Amroha, Uttar Pradesh – Around 9:30 pm on a humid July night, Balwant Singh, stood outside his home in Fatehpur Shumali village, staring at blinking red and green lights hovering above. “It circled the village several times,” the 55-year-old village head recalled. “People came out with torches and sticks. Some even climbed on their rooftops.”
By morning, local WhatsApp groups were buzzing. What had been a simple drone sighting became something far more sinister: villagers now believed that thieves were using drones to scout homes before robbing them.
For weeks, villages across Amroha district in western Uttar Pradesh have been gripped by a strange and growing fear. Nighttime drone sightings, “suspicious” strangers, alerts on WhatsApp, rumours of armed robbers, and a steady stream of unverifiable videos on social media have fed a climate of anxiety – and sometimes, violence.
But the police insist there is no evidence that drones are being used by criminals. “The first complaint we received was around 15–20 days ago, when three locals were flying a drone to shoot a reel,” said Amit Kumar Anand, Superintendent of Police (SP) for Amroha.
“Since then, we’ve had over 250 complaints, but none have linked drone sightings to any actual theft.”
Despite police advisories and meetings held in all 13 police station areas, the panic continues. Villagers are patrolling their neighbourhoods past midnight, strangers are being chased and beaten. And the fear is being shaped and magnified by forwarded messages and viral clips on platforms like WhatsApp, Instagram and X.
Mistaken Identity, Real Violence
On July 3, three young men – Mohit, Nadeem, and Amaan – were attacked by villagers and handed over to the police after being spotted flying a drone near Mohammadpur bypass. The trio, two of whom are students and one a wedding photographer, had stopped at a roadside dhaba for dinner and were flying a drone nearby.
According to the police, they were riding a bike at high speed and shooting from a drone, which alarmed locals and prompted complaints. Officers from the nearby police station detained them under Section 170 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), the updated version of Section 151 of the old Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), which deals with preventive custody in anticipation of a breach of peace. They were later granted bail by the court.
Then on July 24, mob violence escalated across the district.
In one particularly disturbing case from the Gajraula Kotwali area, an elderly man with mental health conditions was severely beaten by a crowd. His clothes were torn. More than ten ATM cards were found in his possession – all of which were later confirmed to be blocked. He was eventually identified as Sonath Singh, a resident of Rourkela, Odisha, and rescued by the police.
Two other men, Dharmendra from Bijnor, and Sanjeev Kumar, a Gajraula local, were attacked under the suspicion of being theives. Police later confirmed that they were intoxicated, but posed no threat.
The fear, however, is real. “We’re tired,” said Rajendra Singh, a 60-year-old farmer from Jogipura. “We work in the fields during the day. At night, we stay up with sticks and lathis to guard our homes. Some people have firearms too.”
Misinfo Meets Fear
The panic isn’t just on the ground, it’s thriving in digital spaces.
WhatsApp groups like “Choro ka Atank” (Terror of Thieves) and “Stay High Alert” have been created by villagers from Chheetra and Dhakia. Originally the groups were to help with night patrol coordination, but now they serve as rumour mills.
One message warned, “Satark rahein, Savdhan! Gaon mein choro ki entry ho gayi hai. Chheetra mein dekhe gaye hain abhi.” (Stay alert, be cautious! Thieves have entered the village. Seen in Chheetra.) Another user quickly replied: “Farzi khabar hai ye.” (This is fake news.)
Rahul Krishna Yadav, a contractor from Dhanaura, is part of several such groups. He pointed out that old crime videos from other parts of India are being recirculated and falsely linked to Amroha.
“A video of an elderly couple murdered in Gujarat was shared on WhatsApp, suggesting it happened in Amroha,” he said. The police had to issue clarifications.
BOOM’s own fact-checking tipline has seen a spike in such claims. A disturbing video posted on X on July 16 showed a woman and seven children lying in a pool of blood, falsely described as a robbery murder from Amroha. The caption read: “In a village in UP's Amroha district, thieves who entered a house with the intent to steal, finding nothing to take, brutally murdered the entire family 💔”
The video was later debunked by Uttar Pradesh Police, who confirmed it was from Mudwala in Muzaffargarh district, Punjab, Pakistan. It wasn’t even from India.
SP Amit Kumar Anand told BOOM that since the first incident, the district police have been inundated with up to 70 calls a day reporting drones. None, he said, had any evidence linking drones to actual crimes.
We have found over a hundred such videos with hashtags like #Amorha and #Amrohadrone. Some of these videos have between 2 to 5 million views. In one such video, which has 3 million views, people can be seen holding sticks and searching for thieves in the Didauli area at 2:20 AM. In another video with 241k views, a user is seen asking whether the object shown is a drone. The same Instagram user has shared multiple videos from Amroha related to night vigilance, thieves, and drone sightings.
To address growing public anxiety, the police held meetings with residents across all 13 police station areas. They issued advisories, asked people to avoid forwarding unverified messages, and joined village WhatsApp groups to monitor and respond in real time. A dedicated helpline number was shared, and drone owners in the district were called in and briefed.
Despite these steps, over 250 complaints have poured in so far. According to the SP, most of them were either based on confusion or deliberate mischief. In several instances, toy helicopters or blinking airplane lights were mistaken for drones. In others, villagers raised alarms without having seen anything at all — likely out of heightened fear. There were even cases where the same photograph of a supposed drone was forwarded by multiple people from different villages, each claiming it was taken in their own area.
“There’s a pattern,” said SP Anand. “We’ve seen the same image or video doing rounds with different captions. The fear is real, but the facts don’t support the rumour.”
In a region where a string of real thefts preceded the rumour, and where policing can often feel reactive, beliefs fill the gaps that facts don’t.
But this isn’t new. Misinformation has led to violence in India many times. In 2018, false WhatsApp forwards about child kidnappers led to the lynching of more than 18 people across the country. Police were often too late to intervene.
More recently, fake news and misleading videos fueled ethnic violence between Meitei and Kuki communities in Manipur. A viral clip of women being stripped and paraded was wrongly attributed to a different location, sparking further unrest. The Indian authorities shutting down internet to prevent misinformation backfired. The false videos continued circulating, triggering more violence.
Now, Amroha is witnessing a similar pattern — with little national media attention.
The Lingering Fear
In Dhakia village, 60-year-old dhaba owner Ashok Singh Chahal says the fear has changed their way of life.
“Since last month, no one here sleeps at night,” he said. “I was coming home from work and saw a drone flying above the village. Soon after, we heard gunshots.” It was fired to scare off the thieves, he was told.
Children, too, are affected. “My four-year-old granddaughter now insists on sleeping next to me,” said Rajendra Singh. “She says she wants to help keep watch.”
Even those who don’t believe the drone theory entirely feel pressured to stay alert.
Gurvinder Singh, a 32-year-old farmers’ union member in Chheetra, said, “I don’t think it’s anything dangerous, maybe someone’s just messing with us. But that doesn’t mean people aren’t afraid.
To verify some of the viral drone videos, BOOM sent them to Milind Raj, CEO of robotics research firm Roboz Dotin Tech. He dismissed both videos as false drone sightings.
About the first video, Milind said: "If we closely observe the LED flashing pattern, it does not look like a drone. This kind of light pattern is usually seen in airplanes. People often mistake it for a drone."
For the second video, Milind explained: "If you observe carefully, you can clearly see the difference between a drone and an aircraft from the ground. The flight pattern is different. Drone lights do not blink like this. These kinds of lights are called NLA (Navigation Lights in Aircraft) which are used in airplanes."
Milind added that he frequently receives similar complaints, especially from rural areas, where unfamiliar lights in the sky create fear and confusion.
The panic has already spilled into nearby districts — Moradabad, Sambhal, Hapur, and Bijnor — where drone sightings and robbery rumours are being reported.
In Singhpur Sani village of Sambhal district, residents stayed up all night after spotting what they believed were drones. Police later confirmed they were toy aircraft. Sambhal SP Krishna Kumar Bishnoi warned that anyone spreading rumours would face action under the National Security Act (NSA).
In Hapur, villages like Ayadnagar and Hafizpur reported seeing four to five drones. ASP Vineet Bhatnagar confirmed that two special teams had been formed to investigate, and appealed to residents to remain calm.
Back in Amroha, despite the police efforts and public warnings, the fear remains – buzzing in the sky, circulating in WhatsApp groups, and keeping entire communities awake.
Meanwhile, the violence continues. On the night of July 25, six young men — Mushahid, Ankit, Tahjibul, Asif, and two others — were brutally assaulted by villagers in Patai Khalsa, Amroha. They were residents of Malakpur Nawada village in neighbouring Sambhal district. The group worked as labourers at a cotton factory in Panipat, Haryana, and were returning home to celebrate Hariyali Teej with their families.
Around midnight, they lost their way and were using Google Maps for directions. When they stopped to ask locals for the correct route, suspicion quickly escalated. In a village already on edge from weeks of drone sightings and theft rumours, the strangers were assumed to be criminals, possibly thieves.
The mob descended on them with sticks and rods, thrashing them brutally and vandalising their vehicle. None of the six had drones or weapons. Just work clothes, phones, and exhaustion from the long journey.
“They were only asking for directions,” said Ramesh, Ankit’s father, over a phone call.
“My son was returning home from work, that’s all. Now he’s in the ICU, fighting for his life.”
All six sustained serious injuries. Some remain in critical condition at Jeevan 24 Hospital in Amroha.
There were no drones in the sky that night – only fear, suspicion, and a deadly mistake.