Lighthouse Journalism came across a video showing a mob scaling a building and assaulting a few individuals, while a crowd gathers below. The video was peddled with the claim that this is how Hindus were attacked in Bangladesh. However, during the investigation we found out that the video does not show an attack on Hindus, but rather shows a video of a police officer who fell into the hands of miscreants.
Claim:
X user Yati Sharma shared the video with a misleading claim.
Check the archive version of the post.
Other users too are sharing the video with the same claim.
Investigation:
We started the investigation by uploading the video in the InVid tool and then running reverse image search on several keyframes obtained from the same.
During the reverse image search we found a video uploaded on a YouTube channel BD News 24.
The description said (translation) : A police officer fell into the hands of the miscreants. BD News Twenty Four.
The video was uploaded 10 days ago on the channel.
Using this video, we ran reverse image search on the keyframes and through Google Lens and Google translate found that the board seen in the video states: বাংলাদেশ পুলিশ (Bangladesh Police)
Through further reverse image search, we found the video uploaded on LinkedIn.
The video was captioned: Public Outrage.
Also, the details on the screen informed that the video was Shot on OnePlus at 17:27 on 5th Aug, 2024. The video was shot by Hasan.
We found one shopfront in the video that was of a Bank. Upon using Google Lens, we found this written on the board: এসবিএসি ব্যাংক পিএলসি (SBAC Bank Plc) and কেরানীগঞ্জ শাখা (Keraniganj branch)
Using this information we checked the address on Google maps.
We found the exact location on Google maps and found the board of police station on the maps.
By using Google Lens on the board of the police station we found that the video was of: জেলা গোয়েন্দা (ডিবি-দক্ষিণ) কার্যালয়, ঢাকা জেলা।
Translation: District Detective (DB-South) Office, Dhaka District.
We then ran a Facebook keyword search using the keywords in Bangla.
This led us to a similar video, recorded from a different angle of the same place.
The caption said (translation): Dhaka Keraniganj DB Office
We also connected with a senior fact checker from Bangladesh, Tausif Akbar who said, “The signboard being taken down reads Bangladesh Police. It is clear that this video depicts a police station being surrounded, vandalized, and looted”.
Conclusion: A video showing a police station in Bangladesh being attacked and vandalized is being falsely circulated with the misleading claim that Hindus are being attacked in the country. Viral claim is misleading.
