Claim: Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari is tying the knot with Mahenoor Soomro, granddaughter of Pakistan Peoples Party’s founding member late Ruqiya Khanum Soomro.
Fact: Mahenoor has denied the rumours, urging people to avoid spreading fake news regarding her marriage.
Fact or Fiction?
On 20 October 2022, the Facebook page Jaanlo claimed that PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari is likely to get married to Mahenoor Soomro.
“Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairman and Federal Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari is likely to tie the knot with Mahnoor Soomro, granddaughter of PPP founding member Ruqia Khanum Soomro, according to sources,” the caption of the post reads.
The claim was also picked up by other pages, including here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here, among others.
Soch Fact Check found the claim to be false. Responding to rumours about her marriage with Bilawal, Mahenoor took to Twitter to urge people to stop spreading fake news.
“Kindly avoid spreading fake news regarding my marriage! Chairman @BBhuttoZardari is my party leader and PPP is family to all jiyalas! Thank you,” she tweeted on 20 October 2022.
https://twitter.com/mahenoor28/status/1583084725044154371?s=20&t=zcQFaXcGijj1ghQmkWHjhQ
Earlier in September, a reporter on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly asked Bilawal about his marriage plans, to which the politician responded, “Of course I have plans to marry,” but “I am in no rush.”
Virality
According to a CrowdTangle analysis conducted by Soch Fact Check, the search term, “Bilawal Bhutto Mahnoor Soomro”, turned up 34 posts on Facebook which received 6,966 interactions over the three-day period leading up to 21 October 2022.
The claim became fairly popular and was shared by multiple Facebook pages, many of which carried it with the same or very similar captions:
- Bilawal Bhutto likely to tie the know with Mahnoor Soomro
- Bilawal Bhutto’s possible wife revealed
- Mahnoor Soomro likely to become Bilawal Bhutto’s life partner
The analysis revealed that Hello Pakistan’s post is performing over 24 times better than other similar posts, with 606 likes and 33 shares. Meanwhile, Jaanlo’s post gained 1,000 likes and 81 shares. Parhlo’s post received 450 likes and 21 shares.
On Twitter, the claim was shared here, here, here, here and here.
Conclusion: Mahenoor Soomro has denied speculations of tying the knot with Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari.