A video has been viewed thousands of times in multiple posts on Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and YouTube alongside a claim it shows a Muslim man spitting at Indian police officers after being detained over scuffles at a coronavirus quarantine centre in April 2020.
The 27-second video shows a man being subdued after purportedly spitting at uniformed officers., Below is a screenshot of the misleading post:, The post’s caption states: “Look at this mullah, what he did with our police officer! #TabhleegiJamaat #मुस्लिम_मतलब_आतंकवादी #TablighiJamaat \xa0#CoronaJihad #coronavirus #CoronaInMaharashtra”, Mullah is a religious leader or scholar in Islam, and “Tabhleegi Jamaat” or “Tablighi Jamaat” in the hashtags are the names of an Islamic missionary movement., The post was published one day after a scuffle\xa0broke out at a quarantine facility housing those who attended a religious gathering organised by Tablighi Jamaat in Delhi in March 2020. The congregation was later identified as a major novel coronavirus hotspot that killed at least 10 attendees, as stated in\xa0this AFP report., On April 1, 2020, those quarantined at a facility run by Indian Railways in Tughlakabad\xa0area of Delhi reportedly “spat at” doctors over complaints about food, prompting a police response. Here is a report on the incident by the local English-language newspaper India Today., The Indian news agency ANI also published this tweet on April 1, 2020, quoting a railway official: “Occupants were unruly since morning&made unreasonable demand for food items. They misbehaved&abused staff at Quarantine Centre.Also they started spitting all over&on persons working/attending them incl doctors.They also started roaming around hostel building.”, Occupants were unruly since morning&made unreasonable demand for food items. They misbehaved&abused staff at Quarantine Centre.Also they started spitting all over&on persons working/attending them incl doctors.They also started roaming around hostel building:CPRO Northern Railway https://t.co/mKLP1UQgJg, The scuffles were also reported on by other Indian newspapers, including The Economic Times here and Deccan Herald here., The same video was also shared here, here and here on Facebook; and here on YouTube\xa0alongside a similar claim., The claim is misleading., A Google reverse image search using a keyframe generated by InVID-WeVerify, a video verification tool, found this longer version of the video. It was published on the Twitter account of the Indian newspaper Mumbai Mirror on February 29, 2020, weeks before the incident at the coronavirus quarantine centre in Delhi., The tweet states: “Thane Police beat man for spitting on them.”, WATCH: @ThaneCityPolice beat man for spitting on them pic.twitter.com/U5b2rt8iWj, "Below is a screenshot comparison of the misleading post (L) and the\xa0video posted on the Mumbai Mirrors\xa0Twitter account (R):", AFP found a full report here on the Mumbai Mirror website, dated February 29, 2020., It is headlined: "Watch: Denied home-cooked food, undertrial attacks cop inside a police van in Thane.”, The report reads\xa0in part: “A 26-year-old undertrial allegedly attacked a few members of the police escort party after they did not allow him to have home-cooked food brought by his family members at a court in Mumbai, an official said on Saturday., “The suspect got annoyed over this and started abusing the policemen. When he was being taken to jail in a police van, he started arguing with the members of the escort party. He spit on one policeman and manhandled another one. He also bit the finger of another policeman.", The incident was also reported by the Indian TV channel NDTV here and the daily English-language newspaper Times of India here., Thane Police also rebuked the claim, saying the video is unrelated to the Tablighi Jamaat gathering. A spokesperson told AFP via Twitter direct message on April 14, 2020: “The incident in the video is old.”, , , Copyright © AFP 2017-2020.  All rights reserved.  Users can access and consult this website and use the share features available for personal, private, and non-commercial purposes.  Any other use, in particular any reproduction, communication to the public or distribution of the content of this website, in whole or in part, for any other purpose and/or by any other means, without a specific licence agreement signed with AFP, is strictly prohibited.  The subject matter depicted or included via links within the Fact Checking content is provided to the extent necessary for correct understanding of the verification of the information concerned.  AFP has not obtained any rights from the authors or copyright owners of this third party content and shall incur no liability in this regard.  AFP and its logo are registered trademarks.
This video has circulated in reports since at least February 2020, weeks before the incident at a coronavirus quarantine facility in India | AFP Fact Check