PTI Fact Check: FIFA will not keep Pele’s feet in museum, social media posts shared with false claim

Similar claims were shared by many other users.In the first step of the PTI Fact Check investigation to verify the veracity of the claim, the team conducted a Google search with the keywords Peles feet kept in museum.

A Facebook claim that Pele's feet would be kept in a museum with the permission of his family led to waves on social media platforms given the huge popularity of the football legend who died on December 29 last year. But the claim was incorrect and no such move was ever planned, FIFA told PTI.

The post was published on January 3 this year. Similar claims were shared by many other users.

In the first step of the PTI Fact Check investigation to verify the veracity of the claim, the team conducted a Google search with the keywords 'Pele's feet kept in museum'. There was no such report. Any such news about the iconic footballer with millions of fans across the world would have created a global splash.

In the next step, the team scanned FIFA's official website as well as its social media handles for any announcement. It also searched the website and Twitter handles of TNT Sports, cited in the photo shared in the social media post, but couldn't find any related information.

Step three was a Google search with different sets of keywords related to Pele's death. This yielded several news reports covering Brazilian great's funeral procession. The 'king of soccer' was laid to rest in Santos on January 3.

The Fact Check team then emailed FIFA to verify the claim shared in the Facebook post. In its email reply, a spokesperson of the organisation that governs the sport, said emphatically, "We completely refute this claim." The conclusion was that the claim shared by social media users about Pele and FIFA was false.

Readers can contact PTI Fact Check team on WhatsApp Number +91-8130503759 to share a claim or social media post they would like fact checked.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)