Visuals of a group of women attacking a man are being shared with a false communal narrative - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
June 14, 2023
Update (14 June 2023):
A video is being shared on social media as visuals of women beating a BJP MLA in Kerala. The same video is also shared as women thrashing a Congress  MLA after watching ‘The Kerala Story’ movie. However, as explained below, the name of the man who was thrashed by the women in the video is Shaji. A group of Christian women attacked Shaji, accusing him of morphing images of a woman belonging to the Emperor Emmanuel Church and sharing them on the Internet. Shaji is neither a BJP MLA nor a Congress MLA. The incident was reported in January 2023, much before the release of ‘The Kerala Story’ movie.
Published (17 May 2023):
A video showing a man being assaulted by a group of women is being widely shared across social media platforms with a claim that the video shows Hindu women in Kerala attacking a Muslim man for misbehaving with them. Through this article let’s fact-check the claim made in the post.
Claim: Video showing Hindu women assaulting a Muslim man for misbehaving with them.
Fact: The viral visuals are related to a confrontation between the past and present members of a Church in Thrissur, Kerala. According to media reports, individuals associated with the Thrissur Muriyad Emperor Emmanuel Mediation Centre attacked Shaji, a former member, alleging that his son had circulated fabricated images of a woman belonging to the Church. There is no communal angle in the incident, as all the people involved are followers of the same religion. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
This video of a group of women thrashing a man is indeed from Kerala. However, the reasons and the identity of the people involved is not as alleged in the viral post.
A reverse image search of the screenshots of the viral video yielded several news reports that featured identical visuals. According to one such report, the visuals show confrontation involving past and present members of a church in Kerala. Allegedly, individuals associated with the Thrissur Muriyad Emperor Emmanuel Mediation Centre attacked Shaji, a former member, who was traveling with his family.
The news reports mentioned that the motive behind the attack was an accusation that Shahji’s son, Shajan Emperor Emmanuel, had circulated fabricated images of the church president.
As per a local media report, 11 women involved in the incident were arrested. Several other news reports also ascertained that the motive behind the attack was a quarrel between past and present members of a church (here, here & here). And none of these reports mentioned any communal angle to the incident.
A case has been registered at Alur police station against 59 women in connection with this attack. In the FIR, Shaji’s family alleged that Emperor Immanuel Church attacked them as they had left it. Additionally, according to Thrissur rural district police chief Aishwarya Dongre, a case has been registered based on the complaint of the church members alleging that Shaji circulated a morphed nude picture of a woman belonging to the Church.
To sum it up, visuals of a group of women attacking a man are being shared with a false communal narrative.