Old and unrelated video and photos falsely shared as ‘Ooty-Coimbatore roads have been claimed by its original owners’

A photo and a video are being shared widely on social media with a claim that ‘Ooty-Coimbatore roads have been claimed by its original owners’. Let’s analyze the claim made in the post.

The archived version of the post can be found here

Claim: Visuals of Ooty-Coimbatore roads claimed by its original owners – Peacocks and Wild Boars.
Fact: The photo of peacocks is an old one and was taken at Chhatbir Zoo (Chandigarh). Also, the video of wild boars was found to be on the internet much before the lockdown was imposed in India. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.

Peacock Photo:

When searched on the internet, it was found that the same photo was posted by a Facebook user in June 2019. Also, a similar but different photo was found on Twitter with the description – ‘Peacocks block a road in Chandigarh, India. Photo by Vama Dalal’. When FACTLY contacted the photographer, she said that the picture was taken at Chattbir Zoo (Chandigarh). Also, the same location with similar visuals can be seen in a YouTube video showing ‘safari’ in the Chattbir Zoo. So, the photo is old, and it was not taken on the Ooty-Coimbatore roads.

Wild Boar video:

When the screenshots of the video were run through the Google Reverse Image Search, the same video was found uploaded on YouTube on 10 February 2020 i.e. much before the lockdown was imposed in India. Also, a Spanish website has written an article on the same video in February 2020. The website claims that the video was taken on a road in Spain but FACTLY could not independently ascertain the location of the video with the available information. So, the video is old and was taken much before the lockdown in India.

Previously, a photo of a herd of deer sitting in the middle of a road was also shared as ‘Ooty-Coimbatore road is now reclaimed by its original owners’. Factly found that the image is at least 6 years old and is from Japan.