Video of Hindu man being thrashed and forced out of mosque during iftar is scripted

By: Azra Ali
April 12 2024

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Screenshots of the viral post.(Source: X/Screenshot)

What is the claim?

A video of a man being thrashed and dragged out of a room has been shared with the claim that it shows a Hindu man being forced out of a mosque. A social media user shared the video on X (formerly Twitter) with the caption, "Hindu dragged out from the mosque." (translated from Hindi). The post garnered thousands of views on the microblogging site, and an archived version can be accessed here. This claim was also shared on YouTube, and archived versions of similar claims can be viewed here, here, and here.

Screenshots of the viral post.(Source: X/YouTube/Screenshot)

However, a scripted video has been shared as a real incident. 

How did we verify this?

A reverse-image search of keyframes from the viral video led us to a YouTube video titled "'When a Hindu Sanyasi goes to a Muslim's Masjid for Iftar? Hindu vs Muslim Social Experiment." The video was uploaded on April 6 by YouTube channel 'PrankBuzz,' which has over 3.7 million subscribers. The video description stated, "The following video is intended for entertainment purposes only," and contains the hashtag "#socialexperiment."

Around the 0:16 mark of this YouTube video, we could see the two men from the now-viral video explaining that they will be conducting a social experiment to see the reaction of people when a Hindu is forced to leave the mosque at the time of iftar (fast-breaking evening meal during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan). The man wearing saffron clothes says: "Today we will go inside a mosque dressed up as a Hindu at the time of iftar to see people's reaction," and the other man, who adorns a kufi ( a rounded cap worn by many Muslim men), then says, "I dressed up as a Muslim will force and thrash him out of the mosque and will see if people will support him or me." This shows that the incident that follows is scripted.

Around 0:51 minutes in this original video, we can see the now-viral visuals where the man dressed as a so-called Muslim is seen pushing and thrashing the man dressed in the 'Hindu' attire.'

The original video goes on to show that other men in the room start questioning the man in the 'Muslim' attire for his behavior and object to him trying to remove the 'Hindu' man from the premises. They force him to remove the room and ask the 'Hindu' man to join them for iftar. We are not sure if this part of the clip is scripted or not. However, towards the end of the clip, some of the elderly men from the gathering tell the 'Prank Buzz' creators that Hindus and Muslims are like brothers and that everyone is welcome to join iftar.  

The verdict 

The viral video showing a Hindu man being thrashed and forced out of a mosque by a Muslim man was scripted and does not show a real incident. Therefore, we have marked the claim as false.