| schema:text
| - Fact Check: Old video of Odisha bus accident victims shared as charred bodies of women and children in Birbhum violence
A viral video claims to show the women and children who were burnt to death in Bengal's Birbhum. The India Today Anti Fake News War Room found the video was from a bus accident that took place in Odisha in 2020, not from Birbhum."
Listen to Story
India Today Fact Check
This video is from a February 2020 accident when a bus caught on fire after coming in contact with an overhead power transmission wire in Odisha’s Ganjam district.
Six women and two children were burnt to death during the violence that took place at Rampurhat in West Bengal‘s Birbhum district on February 22, following the murder of a deputy panchayat chief of the Trinamool Congress. Houses were torched after the murder. A probe is on to identify the connection between the TMC leader's murder and the violence.
Amid this, a video showing a group of women and children lying on the ground with burn marks was circulated on social media with claims that it captured scenes from the Rampurhat incident. A screenshot from one such post can be seen below. We have not used the video in this story due to its graphic nature.
The archived versions of similar posts can be seen here and here.
The India Today Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) found that the video was from a fire incident that took place in Odisha in 2020, not from Birbhum.
AFWA probe
We ran a reverse search of the keyframes of the viral video on Google and found the same video tweeted by a person in February 2020. As per the tweet, the video was from the 2020 North East Delhi riots. Though the information provided in the tweet did not look credible, we were able to confirm that the video was at least two years old.
In the viral video, we could see a private bus parked near the crowd. This gave the clue that the incident could have been a bus accident. Closely observing the bus, we found the name, ‘WWW.DJGADDI.IN’ written on it.
The website of 'DJGaddi' states it is an online ticket booking platform functioning in Odisha.
As per these reports, the incident took place in the Golanthara area of Odisha’s Ganjam district on February 9, 2020. At least nine people were electrocuted to death and several got injured when a bus with over 40 passengers caught fire after coming in contact with an overhead power transmission wire.
The incident was also reported by ANI on Twitter. The bus seen in the viral video can be seen in this ANI post.
Odisha: At least 6 persons dead and around 40 passengers injured after the bus they were travelling in caught fire after coming in contact with 11 KV live electric wire in Ganjam district, Brahmapur. Injured persons have been sent to MKCG Medical College and Hospital. pic.twitter.com/MFB6YsOIqN — ANI (@ANI) February 9, 2020
Multiple video reports about the incident are also available.
According to an NDTV report, the Odisha government suspended four engineers following the Ganjam bus tragedy.
It is thus clear that the video is old and not related to the Birbhum violence.
Please share it on our at 73 7000 7000
You can also send us an email at factcheck@intoday.com
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)
![[cxml]](/fct/images/cxml_doc.png)
![[csv]](/fct/images/csv_doc.png)
![[text]](/fct/images/ntriples_doc.png)
![[turtle]](/fct/images/n3turtle_doc.png)
![[ld+json]](/fct/images/jsonld_doc.png)
![[rdf+json]](/fct/images/json_doc.png)
![[rdf+xml]](/fct/images/xml_doc.png)
![[atom+xml]](/fct/images/atom_doc.png)
![[html]](/fct/images/html_doc.png)