No, Dawn Didn’t Say ‘Not Reading Quran’ Is the Reason Behind Pak Floods

The original article's headline discusses the Pakistan Army being called to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for flood aid.

The article's screenshot was morphed to change the headline.

(Source: Facebook/Dawn/Altered by The Quint)

A screenshot of an article purportedly published by Pakistani news organisation, Dawn, is doing the rounds on social media, which carries a headline saying that the reason behind floods in Pakistan was "not due to climate change, but because people are not reading Quran."

The claim comes on the back of Pakistan experiencing severe floods across several regions, which have claimed at least 1,136 lives as on 31 August.

However, the screenshot is edited. We found that the original article carries a headline regarding the Pakistan army being called to the flood-affected Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region. Dawn itself carried an article dismissing the viral screenshot as an attempt to "mislead public."

CLAIM

Several social media users shared the screenshot, believing it to be an actual article carried by the news publication.

An archive of this post can be seen here.

(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)

Archives of similar posts can be seen here and here.

WHAT WE FOUND OUT

The viral screenshot in question shows the date of the article's publication as 27 August, and the article carries bylines of Saleem Shahid, Manzoor Ali, and Iftikhar A. Khan.

The article in the screenshot was published on 27 August.

(Source: Facebook/Altered by The Quint)

Its vertical layout also indicates that the screenshot was taken on a mobile device.

We carried out a reverse image search on the viral screenshot, which led us to an article by Dawn, which was published on 27 August and carried the same photos and bylines. The headline for this article read – "Army called in as KP faces flood threat."

Using Wayback Machine, we checked to see whether the article had previously carried a different headline, but saw that the headline had remained unchanged through an available archive.

On comparing this article's screenshot to the one in the viral claim, we saw that only the headline section had been edited in the viral screenshot.

The text and font of both headlines differs.

(Source: Facebook/Dawn/Altered by The Quint)

Both screenshots show a difference in font as well as spacing.

The spacing between section headings and the headline is shorter in the edited screenshot.

(Source: Facebook/Dawn/Altered by The Quint)

We also came across an article published by Dawn itself, calling out the viral screenshot. Here, it called the viral screenshot "doctored" and an attempt to "mislead public."

The publication also highlighted inconsistencies between the morphed screenshot and its style guide, noting that the headline in the screenshot ending with a full stop, something that the organisation does not do.

Dawn highlighted inconsistencies with its official style guide.

(Source: Dawn/Screenshot)

Evidently, a morphed screenshot of an article on Pakistan's devastating floods is being shared, which falsely says that the reason behind the country's floods was that people were not reading the Quran.

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