Fact-check: Old video falsely shared to claim police attacked women protesting election ‘fraud' in Sindh

Footage of male cops slapping and pushing women into a police van is being shared online with claims that the video was recorded outside the Sindh Assembly recently, and shows police assaulting women who were peacefully protesting alleged manipulation in the February 8 polls.

The claim is false. The video is old and unrelated to this month’s parliamentary election.

Claim

“Women peacefully protesting outside the assembly were slapped and then arrested by the police,” said an Urdu-language post on X, formerly known as Twitter, shared on February 24 with a 24-seconds video showing men hitting women as they are paraded into a police van.

The post has been reposted over 13,000 times and viewed over 255,000 times.

“Outside the Sindh Assembly, women who were peacefully protesting were slapped and attacked by male police officers,” wrote another user on X, posting the same video.

Fact

An online keyword search found the original video was posted on January 31, 2021, and not February 24, 2024, and was in fact recorded in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa rather than Sindh.

Local media also reported the incident in 2021, broadcasting the same video.

In reality, the footage was recorded in Swat, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, after three women accused of stealing were verbally abused and thrashed by male cops.

The policemen seen in the video were later suspended.

Separately, three station house officers (SHOs) in Swat also confirmed to Geo Fact Check that the video being shared online was recorded in 2021.

While the first information reports of the incident, dated January 31, 2021, are also available with Geo Fact Check, which further establish that on the day three women were attacked by men in uniform, who were later suspended.

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With additional reporting by Nadia Khalid.

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