Fact Check: Viral Video of Crying Child Is Not Related To Pahalgam Terror Attack

New Delhi (Vishvas News). A video of a child crying while sitting near a body is going viral on social media. This video is being linked to the recent terrorist attack in Pahalgam in Kashmir. The post further claims that the child lost his father in the attack. 

Vishvas News found in its investigation that this video is from 2020, when Jammu and Kashmir Police rescued a three-year-old during a terrorist attack in Sopore.

What is going viral?

Instagram user sanatansanskrutivigyan shared the viral video on April 23, 2025, with the caption, “TERROR IN PAHALGAM

TERRORIST KILLED HIS PARENTS, WHO WILL ANSWER FOR HIS TEARS?”

The archived link of the post is here.

Investigation

To verify the viral claim, we first searched the keyframes of the video on Google reverse image. We found the original video uploaded on ANI’s X handle on July 1, 2020 with the caption, “Jammu & Kashmir Police console a 3-year-old child after they rescued him during a terrorist attack in Sopore, take him to his mother. The child was sitting beside his dead relative during the attack.”

#WATCH Jammu & Kashmir Police console a 3-year-old child after they rescued him during a terrorist attack in Sopore, take him to his mother. The child was sitting beside his dead relative during the attack. pic.twitter.com/znuGKizACh

— ANI (@ANI) July 1, 2020

Upon searching with keywords, we found a video report on India Today’s YouTube channel on July 1, 2020. According to the description, “Security forces rescued a three-year-old innocent child sitting next to his grandfather who was shot by terrorists on Wednesday in Sopore, Jammu and Kashmir.”

We found several news reports about this incident that happened in 2020. As per reports, terrorists hiding in a mosque fired indiscriminately on CRPF troops in Sopore, resulting in a gunbattle that killed a CRPF trooper and a civilian.

To confirm this, we spoke to Dainik Jagran’s Jammu and Kashmir Bureau Chief Naveen Nawaz. He confirmed, “This video is from 2020 when this child’s grandfather died in the attack in Sopore and the security forces rescued the child.”

At least 26 people were killed and more than 20 people were injured in the terrorist attack in Pahalgam on April 22, 2025. More information about the incident can be read in this report.

Finally, we scanned the account of the user who shared the video with the misleading claim. We found that the Instagram user sanatansanskrutivigyan has more than 10,000 followers.

Conclusion: Vishvas News found in its investigation that this video is from 2020, when Jammu and Kashmir Police rescued a  three year old child during a terrorist attack in Sopore. This video is not related to the Pahalgam terror attack.

Tags

• JK Terrorist attack
• Pahalgam attack
• Pahalgam terror attack