An old and unrelated video of UP CM Yogi Adityanath applying tilak from ashes is being shared online as his way of paying tribute to the police constable who died protecting Umesh Pal, prime witness in the 2005 case of MLA Raju Pal's murder. BOOM found that the video is at least as old as 2022 and has no links to Umesh Pal's case.
On February 24, 2023, lawyer Umesh Pal, the sole witness in the murder of BSP MLA Raju Pal, was attacked and murdered outside his residence in Prayagraj. Constable Raghvendra Singh, who was in charge of his security was also injured during the shootout and succumbed to his wounds on March 1. The video of Yogi Adityanath is being shared in this context with claims that he was honouring Singh's sacrifice.
It is being shared with the caption, "In Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath -- while applying the ashes of police constable who was martyred in Umesh Pal murder, witness of Raju Pal MLA murder, said -- something big will happen, very soon some big information can also be found."
The clip was earlier shared in the context of Adityanath paying tribute to soldiers. Read out fact-check here.
(Original text in Hindi: "उत्तरप्रदेश के प्रयागराज में राजू पल विधायक हत्या के गवाह उमेश पाल हत्याकांड में शहीद हुए पुलिस कांस्टेबल की राख को सर माथे पर लगाते हुए योगी आदित्यनाथ --कहा--कुछ तो बड़ा ही होकर रहेगा, बहुत जल्दी कोई बड़ी सूचना भी मिल सकती है")
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It is also being shared as a recent clip by some other users.
Click here to view the tweet and here for an archive.
The clip is also viral on Facebook.
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FACT-CHECK
BOOM found that the video is at least as old as 2022 and is unrelated to the death of Umesh Pal and constable Raghvendra Singh. While going through the quote tweets of one of the viral clips, we noticed that a user pointed out that the video was from a Holika ritual in UP.
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Using this information, we searched for the video on Twitter using some keywords and found one uploaded by journalist Sameer Dixit on March 22, 2022.
We used this information to find that in March 2022, Yogi Adityanath celebrated the festival of Holi in his constituency of Gorakhpur, UP.
We found a report by News18, which mentioned that Yogi Adityanath reached Gorakhpur and commenced the festival of Holi by applying a tilak from the ashes of the Holika. He did this at the Gorakhnath Temple.
The report also mentions that Adityanath addressed a large crowd and did a Shobha Yatra on the special occasion.
We also found a report by ETV Bharat which carried a photo of Yogi Adityanath applying the ashes of Holika on his forehead inside the Gorakhnath Temple.
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Holika Dahan is a Hindu ritual that precedes the day of Holi in several parts of India. It celebrates the legend of Prahlada, a mythological figure and his salvation from a burning pyre. It is a custom in Gorakhpur to use the ashes of the holika dahan after they have turned cold and apply them as a tilak on one's forehead.