Several people were killed and many seriously injured in a stampede that took place at around 2 am on January 29 at the ongoing Maha Kumbh in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. According to official figures, the death toll is 30 and the number of injured stands at 60. According to eyewitnesses, the main trigger for the stampede was the sudden rush of pilgrims at the Sangam who were eager to take a bath at 3 am on the beginning of the auspicious muhurat of Mauni Amavasya. Since it was the morning of Mauni Amavasya, one of the most auspicious days of the Hindu calendar, the rush of crowd that gathered to take a holy bath on this occasion transformed into a stampede.
Following this incident, a flurry of different types of videos and claims are being widely circulated on social media. In one such video, a group of men can be seen raising slogans in support of Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav. Sharing this video, it is being claimed that these men caused the stampede at the Kumbh Mela in which many people lost their lives.
A collage of two video clips is also being shared in which one side features a report by The Lallantop. In this, a person is claiming that a bus had stopped here with 15 to 20 youths getting down from it, which caused the stampede. The second video shows footage of a group of youths shouting slogans of ‘Long live Akhilesh Yadav’. It is being claimed that these boys triggered the stampede.
An X user named Ocean Jain shared this video and wrote, “If eyewitnesses are to be believed, some people got down from a bus and caused a stampede. And you can see in the second video how they are shouting ‘Akhilesh Yadav’ as if they have come to a rally. Was this video taken before the stampede? The police and administration should investigate from this angle.” It is worth noting that this user has been found spreading misinformation earlier as well.
चश्मदीदों की माने तो कुछ लोग एक बस से उतरे और भगदड़ मचाए
और आप दूसरी वीडियो देख सकते है कैसे अखिलेश यादव चिल्ला रहे है जैसे किसी रैली में आए हो
कहीं यह वीडियो भगदड़ वाली स्थिति के पहले का तो नहीं है??
पुलिस ओर प्रशासन को इस एंगल से जांच करनी चाहिए pic.twitter.com/asS8eOlIIg
— ocean jain (@ocjain4) January 30, 2025
BJP supporter Raushan Sinha shared the video and wrote that the Uttar Pradesh government should investigate whether these young men were the reason behind the stampede. (Archived link)
BJP supporter Rajiv Bhatia (@Ra_Bies) tweeted this video and called it a shocking incident and slammed Akhilesh Yadav. (Archived link)
BJP supporter Nitin Shukla also shared the video and made a similar claim. (Archived link)
Fact Check
We performed a reverse image search using frames taken from the viral footage and found the source video uploaded on Instagram by a user named Pradeep Yadav with over 1.57 lakh views. We reached out to Yadav, who told us that he had recorded the video on January 27 at 5 am.
He also shared with us a screenshot of the metadata details from the phone that was used to record the viral video. It can be seen below that the video was captured at 5:25 am on January 27.
In addition, Pradeep told us that his friend Virendra Yadav is also seen in the video. Virendra also posted the video on his social media accounts on January 27. Pradeep shared with us the link to the video posted by Virendra on Facebook and Instagram. It can be clearly seen that this video was posted on January 27. In other words, the video was posted on social media two days before the stampede, which occurred on the morning of January 29. Therefore, the claim that these youths caused the stampede is false.
To sum up, many BJP supporters shared a video of some men raising slogans of ‘Long live Akhilesh Yadav’ at the Maha Kumbh Mela and falsely claimed that these men caused the stampede which led to the death of many people. However, in reality, this video was posted online two days before the incident.
The post Viral video of men raising pro-Akhilesh slogans at Maha Mukbh was shot 2 days before stampede appeared first on Alt News.
This content originally appeared on Alt News and was authored by Abhishek Kumar.
Abhishek Kumar | Radio Free (2025-01-31T05:57:23+00:00) Viral video of men raising pro-Akhilesh slogans at Maha Mukbh was shot 2 days before stampede. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2025/01/31/viral-video-of-men-raising-pro-akhilesh-slogans-at-maha-mukbh-was-shot-2-days-before-stampede/
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