Lighthouse Journalism found a few pictures of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee being shared on the social media platforms after her recent head injury. During our investigation we found out that out of the two images used in the post, one was old and not related to the recent incident. The claim with which the picture is being shared is fake.
Claim:
X user @naturalphoton shared the images on his X profile.
Check the archive version of the post.
Other users too are sharing the same claim using the same image.
Investigation:
We started our investigation with the reverse image search of both the images, first the open wound.
We found the image on the website of several media organisations.
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee had suffered an injury to her forehead after a fall, recently on March 14. The chief minister received stitches and was later discharged from the hospital.
We then ran a reverse image search on the second image, where she was seen with a bandaid on her forehead.
We found a similar image in an article on the website of India Today. The article was updated on 24 January, 2024.
The report mentioned, West Bengal chief minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee got injured in a minor car accident while returning from Bardhaman to Kolkata.
The viral image had a logo of ABP Live on it, along with a react option on the right side of the image, hence we suspected that the screenshot could have been taken from a reel.
After then running a reverse image search again. We found a reel on ABP Ananda Facebook page.
We also found the reel where she was seen addressing the media after her accident on the Instagram profile of ABP Ananda.
The video was uploaded 7 weeks ago.
Conclusion: Unrelated picture of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee being shared claiming that the location of her head injury which she sustained after recent fall, has changed. Viral claim is false. The picture shared along with the claim is old.
