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| - Fact Check: Photo of loco pilot holding umbrella inside engine is NOT from Kerala's first Vande Bharat
A leakage was discovered during the debut run of Kerala's first Vande Bharat Express. But did the driver need to cover his head with an umbrella? Here are the facts.
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India Today Fact Check
Although leakage was reported in an AC vent in the Kasargod-Thiruvananthapuram Vande Bharat Express, the image is nearly six-years-old, and was shot inside a dead engine near Dhanbad, Jharkhand.
On April 25, PM Narendra Modi inaugurated India’s 16th Vande Bharat Express, the Kasargod-Thiruvananthapuram Express in Kerala. The train’s debut journey, however, faced some hitches — there were reports of water leakage on its first day while it was parked at Kannur.
Following this, many on social media shared a baffling photo of a loco pilot (train driver) sitting inside a train’s engine with an open umbrella in his hand. Allegedly, this was the loco pilot of Kerala's inaugural Vande Bharat journey using an umbrella to protect himself from the leaking water.
One person tweeted, "Dear Narendra Modi please stop making things. Clearly you are utterly incapable to make anything right. ‘VANDE BHARAT’ on the 1st day of inauguration rainwater started leaking from the roof of VB in Kerala. A picture is worth a thousand words." Archived versions of such posts can be seen here and here.
India Today's investigation, however, found that the image in question is several years old and not related to Vande Bharat at all.
OUR PROBE
A reverse image search of the viral photo led us to a video tweeted by journalist-activist Sucheta Dalal on August 9, 2017. This video featured the same loco pilot with an umbrella covering his head. Dalal tagged then-Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu and the Railway Ministry in that tweet.
In the video, a voice of a man, assumably, the assistant loco pilot can also be heard complaining about the poor working conditions. He appealed to viewers to widely share this video.
The first ever Vande Bharat Express, known earlier as “Train 18”, was launched by PM Modi on February 15, 2019, making it clear that the video can not be related to it.
Where is the video from?
An advanced search with a relevant time filter led us to news reports in The Indian Express and India Times featuring a similar image. Published on August 11, 2017, both mentioned that the video was captured near Dhanbad, Jharkhand.
We also found an extended version of the same video uploaded to the YouTube channel of the Bengali news outlet Sangbad Pratidin.
Around the 20 seconds timestamp of this video, the person behind the camera addresses the loco pilot as BK Mandal from Chandrapura, a town in Jharkhand's Bokaro district. We also noticed the station signage of “Bermo” at one minute 17-second timestamp of this video. The Bermo railway station is in the Bokaro district of Jharkhand and falls under the Dhanbad railway division of the East-Central Railway zone.
In subsequent searches, we also came across a tweet by the Ministry of Railways responding to the viral video, clarifying that the engine was dead (non-working) and was being pulled by another engine in front, as seen in the video.
What happened to Kerala's Vande Bharat?
We looked at various news reports about the water leakage in Kerala's Vande Bharat Express. None of these reports contained any mention or images of the loco pilot sitting under an umbrella.
Per reports in Asianet and Mathrubhumi, the Kunnur district of Kerala witnessed heavy rains on April 25, the inaugural day of the Vande Bharat Express. That night, the leak was observed after the train arrived in Kannur from Kasaragod.
Reportedly, the leak was found through the AC vent. The public relations officer of the Palakkad division, Devadhanam, confirmed to India Today that the leakage was in the AC vent and repair works were complete by April 26 morning.
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