Old video of 'rogue' jawan being captured shared as Indian army officer intercepting a "terrorist" - Alt News
Pooja Chaudhuri
25th October 2018 / 10:23 pm / Last updated: 22nd March 2019
On October 23, Twitter user Diwakar Kothari posted a video of an alleged incident where “an Indian army officer snatched an AK-47 from a terrorist”. The video was liked over 7,500 times and retweeted 4,200 times.
Soon after, it was also viral on Facebook.
After Diwarkar Kothari shared the video on Twitter, several users commented on his tweet alleging that neither was the incident recent nor was the man holding the gun a “terrorist”. A few others also said that the man snatching the gun was not an officer in the Indian army but a J&K cop.
Diwakar Kothari, who had initially posted the video, subsequently put out another tweet saying that it was pointed out to him that the man snatching the rifle might be a police officer.
Taking a hint from these tweets, Alt News searched for any reports in the media about a J&K police officer who snatched a gun from an officer in the Indian army. We stumbled upon a 2012 video of the same incident on YouTube, which was titled – “A brave DySP of J&K police Javed Iqbal Mir…2 part story: part 1.”
The description provided in the video said – “DySP (SOG) Javed Iqbal Mir is a hero in the real sense. As an accident happened in Poonch (J&K) on 7.03.2012, an incumbent of territorial army killed two women with his official weapon AK-47 as he was in search of his bewafa (unfaithful) wife. Mohd Tariq Khan fired indiscriminately for two hours in Alla-Pir locality before he (was) overpowered by this daring police officer. This clip is captured by my friend Shammi Bali, the official correspondent of NDTV.”
As the description suggested that the name of the alleged member of the Territorial Army was Mohd Tariq Khan, we backtraced media reports with the keywords ‘”Tariq Khan” Poonch killed’.
We found that the incident was reported by news organisations India TV and News18 in March 2012. According to these reports, “The jawan of the Territorial Army, Tariq Khan, opened fire from his service AK-47 rifle, killing the young women. Tariq Khan, reportedly, first tried to shoot his wife. Later, he was overpowered by fellow soldiers.”
India TV posted a video of the incident from a different angle. According to their reportage, the incident took place in Poonch’s Alla Pir on March 7, 2012, at around 8:30-9 am. Territorial Army jawan Tariq Khan took his service rifle home after duty, allegedly in search of his wife whom, he suspected, was having an affair. When Khan could not find his wife, he went to the terrace of his house and began to open fire thus, killing two women. India TV mentions that DSP (Poonch) Javed Iqbal intercepted Khan, and his wife was able to escape before another mishap.
Alt News contacted Javed Iqbal, who is currently posted as the SSP of Sopore. He confirmed to us that the man in the video snatching the rifle was indeed him.
Social media claims which suggest that a “terrorist” was intercepted by an officer in the Indian army are, thus, false.
Pooja Chaudhuri is a senior editor at Alt News.
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