Fact Check: Viral Video of Child Holding Sibling’s Body Is from 2022, Not a Recent Case
India has a variety of ambulance services available to cater to different medical needs and emergencies, ranging from
Claim :
Viral video shows a recent incident of an 8-year-old holding the body of his 2-year-old brother while waiting for his fatherFact :
The viral video is an old one. The incident took place in 2022 in Madhya Pradesh and is not recent.
India has a variety of ambulance services available to cater to different medical needs and emergencies, ranging from basic transportation to advanced life support. 108 Emergency Ambulance is a free, nationwide emergency response system providing integrated medical, police, and fire services. It is a government initiative under a public-private partnership model and aims to provide a quick response during the "golden hour" for critical cases. 108 ambulance services are prevalent all over the country. For the transportation of deceased individuals, a dedicated dead body transportation service is available, which includes mortuary ambulances or other specialised vehicles equipped for this purpose.
The transportation of deceased bodies in India, particularly in rural areas, presents significant challenges due to limited resources. Numerous incidents across various states highlight the distressing plight of grieving families, who, unable to secure proper transport, are often compelled to carry their deceased loved ones using undignified means, such as on motorcycles.
Meanwhile, a video showing a young child sitting near a drain and holding his younger brother’s dead body while waiting in hospital premises is going viral on social media, with the claim that this incident took place recently in Badfada village in Morena Ambah, Madhya Pradesh. The posts also claim that the video went viral and caused a stir among the doctors, and that ambulance service was immediately provided.
This video was also shared by the social media handle of Aam Aadmi Party with the caption in Hindi: “यह तस्वीर मोदी और बीजेपी की स्वास्थ्य व्यवस्था की सबसे दर्दनाक तस्वीर है मुरैना में एक गरीब पिता अपने मासूम बेटे की लाश अस्पताल से सड़क तक खुद ढोता है, क्योंकि अस्पताल ने एम्बुलेंस तक नहीं दी। दो साल के शव को आठ साल का भाई गोद में लिए बैठा रहा, जबकि पिता भाड़े के पैसे के लिए भटकता रहा। ये है मोदी के नए भारत की असली हकीकत जहां पूंजीपति दोस्तों के लिए तो जगह है लेकिन ग़रीब के लिए नहीं I”. The post has been deleted by AAP, but we can find the archive link of the claim.
Fact Check:
The claim is Misleading. The video is not recent. It shows an incident that occurred in the year 2022.
When we extracted keyframes from the viral video and searched them using reverse image search, we found several news reports published in July 2022 that shared a screenshot of the video.
According to a report published in July 2022 on Telangana Today, a heart-wrenching incident, in which an eight-year-old boy had to sit for hours by the roadside with the body of his 2-year-old brother on his lap, has come to light. The video of the incident is going viral on social media. The incident happened in the Morena district of Madhya Pradesh when their father went to search for a vehicle to take the body to their native village.According to a news report published in Deccan Herald, some social media users circulated the video and lashed out at the authorities over their apathy and for being "insensitive." In the clip, the boy was seen sitting along a boundary wall of the district hospital, with the covered body of his two-year-old brother, who died at the medical facility during treatment.
According to the BBC, the child's poor father was looking for a cheap vehicle to take his younger son's body home. Pujaram Jatav, a resident of Badfara village of Ambah in Morena district, brought his two-year-old son Raja to the district hospital. Raja, who was suffering from Anemia and water retention in the stomach, died during treatment at the district hospital.
Hence, the viral video of an 8-year-old holding the body of his 2-year-old brother while waiting for his father is not a recent video; it is from the year 2022. The claim is Misleading.
