A viral image on social media (here, here, and here) claims that Delhi police issued a notice about Iranians from Bidar and Gulbarga posing as blanket sellers conducting home surveys and robbing houses. Further, the alleged notice advises people to share this information with their community groups. Let’s verify the truth of the post through this article.
Claim: Delhi police issued a notice about Iranian gang from Bidar and Gulbarga.
Fact: This notice dates back to July 2019, when Bajpe police in Mangalore issued a warning about an Iranian gang posing as blanket sellers to conduct home surveys and rob houses. Udupi SP Nisha James later clarified to local news that no such incidents had been reported in the area and that the warning was a precautionary measure. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
A reverse image search of the post revealed several old reports (here and here) from July 2019 by local news channels in Karnataka. These reports indicated that the “Irani gang members” image was an alert issued by Bajpe police in Mangalore. The reports detailed a gang active in Chikkamagaluru and surrounding areas, posing as blanket sellers during the day to survey homes and rob them later. This confirms that the notice has no connection with Delhi police, and there has been no recent official statement from Delhi police on this matter. The notice is old and was originally issued by Bajpe police, Mangalore.
Further investigation led us to a local report by Vijaya Karnataka, where the Udupi SP stated that no incidents involving such gangs had been reported in the area, and the warning was merely a precautionary measure. The SP also advised people to alert the police if they had any suspicion.
Moreover, when the same image went viral in Telangana in 2019, the Hyderabad police tweeted that it was a fake message.
Factly has previously fact-checked the viral image when it first surfaced. You can read the articles here.
To sum up, an old notice about the Iranian blanket seller gang from Bidar and Gulbarga, issued by Bajpe police in Mangalore in July 2019, is now falsely circulated as a recent notice from Delhi police.
