American portal, with its history of racist attitude towards India, The New York Times, today published a report claiming that the two-day nationwide strike which involved public and private sector workers disrupted services across the country.
Ten central trade unions have given a two-day nationwide bandh call and were supposedly joined by other independent federations and associations. However, if one has grown up in India, one knows how Bharat bandh calls are of little impact unless some protestors decide to go wild and uproot railway tracks or such things, as it quite frequently happens. However, even then, except for the additional cost to the exchequer, very rarely such bandhs have been effective.
Which was quite the case today as despite the strike, most Indians went on about their lives like any other day. So, when Indian netizens saw NYTimes hyping up the strike like it brought the nation to a standstill, they were quite amused.
Why no one inform me about the strike? I could have taken the day off. 🙄
— Numbers & Narratives (@NumNarration) March 28, 2022
Many were upset that they were unaware of the strike and hence missed out on taking the day off. (OpIndia boss Rahul Roushan has asked the team to do an overtime to defy the strike, which means, this reporter is on her 15th work hour.)
The Strike had an impact ….
— Aloke Joshi (@alokejoshi) March 28, 2022
equal to the “Bhookamp” of #RahulGandhi#strike
Looks like we were not the only unlucky few.
Are you guys smoking something?
— Sumeet Raghvan सुमीत राघवन (@sumrag) March 28, 2022
Even otherwise calm people also got triggered. Perhaps the actor Sumeet Raghvan who played the role of Sahil Sarabhai in Sarabhai vs Sarabhai, also had the usual ‘middle class’ moment when he read the exaggerated news of ‘Bharat bandh’. ‘Bharat bandh nahin, Monisha, nationwide strike kaho, Bharat bandh is so Sanghi…’
godi media bol. paid media to sirf wo log hai 😂
— Ankit Sharma (@monke_20) March 28, 2022
The above figure of 2.5 trillion does not include illegal immigrants living in India on fake Aadhaar cards. Even this is something ‘Godi media’ won’t tell you.
If you are working today then send this NY times post to your manager. It is supposed to be a strike holiday. https://t.co/152hwWjyXB
— Afsar (@TheAngrezJailer) March 28, 2022
Umm.
😂😂😂😂Sitting in #India …I came to know about Some Nationwide strike going on in India via an American Propaganda Paper 😂😂😂!! https://t.co/oqQAkY0o4T
— Loose_Bull 🇮🇳 (@loosebool) March 28, 2022
Looks like many are upset at not being able to avail a leave on a Monday.
Except for Kerala (where state unions started strike last night itself – LOL), the strike had very little impact on lives of people otherwise. It was business as usual. But then, NYTimes seems to be living in a parallel universe.