Viral video of crops being injected is scripted, ‘poisoning people’ claims are baseless

A video of three young men standing in a field and injecting something into crops has been making the rounds on social media. The person filming the footage is heard saying that the trio are using injections to grow vegetables. While sharing the video, social media users have demanded that they be identified and appropriate action is taken against them.

A handle named ‘NCIB Headquarters’ tweeted the video and wrote that these were devils hiding in the guise of farmers who are worshipped as ‘Annadata (provider of food)’. He added that they were poisoning people in the process. In addition, he called upon the government to identify such people and take action by invoking the National Security Act against them. The tweet was later deleted. (Archived link)

Journalist Akhilesh Tiwari also made a similar claim while tweeting the clip. (Archived link)

The footage is widespread on social media platforms with the accompanying claim.

Fact Check

Alt News performed a search on Facebook using keywords related to this video. We found an extended version of the clip in question uploaded by a page called Fatima Bonatto on September 2. In the caption of the post, the user has included a disclaimer which states that this video has been made only for the purpose of spreading awareness and was not meant to be taken seriously. A disclaimer also appears in this video at the 3:05 mark in the clip. This can be seen more clearly in the screenshot given below.

The disclaimer can be hard to spot as some text has been added on top of it. However, it clearly mentions that this is not based on any persons, living or dead, and similarity to any actual events is purely coincidental. It is worth noting that this is part of the standard format of any disclaimer.

Alt News examined the page more closely and found more such scripted videos uploaded on it. We found another clip posted on August 29, 2023. In this clip, the same three young men are seen injecting brinjals with something. A disclaimer appears at the 2:18 mark which states that this video is completely fictional, and the events shown in it are scripted and meant to spread awareness.

We also performed a search on YouTube to gather more information. This led us to a similar video uploaded on a YouTube channel named Social Message on November 21, 2022. It is worth noting that it features the same young man seen holding a syringe in his hand in the viral video. In this video too, there is a disclaimer at the 0:18 mark which clearly states that the incidents shown in the video are scripted and have been scripted only for the purpose of creating awareness.

To sum it up, several social media users falsely shared a scripted video of a group of young boys injecting crops in a field, and claimed it to be a real incident.