A video of policemen entering a government school along with a group of civilians is widespread on social media. The video shows Muslim men, women and children reading in a classroom and the police taking a few people in custody at the behest of the civilians complaining that Islamic texts were being taught in a government school.

Twitter user Dr Ajay Alok (@alok_ajay), who describes himself as a ‘BJP karyakarta’, shared the video and took a jibe at AAP leaders Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia.  (Archive)

Same Video was Viral Last Year

BJP leader Ashwini Upadhyay shared the video in April 2022 with the caption, “Government school becomes madrasa.” He also posted it on Facebook.

DD News editor and anchor Ashok Srivastav claimed that the school is in Delhi. He later took down his tweet but an archived link can be accessed here.

The same video was also circulating last year with the claim that the school was located in Delhi. Twitter user ‘@rakesh_bstpyp’ wrote that Rohingyas had taken over Delhi’s government schools. The user identifies as an “editor of a newspaper” in his bio. The video racked up 86,000 views at the time of writing. (Archive link)

Several other Twitter users amplified the footage with the same claim. (Link 1, Link 2, Link 3)

Facebook user ‘Saffron Rajesh Singh’ also amplified the visuals, which garnered 3,900 views as of this writing. (Archive link)

 

👆दिल्ली के सरकारी स्कूलों को केजरीवाल ने मदरसे में बदलना शुरू कर दिया है दिल्ली के विजय नगर का एक सरकारी स्कूल👆

Posted by Saffron Rajesh Singh on Friday, November 26, 2021

The clip was also posted on Facebook and YouTube with the accompanying claim.

Fact Check

Upon taking a closer look at the video, we noticed a board in the background reading ‘Primary School Mirzapur’ in Hindi. This school is located in the Vijaynagar area of Ghaziabad. This means the incident occurred in Uttar Pradesh, not Delhi.

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Alt News reached out to the Vijaynagar police station for more information. The SHO informed us about a man named Riyazuddin who lived with his family in the primary school located in Vijaynagar. He was employed as a janitor and lived on the school premises. When his children suddenly fell ill, he made a pledge to organize a reading of the Quran once they were back to full health. The video was filmed when the reading took place. Though the police did not find them to be conducting any suspicious or illicit activities on the school premises, the matter was being investigated upon the insistence of local residents.

Alt News cannot confirm whether this family was granted the necessary permission to hold the event. However, this incident took place in Uttar Pradesh. The police said that they were no evidence of the group trying to “capture” the school premises but the organiser himself was employed by the school.

To sum it up, employees of a government school in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh organised a Quran reading. Social media users circulated a video of the incident falsely claiming that Rohingyas were trying to take over Delhi’s government schools.

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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.