A viral video showing cops rounding up people without masks in Madhya Pradesh’s Ujjain has gone viral with a false claim that the video shows Delhi Police ‘detaining’ those violating mask guidelines, to be put in jail for 10 hours.
The Quint got in touch with the Deputy Commissioner of Police, New Delhi and Delhi Police PRO, Eish Singhal, who rubbished the claims stating that no such action was taken against mask violators.
CLAIM
The video was shared by several users with the caption, “Without mask 10 hours jail in Delhi and soon to be followed on Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and other States.”
The video uploaded by Facebook pages ‘Troll Maga’ and ‘Hingminashi Eikhoi’ had garnered over 17,000 views and 14,000 views respectively.
WHAT WE FOUND OUT
We noticed that ‘MP,’ which stands for Madhya Pradesh, was written on the number plate of the police vehicle used to round up people in the video. The details of the vehicle’s registration can also be viewed on MP Transport Department’s e-portal.
A simple keyword search in Hindi also led us to a ZeeNews report carrying the same video, which stated that the video was from Ujjain.
Since an Indian Oil Petrol Pump can be seen in the background of the video, we looked up petrol stations in Ujjain.
The second search result came up as ‘Prakash Auto Sales & Service (Indian Oil Petrol Pump),’ at Agar Road in Ujjain. The photos on Google Maps show that its surroundings are similar to those in the viral video.
A comparison of the Google Maps photo with the viral video can be seen below.
We then contacted the Chimanganj Mandi Police Station, which was the nearest police station to the location according to Google Maps.
The Head Constable at Chimanganj Mandi PS told The Quint that such drives were carried out for awareness and those found violating the mask guidelines were detained for a few hours.
Another police official at the Police Control Room in Ujjain, who didn’t wish to be named, confirmed to The Quint that the video is indeed from Ujjain and that those found not wearing masks were kept in “open jails” as per the orders of the Collector.
Further, DCP New Delhi and Delhi Police PRO Eish Singhal told The Quint that no such action was being taken against people not wearing a mask in Delhi.
Evidently, a video of police action against those not wearing a mask from MP’s Ujjain has falsely gone viral as a video from Delhi.
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