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| - Fact Check: Photo claims Muslims blocked an Indian highway to offer prayers. Here's the truth behind the viral pic
An image showing a large gathering of men offering namaz on a road and on top of vehicles is being circulated on social media with the claim that it is a scene from the Friday prayers on a highway in India. India Today's AFWA probes the truth.
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India Today Fact Check
This photo is from the 2020 Bishwa Ijtema, a religious congregation of Muslims that is held annually in Bangladesh's Tongi.
A controversy sparked in Haryana’s Gurugram recently after some Hindu groups and residents in the city objected to Muslims offering namaz on an open ground near a residential complex. Former Rajya Sabha MP Mohammad Adeeb has now moved the Supreme Court with a contempt plea alleging that the Haryana police and civil administration failed to take action against those who prevented Muslims from offering namaz on public grounds.
Amid this ongoing dispute, an image showing a large gathering of men offering namaz on a road and on top of vehicles is being circulated on social media with the claim that it is a scene from the Friday prayers on a highway in India.
Posting the image, Tarek Fatah - who has more than 7.5 lakh followers on Twitter - wrote, “Blocking traffic on a highway in India to perform Friday prayers . This doesn't seem to me as a prayer; it's a demonstration of numbers to intimidate others. Any attempt to ask them to move to designated prayer spaces will be labelled 'discrimination'.”
The archived version of the post can be seen here. After Fatah’s tweet, the image also went viral on Facebook with similar claims.
India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) has found that the claim along with the image is misleading. This image is from a 2020 religious congregation in Bangladesh.
AFWA probe
We found that Tarek Fatah has shared the same image as from Bangladesh on his Facebook profile. However, a reverse search of the image on Google and Yandex did not yield any credible results.
We did a reverse search of the viral image on Bing and found a better-quality image of the same photo uploaded on “Fine Art America”, an online marketplace for buying and selling art.
According to the description provided by this site, the image is from Bishwa Ijtema, an annual congregation of Muslims held in Tongi, a major township in Gazipur, Bangladesh. Bishwa Ijtema is considered as one of the world’s largest gatherings of Muslims.
Closely observing the better-quality version of the image, we can see a green board in Bangla. The next written on it translates to English as, “Biswa Ijtema, 2020. May this year 2020 be good”. We also noticed "Gazipur Metropolitan Police" written in Bangla on the small watchtower seen on the right side of the green banner.
We can also see “BRTC” (Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation) written on a red double-decker bus seen in the image.
A comparison between the bus seen in the viral image and the BRTC bus can be seen below.
The text in Bangla on the red board behind this bus reads “Motijheel- Farm Gate, Station Road (Route)”. A search for this route on Google Maps confirms the location is indeed in Bangladesh.
Also, according to the information provided by the site “Fine Art America”, the image was clicked by Azim Khan Ronnie, a photographer from Bangladesh known for aerial photography.
We then reached out to Azim through Instagram. Speaking to AFWA, Azim confirmed that the photograph was clicked by him during the 2020 Biswa Ijtema in Tongi.
We also found multiple images similar to the one in question uploaded on Azim’s official website.
Stock image site Alamy has also published a similar image as from Bishwa Ijtema, 2020.
It is hence clear that the image in question is not from a highway in India, but from a religious congregation in Bangladesh.
READ: Fact Check: This video does not show Ayyappa devotees chanting Islamic prayers in Sabarimala
ALSO READ: Fact Check: No, Kangana Ranaut did not celebrate Vijay Diwas with BSF jawans
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