A video is going viral that shows people in torn clothes and messy wigs who appear to be behind bars in what looks like a hospital room. The video is being shared with claims that it was filmed in India and shows a real Psychiatric hospital in India.
Additionally, other users have also shared the video, which can be viewed here and here.
Fact Check
Upon investigation, we found the claim to be misleading. We used reverse image search on parts of the video and found a similar video on YouTube. The video was posted on October 12, 2024, with the title “Mental asylum theme-based puja pandal || Santan Sangha || Coochbehar.”
Based on this clue, we found a news article from The Telegraph India published on October 14. The article was titled “‘Behala Fight Club’ to curious monkey to ‘lunatic asylum’ theme, the funny, bizarre moments of Durga Puja 2024.” The article showed the same image from the viral video.
The caption explained: “Not all moments from Durga Puja were just funny. Some were bizarre, too. A pandal in Coochbehar used a ‘Paglagarod’ theme (Bengali word for mental asylum). This caused anger on social media because it showed mental illness in a hurtful way. The pandal had people dressed up as mental health patients.”
Conclusion
Therefore, the viral video doesn’t show a real hospital or real patients in India. It shows people acting and dressing up for a Durga Puja festival display that used a mental asylum theme in West Bengal’s Coochbehar.
