You’ve probably seen how quickly things can spiral online, especially after a crisis. In the tense days following the horrific terrorist attack in New Delhi on November 10, 2025, which left 13 people dead, a short video clip started making the rounds. It featured none other than India's National Security Adviser, Ajit Doval, making a pretty startling claim. The internet was buzzing, and the clip was shared far and wide, but then came a twist: Doval himself declared it a deepfake. So, what’s the real story here? Let's untangle this web of claims and counter-claims.
Key Highlights
- ✓ A video of NSA Ajit Doval went viral after a New Delhi terror attack on November 10, 2025.
- ✓ In the clip, Doval states that Pakistan's ISI has recruited more Hindus than Muslims for intelligence tasks in India since 1947.
- ✓ Doval told CNN-News18 the video was a "deepfake," warning about AI-driven misinformation targeting India's security narrative.
- ✓ A fact-check revealed the clip is from a genuine lecture Doval gave at the Australia India Institute on March 11, 2014.
- ✓ The original context shows Doval arguing against communalizing terrorism and urging for national unity.
The Viral Clip that Ignited a Firestorm
Imagine the atmosphere. The country is reeling from an attack, and emotions are high. It’s in this charged environment that a 35-second video of Ajit Doval pops up everywhere. In it, he’s heard saying, “Since 1947, Pakistan's ISI has recruited more Hindus than Muslims for intelligence tasks in India.” Many people shared this clip to push back against the knee-jerk reaction of blaming minorities after such an incident, using Doval’s own words to argue that terrorism has no religion.
The timing was potent, and the message, coming from the country's top security chief, seemed undeniable. It spread like wildfire across X (formerly Twitter) and other social media platforms. Users shared it as a powerful counter-narrative, a moment of unexpected clarity from a figure at the heart of India's security establishment. The message was clear: if even Ajit Doval says this, then we need to look beyond simplistic communal blame games.
Doval's Swift and Strong Denial
Just as the video reached peak virality, the story took a sharp turn. On November 17, 2025, Ajit Doval himself weighed in. Speaking exclusively to CNN-News18, he issued an unequivocal denial. He didn't just say he was misquoted; he claimed the entire video was a fabrication—a sophisticated deepfake designed to manipulate public opinion. This wasn't just a simple correction; it was a serious allegation about the weaponization of technology.
Doval warned that these AI-driven media tools are used to distort issues of national security and that this particular clip was a deliberate attempt to target India’s counter-terrorism narrative. He stressed that such technological manipulation poses a growing threat, capable of eroding public trust and creating social divides. According to the report by Manoj Gupta, officials believe this followed a global pattern of using AI-generated misinformation to create fissures within democracies. Moneycontrol quickly followed up with a report reiterating Doval’s statement, solidifying the official narrative: the video was fake news.
Fact-Checking the "Deepfake" Claim
So, we have a viral video on one side and a flat-out denial from the NSA on the other, who calls it a deepfake. This is where the work of fact-checkers, like Shinjinee Majumder from Alt News, becomes so incredibly important. Instead of taking the denial at face value, they did some digital digging to verify the clip's authenticity. Using a reverse image search on keyframes from the video, they hit the jackpot.
The trail led them not to an AI-generation tool, but to a 1-hour, 17-minute YouTube video. This wasn't something created last week; it was uploaded way back on March 20, 2014, by the Australia India Institute. The video documented a lecture Doval delivered as part of the "Global Challenges Series" on March 11, 2014. The technology for creating convincing deepfakes simply wasn't widely known or used back then, making the "deepfake" claim highly improbable from the get-go.
The Original Quote in Full Context
Here's where things get really fascinating. The fact-checkers pinpointed the exact moment in the lecture. At the 1:04:00 mark, Ajit Doval says, "Let me tell you one small thing... the number of persons that ISI has recruited for intelligence tasks in India, there have been more Hindus than Muslims. All the number of cases from 1947... more than 4,000 cases, probably not even 20% would be Muslims. So it's a very wrong concept."
So, the words are his. The video is real. But the viral clip, in its brevity, stripped away all the crucial context. Doval made this statement while answering a question about India's response to terror threats. He wasn't just dropping a random statistic; he was building a much larger, more nuanced argument about how to fight terrorism effectively. He was arguing for a unified, national approach rather than a divisive, communal one.
The Power of Missing Context
The viral clip was technically accurate, but contextually misleading. In his full 2014 lecture, Doval’s main point was that terrorism should never be viewed through a communal lens. He explicitly stated that when it comes to fighting terror, it's "not a Muslim population versus Hindu population issue but a national problem." He was making a case for bringing the Muslim community into the fold as partners in the fight, suggesting that working with Ulemas on a joint strategy was the best way forward.
He even pointed out a powerful, often overlooked fact: "The casualties of Islamic terrorism have been Muslims 90% and 10% non-Muslims, and they are aware of it." To support his argument, he cited a 2012 gathering at Ramleela Maidan where 50,000 Maulanas issued a fatwa against global terrorism. He noted that no Hindu organization had taken a similar public stand, emphasizing that the majority of Indian Muslims consistently reject violence, even if a small, violent fringe gets mistaken for the voice of the entire community.
His reference to the ISI recruiting more Hindus was designed to shatter the stereotype that espionage and terror-related activities are exclusive to one community. His broader message was an appeal for unity, a call to remember the significant contributions of Indian Muslims to the nation and to avoid linking national security concerns with communal identity. The viral clip isolated one provocative sentence and let it loose without this vital framework.
Conclusion
So, where does this leave us? The fact-check is clear: NSA Ajit Doval did say that the ISI had recruited more Hindus than Muslims for intelligence tasks in India. The viral video was not a deepfake; it was a real clip from a 2014 lecture. His statement calling it a fabrication is, therefore, false. However, the viral clip is a classic case of decontextualization, where a single point is amplified while the larger, unifying message is lost.
This entire episode is a powerful reminder of how complex our information landscape has become. We have a real quote, presented without context, which is then countered by a false claim of it being a deepfake. It highlights the challenge of not just identifying outright fake news, but also understanding how truth itself can be twisted and manipulated. The bottom line is, the remarks were indeed made by him, and the context was an appeal against communal division—a detail that got lost in the noise of the digital storm.
