A reputed Assamese daily, ‘Asomiya Pratidin‘, has published that Guwahati police picked up a group of evening walkers on Sunday and dropped them off near the airport(Borjhar), 15-20 km away, as a punishment for violating curfew hours which has been imposed from 5 PM to 5 AM.
Headline8 investigated and found that the news is fake and Guwahati Police did not take any such action.
Claim
‘Asomiya Pratidin‘ on Monday published a piece of news in the Guwahati section of its newspaper with the headline ” Guwahati Police’s new way of punishing lawbreakers, picks up several night curfew violators in a bus and drops them off in Borjhar.” The news stated that Guwahati Police on Sunday picked up a number of evening walkers from different parts of the city, put them in a bus and dropped them off near the airport to walk back home as a punishment for violating the curfew hours.
Investigation
Headline8 spoke to Pranjit Borah, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), Guwahati Traffic Police on this matter. Borah dismissed the claims and said, “No such incident has taken place in Guwahati. It is true we picked up violators on a bus, but we only took them to the police station to cut fines and follow procedure as it is difficult to do so on the roadside. We did not leave any violators at the airport.”
In addition, we also contacted the Azara police station in-charge, Tapan Kalita, as the airport area lies under the jurisdiction of the police station. He also rubbished the claims and said, ” “No such bus has come to Azara so far. And we would have known that if Assam police would have taken any such step. This viral news is fake.”
Conclusion
Headline8 investigated and found that the news by ‘Asomiya Pratidin’ is fake. Guwahati Police has not taken any such steps. The violators were taken to the police station, not to the airport.