Two unrelated videos of iron nails found in medicinal capsules have been clubbed together to make a false viral communal claim that it is a new tactic by Muslims in India to kill Hindus.
BOOM found that both the video clips are from two different places and not related with the first clip likely from Pakistan by a pharmaceutical manufacturer in Karachi and the second clip, of a company based in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The first half of the viral video shows a person get a capsule out of a strip, open each of the capsules to reveal tiny iron nails in them and the second clip shows a second set of capsules opened with nails in them.
The 30 seconds clip is being shared with the false claim which translates to, "New, dirty and dangerous act of jihadis to kill kafirs (Hindus) ... These are sold cheaply by concealing iron nails and harmful ingredients in branded companies' medicines, capsules etc., which will be bought and killed by the kaafir (Hindus)"
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(काफिरों(हिन्दूओं) को मारने का जिहादियों का नया, गंदा और खतरनाक कारनामा... ये ब्रांडेड कम्पनियों की दवाओं, कैप्सूल आदि में सफाई से लोहे की कीलें और हानिकारक सामग्री छुपाकर सस्ती बेची जाती हैं, जिसे काफीर(हिन्दू) खरीदेंगें और मारे जाएंगे..!!)
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Viral on Facebook
On searching on Facebook with the same caption we found that the clip is viral with the false claim.
Also Read: Hyderabad Milk Adulteration Incident Revived With Communal Claims
FACT-CHECK
The viral clip clearly shows that the two videos are from different locations with the capsule packaging and the hands of the people dealing with them, both different. One of the videos has the name of the capsule written in Urdu language on the package and in the other video one can hear the person opening the capsules speaking in Russian language.
Taking a cue from this, we ran a search with Urdu and English keywords and found a longer and clearer clip on YouTube, uploaded on February 21, 2021, with the caption, "Medicines are being fed to the public by putting nails inside the capsules."
In this clip, we can see the name on the strip - Esoral. Further, upon zooming into the packaging, 'City Pharmaceutical Laboratories' can be seen with the address of the manufacturer as Karachi. Further the medician strip has Urdu language printing on it. This shows that this packaging is not from India as being claimed.
We then ran a search for Esoral and found that it is a drug owned by Eskayef pharmaceuticals, a Bangladesh based drug manufacturer. The capsules seen in the viral video does not mention Eskayef anywhere. BOOM reached out to Eskayef who said, "We do not sell any products in India or Pakistan. No Indian agent is aligned with us and we do not export to either India or Pakistan."
On looking at the Esoral tablet strip on the company website, we found that the packaging is different from the one in the viral video.
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For the second video clip, we ran a keyword search with 'nails in tablets' and found a longer video which showed the same capsule strip and the text on the strip Russian 'ЭНТЕРОФУРИЛ 200 мг капсулы Нифуркмазил BOSKALLJEN'.
Using Google translate we found that it reads, "ENTEROFURIL 200 mg capsules Nifurkmazil BOSKALLJEN". A search for the same, showed that the company is based in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
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BOOM was unable to independently verify the incident as shown in the clips, however, we could establish that the clips is not from India as being falsely claimed.
