Recently, a video has surfaced on social media platforms showing a very long snake surrounding a Buddha statue with a claim that a 15 feet snake surrounds the statue of Lord Buddha every year during rains.
A Facebook user shared the video with a caption, “Here every year in rain a 15 feet snake covers the statue of Lord Buddha. Watch this video to believe its truth.”
This post received over 100 re-shares at the time of writing this article.
On further checking, we found that this video has been doing the rounds on social media with a similar claim since 2018.
Post carrying the same video can be found here, here, and here.
Fact Check
NewsMobile fact-checked the above claim and found it to be false.
With the help of Reverse Image Search, while using the keyframes from the video, we found this video uploaded on a ‘Sangha Tv’ YouTube channel on 13 May 2017 with the title, ‘Sri Lanka Buddha on snake Gautam Buddha’.
Taking a hint from this, we searched for videos of snakes covering Buddha in Sri Lanka. We found several videos with similar visuals of snakes covering Buddha, which can be seen here, here, and here.
The description of the video says “Muchalinda Nagadaranaya”. On performing a relevant keyword search, we found a video uploaded on May 13, 2017, with the caption that can be translated to, “A boy from Sri Lanka uses robot technology to create the Muchalinda cobra’. Description of the video says that this video was a Muchalinda Nagadaranaya with robot technology.
On searching further, we found out that in popular mythological stories, Muchalinda is the name given to a Naga, a snake-like being, that protected Gautama Buddha from the elements after his enlightenment.
We also found a clearer version of the video uploaded on a Facebook page named Sammaditthi Live on May 13, 2017.
In the above video, one can see the eyes of the snake glowing with red light, and the sounds, lighting used in the video are seen to be typical of an artificial setting seen in other Muchalinda Nagadaranaya videos on YouTube, rather than in an original setting. The video also shows the audience clapping and cheering.
NewsMobile couldn’t independently verify the location of the video. However, it is clear that the video does not show a real snake, and robotic technology has been used to create a show like effect.
Hence, the attached claim is false and misleading.
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