Fact-Check: Old Video of Man Being Thrashed Shared With False Communal Claim

The video dates back to May 2022 and shows a man being assaulted for stalking a minor in Delhi's Shahdara.

A video of a man, purportedly belonging to the Muslim community, being surrounded by a mob and thrashed is being shared on social media, claiming that it shows pro-Hindutva goons assaulting a Muslim man, forcing him to chant 'Jai Shri Ram'.

(Archived versions of more posts sharing this claim can be seen here and here.)

Is it true?: The viral claim is false and the video is old.

• It shows one Imran Khan being thrashed by a minor girl's family members, after she complained that Khan had been stalking and harassing her in Delhi's Shahdara.

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How did we find out the truth?: We took multiple screenshots of the viral video and ran reverse image searches on them across search engines.

• This led us to the same video, which was shared on 19 May 2022.

• The Hindi caption loosely translates to, "In Delhi's Shahdara, at Nathu Colony Chowk, a Muslim man aged 40-45 years was caught stalking and harassing a 14-year-old girl by her parents and family."

• This video did not have an audio of people making someone chant Jai Shri Ram.

Taking a cue from this, we ran a keyword search with the terms 'Shahdara man stalking minor' and looked for posts and reports from May 2022.

• As per a report published by The Indian Express, the man was identified as 37-year-old Imran Khan, who was assaulted by a group of men after he allegedly molested a 13-year-old girl.

• The girl had previously complained to the family about Khan stalking her, after which her parents accompanied her to drop her off to tuition. After he was caught int he act, the police registered an FIR, charging Khan with stalking and relevant sections of the POCSO (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) Act.

• The Delhi Police told news agency ANI that Khan was arrested, produced before court, and later remanded to judicial custody.

Delhi Police arrested a 37-year-old man namely Irfan Khan for allegedly stalking & misbehaving with a 13-years-old girl. Case registered against him u/s 354D IPC & 12 POCSO Act. Accused was produced before court &remanded to judicial custody, police said

— ANI (@ANI) May 12, 2022

What about the audio?: Since it was clear that the video was not related to the audio heard in the claim, we looked for its source on the internet using relevant keywords.

• On YouTube, this led us to a video by India Today, which mentioned that two men had forced a Muslim man to raise the Hindu religious slogan in Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh, back in 2021.

• The Quint had also reported on the incident in August 2021. The audio heard in the claim starts about 11 seconds into our video.

Conclusion: An old video showing a man being assaulted for stalking a minor in Delhi has gone viral with a false communal claim that it shows Hindus assaulting a Muslim man.

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