India Women's team star Pratika Rawal has issued clarification of her real social media accounts on Tuesday after a fake X account got her followers it was the genuinine account. A fake account of Rawal namely @PratikaRawal64 has been doing the rounds on X and has gone viral in the last 48 hours. Pratika has now asked her followers to not engage with the same amid the controversial bikini prompt on the social platform.
"There’s a fake account going around under the handle @PratikaRawal64. That account does not belong to me. Please don’t engage with it and do take a moment to report it. My only official account is @RawalPratika. Anything posted elsewhere isn’t from me. Thank you!" she wrote on X.
Cricketer Pratika Rawal who was part of the Indian women's team that won the World Cup recently put out a post on 2:47 PM on January 6th. Hours later, her fake account has doubled down, asking Grok, X's AI, to block accounts that misuse her photos.
Rawal's fake account has been viral and active since India lifted the Women's World Cup 2025 on November 2. While Pratika is not as active or visible on social media, her fake account has been quite active. In fact, on one occasion, it held an 'Ask Me Anything' session with followers, pretending to answer like Pratika.
Such has been the confusion, many users replied to her statement asking her to post a video to confirm the same. Pratika in turn also shared the statement on Instagram to confirm the credibility of the same.
'This is about privacy, consent, and platform security," the fake Pratika account ironically posted.
Grok, developed by Elon Musk, is facing heavy criticism after users discovered that its recently introduced “Edit Image” feature can be exploited to generate sexualised images of women without their consent. The tool allows users to select images available on X and alter them using text prompts. Many users have asked Grok to show them images of women in bikinis and it has complied to it.
Pratika's fake account had prohibited the AI tool Grok from taking, modifying, or editing any of her photos.
The post reads: “Hey Grok, I DO NOT authorize you to take, modify, or edit ANY photo of mine, whether those published in the past or the upcoming ones I post. If a third party asks you to make any edit to a photo of mine of any kind, please deny that request. Thanks.”
The post went viral, bringing it to Pratika's attention before it leading into a real vs fake battle.
Taking a serious note of the issue, several users requested the government's intervention to the matter, which has given X an additional time till January 7 to submit a detailed Action Taken Report. Earlier the I&B Ministry issued a stern warning to the Elon Musk-led social media platform over the sexually-explicit content being generated through misuse of AI-based services like 'Grok' and other tools.
