this nature can be supercharged through AI models, jeopardising user privacy, trust, safety, and casting a shadow on democratic processes worldwide.
Algorithmic Bias
AI systems are trained on datasets. If the datasets contain biases, AI-driven tools could unintentionally reinforce stereotypes or favor certain groups, leading to unfair outcomes in campaigning or voter engagement.
The Road Ahead: Striking a Balance
The adoption of AI in elections opens a Pandora's box of uncertainties. On the one hand, it offers solutions for breaking language barriers and promoting inclusivity. On the other hand, it opens the door to manipulation and privacy violations.
To counter risks from deepfakes and synthetic content, political parties are now advised to clearly label AI-generated materials and add disclaimers in their campaign messaging. In Delhi, a nodal officer has even been appointed to monitor social media misuse, including the circulation of deepfake videos during elections. The Election Commission of India constantly has to keep up with trends and tactics used by political parties to ensure that elections remain free and fair.
Conclusion
With Bihar’s pioneering experiments with JARVIS in Panchayat elections to give vote counting more accuracy and speed, India is witnessing both sides of this technological revolution. The challenge lies in ensuring that AI strengthens democracy rather than undermining it. Deepfakes algorithms, bias, and data misuse remind us of the risk of when technology oversteps. The real challenge is to strike the right balance in embracing AI for elections to enhance inclusivity and transparency, while safeguarding trust, privacy, and the integrity of democratic processes.
References
- https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/how-ai-is-rewriting-the-rules-of-election-campaign-in-india/articleshow/120848499.cms#
- https://m.economictimes.com/news/elections/lok-sabha/india/2024-polls-stand-out-for-use-of-ai-to-bridge-language-barriers/articleshow/108737700.cms
- https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/namo-ai-on-namo-app-a-unique-chatbot-that-will-answer-everything-on-pm-modi-govt-schemes-achievements-5426028
- https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/gadgets-news/staqu-deploys-jarvis-to-facilitate-automated-vote-counting-for-bihar-panchayat-polls/articleshow/87307475.cms
- https://www.drishtiias.com/daily-updates/daily-news-editorials/deepfakes-in-elections-challenges-and-mitigation
- https://internetpolicy.mit.edu/blog-2018-fb-cambridgeanalytica/
- https://www.deccanherald.com/elections/delhi/delhi-assembly-elections-2025-use-ai-transparently-eci-issues-guidelines-for-political-parties-3357978#
Executive Summary
A video is being widely shared on social media amid claims that the BJP has formed a government in West Bengal. The video shows several people being taken away in a bus while their family members are seen crying and grieving nearby. Users sharing the clip claim that the scene is from West Bengal, where the BJP government has allegedly started sending back Bangladeshis who were living illegally in the state.
Research by CyberPeace Research Wing found the viral claim to be misleading. The research revealed that the viral video has no connection with West Bengal. The video is actually from Assam’s Barpeta district, where in 2024, a Foreigners Tribunal declared 28 people as non-citizens. Following the order, authorities shifted them to a transit camp. The viral clip is from that incident. An old and unrelated video is now being falsely shared as a recent incident from West Bengal.
Claim
On May 14, 2026, a Facebook user shared the viral video and wrote, “How sad… Opposition voters are now being packed off to the Bangladesh border from Bengal and Assam. How will they ever win now? Really terrible what is happening to these poor people.” The post link, archive link, and screenshot are provided below.
- https://www.facebook.com/rajendra.kasliwal1/posts/973081982000168/
- https://archive.ph/y7Y4D
Another user also shared the same viral video on social media with a similar claim. The post link, archive link, and screenshot are given below.
Fact Check
To verify the authenticity of the viral video, we extracted several key frames and performed a reverse image search. During the research, we found the same video uploaded on a YouTube channel named Daily Salar Digital on September 5, 2024. The link to the post and its screenshot are given below.
Further research led us to a report published by IndiaTodayNE on September 3, 2024, carrying a similar description of the incident. The post link and screenshot are provided below.
Conclusion
Our research found that the viral video has no connection with West Bengal. The clip is from Assam’s Barpeta district, where in 2024, 28 people were declared non-citizens by a Foreigners Tribunal and later shifted to a transit camp by authorities. The video being shared online is from that incident. An old and unrelated video is being falsely circulated as a recent development from West Bengal.
