Pratik Sinha, the co-founder of the self-described fact-checking website AltNews, the fountainhead of lies and a portal infamous for being an apologia for Islamist terrorism and the Left, recently took to Twitter to publish a tediously long thread to insist that his organisation is not partisan.
However, in doing so, he inadvertently revealed the innate favouritism his organisation has routinely extended to political figures, parties and communities such as Rahul Gandhi, TMC and Muslims, under the pretext of carrying out dispassionate “fact-checks.”
The explanation proffered by Sinha seemingly stemmed from the criticism directed toward his organisation by “sympathisers” of Congress who have accused AltNews of being “pro-AAP.”
“For months now, certain members and sympathisers of Congress have been running propaganda against @AltNews claiming that we’re pro-AAP. Till now, we have avoided responding to these allegations because they’re so utterly ridiculous,” Sinha posted in his first tweet.
THREAD: For months now, certain members and sympathisers of Congress have been running propaganda against @AltNews claiming that we’re pro-AAP. Till now, we have avoided responding to these allegations because they’re so utterly ridiculous. 1/
— Pratik Sinha (@free_thinker) May 5, 2022
In a bid to allay misgivings that his organisation has turned from being online guardians of the Congress party into cheerleaders of the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party, Sinha asserted that AltNews remained at the vanguard in fighting “misinformation” targeting senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
Curiously, Sinha did not elaborate on how his organisation has been averse to fact-checking misinformation peddled by Rahul Gandhi. For that would have proved it beyond a shred of doubt how loyal AltNews has been to the Congress party.
However, in his subsequent tweet, Sinha tried in vain to continue to put up with the sham of political neutrality. Despite any empirical data to substantiate his claims, Sinha declared that Gandhi had been the most targeted leader and ‘fact-checking’ news about him does not make his organisation pro-Rahul Gandhi or pro-Congress.
Sinha then proceeds to preen on how the maximum number of stories covered on his portal is from West Bengal, a state he claims was bitterly contested, notwithstanding the fact that TMC scored an emphatic victory in the assembly elections last year, triggering a horrifying spate of violence against BJP workers and Hindus in the state, a predicament that reports have pinned the blame on TMC affiliated goons and anti-social elements.
Furthermore, as has been common among the left organisations, where commitment to truth is subordinated to reverence to Gandhi and Nehru, Sinha claimed that his organisation has carried out most fact-check stories on Gandhi and Nehru, insinuating that unearthing truth that has been scrupulously hidden by vested interests is akin to de-legitimising the two individuals.
Moving ahead, Sinha pivoted to the Muslim community, a support bank that the Left has sedulously cultivated in their bid to malign the nationalist political parties, with a concerted attempt being made to perpetuate fear psychosis among the Muslims about the Modi government. Sinha alleged that his organisation, AltNews, has been at the forefront in “fact-checking” claims about the Muslim community, a section of the population that he describes as the target of the most hateful propaganda.
Regardless of the fact that Hindus across the country are targeted, persecuted and dehumanised almost nonchalantly and on a routine basis, Sinha’s assertion that Muslims are the most villanised community reveals the appalling indifference that the Left harbours for the Hindus.
In his subsequent tweets, Sinha continued to project AltNews as a neutral website, even going to the extent of insisting that his organisation has conducted many fact-checks about fake news on PM Modi, the most attacked leader after Rahul Gandhi, the AltNews co-founder claimed. However, that does not absolve the inherent bias of the organisation by using the cloak of fact-checks and blathering on about supposed impartiality.
While Sinha took strenuous efforts to paint AltNews as a bastion of truth and neutrality, in reality, Sinha’s tweets revealed that his organisation is anything but. Instead, his inordinately long Twitter thread only ended up reinforcing the prevailing belief around AltNews: that is a propaganda website with a strong predilection for Congress, Rahul Gandhi, TMC and Muslims, and a deep aversion to the BJP, Hindus and PM Modi.
