A video from December 2021 showing a group of youngsters on bikes chanting "Khalistan zindabad" is being shared with the false claim that the pro-Khalistan bike rally was taken out on January 5, 2022 when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Punjab.
On January 5, 2022, PM Modi was scheduled to attend an election rally and lay foundation stone for development work during his visit to Punjab. However, the Prime Minister's cavalcade was stranded on a flyover in Punjab's Ferozepur district for over 15 minutes due to a protest by farmers and his scheduled visit was later canceled with the BJP accusing the ruling Congress state government for the security breach.
The video shows youths on their bikes chanting "Khalistan Zindabad".
The video is being shared with the caption, "Why Did The Congress Government Not Arrest Those Who Raised Slogans Of Khalistan Zindabad Yesterday? Where does this want to take democracy? this is disgusting #PresidentRuleInPunjab"
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The same video is also being shared on Twitter with the same false claim.
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FACT-CHECK
BOOM found that the viral video dates back to December 2021 and is not from the day of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Punjab on January 5, 2022.
We broke the video into key-frames and performed a reverse image search using In-Vid; search results showed several tweets from December 27, 2021, with the same video.
Additionally, in a reply to the viral video, a user pointed out that the video is from December 26, 2021. The tweet reads, "This video is of 26 Dec 2021 from a Bike March in Remembrance of Chhote Sahibzade in Sirhind Punjab, not in ferozpur. Stop Defaming Punjab and Sikhs" (sic.)
Chhotte Sahibzade are considered the sons of Guru Gobind Singh who are believed to have attained martyrdom on December 26, 1704. This is known as Saka Sirhind and every year from December 24 to December 26, Shaheedi Jor Mela also known as Shaheedi Jor Mel/Sabha is organised at Fatehgarh Sahib, Punjab to commemorate their sacrifice at the place of their martyrdom.
Taking a hint from this, we then searched with the relevant keywords which showed Facebook posts, and the same video uploaded on YouTube on December 27. 2021. The title when translated from Punjabi reads, "Khalistan Zindabaad December 2021 Saffron March by the youth of Punjab on the occasion of Shahidi Jodh Mela".
The same video can be seen in the Facebook post below
BOOM could not independently verify the incident, however we were able to establish that the video is not from Janaury 5, 2022, on the day of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Punjab.
