Rajasthan Police on Twitter has fact-checked a rhetorical claim on the arrest of Mohammed Riyaz Akhtar and Ghous Mohammed, who were arrested for gruesomely butchering a Hindu tailor Kanhaiya Lal in Udaipur on Wednesday. Upon rhetorically asked by a journalist whether the arrested Islamist duo would be met with strict action in the jail or not, the state police Twitter handle took it personally and went ahead to fact the question as ‘news’.
After the two murderers were arrested, a journalist on Twitter posed a sarcastic question based on the conjectures that were doing rounds. He wrote, “This is the photo of two assailants and would Biryani be served to them in Rajasthan’s jail? Had this been UP…”.
The Biryani jibe has the context of Ajmal Kasab, the lone caught Islamic terrorist of the 26/11 Mumbai Attack, who was fed Biryani while he faced trial for years. The Biriyani reference is commonly used to discuss how a slow and lenient justice system lets even the hardest criminals live in comfort. However, the journalist’s tweet which was written in a lighter vein was taken quite personally by Rajasthan State Police. The department’s Twitter handle went ahead to fact-check the tweet saying that the journalist’s claims were false and the perpetrators would not be spared.
The Police handle in retaliation said, “Fake news is going viral. This is absolutely wrong. In Udaipur, strict action will be taken against the heinous criminals. Police will not deal softly with anti-social elements. Rajasthan Police is committed to maintaining law and order in the state.”
The eight-year-old son of the deceased victim Kanhaiya Lal had shared a social media post in support of Nupur Sharma from his mobile. However, after this, Kanhaiyalal was arrested by the Dhanmandi police station officials in Udaipur. He continued receiving death threats over the post after his release, after which he had appealed to the police for protection but the police did not take him seriously. Instead, the local police had made Kanhaiya Lal and some local Muslims sign a ‘compromise’ document and had sought to put the matter to rest.
Meanwhile, the cult of fact-checking is getting obnoxious while often projecting personal claims and opinions as serious news and then fact-checking it in order to ‘expose’ the undercurrents. This has elevated to an extent when self-proclaimed fact-checking agencies like ‘Alt-News’ have been hilariously caught scrutinizing not only personal opinions but at times memes and jokes on social media.
Not just Alt News, even other dubious ‘fact-checking’ websites such as Boom Live and far-left website The Quint have fact-checked satirical political videos posted for fun as ‘doctored’.