Congress leaders share old pic from Nigeria as Bharat Jodo Yatra crowd in Karnataka

A picture of a gigantic crowd is viral on social media with the claim that it is a picture from the Bharat Jodo Yatra led by Congress leader and MP Rahul Gandhi. Many Congress leaders and supporters shared this picture, claiming that it was taken in Karnataka where a massive crowd purportedly gathered in support of Rahul Gandhi.

Provincial President, Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee and MLA Virendra Chaudhary shared the picture, claiming that it showed scenes from a public gathering in Bellary as part of the Bharat Jodo Yatra being led by Rahul Gandhi. (Archived link)

Congress national coordinator Ritu Chaodhary tweeted the picture and wrote that Rahul Gandhi was creating history. She claimed that the image was from the Karnataka leg of the Bharat Jodi Yatra. However, she later deleted the post. (Archived link)

In a now deleted tweet, Madhya Pradesh Congress president Jitendra Patwari also shared the image and wrote that it showed the massive crowd of supporters who gathered for the Bharat Jodo Yatra. (Archived link)

Congress leader BM Sandeep also tweeted this picture with the same claim. (Archived link)

The viral photo was amplified on social media platforms with the same claim.

Fact-check

Alt News performed a reverse image search using TinEye and found another version of the viral image on the results page, a part of which was being cropped and circulated as Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra gathering. This picture was uploaded on a website called Christ For All Nation (CFAN).

When we clicked on this link, we noticed that it was broken. When we looked up the archived version of the link, we found that the image was featured in CFAN’s official press kit. It was archived on May 16, 2007. However, since it was not properly archived, the picture does not appear in the 2007 archive, but is accessible on the one dated August 2, 2009. To verify both the images, we matched the source codes of the images in both the archives and found that they were the same. In other words, this picture is at least 15-year old. This photo in the press kit is from Christian evangelist Reinhard Bonhke’s missionary visit to Ogbomosho, Nigeria.

Next, a keyword search led us to an image posted on the official Facebook page of Christian evangelist Reinhard Bonnke. It was clicked from a different angle than the viral picture. This picture in the post has been listed as the 2002 Crusade in Ogbomosho, Nigeria.

Alt News cannot confirm when this picture was clicked. However, it is clear that the photo is at least 15-year old since it has been on the internet since the year 2007. We contacted CFAN to gather more information about this image. This article will be updated once Alt News receives a response from them.

To sum it up, several Congress leaders shared an old picture of Christian evangelist Reinhard Bonnke’s religious gathering, falsely claiming that it was from the Bharat Jodo Yatra in Karnataka.