No, this video does not show victims of recent Nepal plane crash

A video of bodies draped in white cloth is doing the rounds on social media. It is being claimed that the video shows the bodies of 72 passengers who were killed in the recent plane crash in Nepal.

By Md Mahfooz Alam  Published on  20 Jan 2023 11:15 AM GMT
No, this video does not show victims of recent Nepal plane crash

Hyderabad: A video of bodies draped in white cloth is doing the rounds on social media. It is being claimed that the video shows the bodies of 72 passengers who were killed in the recent plane crash in Nepal.

On 15 January, a Yeti Airlines plane with 72 people onboard crashed into the Seti river gorge near Pokhara, Nepal. The latest media report confirms 71 deaths, and one person has still not been retrieved from the wreckage.

A Twitter user shared the video and wrote, “Nepal plane crash dead bodies of 72 people. No one can tell where they died except Allah.” (Archive)


Click here to see the post.

Fact Check

NewsMeter found that the video is from Indonesia and shows people performing a religious ritual where they pretend to be corpses.

On performing a reverse image search of the video’s keyframes, we found the original video on Daily Motion published on 31 October 2022. According to the caption, the video is from Bali and shows a ritual known as Watangan Matah or Corpse Matah.

The caption also explains that people who volunteer to become Matah corpses are “put to suspended animation, and undergo rituals as if they had actually died.”

Several Twitter and Facebook pages had also posted the video. All the posts confirm that the video shows the rituals of “Watangan Matah” at an event organised at the Ketut Maria Art Building in Tabanan, Bali on 30 October 2022.

(Click here and here to view the Facebook posts.)

We also found a still from the video in an article published by Bali Tribune. It said the Indonesian Youth National Committee (KNPI) DPD Tabanan Regency had collaborated with the Mandala Suci Foundation to hold a Calonarang performance of 108 Watangan Matah on 30 October 2022.

It is evident that the video is from Bali, Indonesia. Hence, we conclude that the claim that the video shows the victims of the recent plane crash in Nepal is false.

Claim Review:The video does not show the victims of the recent Nepal plane crash.
Claimed By:Social Media users
Claim Reviewed By:NewsMeter
Claim Source:Twitter
Claim Fact Check:False
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