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| - Fact Check: Little girl killed in Sri Lanka Easter bombings linked to Covid-19
A heart-wrenching image of some people grieving around the body of a little girl is circulating on social media with the claim that the girl had died of Covid-19.
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India Today Fact Check
The girl in the picture, 13-year-old Shaini, had died in the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka last year.
A heart-wrenching image of some people grieving around the body of a little girl is circulating on social media with the claim that the girl had died of Covid-19.
The post on Facebook urges users to share the information and click on a web link to a blog to watch the video. The headline of the blog reads, "Pretty girl buried admist tears after dying of corona virus unknowingly: mother's reaction breaks people's heart".
The caption of the Facebook post reads, "Rip my only princess. I can question God. Corona killed your father now its you. but lord I know you understand. To as many that will type RIP and SHARE this post untimely death shall never be your port. Only the heatless will ignore. Watch video here".
India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) has found the claim to be misleading. The girl in the picture did not die of Covid-19. Thirteen-year-old Shaini was killed in the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka last year. Her injured grandmother is seen mourning in the picture before the little girl's funeral.
The post has been shared by multiple users on Facebook. The archived versions can be seen here and here.
AFWA investigation
With the help of reverse image search, we found this picture in several websites.
A website called "CatholicPhilly" published this image on April 23, 2019, with the caption, "The injured grandmother of Shaini, 13, who died as bomb blasts ripped through churches and luxury hotels on Easter, mourns at her wake in Negombo, Sri Lanka, April 22, 2019. (CNS photo/Athit Perawongmetha, Reuters)".
The same picture was also published by "Daily Mail" (), along with several others last year, in a feature of the top Reuters images "from a turbulent 2019".
On April 21, 2019, on Easter Sunday, three churches in three cities of Sri Lanka, and three luxury hotels in the capital Colombo, came under a series of coordinated suicide bombings. Thirteen-year-old Shaini lost her life and her grandmother was hurt in the attack at Negombo. The viral picture was of Shaini's wake ceremony before her funeral.
The viral post asks users to click the link to a blog to watch the video. But when one attempts to watch the video, a notification from another website asks users to press the "allow" button, which then takes one to an unrelated website; the video never appears.
Therefore, we can conclude that the girl in the viral image did not die of coronavirus. She was a victim of Easter bombings in Sri Lanka last year. The viral post is clickbait as it asks users to only share the post and leads to unrelated websites by luring them to watch the video.
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