Welcome Shashank Singh aka @Pokershash to HMP News! Pleasure to have you with us, and we thank you for giving your valuable time for this interview.
Tell us something about your fact checking website ‘www.facthunt.in’ becoming a legal entity.
Till now showing facts were fun for me. Now it has become my responsibility. But still I will do it as a fun.
What challenges do you face while doing fact checks?
When we check a video or image then there are many versions of news or captions of the same video or image. So finding the real incident is quite tough.
What methods/processes do you employ while fact checking and how you be able to do in quick time?
For images and videos, we use google image reverse search. And while fact checking crimes, we contact police to verify the claims or see if they have announced anything or multiple media reports.
Any comment on Indiaspend’s biased fact checking & it’s closure?
Indiaspend is not even 1% main stream media. Main stream media are the real reason why fake news gets spread. For TRPs, they run whatever they listen, they do not even verify before posting. And even if they have verified, they edit headline according to their will to attract the viewers or readers. If you have noticed, sometimes the body of the article will be completely different from headline. Because they know 90% people don’t read the article but just the headline.
Do you think India is failing to counter the propaganda spread in foreign media on Kashmir issue or the narritive of ‘Hindu Extremism’?
Yes! Because running a propaganda is too easy, but destroying it by facts is too difficult. Not only media but also many NGOs are working against India. And just like Israel, India is also becoming victim of these propaganda.
Do you think the Government of India conduct daily briefings to counter fake news peddled by MSM against the government?
in my opinion, there should be a government portal dedicated to counter fake news.
What’s your advice to the government in this regard?
Use PIB and Prashar Bharati to counter fake news. Every minister/leader is on twitter; they should immediately react to fake news, contrary to the current reaction time of 3-4 days.
What do you do for living, because fact checking is a part time job?
I am a full-time businessman with mobile fixed in one hand.
