BJP Rajya Sabha member and former Indian cricketer Harbhajan Singh not too long ago re-shared a video on his official X account. Initially posted by an X consumer, Arshdeep Singh Saini, the clip exhibits two younger males standing by the roadside in a seemingly disoriented state with their our bodies showing limp and their actions uncommon. Sharing the video within the context of Punjab’s drug abuse drawback, Singh expressed anguish, and wrote, “Very unhappy to see the state of affairs of Punjab…”
Very unhappy to see the state of affairs of Punjab 💔💔 . Punjab and its youth deserve higher. This challenge wants honesty, accountability, and pressing motion—not denial. https://t.co/Vb6si8eAaj
— Harbhajan Turbanator (@harbhajan_singh) August 10, 2026
The submit, revealed on August 10, has been considered over 100,000 instances, and shared greater than a 1,000 instances. (Archive)
Drug abuse stays a serious challenge in Punjab, which is slated to go to meeting polls in 2027. Harbhajan Singh, who switched from the AAP to the BJP in April 2026, shared the video whereas elevating questions on accountability and the incumbent AAP authorities’s dealing with of the disaster.
A number of different social media customers additionally posted the identical video with comparable captions, pointing to the rising drug abuse drawback in Punjab.
Truth Verify
To start with, we observed that Punjab Police had reshared Singh’s submit mentioning that the viral video was from Sri Ganganagar, Rajasthan, and never from Punjab. The submit from Punjab Police’s official deal with urged customers to confirm information earlier than posting issues on-line. (Archive)
The video being circulated is from Sri Ganganagar, Rajasthan—not Punjab—and has no reference to Punjab Police.
A Punjabi audio observe doesn’t make an incident a Punjab incident.
We urge customers and social media accounts to confirm the information and site earlier than posting… https://t.co/bNHwjXVXsC
— Punjab Police India (@PunjabPoliceInd) August 10, 2026
Mainstream information media shops similar to Times of India and India Today additionally fact-checked Singh’s viral declare. All of the stories echoed the declare of Punjab Police and talked about that the video was from Sri Ganganagar, Rajasthan, though no element of the particular incident or the unique video was shared.
To confirm whether or not the video was certainly from Sri Ganganagar, we continued our investigation.
On August 13, round midnight, the Occasions of India revealed a narrative on its digital portal on the Sri Ganganagar zombie drug case. In response to the article, Sri Ganganagar district police detained two individuals who staged a scene pretending to be underneath the affect of the so-called “zombie drug.”
Quoting district police superintendent Hari Shankar, the Occasions of India article talked about that the detained youths have been Yogesh and Yoginder, who had filmed the video for Instagram.
Armed with this piece of proof, we carried out one other spherical of investigation and got here throughout a Fb submit by SBT Information or Sandhya Border Occasions Information. In response to this platform, the 2 youths have been detained from Bhambhu Colony space of Sri Ganganagar metropolis after they’d filmed the video on August 7.
We then geolocated the spot to verify the scene was certainly from Bhambhu Colony.
The viral video had three necessary markers which helped us to geolocate the precise spot the place the 41-second-long clip was filmed.
Within the video, the 2 youths are seen standing in entrance of an iron pillar with orange and black markings at its base. Such markings are generally seen at Indian Oil petrol pumps, and the tiled flooring within the video can also be typical of petrol pump premises. Tall iron pillars bearing the pump’s branding are additionally generally discovered outdoors petrol stations.
The street in entrance of the petrol pump seems to be a two-way street, with a divider within the center. Vehicles might be seen travelling on either side of the divider, whereas two flags mounted on tall poles are seen on the divider. On the other aspect of the street, a vacant plot overgrown with vegetation can be seen.
To geolocate the spot, we looked for Indian Oil petrol pumps close to Bhambhu Colony in Sri Ganganagar, on the lookout for one beside a two-way street and reverse a vacant plot with dense vegetation. We found a petrol pump that matched these options precisely.
Thus from these above findings, it’s clear that the video which BJP MP Harbhajan Singh shared was not from Punjab. It’s from Sri Ganganagar in Rajasthan. In addition to, in line with police, the 2 males within the video have been enacting being underneath the affect of medication for an Instagram reel.
