By Swasti Chatterjee
A disturbing video showing people slaughtering a cow lying on a Bharatiya Janata Party flag is circulating with false claims that it shows jubilant minorities celebrating the Congress victory in the Karnataka elections by killing a cow.
BOOM found that the video shows visuals of people killing a cow on a BJP flag in Manipur's Lilong area. The incident happened in January. 2022, as a mark of protest after the BJP announced its candidates ahead of the polls.
The Indian National Congress made a sweeping victory at the Karnataka Assembly polls, securing 135 seats and overthrowing the incumbent BJP with a clear majority. Since the Congress' win, several unrelated and misleading videos have been circulating with claims targetting the Muslims. Read BOOM's fact checks here, here and here.
The screenshot from the video, tweeted by one @ssaratht, claimed that Muslims celebrated the Congress win by cutting a cow on a BJP flag. The caption reads, "Barbarians. I got a video saying it’s from Karnataka and Izlamic fanatics cut the cow on BJP flag to celebrate Khangress victory. Twitter isn’t allowing me to upload the video so posting the pics.". Click here for an archive of the tweet.
The tweet has been viewed more than 78000 times at the time of writing this article.
The video is being shared on Facebook with the same misleading claim.
Fact Check
Several users flagged the tweet and stated that the incident is from Manipur's Lilong.
Using keywords we found an article by an obscure rightwing website, satyasanatan.net, which stated that the incident is from Manipur. A blurred screenshot was shared as the featured image of the article. The headline of the article reads, "In Manipur, Abdul Rashid, Najbul Hussain and Mohammad Arif Khan made a cow lie down on the BJP flag and slaughtered it, police arrested after the video went viral." (Headline in Hindi: मणिपुर में अब्दुल राशिद, नजबुल हुसैन और मोहम्मद आरिफ खान ने BJP के झंडे पर गाय को लिटाया और काट दिया, VIDEO वायरल होने पर पुलिस ने किया गिफ्तार।)
The article was uploaded on February 1, 2022 and contained a tweet with the entire video. BOOM has chosen not to the include the video due to its graphic nature.
Chief Minister N Biren Singh replied to the tweet on February 1, 2022 with a screenshot of an article from Imphal Free Press. Click here to read the article.
BOOM also reached out to Paojel Chaoba, a journalist from Manipur, who said that the video was shot in Lilong in January, 2022. "People in the video can be heard speaking in Meitei and cursing the government. A lot of unparliamentary words are being used by the people in the video to curse the chief minister," Chaoba told BOOM.
According to reports, three people Nazbul Hussain, 38, Abdul Rashid, 28 and Arib Khan, 32, all residents of Thoubal district, were arrested for allegedly slaugthering a cow on a BJP flag. The video clip had gone viral on January 30, 2022.
The incident happened at the Meitei Pangal, a Muslim dominated area in Lilong, Thoubal district. A Times of India article quoted a source as saying that the cow was slaughter after the BJP announced its tickets for all the 60 seats for the assembly polls.
Several people from the Meitei community of Lilong slaughtered the cow on a BJP flag after many intending candidates were rejected tickets in the impending elections. The Manipur BJP unit's announcement of the full list of candidates for the Assembly elections sparked protests across the state at that time with many taking to the streets and torching BJP flags and banners.
