Old Photo of ‘Go Back Modi’ Graffiti Revived During PM Modi’s Visit to Rajasthan

The photo dates back to January 2020 and was taken in the Esplanade area in Kolkata, West Bengal.

A photo showing the words 'Go Back Modi' graffitied on the road is going viral on social media, where users are sharing it as people protesting Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Rajasthan's Ajmer on 31 May.

(Archives of more claims on social media can be seen here, here, and here.)

Twitter users shared this photo with the hashtag 'modi_Go_back', which had been used around 1.7 lakh times at the time of writing this article.

But...?: The photo dates back to January 2020.

• It was taken in West Bengal's Kolkata when Modi visited the state before the 2021 West Bengal assembly elections, when anti-CAA protests broke out in the city's Esplanade area.

How did we find out?: The Quint had previously debunked claims surrounding this photo in 2020 and 2021, when they were shared as photos from Bihar and Tamil Nadu respectively ahead of PM Modi's visit to the states.

• Using reverse image search, we had found a tweet by journalist Mayukh Ranjan Ghosh dated 11 January 2020, who shared the image as one from Kolkata's Esplanade area.

This is one of the busiest roads in Kolkata. #Esplanade. Lakhs and lakhs of people commute, jam packed traffic r seen. Just look at this place tonight. Roads turned into graffitis, no traffic, all roads blocked, students protesting overnight.

This is #Kolkata #modiinkolkata pic.twitter.com/jDaf6vufXi

— Mayukh Ranjan Ghosh (@mayukhrghosh) January 11, 2020

Geolocating the photo: We noticed that a sign in the background read 'Metro Channel Control Post Hare Street Police Station'.

• We looked this place up on Google Maps, which revealed that the location is indeed in Kolkata.

• It also carried a similar photo as the one in the claim.

• News reports by Scroll and The Times of India from January 2020 shared photos of the graffiti from different angles.

Conclusion: An old photo of graffiti reading 'Go Back Modi' from West Bengal's Kolkata has been revived and shared as a photo from Ajmer, Rajasthan during the prime minister's visit to the state.

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