{"id":296855,"date":"2025-04-10T21:34:20","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T16:04:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.altnews.in\/english-clone-2026\/?p=296855"},"modified":"2025-04-10T21:34:20","modified_gmt":"2025-04-10T16:04:20","slug":"kancha-gachibowli-forest-clearance-in-telangana-sparks-wave-of-unrelated-ai-generated-visuals-of-animal-suffering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.altnews.in\/english-clone-2026\/kancha-gachibowli-forest-clearance-in-telangana-sparks-wave-of-unrelated-ai-generated-visuals-of-animal-suffering\/","title":{"rendered":"Kancha Gachibowli forest clearance in Telangana sparks wave of unrelated, AI-generated visuals of animal suffering"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amid the outcry over the Telangana government’s clearance drive of the Kancha Gachibowli<\/a> forested land, near the University of Hyderabad (UoH), social media was rife with images and videos showing animals hurt or suffering. Among the visuals that went viral was one of an elephant with an injury on its trunk, one of an enraged tusker trying to topple a bulldozer, and another showing peacocks and deer being chased by earthmovers. Users sharing these claimed it showed the plight of the poor animals who were suffering because of political decisions to raze down the biodiversity-rich forest in Kancha Gachibowli<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For context, in February this year, the Congress-ruled Telangana government, led by Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy, decided to auction off 400 acres of forest land <\/a>next to the university to build IT parks. The location is believed to have prime real estate potential, and the government argues the “development” would bring in a lot of investment and jobs.<\/p>\n

On March 30, earthmovers were brought in and clearance of the land began, triggering a massive wave of protests by UoH students in which 53 were detained and two arrested and sent to judicial custody. Several people were also injured. With the situation escalating, two Public Interest Litigations (PILs) were filed before the Telangana High Court. On April 2, the court issued an interim order directing the government to stop the forest clearing activities until the next hearing. The following day, April 3, the Supreme Court also intervened. Taking suo moto cognisance of the matter, it sought an explanation from the Telangana administration on why it was clearing the land with such urgency. The apex court issued a directive to stop the “alarming deforestation activities” until further notice and has asked a central empowered committee to examine the site and submit a report by April 16.<\/p>\n

In this story, we will examine three viral visuals\u2014two separate videos with elephants and an image showing deer and peacocks running from bulldozers. Alt News has already fact checked one viral video showing burnt carcasses of animals, which social users claimed was from Telangana<\/a> but turned out to be from a fire in Uttar Pradesh.<\/p>\n

Visual 1:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The first viral video is a 10-second clip showing an elephant with a hole in its trunk. Those sharing this video claimed that the animal was hit and injured by the Telangana government’s bulldozer. Users criticised the government for not arranging any medical care for the elephant.<\/p>\n

X account @umanngjain shared this clip on April 7<\/a> with a Hindi caption that translates to: “The Congress government in Telangana doesn\u2019t even have a proper veterinarian to treat this injured elephant that was hurt by a government JCB \ud83d\ude24 @peta Where have you all gone silent?? #SaveHCUBioDiversity”.<\/p>\n

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At the time of this article being written, the post<\/a> garnered over 280,000 views and was reshared about 6,900 times. (Archive<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Several others also shared the video with similar captions. Below are a few instances.<\/p>\n