A video from Rajasthan of a group attacking a man and two women, over an internal family dispute, is being shared with a false communal claim that it shows a Hindu man beaten to death by Muslims.
BOOM found that the video is from Jodhpur, Rajasthan and shows relatives beating up their family members over a personal dispute.
BOOM reached out to Jodhpur Police who denied any communal angle to the incident and said the accused and the victim belong to the same Khatik community and are from the same family.
The disturbing video shows a group of men brutally assaulting a man with sticks, even as he is bleeding profusely and then shows them hitting two women as they try to escape.
One of the claims with the video translates to, "Muslims are not scared of anything because their own Congress party is ruling in Rajasthan. All hail Gehlot (Ashok) for not making any arrests despite it being five days since the incident, because the accused are Muslims."
(Hindi text - मुल्लों को कोई डर नहीं क्योंकि राजस्थान में इनकी कांग्रेस सरकार है| जय हो #गहलोत_राज_जंगलराज अभी तक 5 दिन हो गए एक भी गिरफ़्तारी नहीं क्योंकि मारने वाले मुस्लिम हैं)
BOOM has not included the video as it contains graphic violence.
A longer claim in Hindi claims the victim is a man named Yogesh Jatav who was killed by a man named Rashid. The claim translates to, "In Rajasthan, an innocent Hindu man Yogesh Jatav was beaten to death by Rashid and his friends. This lynching happened in a Congress ruled state, but things are silent because the victim is a Hindu and the accused are 'peacefuls'".
(Hindi text - मुल्लों को कोई डर नहीं क्योंकि राजस्थान में इनकी कांग्रेस सरकार है | जय हो गहलोत अभी तक 5 दिन हो गए एक भी गिरफ़्तारी नहीं क्योंकि मारने वाले मुस्लिम हैं| अखलाक, पहलू खान, तबरेज अंसारी की लिंचिंग पर छाती कूटने वाले आज अफीम चाटकर सो गए क्या? राजस्थान में एक निर्दोष हिन्दू योगेश जाटव की राशीद और उसके साथियों ने पिंट पिंट कर हत्या कर दी| लिंचिंग कांग्रेस शासित राज्य में हुई है, मरने वाला हिन्दू और मारने वाला शान्तिदूत इस लिए सन्नाटाराजस्थान में एक निर्दोष हिन्दू योगेश जाटव की राशीद और उसके साथियों ने पिंट पिंट कर हत्या कर दी| लिंचिंग कांग्रेस शासित राज्य में हुई है, मरने वाला हिन्दू और मारने वाला शान्तिदूत इस लिए सन्नाटा)
FACT CHECK
We first ran a search for the name Yogesh Jatav, as mentioned in the viral claim and found media reports from September 21, where a man by the same name was beaten up in Alwar district of Rajasthan. According to reports, Jatav a 19-year-old Dalit teenager was allegedly attacked by an angry mob after he hit a woman with his motorcycle, injuring her. Jatav who was taken to a hospital, succumbed to his injuries three days after the alleged attack.
The Indian Express quoting the Superintendent of police, Alwar said, "Preliminary investigation suggests that on September 15 Yogesh Jatav was riding a motorcycle, which hit a woman (Daughter of Mubina). While Jatav sustained injuries on his head, the woman was also injured. The woman, along with two to three others were returning to their home after harvesting Bajra (millet) when the accident took place." The incident made headlines after members of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the opposition in the state, termed the incident a case of mob lynching.
A search for videos and images of the alleged attack on Jatav did not show any results. The video going viral is not from the above incident.
We then ran a search in Hindi text for the keywords, 'Man beaten in Rajasthan' and found a tweet by a Dainik Bhaskar reporter where he had shared the same viral video and then a story on the incident claiming the incident is from Jodhpur. According to the Dainik Bhaskar story, the incident was from September 19, in the Maha Mandir police station jurisdiction, where two groups from the same family, belonging to the khatik community, fought and assaulted each other over a personal dispute. The images used in the Dainik Bhaskar story match scenes from the viral video
BOOM then reached out to Lekhraj Sihag, Station House Officer (SHO) of Maha Mandir police station who denied all communal claims and said both parties - accused and victim - are from the same family and belong to the same community. "The incident is from September 19, when members of one family attacked their relatives over an event held the previous day. The argument got out of hand and one group brutally assaulted their relatives," SHO Sihag said. He further added, "Both sides are Hindus and belong to the Khatik community which comes under the Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe category. They are in fact family members and stay close to each other in the same area."
He provided BOOM with names of the accused and victims. "The accused are, Sonu, Suresh, Ravi, Devilal, Santosh, Vikas, Bharat, Vishal, Bhawani, Ghanshyam and Pukhraj," he said and further identified the injured victims as, Ajay, Kanchan, Kailash, Kamlesh and Shanti. "The three victims seen in the viral video are Kamlesh, Shanti and Kanchan. They are injured and undergoing treatment. There have been no deaths in the case," Sihag said. He also said that the victims and the accused go by the same last name - Khatik.
Bharat Bhushan Yadav, Deptuty Commissioner of Police (East), Jodhpur confirmed the same and added, "Any claims that the accused are Muslims or there was a communal reason to the attack are false. The case of Yogesh Jatav, as mentioned in the video, is from an incident in Alwar and not related to the video in anyway."
