Published 16:44 IST, December 15th 2020

Fact Check: Did 250 million people gather for a strike in India over the Farm Laws?

A Twitter handle on December 3 claimed that 250 million people had come on to the streets organizing a massive strike against the backdrop of the Farm Laws.

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Origin

A Twitter handle @zachjcarter on December 3 claimed that 250 million people had come on to the streets of India organizing a massive strike against the backdrop of the protests over the Farm Laws. The handle shared 4 images in his tweet which showed a mass movement with thousands gathered on the streets organizing a strike. His post became particularly misleading since the country is witnessing farmers' agitation over the last 20 days, with many joining the two together to believe that large numbers had taken to the streets against the 3 agrarian laws in the country.

Here's the truth

None of the images shared by the misleading handle belong to the Farmers protest. Twitter, which now takes extra caution over fake information has also labeled the post as 'Manipulated Media.'

So where are the images from?

1. The first image is from Ahmedabad dated January 13, 2020. Published by Portside and credited to photographer Ajit Solanki from Associated Press (AP), the photo belongs to the nationwide bandh called by the Communist Party of India (CPI-M) in January. Here, various members of the trade unions can be seen gathered during the general strike.

2. The second image shows a score of people gathered on an unidentified road to block traffic. Tracing back the origin of the image, Republic learned that this image was from a farmers' march organized in Maharashtra in 2018. The march had been organized by the farmers in Mumbai demanding a complete loan waiver and transfer of Adivasi land to farmers. Notably, the image was also shared by Communist Party Of India (Marxist)’s General-Secretary Sitaram Yechury on Twitter in 2018.

3. The third and fourth images belong to the nationwide shutdown called by CPI(M) members in January 2020. The first is from a railway track in Punjab's Amritsar where hundreds of trade union workers can be seen gathered at the station as a part of their 'Rail Roko Andolan.' The second is the trade union's protest at Amritsar's Bhandari bridge. Both date January 8, 2020, and have nothing to do with the farmers' protest of November- December.