A video showing a man being beaten up in front of police officers is being shared on social media with the claim that he is stand-up comic Munawar Faruqui.
However, we found that the man being beaten up in the video is a friend of Faruiqui, known as Sadakat Khan. He had been arrested along with Faruqui and was thrashed while being presented in court.
CLAIM
One of the posts with the video claimed, “Munawar Faruqui was first beaten up by the police and then by the lawyer; look at his condition.(sic)”
Similar posts were also shared on Facebook.
A few also claimed that “Faruqui was beaten up by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) councillor's spoilt brat and his gang in Indore!”
WHAT WE FOUND OUT
Firstly, the man seen in the video did not look like Faruqui. To demonstrate that, we created a side-by-side comparison of the two.
We then conducted a Google Search for ‘Munawar Faruqui being beaten in Indore court’ and found two news articles about the incident. A news report by NDTV India said that it was Faruqui’s friend who was roughed up at the court.
The NDTV report said, “Munawar’s friend Sadakat, who was at the district court in connection with the incident, was mistaken for the stand up comic and assaulted by a man.”
Lyricist and poet Hussain Haidry also tweeted about the video and said, “This guy who is getting slapped, his name is Sadakat Khan. He's a friend of Munawar, works as a supervisor in a construction company in Bombay. He had gone to meet him in the court for hearing as his maternal home is in Indore, MP, and has gotten arrested too.”
We also spoke to a member of Faruqui’s lawyer’s team, Asad Warsi, who confirmed to us that the man seen in the video is not Faruqui but his friend Sadakat Khan.
CSP-Central Kotwali BPS Parihar also told us that no such incident happened with Faruqui. “Munawar Faruqui was not beaten up in the presence of police officers,” Parihar told The Quint’s WebQoof team.
On Friday, 1 January, Faruqui, along with four other comedians, was arrested by the Indore Police for allegedly "insulting" Home Minister Amit Shah and Hindu deities.
While there have been reports about the comedian being roughed up prior to the arrest, the man seen in the video is not Faruqui.
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