Old video from India mistakenly shared “locals fight robbers in Bangladesh”
With concerns about rising levels of crime in Dhaka, an old clip was misinterpreted as locals struggled with criminals fighting the Bangladesh capital. Local police said the number of robberies in the past year has doubled, but was actually shot in July 2024 in Bihar, eastern India.
The Bengali Facebook post was posted on February 8, 2025.
It shares a video showing two groups of people fighting with sticks, who gradually gained over 22,000 views.
Screenshot of fake posts taken on March 11, 2025
Bangladesh has struggled to control crime since former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s massive uprising against her iron fist rule in August 2024 (a link to archive).
It expands the power to entrust Army officials to enforce the law and order (archive) without police forces.
The clip shares similar claims elsewhere on Facebook.
However, a reverse image search was performed from the keychain in the lens and it was discovered that it had been uploaded to YouTube on July 18, 2024 – Hasina was removed a few weeks ago (archive link).
Clip rotates 90 degrees – contains a title that says it was shot in Muharram’s Islamic month in Bastwara, a village in eastern Bihar, India.
Comparison of screenshots of fake videos (L) and clips was uploaded on July 18, 2024
YouTube users also uploaded a clip the day before, showing the same scene from different angles (archive link).
The image on Google Street View also confirms the location of the video (archive link).
Screenshots (L) compare the similarities in this area with screenshots shared in Google Street View images.
AFP previously debunked another video related to crimes in Bangladesh.
