A video of a woman being shot in public after being dragged out of a car by two men is viral on social media. The video is shared with a caption in Hindi that can be translated to, “RSS supporter woman shot dead by Jihadis”. Twitter handle @HiNdU05019434 shared this video with the same caption. The video now has over 40,000 views and has gone viral but it has been deleted now.
Another Twitter handle, @Vijay754510, shared the video with a similar caption that said ”In Kerala, a woman who is a supporter of RSS, was shot by Muslims. After shooting her, they did not run away. They had the audacity to deliver a speech. This video must go to Modiji”. The tweet has over 15,000 views at the time of the writing of this article.
केरल में RSS समर्थक महिला को मुस्लिमो ने गोली मारी और हिम्मत दिखाए गोली मारकर भागे नहीं भाषण दे रहे हैं ये विडियो मोदी जी के पास जरूर जाना चाहिए pic.twitter.com/hh1JtDhy7s
— Vijay Kumar (@Vijay754510) May 18, 2023
Another user, @kavita_tewari, whose bio says she is a ‘Proud Bharatiya’ and is followed on Twitter by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, shared the video on May 20 claiming the incident took place in the last two days. She later deleted the tweet, but not before it received more than 15,000 views and was retweeted 200 times. An archive of her tweet can be seen here.
The same video and the same claim were widely shared in 2017 as well. One of those viral tweets can be seen here:
This another gory murder in Kerala by Commie/Jihadi goons of a lady supportive of BJP. @bdutt @ranaayyub @sagarikaghose @ShekharGupta pic.twitter.com/hgV8mQkaQk
— Amitesh Kumar (@AmiteshK01) September 12, 2017
Anyone who is familiar with Malayalam will be able to decipher that the video is a scene from a street performance. Here is a transcript of the scene for those who don’t speak the language:
Mob: Calls and cries for violence. (Noisy and unclear) Kill her, kill her!
[The victim tries to run; is shot; falls]
Lead Actor: She was a fighter and she fought. She raised her voice against the RSS and now, here, finally, the RSS has killed her too. They have killed her too. Hold them, tie them up. Why, what for, did you kill this innocent journalist?
Actor from the Killing Mob: We are RSS workers, patriots!
Lead Actor: Did you hear that? Did you hear that? RSS workers, traitors of our independence struggle, the ones who shot and killed Mahatma Gandhi. These are them; these are them, the RSS. It is dangerous. Silence is dangerous. Fascism is dangerous. This silence, even as fascism peeps into your kitchen, this silence, it is dangerous.
Actor 1: Yes, silence is dangerous.
Lead Actor: It is dangerous. Silence is dangerous. The RSS killed around 2000 minorities in Gujarat; they killed Kalaburagi and Govind Pansare. They eliminate those who write and speak. This silence is dangerous.
Several news reports from 2017, for example, one in Hindustan Times, mentioned that the play was staged by the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) in the Malappuram district of Kerala. All the reports cited a local newspaper, Mathrubhumi, as the source.
Alt News looked up the official Facebook page of DYFI Kalikavu to find the actual video that was posted on September 8, 2017, following the killing of journalist Gauri Lankesh on September 5, 2017, outside her residence in Bengaluru. The caption with the video translates to ”This is DYFI Kalikavu… A dashing item against the RSS…A public trial—through a street play—of the RSS for the murder of Gauri Lankesh…”