Authors
Vasudha noticed the growing problem of mis/disinformation online after studying New Media at ACJ in Chennai and became interested in separating facts from fiction. She is interested in learning how global issues affect individuals on a micro level. Before joining Newschecker’s English team, she was working with Latestly.
A screenshot of a 2019 tweet allegedly by Congress Leader Priyanka Gandhi, where she is reminiscing her favourite story about her great-grandfather Pt Jawaharlal Nehru, is going viral on social media platforms. The tweet features an image of Jawaharlal Nehru with the caption, “My favourite story about my great-grandfather is the one about when as PM, he returned from work at 3 am to find his bodyguard exhausted and asleep on his bed. He covered him with a blanket and went to his room to sleep with his wife…” Several social media users who shared the image of the tweet, purportedly by Gandhi, mocked Nehru wondering whose wife Priyanka was referring to, considering Kamala Nehru died in 1936.
Author Bhaavna Arora was among several social media users who shared the screenshot of a Tweet allegedly by Priyanka Gandhi. Her post captioned “Oh no 🤭” has been tweeted over 1,000 times, quoted around 186 times and liked over 4,800 times, since it was posted on August 16. Though Arora later deleted her tweet, an archived version of the same can be found here.
The image is going viral on Facebook as well.
Links to such posts can be found here, here and here.
Newschecker also received the same claim on our WhatsApp tipline (+91- 9999499044) requesting to be fact checked
Also Read: Jawaharlal Nehru Publically Slapped By Swami Vidyanand Videh In 1962? Viral Claim Is False
Fact Check/Verification
On analysing the alleged screenshot of Gandhi’s post, we first noticed that the display picture of Priyanka Gandhi is different from the current one. Her current display picture features India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru holding the national flag. Notably, several Congress leaders including Priyanka Gandhi, had put Nehru’s image as their social media display picture earlier in August to mark the 75th year of India’s independence. We could thus conclude that the alleged screenshot is not from a recent Tweet by Priyanka.
Additionally, the lower part of the image- option for “like”, “comment” and “share” and the laughing emoticon- resembles a Facebook post instead of a tweet.
Taking a clue, we conducted a keyword search on Facebook by using some excerpts from the caption of Gandhi’s alleged tweet, including “My favourite story about my great-grandfather,” “Priyanka Gandhi Vadra great-grandfather” & “ as PM 3 am bodyguard. This led us to several posts from November 2020 carrying a similar screenshot of Priyanka Gandhi’s alleged tweet. Notably, the screenshot of the tweet, that was widely shared in 2020, carried a date stamp of November 14, 2019, as opposed to the image that is viral now. Such posts can be found here, here and here.
Newschecker further scanned through Priyanka Gandhi’s Twitter profile and found the tweet dated November 14, 2019, in which she shared her ‘favourite story’ regarding Nehru.
On comparing the content of the 2019 tweet with the viral image, we concluded that except for the concluding part of the caption, all other elements were the same. The last line in Priyanka Gandhi’s 2019 tweet said “He covered him with a blanket and slept on an adjacent chair,” while that in the viral image read, “He covered him with a blanket and went to his room to sleep with his wife…”
Newschecker also dug up an archived version of the same tweet, which carried the same display picture of Gandhi as seen in the viral image. Notably, the discrepancy over timing of the tweet in the archived version can be attributed to different time zones.
We did not find any tweet on Gandhi’s timeline which carried the same caption as seen in the viral image.
Furthermore, a keyword search for “Priyanka Gandhi Favourite Story Nehru” led us to several reports from November 2019. Carrying the same tweet, the reports elaborated on how Gandhi had paid her tributes to her great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru on his 130th birth anniversary. Such reports can be found here, here and here.
We could thus conclude that the caption of Priyanka Gandhi’s tweet had been digitally altered. The words “slept on an adjacent chair” were replaced by “ went to his room to sleep with his wife…”
How Can One Edit Tweet?
Editing screenshots of tweets with Photoshop apps is a common way to spread misinformation, but the edit is usually evident on close inspection due to differences in font/background colour/spacing errors.
A more convincing way to alter the tweet’s caption is by using the ‘code inspect’, which lends it more authenticity and gives the edited tweet a more authentic look.
Newschecker used the same method to edit Gandhi’s Tweet as can be seen below.
It is thus understood that the tweet was edited by someone, who then took a screenshot of the same and circulated it over the web.
Notably, such an edit is temporary and is only visible to the user who has made the edit and is not visible to other users. The edits are restored back to the original once the page is refreshed.
Conclusion
Viral screenshot claiming to show a tweet by Priyanka Gandhi recalling her favourite story about her great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru has been digitally edited.
Result: Altered Photo
Sources
Tweet By Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Dated November 14, 2019
Self Analysis
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Authors
Vasudha noticed the growing problem of mis/disinformation online after studying New Media at ACJ in Chennai and became interested in separating facts from fiction. She is interested in learning how global issues affect individuals on a micro level. Before joining Newschecker’s English team, she was working with Latestly.
