Fact Check: Morphed photo shows group of people holding 'No road on Indo-China border' placard
A group of people holding a placard that reads “No road on Indo-China border” is being shared on social media with the claim that an NGO called Citizens for Green Doon has filed a petition in the Supreme Court opposing the construction of a road along the Indo-China border.
By Newsmeter Network Published on 14 Nov 2021 10:54 AM GMT
Hyderabad: A group of people holding a placard that reads "No road on Indo-China border" is being shared on social media with the claim that an NGO called Citizens for Green Doon has filed a petition in the Supreme Court opposing the construction of a road along the Indo-China border.
A Twitter user, @MeghBulletin, shared the photo and wrote, "An alleged NGO "Citizens For Green Doon" through lawyers Coulin Gonzales & Md Aftab have filed a petition in the SC urging it to stop the construction of roads on the Indo-China border in Uttarakhand citing the environment. Says "Indian Forces can use air route in war"."
This comes after the Supreme Court considered two separate applications moved by the ministry of Defence (MoD) and the ministry of road transport and highways (MoRTH) to increase the width of three key hill roads in Uttarakhand to a double-lane carriageway with a width of 7 metres each (or 7.5 metre where there is a raised kerb). The width of these roads cannot be more than 5.5 metres as per a September 2020 order passed by the Supreme Court. The Centre's application was opposed by the NGO citing environmental concerns.
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Fact Check:
The claim is false.
NewsMeter performed a reverse image search and found the NGO's Facebook page that had posted the original photo as its cover image in April 2021.
Ira Chauhan, a member of Citizens for Green Doon and one of the admins of the Facebook group, took to Facebook to refute the claim. She shared the viral image and wrote, "Spreading hatred and lies is child's play these days with photoshopped pictures and catchy tweets. A false and malicious campaign is underway against CFGD with morphed picture and concocted lies..."
She further said that the NGO is not against the construction of border roads nor is it anti-national. "The tweet wrongly attributes a statement to our counsel Colin Gonsalves. It further tries to give our case a communal colour by making up a fictitious counsel Mohd Aftab. CFGD has no counsel by that name nor do we know any person by that name," she continued.
Moreover, according to reports on the petition filed by CFGD, the NGO has not opposed the construction of the road but is against the road widening citing environmental concerns.
We compared the viral image with the original image and found that viral image has been morphed and the words on the placard edited.
On the left is the viral photo and on the right is the original photo.
Hence, the claim is false.
