On September 16, Retired Air Marshal Anil Chopra tweeted a video of a leopard roaming inside a lodge with the claim that this happened in Taj, Ranthambore. At the time of writing this article, the tweet garnered close to 1,700 retweets.
Taj, Ranthambore ?? pic.twitter.com/Z6vN6pk686
— Aviator Anil Chopra (@Chopsyturvey) September 16, 2020
IPS officer HGS Dhaliwal tweeted the video with the claim that it was shot “somewhere in Lonavala”. Dhaliwal deleted the tweet before it was retweeted close to 100 times. An archived version of the tweet can be accessed here.
India Today, which operates a fact-checking desk called AFWA, published an article on this trending video on September 16, 2020, which carried all the different claims shared along with the video.
Fact-check
With a keyword search, we found an article published by the New York Post on September 9, 2020. “A leopard recently wandered into the restaurant of a luxury hotel in South Africa while hunting its breakfast,” said the article.
According to the article, the leopard was spotted at the restaurant of the Singita Ebony Lodge in the Sabi Sands Reserve. However, the video published along with the article, as well as on the official Facebook page of the conservation and ecotourism brand Singita, was a different.
We scoured the website of Singita to ascertain the location. A video of Singita Boulder lodge matches with the structure and decor of the room seen in the viral video.
In the comparison below, we have placed a frame from the viral video with one of the frames seen in the video above. The wooden flooring and table, the sliding glass door and balcony match.
In conclusion, a video of a leopard passing through a lodge in South Africa was shared with the claim that the animal was spotted in different parts of India.