Fact Check: Video from 2019 anti-Modi protests in New York passed off as ongoing farmers' protests
Several social media users have shared a video of Sikh protestors chanting pro-Khalistan and pro-Pakistani slogans with a claim that these are part of the ongoing farmers' protests in London. The caption of the video reads,
By Vamsi Krishna Pothuru Published on 13 Dec 2020 9:54 AM GMT
Hyderabad: Several social media users have shared a video of Sikh protestors chanting pro-Khalistan and pro-Pakistani slogans with a claim that these are part of the ongoing farmers' protests in London. The caption of the video reads, "Slogans of Allah-Hu-Akbar, Punjab will become Khalistan, Kashmir Pakistan. What kind of providers are they? #FarmersProtest #Khalistan #London. Do not call them traitors. They are the real providers of the country! Traitors have completely hijacked the farmers' movement and all political parties have joined hands?" This video was shared widely with the hashtags #Farmerprotest and #Khalistan.
Other social media posts with a similar claim can be accessed here.
Fact Check:
The video is from the 2019 anti- Modi protests in New York and is not related to the ongoing farmers' protests.
NewsMeter performed a reverse image search of one of the keyframes of the video and found several Facebook posts featuring the same video from September 2019. Pakistan's Daily Jiddat Karachi had posted the video on 7 November 2019 with a caption stating Pakistan is getting support from other countries. Another user had shared the same video with the caption, "Punjab will become Khalistan (Indian Punjab) Kashmir will become Pakistan. Long live Imran khan. @ImranKhanPTI."
While it is evident that this video is from 2019, a keyframe search could not find the context of the protests. So NewsMeter did a visual analysis of the video and saw the protestors holding placards with the words 'New York' and 'Modi'. Below are the screenshots from the viral video.
Taking a cue from the visuals and slogans, NewMeter searched using the keywords "pro-Kashmir and anti-Modi protests in New York September 2019" and came across a video report by Ruptly from 28 September 2019. The video, titled "Protest against Indian PM Modi met with counter-demonstration in New York", contains similar placards and slogans as in the viral video.
The description of the video reads, "Protesters demonstrating against the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government's ongoing lockdown in Indian-administrated Kashmir were met with a counter-rally in New York City on Friday as the Indian PM arrived to speak at the United Nations General Assembly."
Further search led to a video tweet posted on 28 September 2019 of the demonstration. It also had similar visuals as in the viral video.
Archive: https://archive.is/l79r9
Misinformation has been rampant on social media to discredit the farmers' protests by linking them to the Khalistan movement. NewsMeter had previously fact-checked such false claims here, here, and here.
In conclusion, the viral video showing protestors raising pro-Khalistan and pro-Pakistan slogans is from 2019 anti-Modi protests in New York. Therefore, the claims made that it is from the ongoing farmers' protests are FALSE.
