A set of social media posts (here, here, here, here & here) attributing a few photos and videos to the violence that broke out in West Bengal recently are being shared widely. It has to be noted that violence broke out in multiple parts of West Bengal resulting in the death of around 17 people after the announcement of assembly election results. Political parties of West Bengal have accused each other of fermenting this violence. Let’s fact-check these posts and see if they are indeed related to the violence on the ground.
Claim: Images and video related to West Bengal post-poll violence.
Fact: These images and videos have nothing to do with recent post-poll violence in West Bengal. Few images are related to CAA protests in Bengal back in 2019, whereas few are not related to West Bengal. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
Reverse image search of the photo (left side of the collage) yielded the same image in the Getty images repository. As per the information provided on this website, the image was actually clicked on 14 December 2019 in Howrah, West Bengal and the image shows protesters setting a bus on fire during a demonstration against the CAA.
Further, a news article also published the same image, attributing the image to anti-CAA protest in Bengal back in 2019.
Reverse image search of the right-side images in the collage yielded multiple 2019 news articles which have published the same image. As per one such article, this image also related to the anti-CAA protests in Howrah, West Bengal back in 2019.
Another news article also published the same image. Even as per this article, the image is related to the anti-CAA protests back in 2019.
Reverse image search of this photo yielded multiple 2018 news articles which published the same image. As per one such article by India Today, the image shows police patrolling in Raniganj in West Bengal where clashes and incidents of arson were reported following a Ram Navami procession back in 2018.
Few other news articles which have published the same image associating it to 2018 Ram Navami clashes in West Bengal can be read here & here.
A similar but full version of this image was published by The Statesman in its 2019 article which reported the violent clash between BJP & TMC supporters at Vidyasagar college during Amit Shah’s roadshow. With this, we can infer that the image in the post is the cropped version of the original image.
Few more images related this particular clash back in 2019 can be seen here.
Reverse image search of this photo yielded a November 2020 Bangla news article that published the same image. The article reported about an alleged increase of atrocities against women.
Further through reverse image search, we found few November 2020 social media posts which shared the same image attributing it to an attack on Hindu woman by Muslim goon Mohammad Rubel in Chittagaong, Bangladesh. These posts can be seen here and here. Although we could not independently verify whether this image is related to the incident as claimed in these posts, the presence of this image on the internet predates the current violence which proves that the image has nothing to do with recent post-poll violence in Bengal.
Google search yielded multiple Telugu regional news reports which reported the same video. As per one such report, the video shows an incident of a daughter trying to give water to her COVID-19 positive father in Andhra Pradesh’s Srikakulam district. Later, he died in front of his family.
Few more news reports regarding this video can be seen here and here. This video has nothing to do with post-poll violence in West Bengal.
Amid reports related to multiple instances of post-poll violence in West Bengal resulting in the death of 17 people, misleading posts like these are being shared on social media.
To sum it up, old and unrelated images and videos are being shared attributing them to post-poll violence in West Bengal.
