Old picture falsely portrayed online as showing victim of Bangladesh's record heatwave
- Published on May 28, 2024 at 08:56
- 2 min read
- By Eyamin Sajid, AFP Bangladesh
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Warning: Graphic images
"Men sacrifice everything in the hope of making their loved ones lives a little better. This man died of a heatstroke after the severe heatwave," read the Bengali-language caption of a photo shared on Facebook on April 26, 2024.
The photo appears to show a person who had been carrying kitchen bowls with a shoulder pole lying dead on the ground.
Content warning
The same photo was shared elsewhere on Facebook here and here alongside similar claims.
It circulated as Bangladesh remained in the grip of a suffocating heatwave that has killed at least seven people since the start of April and prompted authorities to close schools nationwide.
The average temperatures in April were the hottest since the country began keeping weather records in 1948.
The photo circulating online, however, does not show someone who died during the record heatwave.
Old photo
A reverse image search on Google led to a similar photo used in an article published by Jamuna TV on May 29, 2019 (archived link).
It says the man was a hawker who was electrocuted by a fallen electrical wire in Raipur, a city in the southeastern Lakshmipur district. Anis Kabir, the journalist who wrote the article, also told AFP the photo predates the recent heatwave.
Below is a screenshot comparison of the photo used in the false posts (left) and the photo in the Jamuna TV article (right), with corresponding elements highlighted by AFP:
Content warning
The same photo was also shared in another Bengali-language report published by Ukhiya News on May 30, 2019 (archived link).
The report also says the hawker died after being electrocuted by an electrical wire in Raipur.
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