Images of a corpse of a beheaded woman lying supine are widely circulating on social media with the claim that the body of a gang-rape victim was found in a forest in Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh. One @sonamSi93 tweeted the images and wrote, “#सहारनपुर: जंगल में लकड़ी बीनने गई लड़की के साथ हुआ गैंगरेप, दरिंदों ने गैंग रेप करने के बाद पीड़िता की निर्मम हत्या कर दी। (Saharanpur: A woman who had gone to collect woods in the forest was gang-raped and brutally murdered.)“
The same images have also been shared on Facebook.
The photographs are viral on both Twitter and Facebook.
OLD PHOTO
A reverse search of the image on Google reveals that it is from 2017. This was also pointed out by Twitter user Riaz Ahmed. According to a report in Oneindia published on October 30, 2017, a beheaded dead body of a young woman was found in the village of Bhavpur in Auraiya’s Kotwali area. The body, with the head and hands chopped-off, was discovered by villagers who alleged rape.
An earlier report by Newstrack states that the incident took place on October 29, 2017. The case was also reported by Punjab Kersari.
Alt News contacted Saharanpur SSP Dinesh Kumar who clarified that false claims are circulating on social media suggesting that the photographs depict a recent incident in the city. Saharanpur police also debunked the misinformation in a tweet.
— Saharanpur Police (@saharanpurpol) December 7, 2019
We were unable to locate any follow-up reports on the case thus specific particulars of the case could not be established. However, as the photographs have been available on the internet since 2017, they cannot represent a recent incident.
Images of a beheaded corpse of a woman, allegedly raped, found in a farm in UP’s Auraiya in 2017 have been shared as a recent case that took place in Saharanpur. Since the gang-rape and murder of a veterinary doctor in Hyderabad, social media has been brimming with misinformation around rape crimes.
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