Fact Check: Did TOI lose followers after Virat Kohli called them out for fake news?
The claim alleging that TOI’s Instagram followers fell after Kohli’s post is false.
By Md Mahfooz Alam Published on 18 Aug 2023 12:25 PM GMT
Screeengrab of the X post.
Hyderabad: Several social media users have claimed that national news organisation The Times of India lost followers after Indian cricketer Virat Kohli called out the newspaper for publishing fake news about him.
The post features two purported screengrabs of The Times of India’s Instagram account, which shows 2.8 million and 5.6 million followers.
X users posted the screengrabs with the caption, “Times of India lost 2.8 million followers after Virat Kohli posted insta story related to fake news about him. His impact is unreal man. (sic)”
(Image Credit: X/@bholination)
The claim comes after Virat Kohli, on August 15, 2023, posted an Instagram story of TOI’s article, which claimed Virat Kohli and his wife Anushka Sharma will build a cricket pitch at their newly bought Alibaug farmhouse.
Kohli wrote in the Instagram story, “Bachpan se jo akhbaar Padha hai, wo bhi fake news chaapne lage ab. (The newspaper that we have been reading since childhood has started publishing fake news these days)”
Fact Check
NewsMeter found that the claim alleging that TOI’s Instagram followers fell after Kohli’s post is false. Also, the screenshot showing 5.6 million TOI's followers is also fake.
We checked the social media analytics website, Social Blade, and found that the follower count of TOI has not dropped since Kohli called out the national daily for spreading fake news. On the contrary, analytics suggest that there has been an increase of an average of 669 followers every day. The TOI account has gained 794, 645, 1374 and 314 followers on August 15, 16, 17 and 18, respectively, at the time of writing this article.
Here is a screenshot of the analytics as seen on Social Blade.
(Image Credit: Social Blade)
As claimed, the data does not show a drop of 2.8 million followers. At the time of writing this article, TOI actually has 2.8 million followers as per its official Instagram page and not 5.6 million followers as shown in the screenshot of the viral tweet.
(Image Credit: TOI)
Hence, we conclude that the viral screengrab showing 5.6 million followers is morphed, and the claim of TOI lost 2.8 million followers on Instagram is false.
