A photo of a man in tears has been shared with the claim that he is Rajesh Tiwari, UPSC civil service aspirant and resident of Lucknow. A viral message claims that Tiwari failed the exam despite scoring 643 in the written paper since the cut-off for the General category is 689 this year. On the other hand, the cut-off for the SC/ST category is 601, per the claim. A demand to end reservation in India has been made through this post. Twitter handle @SyntaxErrorism shared the image along with the viral message. (Archive link)
He is Rajesh Tiwari, 29, Lucknow. The Only person who earns in the family of Seven Members.
He Got 643 Marks in UPSC Civil Services exam this year, But Failed coz Cut Off for General Category was 689 this year.
For SC/ST it was 601.
1/3 pic.twitter.com/UH6I9f9iH9
— Syntax Error (@SyntaxErrorism) June 2, 2021
Another user @AdvAshutoshDube also tweeted this picture and accompanying claim. (Archive link)
He is Rajesh Tiwari, I am not Against any Caste. I want equality.
He Got 643 Marks in the UPSC Civil Services exam this year, But Failed coz Cut Off for Open Category was 689, 3 years ago.
For SC/ST it was 601, the one who has got 601 will become our next Bureaucrat? pic.twitter.com/7xxj83sfV1
— ADV. ASHUTOSH J. DUBEY🇮🇳 (@AdvAshutoshDube) June 3, 2021
It is gaining a lot of traction on Twitter and Facebook.
We found that the photograph has been circulating online since 2017.
Fact-check
Alt News performed a reverse image search and located the original photo on a Bangladeshi website. The individual in the picture has been identified as Saeed Rimon (সাঈদ মন াভ). A subsequent reverse image search with these keywords led us to an article on Bangladeshi news portal Jago News, which said that Rimon has been raising awareness on the prevention of road accidents for the last seven to eight years. He educates school and college students about road accidents and distributes informational pamphlets.
The website has carried several other articles about Saeed Rimon. One of these carries a link to his Facebook profile, where he had addressed misinformation surrounding the image. In a June 5 update, he wrote, “This picture was shared on Indian social media and linked to unemployment. I have also been wrongly identified as Rajesh Tiwari.” He had rubbished the viral claim earlier too on June 2.
Saeed originally uploaded the image on November 30, 2016, to highlight unemployment in Bangladesh.
The image was also posted by a few other Bangladeshi outlets.
Dubbed ‘Rajesh Patel’, an old image of a Bangladeshi man named Saeed Rimon is being circulated on Indian social media with a call to end the reservation policy.
Independent journalism that speaks truth to power and is free of corporate and political control is possible only when people start contributing towards the same. Please consider donating towards this endeavour to fight fake news and misinformation.
