This photo has circulated in reports about a child mauled by a dog in Pakistan

This article is more than one year old.
Published on January 28, 2020 at 03:50
Updated on March 2, 2020 at 12:41
4 min read
By AFP India

A photo of a woman holding an injured child has been shared thousands of times in multiple posts on Facebook and Twitter alongside a claim the child was injured during clashes between Indian police and anti-citizenship law protesters in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. The claim is false; the photo has circulated in local media reports since at least November 2019 about a child attacked by a dog in Okara, Pakistan.

The photo was published on Facebook here on December 30, 2019. It has been shared more than 9,900 times.

Below is a screenshot of the misleading post:

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The Hindi-language caption translates to English as: “#NRC, #NPR, #CAA.The hooliganism of UP police didn’t even spared a child, an example of brutality of Yogi government.”

NRC is an acronym for the National Register of Citizens, a government record of all Indian citizens in India’s northeastern state of Assam. The register has been criticized for being discriminatory against Muslims, as reported by AFP here on September 2, 2019.

NPR refers to the National Population Register, a log of all “residents” of India who have lived in a specific locality for six months or more. It was first implemented in 2010 and is intended to track population density.

CAA is the Citizenship Amendment Act, a new law passed by the Indian government on December 11, 2019. The law, which grants citizenship to non-Muslim immigrants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, sparked violent protests nationwide, as reported by AFP here on December 12, 2019.

“UP Police” refers to the state police of the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, and Yogi government is references to the current state government of Uttar Pradesh, headed by chief minister Yogi Adityanath.

The same photo was also shared here and here on Facebook, and here on Twitter, alongside a similar claim.

The claim is false; the photo has circulated in Pakistani media reports since at least November 2019 about a child who was viciously attacked by a dog in Okara, east Pakistan.

A keyword search on Google found the same photo published here on the Urdu language Pakistani news website PAKTv on November 12, 2019.

Below is a screenshot of the article:

The report’s Urdu-language headline translates to English as: “Who is responsible, the dog who bit her or the authorities?”

The article translates to English in part as: “In Punjab’s province the menace of stray dogs have injured dozens of citizens. The photo of a wounded young girl from Punjab being held by her mother shook everyone except the authorities after it was shared on social media.”

A further keyword search found a second photo of the injured child published here on the website of the Pakistani news outlet Bolnews on November 11, 2019.

Below is a screenshot of the article:

The report reads, in part: “A minor baby girl, bitten and badly injured by a stray dog in Chak No 2 1L near Okara village.

“According to details, Rahman Town resident Allah Dutta said that my youngest daughter Aaliyah had gone to visit her relatives in the village of Chuck No. 21L where she was attacked and bitten by a pye-dog her whole body was filled with wounds.”

The attack was also reported by Karachi-based newspaper Dawn News here on November 13, 2019.

A graphic video of the same child was published by a Pakistan local news channel on Facebook here on November 11, 2019.

In the video, the parent's speaking in Punjabi and Urdu language can be heard complaining about the irresponsible behaviour of the doctors who did not vaccinate their child following a dog bite. They also criticize the ineffective stitching of the wound by doctors which they claim failed to stop the blood.

The post’s Urdu caption translates into English as: “A young girl was bitten by a stray dog. Aaliyah was visiting her relatives in a village when she was attacked by a dog. The baby was taken to a local hospital, THQ, for medical assistance but there was no rabies vaccine available in the hospital. Parents of the injured girl were forced to move with the child to another hospital and they demanded intervention from health officials.-Report by Khaledaq Chaudhar”.

At the 51-second mark, a vehicle registration for the ambulance, OKG, can be seen. OKG is an acronym issued to vehicles in Okara, as stated here by Cellsaa, a Pakistan-based website that tracks mobile phone numbers and vehicle ownership.

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