By Shishir Prashant 
PrashantNews
The assembly elections in Uttarakhand are expected to be held in February, 2027 but the political temperature has already started rising.
Sounding a poll bugle, the Uttarakhand BJP recently uploaded a reel on its official Facebook page purportedly portraying veteran Congress leader Harish Rawat as a leader who is appeasing Muslims.
However, Rawat has hit back warning the BJP to apologize and remove the reel immediately. Rawat has also threatened to file an FIR against the BJP and stage a protest outside their office if the BJP failed to comply.
The AI-generated reel begins with former Chief Minister Harish Rawat saying, “I take refuge in Muslims, I take refuge in shrines, I take refuge in love jihad,” while subsequent reel shows the construction of a shrine and some people smiling and talking about turning Devbhoomi (the land of gods) into a land of shrines. The reel ends with Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami shown walking with police forces and bulldozers.
The twenty-nine-second reel states, “The Congress, blinded by its lust for power, has always only cared about its own chair, even if it means compromising the sanctity of Devbhoomi. The reel further says, “In its greed for vote bank politics, Congress has completely changed the demography of the hills. Under the BJP government, every single infiltrator will be held accountable and shown the door. Tampering with the culture and demography of Devbhoomi will no longer be tolerated.”
Angered by the reel, Rawat demanded that the BJP apologize to the people of the state for “spreading lies,” and sought the removal of the reel from social media immediately. He warned that he would file an FIR on Tuesday. He also threatened to stage a sit-in protest outside the BJP office for seven consecutive days.
In a social media post, Harish Rawat said that the malicious attempt to create a false narrative against him using AI, if not immediately deleted and publicly retracted, only exposes the true nature of the BJP and the so-called “Dhakad Dhami” (strong Dhami).
Commenting on this, the state unit president of the BJP, Mahendra Bhatt, said that it is the Congress’s agenda to appease certain groups and then, when allegations are made, to create a ruckus. He said, “This image of Congress’s appeasement politics has been so deeply ingrained on the minds of the public that they cannot get rid of it even if they want to.”
Bhatt also said that if the Congress leaders want to file a police report in this regard, he should go ahead, and his party has no objection to it.
In yet another move, Rawat claimed that one more reel has been uploaded against him in the social media, a charge denied by the BJP.