On the afternoon of April 13, as factory workers staged protests across Noida, Uttar Pradesh, to demand better wages, two young professionals saw a striking sight on the street opposite the firm where they work.

“It was lunch time and I was on the balcony of my firm’s office,” one of them said. “The police officials arrived here and started beating up people.”

Most of those being beaten up were women workers, said the second eyewitness. “When the officials charged them, one of them shouted at them that assaulting them was a violation of their rights,” the eyewitness said, referring to one of the women who was assaulted. “She demanded to deal with women police officials. But those officials did not relent.”

As the police continued to hit her with lathis, the woman shouted, “Keep beating me. Let’s see how much you can manage”, the eyewitness recalled. The police left soon after – they did not detain the women workers. Since then, it has arrested 396 persons citing rioting and criminal use of force.

Two days later, a video surfaced online showing police officials assaulting women. The video was shared on social media platforms like Instagram and X by several users, including the Uttar Pradesh Congress, who alleged that it showed police officials in Noida lathi-charging and manhandling women workers on the day of wage hike protests.

The police commissionerate in Gautam Budh Nagar district denied this. It said that “prima facie, the video appears to be morphed or AI-generated and does not seem to be from Noida, but rather from some other location.”

But the eyewitnesses, who requested anonymity fearing backlash from the authorities, told Scroll that the video accurately captured the scene they had witnessed.

However, it isn’t just eyewitness accounts that punch holes in the police’s claim. Scroll used geolocation analysis and matched the video against a press photo to establish that the location was indeed Noida – block A and B of Sector 6. We also visited the spot and spoke to several people who had seen the police assault.

Questions sent to Laxmi Singh, Noida commissioner of police, did not elicit a response.

Geolocating the video

We watched the video closely to look for clues pointing to its location. We spotted four things.

First, a signboard that says “Simplex” while the camera is panning at the 25 seconds mark.

Second, across the road from this sign, there is a building with a saffron shed. The angle suggests the video was likely shot from this building.

Third, as the video opens, a building with a bluish-green exterior comes into sight. It has two air conditioners jutting out of what looks like a glass facade.

Fourth, as it zooms in, there is a pole with a white cutout on which hangs a garland.

A Google search throws up more than a few firms called Simplex in Noida. But a satellite image on Google Maps shows that only one of them has a building with a saffron shed across the road. This is Simplex Packaging Limited in Sector 6, Noida.

The building across the road is the office of Kohinoor International Private Limited.

Since this image cannot confirm the presence of a building with a bluish-green facade and the pole, we visited the spot for further corroboration.

On the ground

In Noida’s Sector 6, we found there is indeed a bluish-green building opposite Kohinoor International office. Twenty metres down the road is the office of Simplex Packaging Limited.

The pole with the garlanded white cutout stands right in front of Kohinoor International.

Thus, we were able to confirm that the place seen in the video is Sector 6, Noida.

PTI photograph

Days before the video surfaced, the Press Trust of India had released a photograph that showed police officials approaching a group of women and raising their lathis in the air.

The PTI photograph was carried by Vartha Bharati on April 13, and by The Week and National Herald on April 14 with the following caption: “Police personnel resort to a lathi charge on protesters demanding a salary hike in Noida.”

Given their attire, the women in the PTI photo seem to be the same women seen in the video.

Through our spot reporting, we were able to confirm that the photograph was taken in Sector 6, Noida – just steps away from the location seen in the video.

The photo was taken in front of the factory of Samvardhana Motherson International Limited, an automobile manufacturing firm whose workers were part of the wage hike protests. This factory is right beside Kohinoor International.

According to the two eyewitnesses who saw the women being beaten, the women work at the Samvardhana Motherson factory. We were not able to independently verify this.

The police officials

Other people who live and work in this area told Scroll that some of the police officials lathi-charging and manhandling the women came from a police chowki located about a kilometre away.

At the police chowki, Shailendra Kumar, the official heading the post, said he had not seen the video. He claimed there was a lot of violence by factory workers on April 13. “Some women threw rocks at the police. One of the officials was injured and a police bike was burnt,” he said.

Asked if the women seen in the video were responsible for the violence – in the video, they can be seen peacefully standing on the side of the road – Kumar declined comment.

Local residents could only identify one of the police officials in the video – the official seen lathi-charging and pushing a woman as the video opens. They alleged that he is sub-inspector Prabhat Kumar, who patrols Sector 6.

Scroll met the sub-inspector at the chowki and sought his comment on the allegation. He declined to comment.

His colleague Shailendra Kumar said, “Prabhat [Kumar] does not have a personal enmity with anyone.”