On April 17, Maharashtra minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Nawab Malik had said that PM Modi’s photo should be put on death certificates. During an interview with ANI, Malik had said, “the way PM Modi’s photo is put on vaccination certificates, we demand that PM’s photo should be put on death certificates also.” After his statement, other leaders and so-called intellectuals came forward and made a similar demand.
“Secular” actor Nagma said on Twitter, “As like on every vaccination certificate there is a photo of Modi Same should be on every death certificate of Indian died due to covid.” She also posted an image of a tweet of union minister VK Singh claiming that the former army chief was looking for a hospital bed for his brother. However, that claim was fake. In reality, General VK Singh was trying to help someone else who was looking for a bed. In a single tweet, Nagma managed two self-goals.
Lavanya Ballal, National co-coordinator for Social media AICC, said, “Every Covid death certificate must have Narendra Modi’s pic, every graveyard, crematorium must have his billboard. This too is his contribution to the nation.”
Trinamool Congress’s alleged firebrand Mahua Moitra shared an image of vaccination certificate and said, “If Covid vaccine certificate has Hon’ble PM’s photo, does death certificate of those dying of no oxygen also carry his photo?”
The leaf-leaning, Congress-favoring, and Modi-hating meme-makers, trolls and fake news peddlers found a great opportunity in the statements by the leaders and liberals. Some posts started to show up on social media claiming that death certificates now come with PM Modi’s photograph.
When we reverse-searched the image, we found that the photograph was first published by IndiaTimes in a report titled “Will India Have A COVID-19 Vaccine Passport & How Will It Help You Travel Without Quarantining” that was published on March 11. The said photograph is of a man holding his vaccination certificate, and it is not a death certificate as claimed on social media.
If one looks carefully, the text ‘Provisional Certificate for COVID-19 Vaccination (1st Dose)’ can be seen just below the govt of India emblem. Below it, it has details of the beneficiary on the left side and the vaccination details on the right side.
We also looked for a sample death certificate that one would get in case of a family member’s demise. Here is the sample death certificate issued by the government. Please note that just like birth certificate, death certificates are also issued by state governments and not the central government. Based on the state, the language of the certificate may vary.
Therefore, it is a wrong claim that death certificates have a photograph of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The posts on social media claiming the same are fake.