An old image of a dead body of an unidentified man is being shared with a false claim that it shows a recent death of a farmer at the ongoing protest in Delhi.
The photo is being shared with people believing that he was a protesting farmer and expressing grief over his death. According to latest reports, as many as 25 protesters have died in Delhi and near its borders including Singhu border, many due to the harsh winter conditions in Delhi. Thousands of farmers have camped in and around the Delhi borders braving the biting cold to protest against the three farm laws passed by the Center.
The Bharti Kisan Union Ekta (Ugrahan) organised programmes in 15 districts of Punjab recently to pay tribute to 41 farmers who lost their lives since September 15, as the protests intensified against the farm laws across Punjab and Haryana.
One such tweet has been captioned as, "Expressing with a heavy heart. One more farmer dies in the Delhi Kisan Morcha. Paying huge respect to his sacrifice"
(Original text in Hindi: दुखी मन से बता रहा हूं।।।। दिल्ली किसान मोर्चे में एक और किसान शहीद हो गए , उनके इस शहादत को मै कोटि कोटि नमन करता हूँ। #FarmerProtest #FarmLaws ) . Click here for an archive of the tweet.
It was also tweeted by a handle All India Kisan Sangharsh's with the same narrative. Here is the archive.
The photograph is viral on Twitter and Facebook too.
Fact Check
A reverse image search on the photograph showed Facebook posts from as early as September, 2018.
According to a caption shared with the image on September 2, 2018, the body of the unidentified man was found at Bohri Chowk in Tarn Taran Sahib city of Punjab. BOOM also reached out to BKU (Ugrahan) social media manager who confirmed that the image is not of a deceased protester.
The caption in Punjabi reads, "This old man who is about 70 years old, his dead body was lying in Bohri Chowk of Tarn Taran. The body has not been identified."
(Original text in Punjabi: ਇਹ ਬਜੁਰਗ ਜਿਸ ਦੀ ੳੁਮਰ ਲਗਭਗ 70ਸਾਲ ਹੈ ਤਰਨ ਤਾਰਨ ਦੇ ਬੋਹੜੀ ਚੋਕ ਵਿੱਚ ਇਸਦੀ ਡੈਡ ਬੋਡੀ ਪਈ ਹੈ ਸ਼ਨਾਖਤ ਨਹੀ ਹੋਈ ਕਿਰਪਾ ਕਰਕੇ ਸਾਰੇ ਸ਼ੇਅਰ ਕਰੋ ਤਾ ਜੋ ਇਹਨਾ ਦੇ ਪਰਿਵਾਰ ਨੂੰ ਪਤਾ ਲੱਗ ਜਾਵੇ.)
Other Facebook pages also shared the same image around the same time, with captions carrying similar information about the location and that the man had died.
BOOM however could not independently verify the location of the photograph or identify the old man in the image but was able to ascertain that the image has been present on the internet from as early as 2018, years before the Delhi farmers' protest.