This image depicting crowd watching Babar Azam live at the Lal Chowk is digitally morphed - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
September 1, 2023
An image circulating on social media platforms alleges to depict the public gathered to watch Pakistan cricketer Babar Azam on a large screen in Lal Chowk, Kashmir. Through this article let’s fact-check the claim made in the post.
Claim: Image depicting crowd in Lal Chowk, Kashmir watching Pakistan cricketer Babar Azam live
Fact: This is a digitally morphed image, whereas the original image depicts crowd watching the Chandrayaan-3 landing at the Lal Chowk in Srinagar of Jammu & Kashmir. Further, there are no reports related to live streaming of Pakistan cricket match at the Lal Chowk. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
The viral image depicting people watching Babar Azam is being circulated against the backdrop of the ongoing Asia Cup 2023. However, there are no reports of live streaming of Pakistan cricket matches at the Lal Chowk.
Our research revealed that this is a digitally morphed image, whereas the original image depicts people watching live streaming of the Chandrayaan-3 landing on the lunar surface of the moon. A reverse image search of the viral photo led us to a tweet by the Srinagar police, which shared the original image, wherein people watching the Chandrayaan-3 landing.
People at Lal chowk Srinagar today witnessed Live coverage of Chandrayaan-3 Landing on big screen at 'lal chowk square'. @isro #Chandrayaan3 pic.twitter.com/4nWRmJ4ZrI
Srinagar Police shared the image with an accompanying caption that reads “People at Lal Chowk Srinagar today witnessed Live coverage of Chandrayaan-3 Landing on a big screen at Lal Chowk square.”
Multiple news agencies have reported the live streaming of the Chandrayaan-3 landing at the Lal Chowk (here & here). Local news reports that reported the live streaming of the landing can be viewed here. Thus, all these establish that the viral image is digitally morphed to show people watching Babar Azam.
#WATCH | J&K: Giant screen put up at Srinagar's Lal Chowk, telecasting Chandrayaan-3 landing event pic.twitter.com/EwkLU7chlZ
To sum it up, the image depicting crowd watching the live streaming of Chandrayaan-3 at Lal Chowk is digitally altered to make it appear as though the crowd is watching Babar Azam.