Karnataka hijab row: Video doctored to show Burj Khalifa honours Muskan Khan

The state of Karnataka has witnessed violent protests for the past several weeks due to several colleges barring hijab-wearing students from attending classes. As Muslim students protest against the ban, Hindu students, several instigated by right-wing outfits, have organised counter-protests which has led the violence to intensify.

Amidst these protests, a video from PES college in Mandya had recently gone viral where a group of men in saffron shawls tried to bully a Muslim student for wearing a burqa. The men approached her by shouting ‘Jai Shree Ram’ and attempted to stop her from entering the college but she yelled back ‘Allah-Hu-Akbar’ and stood her ground. The video of this confrontation quickly went viral and the young woman was later identified as Bibi Muskan Khan.

#KarnatakaHijabRow when a #hijabi student arrives at PES college in #Mandya. She gets heckled by students wearing #saffronshawls chanting #JaiSriRam. She raises her hand says “#AllahuAkbar befor being escorted by college staff. Video courtesy: Digvijaya News. #Karnataka pic.twitter.com/l17IL095Bv

— Imran Khan (@KeypadGuerilla) February 8, 2022

In the context of Muskan’s confrontation, a video is now in circulation that claims that the Burj Khalifa in Dubai was lit up to salute Muskan’s bravery. This video is extremely viral on Facebook. Alt News has received multiple requests on its official WhatsApp helpline number (+91 76000 11160) to verify the authenticity of this video.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Doctored video

We took a close look at the video and the first thing that came to our notice is the spelling of “Muskan”. In the viral video, the name has been misspelt as “Muskahan”. Had the Burj Khalifa actually lit up for Muskan, there is very less probability that the organisers would make a mistake this big.

Another observation that we made was the TikTok logo and the username @md.mahinkhan60. Almost all the videos shared had this username superimposed. Using this as a clue we looked for the original video on TikTok with the help of the TOR browser. The original video was of a higher resolution and one can immediately observe that the video has been doctored:

1. The name “Muskahan” doesn’t look like it was lit up on the building, instead, it looks like it is just flying/hovering in front of the building.
2. When the fountain water goes up one can observe that the photo of Muskan appears to move out of the building. It defies the basic laws of physics.
3. When the video stops, the building disappears but the name “Muskahan” keeps flashing on the screen. Which proves that the video was doctored.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

We also checked the official Twitter account of Burj Khalifa and found that the last time it was lit up for an occasion was during the Chinese New Year last month.

#BurjKhalifa welcomes the #ChineseNewYear! Catch the special LED and laser show dedicated to the Lunar New Year every evening till February 4th at 7:45 & 9:45 pm. pic.twitter.com/6osYiZZWFL

— Burj Khalifa (@BurjKhalifa) January 31, 2022

Hence, a doctored of the Burj Khalifa was shared on social media with the claim that the building was lit up to salute the bravery of Muskan, the young woman who stood up to the mob that tried to bully her for wearing the burqa.