By Archis Chowdhury
Social media is rife with a video showing a group of people violently assaulting a few unarmed people with sticks with the claim that it shows Muslims entering the home of a Hindu family in Alwar, Rajasthan, and beating them up.
BOOM found this claim to be false; according to multiple news reports on the incident, the video shows members of the same family, and same religious background, engage in violent confrontation following a land dispute. Alwar Police also put out a tweet rubbishing the communal claim as false and confirmed that both sides of the conflict were from the same family, and were Hindus.
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One of the viral Hindi captions being shared with the video translated to English as, "In Alwar, impious people (reference for Muslims) entered the houses of Hindus and beat them with sticks. Post this video in all groups as soon as possible. Bulldozers should be rolled around today by Rajasthan Government." Click here to view the post.
Click here and here to view more such posts on Facebook.
Fact Check
BOOM did a keyword search in Hindi using terms related to the viral claim, which led us to several news reports in Hindi of an incident from over a week ago.
Rajasthan Patrika carried a similar video in a report which stated that the incident happened in the village Khakasya ki Dhani near Thanagaji town in Alwar district of Rajasthan, and that the conflict seen in the video is between two sides of the same family, arising from a dispute over ancestral land.
The report adds that the enmity between the two sides of the family engaging in the dispute turned ugly, leading to more than a dozen men, women and children from both sides sustaining injuries.
Taking cue from this, we did another keyword search, which led us to a report by Hindustan from January 19, 2024, which also confirmed the details reported by Rajasthan Patrika. According to the report, miscreants attacked a family with sticks in Khaksya ki Dhani, near Thanagaji, due to old rivalry. It also mentioned land dispute being the cause of the conflict.
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We also found another report by Dainik Bhaskar from January 19, 2024, which shed further details on the same incident. According to this report, which also carried a video that closely resembles the conflict seen in the viral Facebook posts, also confirmed that the fight happened between people of the same family over ancestral land.
Family members of 70-year-old Ram Swaroop, a resident of Dhani, Cheema, told that Ram Swaroop's younger brother's wife Badami Devi and her son and grandson wanted to take over the old ancestral house. They had reportedly threatened with violence before, for which a complaint was lodged with Alwar SP at Thanagaji police station, which led to no hearings.
A user also shared the video on microblogging platform X (formerly Twitter) and enquired about the veracity of the viral communal claim while tagging Alwar Police.
Alwar Police replied to the post and rubbished the communal claims made in the viral posts. The post stated that the dispute seen in the video involved members of the same family, and are all Hindus.
We also reached out to local authorities for a comment, and the story will be updated upon getting a response.
