A social media post accompanying a video of an angry mob attacking a vehicle is being widely circulated with a claim that the video shows people chasing the Uttar Pradesh government’s spokesperson and cabinet minister Shrikant Sharma. The video is being shared in the wake of the upcoming elections for the state legislative assembly in UP. Through this article, let’s fact-check the claim made in the post.
Claim: Video of UP government official spokesperson and cabinet minister Shrikant Sharma’s vehicle being chased by people.
Fact: The video is related to a recent incident of attack on former Jharkhand BJP president Ravindra Rai in Bokaro by protesters, who are agitating against the exclusion of Bhojpuri and Magahi from the regional language list of state’s newly made recruitment policy. The video has nothing to with Uttar Pradesh or Srikanth Sharma. Further, there are no recent news reports of an attack on Shrikant Sharma. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
Reverse image search of the screenshots of the video led us to Rajya Sabha MP and Jharkhand State BJP President, Deepak Prakash’s Facebook post which shared the same video. The description accompanying the post reads ‘The attack on former state president of BJP Jharkhand Shri Ravindra Rai ji in Dhanbad is an attack on democracy, no matter how much you condemn, it is less.’
Taking a cue from the MP’s Facebook post, further Google search with relevant keywords led us to a Hindi regional news report which reported the same video. The description of the video reads ‘Ex BJP MP Ravindra Rai attacked. Driver steers vehicle out of danger.’
Further search yielded news reports of the incident (here & here). As per these reports, Ravindra Rai’s vehicle was attacked near Telmachcho bridge in Bokaro, Jharkhand by protesters, who are protesting against the exclusion of Bhojpuri and Magahi from the regional language list of the state’s newly made recruitment policy.
Hindi regional news articles of the attack on Ravindra Rai can be read here, here, and here. Further, we could not find any recent news reports of an attack on Shrikant Sharma. All these establish that the viral video has nothing to do with Shrikant Sharma or Uttar Pradesh
To sum it up, the video of an attack on former Jharkhand BJP chief is passed off as UP minister Srikanth Sharma chased away by people.
