No, Image Of Cop Punishing Lockdown Violators is Not From India

The image is from Surjani Town in Karachi, where cops were punishing lockdown violators in Pakistan.

An image of a cop punishing people is being circulated with a claim that it is from Assam, showing a policeman allegedly punishing lockdown violators.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

CLAIM

As Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a 21-day nationwide lockdown to fight coronavirus, a barrage of misinformation around the virus has hit social media.

In one such case, an image of a cop punishing people is being circulated with a claim that it is from Assam where a policeman was punishing lockdown violators. “Police Punishing in highway Roaming freely in Assam Bandh. Punishing ... Disobeying Lockdown. of CORONA-VIRUS (sic),” the claim read.

(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)

TRUE OR FALSE?

False.

The aforementioned image is not from Assam but from Pakistan’s Karachi, where police personnel were punishing people who violated the lockdown at Surjani Town. The lockdown in Pakistan came into force on Monday, 23 March.

WHAT WE FOUND

On looking at the picture carefully, we saw that the badge on the policeman’s sleeve looked like Pakistan’s flag. However, since the image wasn’t very clear we couldn’t be sure about it.

(Source: Facebook/Altered by The Quint)

We followed this up with a Google keywords search using the terms “Pakistan police punishes defaulters” and came across a news report by DAWN dated 24 March. The report mentioned that the image shows cops punishing lockdown defaulters at Surjani Town in Karachi.

(Source: DAWN/Screenshot)

Hence, an image of a cop punishing people for violating lockdown in Pakistan is being shared as one showing Assam Police’s crackdown on defaulters.

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