Is this Image showing children walking to school on muddy, damaged roads from UP? Fact Check

Claim: Image shows school  children walking to school on muddy, damaged roads in Uttar Pradesh.

Conclusion: Misrepresentation. The image does not show damaged roads from Uttar Pradesh but it is from Gadchiroli district in Maharashtra. Moreover this is an old claim from 2018 going viral again.

Rating: Misrepresentation —

*****************************************************************************

A viral image is being shared across various social media platforms showing children in their school uniform walking through a muddy rural path to school. Posted by a FaceBook user on 9th July 2025, the link to image purportedly shows the condition of roads from Uttar Pradesh and alleges that the UP government is shutting that school.

The caption of the post in Hindi read :

“स्कूल” जाने के रास्ते बना दो,

हम “मंगल” पे जाने के रास्ते बना देंगे..!!!

उत्तर प्रदेश सरकार.

Translated in English, it reads:
“Make a way to go to “school”
We will make a way to go to “Mars”..!!!
Uttar Pradesh government.
Could not make a way to the school.
So thought of closing the school.
If there is no bamboo, there will be no flute.”

Another X user shares the same picture and suggests that the schools should be shut down if there are no good roads, building a narrative in this direction.

जब बच्चों को अच्छे शिक्षक ना‌ दे सको तो स्कूल बंद कर दो

जब बच्चों को स्कूल जाने के लिए अच्छी सड़के ना‌ दे सको तो स्कूल बंद कर दो

जब स्कूल नहीं होंगे तो शिक्षक भर्ती की जरूरत भी नहीं पड़ेगी

जब स्कूल नहीं होंगे तो बच्चों के मिड डे मील का खर्च भी नहीं आएगा pic.twitter.com/BmI1lmIB9g pic.twitter.com/HusGAaDFnw

— मृगांका सिंह (Political Critic and Writer) (@reach2msingh) July 12, 2025

Translation: “When you can’t provide children with good teachers, shut down the school. When you can’t provide good roads for children to go to school, shut down the school. When there are no schools, there will be no need to recruit teachers. When there are no schools, there will be no expenses for children’s mid-day meals either.”

ये हाल है विश्व की चौथी अर्थव्यवस्था वाले देश का….

देश के जिस भी क्षेत्र में बच्चों के स्कूल जाने के लिए सड़क नहीं है, मतलब वहां के विधायक सांसद निक्कमे हैं। pic.twitter.com/T5iXA2Hvka

— Kanchan Toppo (@Kanchankt14) July 11, 2025

Translation: “This is the state of the country with the world’s fourth-largest economy… In any region of the country where there is no road for children to go to school, it means the local MLA and MP are useless.”

Here’s a YouTube video with the same image.

FACT CHECK:

DigitEYE India decided to investigate the claim as the same image is being circulated in social media several times. When we conducted a Google reverse image search, we found that it was an old image posted on Facebook on July 26, 2018 without any caption.

Agian the same image was posted by an X user on September 6 , 2024 that gained 98,000 views.

अरबों रुपए लूटने वाले विधायक, सांसद, मंत्री, IAS, IPS के बेटे लंडन, अमेरिका, यूरोप में पढ़ रहे हैं,

आपके बच्चे इन रास्तों से गुजरकर स्कूल जाते हैं,
जहां ना मूलभूत सुविधाएं हैं, और ना ही ठीक अनुपात में शिक्षक, pic.twitter.com/x342x5N9xj

— ANIL (@AnilYadavmedia1) September 6, 2024

Translated, the post reads:

“Sons of MLAs, MPs, ministers, IAS, and IPS officers who looted billions of rupees are studying in London, America, and Europe, Your children pass through these roads to go to school, where there are neither basic facilities nor teachers in adequate proportion.”

On further investigation, we found a news report from Dinaik Bhaskar in Hindi, published on 16 Aug 2019.

The report titled ““कीचड़ में गिरते संभलते स्कूल पहुंचते हैं बच्चे, सैकड़ों गांवों में स्कूल तक पहुंचने के लिए नहीं सड़क” (Translated into English it reads : Children reach school by falling and getting up in the mud, there is no road in hundreds of villages to go to school.) The article also uses the same image associated with the viral claim on social media.

The news report here begins with an introduction about how children are attending Zila Parishad schools in the Aheri division. Aheri is a town and sub-division in the Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra. The article also mentions other sub-divisions of Gadchiroli, such as Sironcha, Bhamragarh, Etapalli and Mulchera.

As seen in the image above, the news report also sheds light on the condition of the Gadchiroli district, observing it as a remote, tribal-dominated and Naxal-affected district of Maharashtra. It alleged that despite the government spending crores of rupees every year under various schemes for the all-round development of this district, lack of coordination between local officials and representatives has hindered the progress.

Thus, the road image from Gadchiroli district in Maharashtra is being claimed as that of Uttar Pradesh, that too an old image from 2018. Hence the claim is false.