No, Picture Doesn't Show Rahul Gandhi Reading a Kannada Newspaper
The newspaper was published in English with text in Kannada on the first and last page.
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An old picture of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi reading a newspaper in Kannada is going viral on the internet.
Several social media users have shared the picture to take a dig at Gandhi, saying that the person who does not even know Hindi properly is reading a newspaper in Kannada.
(Archives of similar claims can be found here, here, and here.)
The truth: The picture was taken during the relaunch of Congress party-owned National Herald in Bengaluru in 2017. The available e-paper version of the newspaper shows that the first and the last page of the paper was in Kannada, while the rest of it was in English.
What led us to the truth?: The Quint had previously reported on this and it was mentioned that the picture is from the relaunch program of National Herald.
Gandhi had uploaded pictures from the relaunch event on his official Twitter account on 12 June 2017.
Further, we checked the newspaper's official website and came across the commemorative edition from 2017.
On comparing, we found that the front page of the newspaper, seen in the viral image, was the same as the e-paper.
(Swipe right to view all the comparisons.)
One can clearly point out the similarities of the front pages seen in both the images.
The outline of letters "N" and "H" can clearly be seen in both the images.
While the text on the first and the last page is in Kannada, all the other pages in the newspaper were published in English.
Other pages in the newspaper were in English.
(Source: National Herald/Screenshot/Altered by The Quint)
What else did we find?: On checking the newspaper's official website, we found that the National Herald group of newspapers have publications in Hindi and Urdu, but we could not find any details of it getting published in Kannada.
Conclusion: An old picture of Rahul Gandhi from the relaunch event of National Herald is being shared to falsely claim that he was reading a newspaper in Kannada.
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