A video filmed during Pope Francis’ visit to East Timor has been shared hundreds of times with a false claim that it shows a recent protest in India demanding the arrest of a politician belonging to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and a Hindu preacher over offensive remarks about Muslims. The clip actually shows Christians returning from a mass hosted by the pontiff.
“This is not Pakistan or Bangladesh! This is not even Iraq, Iran or Afghanistan! This is our Mumbai where Muslims have come out on the streets to show their strength,” read the caption of a post shared on X on September 24, 2024.
The 27-second clip shows a convoy of vehicles moving slowly along a street surrounded by crowds.
The post has racked up more than 870,000 views.
The false claim surfaced as former Indian lawmaker Imtiaz Jaleel led a convoy of hundreds of vehicles to Mumbai and called for the arrest of BJP politician Nitesh Rane and Hindu preacher Ramgiri Maharaj over “inflammatory remarks” about Muslims, according to local media (archived link).
The protesters were denied entry into the city and returned after handing over their demands to government representatives.
The clip was shared with similar false claims elsewhere on X and Facebook here and here.
But the claim is false. The video was filmed during Pope Francis’ visit to East Timor.
East Timor footage
A reverse image search of the footage on Google found a higher-quality version posted on TikTok by an account called “rey.marques” on September 11, 2024. It was viewed more than two million times (archived link).
Hashtags in the caption suggested it was filmed during the pope’s East Timor visit.
The pontiff celebrated mass for hundreds of thousands of faithful in the tiny Southeast Asian nation on September 10 (archived link).
Around 600,000 people out of a population of 1.3 million attended the mass, the Vatican said in a statement, citing local authorities.
Below is a screenshot comparison of the clip shared in false posts (left) and the TikTok footage (right):
The footage shows the flag of East Timor on streetlights and a poster of the pontiff.
AFP has previously debunked another false claim in the Philippines that shared the same video.
Rey Marques, a photographer based in the capital Dili who owns the TikTok account, told AFP at the time that he did not know who filmed the video but identified the scene as near the Raikotu General Cemetery in the city.
AFP confirmed the location of the footage by comparing it to Google Street View imagery from the area (archived link).
Below is a screenshot comparison highlighting a house, street and tree in the TikTok video (left) and the corresponding elements on Google Street View (right):
A livestream on the Facebook page of local media outlet TVET Entertainment shows a similar scene of crowds walking after the mass (archived link).
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