Fact Check: ANI's video of "Pak 'Accepting' Balakot Deaths" was doctored; Indian media runs story
New Delhi: Days after a video surfaced by news agency ANI was carried by various media houses, claiming that a former Pakistani diplomat had admitted that India carried out Balakot Airstrike and more than 300 people were killed in the attack, a fact-check by Alt News has revealed that the video clip that the news was based on was manipulated.
Several media houses including India Today, Republic, and others had carried the report by news agency ANI on former Pakistani diplomat “Agha Hilaly” admitting on the Pakistani News Channel debate that 300 terrorists had died in the Balakot Airstrike on February 26, 2019.
The report said: "The admission by the former Pakistani diplomat, who regularly takes the Pakistan Army side in TV debates, goes against the zero casualties claim made by Islamabad at that time."
"India crossed the international border and did an act of war in which at least 300 were reported dead. Our target was different from theirs. We targeted their high command. That was our legitimate target because they are men of the military. We subconsciously accepted that a surgical strike -- a limited action -- did not result in any casualty. Now we have subconsciously told them that, whatever they will do, we'll do only that much and won't escalate," ANI quoted "Agha Hilaly" as saying.
But a fact-check by "Alt News" found that the comments were misreported and the ex-diplomat who made the comments was "Zafar Hilaly".
In the debate posted on YouTube by HUM news as part of a program called "Agenda Pakistan", Hilaly said, "What you did, India, was an act of war. India ne jo kiya, international boundary ko cross karke ek act of war. Jisme kam se kam 300 logo ko unhone marna tha. (What India did was an act of war. By crossing the international boundary India committed an act of war in which they intended to kill at least 300 people)."
The very next sentence has the former diplomat saying: "Ittifaqan vo nahi mare, humne [India ne] ek football field ko bomb kiya. (Coincidentally, they [Pakistani people] did not die and India bombed a football field.)"
Zafar Hilaly also tweeted a video saying his statement was spliced and edited.
Alt News said a version of the video posted on Twitter had an abrupt cut "around 0:7-0:9 seconds" and the word "marna (to kill)" sounds as if Hilaly said "mara (killed)".
The news has since been removed by websites
— Zafar Hilaly (@ZafarHilaly) January 9, 2021
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11 more bodies retrieved from Arunachal accident site
Itanagar (PTI): Eleven more bodies were retrieved on Saturday from the deep gorge in Arunachal Pradesh's Anjaw district, where a mini-truck on which 22 labourers from Assam were travelling fell, an official said.
With this, 17 bodies have been recovered from the accident site, Anjaw's deputy commissioner Milo Kojin said.
He said three more bodies will be brought out on Sunday.
The operation, being conducted by a joint team of the NDRF and Army, resumed at 6 am.
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"The retrieval process was extremely difficult because of the treacherous terrain, and the gorge is very deep," Kojin said.
The operation was suspended around 4 pm due to low visibility and will be resumed on Sunday morning, he said.
"One person is still missing, and a search operation will be carried out tomorrow," he added.
The accident happened on the evening of December 8, around 40 km from Hayuliang towards Chaglagam in the district. On the evening of December 10, one survivor managed to climb out of the gorge and reach a nearby Border Roads Task Force (BRTF) labour camp, following which the authorities were alerted.
Six bodies were recovered from the gorge on Friday and handed over to their families on Saturday.
