Footage shows elephant herd in Sri Lanka, not southern India

Published on April 24, 2025 at 08:58
3 min read
By Akshita KUMARI, AFP India

As students in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad protested the felling of a forested area for development, footage of a herd of elephants crossing farmland circulated alongside the false claim it showed the animals "after the government demolished their home". However, the video was actually filmed in neighbouring Sri Lanka.

"After the government demolished their home... the family of elephants in Hyderabad set out in search of a new home," read a Hindi-language caption to the video shared on Facebook on April 7, 2025.

The footage depicts a large herd of elephants crossing farmland bisected by a road.

Hindi-language text overlaid on the video read, "You snatched their home, one day you shall suffer. The elephant family left Hyderabad".

Screenshot of the false post, taken on April 14, 2025

The video circulated with similar claims on X and Instagram as students spearheaded protests against the Telangana State government for clearing parts of the 400-acre (161-hectare) Kancha Gachibowli -- forested land which borders Hyderabad Central University (HCU) -- to set up IT parks in the southern city (archived link).

Police detained at least 50 students on March 30, who were later released. Local media outlet NDTV reported the Supreme Court issued a stay order on the tree-felling on April 3, with a hearing set later in the month (archived links here and here).

Meanwhile, local media Telangana Today reported at least three spotted deer were found dead on the university campus within the week following the clearing of the adjoining forest (archived link).

But the footage of the elephants was filmed in Sri Lanka, not India.

Video from 'Sri Lanka'

A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the video found a longer version of the footage shared in an X post on February 20, 2025 (archived link).

The video is captioned, "When the paddy harvest is over. The elephant crowd came to the paddy field." It included hashtags for Sri Lanka, "Malwatta" and "Ambara", suggesting the footage was shot in the island nation neighbouring India.

Malwatta is a rural village in the Ampara district in the Eastern province of Sri Lanka (archived link).

Screenshot comparison of the video in the false post (L) and the video shared on X

Subsequent keyword searches on Google found similar images in a report published in Sri Lankan media outlet The Sunday Times on February 23 (archived link).

The report said elephants were spotted crossing the Ampara-Kalmunai main road, heading towards cultivated areas.

The footage used in the false posts corresponds to Google Street View imagery of the Samanthurai area of Ampara district in Sri Lanka (archived link).

Screenshot comparison of the footage used in false posts (L) and corresponding features on Google Maps, with matching elements highlighted by AFP

Hyderabad is not typically home to wild elephants, though a stray elephant had trampled a farmer to death in a different district in Telangana in April 2024 after crossing over from a neighbouring state, authorities said (archived link).

AFP has fact-checked other claims linked to the forest clearing incident here and here.

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