On December 15, 2020, InFeed, which describes itself as a news platform, published a report titled ‘Outrage grows after journo attack who exposed Adani’. The report said that Akarshan Uppal, a journalist working with IBN24, was attacked by goons after he exposed Adani group’s secretive forays to acquire hundreds of acres of land before the passing of the new farm bills. The archive of the Infeed report can be seen here.
Many people shared the link of the InFeed story on their social media handle hinting that Adani Group is behind the attack on the journalist.
Dr Surjya Kanta Mishra, Secretary, West Bengal State Committee and Polit Bureau Member of Communist Party of India (Marxist), also shared the InFeed report on his Facebook page.
(As received and reported)
Akarshan Uppal who was exploring Adani group’s interests in the new farm laws was thrashed…
Posted by Surjya Kanta Mishra on Friday, 18 December 2020
Many people shared an image of an injured man on social media with the claim of Akarshan Uppal attacked after reporting on Adani Group.
Photo of a journalist Akarshan Uppal from Karnal in Haryana who 2 days back exposed how Adani group is buying 100’s of…
Posted by With RG on Thursday, 10 December 2020
The claim, ‘Akarshan Uppal attacked for exposing Adani’s 100 acres land deal before the passing of Farm Bills’, is viral on Facebook too.
The news is viral in the backdrop of ongoing farmers’ protest in Delhi against the three controversial farm laws passed by the government of India in September 2020. Many are of the opinion that the farm laws have been passed to support big corporates like Adani group and Reliance Industries to enter into the agricultural sector. Farmers believe that a section of the new rules allow farmers to sell their products outside the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) markets; based on this rule, many corporates will initially start purchasing crops from farmers at a much higher rate than APMC, slowly destroying the APMCs and later making the farmers dependent on their mercy.
Claim:
IBN24 journalist Akarshan Uppal was attacked for exposing the purchase of 100 acres land by Adani Group.
Fact Check:
On doing a reverse image search of the viral image of the injured man, we found a video on YouTube channel of IBN24 that reported the deadly attack on journalist Akarshan Uppal and the visit of Haryana Chief Minister, Manohar Lal Khattar to the hospital to see him. A keyframe of the video is the same as the viral image of Akarshan Uppal. Hence, the viral image is of Akarshan Uppal.
Most of the Tweets embedded in the report of InFeed about Akarshan Uppal’s injury were also based on fake claims.
A Tweet by Twitter user Sushmita, showing a list of companies registered by the Adani group purportedly in 2019 just before the farm laws were passed, was embedded in the report of InFeed. The tweet showed one of the cases against Adani group purportedly exposed by Akarshan Uppal. The Logical Indian has earlier Fact-Checked the claim and found it to be false. The dates mentioned in the list were the dates when Amit Malik took over the Directorship of the organisations mentioned in the list and not the date when they were registered by the Adani groups. Most of these organisations were registered in or before 2018.
Another tweet embedded in the InFeed report showed Ahmedabad airport has been renamed as Adani airport from Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport. The Logical Indian had debunked the claim earlier. Thus, the ‘Adani airport’ written on the board is not the name of the airport but a logo of the Adani enterprises, who have been handed over the Airport for its operation and management purposes.
The Logical Indian did a story on Akarshan Uppal’s injury on December 17, 2020. According to the report, Akarshan Uppal was attacked and beaten for reporting a drug abuse case. Uppal had exposed the people involved in the drug case after receiving a call from an anonymous person. The report said that the police caught at least three people in Ramanagar, Shiv Colony of Karnal. The report said that the accused, Gurmeet Singh was arrested who later died in prison two weeks after the arrest. After Singh’s death, Uppal and his family allegedly received threat calls from the elder brother of the accused, Ghelu, blaming the journalist for his brother’s arrest.
We also called a reporter of a local media site of Karnal, Karnal Breaking News, who covered the story and he confirmed that Uppal was beaten by people associated with the drug case.
Akarshan Uppal had done a story on Adani group which was shared on Facebook page of IBN24 on December 6, 2020. A video was shared with the caption, ‘अडानी ग्रुप पर पूर्व सरपंच का बड़ा खुलासा : पानीपत में अडानी ग्रुप पर गेंहू स्टोरेज के लिए 100 एकड़ जमीन खरीदने का आरोप, गाँव वाले बोले कृषि कानून से पहले अडानी ग्रुप ने कैसे खरीद ली जमीन, रेलवे कारखाना लगाने के नाम पर ग्रामीणों पर जमीन बेचने का दबाव बनाया ? विधायक से लेकर सांसद ने किसी ने भी अपनी उपलब्धी इस प्रोजेक्ट …
