Claim: Former Prime Minister Imran Khan called for the Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan’s resignation for not including Khan’s photo in the new PKR 75 note.
Fact: The news was shared by satire Twitter account South Youthia Index and is being shared as real news across social media platforms.
Fact or Fiction?
On 14 August 2022, Twitter account South Youthia Index posted the following image, first shared on Startup Pakistan, with the caption: “Just IN:— Former PM Imran Khan calls for State Bank Governor’s resignation after new 75 rupee note doesn’t include his photo.”
South Youthia Index is a parody account of South Asia Index, a Twitter news account sharing bite-sized news relating to South Asia. South Youthia Index, on the other hand, posts solely satirical content about Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and former PM Imran Khan. “Youthiya” is a term often used to refer to PTI supporters, more often than not, in a derogatory manner. South Youthia Index clearly states that it is a parody account; their Twitter bio reads, “Data driven parody account of @SouthAsiaIndex. DM for submissions (Satire)”.
The text of the Tweet was then edited on to the image by Standup Pakistan, along with its logo on the top right hand corner. Standup Pakistan, as the name suggests is another comedic account sharing political satire. The tweet is captioned:
“🚨🚨 BREAKING 🚨🚨
Former PM Imran Khan calls for State Bank Governor’s resignation after new 75 rupee note doesn’t include his photo. ‘Jo krwa rha hai Amreeka krwa rha hai’ he said.”
The image was also shared by South Youhia Index’s Instagram account.
Virality
The satire image has since been shared across social media, blurring lines between legitimate news and satire for users. While CrowdTangle was unable to detect the image text, an organic Facebook search turned up 55 posts of the image. The post can be found here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
It was also shared on Twitter by comedy show Banana News Network (BNN) producer, Faysal Chaudry with the caption: سٹیٹ بنک کے گورنر کا اس گستاخی پر استعفیٰ بنتا ہے”
[State Bank governor should resign for this blasphemous behavior]”
The Tweet received 1631 likes, 415 retweets and 34 quote tweets. It was also quote tweeted by his BNN colleague Mustafa Chaudry with the caption: خان کی بنتی بھی ہے اتنے زیادہ لوگوں کو “یوتھیا “ بنانا مزاق نہیں ہے_ اور جنکی کی تصویریں ہیں انہوں نے تو ورلڈ کوپ وی نہیں جیتا ہو
[Khan also deserves to be on the note, it is not a joke to make so many people ‘Youthias’. And the people who are on the note have not even won the world cup]”. Chaudry’s tweet gained 1102 likes, 263 retweets and 14 quote tweets.
Responses to the image have been mixed. While some users have called out the image for spreading “fake news”, some have shared it to be true, some have questioned whether it is exaggerated or real and others have shared it to be legitimate news. The news was also forwarded over Whatsapp, as reported to Soch Fact Check by social media users.
Conclusion: Imran Khan did not call for the State Bank Governor’s resignation for not including his photo in the new PKR 75 note. The post was created by a satirical Twitter account which was shared as real news by social media users.