Following the passage of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, in the first week of April, Muslims have been protesting against the newly enacted law across the country, including in West Bengal (here, here, and here). According to news reports (here, here), on 11 April 2025, these protests turned violent in Murshidabad district, West Bengal, resulting in Violence and riots. Reports (here, here, and here) indicate that three people lost their lives in the violence: two Hindus, Chandan Das and Hargobind Das, were killed in a mob attack, while a Muslim man died in police firing. According to reports, hundreds of people (mostly Hindus) affected by the violence in Murshidabad district crossed the Bhagirathi River. They sought refuge in the adjoining Malda district (here, here, and here). On 12 April 2025, the Calcutta High Court ordered the deployment of central forces to restore peace and order in the district (here). Amidst this, a video is going viral on social media (here, here) showing a man walking on the road with a pistol in his hand. The post is being shared with claims that the visuals are from West Bengal. Let’s verify the claim made in the post through this article.
Claim: The video shows a man walking through the streets of West Bengal carrying a pistol.
Fact: This video has been on the internet since July 2024. It shows a man walking on the road with a pistol in the Muradpur area of Chittagong during the job quota protests in Bangladesh. The viral video is unrelated to the recent protests in West Bengal. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
A reverse image search of the keyframes from the viral video led us to multiple YouTube videos from July 2024 featuring this footage (here, here, and here). Bangladeshi media outlets ‘Bangla Tribune,’ ‘Channel 24,’ and ‘SOMOY TV’ uploaded the video on their official verified YouTube channels in July 2024, stating that it is from the Quota Protest in Chattogram.
To gather more information about the video, we searched the internet using relevant keywords and found Bangladeshi news reports published in July 2024 (here, here, and here). According to these reports, the incident occurred during the quota protests in Bangladesh against reservations in government jobs.
According to news reports (here, here, and here), on 16 July 2024, a clash broke out between the protesters, police, and leaders of Chhatra League, Jubo League, and Sukhbir Sebak League. A man in the Muradpur area of Chittagong, Bangladesh, was walking around with a pistol and firing at the protesters. The man was identified as Feroz Alam, as reported by ‘Protidiner Bangladesh’.
We identified the location in the viral video by noting a blue board next to the Bata showroom labelled ‘Raja Guest House.’ Using this clue, we pinpointed this site via Google Maps. The video was shot near the Bata showroom at 70 Hathazari Rd in Chittagong, close to ICB Islamic Bank Ltd.
Additionally, the West Bengal government’s cybercrime wing clarified via social media that the viral claim is fake and that the incident occurred in Chittagong, Bangladesh, in July 2024 (here, here).
To sum up, a July 2024 video of a man roaming with a pistol on the streets of Bangladesh is falsely shared as that of West Bengal.
