Pabna footage falsely shared as mosque demolition in India
A video has been circulating on Facebook with the claim that Muslims in Bangladesh are celebrating Durga Puja while mosques are being demolished in India. However, Dismislab’s fact-check found that the video does not show a mosque being vandalized in India. It actually shows an incident in Bangladesh in which an angry mob vandalized the house of Mostafa Pramanik, the prime accused in a case involving the rape and murder of a child in Pabna Sadar Upazila.
On October 20, a 22-second video was posted from a personal Facebook profile with the caption, “Muslims in Bangladesh are celebrating Puja while India is demolishing mosques.” Text overlaid on the video reads, “Muslims are busy with Durga Puja, while India is busy driving Muslims out.” At the beginning of the video, a man dressed in white is seen demolishing a building. Another man dressed in black later joins him. The building bears the Arabic and Bangla inscription “La ilaha illallahu Muhammadur Rasulullah” (There is no god but Allah; Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah).
Until the publication of this report, the video had been viewed around 70,000 times and shared 1,700 times.
The video was also posted from several other Facebook profiles (1, 2, 3).
A reverse image search using keyframes from the video led to a video published on the Facebook page of Times of Bangladesh on September 18. Its headline read, “Child Koli murder case: Villagers vandalize house of arrested accused.” The structure and color of the damaged building, as well as the Arabic and Bangla inscriptions, match those in the video circulating on Facebook. The Times of Bangladesh video is 1 minute and 17 seconds long.
A search also found several news reports (1, 2, 3) about the incident. A report published by Prothom Alo on September 20 under the headline “After raping and killing schoolgirl, mob demolishes accused’s house” said that the house of Mostafa Pramanik, the prime accused in the rape and murder of a 10-year-old schoolgirl in Pabna Sadar, was demolished. Local residents gathered and attacked his house, vandalized furniture, and used hammers to break the doors, windows and roof, destroying much of the structure.
In other words, old footage showing angry villagers attacking and vandalizing the house of the prime accused in a child murder case in Pabna is being circulated on Facebook with the false claim that a mosque is being demolished in India.
