Graphic footage of a man whose limbs have been severed is viral on social media. In the final seconds of the video, he is seen falling to the ground. Alt News will not be including a link to the visuals due to its disturbing nature. The video is being circulated on Twitter as the murder of an RSS worker in Kerala.

Another Twitter user shared the clip with this claim.

It has also made its way to WhatsApp with the accompanying claim.

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Fact-check

Taking a closer look at the video, we discovered that the language being spoken is not an Indian language, indicating that it is not from India.

Alt News then performed a reverse image search using frames from the video. We found that it had been posted on Facebook back in 2018. However, the user who posted it did not provide any additional information.

Upon further research, we came across a report dated August 4, 2018 on a website named ADN Sureste which said that the incident occurred in Ohaka, a city located in Mexico. At the time, two individuals from the city of Chahuites had been kidnapped and were reported missing.

A few other articles from 2018 (Link 1, Link 2) also reported that the violence occurred in Mexico, identifying it as murder by a drug cartel. One of these further states that the people recording the footage are interrogating the man and asking him, ‘Who murdered Juanito Castellanos?’.

To sum it up, a video of a murder in Ohaka, Mexico from around three years ago was falsely circulated on Indian social media as visuals of an RSS worker being killed. It is worth noting that there have not been any recent reports of such an incident from the state. The last incident of an RSS worker being killed in Kerala occurred over a month ago.

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About the Author

Kinjal Parmar holds a Bachelor of Science in Microbiology. However, her keen interest in journalism, drove her to pursue journalism from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication. At Alt News since 2019, she focuses on authentication of information which includes visual verification, media misreports, examining mis/disinformation across social media. She is the lead video producer at Alt News and manages social media accounts for the organization.