On July 15, Congress leader Acharya Pramod Krishnam posted an image of men burning BJP flags on Twitter (archive link) and Facebook. Krishnam claimed that members of the Brahman community burned the flags. Cumulatively, both posts were shared over 5,000 times and liked over 20,000 times.

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Twitter user @Sidhujaihind (archive link) also shared this image. Alt News has received multiple requests on Twitter to fact-check this image.

Fact-check

Alt News performed a reverse image search using multiple search engines but could not find relevant results. However, we came across a 2019 fact-check report by Vishvas News. According to the report, the image was viral last year with a similar claim. As per their investigation, the building in the background resembles a BJP office and the turban worn by the politician in the BJP banner resembles a Rajasthani turban. Using this as a clue they performed a reverse image search and found that Dainik Bhaskar had published the image in their article around 2018 assembly elections in Rajasthan.

Supporters of local politician Hansraj Patel burnt the effigies of UP BJP organization general secretary Sunil Bansal and Union Minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore.

Alt News tried to find the Dainik Bhaskar report, however, it is no longer available online. We did find a cached preview of the 2018 article on Google, but it doesn’t include the viral image (archive link). However, after a keyword search on YouTube, we found that the channel Lokvarta uploaded a news report where the burning of flags has been captured on video.

Thus, Acharya Pramod Krishnam’s claim that Brahmans burnt BJP flags is false. The image is from the 2018 assembly elections in Rajasthan.

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About the Author

ЁЯЩП Blessed to have worked as a fact-checking journalist from November 2019 to February 2023.