A concerted campaign has been up on social media ever since Barmer collector Tina Dabi received national award for water conservation in November 2025. Activists on social media had termed her ‘reel star' and disputed all her achievements as public servant.
Social media users raised doubts on the photographs and documents uploaded on the official portal for claiming the award. They also put question mark on the credibility of this 2016 batch IAS pricier, who had topped her batch.
In some posts on social platform X, it has been claimed that the data was rigged on behalf of Barmer and the same photo was used to represent different works and presented to win Rs 2-crore award from the President Droupadi Murmu.
Tina Dabi who had been shying away from media for quite some time, came out to ridicule the claims made on social media.
Dabi said that the claims on social media are baseless and are aimed at tarnishing the image of Barmer administration.
She said that a Barmer district received the award for the construction of more than 79,000 water conservation structures and public participation under the Jal Sanchay Jan Bhagidari programme while photos drifted on social media are of different programme.
She claimed that posts on social media are misleading.
“A post on social platform ‘X' has come to our cognisance, in which screen shots have been uploaded. The post claims that single photo has been uploaded on official portal multiple times to mislead the government,” she said adding that the post is completely baseless.
Two programmes, different photos
Dabi said that the central government runs two different programmes on water conservation – Jal Shakti Abhiyan and Jal Sanchay Jan Bhagidari programar which was launched by PM Narendra Modi On September 6, 2024 in Surat, Gujarat.
“The photographs that are running on social media are from the Jalshakti Abhiyan portal while the one on which we have received the award is the Jal Sanchay Jan Bhagidari programme. Both are separate programmes and have no link with each other. So the posts on social media are baseless and fake,” she said.
However, Dabi said that the administration has taken serious note of duplicate photos being uploaded on Jal Shakti portal under Catch the Rain (CTR) programme.
“It has come to our notice that duplicate photos have been uploaded portraying different works in three blocks Dhorimanna, Chauhattan and Barmer rural. We are getting it checked. Action will be taken against the officer and employee who is found guilty,” she said.
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