Meta has issued a formal apology after an automatic translation error on Facebook declared chief minister of the southern Indian state of Karnataka dead.
On Tuesday, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah published a condolence message in Kannada language to veteran Kannada actress B Saroja Devi.
Meta’s auto-translation to English said: "Chief Minister Siddaramaiah passed away yesterday multilingual star, senior actress B. Took darshan of Saroja Devi's earthly body and paid his last respects."
Meta has later announced that the issue had been fixed.
"We fixed an issue that briefly caused this inaccurate Kannada translation. We apologize that this happened," a Meta spokesperson told PTI.
Meta's machine auto-translations are commonly shown to users on Facebook and Instagram, particularly for public biographical info and specific pieces of content.
In the aftermath of the incident, Mr Siddaramaiah posted on X:
"Faulty auto-translation of Kannada content on Meta platforms is distorting facts and misleading users. This is especially dangerous when it comes to official communications.”
Mr Siddaramaiah added in a separate post:
"In many cases, Facebook shows auto-translated versions of posts by default in user feeds. The original Kannada post remains unchanged and can be viewed by selecting, 'See original' option.
“I request everyone not to spread confusion or misinformation based on an error that did not originate from us. It is time Meta puts in place better and more responsible translation systems,” he concluded.
On July 15, I paid my respects to the mortal remains of the late B. Saroja Devi - a moment of deep personal and public sorrow. A post about this was shared in Kannada from the official Chief Minister of Karnataka Facebook page.
undefined Siddaramaiah (@siddaramaiah) July 18, 2025
Unfortunately, some people saw a wrong English… pic.twitter.com/TVivkeVYRk
Kannada is one of the most widely spoken languages in India, with roughly 50 million native speakers. Its distribution is limited to the state of Karnataka in the southwest of India, where it’s an official language.
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