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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Politics & government fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about politics & government. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

12,754 published reviews in this topic

Fact CrescendoPolitics & government

Claim: K Anbazhagan is the father for MK Stalin

Publisher’s rating: Fact Crescendo Rating: False

Fact Crescendo investigated a social-media post claiming that Dayalu Ammal had said Anbazhagan was M.K. Stalin’s father. The post included what appeared to be a News7 Tamil news card bearing the line “Anbazhagan is Stalin’s father” and attributed it to Dayalu Ammal. The review says the Facebook post did not identify when she had supposedly given an interview. The investigation therefore focused on whether the card was authentic and whether the claim had actually been reported by the broadcaster. The review gives two specific reasons to doubt the card. It says News7 Tamil’s usual cards included a date and time, but these were absent from the circulated image; it also compared the image’s design with cards the channel used around 2017 and noted a difference in the Tamil fonts. These were checks of the graphic’s appearance, rather than evidence that Dayalu Ammal made the statement. For a direct verification, the review says Fact Crescendo contacted News7 Tamil, which confirmed the card was fake and said the channel had not published it. The article also reports that Dayalu Ammal was receiving treatment at home for Alzheimer’s and other age-related illnesses. On the evidence described, the review concluded that the attributed statement was unsupported and that the purported News7 card was fabricated; its finding was about the authenticity of the circulated post, not an independent examination of family records.

FACTLYPolitics & government

After the Ayodhya verdict, American President Donald Trump has fired Desi Katta on the top of the White House and chanted Jai Sri Ram.

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns an image presented as an Aaj Tak “Breaking News” report that Donald Trump fired a “Desi Katta” on top of the White House and chanted “Jai Sri Ram” after the Ayodhya verdict. FACTLY examined the image and the reported event, concluding that the Aaj Tak template in the post was photoshopped and that it found no credible confirmation of the alleged celebration. The review states, “The ‘Breaking News’ template of the ‘Aaj Tak’ news channel in the post is a photoshopped one” and that “information from no credible source was found” confirming the incident. The review describes comparing the post’s image with Aaj Tak video coverage from the time of the verdict. It found a video with similar anchor and studio visuals, but says that video did not report Trump firing a weapon at the White House. FACTLY also reports searching the Twitter accounts of the White House, President Trump and Donald J. Trump, and searching for news reports of the alleged event; it found no such information or reports. Its conclusion is that the image was altered and that Trump did not carry out the act described in the claim.

Fact CrescendoPolitics & government

Claim: Home ministry released new political map of India

Publisher’s rating: Fact Crescendo Rating: Partly False

The review examined a Facebook image described as a new map of India released by the Union Home Ministry. It distinguished two things that the post appeared to conflate: whether the government had released a new political map, and whether the circulating image accurately represented that map. The review says the government announced on August 5, 2019, that Jammu and Kashmir would become two union territories, Ladakh and Jammu and Kashmir. It then reports that the Home Ministry released a new map on November 2, 2019, and that Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Jitendra Singh shared it on his official Twitter account. The review compared the map in the Facebook post with the government’s new map. It found that the official map showed a relatively larger boundary area for Ladakh and a narrower one for Jammu and Kashmir, while the Facebook image showed the reverse. Thus, the claim that the Home Ministry released a new political map was supported, but the specific image circulating as that map did not accurately depict the boundaries shown in the official version. The review’s conclusion rests on that comparison; it does not say that no new map was released.