Hindu priest was beaten with a cricket bat by a Muslim? Read the Fact Check

One video is going viral on social media with the claim Muslim guy is beating a Hindu temple priest. In the video, we can see that a man is getting beaten with a cricket bat.

A X user shared a video and wrote “Video of a staunch Muslim beating up a Hindu temple priest Share it in all groups Please share this video to identify the culprit and arrest him Dear Hindus”(Translated into English)

Fact Check

To know the truth of the viral video, the DFRAC team converted the video into some keyframes and reverse-searched it on Google. We found multiple news reports which were dated of the year 2020.

On further investigation, we also found that the video was shared previously in march 2023 as well with misleading claims. We found the factcheck in our archive dated march 2, 2023.

Media Coverage

According to the media report by News 18: “A case of brutally beating a temple priest with a cricket bat has come to light in village Dhabikalan of Bhattukalan police station area of ​​Fatehabad district of Haryana. According to the police, the reason for beating the priest has come to light, viral audio in which male and female voices are saying objectionable things. Allegations are being made that the man talking in the audio is the temple priest and the woman’s voice is of the village girl.”

Zee Salaam also shared the video with the caption “Youth beats temple priest with bat on charges of molestation”.

Moreover, we found two media reports by Dainik Bhaskar which were of the same incedent a. In the first report it was said, a priest was beaten with a bat in the Dhabikalan village of Fatehbad district in Haryana. According to the report, the priest was beaten by boys who were playing cricket after accusing him of molestation.

In the second report, it was said that the priest was beaten for refusing to keep a bat in the temple.

Likewise, we found a Facebook user named Swatantar Khabar also shared the same video on 6 Nov 2020. According to the information given in the video, a case has been filed against Amit and Krishna. They are the residents of Dhabikala village, and Pradeep resident of Thuiya village, and one other for beating the priest. Police have arrested all the accused.

Conclusion

Therefore, it is clear from the DFRAC fact check that the video going viral is 3 years old. Furthermore, according to media reports, those who beat the priest were not Muslims but youth from the Hindu community.