A screenshot of an advertisement in a newspaper thanking Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot for including Tanha peer dargah in the religious tourism circuit and allocating Rs. 100 crores for the project is being shared with the false claim that the entire corpus is being spent on one dargah. The viral claim is being shared on both Facebook and Twitter with a screenshot of an advertisement thanking CM Gehlot for allocating Rs 100 crore for a dargah, which appeared in Hindi daily Rajasthan Patrika. Originally in Hindi, when translated to English the claim reads: “We Hindus are going door to door to collect funds for the Ram Temple. On the other hand, Rajasthan government has allocated Rs 100 crore to a dargah.”
However, it was found that the claim is misleading and the Rajasthan government has allocated Rs 100 crore in its annual budget for a project involving religious places of all faiths and not just Islam. In the 2021-22 budget, the Rajasthan government has allocated Rs. 100 crores for development of religious tourist circuit connecting places of worship of Sikhs, Jains, Hindus, and Muslims in order to develop ‘Sarva Dharma Sama Bhava’. On the Budget document at point number 213 on page 74 and 75, it clearly states that Rs 100 crore had been allocated to the Religious Tourism Circuit project, which aims to connect major religious places of worship of all faiths. Among the list of places Tanha peer dargah is also mentioned that is in the ad, with several other prominent places of worship of Sikh, Jains, Hindus and Muslims as marked in red. Also, the Rs. 100 crores allocated to this initiative will be spent for developing connectivity and other areas concerning the places of worship of the four religions. From this, it is evident Rajasthan government’s allocation of Rs. 100 crores for developing a religious circuit by connecting religious places of four different religions is misconstrued as the government allocating Rs. 100 crores just to develop a dargah.
This ad was published on 12th March in the Rajasthan Patrika, and the claim was spread as a fallacious context by a social media user and no solid ground whatsoever.
