An old photo of Samajwadi Party leader and former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav and his MP wife Dimple Yadav offering flowers at Mulayam Singh Yadav's memorial (samadhi sthal) has now surfaced with false claims that it shows the former visiting the grave of gangster turned legislator Mukhtar Ansari after his death on March 28 in an Uttar Pradesh prison.
Akhilesh Yadav paid a visit to the family members of Mukhtar Ansari on April 7, expressing solidarity with his elder brother and SP Lok Sabha candidate from Ghazipur, Afzal Ansari. Yadav raised concerns regarding Mukhtar Ansari's death in jail and called for an investigation into the matter by a sitting Supreme Court judge. The photo has gone viral in this backdrop, with a Hindi caption that roughly translates to, "Akhilesh Yadav boycotted the Ram Mandir inauguration ceremony... both have gone to offer flowers at Mukhtar Ansari's grave".
(Original Text in Hindi: अखिलेश यादव ने राम मंदिर उद्घाटन समारोह का बहिस्कार लिया,, मुख्तार अंसारी की कब्र पर फूल चढ़ाने दोनों गए हैं)
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Fact Check
BOOM Hindi had debunked the same photograph when it went viral in March this year with false claims that Yadav visited the grave of politician-gangster Atiq Ahmed who was shot dead by two assailants. We found that the image shows Yadav offering flowers at the 'samadhi sthal' of his late father Mulayam Singh Yadav in Saifai before leaving for nomination for Mainpuri bypoll.
Yadav had posted the same photograph along with two other images of him visiting the memorial of his late father and former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Mulayam Singh Yadav, on November 14, 2022, from his official X handle.
The Hindi caption with the X post translates to: "In fact, Netaji's socialist beliefs are being nominated as SP candidate in Mainpuri by-election. The way people and people of all parties, rising above party politics, have come to Saifai and paid tribute to Netaji, the true result of this will be that the SP candidate will have a historic victory."
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We additionally came across a report by India Today dated November 14, 2022, which covered the incident.
The article reported about Akhilesh Yadav and his wife's visit to the Mulayam Singh Yadav Samadhi Sthal in Saifai, where they offered flowers before proceeding to file nominations for the Mainpuri by-election. It further stated that Dimple Yadav would be submitting her nominations for the vacant Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat following the death of the Samajwadi Party founder, Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Dimple Yadav also posted the photo from her official X handle corroborating same information at that time.
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The Times of India on December 8, 2022, reported that Dimple Yadav won the Mainpuri parliamentary bypoll in Uttar Pradesh by defeating BJP candidate Raghuraj Singh Shakya, by a margin of 2,88,461 votes. The report also added that Yadav's victory margin surpassed that of her father-in-law, who had defeated the BJP candidate Prem Singh Shakya by over 94,000 votes in 2019.