WHEN HOAX INFO INCITED FURY

Rumours inciting violence that spread quickly on WhatsApp have claimed lives and are adding to the increase in hate crimes

MAY 18, 2017

Seven men in two separate instances were lynched by mobs after fake news about ‘child lifters’ armed with sedatives and injections spread through WhatsApp in Jharkhand.

In one instance, four Muslim cattle traders were dragged out of their vehicle and lynched by villagers in Sobhapur.

Not too far from the location, on the same day, three Hindu men -Gautam Verma, Vikas Verma and Gangesh Gupta, who had gone to the village for work related to the Swachch Bharat campaign, were beaten to death while a fourth member, Uttam Verma managed to escape.

In both instances, the police were unable to save the victims from the mob fury.

JULY 7, 2017

During the communal riots in Basirhat, West Bengal, a Facebook post of a Hindu woman being molested was widely circulated. The photograph was a still from a Bhojpuri film released in 2014.

JULY 14, 2017

Alt News – a website which debunks fake news, reported a call for lynching when a bus with Mohd. Ali Jinnah’s photograph was spotted in Bengaluru. The call for lynching the bus driver came from a Facebook post by a rightwing website contributor. The bus turned out to be a prop from a Malayalam film set.