On July 16, as part of the “March to Gopalganj” program, leaders and activists of the National Citizens Party (NCP) went to Gopalganj. However, before they arrived, there were attacks and vandalism at the rally site. In clashes between law enforcement and Awami League supporters, reports say at least five people have been killed so far. Against this backdrop, a video claiming to show corpses lying in Gopalganj has spread on social media.
See some of the posts shared on Facebook making this claim: Here, Here, Here, Here, and Here.
Fact-check
The Rumor Scanner team’s investigation revealed that the circulated video is not from Gopalganj. Rather, it is a video from the Jatrabari area in the capital during last year’s August student-public uprising.
In this investigation, an investigative report published on July 9 by international media outlet BBC Bangla on their YouTube channel covered the police killing in Jatrabari during the student-public uprising on August 5 last year. The location in that video matches the location shown in the circulated video.
The footage shown in the BBC’s report appears to be CCTV camera footage, dated August 5, 2024, and recorded at 2:53 PM.
Additionally, a report published on January 14 by Prothom Alo, titled “Documentary of Indiscriminate Firing and Killing of Students and Public in Jatrabari Area on August 5,” also shows the same location in video footage.
That report states that as the intensity of gunfire decreased, the surviving, terrified people began helping the injured and the dead in a narrow alley.
In that part of the report, the body of a blood-soaked man wearing a lungi and panjabi is visible, which is also seen in the circulated video.
In other words, the video is not from Gopalganj; it shows scenes from Jatrabari in August 2024.
Therefore, a video from last year in Jatrabari has been falsely circulated claiming to show corpses lying in Gopalganj—this is false.
Sources
- BBC Bangla: BBC’s Investigation: August 5 Jatrabari, Sheikh Hasina’s Phone Record | BBC Bangla
- Prothom Alo: August 5, Jatrabari: Documentary of Indiscriminate Firing and Killing of Students and Public | Jatrabari
