Thread by @free_thinker

Post the fact-check by my colleague @AbhishekSay about how mainstream media orgs including @IndiaToday wrongly claimed that the St George's Cross in the Indian Navy's flag was re-introduced during UPA, @ShivAroor put out a clarification, first on Twitter, and later on TV. 1/n

In this televised clarification, @ShivAroor suggested that the fact that he didn't brazen this out is evidence of his fairness and non-partisanship as a journalist. 2/n

https://twitter.com/ShivAroor/status/1570752272665300993

The #AltNewsFactCheck was published on Sep 15, 2 weeks after the claim was first televised by @IndiaToday on Aug 30. The reason for the delay was because @AbhishekSay patiently watched broadcasts of multiple news channels to determine who all put out the false claim. 3/n

Additionally, since we did not want to rely purely on media reports, @AbhishekSay painstakingly went through Rajya Sabha QnAs to find the relevant references.

4/n

However, the information that the St George's Cross wasn't re-introduced by UPA Government has been out in the public domain for a while now, with @IndiaToday's own fact-checking unit having put out a story on September 5th. 5/n

On Sep 2, Congress's @dubeyamitabh tagged @gauravcsawant informing him that the verbatim claims by BJP that @IndiaToday was broadcasting were false, and should have been fact-checked.

https://twitter.com/dubeyamitabh/status/1565746010462502912

6/n

If this is not brazening out, then what sort of quality control does @IndiaToday have that four of its most senior anchors with each having over 15-20 years of experience put out the same false claim, and the same doesn't get corrected for over 2 weeks?

7/n

How does it happen that a fact-check published by @IndiaToday itself, albeit without mentioning that their own anchors had put out the misinformation, doesn't get relayed to the members of the same organisation?

8/8