Dear Priyanka Chaturvedi, you asked for one instance when Alt News’ Md Zubair peddled fake news. Here are 20 such incidents for you

On June 21, Shiv Sena leader Priyanka Chaturvedi got into an argument with a netizen after he called Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair a fake-news peddler. Chaturvedi had replied to a News18 post where the media house had announced that one of their anchors, Shreya Dhounadial left the channel. Chaturvedi wished her the best for the future and said she was one of the sane voices on the channel.

A Twitter user, karanjohar4, questioned her what if she joined Republic TV, to which Shreya said, “over my dead body, sir.” Another Twitter user, AravAmbastha, questioned, “What if she joins @zoo_bear to peddle fake news or @AlJazeera.” Arav’s reply did not get an answer from Shreya, but Chaturvedi seemed to have gotten irked by his tweet. She said, “Please help me find one fake news from @zoo_bear, if not, then request you to shut up and sit down.”

Her ‘challenge’ on a public platform opened Pandora’s box, and multiple Twitter users came up with posts and threats showing how Zubair had been allegedly caught lying to his tooth multiple times. Zubair, who is liberals’ favourite, often gets scolded by netizens for spreading misinformation and fake news in the name of fact-checks. Recently, Twitter user The Hawk Eye exposed how Mohammed Zubair, who dog whistled Islamists against Nupur Sharma over remarks on Prophet Muhammad, had himself made derogatory posts against Hindu Gods and Hinduism. Soon after he was exposed for his Hinduphobic posts, he deleted his Facebook page. Days later, Zubair also removed his disparaging tweets against Hindu Gods and Hinduism.

However, being the blue-eyed boy of the liberals, the Left intelligentsia continues to pull in his support, even if that entails whitewashing fake news and propaganda peddled by him. Chaturvedi, too, tried the same, but she might not have expected what would hit her next. We, at OpIndia, would like to point out 20 such cases where Zubair was caught spreading fake news. All these incidents are in public, but the liberals conveniently choose to gloss over them.

20 instances when Alt News’ Mohammed Zubair peddled fake news

1. There was an incident where Zubair shared an edited video alleging that an elder named Abdul Samad was forcibly asked to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram. The incident was from Loni, and the accused in the case were Arif, Adil and Mushahid. During the investigation, the police found that nothing as such had happened, and it was not a communal incident.
2. In February 2021, he published a tweet claiming a Pujari collected 20 lakhs in the name of donations for Gau Sewa and ran away with the money. The image that he posted with the tweet was an old report. The idea behind posting that image was to mislead people by proving its association with the ongoing nationwide fundraiser campaign for the construction of Bhavya Shri Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.
3. In November 2020, he shared a clip of the Lallantop website where a person was seen counting the flaws of the Modi government. The man had called himself a fan of PM Modi. However, upon investigating, it was found that the man was a candidate for the Communist Party of India.
4. In October 2020, Zubair published a tweet suggesting that a group of people were planning to attack one of Tanishq’s showrooms while chanting ‘Jai Shri Ram. At that time, there was an ongoing controversy because of the Tanishq ad. Upon investigation, it was found that there were no threats of attacking the showroom, and the protest was peaceful.
5. After the Hathras incident, a video of Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi made it to social media, where they were travelling to Hathras and laughing while they were on their way. Zubair “fact-checked” it and used a photograph from the 2019 elections to declare that the brother-sister duo were not laughing.
6. In February 2019, he shared a video of Vishwa Hindu Parishad from Gonda suggesting that anti-national slogans were raised at a protest rally against the Pulwama terror attack. Later, Gonda Police clarified that the VHP video was being used to mislead the public and added no such slogans were raised during the event.
7. When Islamists pelted stones on the Police in Jamia library in February 2020, AltNews claimed the students did not have stones but wallets in their hands. Zubair carried it forward on social media, but when the reality was exposed, he stopped replying to people.
8. During the lockdown, he shared a photograph of two Jain monks with people around them with folded hands. He tried to imply that they were violating the lockdown. However, in reality, the two monks were distributing food packets to people and feeding animals. Zubair cunningly hid another photograph from the event where food packets were clearly visible.
9. In June 2020, AltNews and other media houses tried to project that a man was gunned down in Amroha while trying to enter a temple on account of his caste. However, later Amroha Police clarified that there was no reference to the caste of the youth in the matter. There was an ongoing enmity over money between the two groups that led to a clash and the unfortunate death of the youth.
10. During the lockdown, he came in support of a Maulana named Raukab Noorani Okarvl, who had spread misinformation about the Covid-19 vaccine. Zubair defended him and said the man was from Pakistan and not from India. He added, “By the way, I remembered that nano chip reports in currency notes after seeing this video.”
11. In a Tweet, Zubair had claimed that while Mexico runs educational channels on Television, Doordarshan was busy telecasting PM Modi’s Mann Ki Baat. Interestingly, it looked like Zubair never checked Doordarshan channels before posting the tweet. Several netizens pointed out there are over three dozen government channels in academia. He deleted the tweet after getting exposed. Doordarshan added many channels and programs during Covid to help students take classes during the lockdown.
12. He once had shared a report from Solapur suggesting fire broke down in the city. He had shared the video in April, while in reality, the video was from February. The Tweet that he had retweeted was also two months old.
13. He had once claimed that the comments on PM Modi’s Mann Ki Baat were switched off due to fear of protests by students. However, in reality, the comments on all the videos on PMO India’s channel had been off for years. The comments section was on videos on the YouTube channel of Narendra Modi and BJP that had the same video.
14. During Covid, when reports of Mahant Gopaldas being Covid came out positive, he shared an edited photograph claiming RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat was sitting next to him. His claims were debunked.
15. When Bhoomi Pujan for Bhavya Ram Mandir was scheduled in August, reports came out that a digital billboard in Times Square in the USA would play an ad for Ram Mandir. Zubair had claimed that the event was cancelled, but later the video was played in Times Square.
16. On his troll page ‘Unofficial Subramanian Swamy’, he had claimed that BJP was stealing EVMs from strong rooms. FactHunt fact-checked the claims, after which he put the blame on one of the admins of the page.
17. During farmers’ protests, he shared a photograph and claimed that the farmers were being treated like terrorists by the police. Later it was found that the photograph was from 2013 when UPA was in power at the centre. The photograph was first published by Kavita Krishnan.
18. After an attack in Sri Lanka, a minister wrote a letter stating intelligence officers were already aware of the possible attack. When Twitter users and prominent personalities like Abhijit Majumdar and Anand Ranganathan shared the letter, Zubair called it fake in a bid to protect the terrorists. Interestingly, the letter was published by the minister himself on Twitter.
19. OpIndia had published reports regarding the innocence of Vishal Jangotra in the Kathua case, which was criticized by Zubair. Later the court found that he was innocent.
20. In January 2022, he mixed up districts with assembly constituencies to defend the Samajwadi Party, which had used old Islamic names of the constituencies in candidate lists. Mohammed Zubair posted two candidate lists published by SP and BJP for UP assembly elections and alleged that both parties used old names for districts renamed by the Yogi Adityanath-led BJP govt. However, in reality, he was “confused” between the constituency names and district names.

Netizens remind Priyanka Chaturvedi of instances when Zubair had spread misinformation and fake news

Netizens also came up with posts of their own showing Chaturvedi how Zubair had lied to his teeth in the past.

In 2020, Twitter user iAnkurSingh shared a thread of fake news peddled by Zubair and his organization. Ankur shared that threat in the comments under tweet by Chaturvedi.

Alt News says ‘Mohammad Zubair has been at forefront of fighting fake narratives’.

Let’s Fact Check It.

A thread on Fake News spread by @zoo_bear.

Decide yourself if he’s a Fact Checker or Congress IT Cell coolie. https://t.co/V18hjxRJ6y

— Ankur Singh (@iAnkurSingh) September 6, 2020

Twitter user BefittingFacts shared a screenshot of a post by Zubair where he had admitted of publishing misleading posts.

Listen from his own mouth!!!

I know you wont reply now, because you are one shameless person with zero credibility and no diginity. pic.twitter.com/KVwIinhoqS

— Facts (@BefittingFacts) June 21, 2022

Twitter user FabulousGuy shared seven screenshots in a collage where Zubair admitted to publishing false news.

My mob can only add 7 pics in one collage pic.twitter.com/bDPYNAHm1H

— Lala 🇮🇳 (@FabulasGuy) June 21, 2022

This list of fake news peddled by Zubair is just the tip of the iceberg. There are countless instances where he misled his followers with fake news.