Authors
A self-taught social media maverick, Saurabh realised the power of social media early on and began following and analysing false narratives and ‘fake news’ even before he entered the field of fact-checking professionally. He is fascinated with the visual medium, technology and politics, and at Newschecker, where he leads social media strategy, he is a jack of all trades. With a burning desire to uncover the truth behind events that capture people's minds and make sense of the facts in the noisy world of social media, he fact checks misinformation in Hindi and English at Newschecker.
Claim
A man was urinating on the wall built to hide the slums before US President Donald Trump’s visit.
Verification
Since US President Donald Trump is visiting India on 24-25 February, his visit has created a buzz on social media. Writer and Director Avinash Das, Aam Aadmi Party social media Incharge Aishwary Verma, Writer Santosh Addagulla and many others have shared a photo in which a man can be seen urinating on a wall that consists the paintings of US President Donald Trump and Indian PM Narendra Modi.
ट्रंप की नज़रों से बचाने के लिए स्लम्स के इस पार जो दीवार बनायी गयी है और उस दीवार पर जो रंग-रोगन किया गया है और उस दीवार के पास जो आदमी खड़ा है, वो है सच्चा भारतीय।#Trump #IndiaVisit pic.twitter.com/0BVngE1BYH
— Avinash Das (@avinashonly) February 19, 2020
Caption please #TrumpVisitIndia pic.twitter.com/NHJ4uyvuca
— Aishwary Verma (@AishwaryVerma9) February 20, 2020
Can’t believe my eyes pic.twitter.com/C3QooxO2mD
— Santosh Addagulla (@santoshspeed) February 19, 2020
As we reverse searched the viral picture, we found that the man urinating on the wall is missing in the actual picture. The same image is posted by many websites.
India builds wall along slum ahead of Trump visit
A senior government official said the wall was built ‘for security reasons’
India hastily builds wall along slum ahead of Trump visit
Published: Tuesday, February 18, 2020 @ 8:09 AM Updated: Tuesday, February 18, 2020 @ 8:08 AM – A half-kilometer (1,640-foot) brick wall has been hastily erected in India’s Gujarat state ahead of a visit by U.S. President Donald Trump, with critics saying it was built to block the view of a slum area inhabited by more than 2,000 people.
India hastily builds wall along slum ahead of Trump visit
AHMEDABAD, India – (AP) – A half-kilometer (1,640-foot) brick wall has been hastily erected in India’s Gujarat state ahead of a visit by U.S. President Donald Trump, with critics saying it was built to block the view of a slum area inhabited by more than 2,000 people.
The difference between the two images:
The key differences between the two images are:
- The urinating man is missing in the original image.
- There is no shadow of urinating man in the edited image while the shadow of the tree is clearly visible.
- The edited image is zoomed and cropped hence the quality of the edited image has deteriorated (Generally, edited images are of low quality).
Now since it is proved in our investigation that the image shared by social media users is ‘Photoshopped’, we began our investigation to know more about the urinating man. At first, we reverse searched the cropped picture of the urinating man but we didn’t find any authentic information.
We searched Google with several combinations of keywords and we found that the picture is existing on the internet from a long time. We searched Google with the keyword ‘man urinating on a wall in India’, we found that the same image was shared by a satirical website namely ‘Faking News’ in January 2017.
As it is clear from their name, the website ‘Faking News’ is a satirical website and the content shared by them is for entertainment purposes only. However, it was evident from the date on which the Faking News article was published that the picture of urinating man is not related to Trump’s India visit in anyway.
Good citizen urinating only on walls that already smell of piss
Urinating on public walls is an integral part of Indian culture. While people generally use any wall they see for urination, 26 yrs old Azad Singh makes sure that he urinates only on walls that are already smelling of piss.
Since the picture of urinating man on the wall in the edited picture is of low quality, the same picture is available in high quality in Faking News’ article. As we reverse searched it, we found that the same picture is used by multiple publishers between 2012 and present.
Amid multiple reports, we found a YouTube video uploaded by a channel namely ‘newsofdelhi’. The video was uploaded on 13 January 2012 with the title ‘Delhi Metro Walls have become the famous Peeing destination for Delhiites’.
Now we matched the screengrab from the above video and the picture of the urinating man from the claim and we found that the same man is present in both the images.
Similarities between the two images:
- The cap is the same in both the images.
- The color of the sweater is the same in both the images.
- The color and positioning of the bag are the same in both the images.
- The color of the pant is the same in both the images.
It is evident from our investigation that the claim shared by Avinash Das, Aishwary Verma, Santosh Addagulla and others is ‘Misleading’ as image shared by them is ‘Photoshopped.’
Sources
- Google Search
- Reverse Image Search
Result: Misleading
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Authors
A self-taught social media maverick, Saurabh realised the power of social media early on and began following and analysing false narratives and ‘fake news’ even before he entered the field of fact-checking professionally. He is fascinated with the visual medium, technology and politics, and at Newschecker, where he leads social media strategy, he is a jack of all trades. With a burning desire to uncover the truth behind events that capture people's minds and make sense of the facts in the noisy world of social media, he fact checks misinformation in Hindi and English at Newschecker.
