First Bihar, now Chennai, 2020 ‘Go Back Modi’ graffiti from Kolkata continues to play musical chairs
India Today
A photo of a “Go Back Modi” graffiti went viral falsely claiming that Chennai residents protested against Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the city.
Amid the Prime Minister’s Chennai trip on May 26, a photo of a “Go Back Modi” graffiti went viral with the claim that this was how people in the city protested Narendra Modi’s visit.
Several people on Twitter and Facebook shared the photo with hashtags like #GoBackModi and #GoBackFascistModi.
The India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) found that this photo was neither new nor from Chennai. In January 2020, anti-CAA protesters in Kolkata painted this graffiti to express their opposition to the PM’s visit there.
The viral posts are archived here and here.
Our first clue was that the people in the photo could be seen wearing winter wear, which is unlikely to happen in Chennai in May.
A reverse image search led us to an Ei Somoy news report from January 12, 2020. The Bengali news portal reported that the location of the graffiti was near Metro Channel. A brown structure visible in the photo bearing the words, “METRO CHANNEL CONTROL POST, HARE STREET POLICE STATION,” could be seen in the viral image.
When we searched Google Maps for “Metro Channel Control Post, Hare Street Police Station”, we found stark similarities between the photos we found and the viral shot.
