The actual photo on which the meme is based features just Adityanath and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, and dates back to March this year, when the CM had received the Art of Living founder in Gorakhpur. Mevani later apologised for the post.
New Delhi: A photoshopped image of Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath and columnist Shefali Vaidya went viral on Twitter this week after it was posted by Dalit rights activist Jignesh Mevani, an MLA from Gujarat.
The photo with the trio seeks to draw a parallel with an image from 2012 Hindi film Oh My God, which centres on the abuse of faith by cons masquerading as religious leaders.
By Wednesday morning, Mevani’s post, which credits the Facebook page ‘Indian Atheists’ as the source of the image, had received 900+ retweets and over 3,200 likes. ‘Indian Atheists’ has a following of 2.4 lakh, and got nearly 6,500 likes and over 2,800 shares for the post.
Jignesh tweeted:
https://twitter.com/jigneshmevani80/status/1001507199993036800
Translation: “I really wanted to say Oh My God! Quite filmy. Did art predict real life? Just like the film, these three are big actors… dramebaaz.”
Fake Picture analysis
The actual photo on which the meme is based features just Adityanath and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, and dates back to March this year, when the CM had received the Art of Living founder in Gorakhpur during his three-day Uttar Pradesh tour.
Vaidya, who is known for her right-of-centre views and has over two lakh Twitter followers, was superimposed on the image, evidently to bolster the Bollywood comparison.
When ThePrint contacted Mevani, he replied that the tweet had been posted by his team who handles his Twitter account. He subsequently posted an apology on Twitter, “I am told that this is a photoshoped (sic) image. Apologies for posting it without verification. Deleting my previous tweet now and will be careful in future.”
I am told that this is a photoshoped image. Apologies for posting it without verification. Deleting my previous tweet now and will be careful in future.We all should be careful abt this and whenever we get to know that it's fabricated we should delete ithttps://t.co/Iw5FnxINe5
— Jignesh Mevani (@jigneshmevani80) May 30, 2018
“We all should be careful abt (sic) this and whenever we get to know that it’s fabricated we should delete it,” he added.
The article is in collaboration with SM HoaxSlayer