A group of people allegedly beat up four women and stripped two of them in Jalpaiguri district of northern West Bengal on Monday on the suspicion that they were child lifters. This is the fourth such incident just this month in Jalpaiguri district, the police said.

Sanjay Dutta, the inspector-in-charge of Dhupguri police station said, “We rescued the women from the mob. No arrest has been made till [Monday] night,” according to the Hindustan Times.

The women had gone to a market in Dawkimari village in Dhupguri block when they were attacked, the police said. Two of the women had gone to the office of a micro finance company, while one was on her way to meet a relative and another was going door-to-door to sell clothes.

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After some people created panic that the women were child lifters, a mob gathered at the market and began beating them up. “The women were rescued by the police and taken to a nearby primary health centre, where their condition was stated to be stable,” Jalpaiguri Superintendent of Police Amitabha Maity told PTI. He added that the women were aged between 20 and 50 years.

“We are creating awareness on this [fake news and rumours] through the social media and public media like announcements over mikes,” Maity said. “People should contact the police on the helpline if they find someone suspicious, but not take law into their own hands.”

A spate of mob lynchings has claimed over 20 lives in Maharashtra, Tripura, Assam, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka since March. In nearly all cases, the mobs seem to have been incited by widely shared WhatsApp videos and messages asking people to beware of child kidnappers. The victims have ranged from innocent people asking for directions; transgendered people; the poor; and the mentally disturbed. The police have since started outreach programmes to quell fake news.