A video clip of children singing has claimed that students in Mardan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are being forced to sing political songs of the ruling party in the province instead of the national anthem of Pakistan.
The claim is misleading. The video is old, not new.
Claim
On January 15, a user on X (formerly Twitter) shared a one-minute video of children singing a Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) campaign song. The user claimed that children were asked to sing the song instead of the national anthem at a school in Mardan.
The post reads The post has been viewed over 10,000 times, reposted over 280 times, and liked over 467 times.
The same video was shared by another user with the claim that since PTI came to power in the province after the 2024 elections, students have been forced to sing the PTI anthem instead of the national anthem of Pakistan.
The user further said, “In this way, the minds of the new generation of Pakistan are brainwashed.”
Do
The video in question is not recent. It was filmed in 2018, much before PTI’s recent election victory in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the district education officer in Mardan and media reports confirm this.
Zahid Muhammad, District Education Officer for Mardan, informed Fact check that the video was recorded six years ago. He further clarified that no such incident has occurred recently.
He said: “I have been working here for two years, and there has been no such incident recently. The video dates back to 2018, when a child sang the PTI anthem at an event, like a day “Following this, the teacher, school head and deputy education officer of the sub-division present at the event were suspended by the then PTI government.”
Fact check also found a news report from November 2018, which confirmed that the PTI government took note of the incident. The report details how children were made to sing political songs, prompting swift punishment for the parties responsible.
Verdict: The video of the children singing the PTI song was filmed in 2018. After the video circulated, authorities took disciplinary action and suspended the teachers involved. The claim that this incident happened recently under the current PTI governance in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is false.
