Fake news ascribed to Arvind Kejriwal goes viral 

Arvind Kejriwal.

On Facebook, a page called “योगी आदित्यनाथ की सेना” (Yogi Adityanath ki Sena), on Tuesday, posted a fake image which look like a cropped article from a Hindi newspaper. It looked like a genuine news story with Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s photo and a headline that read “India should concede its right on Kashmir as Kashmiris want independence: Kejriwal.”

The post was shared approximately 5,000 times on Facebook by the time of writing of this post.

Among those who shared the image of the fake newspaper clip, one user, with the handle @RaviNEGI4BJP, particularly stands out. @RaviNEGI4BJP, who shared it on Twitter with the text: “If it were to be left to Kejri Ali, even Delhi would be sold,” identifies himself as a member of the Bhartiya Janata Party and is being followed by railway minister Piyush Goyal’s office.

प्रधानमंत्री बनने की सोच रखने वाला कंजरी अली का बस चले तो दिल्ली को भी बेच दी pic.twitter.com/wAxIJkm6Ei

— RaviNEGI4BJP (@ravinegi4bjp) June 23, 2018

Fact-checking site Alt News found that in 2015, a parody account of Kerjiwal had posted the same image but with the photo of former Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif instead of Kejriwal’s with a changed headline.

Pak PM Nawaz Sharif invited me 4 talks on Kashmir. It brought tears in my eyes. Willing 2 give Kashmir 2 Pak.

Teesta pic.twitter.com/S1FGwg6Cg1

— Arvind Kejriwal (@dArvindKejriwal) February 13, 2015

On further probe, the also found that the fake newspaper clipping of Kejriwal has been circulating since 2016.  Some websites fell for it, like mobilenews24.com, but deleted it when it was busted as fake news.

(Courtesy Alt News)