Pak DG ISPR Peddles Fake News, Posts Doctored Video of Retd IAF Air Marshal

Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman's clip -- which was released by the Pakistani military -- can be seen on the top right of the screen in the video posted by Ghafoor.

New Delhi: Pakistan’s Director-General of Inter-Services Public Relations, Asif Ghafoor, attracted ridicule after posting a doctored video of war hero and retired IAF Air Marshal, Denzil Keelor on Sunday.

Ghafoor shared a video of Keelor on his Twitter account, claiming that the war veteran was talking about the “Indian failure” during the dogfight between the Indian Air Force (IAF) and Pakistan Air Force (PAF) on February 27 this year, just a day after the Balakot airstrikes.

Admission of Indian failure and losses on 27 February 2019 by a well decorated Indian Airforce veteran Air Marshal Denzil Keelor.#Surprise pic.twitter.com/uTeErbucCl

— Asif Ghafoor (@peaceforchange) July 28, 2019

Netizens were quick to point out that the video was recorded in 2015, approximately four years before the Balakot and its ensuing incidents occurred in 2019.

In fact, the interview titled ‘Nehru lost India the war: Air Marshal Denzil Keelor speaks about India’s battle losses’ was posted by Wilderness Films India on Aug 9, 2015, on the video-sharing website, YouTube. The former Air Marshal was invited by the production house for a talk on the wars of 1962 and 1965, according to its description.

Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman’s clip — which was released by the Pakistani military — can be seen on the top right of the screen in the video posted by Ghafoor. The DG ISPR’s doctored video is interspersed with visuals of a crashed plane.

Twitterati strongly reacted to Ghafoor’s post, with many poking fun at his gaffe.

“Gafoora tomorrow will claim he landed on moon,” a Twitter user stated in response.

“You leave no stone unturned to advertise your incurable ‘foot in mouth’ disease. At your level, you should refrain from peddling amateurish morphed videos that make you a laughing stock on global platform. Kindly get a better video editor who bothers to edit out the giveaways,” another Twitter user @Shonkho wrote.

Falling short of an apology, Ghafoor later acknowledged that the Keelor clip shared by him was indeed doctored.

“The clip of Air Marshal is revealed to be doctored through inset. Admission and expression were too identical to differentiate. Unintentional omission is acknowledged, especially to Indians. Nonetheless, the environment remained unchanged for IAF on both the occasions,” he tweeted.

The DG ISPR is yet to delete the video or formally apologise for his misstep.