This video has circulated in reports about a double murder in West Bengal -- police said it is not related to sectarian violence in India

This article is more than one year old.
Published on March 4, 2020 at 09:20
Updated on March 4, 2020 at 13:06
2 min read
By AFP India

A disturbing video that shows the bodies of a woman and a baby being exhumed from a yard has been repeatedly shared on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube alongside a claim that it shows bodies of Muslims who were buried alive by workers of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), India’s ruling political party. The claim is false; police in West Bengal told AFP the video shows an exhumation that occurred after a man murdered his wife and two-month-old daughter in an incident unrelated to sectarian violence in India; other video footage and photos of the same incident have previously circulated in media reports about the same double murder case in West Bengal’s North Dinajpur district.

The one minute 40-second long video was shared here in a Facebook post on March 1, 2020.

Below is a screenshot of the misleading Facebook post:

Screenshot of misleading Facebook post

The post’s English caption reads: “Indian BJP hooligans buried Muslims alive. Sorry it’s painful but we have to spread it all over the world."

The footage and the claim circulated widely in the wake of violent clashes in Delhi, India’s national capital, between February 24-26, 2020. At least 42 people were killed in the unrest which was triggered by India's new citizenship law, AFP reported here.

The same video was also shared on Facebook here, here, here and here; on Twitter here, here, here and here; and on YouTube here and here alongside an identical claim.

The claim is false. Local police told AFP that the video was recorded in January 2020 and shows an exhumation that occurred after a man murdered his wife and two-month-old daughter and buried them in the backyard of their home.

The police also said the incident occurred in Islampur, a town in West Bengal’s North Dinajpur district.

“The incident has nothing to do with the Hindu-Muslim clashes. It was a family matter,” Pintu Barman, the Sub-Inspector at the Islampur Police Station, told AFP by phone on March 3, 2020. “The man’s name was Akbar Alam and he had buried the body of his wife and daughter after killing them following a fight between them on January 30, 2020.”

Barman added that the suspect was arrested, but that he "died in an accident while attempting to escape” from custody.

A Google keyword search found another video showing the same incident published here on YouTube on January 30, 2020.

“A baby and her mother were found buried in Islampur,” says the video’s Bengli caption.

A further Google search found the incident was reported here by a local news website on January 31, 2020.

Below is a screenshot of the media report:

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“A husband has been accused of murdering his wife and one-and-a-half-month-old baby and burying the bodies. The incident took place on Thursday in Haluguch village of Islampur police station in North Dinajpur. The local residents were outraged by the incident,” reads the report in part.

The incident was also reported in by regional Bengali-language news website Mahanagar24x7 Bengali here and the Bengali-language service for Indian news channel News18 Bangla here.

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