The video is not from Kashmir -- it shows a procession in another part of India

This article is more than one year old.
Published on August 23, 2019 at 08:45
3 min read
By Supriya BATRA

A video has been shared thousands of times in Facebook posts that claim it shows Muslim residents of Kashmir chanting pro-India slogans in celebration after Delhi ended the region’s semi-autonomous status in August 2019. The claim is false; the video has circulated online since February 2019 in reports about a procession in the southern city of Bangalore.

The 45-second video clip was posted on Twitter in this tweet on August 9, 2019, where it was viewed more than 4,800 times and retweeted at least 245 times. It has since been removed.

It accompanies the following caption:

"Secular Religion who once Opposed to Say BHARAT MATA KI JAY n
VANDE MATARAM are now Chanting with INDIA Flag.
Effect of Abolishment of Article 370 n 35 #KashmirHamaraHai
#KashmirMeinTiranga"

“Bharat Mata ki Jai” and “Vande Mataram” are Hindi language slogans which translate to English as “Victory of Mother India” and “I praise thee, mother”.

On August 5, 2019, India scrapped Article 370 of the constitution, which gave Kashmir a special semi-autonomous status within the country.

The decision was accompanied by restrictions on movement and communications access in Kashmir, and has been met with widespread unrest, including protests and clashes with police.

The Hindi-language hashtags on the post translate to English as: “Kashmir is ours” and “Tricolor in Kashmir”, the latter a reference to the Indian national flag.

Below is a screenshot of the post:

Screenshot of the misleading post

On August 2, 2019, a longer 1:52 video containing the same visuals was also posted on Facebook here, where it has been viewed more than 117,000 times and shared more than 5,000 times. The caption also claims the video was shot in Kashmir.

The same video was uploaded to YouTube here on August 8, 2019, accompanied by the title “Muslims in Kashmir chanting ‘Vande Matram & Bharat Mata Ki Jay’”.

However, the video has circulated online since at least February 2019.

An InVid reverse image search using screenshots of the footage found a copy of the longer 1:52 version of the video published on YouTube on February 26, 2019.

The English caption accompanying the video states: “Bohra Muslims near Bannerghatta Road area in Bangalore took out procession in memory of martyred CRP”.

The video appears to show a rally held to commemorate dozens of paramilitary soldiers from the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), who were killed in a suicide bomb attack in Kashmir on February 14, 2019.

The same video was also shared on Facebook here and Twitter here in February 2019 with similar descriptions.

People in the video can be heard saying “martyred soldiers remain immortal” and chanting pro-India slogans.

In the initial 10 seconds of the video, the name “Burhani Flora” can be seen on spotted written on the side of one of the buildings. Below is a screenshot of the video with the words highlighted in red.

An apartment building of the same name exists in Bengaluru, according to a Google search. Below is a screenshot of the Google search result that gives the address and aerial location of the building:

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