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| - Fact Check: Were fake notes seized from a temple in Gujarat during lockdown?
A viral post on social media claims that at a time the country is struggling against the coronavirus pandemic, a temple in Gujarat was busted manufacturing fake notes.
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India Today Fact Check
The incident took place last year and has no relation to the coronavirus lockdown.
A viral post on social media claims that at a time the country is struggling against the coronavirus pandemic, a temple in Gujarat was busted manufacturing fake notes.
Facebook page "NewsIdol" posted a news clipping of "Zee Bihar Jharkhand" with a caption in Hindi that translates to, "While on one hand, the whole country is fighting coronavirus, on the other, a temple is Gujarat is manufacturing fake notes taking full advantage of the lockdown." The post also asks people to follow an Instagram account.
India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) has found the claim to be misleading. The incident took place in Gujarat's Surat last year and has no relation to the coronavirus lockdown.
The archived version of the post can be seen here. Till the filing of this story, the post was shared more than 26,000 times. Many Facebook users have shared the video with similar claims.
The 3-minute-45-second video by news channel "Zee Bihar Jharkhand" says fake currency notes were being printed in an under-construction Swaminarayan temple in Surat, Gujarat. Five people, including a priest, were arrested for manufacturing and circulating the notes. The anchors or the news report does not say anything about coronavirus or lockdown.
We found that the same news clip was posted on Facebook by a user more than five months ago on November 26, 2019. With the help of keyword search, we found that the incident was reported by several media organisations around this time.
"TV9 Gujarati" ran the news which was uploaded on YouTube on November 24, 2019, with the caption, "Kheda Swaminarayan Sadhu supplied fake currency notes in prasad box, arrested by Surat crime branch".
This incident was also reported in various newspapers such as "The Indian Express" and " The Economic Times" in November 2019.
According to these news reports, fake notes worth Rs 1 crore were confiscated and five people, including a priest, arrested by the crime branch of Gujarat police from an under-construction Swaminarayan temple in Ambav village in Kheda, Surat.
Therefore, it is clear that the incident is from last year and in no way linked to the present coronavirus lockdown. It looks as if the misleading claim was made deliberately to create sensation and garner followers for an Instagram account mentioned in the post.
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