Indian ruling party leaders were not 'arrested over deadly Maoist rebel attack on police'

"Change the name of BJP to 'Hindu Taliban'," reads part of a Hindi-language tweet posted here on May 1.

The tweet, which has been retweeted nearly 650 times, includes a screenshot of what appears to be a headline from a news story by the "News Express" outlet that details an attack by Maoist insurgents, known as Naxalites.

The headline reads: "Two BJP leaders arrested in connection with Chhattisgarh Naxal attack, they bought a tractor to help the Naxalites”. Below the text is a composite image of a rebel holding a gun, people waving BJP flags and two uniformed personnel.

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A screenshot of the false tweet, captured on May 4, 2023

The tweet circulated after ten police reservists and their driver were killed on April 26 when their vehicle hit an improvised explosive device, an attack police blamed on Maoist rebels. The security personnel were returning from a mission to investigate rebel movements in the remote Dantewada district.

India's long-running Maoist insurgency began in the 1960s and has cost thousands of lives in the decades since, although violence has waned considerably in recent years.

Naxal groups say they are fighting for rural people and the poor, and they are most active in the remote parts of the country’s interior where much of the population remains mired in poverty and lacks access to critical services.

The claim was also shared on Facebook here and here; and elsewhere on Twitter here.

The claim, however, is false.

Dantewada police inspector Amit Patil told AFP on May 3 they had not arrested anyone from any political party in connection with the attack.

Reports about the police's investigation into the attacks by local media outlets The Hindustan Times and The Print make no mention of any BJP leaders being involved (archived links here and here).

Arrests in 2020

A keyword search on Google led to a story, retrieved from the Wayback Machine, with the same headline published on the website "thenation18.com".

The undated Hindi-language story says: "A local BJP leader and another person have been arrested for being Maoist supporters in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada district."

It says the accused had bought a tractor to give to a Maoist rebel, but makes no mention of the attack on police in April 2023.

A search for the same story attributed to "News Express" did not return any results.

Further keyword searches led to tweets from June 14, 2020 by the news agency ANI about a BJP leader being arrested for assisting rebels (archived link).

One of the tweets reads: "On further investigation, it was found that Jagat Pujari (BJP leader) was supplying goods to naxals since last 10 yrs. He used to meet them regularly & supplied goods to them with the help of villagers. Jagat Pujari & a naxal arrested: Abhishek Pallav,SP Dantewada. Chhattisgarh.”

A report in The Print from June 2020 also says a BJP leader was arrested on suspicion of having links to Maoist rebels (archived link).

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