Image showing multitude of devotees offering prayers not from India
Image showing multitude of devotees offering prayers not from India
(Reuters) - An image showing a large congregation of Muslim devotees offering prayers at the 2020 Bishwa Ijtema – an annual pilgrimage in Tongi, Bangladesh, has been miscaptioned by users on social media who claim that the image shows people “blocking traffic on a highway in India to perform Friday prayers.”
The photograph actually shows people offering prayers at a Muslim gathering in Bangladesh in 2020.
An image reverse search revealed that the viral image is a cropped version of the original which is available on alamy.com (shorturl.at/bhlzM) a photo website. The image details reveal that the photo was shot it in 2020 by Sheikh Mohammad Mahadi Hassan. The image caption reads, “Muslims are performing Jumma prayers at The Bishwa Ijtema, the second largest congregation of the world’s Muslims after Hajj.”
Bishwa Ijtema which translates to “world congregation”, sees devotees gather on the banks of the Turag river at Tongi, north of capital Dhaka. A Reuters image from the pilgrimage in 2020 can be seen here .
The miscaptioned photo was shared amid ongoing objection by some Hindu groups and residents in the city of Gurugram, Haryana to Muslims offering prayers in open public spaces (here, here).
VERDICT
Miscaptioned. The image is from 2020 and shows devotees offering prayers at the Bishwa Ijtema – an annual pilgrimage in Tongi, Bangladesh. It does not show a scene from India.
