Video of man bulldozing toll plaza in Uttar Pradesh shared with communal spin

What’s the claim?

Social media users on X (formerly Twitter) shared a video of an incident on 11 June 2024, showing visuals of a bulldozer driver destroying a toll plaza with a claim that the incident occurred in the North Indian state of Uttar Pradesh's Hapur when asked to pay the toll fare. Several identified the accused as "Mohammad Sajid Ali" and shared visuals of him at the toll plaza and in police custody. 

Archive links for such posts can be seen here, here, and here.

Screenshots of the claims. (Source: X/Modified by Logically Facts)

However, the accused is being misidentified. Hapur SP Abhishek Verma confirmed that his name is Dheeraj Kumar and he doesn't belong to the Muslim community. 

What we found

A reverse image search on the keyframes of the clip led us to a report published in the English daily The Indian Express, which confirmed that the incident occurred on June 11 in Hapur. The news report carried a post by Sachin Gupta, an Uttar Pradesh-based journalist, who shared the video of the incident on his X account (archived here). 

Another national daily, The Times of India, quoted the manager of the toll plaza as saying that the bulldozing happened after the staff asked him to pay the toll fee. However, according to these media reports, the arrested person's name was Dheeraj Kumar, not “Mohammad Sajid Ali.”

We also came across a post on Hapur Police’s X account  (archived here) with a press note naming the accused as “Dheeraj”. Their post described the incident and also carried a photo of the accused. 

Screenshot of the video from the arrest uploaded by the claim and the photo uploaded by the Hapur Police (Source: X/Modified by Logically Facts)

On the same day, Hapur Police also posted a video (archived here) of Superintendent of Police (SP) Abhishek Verma speaking about how Hapur Police was made aware of the incident through social media and the damage caused. He further goes on to say that the man, who was intoxicated at the time of the incident, has been arrested and charged under section 307 (attempt to murder) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

Speaking to Logically Facts, Verma further confirmed that the arrested driver's name is Dheeraj Kumar and that he belongs to the Hindu community.

The verdict

The claim that the driver involved in the toll plaza incident was a Muslim man named Mohammad Sajid Ali is false. Police have arrested the accused, who was identified as Dheeraj Kumar.