A 2024 video from East Timor is falsely linked to the recent protest held against the Waqf Bill 2024 in Delhi in March 2025
On 17 March 2025, the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) held a protest against the Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2024 at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, demanding its withdrawal (here, here, and here). In this context, a video showing a large group of people participating in a rally is being widely shared on social media platforms, claiming it to be from the recent protest against the Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2024 in Delhi (here, here, here, and here). Through this article, let’s fact-check the claim made in the post.
Claim: Video shows a rally held against the Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2024 in Delhi in March 2025.
Fact: This video has no connection with India and dates back to September 2024. It was captured during Pope Francis’ three-day visit to East Timor in September 2024. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
To learn more about this viral video, we conducted a Google reverse image search using keyframes from the video. This search led us to a video (archived link) uploaded on Facebook on 12 September 2024. The post was captioned, “More than 600,000 people attended the Mass presided over by Pope Francis in Taci Tolu, Timor-Leste, on the afternoon of 10 September 2024” (translated from Vietnamese to English). The description of this video states that the visuals are from Pope Francis’ visit to East Timor in September 2024.
Taking this as a cue, we conducted a relevant keyword search to learn more about this video. This search led us to a news report video published by Reuters on YouTube on 10 September 2024. According to this report, the video shows hundreds of thousands of Catholics in East Timor attending a Mass with Pope Francis during his three-day visit to Timor-Leste, East Timor, on 10 September 2024. Additional news reports about Pope Francis’ visit to East Timor can be seen here and here.
On comparing some of the posters visible in the viral video with those in the Reuters article, we realised that both visuals featured the same posters.
Additionally, we geolocated the exact spot where the viral video was filmed using Google Maps Street View. The location is in East Timor, near Dili, the capital city. From all available information, it is evident that the viral video is from East Timor and not from Delhi, India.
To sum up, a 2024 video from East Timor is being falsely linked to the recent protest against the Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2024, at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar.