Ever since American pop star Rihanna shared a news article on Twitter, voicing her support for the ongoing farmers’ protest in India, a picture has been circulating on social media in which she can be seen standing at a cricket stadium holding Pakistan’s national flag. 

However, the image, which has been shared several thousand times, has turned out to be morphed. Social media users, including BJP’s Uttar Pradesh spokesperson Shalabh Mani Tripathi, fell for the doctored image and shared it on their personal accounts.

Rihanna’s fake picture first appeared in a Facebook post on Wednesday. “Rihanna is the new godmother of the anti-government group. Now you can understand who she really is,” the caption of the photo reads in Hindi.

Interestingly, the original photo was taken from the International Cricket Council’s Twitter handle. The image, which was posted on July 1, 2019, shows Rihanna holding a flag with West Indies cricket’s official logo on it.

“Look who’s at #SLvWI to Rally ’round the West Indies!

Watch out for @rihanna’s new single, Shut Up And Cover Drive,” reads the caption of the original post.

Notably, Rihanna was heavily criticised on social media after she came out in open support of farmers protesting at various Delhi borders against the Centre’s newly enacted farm laws.  

“Why aren’t we talking about this?” she wrote on Twitter posting a CNN report on farmers’ protest on Tuesday.

Her post has garnered over 770,000 likes and 322,000 retweets till the time this copy was published. The global music sensation has over 101 million followers on the platform.

Tens of thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab and Haryana, have been camping at several borders of the national capital since November last year demanding the Centre to repeal the three agri laws.