CLAIM
A video clip of cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni, clad in the Army uniform, singing ‘Main pal do pal ka shaayar hoon’ is being widely shared on social media.
Multiple news outlets have picked up the video as well, writing about it in the context of Dhoni recently joining his regiment, 106 Territorial Army Battalion (Para) in Jammu and Kashmir.
News agency IANS wrote in an article that “Former Indian captain MS Dhoni is busy performing his military duty in Jammu and Kashmir. And after he was seen playing volleyball with members of his Territorial Army Battalion and polishing shoes, another video is making rounds on social media where the 38-year-old, while donning the uniform, is seen humming the lyrics of the famous Bollywood song “Main pal do pal ka shayar hun” from the movie ‘Kabhi Kabhie’.”
The Economic Times put out an article about the video, headlining it “On Kashmir duty, Lt Col Dhoni entertains fellow soldiers with Big B song.”
TRUE OR FALSE?
While the video is real and not doctored in any way, it needs to be clarified that the video is from a 2014 programme and not from his current time with his regiment. However, the video is being shared without context and is instead being talked about with the implication of it being recent.
WHAT WE FOUND
On looking carefully at the video, we were able to see the word "Jai" inscribed in Hindi on a wall behind Dhoni. We assumed that it was a part of "Jai Hind". On running a Google search for "Jai Hindi Dhoni pal do pal ka shaayar hoon", we came across a screenshot of the same video, which showed clearly that it was actually an Aaj Tak video.
On running a search on YouTube with the keywords "dhoni aaj tak programme", we came across a video, published on 26 January 2014, which showed the entire event at which Dhoni sang the song to the troops.
This was a Republic Day special programme and the shorter clip was snipped from this video, which shows Dhoni interacting with the troops and eventually singing this song for them.
Therefore, the video is not from Dhoni's recent days with his Army regiment in J&K, but from a programme in 2014.
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