Pakistani Mufti provoking people to flout lockdown shared to target Indian Muslims

On April 13, a Facebook profile which goes by the name Karamveer Chamar Hindu Yodha posted a video of a person addressing a crowd. After listening to the audio, it is understood that the people in the crowd are members of the Muslim community. The man addressing the crowd says that if the government is saying that not more than five people are allowed to offer namaz inside a mosque then he will strongly oppose all the government orders. He ends the speech with an indication to violence and says that if required “we are even ready to bleed for it”. The message shared along with the video target the Muslim community without providing details such as where the video was shot.

This video has been shared by several Indians on Twitter and Facebook. While most of these posts don’t claim that the video is from India, the attack is certainly directed at the Muslim community. Some of the captions express resentment that these people are disobeying the government’s directives.

Alt News has also received requests on its official WhatsApp number (+91 76000 11160) to fact-check this video.

Video from Pakistan

Upon listening to the address we came across two important sentences which are quoted below:

1. “We won’t adhere to their order to vacate keep the mosque. We have seen the jail, we have also seen (coherent part, could not be translated). We have seen the military, we have seen the rule. We only fear Allah and not anyone else.”
2. “…if they do it then we will be forced to understand that mosques are kept vacant on the orders from America.”

In the first sentence, there are mentions of jail, military, and rule. This hints at the political system in Pakistan. The country was a military rule for many years but before identifying as a democracy. This is also corroborated by the fact that the man says that they are keeping the mosques vacant on American orders. Critics of the Pakistani government have often alleged that the Pakistani government heeds to the US’s demands.

Based on this observation, we performed a keyword search on Google and found an article published by international news agency Reuters on April 13. According to the report, a large number of people in Pakistan are flouting the government’s directive and violating lockdown rules.

“A prominent leader of a religious party told a crowd of hundreds of people gathered for a funeral last week that government orders to limit congregations were unacceptable,” stated the report. The statement by Mufti Kafayatullah as heard in the viral video has been quoted in the report -“If you do this, we will be forced to think that mosques are being deserted on America’s instructions.”
With a keyword search on Twitter, we found the same video posted by Twitter handle @SAMRIReports. According to the tweet, Kafayatullah is a Mufti of the Deobandi sect.

#Deobandi cleric Mufti Kifayatullah: We shall adopt protective measures against #COVID19 but won’t let anyone close mosques and ban congregational prayers. If Pakistan govt tries to close mosques at the behest of USA, we shall sacrifice our lives to foil that American conspiracy. pic.twitter.com/t37qigwfFJ

— SAMRI (@SAMRIReports) April 11, 2020

Based on the above tweet and the Reuters report, it can be said with certainty that the video is from Pakistan. However, it is being shared in India to target the minority community despite ti having nothing to do with Indian Muslims.