A video of people digging into a trench, with a tractor attempting to drive through it, is being shared on social media, where users are connecting it to the ongoing farmers' protests around Delhi.
The claim: The video is being shared to claim that since security forces have blocked all possible roads for farmers to enter the national capital, protesting farmers have started making new roads to get into Delhi.
An archived version of this post can be seen here.
(Source: X (formerly Twitter) /Screenshot)
This post by X user Mario Nawfal was viewed more than four lakh times at the time of writing this report.
(Archives of more posts sharing the same claim can be seen here, here, and here.)
Is it true?: No. The video shows farmers in Punjab, from a town called Talwandi Sabo in Bathinda district, filling up a trench dug to lay a pipeline after failing to receive appropriate compensation for their land.
How did we find out?: We divided the video into keyframes using InVID, a video verification tool, and ran a reverse image search on one of them.
This led us to a YouTube video on a channel called 'Mewa Sangat', which had shared it on 7 February.
The oldest version of the video was shared six days before the farmers' protests began.
(Source: YouTube/Altered by The Quint)
This predates the ongoing farmers' 'Delhi Chalo' protest, which began on 13 February.
We looked for the same user's profile on other social media platforms.
On Facebook, the user had shared this video on the same day, with a caption in Punjabi, which loosely translates to "Farmers filling the trench of Lelewala gas pipeline."
The post also mentioned Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) Ugrahan.
Using these clues as keywords, we looked for more information related to farmers and the gas pipeline.
This led us a to report by The Times of India, which mentioned that farmers in Bathinda's Koreana village filled up a trench dug to lay a domestic gas pipeline.
It said that the farmer union "refused to let a company lay the final few sections" of the pipeline before "compensating the landowners."
Farmers and landowners in Talwani Sabo filled the trench dug to lay a gas pipeline.
(Source: The Times of India/Screenshot)
What was the issue?: The pipeline placed restrictions of the landowners, who got a compensation of three lakh rupees for one-eighth of an acre of land, or ₹24 lakhs for an entire acre.
However, a small part of the pipeline is unfinished, in an area where farmer unions have reportedly sought a higher compensation of ₹ 40 lakhs per acre, without which they would not let the construction be completed, TOI said.
The village lies near the town of Talwandi Sabo in Bathinda, Punjab, mentioned a report by Punjabi Tribune, which mentioned that the farmers were yet to receive the ₹24 lakh in compensation, which was promised to them in May 2023.
BKU Ugrahan Talwandi Sabo: The local Facebook page shared several posts about the pipeline around 6 and 7 February.
The page had shared visuals of a meeting ahead of the protest against the gas pipeline.
(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)
It also shared visuals of farmers marching in protesting, demanding that the government and the pipeline company – GSPL India Gasnet Limited (GIGL) – remember the agreement and compensate the landowners adequately.
This page carried the same video as the one in the viral claim.
Conclusion: A video of farmers and landowners in Bathinda, Punjab, filling up a trench dug for a gas pipeline, is being falsely linked to the ongoing farmers' protest.
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