Old Video of Akhilesh Yadav at SP's Rally in UP Linked To MP State Elections

A video from 2021 of a rally for 2022 elections is being falsely linked to the upcoming Madhya Pradesh elections.

Fact-Check: An old video is going viral to falsely claim that Akhilesh Yadav carried out a rally in Madhya Pradesh ahead of the 2023 Assembly elections.

(Source: Altered by The Quint)

A video showing Samajwadi Party (SP) President Akhilesh Yadav waving to a huge crowd at a rally is going viral to claim that it shows SP's recent rally in the poll-bound state of Madhya Pradesh's Niwari district.

Madhya Pradesh will hold assembly state elections on 17 November.

An archive of the post can be seen here.

(Source: X/Screenshot)

(Archives of similar claims can be seen here and here.)

But the video is not recent: The video dates back to 2021 and shows Yadav attending the Samajwadi Vijay Yatra held by SP for the 2022 UP Assembly elections.

How did we find out the truth?: We noticed a hoarding on the right side on the clip which read, "Mission 2022", in Hindi along with several leaders' photos.

The hoarding reads, "Mission 2022", in Hindi.

(Source: Altered by The Quint)

• Taking a cue, we performed reverse image search on some of keyframes of the video and also added a few relevant keywords.

• This led us to a YouTube video shared by TV9 Uttar Pradesh Uttarakhand which was streamed live on 17 November 2021.

• The title stated that it shows SP's Samajwadi Vijay Yatra from Ghazipur to Lucknow.

• We also found a still at 16:18 timestamp that matches the hoarding seen in the viral video.

Comparison between the viral video and the TV9 video.

(Source: Altered by The Quint)

• Another video from Navbharat Times also shared a live stream of this rally where the same hoarding can be spotted by 18:13 timestamp.

• We also found another image shared by Yadav on his official Instagram account on 20 November 2021, showing the same hoarding during the Samajwadi Vijay Yatra.

• In the caption, he stated that this image is from the rally which took place from Ghazipur to Lucknow ahead of the 2022 assembly elections.

The visual is from 2021.

(Source: Altered by The Quint)

Conclusion: A video from 2021 is going viral to falsely claim that Samajwadi Party's President Akhilesh Yadav carried out a rally in Madhya Pradesh ahead of the 2023 Assembly elections.

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