Kalpitiya Beach or a Scene of Animal Cruelty?
Kalpitiya is a peninsula that separates the Puttalam lagoon from the Indian Ocean located in the North-Western Province of Sri Lanka and has traditionally been considered a location for maritime trade and home to larger number of fishing communities. However, during recent times equipped with its natural pristine coastline, Kalpitiya peninsula has gradually become one […]
Kalpitiya is a peninsula that separates the Puttalam lagoon from the Indian Ocean located in the North-Western Province of Sri Lanka and has traditionally been considered a location for maritime trade and home to larger number of fishing communities. However, during recent times equipped with its natural pristine coastline, Kalpitiya peninsula has gradually become one of the more popular tourist destinations with whale & dolphin watching and kite-surfing being some of the key attractions.
We found a photo claimed to be from Kalpitiya beach posted on 5th September by a Facebook page called “ගමේ සෙට් එක - Game Set Eka” having been shared over seven thousand times so far. In this, near a beachside house, 2 dolphins are seen swimming and the post had mentioned “පිටරට නෙවෙයි. මේ කල්පිටිය” which translated to “ Not abroad. This is Kalpitiya” as shown below.
| ගමේ සෙට් එක - Game Set Eka Facebook Post | Archived Link |
We found another travel-related page called “ඇවිදිමු” sharing the same content after the above post had gone viral as below.
| ඇවිදිමු Facebook post | Archived Link |
While some users had admired the beauty of the photo and being amazed whether such a location exists in Kalpitiya some had questioned the authenticity of the post. Hence, we decided to do an analysis of the above claims.
Fact Check
Initially, we monitored the comments the users had posted on these photo claims and some had clearly mentioned that this is a fake photo and the original is photo is from Cuba. Below are some of these user comments for the above photo claim.
Further, we found few posts by Sri Lankan Facebook users mentioning that this is actually a place called “කිඳුරු දූපත, Cuba ? කියුබාව”
For further investigation, we decided to use Google Reverse Image to find the original picture and whether this photo is actually taken from Cuba as suggested by many users. The reverse image search provided a huge number of results indicating that this photo had been used in a multiple number of locations and some of the earliest instances of this photo being submitted date way back to 2013 as shown below.
Further research indicated that this photo is from a location called Cayo Largo, Cuba and a Google search for “Cayo Largo Cuba” resulted in this image as well.
Further, we found that this photo submitted by a tourist in 2015 as below had been used in a Tripadvisor review for "Delfinario de Cayo Largo"
| Traveler photo submitted by NICO_TDF (May 2015) | Archived Link |
In addition we found in the review for "Delfinario de Cayo Largo" by TripAdvisor some tourists had in fact requested fellow travellers to avoid spending money on watching and swimming with these 2 dolphins stating that they are kept in captivity and not looked after properly.
| Full Review of Delfinario de Cayo Largo by Tripadvisor | Archived Link |
OIPA (International Organization for Animal Protection) had also requested from the public in 2016 to boycott this place and mentioned that they “received a segnalation from a tourist about a dolphinarium in Cuba – Cayo Largo where two dolphins were trapped with nets in the corner of a beach, forced to swim and play with the visitors. Dolphinariums and aquariums are always sad places for the animals, but this one in particular is a miserable tiny prison for these dolphins”
| Full Article by OIPA | Archived Link |
Conclusion:
From our investigation, it is clear that this picture is not taken from Kalpitiya beach and in fact taken from Cayo Largo beach in Cuba and is a photo which has been used extensively over the internet.
