No, this is not a photo of an Indian ruling party candidate dressed like the monkey god Hanuman
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on May 6, 2019 at 10:45
- 4 min read
- By AFP India
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Multiple Facebook posts, for example this one published on April 26, have shared a photo which shows a man dressed like Hanuman sitting on the bonnet of a car.
The misleading post’s caption says: “This guy is BJP’s Lok Sabha candidate from Ranaghat, WB.”
The Lok Sabha is India’s parliament. Ranaghat is a constituency in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal. The BJP's candidate for Ranaghat is Jagannath Sarkar.
Below is a screenshot of the misleading post:
India’s six-week general elections began April 11. Here is a recent AFP story about the ongoing polls.
The same photos and similar claims have been shared elsewhere on Facebook, for example here and here, and on Twitter here.
The tweet says: “Believe it or not, this cartoon sitting on bonnet of jeep is Jagannath Sarkar, BJP MP candidate from Ranaghat. Its easy to laugh but thats not the point. This shows 1. How much alien BJP is to Bengalis incl Hindu Bengalis, 2. Bengali-born BJP ppl are Dhimmis of Hindi imperialism.”
Below is a screenshot of the misleading tweet:
The image in the misleading posts does show a campaign event for BJP candidate for Ranaghat Jagannath Sarkar.
But Sarkar is not the man seen dressed as Hanuman in the photo in the misleading posts.
A Google reverse image search found that the photo was first posted here on Facebook by the BJP’s West Bengal unit chief Dilip Ghosh on April 22 during a campaign event for Sarkar in the constituency of Ranaghat.
The caption alongside the pictures in the Bengali-language post translates to English as: “Road show with Jagannath Sarkar, candidate for Ranaghat seat. (Badkulla, Khamar, Simi, Chitroshali Bajar, Fulbari.) Common people are visibly enthusiastic for the BJP.”
The original images can be seen in the Facebook post embedded below:
Sarkar is listed as the BJP candidate for Ranaghat constituency here on one of the party’s official websites.
Below is a screenshot of the website that shows his photo on the left next to the picture of Prime Minister Narendra Modi:
BJP’s West Bengal unit chief Dilip Ghosh posted another picture of the campaign event with Jagannath Sarkar here on Facebook on 22 April, 2019.
Below is a screenshot of the post, AFP has circled Jagannath Sarkar's face in red:
Jagannath Sarkar can also be seen in this photo of the same campaign event posted here on his official Twitter account on April 22, 2019.
The image shows him dressed in saffron and standing on left side of the frame.
His face is circled in red in the screenshot of the post below:
The Tweet's caption reads: “State President Sri @DilipGhoshiBJP joined our rally from Badkulla to Bagula. Candidate for Assembly by-election of Krishnagunj also attended our campaign.”
This composite image below shows candidate Sarkar from the BJP website (L), Sarkar during the parade (C) and the man dressed as the monkey god from the same parade (R):
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