Lighthouse Journalism discovered a video circulating widely on social media, showing a woman in a cycle rickshaw being harassed by passersby. The video was falsely claimed to depict an incident in India, alleging that Indian citizens had misbehaved with an American woman on the streets. However, upon investigation, it was found that the video was actually from Bangladesh. The woman in the video was actress Mishti Subas, a supporter of Sheikh Hasina, who faced harassment for celebrating Sheikh Hasina’s birthday in Bangladesh.
Claim:
X user Ajaz Khan shared the video with the viral claim on his profile.
Other users too are sharing the video with same claim.
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Investigation:
We started the investigation by running a reverse image search on the screenshots obtained from the video. During the investigation, we excluded the text on the video.
This led us to a video uploaded on the Facebook page of Times Now on October 1, 2024.
The caption said: Actress Mishti Subas, and a supporter of Sheikh Hasina was harassed for celebrating Sheikh Hasina’s birthday by cutting cake in Bangladesh
We also found the video on several other platforms. Jist News had also uploaded the video on October 1, 2024.
We also found news reports about the incident.
Conclusion: An old video of actress Mishti Subhas being harassed on the streets of Bangladesh for celebrating former PM Sheikh Hasina’s birthday was shared as a recent incident from India, falsely claiming that an American tourist was being harassed in India. The viral claim is misleading.
