A set of two images showing a wrecked fighter jet is going viral online to claim that it Indian Air Force's Jaguar fighter jet was destroyed in Pakistan during Operation Sindoor.
Who shared it?: This image was shared by several social media users who claimed that the report was shared by media outlet Republic Bharat.
An archive can be seen here.
(Source: X/Screenshot)
(Archives of similar claims can be seen here, here and here.)
What's the truth?: This image is unrelated to Operation Sindoor and shows wreckage at a site after a Jaguar fighter jet crashed in Gujarat on 2 April 2025.
The audio in the video has been edited and added to the old footage. The ticker was also edited.
How did we find out the truth?: We performed a reverse image search on the photo using Google lens which led us to several old reports shared on 3 April 2025.
India Today's report carried the same image shown in the Republic Bharat's news bulletin and stated that this image shows Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel and locals near the debris of IAF's Jaguar fighter jet that crashed on 2 April 2025.
The report also credits the image to Press Trust of India (PTI).
The same image with this information was shared by ABP Live and Times of India.
We also ran a reverse image search on Google for the second image which does not include any IAF personnel standing near the wrecked jet.
The result yielded old reports carrying with the same image.
Reports shared Indian Express and India Today that this image shows wreckage at the site after a Jaguar fighter jet crashed in Gujarat on 2 April 2025.
Edited old report from Republic:
We found a news report from Republic Bharat, shared on 2 April, which talked about the crash in Jamnagar.
The clip showed that the report was not recent and the old video report was edited, both by using a fake voiceover and ticker text.
Additionally, no such recent report was found on Republic Bharat.
More about Operation Sindoor: The IAF launched ‘Operation Sindoor’ early on Wednesday, 7 May.
This was targeted at terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK).
This operation comes days after the Pahalgam terror attack which happened on 22 April 2025.
Conclusion: Old images of a wrecked fighter jet are going viral where users are linking it to Operation Sindoor.
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