Photo of injured Afghan activist passed off as domestic violence victim from Pak

Hyderabad: A photo of a bleeding woman is being shared with the claim that it shows the horrible state of women in Pakistan. People sharing the photo claim that the woman was attacked by her husband because he did not like the food she cooked.

A Twitter user shared the photo and wrote, “Horrible state of women in #Pakistan where a Husband in Lahore attacked her wife with a knife just because he did not like the food she cooked - he slit her cheek open (sic).” (Archive)

Click here to see the post.

Fact Check

NewsMeter found that the bleeding woman in the photo is Nargis Sadat, an Afghan women’s rights activist.

On performing a reverse image search, we found a video showing similar visuals as seen in the photo. The video was tweeted by Kabir Haqmal, a former BBC Phasto journalist and former director and spokesperson of the National Security Council of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.

In the tweet, he said women’s rights activist Nargis Sadat was beaten in Kabul by the Taliban during a women’s protest demanding roles in the government.

We also found the photo in an article published in 2021 by CBS News titled “As Taliban robs Afghan women and girls of work, school and safety, the most vulnerable “have nowhere to go”.”

The description of the photo read, “An image from a video sent to CBS News by Afghan women’s rights activist Nargis Sadat shows her bleeding from her head after Taliban members attacked her during a protest in Kabul in September 2021.”

A 2021 NDTV report also carried the image of Nargis Sadat. It said activist Nargis Sadat had alleged that she was beaten up by the Taliban during a protest led by women’s rights activists.

It is evident that the viral photo shows Afghan activist Nargis Sadat and not a victim of domestic violence from Pakistan. Hence, we conclude that the claim is false.