A clip from CCTV footage (here, here, and here) of a priest suffering a heart stroke/attack while performing a pooja to Lord Ganesh is doing the rounds on social media. Later in the video, a religious flag falls off Ganesha’s idol and falls on the priest, which leads to him miraculously surviving the heart attack. Let’s verify the authenticity of this claim through this article.
Claim: CCTV footage of a priest miraculously surviving a heart attack in a Ganesh pandal.
Fact: This is a scripted video made for entertainment purposes. This was originally published on the Facebook page of actress Sanjjanaa Galrani with a disclaimer saying that it was scripted and made for entertainment and educational purposes. Hence, the claim made in the post is False.
To verify the authenticity of the claim, we performed a keyword search on the internet, which led us to a Facebook post containing the same video. This post has a tag that reads ‘watch more original videos by: Sanjjanaa Galrani.’
Taking this as a hint, we searched for that viral video on Sanjjanaa Galrani’s Facebook page and found that she uploaded the video originally on 19 September 2024.
This post’s description contains a disclaimer that reads, ‘Thank you for watching! Please be aware that this page features scripted dramas and parodies as well. These short films are for entertainment & educational purposes only! Characters in this video are entertainment and educational purpose.’
This means that the viral video does not show actual CCTV footage but shows a scripted video. The same disclaimer appears at the end of the video, too, at the 3:07 mark. Sanjjanaa is a well-known actress who regularly uploads such scripted dramas (here and here) on her Facebook page.
To sum up, a scripted video made for entertainment and educational purposes is being shared as CCTV footage of a real incident.
