Viral video from Bengaluru falsely claims to show police arresting child kidnappers

Context

A video is circulating on social media where the police are taking away a burqa-clad woman and two men. The person recording the video and speaking in Urdu asks angrily how they could "grab that girl child" and tells the police not to let them go in Kannada. The police can be seen responding in Kannada, asking the person recording the video to come to the police station. The Hindi caption shared with the viral video says that child kidnappers were caught red-handed at a bus stop in Shivajinagar, Bengaluru. It adds that such people could easily be identified by their "clothes," referring to the burqa worn by the woman and the kufi cap worn by one of the men being escorted by cops.

Against the backdrop of upcoming elections in Karnataka, this viral post and claim have been amplified by right-wing propaganda social media accounts that often post misleading information. Sudarshan News, a right-wing news outlet often seen spreading misinformation, also shared this video, claiming that kidnappers were caught in the city. This claim has been circulating on Twitter since at least May 1 and has over 32k views.

In Fact

We could not find any local news reports of "child kidnappers" being arrested or any FIR being lodged regarding the same in recent weeks from Shivajinagar, Bengaluru. 

To verify if the video is from the claimed location, Logically Facts contacted the Shivajinagar Police Station (Bengaluru City Police East Division) and was told that the Commercial Street Police Station handled the incident seen in the viral social media posts. Police Inspector R. C. Chowdhary told us that the claim shared with the video was false. He also said it was not a kidnapping case and that no offense was committed.

He added that the incident occurred in "rush hours during Ramzan on April 16, when people break their fast and move about the city." He further said, "When a Muslim couple with their baby girl was at the bus stop, another man touched the baby, and he was beaten for it. Two women, who were his relatives, came to his rescue, asking what happened and why they beat him. The parents said he'd tried to grab their child, and an onlooker called the police. After the police arrived and took them to the station, the man's relatives told them he had a mental health condition and that they had just taken him to the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS) earlier in the day. On being informed of the man's medical condition, the couple refused to press any charges against him."

The Verdict

The video in question shows the Shivajinagar police in Bengaluru escorting some people to the police station to discuss an incident that did not involve any offense and did not result in the filing of an FIR. The video is being shared with a false narrative with communal undertones. Therefore, we have marked this claim false.