What was claimed
A video shows an Indian pilot landing by parachute after being shot down by Pakistan.
Our verdict
False. This video shows a recreational Pakistani paraglider several weeks before the recent India-Pakistan crisis began.
Video shows Pakistani paraglider, not ‘shot down’ Indian pilot
A video is being shared on Facebook with the incorrect claim that it shows an Indian pilot who has been shot down by Pakistan.
It actually shows a Pakistani paraglider landing normally—as the paraglider himself explained in his own video on Instagram.
The videos being shared on Facebook show someone gliding to the ground beneath an orange canopy, with the words “Rafale shot down by Pakistan Female pilot caught by locals [sic]”.
But as other fact checkers have pointed out, this footage actually comes from a Pakistani paraglider who posted it on YouTube on 23 March and Instagram on 25 March, weeks before the recent crisis involving India and Pakistan began.
In a separate video, the paraglider said (when translated by ChatGPT): “People have been sharing the video claiming it shows an Indian pilot, posting it on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook—everywhere—without any verification. But it turns out to be fake news. It’s very important not to share such things without verifying them.”
We have debunked other misinformation circulating online about the India-Pakistan conflict—including false claims about the shooting down of Indian jets. We’ve also produced guides with helpful tips on how to spot AI-generated images, and deepfake videos being shared on social media.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because the video shows a Pakistani paraglider landing normally, not an Indian pilot who has been shot down.