Video of Indian police drill shared with false claim it shows officers 'firing on protesting farmers'
- Published on November 28, 2023 at 10:11
- Updated on November 28, 2023 at 10:25
- 4 min read
- By Devesh MISHRA, AFP India
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"In 2016, the Shivraj government shot six farmers in Mandsaur for demanding the right price for their produce. The same government is now portraying itself as farmer friendly," reads the Hindi-language caption of a Facebook post shared here on November 11.
The text overlaid on the video reads: "Mandsaur firing: This is how Shivraj shot the farmers."
The 30-second video, which has been viewed more than 100 times, shows two policemen pointing their guns at a group of protesters before opening fire. As a couple of protesters fall to the ground, they are rushed away on a stretcher. Paramilitary personnel armed with batons and shields then start marching towards the protesters.
Mandsaur is a city located in the Madhya Pradesh state in central India, currently ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with Chouhan as the majority leader in the state assembly. The video was shared ahead of the assembly election on November 17.
At least five people were killed during clashes between police and protesters in June 2017 when farmers staged a rally to demand the authorities to raise the minimum price of their crops and to forgive their loans. Officers opened fire on the crowd after the protesters threw rocks at the police and torched vehicles.
A commission appointed by the state's BJP government cleared the police of any wrongdoings in 2018, saying officers were forced to open fire as they were attacked by mobs armed with rods and petrol bombs (archived link).
The video was shared with similar claims elsewhere on Facebook here, here and on X, formerly Twitter, here.
But the claim is false. The video in fact shows a police mock drill conducted in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand in 2017.
Police mock drill
AFP previously debunked the video in 2020 when it was shared with a different false claim.
A reverse image search on Google with relevant keywords found a longer version of the video uploaded here on YouTube on November 2, 2017 (archived link).
The video is titled: "Moke Dreal [Mock Drill] of Khunti Police".
Khunti is a town in the Indian state of Jharkhand.
At the end of the video, a police officer can be heard making an announcement in Hindi: "This was just a demo to show that the Khunti police is always prepared to act against any untoward situation."
Local freelance journalist Anand Dutta has previously told AFP that the drill was conducted near the main square of Khunti town around the same time as celebrations for the Hindu festival of Diwali in 2017.
"The location seen in the video is near the main square of Khunti town," he told AFP.
Dutta also sent photos of the street to AFP via WhatsApp where the drill was conducted.
Below is a comparison of a collage of photos sent by Dutta (left) and screenshots from the video posted in the false post circulating in 2020 (right), with similar elements highlighted in green:
A 2:35 clip of the same mock drill shot from a different angle was uploaded here on YouTube on November 4, 2017. The video is titled: "Jharkhand police KHUNTI (part of training) REHEARSAL" (archived link).
The caption with the clip reads: "In khunti rehearsal for police how we all police take charging and controlling on crowds at towns and other places. (it's only and only rehearsal)."
Images on Google Street View also show the video was filmed in Khunti (archive link).
Below is a screenshot comparison of the 2017 YouTube video (left) and the Google Street view of the location (right), with similarities highlighted by AFP:
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