Scripted Video of a Man Attempting To Kidnap School Girl Shared as Real Incident

Another scripted video went viral, where social media users shared it as a real incident and praised the girl.

A video of a man speaking to a school girl and later attempting to kidnap her went viral on social media, with users sharing it to commend the girl’s bravery and presence of mind.

However, we found that the video being shared is scripted and has been shared as one of a ‘real’ incident. We found posts which specified that the video was for "educational purposes only."

CLAIM

The video is being shared across social media platforms with the following claim in Hindi:

“किसी भी स्कूल वालों को, बच्चियों को ऐसे स्कूल के बाहर नहीं खड़ा करना चाहिए, बच्ची बाल बाल बची है,

नहीं तो, किसी झाड़ियों में लाश मिलती, ऐसी वीडियो से सीख लेने की जरूरत है|”

(Translation: Any school should not make girls stand outside the school like this. Fortunately, the girl is safe, else her corpse would be found in the forest somewhere. It is important to learn from such videos.)

The claim was widely shared on Facebook.

The video was shared in a tweet by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Delhi’s media head, Naveen Kumar Jindal, who praised the girl and her parents.

The claim is being shared on Facebook and Twitter, and their archives can be seen here, here, here, and here.

WHAT WE FOUND OUT

Using InVID, a video verification tool, we fragmented the video into keyframes and ran reverse image searches on some of them.

The results led us to a Facebook post, which shared the video published by Telugu actor Hamsa Nandini’s verified Facebook page. In the video’s caption, the actor noted that the video was shared by a page that featured scripted videos and parodies, adding that the video was for “educational purposes only.”

The actor's Facebook page has shared several other scripted videos as well.

We also found YouTube channels that had uploaded the same clip, which also mentioned that the incident was not real.

The Quint’s WebQoof has fact-checked many claims which shared scripted videos as real incidents. To know how you can spot whether a video is an awareness or educational video, watch this:

Clearly, another scripted video which showed a schoolgirl’s timely actions in protecting herself was shared as a real incident on social media.

(With inputs from SM Hoax Slayer)

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