Amid the Covid-19 pandemic, India is dealing with shortages on all fronts, be it oxygen, medicines, vaccines, or even doctors and nurses. The capacity is limited and the demand is overwhelming. As a result, there is chaos and what is being called a system collapse. Recently, a video showing an Indian Railways’ Oxygen Express train with seven tankers leaving from Kalamboli goods yard in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra for Visakhapatnam is being shared with a false claim that it shows medical aid arriving from Pakistan to India. So far, India has two vaccines available for use i.e. Covishield, which is the Oxford vaccine, and Covaxin, which is made in India. India gets about 70 to 85 million doses per month.
Several social media users posted the video with the caption, “Oxygen tanker left Pakistan for India after Imran Khan’s announcement.” A few days back, Pakistan offered material support to India to tide over the Covid-19 crisis. On April 24, Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan even expressed solidarity with India against the “global challenge confronting humanity”. Anti Fake News War Room (AFWA) has found the claim to be misleading. The video is actually of Oxygen Express operated by Indian Railways. The train seen in the video was carrying seven empty tankers from Navi Mumbai to fill them up at Visakhapatnam. On performing a keyword search with the relevant keywords, a few news reports were found which stated that the Ro-Ro service with seven empty tankers had departed from Kalamboli goods yard for Visakhapatnam steel plant where it would be loaded with Liquid Medical Oxygen according to the Indian Railway Ministry. The same video was tweeted by Railways Minister Piyush Goyal on April 19, saying that seven empty tankers departed from Kalamboli to Vizag to load liquid medical oxygen.
News reports by “The Financial Express” and “Firstpost” also said that the tankers were to be filled with oxygen at the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant and brought back to Maharashtra, which is facing a shortage of oxygen to treat critical Covid patients.
Thus, the viral video is not of oxygen tankers from Pakistan coming to India. It was taken a few days back when the Indian Railways’ Oxygen Express was carrying empty tankers to get them filled with liquid oxygen at Visakhapatnam.
