Lighthouse Journalism found a video being widely shared across social media platforms, purportedly showing an aerial view of the crowd at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s recent “Chhatron Ki Goonj” event in Pune, Maharashtra.
The video is being shared with the claim that it was recorded at the Pune programme. However, Lighthouse Journalism’s investigation found that the video is old and was recorded in Mexico. It is unrelated to Rahul Gandhi’s Pune event. The viral claim is misleading.
This fact check was important because the viral video misrepresented the location and context of a major political event, portraying footage from Mexico as a crowd at Rahul Gandhi’s Pune programme. The claim was widely circulated across X, Instagram and Facebook, potentially misleading viewers about the event’s turnout.
Claim:
X user Amit Sharma INC shared the viral video with a misleading claim.
Other users are also sharing the same video with a similar claim.
Investigation:
We started the investigation by extracting keyframes of the viral video.
In one of the keyframes “Mexico 26” is clearly visible.
We then ran a reverse image search on the keyframes obtained from the video. This led us to a Threads account.
The caption said (translation): This is how Mexico’s first goal was celebrated in the Zócalo
We also found the video on the verified Instagram handle of Carlota Vizmanos, a journalist.
Bio stated, Carlota is a Sports presenter at Telemundo (a Spanish website).
Mexico opened the World Cup with a victory. Lighthouse Journalism also found several reports about the same.
Conclusion: The video being circulated as footage from Rahul Gandhi’s Pune programme is actually from Mexico. It shows football fans celebrating Mexico’s victory over Ecuador in a match held in July 2026. The old video is unrelated to Rahul Gandhi’s event and is now being shared with a misleading claim linking it to his Pune programme.
