New Delhi: Pakistani-Canadian author Tarek Fatah shared a video early Wednesday of a woman screaming at two polio vaccine volunteers and refusing to allow her children to take the drops.
Fatah had tweeted the video claiming it was from Pakistan, but deleted it later in the day.
In the clip, the woman can be heard saying: “I will never allow my children to take these drops. My children will never drink this.”
The columnist and author, whose Twitter bio says he has been imprisoned by successive military regimes in Pakistan, had shared the video on Facebook as well.
While the Facebook clip was viewed more than 6,000 times until the time of filing this report, the video has been retweeted more than 3,000 times and liked by over 8,000 people on Twitter. Many criticised the woman and the state of affairs in Pakistan.
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Fact check
The video is actually from a Pakistani movie called Load Wedding, which was released on 22 August 2018. The movie’s lead actor, Mehwish Hayat, replied to Fatah’s tweet, debunking his claims.
Hayat also asked him to check his sources.
“It’s a scene from my movie ‘Load Wedding’, the polio worker is me & that woman an actress. Through the film we were raising awareness on the issue. Glad to see our performances were so convincing (sic),” she wrote.
Thank u for giving ur 2 cents on this but pls first verify the source b4 posting next time. It’s a scene frm my movie”loadwedding”,the polio worker is me & that woman an actress.Through the film we were raising awareness of the issue.Glad 2 see our performances were so convincing https://t.co/ididoJJcxL
— Mehwish Hayat TI (@MehwishHayat) January 15, 2020
Load Wedding is a romantic social comedy, shedding light on issues prevalent in Pakistani society.
It isn’t the first time that Fatah, who is known for his anti-Islam views, has fallen prey to fake news.
In November 2019, he had tweeted a doctored image of a madrassa teacher explaining to students why Islam was superior to Hinduism. At the time, Fatah had said: “No, the mullah is not playing knots & crosses. He is teaching Muslim girls in an Indian Islamic school the comparative superiority of Islam over Hindusim.”
The image was actually from a madrassa in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, which was in the news for teaching students Sanskrit along with subjects such as English, Hindi and Urdu.
In collaboration with SM Hoaxslayer.
Also read: Video of Muslim girl kicked by lawyers shared as ‘Hindu rape victim’ beaten up in Pakistan