Old mob attack video falsely linked to Pakistani politician Attaulah Tarar

The video was shared on Facebook on November 22, 2023 and has since been viewed more than 820,000 times.

Its Urdu-language caption translates as: "People started throwing stones at Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz leader Attaullah Tarar when he reached out to his constituents in a village and asked them to vote for him."

"Rain of stones on Attaullah Tarar. Just try to face the people (and you will get this treatment)."

Tarar is the deputy secretary-general of Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz party and has served as a special assistant to former prime minister Shehbaz Sharif when his party led the ruling coalition from April 2022 to August 2023 (archived link).

The video shows people running and throwing stones at a white sports utility vehicle as it speeds away on a roadside along with other cars.

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Screenshot of misleading Facebook post

The same video along with similar claims was published on Facebook here, here and here, and on X here, here and here.

Most of the posts were shared by the supporters of rival Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party which ruled the country from 2018 to 2022 (archived link).

A caretaker government was installed in August in Pakistan to run the country until a new one takes over after the elections on February 8, 2024 (archived link).

However, there have been no recent reports about the purported attack on Tarar and the claim has been previously debunked by Pakistani fact-checking organisation Soch Fact Check (archived link).

Misrepresented video

In a post on X, Tarar criticised what he called "lies" of PTI supporters who were sharing the claim (archived link).

"Such shamelessness and brazenness is unparalleled. Writing the name of Atta Tarar on a video of attack on Chaudhry Musa Elahi in Kotla Arab Khan, Gujrat proves only one thing that PTI is hurting due to Atta Tarar. There is no cure for this pain. I will continue to expose PTI's lies," Tarar wrote on X, in response to a post from a PTI supporter.

A reverse image search of the video's keyframes on Google found the incident occurred in January and involved another politician.

Pakistani private news television channel Geo TV published a report containing the video on January 17, 2023 about the incident (archived link).

Geo TV reported that politician Chaudhry Musa Elahi was attacked by a crowd who opposed renaming a hospital after his late grandfather Chaudhry Zahoor Elahi. The crowd reportedly said the land where the hospital was built had been donated by their families.

The younger Elahi is a scion of an influential political family from Gujrat city in eastern province of Punjab and a leader of centrist political party Pakistan Muslim League Q (archived links here, here and here).

Below is a screenshot comparison of the video shared in the false posts (left) and the video published by Geo TV (right) with similarities marked by AFP:

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A screenshot comparison of the video in the misleading post (left) and the video embedded in Geo television report (right) with similarities marked in coloured circles by AFP:

Elahi talked about the incident in a press conference recorded live on his Facebook account on January 17, 2023 (archived link).

"We have inaugurated the hospital today despite their loud claims that they would not allow it to happen," Elahi said. "We could have retaliated, but we did not as our mission was the welfare of people and for this purpose we had gone there."

An official of the local Crime Investigation Agency told AFP on December 19 that two suspects in the attack were on protective bail since January and the probe is still ongoing.