Old video from West Bengal falsely linked to Nuh violence

Context

In the aftermath of the communal clashes that broke out amid a religious procession on July 31 in several parts of Haryana in which seven people were killed, many videos and photos on social media are claiming to show visuals of the violence. One such video showing a procession of kids marching with weapons and green religious flags was shared on X (formerly Twitter) linking it with the communal tension in Haryana. A user shared the video with the caption, "#GuruGramViolence peacefully religion." The post gained over 10k views. Similar posts were shared on social media with such captions. An archived version of the post can be found here.

However, the claim is false. A video of Muharram procession in West Bengal was falsely linked to Nuh violence. 

In fact

We carefully observed the viral video and identified a green, globe-shaped statue along with a poster of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in the background. 

The globe-shaped statue is the symbol of the Biswa Bangla Initiative - a state government initiative promoting  culture, art, craft, and West Bengal heritage. 

The statue of the globe and Banerjee's poster in the viral video suggests that the video is from West Bengal.

Further research showed a user named Shaikh Aptaj Bharatiya first shared the video on Facebook saying the incident is from Murshidabad. Although the user deleted the video, he confirmed to Logically Facts that he shot the video, and the one being shared amid the Nuh violence is the same. 

Saif Ahmed, a local from Murshidabad's Dhuliyan, also confirmed that the video is from the area and shows a Muharram rally. He assisted us in geo-locating the place, pinpointing the video's origin to CJ Patel More Road on Bidhan Chandra Road. On comparing the viral video with Google Street View, we identified the Biswa Bangla Globe and Banerjee’s poster in both videos.

"I captured the video on July 29 when a Muharram rally was passing through Dhuliyan main road. The video was taken near Allahabad Bank at around 2:00-2:30 pm. These rallies happen every year. I uploaded the video on July 29th and later deleted it. The claims are baseless, and the video is not from Haryana," Aptaj told Logically Facts.

He also sent us a screenshot of the video he uploaded.

The verdict

A video of a Muharram rally in Murshidabad, West Bengal, was falsely linked to the Nuh violence incident in Haryana. The viral video shows a Muharram rally and has no communal angle. Therefore, we have marked this claim as false.