Old flash flood video falsely linked to Hindu festival Kumbh

An old video of a flash flood from another state has been shared hundreds of times on social media, falsely claiming that it occurred during the Kumbh Mela in Prayagraj, a city in northern India. The video shows a strong water current hitting the riverbank, causing people to flee. However, this claim is false—the footage is actually from Kolkata, an eastern Indian city, and has been available online months before the Kumbh festival began.

"Kumbh mela," reads the Hindi-language caption of a Facebook post shared on February 11, 2025.

The post also shares a video with text overlaid that reads, "Maha Kumbh Prayagraj."

The clip has been viewed more than 6.3 million times.

India's government said February 11 that more than 450 million pilgrims had attended the festival, a six-week-long celebration of prayer and ritual bathing in the northern city of Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh (archived link).

The festival is held every 12 years at the confluence of the Ganges, Yamuna and mythical Saraswati rivers. It ended February 26.

The video with similar claims was shared on Instagram and Facebook.

However, the video is available online since November 2024.

Kolkata, not Prayagraj

Google reverse image search using keyframes led to the original, longer version of the video, which was posted on Instagram on October 17, 2024 (archived link).

The Kumbh festival began in Prayagraj on January 13, 2025, confirming that the video was available online months before the festival started.

AFP reached out to the user Ranjit Paswan on March 3, 2025, who confirmed that the claim associated with the video is false. He stated that the video is from Kolkata, not Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh.

He added, "I shot this video in October during the Navratri festival on the banks of the Ganga river near Bhoothnath Temple in Kolkata, West Bengal."

AFP confirmed the video was filmed near the Bhoothnath Temple in Kolkata by comparing it to images of the area on Google Maps (archived link).

AFP has fact-checked more misinformation about Kumbh Mela here.