The ‘man on fire in Dubai mall’ video is fake – Here’s the truth

A video was making rounds recently showing a man on fire at a Dubai mall after a mobile phone battery reportedly exploded inside his pocket. But it’s now transpired that the location of the incident was misreported.

According to Faisal Cp Kuttammakkal, who shared the video on Facebook — the fire was the result of the man’s mobile exploding inside his pocket. With over a hundred shares in less than 24 hours, the short clip, the caption of which in Malayalam translated to “an incident that just happened in Dubai”, had gone viral.

Many can be seen trying to douse the fire with clothes and shrieking in fear. But as it turns out, the news is fake.

According to a report by Gulf News, Dubai Police warned people not to believe everything they see, explaining that the accident apparently happened in Morocco, in a city called Agadir, on June 3.

“The video wasn’t in The Dubai Mall or in any mall in the emirate. There is a police post in the mall and the officers didn’t receive any alert about such an incident,” Major-General Khalil Ebrahim Al Mansouri, Assistant Commander-in-Chief for Criminal Investigation Affairs of Dubai Police, said.