Fact check: Pakistan's video went viral referred as Kedarnath Jam
A video of the massive traffic jam is being shared on the social media platform Instagram and it is being claimed that it is from Kedarnath. In the video, a jam of vehicles is observed.
An Instagram account named chandigarhupdates, which has more than 66 thousand followers, shared the video and wrote, “There is traffic jam on the roads as far as the eye can see to go to Kedarnath. The journey is till November, just wait for some time.”
Fact check
The DFRAC team converted the video into keyframes and performed a reverse image search to verify the viral claim. We found the same video uploaded on X handle named destinationpak on July 25, 2021. Regarding the video, the destinationpak handle had said, “This is the situation on Balakot-Naran road. “After Eid, a lot of tourists are heading towards northern areas.”
Additionally, we found the same video uploaded on Googly News TV YouTube channel on July 25, 2021, with the caption “Kaghan Valley’s worst traffic jam witnessed.”
Apart from this, ARY News YouTube channel also uploaded this video on 26 July 2021 with the caption “Roads blocked, hotels full, tourists stranded on roads towards Kaghan”.
Conclusion
It is clear from the fact check of DFRAC that the viral video is not of the terrible traffic jam in Kedarnath, but of Kaghan Valley of Balakot-Naran Road in Pakistan and this video is from the year 2021. Therefore the claims of social media users are misleading.
