A disturbing video showing a woman dressed in burqa hitting another woman inside a gym while a man tries to break the scuffle is viral on social media with a false communal claim that it shows an incident of 'love jihad'.
The video has been shared on right wing Hindu pages on Facebook falsely claiming that the woman being attacked is a Hindu.
BOOM found that the viral video is from Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. We talked to the local police and confirmed that everyone involved in the scuffle shown in the video belonged to the Muslim community.
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Love jihad is a term popularised by right-wing Hindutva groups that allege Muslim men lure Hindu women into converting to Islam on pretext of a relationship or marriage. Read more here.
The 2.15-minute-long viral video shows a woman assaulting another woman inside a gym. A man who tries to intervene and pull aside the woman being attacked is also hit.
The video has been shared with a long Hindi caption which translates to 'An incident from a gym in Bhopal. A Muslim woman thrashes her husband and his Hindu lover. The family of the Hindu woman, who is married, has still not awakened and are giving their daughter-in-laws, daughters and wives to these love jihadis via gyms. The video confirms two things... first, now Muslim women are not afraid of triple talaq and second the alleged Hindu woman will surely travel in a suitcase'.
(Hindi: भोपाल मैं एक जिम की घटना, मुस्लिम महिला की जागरूकता के कारण अपने पति को एवं उसकी हिन्दू प्रेमिका को तबियत से धोया गया, परंतु इस हिंदू महिला का परिवार जो कि शादीशुदा है अभी भी सो ही रहा है, जो अपनी बहू,बेटी,पत्नी को जिम के माध्यम से इन लव जिहादियों को सौंप रहे हैं.. इस विडियो से दो बातें स्पष्ट हैं पहली अब मुस्लिम महिलाओं मे तीन तलाक का भय नहीं है, इस महिला का तलाक तो निश्चित रूप से होना है क्योंकि वो बोल रही है कुछ मामला कोर्ट में है और कोर्ट के लिए सबूत वो जुटाने आई थी, और दुसरा ये जो कथित हिन्दू महिला है ये निश्चित रूप से सूटकेस कि यात्रा करेंगी)
BOOM has not shared the viral video due to its graphic nature.
The viral posts can be viewed here, here and here. The video is disturbing in nature, viewers' discretion is advised.
Fact Check
BOOM did a search with keywords 'भोपाल जिम वीडियो viral' and found several news reports with screenshots from the same video that is viral now.
According to a report published in Hindi daily Dainik Jagran, the incident took place on October 15 in Kohefiza area of Bhopal. The burqa clad woman and her sister had visited the gym after she learnt that her husband was having an alleged affair with another woman at the gym.
According to the report, police had registered cross complaints from both the parties in the case. The news reports, however, do not mention anything about the religion of the people involved in the scuffle.
The Dainik Jagran report also states that the woman had earlier file a case of dowry against her husband. The man had meanwhile denied his wife's allegation of having an affair with another woman. Read more reports here and here.
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Taking cue, BOOM called Kohefiza police station to get more details about the case. Speaking to BOOM, a police constable Devesh Singh said that the viral claims on social media are false as all the persons belonged to the Muslim community.
"Complaints have been filed from both the sides. All the persons seen in the viral video are from the Muslim community and there's no communal angle here," Singh told BOOM.
The police personnel told us the names of all those involved in the incident. However, we are not revealing the names in order to protect their identities.
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