Fact Check: Video Of Mumbai Police At Mahim Dargah Shared With Misleading Claim

A video of Mumbai Police personnel offering homage at the shrine of Sufi saint Makhdoom Mahimi, at Mahim Dargah, is being shared on social media with a claim that this was the first time Mumbai Police has done something like this.

The post also claims that this ‘new’ tradition has been initiated by the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government.

“मुंबई पोलीस द्वारा पहली बार पीर हजरत मकदूम शाह को सलामी शिवसेना अब अपने अंतिम पड़ाव पे है,” the Facebook caption read.

(Translation: Mumbai Police salutes Pir Hazrat Makdoom Shah for the first time. Shiv Sena is now at its last stop)

Here’s the link to the above post.

More such posts can be seen here and here.

FACT CHECK 

NewsMobile fact-checked the post and found it to be misleading.

We ran a keyword search and found the same video on YouTube dated December 29, 2020. “#Salami Mumbai Police Mkhdoom Baba Mahim Mumbai (Under COVID-19 Rule),” the title of the video read. 

However, we also found that similar video of Mumbai Police paying homage at Mahim Dargah was also uploaded in 2019 and 2017. The YouTube videos can be seen here, here, here, here and here.

Title of one of the above videos read, “Mumbai Police Salami at Makhdoom Shah Baba Dargah Opening of Urs 2019, Mahim.”

The death of a Sufi saint in South Asia is observed as ‘Urs’ or ‘Urus’ in the saint’s dargah.  As per a Times Of India article, Urs is a celebration instead of mourning because of the belief that the death of the Sufi was a union (Visaal) of his soul with the Divine being.

Based on this, we ran another keyword search and found an article by Scroll from 2015 with the headline, “Why Mumbai police detectives are lining up at the tomb of a 14th-century Sufi saint this week.”

“Once a year on Mahimi’s Urs, thousands from around the city, not least the Mumbai police force, come to pay their respects and seek his blessings. The Mumbai police force has the privilege of laying the first chadar, or decorative tomb covering, of the Urs in Mahimi’s respect,” the article explained.

As per an article by Sabrang, “The precedent was set by a 1911 Gazette that mandated police officers of the area to offer the first Chaadar/sandal (decorative cloth covering for tomb) at the 10-day festival.”