AI-edited image falsely shows Khaleda Zia holding ‘Amar Desh’ newspaper at rally
A side-by-side image has been posted on Facebook showing former Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia holding up a copy of the “Amar Desh” newspaper on a rally stage, while Rashed Khan, political assistant to Prime Minister Tarique Rahman, tears up the same newspaper. However, a fact-check by Dismislab found that the image of Khaleda Zia holding the newspaper was edited using AI. The original photo showed her with an empty hand and the Amar Desh newspaper was added through AI editing.
On 1 November, an image was posted (archive) on the verified Facebook page of Joynal Abedin Shishir, publicity secretary of the National Citizen Party (NCP). The left side of the image shows former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia holding up the Amar Desh newspaper. The right side shows Rashed Khan, political assistant to Prime Minister Tarique Rahman, tearing up the Amar Desh newspaper. The caption at the bottom of the image reads, “Amar Desh newspaper in the hands of Begum Khaleda Zia. On the other hand, Amar Desh newspaper in the hands of neo-BNP Rashed Khan.” In the post, Shishir wrote, “Will you tear it up just because you dislike it? Then Rashed Khan is also at the top of the list of individuals the people of this country dislike.” By the time of publication, the post had been shared 50 times.
Several inconsistencies are visible in the part of the circulated image showing Khaleda Zia holding the Amar Desh newspaper. The media booms placed in front of the speaking Khaleda Zia appear distorted. The text on the microphone in front of her is also unclear. The headline of the Amar Desh newspaper in her hand reads, “Hasina is establishing a reign of corpses.” However, the word “reign” (রাজত্ব) is distorted here. Apart from that headline, the other news items are also illegible.
For verification, Dismislab checked that part of the image using the AI detection tool SynthID. The results showed that the image was created or edited using an OpenAI model.
On further verification, a reverse image search of keyframes from the image found an almost identical photo in a report published on 14 August 2018 on the website of the German media outlet Deutsche Welle. Khaleda Zia, the microphones and the spread of media booms visible in the circulated image match that photo. However, no newspaper can be seen in Khaleda Zia’s hand in that photo.
To find out which rally the image of the speaking Khaleda Zia came from, Dismislab ran a relevant keyword search and found a video uploaded on 13 November 2017. The video was uploaded by a YouTube channel named “Jessore District BNP”. Within the video, it is described as footage of a rally held at Suhrawardy Udyan on 12 November of the same year. At no point in that speech, lasting 1 hour 1 minute 44 seconds, is Begum Khaleda Zia seen holding any newspaper.
In addition, publication of Amar Desh was shut down on 11 April 2013 and resumed on 22 December 2024. In other words, the image was edited with AI to place the “Amar Desh” newspaper in her hand.
However, although this image was edited with AI, it could not be verified whether former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia held up the Amar Desh newspaper in this way in any of her other speeches.
Notably, in a recent Facebook Live responding to two reports published in Amar Desh, Rashed Khan, the prime minister’s political assistant, tore up a copy of the newspaper.
