Is it the video of ISRO Chairman dancing during success celebration of Chandrayaan-3 landing?
Claim
Am just loving it. Party time @isro Success celebration of #Chandrayaan3Landing
Rating
Explanation
After a failed attempt four years ago, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched its third lunar exploration mission, Chandrayaan-3 on July 14 and it successfully landed near the Moon’s South Pole yesterday (August 23). India is the first country to touch down near the less-explored South Pole and is the fourth country to land on the moon after the United States, the Soviet Union and China. The entire nation feels proud of it.
https://twitter.com/meghupdates/status/1694372751832932602?s=46&t=kIszbQH_arRSG8kPbuGeZw
The scientists behind the success of Chandrayaan-3 are being celebrated on social media platforms. Meanwhile, a video clip of Dr. Somanath, ISRO Chairman dancing among a crowd is widely shared to claim that he is partying after the successful landing of Chandrayaan-3. Some of the posts with similar claims can be seen here, here and here. Multiple news portals reported about it.
What is the truth?
When searching with relevant keywords we found the earliest posted version of the viral video on X (Twitter). The video started becoming viral after this post by a Journalist, Sidharth.M.P. This video is captioned “Dr. S. Somanath & team #isro… Celebrate and dance your hearts out tonight. How many ppl in the world have the power & knowledge to make 1.4+bn hearts swell with pride & joy!”
Pls note: This is a video from earlier this year and I had formal access to this entire event and that's how I had filmed it
This video is not from tonight!
— Sidharth.M.P (@sdhrthmp) August 23, 2023
However, in the next post, he clarified that the video was not recorded after Chandrayaan’s landing on the Moon. The video is said to have been recorded earlier this year by Sidharth when he had formal access to the entire event related to the viral video. His first tweet was amplified by many in thought that the video was recorded yesterday night due to the confusing caption.
Moreover, the initial post of the viral video by Sidharth is timed at 7.40 PM whereas we found a live video of Chandrayaan-3 landing on ISRO Facebook page. This video has reportedly started at 5.18 PM and lasts for 1:11:49 hours. And we just so happened to witness the video of Dr. Somanath dancing as we were watching his back-to-back interviews on TV channels following Chandrayaan’s landing.
In addition, his clothing looks to be different in the party video compared to the interview videos. Although he is dressed formally in both videos, it seems less plausible that the dance video was taken on August 23 immediately following Chandrayaan-3’s landing.
Conclusion
It is found that the video showing Dr. Somanath, Chairman of ISRO dancing is not recent but was recorded before the launch of Chandrayaan-3.
