A viral story claiming a bride's father cancelled a wedding in Delhi after the groom performed on the Bollywood song 'Choli Ke Peeche' is fake with no such incident reported anywhere.
BOOM found the fake story was published as part of an ad by MX player, an Amazon owned streaming platform. It appeared in a newspaper and quickly went viral, with media outlets misreporting the incident as real.
The Times of India, The Indian Express, The Economic Times, Mint, Navbharat Times, NDTV, News 18, Republic, Deccan Herald, Times Now, India TV, Hindustan Times, Deccan Chronicle, ABP Live, Mathrubhumi, One India, News9 Live, Gujarat Samachar and DNA and several other regional media outlets misreported claiming it was a real incident from Delhi.
In addition to the misreported news stories, the photo of the story as it appeared in a newspaper is also viral. The image has the story titled, "Groom dances on 'Choli Ke peeche' to entertain his guests. Bride's father cancels the wedding." highlighted in red with an ad for Amazon's MX Player visible next to it.
The story body further adds to the fake piece, claiming the father was furious at the groom for dancing on the Choli Ke Peeche song, believing it to be against the family's tradition. It adds that the wedding was called off despite please from the bride and the groom.
Fact Check
BOOM found that the incident is not true and first appeared as an ad for Amazon's MX Player in newspapers.
We analysed the viral image being cited as a source in news reports and found that it was a photo of the Delhi edition of The Pioneer newspaper. We then looked through the e-paper of the daily and found that it was carried by the newspaper on January 30, 2025.
Parts of other news stories seen in the viral image match those published on Page 3 of the January 30 edition of The Pioneer. The same can be seen below:
We also noticed discrepancies in the format and style of the viral story and other pieces of news published on the same page.
1. Story Has No Byline
We observed that the report lacks a byline, unlike other reports. A byline is the name of the journalist, author or the media outlet that has reported the published news, generally appearing below the headline in newspapers.
We compared the story with articles from the same edition of the The Pioneer. While other stories had a byline for 'Staff Reporter' or 'Pioneer News Service', this piece of news had no such byline.
2. Difference in Font Style
We then compared the font style of the fake story in the newspaper with the other reports published by The Pioneer and found stark differences, including the addition of a period in the headline of the fake story.
We also noticed that the fake story, "Groom dances on 'Choli ke peeche' to entertain his guests. Bride's father cancels the wedding," is placed in the same box as the ad by Amazon MX player. The other stories appear above this box as can be seen below.
3. Difference in Editorial Style
We also noticed that the fake story does not use the same writing style as in the other news reports of the paper. For example the fake story writes the date as, 18th of January, unlike the other stories in The Pioneer.
We then reached out to Barun Kumar Chaudhary, Head of Advertising and Sales for The Pioneer in Delhi who confirmed that it was an ad. Chaudhary told BOOM, "This is not a piece of real news, but an advertorial. This is part of the advertisement for Amazon's OTT platform MX Player." He further clarified that the newspaper should have added a disclaimer distinguishing the fake story as a promotional feature.
(Additional Reporting: Rohit Kumar)