Fact Check: Man slapping a cop in public is not from Andhra Pradesh, but Tamil Nadu
With the polling day drawing closer, leaders of various parties in Andhra Pradesh are trying to do their best to woo the electorate and gain from their votes.
Man slaps cop
With the polling day drawing closer, leaders of various parties in Andhra Pradesh are trying to do their best to woo the electorate and gain from their votes. During their campaigning, some leaders are trying to show off that they know the hardships of commoners and trying to assist them by getting involved in their day-to-day activities like preparing dosas at roadside canteens, feeding old people, etc. Along with that, lambasting the rivals for their anti-people policies and opportunistic politics is also being witnessed. As part of the blame game, many old images and videos are also being made viral on social media. Some of the viral news on social media are either morphed or used under misleading contexts.
One such video shows a man slapping a police man in broad day light in the middle of a street and it is being shared with the caption that this incident occurred in Andhra Pradesh. The caption in Telugu goes “పట్టపగలు నడిరోడ్డు మీద ఒక పోలీస్ అధికారి మీద ఇలా చెయ్య చేసుకుంటున్నాడు అంటే చాలా దౌర్భాగ్యమైన పరిస్థితిలో ఉంది ఆంధ్రప్రదేశ్... మేలుకో ఆంధ్రుడా నీ అమూల్యమైన ఓటు ని టీడీపీ జనసేన కూటమికి వేసి ఆంధ్రరాష్ట్రాన్ని పరిరక్షించు...”
When translated, it claims: “Andhra Pradesh is in a very unfortunate situation as a police officer is slapped on the road in broad daylight... Wake up Andhra and cast your precious vote for the TDP Janasena alliance and save the state...”
Fact Check:
The claim is Misleading. The video is from Chennai, Tamil Nadu and not from Andhra Pradesh.
When we extracted keyframes from the video and searched using Google reverse image search, we found a few news reports published in 2017.
The YouTube channel of Mirror Now shared the viral video on December 25, 2017, with title ‘Chennai: Students Slap Cop When He Caught Three Of Them Riding On A Motorbike’
According to the Times of India, the policeman had stopped three students riding a bike for tiple riding and during the argument that followed, the 21-year student slapped the cop.
This video was also shared by the YouTube channel of oneindia.com, with the following description: A shocking video of a college student slapping a Chennai policeman has now gone viral. The student is seen assaulting the policeman in full public view after being stopped for a traffic violation. The video shows the student abusing the policeman first and then going on to assault him. Constable Mageswaran was manning the traffic at Pari Nagar-Karikalan Nagar junction last week when he stopped three men on a bike for helmetless riding and triple riding offenses. The trio refused to stop and sped away only to fall due to a pothole nearby. Enraged, one of the pillion riders, Manikandan, walked up to the constable to pick a fight. Watch this viral video here.
Therefore, the viral video of a man slapping police is not from Andhra Pradesh, it is from Chennai, Tamil Nadu. The claim is Misleading.