(Trigger Warning: Disturbing visuals and description of animal abuse.)
A graphic video showing a man cutting a cow's throat and keeping a Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) flag under it is going viral on social media as a recent clip from Karnataka.
The claim links the video with the Congress Party's win in the state's Assembly Elections.
(Note: Due to the distressing nature of visuals, we have refrained from adding archive links.)
Where is the video actually from?: This video is from 2022 and not from Karnataka.
The video is from Manipur, and three people were arrested under the Prevention of Cruelty To Animal Act 1960.
How did we find out the truth?: On performing a reverse image search on some of the keyframes of the video, we came across a tweet from 31 January 2022.
The tweet carried the same viral video and stated that this incident happened in Manipur.
It also stated that people in the video are abusing BJP and Manipur's Chief Minister, N Biren Singh.
Singh also replied to this tweet with a screenshot of The Imphal Times's story about three men being arrested for slaughtering a cow.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India had also replied to a user under this tweet stating that the Lilong police had arrested three accused.
Next, we conducted a relevant keyword search and found reports about the same incident from 2022.
The Imphal Times, The Hindu and The Times of India have stated that police registered a case after a video of the three people slaughtering a cow over the BJP flag went viral in January 2022.
It also added that the arrested persons were from Lilong in Thoubal district and were identified as Nazbul Hussain (38), Abdul Rashid (28) and Arib Khan (32).
We also accessed the FIR copy of the incident, which stated that the FIR was registered under sections 153A, 429, and 504 of the IPC and Section 11(1) of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960.
This is a screenshot of the FIR copy.
(Source: Manipur police website/screenshot)
Conclusion: Clearly, this is an old video from 2022 and not from Karnataka.
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