Update (04 October 2023): Jyothi Yarraji has won the silver medal in the Women’s 100m hurdles event at the 19th Asian Games held in China.
A video is being circulated on social media claiming that Indian Athlete Jyothi Yarraji from Andhra Pradesh had won a gold medal in the ongoing Asian Games 2023 in Hangzhou. A few other posts explicitly claim that Jyoti Yarraji has become the first Indian woman to win a gold medal in the 100m hurdles category at the Asian Games 2023. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: Indian Athlete Jyothi Yarraji won a gold medal in the 100m hurdles in the ongoing Asian Games 2023.
Fact: The video shared in the post shows the 100m hurdles event held during the Asian Athletic Championship 2023 in July 2023. The women’s 100m hurdles race in which Jyoti Yarraji is scheduled to participate in the ongoing Asian Games 2023 is yet to commence. Her first race at the Asian Games 2023 is scheduled to be held on 30 September 2023. Hence, the claim made in the post is False.
On observing the video carefully, one could see ‘Asian Athletics Championship 2023’ written on a board placed behind the athletes before the start of the race. When we searched for the video using relevant keywords, we found the same video tweeted by Sai Media and other sports foundations in July 2023. The Reliance Foundation Youth Sports published the same video with the description, “Jyothi Yarraji grabs gold in the 100m Hurdles event at the Asian Athletics Championships 2023 with a timing of 13.09s!”
Indian sprinter Jyothi Yarraji won a gold medal in the 100m Hurdles event by completing the race in 13.09 seconds at the Asian Athletics Championships 2023. Additionally, the video shared in the post displays a scoreboard revealing that Jyothi Yarraji had finished the race in 13:09 seconds. Several news sites published articles and videos reporting about Jyothi Yarraji securing a gold medal at the Asian Athletics Championships 2023.
The Asian Games 2023 are being held from 23 September to 08 October 2023 in Hangzhou, China. However, the women’s 100-meter hurdles race has not yet started. The women’s 100m hurdles race in which Jyoti Yarraji is scheduled to participate in the ongoing Asian Games 2023 is scheduled on 30 September 2023. From all these pieces of evidence, it can be concluded that the video shared in the post shows the 100m hurdle race event held during the Asian Athletics Championship 2023, not during the Asian Games 2023.
To sum it up, a video of Jyothi Yarraji winning a gold medal at the Asian Athletic Championship 2023 is shared as the one from the ongoing Asian Games 2023.
