Image Credit: Twitter
Uttar Pradesh
Old Photo Of Banner Appealing Not To Offer Prayers On Road In Meerut Viral Attributing To Agra Incident
|The image is viral with a false claim that the poster was put after 150 people were booked for offering prayers without prior permission on the roads outside mosques in Agra.
Amidst the loudspeaker controversy, UP police has recently registered a case against three named and 150 unknown people for offering Namaz on the road without permission in Agra, Uttar Pradesh.
Against the same backdrop, an image of a poster urging people not to offer prayers on the road is going viral on social media. In the viral photo, two people can be seen holding a banner. The text of the banner reads n Hindi, "बराए मेहरबानी कोई भी नमाज़ी मस्जिद के बाहर सड़क पर नमाज़ न पढ़ें. मुतवल्ली दरबार वाली मस्जिद भवानी नगर, मेरठ." [English Translation: Kind request, no worshiper should offer prayers on the road outside the mosque. Mutawalli Durbar Wali Masjid Bhavani Nagar, Meerut]
It is being claimed that after the action taken by the police in Agra, a banner was put outside a mosque in Meerut, UP, requesting people not to offer prayers on the road.
TV Journalist Ashok Shrivastava shared this image and wrote a caption in Hindi which reads, "आगरा में सड़क पर बिना अनुमति नमाज पढ़ने वाले 150 लोगों के खिलाफ पुलिस ने FIR दर्ज कर दी जिसके बाद मेरठ की मस्जिद में बैनर टांग दिए गए हैं कि सड़क पर नमाज कोई न पढ़े। कानून का कड़ाई से पालन हो,तो कानून तोड़ने वाले खुद सुधर जाएंगे, #योगी जी का यूपी इसकी मिसाल पेश कर रहा है."
[English Translation: In Agra, the police registered an FIR against 150 people who offered Namaz on the road without permission. Banners have been hung in the mosque of Meerut that no one should offer Namaz on the road. If the law is strictly followed, the lawbreakers themselves will improve; # योगी ji's UP is setting an example for this.]
It is being widely shared on Facebook and Twitter with a similar claim.
Claim:
Muslim people posted a banner outside a mosque in Meerut, UP, requesting people not to offer prayers on the road after police registered an FIR against 150 people.
Fact Check:
The Logical Indian fact check team verified the viral claim and found it false. The picture is around three years old and has had a presence on social media since August 2019.
We conducted a Google reverse image search of the viral photo, which led us to a Facebook post by IPS Ajay Sahni on August 16, 2019. He shared the same picture and captioned it in Hindi, "पटेल मण्डप वाली मस्जिद पर इमाम हाजी अख्तर ने बैनर लगाए".
[English Translation: Imam Haji Akhtar put up banners on the Patel Mandap mosque.] The post has around 1.8K likes and over 150 shares.
In the viral photo, one can clearly see the Hindi text on the banner which reads, "बराए मेहरबानी कोई भी नमाजी मस्जिद के बाहर सड़क पर नमाज़ न पढ़ें। मुतवल्ली, दरबार वाली मस्जिद भवानी नगर, मेरठ".
Taking a clue from the written address, we searched on Google and found a Hindi article on the news aggregator application Inshorts, which carried the same photo. The report was published on August 17, 2019, and noted that the banner was an appeal by Darbar Wali Masjid in Meerut after the Inspector General (IG) of the city police range had issued orders to prohibit any religious activity on the roads.
The Inshorts report also carried a link to the Twitter post by Meerut Police carrying the same image. They tweeted the photo on August 16, 2019, and captioned it, "पटेल मण्डप वाली मस्जिद पर इमाम हाजी अख्तर ने बैनर लगाए".
We also searched for other media reports on the matter and found a Navbharat Times and Amar Ujala reports published on August 16, 2019. According to the articles, traffic jams used to occur in many city areas because of people offering Friday prayers on the road. To address this issue, the Meerut administration met imams of several mosques and collaboratively instructed that no prayers would be offered on the streets. During the same time, Bhavani Nagar Masjid of Meerut had put up banners and appealed to the people not to offer Namaz on the road.
To conclude, an old photo of a banner appealing to people not to pray on roads outside a mosque in Meerut is being shared with a false claim that the poster was put after 150 people were booked for offering prayers on roads without prior permission in Agra.
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