Claim: A picture shows the dead bodies of the BLA militants who were killed in an operation by the Pakistan Army after the armed group targeted and hijacked Jaffar Express on 11 March 2025.
Fact: The picture predates the Jaffar Express hijacking and likely shows the bodies of some of the men who were reportedly kidnapped and killed by the BLA in April 2024.
On 12 March 2025, X (formerly Twitter) user @ZEUS_PSF posted (archive) a picture of dead bodies lying in a dark, desert-like area, likely at night or in low-light conditions, with the following caption:
“Pictorial Confirmation ☠️🗡️🇵🇰 7x BLA terrorists aka ‘Missing Persons’, laying in open after knowing the meaning of, ‘F around, find out’.”
“F around, find out” is slang and contains an expletive denoted by the F; the phrase indicates that specific actions will result in negative consequences.
Jaffar Express hijacked
The claim emerged as the separatist militant group Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) hijacked the Peshawar-bound Jaffar Express “in [the] Dhadar area of Bolan Pass” in Balochistan, on 11 March 2025, according to the state-run Radio Pakistan.
The nine-coach train was travelling from Quetta to Peshawar via the Punjab province and had around 450 passengers, Quetta Railways Controller Muhammad Kashif told CNN. Its front portion was attacked first, grounding it to a halt, and its driver, who was initially reported dead, emerged alive.
The BLA demanded the release of Baloch political prisoners, activists, and missing persons it claims have been abducted, failing which it would execute the hostages.
In its statement, the Pakistan Army’s media wing, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), said, “The terrorists, after blowing up the railway track, took control of the train and held the passengers hostage including women, children and elderly, using them as human shields.”
The Pakistan Army “successfully eliminated all 33 terrorists” who “took the lives of 21 innocent hostages” as the face-off with the BLA concluded but “4 brave security forces‘ soldiers made the ultimate sacrifice and embraced shahadat [martyrdom]”, the ISPR added.
“Intelligence reports have unequivocally confirmed that the attack was orchestrated and directed by terrorist ring leaders operating from Afghanistan,” the statement read.
ISPR Director-General Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry was quoted in a report as saying the Pakistan Army, Air Force, Frontier Corps (FC), and the Special Services Group (SSG) were part of the operation.
Days later, however, Chaudhry updated the death toll, saying the number had risen to 31, according to Reuters. He had earlier said 354 hostages were safely rescued.
On the other hand, the BLA, which is a proscribed ethnonationalist militant organisation, claimed otherwise, saying it escaped with 214 hostages, including military personnel, and executed all of them.
There were over 150 security personnel aboard, “official sources who did not have permission to speak on the record” confirmed to The Guardian, which added that the BLA had even offered a “prisoner exchange”.
Contrary to the military’s statement, the group asserted that it had released a number of the hostages. Soch Fact Check could not independently verify either party’s claims about the number of hostages and casualties.
A passenger who managed to escape shortly after the BLA attack on the Jaffar Express told the media that the militants “separated women and asked them to leave” and “spared [the] elders”.
Meanwhile, the Foreign Office has accused India of being behind the hijacking in Pakistan. These comments were echoed by Pakistan Army later, with spokesperson Chaudhry saying the “main sponsor is eastern neighbour [India]”.
The National Assembly passed a resolution on 13 March strongly condemning the Jaffar Express hijacking and all acts of terrorism.
‘Alarming’ situation in Balochistan
The armed separatist militant group has been regularly targeting railway infrastructure; in August 2024, it blasted off a key railway bridge between Kolpur and Mach. Just a few months later, in November, a BLA-claimed suicide blast at the Quetta Railway Station killed at least 26 people and injured 62.
In its January 2025 report, Islamabad-based think tank Pak Institute of Peace Studies (PIPS) termed the situation in Balochistan “alarming”. The province experienced a sharp rise in terrorist attacks and casualties in 2024, with an 84% increase in attacks compared to the previous year, it said, adding that those carried out by the BLA and the Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF) had shot up 119%.
The BLA is considered the biggest of the many militant groups, who, for the past few decades, have consistently claimed that Pakistan’s federal government unfairly exploits Balochistan’s rich gas and mineral resources. It is also committed to “Balochistan’s complete independence from Pakistan”, according to a profile of the group by Al Jazeera.
Fact or Fiction?
A reverse-image search led us to an X post (archive) from 13 April 2024, containing the same picture of the dead bodies, as well as another of the identity cards of the men and close-ups of their faces. It is captioned as follows:
“سانحہ نوشکی میں بے گناہ سولین مزدوروں پر BLA کے حملے پر گہرا دکھ ہوا ہے۔ فورسز کو فیصلہ کرنا ہوگا کہ یا تو ان کے ساتھ صلح کر لیں یا BLA کے خلاف فیصلہ کن فوجی آپریشن کریں۔ میرے گاؤں چک فتح شاہ کے چھ نوجوان اس واقعے میں شہید ہوۓ ہیں۔
[Deeply saddened by the BLA attack on innocent civilian workers in the Noshki tragedy. The [armed] forces will have to decide whether to make peace with them [BLA] or launch a decisive military operation against the BLA. Six youths from my village Chak Fateh Shah have been martyred in this incident.]”
Our investigation strongly suggests that the image shows the dead bodies of some of the nine men who were killed after being abducted from a bus in Noshki, Balochistan, in April 2024. The BLA had claimed responsibility for the attack.
According to Dawn, Deputy Commissioner (DC) Habibullah Musakhel said, “About 10-12 gunmen blockaded the Quetta-Taftan Highway N-40 in the vicinity of Sultan Charhai near Noshki and abducted nine passengers from a bus.” The publication added that all of the deceased were men and hailed from different cities in Punjab, including Wazirabad, Mandi Bahauddin, and Gujranwala.
Police officer Abdullah Mengal told Reuters at the time that the men were shot at close range. DC Musakhel said the victims’ “bullet-ridden bodies were found beneath a bridge after one and a half hours”, the outlet added.
Reuters also quoted the BLA as saying it had killed men it considered “were intelligence operatives”. However, it added that authorities had refuted the claim, saying the deceased were labourers travelling to Iran.
The attack was the second of two in the area by the same assailants, who had earlier opened fire on a car as it neared their blockade, according to Al Jazeera.
A passenger, Mohammad Tahir, had explained the attackers targeted those hailing from Punjab, The Associated Press reported on 14 April 2024. “They said, ‘Get up from your seats whoever is from Punjab. […] You kill our children. You do bad things to us,’” he had narrated.
The publication also noted that according to an initial police report, two of the men who were killed “were human smugglers”.
Soch Fact Check also came across the same viral picture in an X post by journalist Faizullah Khan, who wrote:
“بلوچستان میں پنجابیوں کو نوشکی روڈ پہ قتل کردیا گیا مقتولین میں8سرکاری اہلکار شامل ہیں بلوچ علیحدگی پسند پنجاب سے تعلق رکھنے والے افراد کو ماضی میں بھی شناخت کرکے قتل کرتے رہے ہیں جسمیں سرکاری اداروں کے اہلکاروں سمیت عام پنجابی بھی شامل ہیں جنہیں جاسوس قرار دیا گیا
[Punjabis were killed on Noshki Road in Balochistan. Eight government officials are among the dead. In the past as well, Baloch separatists have identified and killed people hailing from Punjab, including government officials and ordinary Punjabis, who were declared spies.]”
Virality
The post by @ZEUS_PSF has garnered over 47,100 views so far.
Soch Fact Check found the claim circulating here, here, and here on Facebook and here and here on Instagram.
Journalist Anas Mallick also posted the false picture alongside the following text: “Killed Terrorists of the terrorist outfit BLA in Dhadar in Bolan, Balochistan, Pakistan — Not an Al Image — All 33 terrorists involved in the Hijack of Jaffar Express train, belonging to terrorist outfit BLA were killed. #Pakistan”. However, he took down the X post and apologised for his error, but it appears that the visual had already spread on social media.
Conclusion: The picture predates the Jaffar Express hijacking and likely shows the bodies of some of the men who were reportedly kidnapped and killed by the BLA in April 2024.
Background image in cover photo: Hassaan Malik
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