Following the outrage of Death of Pregnant Elephant in Kerala, the media and the ruling BJP politicians are trying hard to defame Kerala in general and Muslims in particular.
Kerala had recently gained praise for it’s handling of COVID-19 from international communities.
On May 4th, many including, former Union Minister Maneka Gandhi, had falsely claimed that the incident took place in Muslim-majority Malappuram district.
Fake news viral as accused are Amzath Ali and Thamim Shaikh:
On June 5th, several social media users shared the fake news claiming that the 2 arrested in the Kerala elephant death case were Amzath Ali and Thamim Shaikh.
The news was first shared by Mr. Amar Prasad Reddy, advisor to Central Health Minister. The tweet got around 5000 retweets and more than 7000 likes.
Following which many on social media started bashing Muslims.
Amar Prasad Reddy later deleted the tweet. Here is the archived link to the tweet.
Journalist Deepak Chaurasia and Prashant Patel Umrao (Practising Advocate at Supreme Court) also tweeted with a similar claim. Both of them then went on to delete their tweets too.
Many other verified accounts also tweeted the same.
Fact Check:
Media Scanner reached out to Mannarkad Divisional Forest Officer to verify the viral claim. He said that no person named Amzath Ali and Thamim Shaikh have been arrested with respect to this incident and the investigation is still under progress.
According to the report, Kerala Forest Minister K Raju said that a man was arrested and another detained by the joint investigation teams of the police and forest departments in connection with the incident.
The arrested man has been identified as P Wilson, an employee of an estate that cultivates cash crops and spices. The minister said more arrests will be by evening.
The two men have reportedly told interrogators that they set up a snare of fruit filled with crackers to scare wild boars, which often destroyed their farms.
