Two photographs have been widely shared across social media platforms with the claim, “RSS goons has attacked on a Hindu woman who attempt sehri for a muslim Kashmiri girl.” The first image shows a woman standing beside a girl eating food and the second photo shows the woman with a wounded nose.
The claim has been shared by several users on Twitter and Facebook.
Alt News has also received several fact-check requests on its official mobile application.
Fact-check
A close look at the collage reveals that the woman in both images is not the same. A reverse image search led us to a Twitter post from April 25 where the image on the left was shared. “A Hindu lady wake up early morning to feed Sehri to a Muslim girl. This is the Beauty of my Country Flag of India. Long Live Humanity . #HumanityFirst #RamadanMubarak,” reads the caption by Twitter user @Fajahatfarooqbt. On the bottom right, the photograph carries a date – April 25, 2020.
The second image was found in a tweet by @manishwar29. It was shared on February 24 with the caption, “Gujrat they are testing the patience of majority and initiating the one sided violence people like u are responsible for such incident we knew u r waiting for moment when reactions take place to capitalise ur agenda.”
#Khambhat Gujrat
they are testing the patience of majority and initiating the one sided violence
people like u are responsible for such incident
we knew u r waiting for moment when reactions take place to capitalise ur agenda .
— Manish हिन्दु 🦁 Pandey (@manishwar29) February 24, 2020
Furthermore, several users posted the same image between February 23 and 25. A close look reveals a notice in the background where “શાંતિ જાળવો” is written in Gujarati. This translates to “Maintain Silence”.
A keyword search ‘Khambhat CAA protest’ led us to a TV9 Gujarati broadcast from February 25 which reported on violence between two communities in the area. At 1:41 minutes, the woman from the viral image is spotted in the broadcast.
The collage above makes it evident that the woman is the same – identical hairline, nose structure and wrinkles on the neck. The place of the wound is also the same.
Therefore, photographs depicting two different incidents were clubbed together to promote the false claim that a Hindu woman was beaten up for preparing sehri for a Muslim Kashmiri girl. The misinformation has been shared in the wake of Ramzan which began on April 23.