Fact Check: Chandrababu Naidu did not touch Amit Shah’s feet concerning alliance with BJP
The Assembly elections are set to be held before May 2024 to elect 175 members of the state assembly in Andhra Pradesh. The political scenario has heated up in the state with the parties declaring the candidates and trying to form alliances.
Claim :
Viral image shows Telugu Desam Party chief Chandrababu Naidu touching Amit Shah’s feetFact :
The image is morphed and has been created by using two different images. This is not true.
The Assembly elections are set to be held before May 2024 to elect 175 members of the state assembly in Andhra Pradesh. The political scenario has heated up in the state with the parties declaring the candidates and trying to form alliances. Telugu Desam party Chief is in Delhi holding talks with Bharatiya Janata party leaders Amit Shah and others, Janasena party chief Pawan Kalyan to form alliances.
Amidst all this, an image showing TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu touching the feet of Amit Shah is going viral on several platforms of social media. The image, along with the Telugu text which looks like a news short published by way 2 news, is in circulation with the claim that Chandrababu Naidu who went to Delhi to form an alliance with the BJP touched the feet of Amit Shah.
The text on the image is “అమిత్ షా కాళ్లు మొక్కిన చంద్రబాబు! బీజేపీతో పొత్తుపై చర్చించేందుకు ఢిల్లీకి వెళ్లిన చంద్రబాబు.. అమిత్ షా కాళ్లు మొక్కడం చర్చనీయాంశంగా మారింది. ఇందుకు సంబంధించిన ఫొటో సోషల్ మీడియాలో వైరల్గా మారింది. ఇదిలా ఉండగా.. బీజేపీకి 4 ఎంపీ స్థానాలు, 22 అసెంబ్లీ స్థానాలు ఇచ్చేందుకు చంద్రబాబు అంగీకరించినట్లు సమాచారం. ఎంపీ అభ్యర్థులుగా విశాఖ నుంచి పురందేశ్వరి, రాజమండ్రి నుంచి బాలయ్య చిన్నల్లుడు భరత్, నరసాపురం నుంచి రఘురామకృష్ణ, విజయవాడ నుంచి సుజనా చౌదరి పోటీ చేసే అవకాశాలు ఉన్నాయి. మరి కాసేపట్లో దీనిపై క్లారిటీ రానుంది.”
The text when translated claims, “Chandrababu touched Amit Shah’s feet! Chandrababu went to Delhi to discuss his party’s alliance with the BJP, and touched Amit Shah’s feet. The photo related to this has gone viral on social media. Meanwhile, it is reported that Chandrababu has agreed to give 4 MP seats and 22 assembly seats to BJP. Purandeswari from Visakha, Balakrishna’s younger son-in-law Bharat from Rajahmundry, Raghuram Krishna from Narasapuram, and Sujana Chaudhary from Vijayawada are likely to contest as MP candidates. There will be more clarity on this soon.”
Social media users are sharing this image with various captions in Telugu.
Fact Check:
The claim is False. The viral image is morphed.
When searched the social media handles of way2news, the hyper short news app whose logo can be seen on the viral image, we found a tweet by them stating that the image is not their news story. The caption states “This is not a #Way2News story. Some miscreants are spreading misinformation in #SocialMedia, using our logo, and the 'attached post' has gone viral. We confirm that this has not been published by @way2news”
On performing a Google reverse image search of the image, we found that the image of Chandrababu Naidu bending was taken from a YouTube thumbnail which was used to show him performing Yoga asanas. This video was published on June 21, 2018. The video shows the visuals of Chandrababu Naidu performing asanas on Yoga Day in 2018 when he was the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh.
Though the same pose cannot be seen in the video, the thumbnail of the video has the same image. Here is the comparison.
Though Chandrababu Naidu indeed met Amit Shah, the results of the meeting are yet to be announced. There is no truth in the viral image and it is a morphed one.
