“News of 7 Pakistani Army soldiers being killed by Baloch freedom fighters of Jaish-al-Adl is trickling in. My Baloch friends say that they will keep attacking Pak Army till they achieve Independence from Pakistan. @OfficialDGISPR kindly confirm news of Pak soldiers KIA“, was the text of a tweet by Major Gaurav Arya, a retired Indian army personnel and host of the show “Patriot” on Republic TV. Along with the text, Arya posted three pictures. Arya has now deleted the tweet, a screenshot of which can be seen below.
The same images with a similar narrative were also tweeted by a verified Twitter user Gaurav Goel who claims to be the state president of BJYM Chandigarh.
बलूचिस्तान मांगे आज़ादी।
7 Pakistani #ARMY soldiers being killed by #Baloch freedom fighters of #Jaish-al-Adl is trickling in.@iamraj_offical #Balochistan @SuPriyoBabul pic.twitter.com/1oqLEWoUAP— Gaurav Goel (@goelgauravbjp) March 28, 2019
Old pictures from 2006 & 2010
1. The picture of the dead bodies laid down on the ground is from 2006. According to a report in Outlook, forty-five Pakistani army recruits undergoing training at a Punjab Regimental Centre training school at Dargai, 100 kms north of Peshawar in the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) of Pakistan, were killed and many others were injured early on the morning of November 8, 2006, when a suspected suicide bomber ran towards them and blew himself up.
2. The picture of the coffins with army personnel around them is from 2010. According to a report in TIME, the picture is of Pakistani paramilitary soldiers saluting the caskets of soldiers who were killed in a suicide car bombing during a funeral at their base camp in Bannu, Pakistan, on Jan. 2, 2010.
3. The picture of the armed militants sitting next to a car is a cropped picture. The full photograph can be seen below.
While Alt News couldn’t find the exact origin of this picture, it has been circulating atleast since October 2018 as can be seen from a Google reverse image search snapshot below.
Moreover, the logo on the top right corner is a symbol of Jaish ul-Adl, a terrorist organisation based in Pakistan.
Earlier this month, Alt News had documented multiple instances of misleading images and videos shared by Arya.
