Disturbing CCTV footage from 2011 capturing a domestic help contaminating a drum filled with water by mixing urine, has been revived online with a false and communal claim that the woman is a Muslim. BOOM found that the clip is eight-and-a-half years old and that the accused did not belong to the Muslim community.
The video is being peddled with a Hindi caption claiming 'Mukesh Suri from Bhopal had employed a Muslim domestic help named Hasina. The maid started behaving as per the Islamic tradition and laced Suri's food with spittle and urine'.
(Hindi: भोपाल में मुकेश सूरी जी ने 'हसीना' नामक मुस्लिम नौकरानी को काम पर रखा और नौकरानी ने अपने इस्लामी मज़हब के अनुसार आचरण करना शुरू कर दिया!! अपने थूक और पेशाब से बना कर खिलाती थी खाना!)
The same video is also viral from Twitter. The claim here refers to 'Mukesh Suri' as 'Srivastava Ji'.
The clip shows a news anchor speaking about the incident. Later, clips of CCTV footage are shown wherein a woman can be seen urinating in a tumbler and pouring the content in a drum filled with water.
View the post below and access their archived versions here and here.
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भोपाल में मुकेश सूरी जी ने 'हसीना' नामक मुस्लिम नौकरानी को काम पर रखा और नौकरानी ने अपने इस्लामी मज़हब के अनुसार आचरण करना शुरू कर दिया!! अपने थूक और पेशाब से बना कर खिलाती थी खाना! pic.twitter.com/G68jAyHE8J
— राजबहादुर मौर्य (@121rajbahadur) April 8, 2020
The video is quite viral on Twitter too.
Fact Check
The top left corner of the video has a time and date stamp that shows the video is from October 17, 2011. BOOM then looked for news reports from that time period with the help of keyword search. We found articles from Times of India and Dainik Jagran which had reported the incident. Both the news reports have mentioned the name of the accused as Asha Kaushal.
According to the news reports, the employer Mukesh Suri had installed CCTV cameras in his house to keep an eye on the activities of his domestic help after his wife complained of household items going missing.
The woman was recorded in the kitchen CCTV where she can be seen urinating in a tumbler and then mixing it with the drinking water and the food that was being prepared. The accused was out on bail the next day.
As per the Dainik Jagran report, the accused domestic help had told the police that she had taken the repulsive step to teach her employer a lesson. She alleged that Suri had displayed undesirable behavior toward her young grand-daughter.
Meanwhile Times of India, in its report, mentioned daughter in place of grand-daughter.
BOOM also came across the same video posted on Facebook in 2015 with a caption 'Domestic maid's shenanigans revealed. See how she mixed urine in food.'
The clip is the latest example of disinformation targeting Indian Muslims with a narrative that blames them for spreading the novel Coronavirus after several members of the Tablighi Jamaat - an Islamic sect - tested positive and were responsible for a spurt of cases in several states.
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