U.P: Fake News. Naved Alam dug up graves and threw dead bodies in Ganges to malign U P’s BJP government.

A viral claim suggests that the Uttar Pradesh police has arrested ‘Naved Alam’ for digging out dead bodies and dumping them in the Ganga river to defame Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Prime Minister Modi over rising deaths due to COVID. The claim has been shared in both English and Hindi — Naved Alam and नावेद आलम (Facebook, Twitter).

Twitter user @MJ_007Club garnered 500 retweets for the claim.

Twitter user @Vineetbhargava9 and @TheAbhishek_IND posted this claim in Hindi. Their tweets gained over 3,000 retweets cumulatively. Among other handles that amplified the claim is @agor1312.

[Hindi text: मुर्दा घर में पड़े लावारिस लाशों को पैसे देकर उठाया गया और नदियों में बहाया गया….दफन किए हुए शवों को खोदकर गंगा नदी में फेंकने वाले नावेद आलम को यूपी पुलिस ने गिरफ्तार किया है.]

The following screenshots show Facebooks posts that gained high engagement. Some of the posts were carried by UP CM Report Card, Narendra Modi for 2024 PM, and We are with Modi ji.

The claim is also viral on WhatsApp. Download our mobile application to send such forwards for verification (Android, iOS) or share your queries on our WhatsApp helpline (76000 11160).

FICTITIOUS CLAIM

In the second week of May, Dainik Bhaskar reported that over 2,000 bodies were found along 1,140 km bank of river Ganga, spread across several districts in Uttar Pradesh. Multiple other media outlets – Reuters, Hindustan Times, India Today, Mojo Story, and BBC – have reported about the river swollen with corpses.

Alt News spoke with Dainik Bhasker reporter Aditya Tiwari, one of the correspondents who broke the story. “In our report, we covered an area of 1140 km and counted over 2,000 dead bodies. As per my knowledge, as of May 24, UP police has not arrested a person named Naved Alam for dumping dead bodies in Ganga as suggested on social media,” he said.