A video which shows people damaging railway tracks has gone viral on social media, nearly a week after a horrific train accident in Odisha's Balasore, which claimed at least 288 lives.
The claim: The clip is being shared with text in Hindi, which reads, "देखिए ये कौन लोग हैं। सब कुछ पॉलिटिक्स की वजह से हो रहा है। 2024 का चुनाव जो आ रहा है और मोदी विरोधी लोग अपनी औकात पर आ गए हैं"
Those sharing the viral clip have not provided any context regarding the date or location of the video.
[Translation: Look at these people. Everything is happening because of politics. 2024 election is coming and anti-Modi people are showing their true colours.]
An archive of this post can be seen here.
(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)
The Quint received several queries for the video's verification on its WhatsApp tipline.
(Archives of more claims can be seen here, here, and here.)
But...?: The video is not a recent one. The clip dates back to June 2022, and shows people protesting against the Centre's Agnipath scheme in Rajasthan's Bharatpur.
How did we find out?: Using InVID, a video verification tool, we divided the viral video into multiple keyframes.
We then ran a reverse image search on one of the viral keyframes using Yandex, a Russian search engine.
The results led us to a tweet with the same video, which was shared on 19 June 2022.
The tweet was shared on 19 June 2022.
(Source: Twitter/Altered by The Quint)
It mentioned that the visuals were related to the widespread protests against the Centre's Agnipath scheme.
The video was also shared on the social media website Reddit on 19 June 2022 with a similar title, where the original poster mentioned that it was from Rajasthan's Bharatpur.
The user who posted the video on Reddit mentioned that it was from Bharatpur, Rajasthan.
(Source: Reddit/Screenshot)
Taking a cue from this, we looked for related reports.
We found that Hindi news organisation Dainik Bhaskar had carried the same visuals in its year-old report about the protests.
The report mentioned that protesters had gathered at Rajasthan's Bharatpur Railway Station on 17 June, 2022.
(Source: Dainik Bhaskar/Altered by The Quint)
It mentioned that protesters had gathered on the railway tracks at Bharatpur Railway Station in Rajasthan on 17 June, and damaged the tracks and fish plates.
Stone pelting began when police personnel arrived at the spot, which left one policeman injured.
The report added that maintenance took about three hours before trains could be allowed to pass the railway station.
Conclusion: The video dates back to June 2022 and is not a recent video of people damaging railway tracks.
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