Fact-check: Is Nawaz Sharif’s BA degree fake?

Multiple posts shared on social media appear to show a screenshot of the undergraduate certificate issued to former prime minister Nawaz Sharif in 1968.

Twitter users, and a news channel, claim Sharif’s educational certificate is fabricated as it carries a recent picture of him, rather than one from 1968, when he graduated.

The claim is false.

Claim

“The Sharif family have been caught in yet another digital scandal,” alleged BOL Television in a news report aired on June 16, “How does a BA (bachelors) degree of Nawaz Sharif issued in 1968 have a picture of him from the year 2000?”

The video has been liked nearly 1,000 times and viewed over 13,000 times.

On June 17, a Twitter user posted the same video clip alongside the caption: “The big news is that Nawaz Sharif’s degree has turned out to be fake.”

Fact

The document circulating online is not the 1968 educational certificate of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, but merely an application Sharif sent recently to obtain a copy of his bachelor's certificate, an official at the University of the Punjab told Geo Fact Check.

The official, who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, also shared the original application sent by Sharif on June 7. A duplicate bachelor’s certificate was issued to Sharif the very next day.

In fact the document [seen below] is clearly headlined: “Application Forms For Certificates.”

The official also shared a copy of the Rs2,990 deposit Sharif made to obtain a copy of his bachelor’s degree.

“He [Nawaz Sharif] was a student of Government College, Lahore, which was back then affiliated with the University of the Punjab,” the official said over the phone, “At that time there was only one university [University of the Punjab] and all educational degrees were also issued by it.”

— With additional reporting by Nadia Khalid

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