Muharram procession video doctored with slogans against PM, Shiv Sena, Bajrang Dal - Alt News
Jignesh Patel
22nd July 2019 / 8:33 pm
A video of men wielding sticks and swords, where they can be heard raising slogans against PM Narendra Modi, Bajrang and Shiv Sena is being circulated on social media. Twitter user Sushil Kumar posted the video with a message, “भारत का डरा हुआ, खौफजदा, पीड़ित समुदाय, हाथों में तलवार लेकर शिवसेना हाय हाय और बजरंग दल हाय हाय के नारे लगा रहा है. भाई-भाई और सेक्युलरिज्म का विधवा विलाप करने वालों को नहीं दिखेगा यह सब. (India’s scared, intimidated, victim community, is wielding swords and chanting slogans against Shiv Sena and Bajrang Dal. People who talk about brotherhood and mourn like widows for secularism will not see this -translated)”. At the time of writing this article, the tweet has garnered more than 450 retweets.
भारत का डरा हुआ, खौफजदा, पीड़ित समुदाय, हाथों में तलवार लेकर शिवसेना हाय हाय और बजरंग दल हाय हाय के नारे लगा रहा है..
भाई-भाई और सेक्युलरिज्म का विधवा विलाप करने वालों को नहीं दिखेगा यह सब…..
हर हर महादेव🙏🏼🙏🏼 pic.twitter.com/tqzTGc7caL
— Sushil Kumar (@chsushilkumar) July 20, 2019
At the beginning of July 2019, the same video was shared with the narrative that the Muslim community was out on roads in Agra to protest against the mob-lynching of Tabrez Ansari in Jharkhand. Videos posted with identical narrative by Facebook pages – Ai MiM Rayachoty youth and Dhaka New imim Club – have been shared close to 37,000 times and viewed in excess of 7 lakh times.
Using the digital verification Invid, Alt News broke the video into multiple frames and found a fact-check article published by Aaj Tak. According to the article, the video is from Gopalganj, Bihar. The same video posted by a YouTube user on November 4, 2014, was one of the earliest instances that Alt News could trace. From 0:24 mins to 1:17 mins in this longer version of the same video, the 53-second viral clipping can be seen.
Seeing this video, it is evident that the audio heard in the viral clip, now falsely shared as from Agra, was superimposed with the sloganeering against PM Modi, Shiv Sena and Bajrang Dal. In the unadulterated version of the video posted in 2014, only the sounds of drum beating can be heard.
With a Google search of the slogan“हिंदुस्तान में रहना होगा अल्लाह हू अकबर कहना होगा (If you want to live in India then you will have to say Allah hu Akbar -translation)”, Alt News found a YouTube video posted on December 29, 2017. From the start till 53 seconds in the video posted below, the same audio which was superimposed over the viral clipping can be heard.
According to a report by India TV, the said incident took place in Udaipur on December 13, 2017, where similar slogans against Shiv Sena, Bajrang Dal and PM Modi were chanted. The protest took place in the backdrop of the brutal killing of a Muslim labourer, by a man named Shambu Lal Regar. It was held at Chetak Circle in Udaipur, Rajasthan.
In conclusion, it may be stated,
1. The video is of a Muharram procession which took place in Bihar in 2014
2. The audio is from a protest which took place in Udaipur, Rajasthan in 2017
This clip was manufactured by superimposing the audio from the Udaipur protest on to the video from Bihar.
Jignesh is a writer and researcher at Alt News. He has a knack for visual investigation with a major interest in fact-checking videos and images. He has completed his Masters in Journalism from Gujarat University.
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