A video showing several people enjoying a feast on banana leaves on a long table is being shared on social media, shortly after the festival of Pongal was celebrated in the southern part of India.
What is the claim?: The video is being shared to claim that it shows United Kingdom's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak celebrating Pongal with his office staff, while enjoying a traditional feast served on banana leaves.
Who is sharing the video? Media organisations such as India TV, TV9 Telugu, Zee News Kannada, One India, and The New Indian shared the video with the claim. Media organisation Times Now had also shared a similar claim, but later corrected it.
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An archive of the article can be seen here.
(Source: India TV website/Screenshot)
What is the truth?: The claim is false. The video shows a Thai Pongal celebration organised by the Tamil Cultural Association of Waterloo region, Ontario, Canada.
How did we find out?: At first, we noticed the word "police" written on some of the people's uniforms in the viral video.
Taking this as a clue, we performed a keyword search using words such as "Police pongal feast".
This led us to the same video uploaded on an unverified Facebook account called "Suresh R" with a caption that mentioned it is from Waterloo, Canada, where a Pongal feast was organised by the Tamil Cultural Association.
We searched for the association on Google and came across a website named 'Tamil Culture Waterloo'. Under the event's section, we found a photo gallery of Thai Pongal celebration.
On comparing one of the images available on the website to a frame of the viral video, we found some similarities.
The same video was also shared on the association's Facebook page.
Further, we found a tweet by the mayor of Waterloo, Dorothy McCabe, posted on 15 January with the caption that said , "Thank you to the local @waterlootamils community for a wonderful evening of entertainment, enjoyment and delicious food!
On comparing the fourth picture uploaded by McCabe with one of the frames of the viral video, we found that she can be seen sitting on the table in the clip.
The Quint reached out to the Tamil Cultural Association Waterloo for their inputs and will update the article as and when it is received.
Conclusion: The video is from Waterloo in Canada's Ontaria and does not show UK PM Rishi Sunak celebrating Pongal by sharing a feast with his office staff in London.
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