A video of people wearing skullcaps, gathering piles of money from donation boxes and counting them in groups is being widely shared on social media. The video is being shared with the claim that it shows Muslims collecting donations made to the Shirdi Sai Temple in Maharashtra.
A X user shared the video with a caption, “शिरडी सांई की झोली में डाली गई हिन्दुओं की कमाई कहाँ जा रही है खुद ही देख लो ! इसको इतना वायरल करो कि देश के एक एक हिंदू तक पहुंचे जोकि आंखे होते हुए भी अंधे बने हैं ? (See for yourself where the Hindus’ money put into Shirdi Sai’s pocket is going! Make it so viral that it reaches every Hindu in the country who has become blind despite having eyes?”)
SouthCheck found that the video is not even from India.
We closely observed the video and found Bengali text written on the sacks shown in the video. Taking a hint, we did a Google Reverse Image Search with one of the screenshots and found a similar video shared on the YouTube channel Jamuna TV on May 6, 2023.
The caption said that the video is from Kishoreganj Pagla Mosque in Bangladesh where people were emptying the donation box and counting the money.
We also found that The Daily Star uploaded the same video with a different angle on May 6, 2023. The video was shared with the caption, “At least 19 bags of money were recovered from eight donation boxes of Pagla Mosque in Kishoreganj. The exact figure could not be known yet as the money was being counted till the filing of this report.”
The Business Standard had also reported about the incident on December 10, 2023. The report stated that the Pagla Mosque had received a donation of Tk5,78,9,325.
Quoting the deputy commissioner and Pagla Mosque Management Committee president Mohammad Abul Kalam Azad, the report read, “After three months and 13 days, all the donation boxes of the mosque were opened yesterday. A total of Tk5,78,9,325 were found after counting the money. Apart from money, diamonds, gold ornaments and foreign currency were found in the eight donation boxes of the mosque. This is a record amount compared to the amount received in the past.”
Hence, we conclude that the video is old and shows people counting donations in Bangladesh’s Pagla Mosque which is not in India.
