No, this is not a photo of an Indian policeman kicking a religious devotee
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on November 30, 2018 at 06:30
- 1 min read
- By AFP India
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The photograph, shared here on Facebook on November 13, 2018, purports to show a policeman kicking a man who it claims is a devotee of the Hindu god Lord Ayyappa.
Below is a snapshot of the miselading post:
The hashtag #SaveSabarimala in the text accompanying the photo is a reference to November protests in the southern state of Kerala. Here is an article in the local media on those protests.
The photograph used in the misleading post is taken from a 2013 protest in Kerala.
The image can be seen published on the Communist Party of India website from 2013 here.
The Malayalam, a local news outlet published in the regional dialect, also published the image in 2013 here.
DYFI, an organisation which identifies itself as the youth wing of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), staged a protest on September 4, 2013 in a South Indian city of Thiruvanathapuram against then state chief minister Oommen Chandy.
Here is an English-language report on the protest.
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