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Harsh Mander: The obsessive Ishrat apologist

Hariharan
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Harsh Mander: The obsessive Ishrat apologist

Blessed are the secular “intellectuals”. Ask Harsh Mander, he will tell you the virtues of fact-free-life (phrase borrowed from Kartikeya Tanna’s tweet), which as a secular he has been blessed with. If you think I am being sarcastic, read his recent piece in The Wire.

What you and I consider as overwhelming evidence against Ishrat, for him, is just ‘their’ version. The near 3,000-word piece is very high on emotions, higher on omissions and low on facts. Dissect his piece to understand what I am saying.

High on emotions

Mander explains in 1,524 words Ishrat’s history, how a handful of insensitive journalists broke the story of her death to her mother on the fateful Jun 15th evening, the harassment her mother suffered in the hands of police thereafter, that her relationship with Javed Sheik was just that of a subordinate with her boss and that those who doubted it were misogynists. A cohesive story which has the intended fictional impact. His editing skills are impressive as can be seen from the inconvenient facts that he has cut out from the narration to make it interesting. Says Mander:

In March 2004, some relatives introduced the family to a middle-aged man Javed, who was looking for help with marketing and accounts for his perfume business. He would pay 3,500 rupees a month. It would also involve some out-station visits, for which he would pay extra. With seven mouths to feed, her mother had little option but to allow Ishrat to accept the job, for the lean summer months. Ishrat made two short visits to Pune and Lucknow. On June 11, she left on her last out-station assignment. Her brother left her at the bus stand. Javed was to meet her at Nasik, from where they were to travel by car to other cities.

Let us ignore the ‘seven mouths to feed’ as it is intended at winning sympathy. Mander’s version is that Javed employed Ishrat for his perfume business, the employment involved travelling with him, Ishrat’s mother was aware of the whole thing, and that she assigned the job of leaving Ishrat at the bus stand to her son. Yet, she did not know about Ishrat’s whereabouts when media persons asked her initially. A couple of days later, she told them that Ishrat had left for Mumbai for an ‘interview’. If you wondered why an interview at Mumbai, which was just 50 kms away, should have kept Ishrat away for 4 days, you must be a bhakt. And if you felt that this was already a 2nd alibi and still different from the one Mander is proffering, don’t lose heart for she switched over to this version soon. But stop for a moment to appreciate Mander’s editing skills. If he had mentioned all these flip-flops, do you think the story would have had the emotional appeal that his clean version has?

After her brother left Ishrat at the bus stand, they—Ishrat and Javed—were to travel by car to other cities. On June 15, when the encounter took place, there were two others with the duo. Who were they? What did they have to do with the ‘perfume’ business of Javed? Ishrat’s diary showed that she had paid Rs 1.06 lacs to one of the two Pakistani nationals. What does Harsh Mander have to say about this? He must have ignored these facts, as it is ‘their’ version.

Let us move to the next emotional part in Mander’s piece:

They (Ishrat’s family) owned no television and were not allowed to watch films, even to visit friends. They were busy just in the business of everyday living: content in their routine of studying, working, dreaming; hardly aware of the world outside their home.

What do these two sentences convey? That they were poor, yet conservative? Being conservative is not a virtue in the lexicon of secular “intellectuals” , but if it helps to generate sympathy, why lose the opportunity? And that is what Harsh Mander also has done. But then if you ask, as Tavleen Singh does in this documentary, why did such a conservative mother not have any qualms allowing her daughter to travel with a stranger for days together, you risk being branded as a misogynist by Vrinda Grover, Ishrat’s mother’s lawyer.

Ishrat did not just travel with strangers. She pretended as Javed’s wife while staying in hotels under a false name. Records of a hotel in Lucknow and the evidence of its manger bear testimony to this. Harsh Mander’s defence? The hotel records ‘could have been manipulated by the investigators’. How convenient!

Higher on omissions

Harsh Mander’s secular clock stops at September 2009 when S P Tamang, a metropolitan magistrate submitted an inquiry report u/s 176 of CRPC. Not just Mander, almost all secular “intellectuals” consider this report as the high point in the judicial review of Ishrat case. Prior to that, all superior courts ‘prevaricated.’ Post this report, Mander is yet to make up his mind on the court’s conduct.

Mander describes Tamang’s report as a ‘lucid and tightly argued’ one, which was prepared after careful analysis of ‘post-mortem and forensic evidence.’ And what were Tamang’s findings? Ishrat and Javed were peace-loving citizens of the country and the encounter was a fake and was stage-managed by police officers to get ‘promotions’ in their jobs and to please the Chief Minister. That 21 police officers would collude to kill 4 innocent persons just to get promotions beats me, but then people like me must part of ‘they’ in Mander’s world-view whose apprehension deserves to be ignored. Fair enough. But what did the High Court say about this ‘lucid and tightly argued report’?

It is a fact that the initial order of the Gujarat High Court staying Tamang’s inquiry report was criticised by the Supreme Court and set aside. But then a year later, a division bench of the Gujarat High Court refused to accept the Tamang’s conclusion about the motive on the ground that the magistrate had no material evidence or information to reach to this conclusion. It also raised doubts on the magistrate’s conclusion about the time of death of four people on basis of post-mortem report, FSL reports and statements. So much for the lucid and tightly argued report.

The Gujarat High Court then formed an SIT to go into the case. Mander declares that the SIT found the ‘purported encounter’ to be ‘not genuine.’ He asks further: Even if Ishrat Jahan and her alleged fellow-travellers in the car were terrorists, it still does not justify their killing in cold blood.

Fair question, is it not? But what Mander does not tell you is the following: The SIT constituted a 16-member forensic team to reconstruct the encounter and give its findings on whether the encounter was genuine. The forensic team after multiple visits to the encounter spot concluded that the encounter could have been genuine. The SIT headed by Satish Verma inexplicably trashed the report. Does Mander consider the experts from AIIMS and CFSL to be part of ‘them’?

Low on Facts

Mander says that Javed was introduced to Ishrat’s family in March 2014. But Ishrat’s mother had told the police that Javed lived in Mumbra for 3 years in the late 1990s during which time they had family relations. How does Mander explain this apparent contradiction?

Mander finds merit in the following findings of SIT:

It is undisputed that she met Javed Sheikh for the first time on May 1, 2004. She was killed 45 days later. Of these days, college attendance registers prove that she was attending college in Mumbra for 35 days. She travelled with Javed for ten days. How could she in this time have become a terrorist, a suicide bomber?

Now the question is when Ishrat met Javed: In the 1990s as her mother told police or in March 2014 Mander says in the earlier part of his piece or on May 1, 2014 as SIT asserts? This is significant because SIT uses this short period of acquaintance for rejecting the accusation that Ishrat was an LeT terrorist.

The Facts

Am I being uncharitable to Harsh Mander? Does his piece not contain any facts? To be fair to Mander, the first 3 sentences of his piece are in fact statements of fact:

In the early hours of a midsummer morning, at the outskirts of Ahmedabad near the city’s waterworks, on June 15, 2004, the Gujarat police shot dead four occupants of a car. One of those killed was a young 19-year-old woman. Her name was Ishrat Jahan.

Bogey against Social Media “trolling”, a conspiracy against Free Speech in virtual world?

Shwetank Bhushan
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Bogey against Social Media “trolling”, a conspiracy against Free Speech in virtual world?

On the 19th of May, flipping channels watching reactions on assembly results, I saw a short conversation on NDTV, and it was shocking. For the last one week, I was somehow trying to live with it, ignore it, digest it or perhaps decide a strategy on how to ‘un-see’ this four-minute clip.

Co-Founder and Executive Co-Chairperson of the tainted NDTV, Prannoy Roy asked a question to Arun Jaitley, asking whether ‘disgusting toxic trolls’ who ‘claim to have support of BJP’ could be controlled. Further, he also passed a judgement that “people in Kerala and Tamil Nadu do not like these trolls because the south is a much more peaceful part of India”. Countless wrongs in just two sentences.

A day before, I came across an opinion piece titled “I Was Threatened On Twitter With Rape Like Nirbhaya” by none other than Congress spokesperson Priyanka Chaturvedi. She plugged it on Twitter with a tweet “My opinion piece: facing threats on social media from the RW trolls and Mr. Jaitley you can’t pass the buck on this”. Reading this tweet, the alarm bell rang about a possible concerted effort of the Congress ecosystem to insinuate a fake bubble.

First the Co-Founder and Executive Co-Chairperson, NDTV, Prannoy Roy’s bizarre insinuation on NDTV, followed by Congress person’s blog claiming ‘violence against women’ on social media had all the ingredients to look into this narrative with a suspicion.

Mr. Roy hardly has any opinion to share on Twitter, which to his discomfort is a two-way communication medium. He started using Twitter in 2009, and was active in 2010, but never replied to anyone except a few times to Anand Mahindra, Shahrukh Khan and Karan Johar with 331 tweets in total so far. I am unaware of his mentions on twitter at that time and do not know how toxic his respondents have been. But Mr. Roy was silent on Twitter and only started using it again in late 2014 and 2015. Does that suggest he is more comfortable tweeting since the new Government took charge?

Most of the controversy surrounding censorship of trolls arises from the fact that what we see as “trolls” may not be what people like Prannoy Roy classify as trolls.

Let me here try to define a ‘troll’: There are broadly two types of trolls. One, a Twitter handle which persists on giving unsolicited opinions to get noticed, gets into abusive behaviour, threats, obscene language, harassment and targeted personal attacks.

The other type is the knowledgeable lot, who put hard facts to counter innuendos, some are focused on their subject of interest, some are very sharp and logical, some hilarious and highly sarcastic. In fact according to Prannoy Roy, some media watchdogs who keep a check on mainstream media spins and lies may also be called “trolls”. This lot scares the condescending handles with an established name in the society. We have come to know of them as “Smart Trolls”.

Example:

Trolls

If Prannoy Roy and Arun Jaitley were talking about the ‘abusers’ on the SM, I agree with them. But it is highly unfortunate that it is almost impossible to have a check on such handles. Some of these abusive trolls are launching vicious attacks on women, which many users might not be aware of. Such anti-social abusers, supporting the Right Wing or Left Wing, must not find any space on the social media. They must be mass-blocked at the very first instance.

But were Prannoy Roy and gang talking about abusers? It certainly doesn’t seem so because Prannoy Roy’s follow up reveals a lot:

Prannoy Roy: “And the worry is, to add to Shekhar, what happens when these trolls start influencing Govt. policy and behavior. That’s when it becomes a bit worrying. That’s going over the…crossing the line. And I hope, none of your ministers get intimidated or have a fear factor for being trolled. We are all trolled and nobody should have any fear of people who hide behind anonymity to make disgusting statements. But thank you very much for joining us.”

You see, the duo was certainly not talking about the abusers, but those influencers, who are impacting Government decisions. How does Prannoy Roy know that it is the abusive handles alone who influence Government policies? How can an editor label millions of average Indians on social media, who call out the Government for specific changes in polices, as “trolls”? Isn’t a Government supposed to listen to the voice of its country-men? Is this an informed comment by Prannoy Roy or is this a fall-out of reports that the Government had cancelled a deal with NDTV recently?

Social media has provided a voice to the average Indian. Yes there are those who misuse it, and action should be taken against them, but is “influencing Government policies” a form of misuse? Is calling out the blatant lies and inaccuracies of media misuse?

More than any debate on the prime time, people prefer to read specific threads on Facebook and Twitter to enlighten themselves on certain topic. People enjoy these social media tools because the ‘disinformation’ is rebutted in no time. Is using social media as a tool for laughter, (like in this case) misuse? According to Dr Roy are all the above cases examples of “trolling” which must be “controlled”?

And is this a new phenomenon? Satirists like Rahul Roushan have written about how their families had been attacked on social media. Shefali Vaidya has talked about how her daughter was threatened with murder, only because she happened to be a pro-BJP social media user. And can we forget Congress office bearer Amaresh Mishra, openly abusing and threatening all and sundry?

The irony is that the old media including the liberal opinion traders are so conservative that they do not realize that the technology has closed one-way traffic, and they are unable to reconcile and adjust to reality.

What the Congress ecosystem really wants is to create another fake narrative similar to ‘rising intolerance’ in a way to threaten people to curb dissent and scrutiny, to maintain control and get back to power. If not, then the focus would not have been only on “trolls”of a particular political leaning.

We must all unite against abusive/threatening accounts on social media belonging to all political hues, but partisan concerns and ulterior motives must be kept away from. And we all also must unite against this attempt to bring back censorship (remember section 66A of the IT act?) online.

Also read: The-Lying-Lama on Twitter: The guy who’s gets Rajdeep Sardesai’s goat, everytime

Slander and abuse that right-wing women face on social media, which MSM ignores

OpIndia Staff
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Slander and abuse that right-wing women face on social media, which MSM ignores

Recently a new narrative is shaping up: A section of the left-liberals are highlighting abuse/threats received by them from alleged right-wing social media users and are attempting to paint all online abuse as stemming from the right-wing.

The end-game of this narrative seems to be an attempt to throttle freedom of expression on social media, with senior editors even asking senior ministers to consider “censorship” of mediums such as Twitter. The fear is that this smokescreen of “abuse” could be misused to censor any opposing view.

There is no denying that there are individuals using social media who use abusive language. We had written over a year ago on this same issue, that although abusive attacks and threats are present online, it is incorrect to label all abuse as “right wing” when even prominent handles from the leftist sphere of influence are very abusive by nature.

Last week we kicked off a series where we asked prominent faces about their experiences facing abusive threats and attacks from left-liberal social media trolls. Founder and Editor of Faking News, a popular satire site, wrote last week how his family was targeted by the so-called “liberals”.

Today, writer and newspaper columnist Shefali Vaidya has hit out at this propaganda by revealing how she has been the victim of misogynistic attacks online. In a Facebook post, she has detailed how she and her family have been regularly attacked online. It was in response to the specific incident of Congress spokesperson Priyanka Chaturvedi trying to brand all abuse as “right wing”.

At the outset, she makes it clear that no woman should be subjected to such abuse and attacks online, irrespective of political leaning and that those guilty must be booked:

A threat of rape and murder is repugnant and NO woman, I repeat, NO woman regardless of her political inclination should be subjected to it. I am sure there are abusive and sick trolls who claim to support the BJP, and they need to be exposed and punished.

But her angst lies in the fact that slowly a narrative is being created that only “right wing” trolls are the ones at fault:

But sexual abuse, threats and slander is NOT an exclusive domain of the ‘right wing’ as our media would like you to believe. I have been subjected to threats, sexual abuses, assaults on my family and slander by frustrated Congress supporters for months now, just because I am a vocal supporter of the BJP

With screenshots of past abusive threats, she makes her point how she was attacked for being a vocal supporter of BJP:

Misogynistic personal attacks
Misogynistic personal attacks

Even an innocuous picture of shaking hands with the Prime Minister Narendra Modi was given a sexual twist and circulated with slanderous insinuations:

Abuse on facebook
Slander and personal attacks
abuse that right wing women face
Abusive messages galore

Shefali Vaidya told us that she had even received messages threatening that her daughter would be murdered and mutilated:

Daughter's name has been blanked out
Daughter’s name has been blanked out

This is the unfortunate reality. Social media is used by some to abuse, threaten and intimidate voices which belong to the other political spectrum. Censoring any medium may not be a solution but certainly legal action and support must be ensured to stop such attacks.

However, any motivated, agenda-driven attempts to classify such attacks as the prerogative of only section must be called out since it will only weaken the cause.

Paranoia or Propaganda? Analyzing the latest outbursts of Julio Ribeiro

Hariharan
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Paranoia or Propaganda? Analyzing the latest outbursts of Julio Ribeiro

A police officer is a police officer—more so, a distinguished retired cop who lives on past laurels—however impeccable his achievements were during service. Respect him. Expect him to protect you. But to allow him to assume the role of judge would be inappropriate.

And that is what has happened early this week when Julio Ribeiro donned the role of a judge for the 2nd time in the last one year and pontificated through his column in The Indian Express on what he considers the Hindutva agenda.

What are his grouse? Hemant Karkare is an honest officer and NIA’s insinuations are an insult to his memory. No one has a problem till this. After all, Ribeiro seems to know Karkare very well and is entitled to be angry over NIA’s charge sheet. But even here, we must remember that he is giving just emotional and moral support to his erstwhile friend. For, his column in The Indian Express does not point to any loopholes in NIA’s findings to support his outrage. Look at his admission (comments – in brackets – in the followign and subsequent quoted paragraphs from the Riberio’s article are of this author):

I did not look into those files (the Malegaon 2008 investigation files that Karkare brought to his residence) for lack of patience. I am sorry today that I did not take more interest in his findings. If I had done so I could have attempted to defend that good and honest man with concrete facts.

He does not have ‘concrete facts’ to punch holes in NIA’s charge sheet, but that does not stop him from casting aspersions on the teams that investigated Malegaon 2008 blast. Consider what he has to say:

The investigators seem to be hopelessly at odds with each other: The first set actually arresting the usual suspects (refers to the Muslim extremists. Notice Ribeiro’s dismissive language), the second collaring a more plausible group with concrete proof in the shape of telephone intercepts and recorded conversations (how does he know when he has not read the file? Not having gone through the case file, all he has to form an opinion are media reports), and then the third watering down the evidence and charges against the alleged culprits named by the Karkare team.

Agreed, Ribeiro did not read the case files. But, he could have read reports in the net which is flooded with data on the case. Sandhya Jain for one has been writing relentlessly since 2008 on the case. Her columns on how the case against Sadhvi Pragya rested on flimsy evidence  and how she was tortured by ATS have not been contested effectively till date by anyone.

That Karkare is a martyr (his sacrifice is extraordinary and it is not my idea to belittle the same) is no reason why the investigation methods adopted by the ATS under his leadership should not be questioned. If this logic is acceptable, even Col Purohit did not have a blemish in his service till the Malegaon-Samjhauta blasts, which are under scanner now. Read Dr Aparna Purohit’s story here. And absolute tearjerker. Why does Ribeiro want us to dismiss the fact that Col Purohit could have been framed?

Halfway through his column, Ribeiro must have felt that he would be perceived as being overly supportive of Karkare. He wants to show that he represents the ‘disenchanted force.’ And the force, obviously, cannot be selectively disenchanted with Malegaon investigation. He has to cite a case from the opposite end of the spectrum. He picks up the Ishrat Jahan case. Read what he says:

I had sensed a similar disenchantment in the force when the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), in the Ishrat Jahan case, named some Intelligence Bureau (IB) officers in the conspiracy to eliminate Ishrat.

Notice that Ribeiro does not even mention Rajinder Kumar by name. Though he had sensed ‘similar disenchantment’, why did he not stand up for the IB officer at that time? Why did he not choose to represent the force at that time?

Even if we decide to be very charitable to Ribeiro and treat all the above as ‘emotional excesses’, how does one justify his illogical extrapolation that ‘Malegaon blasts case shows that Hindutva forces are succeeding in widening Hindu-Muslim divide’? Apart from Rohini Salian’s allegation that an SP from NIA had asked her to go soft on Hindutva ultras (the allegation was promptly refuted by NIA), Ribeiro does not offer any explanation as to how this can be linked to the designs of Hindutva forces.

This is not the first time the ace cop is attempting illogical, bereft-of-evidence pontification. In March 2015, he declared that as a Christian, he felt he was a stranger in his own country. What was basis for this apprehension? One, the alleged attacks on churches. Though Rupa Subramanya had meticulously gone through the facts of each incident and proved that there was no design and all of there were mere accidents a month earlier in February 2015, it did very little to stop the cop from ventilating his ill-founded fear. Two, Mohan Bhagwat said that Mother Teresa proselytized Hindus to Christianity. This is an accusation against an individual and there seems to be prima facie evidence to support Bhagwat’s claim. Why should Ribeiro perceive this as an attack on Christianity as a whole?

There is, however, a common thread between his outbursts of last year and today—the people he hold in esteem should not be subjected to any scrutiny; he cannot stand that. If it was Mother Teresa in the first instance, it is his good friend Hemant Karkare now.

Ribeiro is a trained cop and one expects a trained cop to build his case on facts so that it stands the scrutiny of the courts. Why then is he failing in this expectation? One of the concluding paragraphs of his Mar 2015 column offers some insight into what, perhaps, bothers Ribeiro. Read this:

What does reassure me in these twilight years, though, is that there are those of the predominant Hindu faith who still remember my small contribution to the welfare of the country of our birth.

Why does he need this reassurance? Is there a doubt in his mind that people might have forgotten his contribution? his icons are questioned, does this doubt erupt in him? His childish excitement at being photographed by his fans seems to confirm this. If so, let us give him the reassurance:

“Ribeiro saab, we value your contribution and will continue to do so. But please remember, building reputation is difficult and you did it successfully. Retaining it is very difficult. Squandering it is easy. Please do not choose the 3rd option.”

Ignore the media, Congress and Rahul Gandhi have nothing to worry post Verdict 2016

OpIndia Staff
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Ignore the media, Congress and Rahul Gandhi have nothing to worry post Verdict 2016

It is a known fact that Indian media outlets are largely compromised. So should we believe them? Many anchors are screaming hoarse that the big winners of the elections held in 5 states recently are BJP, Amma, Didi and Left in Kerala. In the same breath they trash Congress claiming it has been a big blow to Congress and that it is losing steam and that we are soon seeing a Congress Mukt Bharat.

Instead of going for Mahaul, one must stick to data. Data which is manipulated to show the version of the truth which we want to believe is true. Take a look at the irrefutable data presented by this Congress IT Cell member:


Ignore minor inaccuracies in the data such as Congress alone only won 20 odd seats in Kerala and Pandhi is showing the seats of entire Congress coalition UDF which got 51. Such minor aberrations should be overlooked and the larger picture must be seen: If all these states were one state, Congress would have been declared the winner. Don’t you see how media is manipulating you? Instead of showing you the national picture, they are breaking up India into arbitrary chunks called “states” and then declaring winners in each state!

“Independent” senior advocate Sanjay Hegde has also vetted this: Congress may have lost some points but it has won the set!


It is exactly this sort of rosy bigger picture which Congress must see. There is no apocalypse there is no need for Rahul Gandhi to take any responsibility for any defeat because this in indeed a victory!

Some dooms-day patrakaars have even declared Congress to be a regional outfit. A map of India and the states ruled by Congress is also being shared:

Congress Mukt Bharat
Congress Mukt Bharat

Is this really true? Nope. If you use an extremely convoluted weighted average system giving arbitrary weights to parties based on some notion you have just invented out of thin air, then the data, after a bit of tinkering will prove that Congress is still the best in the world. That should soothe your nerves if you are a nervous Congress supporter or a close family friend of the Gandhis:


And if all fails, you can cook up well in advance, stories that the trends in BJP’s favour are fake. Learn from this intrepid Congress IT cell worker:

Fake trends?

So Rahul Gandhi, ignore all the shouting Arnabs and anxious Barkhas, the true intellectuals and analysts are on Twitter. And their verdict is out – Congress has nothing to worry. It’s BJP that is going down. A trip to Europe in June to celebrate?

(This is a satirical take)

NDTV journalist exposed on social media for gross lies and misreporting

OpIndia Staff
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NDTV journalist exposed on social media for gross lies and misreporting

Yesterday we had written a report  on how NDTV spun an interview with Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi. She gave an interview to NDTV’s Sunetra Choudhury on various issues such as the new draft policy for women, marital rape, better facilities and help for abused women etc. But NDTV’s report chose to focus only on one issue, and the headline used was this:

The original headline

The video of the interview with the Minister though, showed that she had said something different. In fact there was no mention of the word “trolling” and neither had she said anything would be equated to violence. Maneka Gandhi had only said that they have asked MHA to state a separate division to deal with “viciousness against women on the net”, and also explained how her Ministry has take steps to stop this from happening on Matrimonial sites. There was no mention of “trolling” or about “considering anything as violence”.

When Sunetra Choudhury was questioned on this, she gave replies such as “here is the video, it is very clear” and later claimed she “had to leave out bits to fit into 19 mins slot”. As the day passed, NDTV kept changing the headline of the report:

Multiple headlines, same report

The word “trolling” had been dropped in the final headline, which was still misleading since it claimed that Maneka Gandhi had said it “would be considered as violence”. When asked why the word “trolling” was dropped, the anchor replied that it was to make sure that “discerning viewers don’t get put off”. Later when she was asked again for the video showing the Minister say what she claimed she had said, Sunetra’s reply was that since there was no clarification, her story stood correct!


So according to Sunetra Choudhury, until someone steps in and says they have been misquoted, the misleading news is correct? And there is no burden of proof on the journalist to back up what they claim?

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Another social media user, Anand Ranganathan, himself a columnist, also found the changing of headlines odd, to which she replied that only the headlines were changed and the content was the same:

But these were blatant lies, and she was caught. Anand Ranganathan went on to put out screenshots of the article, and the 2 versions show that there was a complete rewrite of the piece, and Sunetra had lied through her teeth:

The cached copies of the 2 versions are here and here. Even at this point Sunetra was unwilling to admit her guilt and chose to brazen it out. Now her argument was that headline was “still there” and the TV interview was “still same”. Did an NDTV journalist just imply that we must be grateful that NDTV did not edit and change a recorded video interview?

Perhaps the most telling comment, which may reflect the ethos of NDTV as a whole, came from Sunetra Choudhury in her conversation with senior journalist Minhaz Merchant. He too asked similar questions of her, as to why she had chosen to mislead. To this, the response of the NDTV journalist was shocking:

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsTill now, we always believed, “news” has to be based on hard cold facts, and facts are objective. But NDTV’s journalists seem to have a different understanding of news. This is the first time possibly a journalist has accepted that “news is subjective” for them.

To start, NDTV chose a false headline, used a statement which the Minister never made, and attributed it to her. Secondly, when asked for video proofs, NDTV chose to chop and change headlines to avoid scrutiny. Thirdly, the concerned reporter lied that the “content was same” even when the content was in fact heavily changed. And finally, in a Freudian slip, the reporter admitted that to her “news is always subjective”! It is indeed a shame that NDTV has such low standards of journalism.
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3 headlines in 3 hours: NDTV’s report on Maneka Gandhi’s interview regarding “trolling”

OpIndia Staff
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3 headlines in 3 hours: NDTV’s report on Maneka Gandhi’s interview regarding “trolling”

The Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi, recently gave an interview to NDTV’s Sunetra Chaudhary on various issues such as the new draft policy for women, marital rape, better facilities and help for abused women etc. One of the questions in the interview was also pertaining to online “violence”, and somehow, instead of the other vital parts, this question became the talking point.

NDTV first reported that Maneka Gandhi had said the following:

The original headline

This was met with widespread outrage on social media. Online trolling can range from being funny while showing up the other person, to provocation to make someone upset. Nowadays, it has also become a practice to call abusive language and threats as trolling, instead of calling them for what they are: attacks. Hence when NDTV reported that the Minister had said online “trolling”, which covers a large number of activities, even something as harmless as this, would be considered as “violence”, it angered many.

But, the video of the interview with the Minister showed that she had said something different. In fact there was no mention of the word “trolling” and neither had she said anything would be equated to violence. Here is a transcript of the relevant portion:

Sunetra: We are all talking about physical violence, but a lot of the girls here are talking of online kind of…, is that something that the new policy and you recommend?

Maneka: Very strongly. And we have recommended the home ministry that they have to start a division which deals just with viciousness against women on the net. On our side we have redone the matrimonial columns. 1 crore women are on matrimonial columns and instead of getting a mate, they will get sexually accused, ditty innuendos they will get phoned in the middle of the night. If they are divorced they will be asked to prove that they are sexually fine. All sort of dirty things. We tried for 2 years with all these companies and they wouldn’t come to the table. Then we got hold of NASSCOM and the minister for telecom and finally they changed their policy and we gave them a written policy

Maneka Gandhi only says that they have asked MHA to state a separate division to deal with “viciousness against women on the net”, and also explains how her Ministry has take steps to stop this from happening on Matrimonial sites. There is no mention of “trolling” or about “considering anything as violence”.

After repeatedly asking the host of the interview the reason for the discrepancy, the answers given were ranging from: “She did say it, it is in the video” to “had to leave out bits to fit into 19 mins slot”:


At one point, the journalist even admitted that “viciousness” isn’t the same as “trolling” and that she was rather talking about “attacks, abuse, misogyny, harassment”. This was the closest she could get to admitting that maybe her headline, which contained “trolling” wasn’t quite right. 

And as the day passed, the headline kept changing. What was “Online trolling against women will be considered as violence” became “Women in matrimonial ads being stalked, we stopped that” to “Online attacks on women to be treated as violence”. The URL though still contained the original title: “online trolling against women will be considered violence – maneka gandhi” :

Changing headlines

While the first one was clearly wrong since nowhere did the Minister say “trolling” or that any action “would be considered as violence”, the second headline was more accurate as the Minister did in fact speak at length on this issues and the steps taken. The third headline deleted the reference to “trolling” and replaced it with “attacks”, which could be considered to be a fair representation of the Minister’s views, but it still continued to keep the part claiming that Maneka Gandhi had said it “would be considered as violence”.

When asked why the word “trolling” was dropped, the anchor replied that it was to make sure that “discerning viewers don’t get put off”. No admission of mistake, but at least a part of it has been rectified to suit “discerning viewers”. Although the article headline was changed, the video still contained the erroneous headline though:

Video Headlines
Video Headlines

It would be ideal if NDTV waited a bit and took a deep breath, before jumping the gun on framing its headlines. 

Chanting Om on Yoga Day not compulsory, but NDTV suggests the opposite

OpIndia Staff
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Chanting Om on Yoga Day not compulsory, but NDTV suggests the opposite

International Yoga Day is celebrated annually on June 21 and was declared to be internationally recognized by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on December 11, 2014. The Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had in his UN Address suggested the date of June 21. A total of 175 nations co-sponsored the resolution and had the highest number of co-sponsors ever for any UNGA Resolution of such nature.

Once again this year, the Government got into action to celebrate World Yoga Day, but another controversy erupted. There were some reports in the media that the Government had made chanting of the words “Om” and some mantras from the Rigveda “compulsory”. The reports claimed that a similar proposal last year created an uproar, requiring a clarification from the Centre that chanting ‘Om’ is not compulsory.

Yesterday too, by 5 pm in the evening, media carried reports that the Government had clarified that no such chanting was compulsory. AYUSH Ministry Joint Secretary Anil Kumar Ganeriwala said:

“There is no compulsion to chant ‘Om’ before the yoga session. It is completely voluntary and one can remain silent. No one will object,”

In spite of this clarification, NDTV scheduled a prime-time debate: ‘Om’ Chants In Yoga Day Protocol: BJP’s Mantra Of Controversy? at 8.30 pm, hosted by Vishnu Som. A few minutes into the debate, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra interjected out of turn, trying to put the facts on record and asked Vishnu Som to read the circular. Som then said: “I am looking at the circular, it doesn’t make anything compulsory, but it suggests…” Patra asked him to show him the place where it is said “Om” is made compulsory. Vishnu Som repeatedly pleaded saying “I have not said that, I have not said that, I have not said that at all”.

At this stage, Patra showed him the common yoga protocol circular for both 2015 and 2016. We present a screenshot of the same here:

Yoga day document
The government circular

Patra read out the first line which made it clear that the words used are prayer “or” a prayerful mood, and claimed that these are the exact same words from last year. Vishnu Som now re-confirmed that “its not compulsory but its a recommendation”.

Patra also explained that the guidelines were asked to be framed by Yoga experts and they said that words like Om should not be dropped, but since India is a secular country, the Government decided to make such words voluntary and not compulsory.

So within the first 5 minutes of the debate, the entire issue had been sorted out. The anchor had also agreed to the facts pointed out. But it seems someone in NDTV had not quite agreed as yet, because the ticker which kept flashing had these messages:

NDTV's misleading tickers
NDTV’s misleading messages on the ticker

So why was NDTV indulging in double speak? The anchor specifically agreed multiple times that no mantras were mandatory, yet the program he hosted said something else!

As if this wasn’t enough, the same topic was again put up for debate in the show ‘Left Right and Centre’ at 9.30pm with Nidhi Razdan:

Left Right and Centre
Left Right and Centre

The show again perpetuated the same point which was already settled in the earlier debate. In this debate, no one even touched on the point that the chants were voluntary. And again the tickers were misleading:

Misleading tickers
Misleading tickers again

One wonders from where this misinterpretation of English words starts and why it is allowed to perpetuate without basic fact check and even after clarifications are made by the Government.

Why they don’t want you to see Buddha in a Traffic Jam

Gaurav
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Why they don’t want you to see Buddha in a Traffic Jam

Picture this: An indie movie, on an off-beat topic. There is no typical Bollywood masala kitschy running around trees by over-aged botoxed heroes. Instead there are poems by the legendary poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz. The story is not the banal rich guy meets poor girl, or how one man does insanely ridiculous stuff to change the system. The story is about real world problems, and how lives revolve around it. It’s not a 4.5 star rated movie which involves an ageing star, playing out some hyper-realistic sequences, with patchy “special” effects, an unconvincing plot, all wrapped up in a self-idolising movie. It’s instead the story about ordinary students, who uncover something extra-ordinary. The climax is not a clash of brawn and might, it is a clash of ideas and ideologies.

On the face of it, such a movie would be the darling of our “enlightened”, “intellectual” movie critics. So many times have we heard them cry for out something more from Bollywood or the Indian film industry at large.

Buddha in a Traffic Jam, is one such movie, which, if not delivers completely on the promise, at least dares to trod the path less ventured on, and succeeds to a large extent.

The movie’s first sequence shows us how poor and down-trodden India’s tribals in the Naxal infested areas are. Not only is their financial situation pitiable, they are forever caught up in a situation of being caught between proving and choosing loyalties, to the local Naxal overlord, who terrorizes them, and the Government, whom they cannot entirely trust. The Government and its representatives here are no heroes, making the predicament of the villagers even more complex.

The next sequence shows a bunch of free-thinking, party-going students, taking on the self-appointed moral police chieftains of our society. The movie makes no bones about making it clear that these goons in fact belong to the Hindu far-right, heck even the picture of a real-life goon from such fringes is shown. And these students stick it to these guys. This along with the theme of sympathy for the downtrodden and angst against extremist forces are what constitute wet-dreams of Indian leftists. But that’s just the sucker punch, the fattening of the proverbial lamb.

As the movie progresses, we see what no leftist would ever want us to see. How socialist ideas are irrelevant and failing. How some ideologies can be misused for exploitation of the poor. How leftists have penetrated institutions across the board. How capitalism is running the world around us, and how it can solve many core issues. Without revealing much, one can say it does ask a lot of questions.

Even thought I am not qualified to comment on this aspect, from a pure movie-making angle, the film is not perfect. Some of the acting could have been better. Certain portions seem unwarranted, and a tighter edit could have made proceedings more riveting. Some crucial plot points seem to be under-developed, leaving the viewer to figure out a bit on his own. But this is not what the movie reviewers talk about. They focus, on entirely other things, to make sure the viewer doesn’t go to see it. Most negative reviews of the movie follow a template, which can be explained thus:

1. Before the review of the movie, comes the review of the director and his fans. “Oh Right-wingers”, “Oh he directed these movies before this one” are desperate attempts to downplay the credentials of the director. A classic tactic of ad-hominem attacks being used here, and of course no one will tell you that the movie has been screened in multiple film festivals, even bagging a few awards. Yes, we are to believe these are independent unbiased reviewers.

2. There is a reference to the 2 or 3 sequences, which otherwise do not aid the story per se, which are tributes to path-breaking movies from Hollywood. While fair, unbiased reviews have indeed called them “tributes”, the leftist critics have been unanimous in calling them “rip-offs”, almost as if all of them were given the instruction to say this.

3. There is a reference to a few small scenes which according to the reviewers make no sense. One reviewer even said this:

Bizarrely, he seems to be rather aroused by information, at one point inexplicably shown to be touching himself, one hand down the front of his boxers, while reading left-wing material written by his professor. Seriously, I can’t make this stuff up.

Sorry sir, you did make it up. The character was in fact not looking at left-wing material and as confirmed by the director himself, was not even touching himself. Quite a flight of imagination by the reviewer. So apart from focussing on trivialities, reviewers are even “making stuff up”.

4. Most importantly, everyone makes sure to point out that the story is ridiculously unbelievable. Yes, in this cuckoo world, a reviewer gives 4.5 stars to a movie which shows a character who is a top-billed Bollywood actor, running at night on the streets and on rooftops, to catch a nemesis who looks exactly like him. But, the same reviewer calls Buddha in a Traffic Jam’s plot: “preposterous”. Other adjectives used by some other reviewers include: “propaganda”, “unconvincing”, “ridiculous plot”, “laughable”. Sure, it is a simplistic approach to a very complex issue. After all, it is a movie and not a documentary. But is it really “preposterous” when there have been numerous cases of the exact crucial plot point unfolding in real life? (Spoiler alert:1, 2, 3, 4)

5. And most reviews are peppered with inaccurate observations. Examples:

a. Some reviewers question the accent of Arunoday Singh. Maybe they  did not hear Arunoday’s character himself saying that he had spent 4 years in USA. What could have been a cinematic accuracy is being questioned by so-called critics now! (and of course another banal point)

b. One review claims that a character pictures his professor while making love to some girl, “orgasming to his master’s voice”, when truly, the movie shows all the different events, which continue to haunt the character even when he should be mentally involved in something else. And for the record, his mind is shown picturing numerous sequences besides his professor too.

c. Another review claims that the Indian School of Business was interchangeably called the Indian Institute of Business at certain points. Hello Mr Reviewer, the movie clearly calls the college the “Indian Institute of Business”, even though it is shot at the real-life ISB. In fact, there is even a statement at the start which says that one shouldn’t conflate the fictional IIB with the real ISB, since the ISB holds different values and beliefs.

They list the above problems, but very clearly the elephant in the room which no “critic” will speak about is this: The movie cuts a bit too close to the bone on occasions. Further, it has the potential to be used as a tool, and in the exact manner as they use their tools. Remember how some “trolls” are branded Sanghi RSS-supporting Hindutva Bigots as soon as one speaks anything pro-Modi or pro-BJP or pro-Hindus or pro-Government and even just anti-Left? This movie shows how some on the Left might be aiding Naxals, and there in lies the fear in the minds of the “critics”: What if we all are labelled Naxalists by the people who watch this movie?

In the end, Buddha in a Traffic Jam doesn’t pretend to offer any solutions to a very complex issue. It simply poses certain questions, which have clearly become uncomfortable to a few: How do we address the very real issue of tribal upliftment? How do we tackle the serious threat of violent Naxalism in parts of India? How do we take care of a small section of the bleeding heart leftist “intellectuals”, who either knowingly or unknowingly are helping Naxalism? Can plain and simple capitalism be a panacea for many ills? How do we get out of this traffic jam?

Watch the movie for its attempt at touching on a topic no-one has dared to talk about. Watch it for some eye-opening possibilities it presents, which have been mirrored in real life. And watch it for being amazingly prophetic, by filming in 2012 (when the movie was actually made), a scene which has played out in real life in 2016, and which has been a focal point of debates for some time. Not really “preposterous” now is it dear reviewers? It is no masterpiece, but it isn’t one to swept under the rug either.

Editor’s note: The director of Buddha in a Traffic Jam has previously written columns on OpIndia.com

Top Lies spread by Indian Media in April 2016

Gaurav
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Top Lies spread by Indian Media in April 2016

Big Lies:

1. Janta ka Reporter: Aamir Khan adopts 2 drought hit villages

We had reported on this in detail here. Janta Ka Reporter, took a completely unverified bit of information that Aamir Khan had adopted 2 villages in Maharashtra and published it as gospel truth. This was picked by almost entire media blindly without checking for the authenticity. Eventually it was found out that the news was untrue. Read our detailed report which shows how low the standards of reporting are at Janta ka Reporter. The source of the information will shock you.

2. All media: Chandigarh all set to ban women wearing miniskirts from discotheque

We had a separate report on this. Almost the entire media reported the above when the truth was completely different. The order of the administration only banned “exhibition or advertisement whether by way of posters or in the newspapers“ and not scantily dressed women themselves. The order itself had no mention of miniskirts but for some reason the Indian media made this into a banning miniskirts issue.

3. Multiple media houses: Dalit boys stripped, thrashed by Upper caste men in Rajasthan

Here, media chose to spin the incident where 3 dalit boys who were accused of robbery were stripped and beaten by a mob. Somehow our media sleuths determined the castes of the people in the angry mob and labelled them as “upper castes”. Soon news was spread that upper castes beat dalits and this became the main focal point. Police, on their investigation confirmed that some of the people who beat the boys were also from lower castes. The police report said, the arrested suspects belonged to Meena (ST) and Dhakad (OBC) communities and the crime was not at all caste related.

4. Multiple media outlets: Rafale deal done: India To Buy 36 Rafale Jets

This news was reported in mid-April with great fervour by many media houses. It was a source based piece which claimed that the long in the works deal for Rafale Jet with France had finally been sealed. Media even reported the figure for which the planes were being bought, with NDTV quoting $8.8 Billion. It was only recently, in Rajya Sabha that the defence minister clarified that no deal had been finalised yet and they were still working on it. He also accepted that looking at the detailed media reports, even BJP’s IT cell got fooled with this news.

5. The Independent: Prime Minister Modi calls the Kolkata flyover collapse an “Act of God”

In the above piece, the following paragraph was mentioned, which was factually incorrect:

Eventually, after it was pointed out on Twitter, that the reporting had been completely wrong, The Independent corrected the report:

6. Janta ka Reporter and others: Kanahaiya’s “attacker” was BJP coordinator

We had a separate report on this. This was another example of poor malicious reporting from Janta ka Reporter. Kanhaiya alleged that a Manas Deka had tried to “strangulate” him in a plane. The police eventually found this claim to be a lie. Based purely on Kanhaiya’s statement and the name of the “attacker”, portals like Janta Ka Reporter ran a story that this Manas Deka was a BJP coordinator. In fact, Manas Deka who was a BJP office bearer was a totally different person. He even had his mobile number online and a simple call for confirmation would have given a factual position.

7. CNN News 18: Smriti Irani speaks about Kanhaiya, Umar Khalid 

We had a separate report on this. In a tweet which was later deleted by CNN News 18, they claimed that HRD Minister Smriti Irani “spoke out” on Kanhaiya being fined and Umar Khalid being rusticated. Irani, quickly took to twitter clarifying that she had not spoken about any specific student and wonder whether her views would be taken out of context. Even the interviewer Vir Sanghvi  tweeted that Irani had in fact not spoken about any student in particular. Anchor Bhupendra Chaubey stepped in too to reassure the minister even as CNN News 18 slyly deleted the tweet.

8.The Indian Express: BSNL offering 20GB broadband for Rs 50.

This viral rumour about BSNL offering 20GB broadband for Rs 50 was first started by The Indian Express. This led to memes being circulated on social media and many other sites covering this news. Finally BSNL, in an official statement, had to clarify that BSNL had not officially declared any offer like 20GB 3G data for Rs 50 and neither did the company intend to do so. At this point, The Indian Express changed the headline of their post from: “BSNL 20GB 3G data offer for Rs 50 could help win new customers” to “BSNL is not offering 20 GB data at Rs 50, but users can share mobile data”, completely changing the story.

9. ABP News: Ganesh Joshi, BJP legislator, attacked and severely injured Shaktiamaan the horse. 

In a post in March itself, we had written how videos show that the BJP legislator did not hit or injure the horse. The horse’s leg was never hit by anyone but it got hurt when it hit a metal rod. After the initial noise, even some media outlets accepted this fact. Still, ABP News continued to peddle the above lies. Later ABP News changed the post and removed the above part.

Miscellaneous Lies

1. Sambad (Odia media): Poor utilisation of MPLAD funds by MP Baijayant Panda

We had a separate report on this. BJD MP Baijayant Panda took to twitter to explain this lie. Relying on old data, and without bothering to confirm with the MP himself, the above media house published news that the MP had under-utilised his MPLAD funds by a huge margin. Panda even wrote to them setting the record straight but they did not publish the rebuttal. Hence Panda put out the latest utilisation certificate on social media showing more than 99.5% utilisation of funds.

2. The Indian Express: Former Cricketer Ashok Malhotra named in Panama leaks

The Indian Express which was the only Indian media house working on the Panama leaks documents along with many other international business houses, and which had claimed to do in depth research on this topic, floundered in their own coverage. In the initial report, they claimed that the Ashok Malhotra who was named in Panama leaks was a former cricketer. But on the next day, in the back-pages, they issued a correction saying the Malhotra who was named in the Panama leaks, was actually a Kolkata based businessman.

3. Multiple media houses: NIT Srinagar students demand temple inside hostel

At the peak of the unrest at NIT Srinagar, media reports came out with the news that NIT Srinagar students had demanded a temple inside the campus. This was completely untrue. Nor was it seen in the video of demands raised by the students, nor was it mentioned anywhere in the formal demands letter sent to the HRD Ministry by the students. This news was probably based on the tweets of an unofficial handle which claimed to represent NIT Srinagar.

4. The Indian Express: Shishir Bajoria left CPI(M) and joined BJP in August 2014

The Indian Express reported the above news on April 4th. And a few days later, once CPI(M) clarified, they issued a small correction saying that Bajoria was in fact never a CPI(M) member.

5. Indian Express: BJP leader Sajjad Lone resigns from J & K cabinet

Indian express, in a tweet first claimed that Sajjad Lone was a BJP leader. Later when it was pointed out that Sajjad Lone was in fact not a BJP leader, Indian Express deleted the tweet and corrected the error.

6. CNN IBN: Panama Leaks exposes names of over 500 Indians for tax evasion

In a tweet, CNN IBN (now known as CNN Network 18 News) claimed that in the Panama Leaks over 500 Indians were named for “tax evasion”. It is true that the names of many Indians cropped up but no one at this time can say whether any tax was evaded or not. The leaks only mentioned names of people who were associated with off-shore companies. Even the source report clearly stated that it is not illegal to hold offshore companies and many such companies could have legitimate purposes. Hence IBN jumped the gun in labelling those named as “tax evaders”.

 

7. PTI and all media sites quoting it: State discoms raise Rs 99 lakh cr via UDAY Bonds in FY’16

PTI got the amount raised via sale of Uday bonds grossly wrong in their headline, which led to many media houses copying the same. This inspite of the fact that the 1st line of the report clearly states the figure as “Rs 98,959.96 crore” and not 100 times that figure i.e Rs 99 lakh crores.

8. Times of India: Using a fake picture of Patanjali noodles

In a report, Times of India used a fake picture of Patanjali noodles which has been circulating on soical media for long. On the packet, the words “Maggi” are mentioned, which is legally not possible since Patanjali cannot use a trademark of Nestle. The real picture is this.

9. Times of India: Farzana, wife of murdered NIA officer Tanzil Ahmed, Dies

This was reported by Times of India on 6 April 2016. Soon they issued an apology stating the the reports are incorrect. Unfortunately, she did succumb to her injuries, but almost a week later.

10. IndiaToday: Salim Khan snubs BJP offer, writer refuses to be Rajya Sabha MP

The above news was reported by IndiaToday but within a few hours, Salim Khan tweeted that the news was false and that he had never been offered the Rajya Sabha seat. He also said it would be a great honour of he was actually given the chance, but he would have think about it considering his age.

11. New York Times: Barkha Dutt one among the Muslim women who took on Ayaan Hirsi Ali

In the above report, NYT initially mentioned Barkha Dutt as a “muslim woman” who took on Hirsi Ali, along with 3 other Muslim women in a debate. Later, NYT issued a clarification accepting that they had gotten it wrong:

Correction: An earlier version of this article identified four of the women on the stage as being Muslim. The panel was made up of four Muslim-born women and moderator Barkha Dutt.

January 2016: 20 lies

February 2016: 22 Lies

March 2016: 17 Lies 

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