Fact-Check: Has PM Modi been taken by a Taxi during his recent France visit? Here’s the reality

PM Modi has recently visited France and attended the AI Action Summit 2025 where he emphasised the need to build quality data sets that are free from biases and embrace open-source models. He also carried a rather hopeful message on the potential impact of AI on jobs. At present, he has received a warm welcome from US President Trump in the USA. In this aftermath, an image showing PM Modi embarking off from a Taxi is doing rounds on social media platform X(formerly Twitter). Users are sharing this image and claiming that French people are disrespecting PM Modi by taking him in a taxi.

Sharing this image on X, a user wrote: “Hey French folks, don’t disrespect our Visha Guru so much, he shouldn’t have been taken by taxi ____”

Furthermore, several users shared this image and claimed similar information. The preview link can be seen here and here.

Fact-Check

The team investigated the viral image and found it to be digitally edited. The real image is from Oct 2021 showing PM Modi reaching to meet Pope Francis at the Vatican.

Using Google Lens, we reverse-searched this image and found a similar image on the X handle of ANI with the date Oct 30, 2021. Moreover, the image’s description read: “PM Modi had a very warm meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican. The meeting was scheduled only for 20 minutes but went on for an hour. PM & the Pope discussed a wide range of issues aimed at making our planet better such as fighting climate change &removing poverty: Sources”.

Upon investigating further, the image given in the ANI’s tweet is quite similar to the viral image but on a close inspection, we have noted that the number plate with blue color has been digitally edited in the viral image.

Conclusion

It is evident from DFRAC’s fact-check that the viral image of PM Modi embarking off from the Taxi has been digitally edited and misleadingly shared on X. In reality, the real image dates back to Oct 2021, showing PM Modi’s visit to Pope Francis at the Vatican. It is completely unrelated to PM Modi’s recent visit to France.

Analysis: Misleading