India TV Fact Check: Amidst the ongoing Lok Sabha elections 2024 in India, fake news concerning the elections is circulating widely on social media platforms. In order to caution you against such misinformation, we present India TV Fact Check. The most recent case of fake news involves Indian cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni. A picture of Dhoni is being shared alongside claims that he has voted for the Congress party in the Lok Sabha elections 2024 and has urged people to vote for Congress only. However, when India TV fact-checked this claim, it was proven to be completely false.
What is going viral?
Actually, a picture of former Indian cricket team captain Dhoni is going viral on social media. In this picture, Dhoni is showing his hand. While sharing this picture, it is being claimed that Dhoni has appealed to the public to support the Congress party. Facebook user Manish Kumar Upadhyay wrote - "A hint is enough for the wise, Mahendra Singh Dhoni has also appealed to vote for the Congress party." Similarly, on social media platform X, user Praveen shared a similar post, writing - "A hint is enough for the wise..!! Dhoni ji is also saying things will change! Vote for Congress!"
India TV investigated
Given the widespread circulation of the claim suggesting Dhoni's support for Congress via a picture, we decided to investigate this claim. Initially, we scoured various websites using relevant keywords via Google Open Search to uncover any news of Dhoni's purported support for Congress. However, our search yielded no results confirming such a move by Dhoni.
Subsequently, we used a Google reverse image search. Upon conducting this search, we quickly discerned that the picture of Dhoni in question is approximately four years old. An identical image of Dhoni was located on the Chennai Super Kings page on Instagram, posted on October 5, 2020. The post celebrates the Chennai Super Kings' Twitter family reaching 6 million followers. It became evident that Dhoni's old picture was being circulated with false claims.
What came out in the fact check?
India TV's fact-check has unveiled that the picture of Dhoni circulated with false claims of supporting Congress, is actually four years old. The image has no relevance to the Lok Sabha elections of 2024. The picture of the cricketer is being circulated with false claims. It's advised for people to exercise caution regarding such misleading posts.
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