Images From Brazil Shared to Claim Kukis Turned Forest Into Wasteland in Manipur

A set of two images showing a barren land and a lush green forest are going viral on social media to claim that it's from Manipur.

The claim further blames the Kuki community for turning the forest into a wasteland.

(Archives of similar claims can be seen here and here.)

What's the truth?: These images are from Brazil and are unrelated to the Kukis in Manipur.

• It shows how two people transformed a barren land into a forest by planting trees in the Minas Gerais region.

How did we find out the truth?: We performed a reverse image search on the pictures and came across a report from the British tabloid Metro on 4 May 2019.

• The article carried images and it matched the photograph showing the barren land in the viral post.

• It also mentioned that photojournalist Sebastião Ribeiro Salgado and his wife Lélia replanted trees in nearly 1,754-acre plot of land and transformed it into the lush green forest as before.

• Salgado returned to Brazil in the Minas Gerais region and decided to take this step nearly 30 years ago.

• This was also reported by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)

• He also founded Instituto Terra, a non-profit civil organization, in April 1998.

We found the location on maps: We checked Google maps and Earth with Instituto Terra and the location matched the viral images.

Conclusion: Images from Brazil are being falsely shared as from Manipur with a claim that they show the difference between the condition of hills before and after Kuki's arrival.

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