The mayor of Leicester has said that the recent brawl between the Hindu and Muslim communities of the region broke out due to ‘social media disinformation’.
A large-scale scuffle broke out between the Hindu-Muslim communities of Leicester over the weekend, after weeks of disturbances following an Asia Cup match between Pakistan and India on August 28. Police arrested fifteen people on Monday in connection with the disorder.
“I’ve seen quite a selection of the social media stuff which is very, very, very distorting now and some of it just completely lying about what had been happening between different communities,” said Leicester Mayor Peter Soulsby. He added that there was no obvious cause for the disturbances, and that a distortion of facts on social media had brought unrest to ‘a peaceful city’.
According to a police spokesperson, the post-match celebrations turned ugly when someone posted a video of a Muslim supposedly being attacked by a group of Hindus. “This was wrong – the victim was in fact Sikh and supported the same team as the people who assaulted him,” the spokesperson said.
The police believes that disinformation on social media has attributed to unrest and tensions in the community.
