2017 Attack On Chennai Cop Peddled With False Communal Claim

Two images from 2017 featuring an injured policeman are being shared with a false claim that the cop was attacked while on patrol by three knife-wielding Muslim youths who were harassing a woman at Chennai's Marina Beach.

The posts also claim that 'hundreds' of Muslims protested in front of the police station in support of the arrested youths.

BOOM found that the incident happened in 2017 and that the accused in the attack are not Muslims. The claim about the accused harassing a woman is also false.

The image has also been shared with the false claim on Twitter.

The collage being shared with the false claim has two images. One shows a blood-soaked police shirt with the name tag C Akilan. The other image shows a man wearing a vest and sporting a cut below his right eye while a police officer stands behind him.

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The translated Tamil Facebook post reads: Chennai becoming a mini Pakistan. Near Marina beach, 3 Muslim youngsters from Tiruvallikeni area under the influence of cannabis, were behaving wrongly with women and the assistant police who went to talk to them suffered multiple cuts. 100s of Muslim people protested in front of the police station in support of the arrested Muslim youngsters'. Is this Tamil Nadu? Or Taliban Nadu?

(Original caption: மினி பாகிஸ்தான் ஆகும் சென்னை: மெரினா கடற்க்கரையில் கஞ்சா போதையில் பெண்களிடம் தவறாக நடந்துக்கொள்ள முயற்ச்சித்த திருவல்லிக்கேணி பகுதியை சேர்ந்த 3 இஸ்லாமிய இளைஞர்களை தட்டிக்கேட்க சென்ற உதவி ஆய்வாளர் அகிலனுக்கு சரமாரி வெட்டு. கைது செய்யப்பட்ட இஸ்லாமிய இளைஞர்களுக்கு ஆதரவாக நூற்றுக்கணக்கான முஸ்லீம்கள் காவல் நிலையம் முற்றுகை... இது தமிழ் நாடா? தாலிபான் நாடா?)

The archives of the Facebook posts can be found here, here and here. The archives of the tweets can be found here and here.

Fact Check

BOOM ran a search on Google with the keywords "police akilan marina beach attacked knife" and found this Times of India article from August 2017. The article mentions that Akilan, a constable from the Armed Reserve Force, was patrolling Marina Beach when he saw two people drinking alcohol. When he asked them to leave, they attacked him and inflicted a cut below his right eye with a sharp object. The report mentions that one of the alleged attackers, Hari Ram, was later arrested and charged with attempt to murder.

BOOM contacted the Marina Beach police station and shared one of the posts with Sub Inspector Ramesh Babu asking him to share details. SI Babu said that the incident occurred in 2017 and that the case is currently under trial. SI Babu further said that the accused have been identified as Dinesh Kumar and Hariharan.

SI Babu also rubbished the claims made in the post and said that nothing that the post described, apart from the attack, ever happened.

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