A social media user along with officials of ruling party, Bhartiya Janata Party, posted a video of Muslim protestors holding guns, linking it to recent orders by Uttar Pradesh’s government to demolish house of Muslim activist, Afreen Fatima, for protesting against remarks made by BJP’s Nupur Sharma.
(Screenshot from Facebook post)
(Screenshot from Twitter post)
Debunked Source
https://www.facebook.com/100003927970232/videos/553870499578298/
*ये हैं कानपुर के जिहादी जो खुल्लम खुल्ला अत्याधुनिक हथियारों से कर रहे था अंधाधुंध फायरिंग और पुलिस सिर्फ आंसू गैस के ही गोले छोड़ रहीं थी,इनका इलाज हैं सीधी गोली एक बार अगर दस बीस उड़ गए तो फिर ये लोग जल्दी से हिमाकत नहीं करेंगे😡* pic.twitter.com/mo8jhuvhhZ
— Santosh Chauhan Sudarshan News (@Santosh_Stv) June 11, 2022
https://mobile.twitter.com/harshcha/status/1535918481241083904
Fact Check
In order to investigate the claim, we extracted key frames and performed a reverse image search.
Reverse search revealed that video dates back to 12th May 2021. The incident took place in Dhauratanda, UP amid clash between two communities; Qureshi’s and Banjara over the price of meat. Indian news site “Amarujala” reported Jaleesh Ahmed had given his shop on rent to Salim Qureshi on the condition that meat will be sold in the shop “legally”. On the day of the altercation, it was alleged that Qureshi allegedly inflated the price of cow meat to Rs 250/kg from Rs 150, which led to a dispute. Ahmed asked Qureshi to vacate the place, and the people of the Banjara community physically assaulted Qureshi, after which Qureshi’s family members reached the spot with licensed as well as illegal weapons. They fired in the open, causing a stampede. Ahmed belonged to the Banjara community.
(Screenshot from Amarujala news website)
Source
Rating
Misleading/Propaganda
Conclusion
Our fact-check confirmed that a year-old video from Dhaura Tanda village where two parties of the same community fought over the price of meat was falsely shared as a video from Kanpur and linked to protests against Nupur Sharma in order to fire up ongoing communal clashes in India.
ABCDE Framework-Based Analysis
| Actor | Religious extremists and BJP leaders on social media are involved in disseminating the misleading content. |
| Behavior | Old videos with misleading statements are posted by religious extremists to incite religious bigotry and spread more hatred against Muslims in the country through fake news. |
| Content | Videos with misleading captions are posted. |
| Degree | The target audience of this disinformation are Muslims residing in India who are prone to be targeted while remedying disinformation. The circulated video is not forged, but it is old and wrongly associated with recent protests. |
| Effect | Disinformation campaigns are created and run by religious extremists across the country targeting religious minorities which leads to hate speech, death threats and mob lynching incidents. |