An old video from 2022 of police beating stone-pelters at a Garba event in Gujarat is being shared as recent
A video going viral on social media (here, here, and here) shows an incident in Gujarat’s Kheda area where Muslim youths allegedly pelted stones at a Garba event near a mosque, injuring a few. The police reportedly responded by tying the youths to a pole and flogging them in public. The post claims that this incident occurred in 2024. Let’s verify the claim in this article.
Claim: Youths who pelted stones at a Garba event near a mosque in Gujarat were tied to a pole and flogged by the police, the incident occurred in 2024.
Fact: The incident in the video took place on 03 October 2022 at Undhela village in Kheda, Gujarat. A garba program was organized by the village sarpanch on the occasion of Navratri festival. However, Muslim members of the town objected to Garba being held near the mosque. On this occasion, some people pelted stones from the mosque. Six people were injured in this incident. Police arrested nine people on 04 October 2022 and flogged them in public. Due to the significant uproar at the time, an inquiry was ordered into the police’s actions. However, this is not a recent incident. Hence, the claim made in the post is Misleading.
A reverse image search of the keyframes from the viral video led us to a news report video published by the NDTV on 04 October 2022. According to this report, police personnel tied some Muslim men to a pole and flogged them after they were arrested for allegedly throwing stones during Navratri Garba in the Kheda district of Gujarat.
Taking a clue from the description, a Google keyword search led us to media reports from October 2022 (here, here) describing the incident. According to these reports, on 03 October 2022, during a Garba event in Undhela village, Kheda, stones were pelted, injuring six people. The village sarpanch organized the event, but some Muslim villagers objected to it being held near the mosque, leading to stone-pelting. On 04 October 2022, the police arrested nine people and publicly beat them with lathis. Villagers cheered, saying “Gujarat Police Zindabad.” Due to the significant uproar at the time, an inquiry was ordered into the police’s actions.
To sum up, an old video from 2022 of police beating stone-pelters at a Garba event in Gujarat is being falsely shared as recent.