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Video claims to show woman falling into sinkhole at Rampath, Ayodhya. Here’s the truth

A viral video claims to show a woman falling into a sinkhole on the newly-constructed Rampath in Ayodhya. Here's the truth.

Updated on: Jul 4, 2024, 09:17:37 IST
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A video that is being widely circulated online claims to show a woman falling into a sinkhole on the newly-constructed Rampath in Ayodhya. The blurred footage shows the road caving in as the woman walks on it. She falls into a hole filled with water and is helped out by people who rush to her aid.

A viral video shows a woman falling into a sinkhole. (X/@GuptaPragnya)
A viral video shows a woman falling into a sinkhole. (X/@GuptaPragnya)

The video is being circulated online with claims that the incident took place in Ayodhya after the first rainfall of the season. The Rampath was constructed ahead of the highly-publicised inauguration of Ram Temple in January this year. However, barely a few months later, there were reports of waterlogging and road cave-ins at Rampath.

The video of the woman falling into the sinkhole was also widely shared online with claims that she was walking on Rampath, Ayodhya after the rains when the road caved in.

What is the truth?

The video in question is actually from Brazil, not Ayodhya.

When Hindustan Times performed a simple reverse image search using Google, it became clear that the footage in question has been circulating on social media since 2022.

Digging a little deeper revealed that the video was filmed at Cascavel, Fortaleza in Brazil. According to a local news website named Go Outside, it shows 48-year-old Maria Rosilene Almeida de Souza being swallowed by the water-filled sinkhole.

Maria was walking on a sidewalk – not a road – in June 2022 when she fell into the sinkhole.

The woman said she did not notice the orange traffic cones placed near the area to warn passersby. “When I realized it, I was already in the water. The hole was deep, and I was lucky that it was full of water, because I went there after it dried up and saw that there were a lot of rocks,” she said. Maria, who works as a street cleaner for the Cascavel City Hall, escaped with minor injuries.

  • Sanya Jain
    ABOUT THE AUTHOR
    Sanya Jain

    Sanya Jain is an Assistant Editor with Hindustan Times Digital. She has nearly a decade of experience in covering offbeat stories that speak to the everyday experience - from viral videos to human interest copies that spark conversation. Her interests stretch across business, pop culture, social media trends, entertainment and global affairs. Before joining Hindustan Times, Sanya spent two years with Moneycontrol and five years with NDTV. She holds an undergraduate degree in English literature from St Stephen’s College, Delhi, and a master’s in journalism from the Xavier Institute of Communications, Mumbai. Sanya has a sharp eye for spotting emerging trends and looking for newsworthy angles to elevate viral posts into meaningful narratives. She was the first one, for example, to cover Narayana Murthy’s remark on 70-hour work weeks that sparked a national conversation. She is equally at ease writing about business leaders as about the common man, about issues of national importance and memes that amuse social media. Sanya enjoys speaking with content creators, newsmakers and entrepreneurs to transform everyday moments into engaging, slice-of-life stories that resonate with readers. When she is not working, Sanya can be found curled up with a good book. Born and raised in Lucknow, she has spent the last several years in Delhi. She is deeply interested in animal welfare and now spends a lot of her time running after her destructive orange cat.Read More

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