Photo of Indira Gandhi addressing Indian soldiers at Leh shared as Galwan valley - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
June 23, 2020
A photo of former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi addressing soldiers is widely shared on social media claiming that it was taken at Galwan valley. The photo is being shared in the wake of China’s claim over the entire ‘Galwan valley’, the place where clashes broke out between Indian and Chinese forces on ‘15 June 2020’. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Photo of former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi addressing the army jawans at Galwan valley.
Fact: The photo of former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi addressing the Indian soldiers was taken at Leh in 1971, not at Galwan valley. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
When the image is subjected to reverse image search, it was found in an article of a website ‘Art-Sheep’. The article was about Indira Gandhi and had the following description regarding th photo – ‘One of the rare pictures of former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi addressing jawans in Leh in 1971‘.
When searched with the same description on Twitter, it is found that a user had tweeted the same picture in 2017 as that from Leh. Another verified twitter user has tweeted that he had posted the same image in 2012 and stated that it could be from Ladakh. He later posted another tweet that he found the source of the image and provided credits to ‘PTI Photo/ Courtesy DPR Defence’
Got the source-
RETRANSMISSION-B-204, DEL –  301086 – OCTOBER 30, 2009 – New Delhi: One of the rare pictures of former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi addressing jawans in Leh in 1971, as the nation prepares to observe her 25th death anniversary. PTI Photo/ Courtesy DPR Defence
With the above information, when searched on the ‘PTI’ news website, the photo was found in its archives. The photo had the same description that it was taken at Leh when Indira Gandhi had addressed the Indian jawans. ‘Leh’ is the capital city of Union Territory ‘Ladakh’ and it is far away from the ‘Galwan valley’.
To sum it up, the photo of former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi addressing the Indian soldiers was taken at Leh is shared as that from Galwan valley.
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