Unrelated clip falsely shared as ex-pro wrestler 'protesting India food stall order'
- Published on August 5, 2024 at 06:32
- 3 min read
- By Sachin BAGHEL, AFP India
Copyright © AFP 2017-2024. Any commercial use of this content requires a subscription. Click here to find out more.
"The Great Khali protested against nameplate rules by eating fruit from Muslim brothers," read a Hindi-language post on social media site X on July 21, 2024.
It referred to the ring name used by Rana, who remains widely popular in India following his stint at the WWE professional wrestling juggernaut.
The post included a video showing him posing next to several men wearing Muslim caps at roadside stall selling mangoes.
The video has also been shared alongside similar claims elsewhere on X and on Facebook.
The posts surfaced days after police in Uttar Pradesh's Muzaffarnagar district ordered on July 17, 2024 that food stalls along the Kanwar Yatra pilgrimage route publicly display the names of their owners and staff members (archived link).
The police said the order was issued to "avoid any confusion" among Hindu devotees who must maintain a strict vegetarian diet during the pilgrimage, according to a report by Indian newspaper The Hindustan Times (archived link).
The order was later extended to the rest of the state and in neighbouring Uttarakhand before India's top court halted its implementation while it considered legal challenges (archived link).
The order was slammed by opposition politicians who said it targets Muslim-owned businesses. Some allies of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that rules Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand have also criticised it.
But there have been no official reports indicating Rana, himself a member of the BJP, made public comments about the case as of August 5, 2024.
Unrelated video
A Google reverse image search using keyframes from the video found it was uploaded to Rana's Instagram account on July 11, 2024 -- a week before the police order was issued (archive link).
Below is a screenshot comparison of the video in one of the false posts (left) and the video posted on Rana's Instagram (right):
Anil Rana, a member of the former wrestler's management team, said the claim that the video showed Rana was protesting against the order was false.
He told AFP the video was filmed in Himachal Pradesh state.
"The video is old and was posted on Instagram on July 11, while the [Uttar Pradesh] government issued the order on July 17," he said.
Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.
Contact us
