A video showing an unusual sight of a leopard resting against a median on a road in Hyderabad, Telangana is viral on WhatsApp and Facebook with a fake claim that the wild animal was seen in Mumbai's Sion area.
A Facebook page shared the video claiming that the leopard was spotted in Mumbai during the ongoing lockdown. "Lock Down Miracle* *Leopard spotted resting in the midst of Mumbai's traffic in Sion area," the text of the post said.
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The video can be seen below and an archived version of the post is accessible here.
Bollywood actress Raveena Tondon had also tweeted the video and said she had received it on WhatsApp but tagged Parveen Kaswan - a forest official - to verify the authenticity of the claim.
In Sion ,mumbai. - via wassap. @ParveenKaswan can you verify this and what was the outcome ? Any news,anyone has of this leopard? pic.twitter.com/kockpS1F5S
— Raveena Tandon (@TandonRaveena) May 15, 2020
He in turn confirmed that the video was from Hyderabad and not Mumbai.
This video was from Hyderabad. Yesterday. The leopard seems injured. Ran away nearby farms later. Hope it will find its way home soon. https://t.co/aZFpfz0RcC
— Parveen Kaswan, IFS (@ParveenKaswan) May 15, 2020
Fact Check
BOOM ran a reverse image search and found several articles on the incident which took place in Hyderabad on Thursday.
A leopard was seen lying beside the median on the National Highway-7 (NH-7) in Hyderabad's Mailardevpally. Police stopped vehicular traffic from both sides as the animal started attracting crowds who were keen to take images and videos. The leopard was later seen entering a private farm on the Shamshabad Road, but was still untraceable at the time of writing this story. A team of police, forest officials and officials from the Nehru Zoological Park were looking to rescue the animal. It is unclear if the leopard was injured.
A video uploaded by Hindustan Times from the incident shows the same divider and electric pole. Other visuals such as the movements of the leopard and the wall alongside the road are exactly the same as the viral video. The video can be seen below.
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We found reports by Mumbai Mirror, NDTV on the same with similar screen grabs and video clips. A comparison of the viral video and the videos by The Hindustan Times and Mumbai Mirror can be seen below.
Screengrab of the viral video in the right.