Fact Check: Flags of IUML waved at Congress Karnataka rally wrongly believed to be Pakistani flags

Lok Sabha Election 2019 Fact-checker: Claim: Pakistani flag was waved at a Congress rally in Karnataka Fact: FALSE. Though the contents of the video were not morphed or tampered with, captions and comments claiming that it was the Pakistani flag are untrue as the flag seen in the video is of Kerala based political party Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) which bears similarities with the national flag of the neighbouring nation. *** Election season in India also brings with itself a barrage of carefully-crafted fake news planted to instigate people against Opposition parties. One such recent instance was a video showing the presence of “Pakistani flag” at Congress rallies in Rajasthan and Karnataka. However, it has turned out that in both the incidents the flags waved were not those of Pakistan but a local Muslim organisation and a Kerala-based Muslim party respectively. In one of the recent viral videos, a flag, green in colour and bearing the white crescent and star, is being waved at a Congress party rally in Tumkur, Karnataka. It is, however, the banner of a political party-based in Kerala, the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML). Earlier, a similar claim was shared in 2018, ahead of the Karnataka Assembly election, which was debunked by AltNews.

See the congress rally in Tumkur where Pakistan flags are waived in open, shame to the party pic.twitter.com/eYY34MkFAT

— maibichowkidaar (@srk2ma) March 24, 2019

The other video, which was reportedly shot in a Rajasthani village, was shared with claims that a Pakistani flag was raised at a Congress victory rally. But, on close inspection, the flag in the video, although green, appears to have minarets in the centre and white stripes on both sides with some inscription written in red and blue — unlike the Pakistani flag which has a white band on the left. The false claims of those sharing the video with the deceiving caption on social media were also busted by the Rajasthan Police who confirmed that it was fake news.

Alert 🚫🔊

This video 📽️ circulating on #socialmedia claims that there is a Pakistan flag being waved in a victory procession of @INCIndia.

This is false and we request people not to get trapped by this ❌. We are trying to trace the mischief-maker.#FakeNews @SMHoaxSlayer pic.twitter.com/WDnABuJx2M

— Rajasthan Police (@PoliceRajasthan) December 12, 2018

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Earlier, similar claims were made of Pakistani flags being used during rallies of Congress leader  Ashok Gehlot which were debunked by online fact-checking websites. There were also reports of a similar Muslim group’s flag being hoisted in Kolkata in celebration of the newly-elected mayor, which was widely criticised for the use of the Pakistani flag, but was later found to be false.