Delhi Congress leader Asif Khan’s spat with cop: Old video viral with false ‘Pakistan Zindabad’ claims

A 1:26-minute-long video has gone viral on social media, capturing a man engaged in a heated altercation with a police officer and threatening him. The claim accompanying the video suggests that the incident occurred in Madhya Pradesh. It is alleged that the police officer was threatened by a Congress leader and his supporters when he tried to prevent them from chanting pro-Pak slogans.

Sharing this video on Twitter, user Harsh Vyas wrote in Hindi, “The condition of a policeman who attempted to stop a Congress leader from raising Pakistan Zindabad slogan… These people threatened him. Imagine if Congress comes to power in the country or in the state, there’ll be chaos everywhere.” (Archive)

मध्यप्रदेश के एक कांग्रेसी नेता को पाकिस्तान जिंदाबाद नारा लगाने से रोकने वाले पुलिस कर्मियों की हालत खराब कर दी ये लोग बेचारे को जान से मारने की धमकी देने लगे सोचो अगर देश में और राज्य में अगर गलती से भी कांग्रेस आ गई तो पूरे देश में हाहाकार मच जायेगा….. pic.twitter.com/BQ3CmQ3wha

— Harsh Vyas 🇮🇳 (@Harsh2147) June 25, 2023

Twitter users @engineerssahab, @sanjaymakwana62, @KailasSanatani, @mukeshgavel, and various others shared the video with the same claim.

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The video has been uploaded multiple times on Facebook, where it is being shared along with the original Hindi caption.

Fact Check

After conducting a keyword search on Google, we came across a report from November 2022 by India Today that featured the same video. According to the report, the individual holding the microphone in the video was former Congress MLA Asif Khan, and the incident took place in the Shaheen Bagh locality of Delhi.

Several reports on the incident state that Khan allegedly organized a gathering in support of his daughter, Ariba Khan, who was a Congress candidate in the Delhi municipal polls, without obtaining permission from the State Election Commission. In connection with the incident, Khan, along with two others, was later arrested under sections 186 and 353 of the Indian Penal Code, which pertains to assault or criminal force intended to deter a public servant from discharging their duties.

The report does not make any reference to the raising of pro-Pak slogans. In fact, multiple reports pertaining to this incident that have been published but none of them mentions any such slogan being raised.

We also examined the original video, which is publicly available. It is evident from various instances during the altercation that the slogan being raised was “Asif Khan Zindabad.” For example, in the video report shared by The Times of India, a distinct chant of ‘Asif Khan Zindabad’ can be heard at the 0:37-second mark. Furthermore, at 1:05 and 1:23 minutes into the video, a child near the microphone can be heard starting to raise the slogan but abruptly stopping midway, the mic captures the ‘Asif Khan’ part in both instances.

Furthermore, upon examining the copy of the FIR filed in this case, we found no mention of pro-Pak slogans being raised during the gathering. The PDF copy of the FIR can be accessed here.

In conclusion, a video capturing a confrontation between former Congress MLA Asif Khan and a police officer, which took place in Delhi last year, was inaccurately shared as an incident from Madhya Pradesh. The false claim suggested that a police officer was threatened for intervening when the Congress leader attempted to raise pro-Pak slogans.