A video featuring a teenager tearing up the Indian national flag and asserting his identity as a “Pakka Musalman” (true Muslim) has been circulated as a recent event. However, D-Intent Data has found that the video was old and the boy is not from the Muslim community.
Sharing the video on X (Formerly Twitter), serial fake news peddler @ajaychauhan41 wrote, “Pakka Musalman hoon”( I’m a true Muslim). As of now, the post has received more than 550k views, 4.8k likes and a significant number of engagements.
Several other users, influencers and propagandists have also shared the video and made similar claims. Their posts can be seen here @NidhiForX, @Sudhir_mish, @nbramllb
The truth about the viral video of teenager tearing up the Indian national flag, Fact Check
As soon as the posts containing the sensitive video of a teenager tearing up the Indian national flag came to our notice, we conducted research and analysis of the video and found that the video was old and unrelated to Muslim individuals.
To verify the claims made by the users. We performed a relevant keyword search on Google. This led us to a report by TOI regarding the incident, published in August 2018. According to the report, A young boy, who claimed to be from a minority community, is seen tearing a paper tricolor in the video. Police traced the boy and another teenager from Amroli and called them to the police station along with their family members. “They were allowed to go after they confessed to having shot the video on a mobile phone just for fun. “The two boys and their family members apologized.”
Reportedly, B C Thacker, assistant commissioner of police, B-Division said. “We did not take action against the boys as they were just 14 years of age. They told us they were not from the minority community. We explained to them the repercussions of their action and asked them to ensure they don’t repeat the mistake”.
During a reverse image search of some key frames from the viral video on Google Lens. We found that the same incident videos(Twitter, Facebook) were circulated with similar claims in 2018 as well.
Hence, it is evident from D-Intent Data‘s Fact Check that the viral video of a teenager tearing up the Indian national flag while saying “Pakka Musalman hoon” is not related to the Muslim community. But majority community. The video is from 2018 and was created by two minors in Amroli, Gujarat, as part of a prank.
Intent
Social media users, influencers and propagandists are circulating old videos with misleading claims to set their narrative based on religion.
Conclusion
Claim– The video depicts a Muslim teenager tearing up the Indian national flag and saying Pakka Musalman hoon (I’m a true Muslim).
Fact– According to the verified sources, the video is from Almori, Gujarat and doesn’t depict Muslim individuals. But two minors belonging to majority community created it as part of a prank.
