A photo of a Hotstar advertisement billboard featuring BJP MP and actor Ravi Kishan is being shared on social media claiming that the BJP leader has acknowledged the power cuts in his state for earning money through the advertisement. A few social media users have shared this photo explicitly mentioning it as a hoarding placed in Uttar Pradesh. They can be seen here and here. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: BJP MP Ravi Kishan featured Hotstar advertisement billboard in Uttar Pradesh.
Fact: The Hotstar advertisement hoarding picture shared in the post was taken in 2019 and was placed near Holkar college in Indore, Madhya Pradesh. This photo was taken before Ravi Kishan was officially declared as the Member of Parliament from Gorakhpur in the 2019 General Elections. The billboard has nothing to do with Uttar Pradesh. Hence, the claim made in the post is MISLEADING.
When we searched for this photo using relevant keywords, we found that several social media users have posted the same photo on their Facebook pages in May 2019. A few of those posts can be seen here and here. A user posted this picture on 13 May 2019 and described it as a hoarding placed at Ramachandra Nagar in Indore, Madhya Pradesh.
BJP candidate Ravi Kishan was officially declared as the Member of Parliament of Gorakhpur after the announcement of the 2019 General Election results on 23 May 2019. So, it can be confirmed that this Hotstar advertisement hoarding was displayed before Ravi Kishan was declared the Member of Parliament from Gorakhpur.
The ‘Bhopal Samachar’ news website published the same photo in their article published on 14 May 2019. Sharing the photo, this article reported that in Indore, even companies are taking advantage of frequent power cuts for their business. According to the article, the hoarding was located near Holkar college in Indore.
To sum it up, this Hotstar billboard referring to power cuts was placed in Madhya Pradesh before Ravi Kishan became the MP from Gorakhpur, and has nothing to do with Uttar Pradesh.
