Old Video Falsely Shared as Punjabi Singer Sidhu Moose Wala’s Funeral Procession

The video has been on the internet since at least December 2021 and predates Sidhu Moose Wala's death.

A video showing a large crowd gathered at a cremation ground is being widely shared on social media with the claim that it shows Punjabi singer Sidhu Moose Wala's funeral procession.

Sidhu Moose Wala was shot dead by unidentified people in Mansa, Punjab on 29 May, a day after the state government scaled down his security cover. Two people travelling with him were also injured in the attack.

However, the video does not show visuals of Moose Wala's funeral procession. We found that the video has been on the internet since at least December 2021, when it was shared as a soldier's funeral procession.

CLAIM

The short video is being shared as visuals of Punjabi singer Sidhu Moose Wala's funeral procession.

This video by Facebook user Lovely Sharma Kalwanu was viewed over 7 lakh times and shared by more than 8,000 users at the time of writing this article.

Archived versions of more claims on social media can be accessed here, here and here.

WHAT WE FOUND OUT

Using InVID, a video verification extension for Google Chrome, we divided the viral video into multiple keyframes and ran reverse searches on a few of them.

One of the searches led us to a video uploaded on social networking website ShareChat by user Umesh Baglane, five months ago.

When played, the video showed text which read 'Heartfelt tribute to Beed district's martyred soldier Avinash Andhale' in Marathi.

Using the soldier's name as keywords, we came came across more videos uploaded to YouTube, which were uploaded in December 2021.

Marathi news publication Sakal carried a report, dated 7 December 2021, about the demise of soldier Avinash Andhale in Delhi, who suffered from heart attack while on duty.

MASSIVE CROWDS AT MOOSE WALA'S FUNERAL PROCESSION

Sidhu Moose Wala was cremated on Tuesday, 31 May, in Moosa village in Punjab's Mansa district, where massive crowds of fans and supporters joined the funeral procession.

The Quint also covered the singer's funeral, speaking to Moose Wala's fans and friends. As per the visuals seen in the report, Moose Wala was cremated in a field, and not a cremation ground as seen in the viral claim.

Clearer visuals of the funeral procession can be seen five and a half hours into this livestream by News18 Punjab/Haryana/Himachal's verified YouTube channel.

While we were unable to independently verify the context of the viral video, we can confirm that the video precedes Moose Wala's demise.

Clearly, the video does not show Punjabi artist Sidhu Moose Wala's funeral procession as it has been on the internet since at least December 2021.

(Not convinced of a post or information you came across online and want it verified? Send us the details on WhatsApp at 9643651818, or e-mail it to us at [e-mail] and we'll fact-check it for you. You can also read all our fact-checked stories here.)