‘Donate Coal’: Altered Ad Amid Shortage Shared Mocking Delhi Govt

The original newspaper advertisement on 9 July in Hindustan featured a COVID-19 scheme ad by the Delhi government.

The claim states that this ad was issued by the Delhi government following coal shortage.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

A screenshot of Hindi daily Hindustan carrying an advertisement appealing Delhi residents to donate coal to the Delhi government, and featuring Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, is being shared by social media users.

The image is doing the rounds in the backdrop of Kejriwal warning of a power blackout due to shortage of coal supply in the national capital.

However, we found that the advertisement is altered and the original ad on 9 July was about the (Delhi) 'Chief Minister COVID-19 Family Financial Assistance Scheme' in the Hindustan newspaper.

CLAIM

The photo is being shared with the claim, originally in Hindi, that reads, "बिजली की कमी दूर करने के लिए दिल्ली वासी अपने घरों का कोयला दान करें!!"

(Translation: To mitigate the problem of power outage, Delhi residents donate coal to the government from your homes.)

An archive of the tweet can be found here. 

(Source: Twitter/Screenshot)

The photo is being shared by several social media users and the archived links can be seen here, here and here.

The photo has also been shared by Renuka Jain, who has often been called out for spreading misinformation.

An archive can be seen here.

WHAT WE FOUND

After looking at the image closely, we noticed the word 'satire' written at the bottom-right corner.

One can see 'satire' written in the image.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

Next, we zoomed into the image and found the date of the newspaper written as 'Friday, 9 July 2021' and noticed that it was from the Bihar edition.

The date reads 9 July 2021.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

We then looked at the e-paper of 'Live Hindustan', Bihar edition of 9 July, and found the newspaper advertisement that looks similar to the viral post.

Clearly, the text has been altered.

Altered image (L), the 9 July advertisement in Hindustan, Bihar edition e-paper screenshot (R).

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

The 9 July advertisement was about the 'Chief Minister COVID-19 Family Financial Assistance Scheme' under which the Delhi government will pay an ex-gratia payment of Rs 50,000 for each death to the family of the deceased due to coronavirus, and Rs 2,500 monthly to those families who have lost bread earners.

Clearly, an altered photo of an advertisement by the Aam Aadmi Party government is being shared by social media users.

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