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| - Fact Check: 2021 video from Punjab becomes fodder for misinformation about police-army clash in Manipur
A video featuring uniformed soldiers lying on the floor, supposedly after clashes with the Manipur police, turned out to be old, and from Punjab.
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India Today Fact Check
This video is from a 2021 military training organised in Punjab’s Pathankot, during which several soldiers collapsed because of extreme weather conditions.
While the internet continues to be suspended in Manipur, misinformation about the situation there appears to be plentiful. The northeastern state has been witnessing ethnic clashes between Meiteis and Kukis for a month now.
A new video, allegedly from the state, purports to show that clashes are now taking place between the military and the police there. It showed several uniformed men carrying a seemingly unconscious man towards a jeep. Other soldiers could be seen attempting to resuscitate two men. The whole scene seemed to unfold inside a cantonment.
“There has been a massive clash between Indian army soldiers (37 Assam Rifle Battalion) and Manipur police in which one Indian army soldier died while some others were severely injured,” read a tweet containing the video. Archived versions of these tweets can be seen here and here.
India Today, however, found that this video does not have any links to Manipur. It is from Pathankot in Punjab.
OUR PROBE
A keyword search about a standoff between the two forces fetched a news report from the Imphal Free Press. According to it, a confrontation reportedly took place at the Sugnu police station between the Sugnu police and the 37 Assam Rifles after the latter blocked the main entrance of the station on June 2.
We also found a video of the incident where officers could be seen arguing with each other as a huge military truck blocked the way. However, we could not find reports about a violent (even fatal) tussle between the two forces.
Further searches led us to a tweet from the Public Relations Officer for Kohima and Imphal in the Ministry of Defense. The tweet refuted the viral allegation. It said, “Indian Army & Assam Rifles rejects the fake video, that has emerged on social media, claiming casualties of a Assam Rifles in Manipur post scuffle with @manipur_police. The video depicts a training activity of army in Punjab in 2021.”
The official Twitter account of The Dimapur-based III Corps of the Indian Army (also known as Spear Corps) too tweeted the same information.
Using this clue, we found several tweets from August 2021 containing the video in question. According to these tweets, the video was shot during a Battle Physical Efficiency Test or BPET in Pathankot, Punjab. Allegedly, soldiers had collapsed following heat strokes and exhaustion.
According to a news report by The Print, the training was organised in the area under the 9 Corps of the Indian Army at the Mamun military station. Nearly three dozen soldiers reportedly collapsed because of extreme weather conditions during a 10 km endurance run as part of a recce troop competition.
The Indian Army also issued a statement regarding this incident on August 21, 2021. According to it, the training was undertaken by “11 officers, 11 JCOs, and 12 other ranks” near Pathankot, Punjab.
Thus, it is more than clear that an old video from Punjab is being peddled as a scuffle between Manipur police and the Indian Army.
(Written by Sanjana Saxena)
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