Video from Pakistan falsely shared as floods in Bangladesh

What's being claimed?

Social media users have shared a video of water gushing under a bridge claiming it shows a flood in Bangladesh after India opened the gates of the Dumbur dam in Tripura. An X (formerly Twitter) user shared the video and wrote, "Those who call India friends, they are enemies of Bangladesh. I repeat again they are the eternal enemy of Bangladesh  Bangladesh is facing the worst flood in history. Pray for Feni, Cumilla, Noakhali. #Flood."

The post had 807 likes and 297 retweets. The same video was also shared on Facebook and YouTube. Archived versions of such posts can be found here and here. 

The posts have been shared after a protest by Dhaka students, who alleged that India's decision to open the gates of the Dumbur dam in Tripura led to flooding in Bangladesh. However, India has dismissed the allegations, with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) releasing a statement stating that the current floods at the Bangladesh borders were not opening the gates of the dam, which is upstream of the Gumti River in Tripura. The statement said that the flood was created by rain.

However, the now-viral video is from Pakistan, not from Bangladesh. 

Here are the facts

Through a reverse image search, we found the same video posted on the YouTube page of Pakistani Urdu news channel HUM News on August 8, 2024 (archived here). It was titled "Flood situation in different areas after rains in Pakistan | High Alert | Breaking News." The viral clip can be seen at a timestamp of 0:18 seconds. Another YouTube channel, WE News (archive here), also posted the video on August 8, 2024, claiming that "Torrential rains wreak havoc in Talagang, rivers overflowing | WE News."

The same clip was posted by Pakistan Weather Channel's Facebook account (archived here) on August 8, 2024. The caption reads in Urdu, "Heavy rain was observed in Talgang." 

Screenshot of the bridge on Google Maps. (Source: Google Maps)

We geolocated the bridge in the video to Chakwal-Talagang Road, Talagang. Pakistani newspaper Dawn published an image of the bridge, taken from a different angle, in September 2020. The caption reads, "Raging water gushes through Dharabi Bridge on Chakwal-Talagang Road." Other visuals of the bridge, uploaded on YouTube, also match the viral video. 

Comparison of Dawn image and viral video. (Source: Dawn/X/Screenshots)

While we could not verify when the now-viral video was recorded, we found that the video is from Pakistan, not from Bangladesh.

The verdict

A river overflowing under a bridge in Pakistan has been shared with the false claims that it shows flooding in in Bangladesh after the gates of a dam in Tripura, India, were opened.