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What were you doing when you were 28?

OpIndia Staff
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What were you doing when you were 28?

After the electrifying speech of Kanhaiya, Indian media has already declared him “Student of the Year”. Odes are sung, eulogies are prepared, op-eds are written. However, during this whole JNU episode, people are again raising the argument which they raised during FTII controversy, which questioned, “till what age should the state fund education of students?” Another interesting argument is that if Kanhaiya’s parents are very poor and Kanhaiya can earn to uplift them, should he not also focus on earning his livelihood instead of just wasting his time in protests and dharnas.

 started a poll on Twitter, asking, “What were you doing when you were 28?”. The poll has gone viral. People are not only voting but also sharing their experiences. Some of our readers requested us to compile and share these stories. We have picked some of the tweets and responses on his poll:


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


 


We will like to hear your stories too. Please use the comment section to share your part of “What were you doing when you were 28?”

Kejriwal shared fake “Pakistan Zindabad” JNU video to target ABVP, will he apologise?

Gaurav
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Kejriwal shared fake “Pakistan Zindabad” JNU video to target ABVP, will he apologise?

At the height of the JNU anti-national slogans incident, there were videos and counter videos flying across from all sides. In this melee, Delhi CM Shri Arvind Kejriwal shared the following video:


The tweet by Kejriwal quoted a tweet by ABP News’ journalist Abhisar Sharma, who had originally shared the “shocking” video. The same video was shared by AAP leader Dilip Pandey, which was then retweeted by Delhi’s Cabinet Minister Satyendar Kumar Jain. AAP leader Ashutosh also tweeted about this video and was retweeted by another AAP leader Sanjay Singh.

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Kejriwal later gave a statement too to NDTV that the “Pakistan Zindabad” slogans were raised by ABVP to malign JNU:

This video was also shared by many other controversial journalists such as Mihir Sharma, Shivam Vij (who has since deleted the tweet) and CNN-IBN employee Zakka Jacob:


This video was also shared by Left supporter Swara Bhaskar and General Secretary of CPI Sitaram Yechury. The original tweeter “Siddharthya Roy”, who has been a columnist for Newslaundry , The Hindu, The Hoot and possibly also for The Wire, has now deleted his account, perhaps realizing the truth of the video, which this post will talk about.

First have a look at the video:

The entire video focuses on a 10 second clip from the 9th of February in which some ABVP students are seen and some slogans are heard which seem to be calls of “Pakistan Zindabad”. So are these really ABVP students? Are they really shouting “Pakistan Zindabad” slogans? Was this a planned strategy by ABVP?

From the pictures, it appears these are indeed ABVP students. The girl circled in the video though never shouts any slogan, but another male student on the right is seen saying “Zindabad”. So was he saying “Pakistan” Zindabad? Listen to the clip again, this time maybe without the video:

Does it still sound like “Pakistan” Zindabad? Especially the second time? No! That slogan was not raised. It’s a bunch of guys saying “Bhartiya Court Zindabad”. 

Does this explain why the police report abut JNU did not mention “Pakistan Zindabad” as a slogan but had many other slogans such as “Bharat ki barbaadi”, “Bharat tere Tukde honge etc?” To get further confirmation, we talked to a ABVP student from JNU and he confirmed that the slogans were “Bharatiya Court Zindabad” i.e. long live Indian Courts as a counter to the claims of “judicial killing” of Afzal Guru.

Arvind Kejriwal had instructed the District Magistrate to conduct an inquiry into the claims that ABVP had shouted these anti-national slogans. Even the District Magistrate’s report states that, in the FIR, the police too mention Pakistan Zindabad in inverted commas, but not any other slogan. The DM further states that the slogan can neither be “clearly heard” in the video, “nor in the transcripts of the JNU videos shot by the security staff”. This he says, showed that even the cops had doubts about this slogan. And this, as we know, is eventually reflected in the police’s submission to the court, which skipped this slogan entirely.

But, surprisingly, although the brief of the DM was to investigate the role of ABVP, his 1 page summary letter does not even mention ABVP. Neither does the report anywhere mention any clean chit to ABVP, although he himself says doubts existed that the slogan “Pakistan Zindabad” was even raised.

So did  a group of AAP and Leftist leaders, along with another group of Leftist journalists, spread a fake video around to attack ABVP at the height of the anti-national controversy? Whom were they trying to protect? Will any action be taken against them? Will they apologise?

As to how did this entire propaganda that “Pakistan Zindabad” slogans were shouted begin, see this. 

Truth Labs Report

Another angle to this issue is what did Truth Labs, the forensic lab checking the videos say?  Truth Labs’ final observation on Q4 (the name they gave to a longer version of this video, which besides the above, had Kanhaiya’s speech etc) was that Q4 was an “authentic recording, representing actual events”! How did they arrive at this conclusion? The report said that there were “no abrupt changes in pitch and intensity contours” and “no signs of temporal and spatial distortions”. 

So the DM has doubts about this video, the police do not say this slogan was raised, ABVP students corroborate, but the forensic lab which studied these videos said Q4 which was the video shared by Kejriwal and the video with “Pakistan Zindabad” slogan was an “authentic recording, representing actual events”,  all on the basis of some technical analysis? This in spite of the fact that the content clearly claims that “Pakistan Zindabad” is being shouted, whereas you can hear yourself (and we confirmed it from JNU sources) that it was “Bhartiya Court Zindabad”.

In our opinion Truth Labs should have simply stated that there doesn’t seem to be malicious editing of the video, such as adding/deleting audio/video tracks. By saying it was an “authentic recording, representing actual events”, they have exceeded their scope since they have not analysed the content of the video, and hence cannot opine whether the video, along with all its annotations and commentary represents actual events.

Proud of You, Media!

Ullas
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Proud of You, Media!

Thank You, Media!

It is with pride I can now say that Indian media has indeed evolved. For long, I have been very critical of the prime-time shows, their anchors and their guests. In this post, I would like to focus on the anchors and their diligent covering of news and their follow-ups.

When the news of Lance Naik Hanumanthappa Koppad being alive after 11 days buried in snow came about, it was heartening to see Bhupendra Chaubey rush to Betadur village in Karnataka to share the happiness of Koppad’s wife and mother. The interview really bought tears to my eyes. He wonderfully followed it up with asking Indians to have silent prayers at the India Gate. When all their prayers didn’t bear fruit and Hanumanthappa Koppad martyred, the nation wept along with his beleaguered family.

I expected the media to let the family mourn in private. After the burial, it was Ravish Kumar this time – who went to South India for the first time and talked to the Koppad family. After all, the Koppads were also poor – very much like a JNU student who was put behind bars. I give Ravish immense credit for not asking his favourite “jaat” question too. This is a case study for future journalism students on how language must not be a barrier or excuse to not cover news.

Koppad

This is the site of Koppad’s mortal remains as shown by Ravish on his show. Two flags respect the martyr. The State government has promised to make this site a memorial. I am sure Ravish will follow-up on this news. In the mean time, I cannot forget those 60 minutes on February 13 when the Indian tricolor flew proudly in his show – no talk, no guests, no news. What a way to mark your respect to the soldiers and a message to the government to take care of our heroes!

This was not all. I had many more surprises waiting for me.

Rajdeep Sardesai, of all people, proved me wrong. I had expected him to not move out of his comfort areas of Lutyens, Montenegro or New York. But, there he was. He and his team visited the home-town of each of the 10 soldiers who were buried in Siachen. The pain of the families of the soldiers left me speechless. It was natural that Hanumanthappa’s story was the limelight, because of the odds he had faced to come alive. But, it was Rajdeep’s prime time show that made me realise that 9 other soldiers who were buried – their dead bodies were stuck in Kashmir. Weather didn’t allow the bodies to be flown to their home-towns for the final-rites for days. Rajdeep and his team were on the job taking the government to task for not being able to devise alternate ways to ensure the families get the bodies of the martyred soldiers faster. Talk of holding the elected government’s feet to fire.

The biggest surprise for me was from Barkha Dutt. I have to confess I hated her for the Radia episode, for her chubby relationship with Congress leaders and many other things. But imagine Barkha reporting from a war zone in Chattisgarh. It is not like a daily routine where she can hop onto a ride to JNU or 10 Janpath for a talk on how to change a narrative. But in this ongoing anti-maoist operation, based on various reports, fifteen CRPF commandos are injured and three are killed. The visuals of Barkha running from the operations center in Raipur, asking for minute to minute updates from the commanding officer, reminded me of 26/11 where she was giving a live commentary to India. Her cameraman running behind her, as the shaking images make it clear – was the type of journalism we have romanticized for ages. It is a different matter that Maoists may not have TV sets, so that they could have benefited from live updates from Barkha. Her concern for the soldiers and the villagers in the line of fire was palpable in that breathtaking reporting.

I had given up hopes on Indian journalism. My friends would tell me to watch or listen to local media to get local news. But I would argue that in Karnataka, how can I know what is going in naxal afflicted areas of Chattisgarh. I am so proud to be proven right. The prime time shows have re-affirmed common man’s faith in media. It was indeed “sense over sensationalism”. Borrowing quote from a favourite politician, I can say “Proud of You, Media!”

Reviving Indian Textbooks: The Barkha files

OpIndia Staff
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Reviving Indian Textbooks: The Barkha files

Last week we launched a campaign: #SaveOurChildren. The thought emerged from the HRD Minister’s speech in Parliament where she read passages from Class IV and Class VI textbooks, approved by the previous UPA regime, which are factually incorrect, distort history, and paint India in poor light with respect to the ongoing conflict with Pakistan on Kashmir.

There have always been murmurs about how several facets of the history, geography, economics, and civics we teach our children are written by agenda merchants, pop historians, and establishment professionals, who made careers out of carving out a neo-Anglican narrative, which constantly and purposely demeans the Indian dharmic narrative. Hence, we launched #SaveOurChildren, asking all our readers and people at large, to send to us such cases of distortion.

We received an overwhelming number of entries, on a variety of topics. Eventually, we will make a collection of these problems with our children’s books and we will then petition the Union Minister for Human Resource Development Mrs. Smriti Irani to:

  1. Verify if such passages indeed in our textbooks
  2. Verify if such textbooks are still being used
  3. Get these references fact-checked
  4. Issue corrections wherever needed

Today we publish the first tranche of such cases sent to us by readers. While we were expecting a fair bit of historical, cultural and political distortion, we had never imagined we would find in textbooks, the names of modern day journalists, who are still working in their field. One such name was of Barkha Dutt. While Barkha is arguably one of India’s most prominent female faces on TV, she is one of the most controversial ones too.

She has received extreme criticism for her poor or rather excessive coverage of the 26/11 terror attacks, which eventually might have helped terrorists in their mission. She has long denied this, but recently she did admit to this and this was her best defence:


She has also been embroiled in the Radia tapes issue, where she was heard discussing political formations with Nira Radia, a power broker. Barkha was accused of lobbying and power-broking for former telecom minister A Raja.

Of course Barkha emerged absolutely unscathed out of both the above controversies, controversies which could have finished careers in another time, in another land. The same cant be said though of Chaitanya Kunte, a blogger whose only crime was to expose Barkha’s shoddy reporting on 26/11. He was sued by Barkha, hounded and his blog was shut down.

For these reasons, it is appalling to see readers claiming that she finds a mention in textbooks which our children our reading:

A reader claims the above picture is from a CBSE textbook.

And this is another instance where she is said to be mentioned in a sanskrit textbook:

If the above is true, those who were in favour of a “nuanced” history should also consider if Barkha Dutt’s antecedents should also be listed in books, if at all her name should be there in the first place. Once the campaign is over, we shall send over these claims by various people to the HRD ministry so that they can verify that these are indeed real and then take appropriate action. Till then, you can send your entries :

Click their pictures and share with us:

On our Twitter handle @OpIndia_com

or

On our Facebook page

or

Email to us at [email protected]

or

If you wish to remain anonymous, use file sharing sites like these.

Append these social media posts with the hashtag #SaveOurChildren. Do not forget to mention these details along with your submission: The name of the state, the name of the board / agency (CBSE, ICSE, NCERT, State Board etc) and the class/division the book is from.

 

What the courts say in Kanhaiya’s bail order

OpIndia Staff
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What the courts say in Kanhaiya’s bail order

Today, JNUSU President Kanhaiya Kumar, who was arrested for investigation with relation to anti-national activities was released by the courts on “conditional interim bail”. This did not stop some journalists, who at one point had  called Ishrat Jahan an “innocent, moon-faced teenager”, from frothing at their mouths and declaring this bail to be an acquittal:


The courts will eventually decide whether he is innocent or not, but as of now at least, the court order reveals a lot. The judgement itself starts off with a patriotic song. This should indicate where things are heading:

‘Rang hara Hari Singh Nalve se, Rang laal hai Lal Bahadur se, Rang bana basanti Bhagat Singh, Rang aman ka veer Jawahar se. Mere Desh ki Dharti sona ugle Ugle here moti mere desh ki dharti’

The judgement states that the slogan “Pakistan Zindabad” does not figure in the list of 30 slogans filed in the status report by the state.

The next key point is that the judge states that Kapil Sibal, who is representing Kanhaiya, has accepted that Kanhaiya was at the spot where the slogans were shouted. While Sibal maintains Kanhaiya had no role to play in the ongoings of 9th February, this is also an admission of the fact, which was apparent from many videos, that Kanhaiya was very much present there. The judge also states that

His presence at the spot on the day of incident when alleged antinational event was organised, is not disputed

What Kanhaiya was doing there is a different argument, but this acceptance of Kanhaiya being present there flies in the face of TV journalists who couldn’t see him:


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The judgement also states that the police has statement of witnesses who say Kanhaiyya talked to the concerned JNU authorities showing his resentment about the cancellation of the permission for the event on 9th February. This, the police say, is indication that Kanhaiyya was more than a bystander. This needs to be examined by a court.

The judge then refers to some of the slogans raised at the 9th February event:

1. AFZAL GURU MAQBOOL BHATT JINDABAD.

2. BHARAT KI BARBADI TAK JUNG RAHEGI JUNG RAHEGI

3. GO INDIA GO BACK

4. INDIAN ARMY MURDABAD

5. BHARAT TERE TUKKDE HONGE– INSHAALLAHA INSHAALLAHA

6. AFZAL KI HATYA NAHI SAHENGE NAHI SAHENGE

7. BANDOOK KI DUM PE LENGE AAZADI.’

The judge takes serious note of these slogans and says that

“Freedom of speech guaranteed to the citizens of this country under the Constitution of India has enough room for every citizen to follow his own ideology or political affiliation within the framework of our Constitution“.

She also reminds everyone that such freedom is afforded to him “because our forces are there at the battle field situated at the highest altitude of the world where even the oxygen is so scarce that those who are shouting anti-national slogans holding posters of Afzal Guru and Maqbool Bhatt close to their chest honoring their martyrdom, may not be even able to withstand those conditions for an hour even.”

The judge further notes that:

The kind of slogans raised may have demoralizing effect on the family of those martyrs who returned home in coffin draped in tricolor

The judge also has a few words for the JNU faculty:

The faculty of JNU also has to play its role in guiding them to the right path so that they can contribute to the growth of the nation and to achieve the object and vision for which Jawaharlal Nehru University was established.

The judge then says the JNU administration should find out why such thoughts enter the students’ minds and asks them to take remedial steps so that there is no recurrence of such incident.

In harsher words, the judge also chastises the students saying:

The investigation in this case is at nascent stage. The thoughts reflected in the slogans raised by some of the students of JNU who organized and participated in that programme cannot be claimed to be protected as fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression. I consider this as a kind of infection from which such students are suffering which needs to be controlled/cured before it becomes an epidemic. Whenever some infection is spread in a limb, effort is made to cure the same by giving antibiotics orally and if that does not work, by following second line of treatment. Sometimes it may require surgical intervention also. However, if the infection results in infecting the limb to the extent that it becomes gangrene, amputation is the only treatment

Finally, the judge says:

To enable him to remain in the main stream, at present I am inclined to provide conservative method of treatment

Further, considering Kanhaiyya’s claim that his mother earns barely Rs 3000 per month, the judge sets the bail bond at Rs 10000.

The judge ends the order with the statement that the observations made above are only for the purpose of deciding the bail application and shall not be considered as an expression on merits.

Seeing the language and remarks of the judge, it wont be surprising to see some people launching attacks on the judge and her “hyper-nationalism”.

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The EPF mess and how not to bring in a taxation change

Gaurav
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The EPF mess and how not to bring in a taxation change

The Union Budget 2016 was largely seen as a pro-farmer- anti-big shots, pro-jobs and pro-small businesses due to many measures taken to uplift these sectors. But there has been one issue which has hurt the “middle-class” of India: Bringing PF under tax ambit.

Until now EPF has been the holy grail of all salaried employees. Tax free at all stages from deposit to withdrawal, secure, and a very high rate of Interest. Now, with a prospective effect, the returns are going to diminish significantly since part of the proceeds maybe taxed. Without going into the technical details, there have also been some pre-budget moves to make withdrawal of money from EPF harder.

Why has the Government suddenly turned towards EPF?

The stated objective of the Government, as per the PIB release and other statements is this:

The Government wants EPF kitty to be used by people as a post-retirement fund from which they can earn pension. The people on the other hand use EPF for various purposes, and often withdraw large sums from the account, much before retirement to meet expenses arising from weddings, education or anything they deem fit. The Government is of the view that they have given you a completely tax-free instrument, for your retirement security, and not for your expenses before that, so if you want to spend it before retirement, we will tax you.

Firstly, the Government’s intention is not completely wrong. There can be situations where a person withdraws money prematurely and then is left with nothing at his retirement. The Government just wants to avoid this situation.

But, the means used to arrive at this desired goal are completely wrong. They have failed to factor in that for decades now, people have looked at and used EPF from a completely different angle, and now, midway through one cant just change the rules of the game. Sure, the money which has been deposited pre-April 2016 will not be touched, but still, it is a setback for those who though EPF will help them accumulate money for the any big expense lined up.

Another reason for taxing EPF now is to bring it on par with NPS. NPS is the pension scheme started last year, probably to help take forward the intention of providing retirement security. But till recently, NPS was not competitive as compared to EPF due to different taxation policy. Now, what the Government has done is made both NPS and EPF taxable equally, ensuring parity, and in short nudging people to move towards NPS.

Again, the means used to nudge people to NPS are wrong. It was widely expected that to bring both the schemes on par, NPS will also be made exempt throughout, like EPF, but the Government has gone in the other direction.

Even with this approach, which has now drawn lot of flak, the Government could have reduced the brickbats, but the entire approach to this change has been miserably unplanned. This is just an extension of the abysmal communication skills of this Government.

Before we study how they messed it up here, jog your memory to another scheme which pinched the common man but was implemented largely successfully: The Give it Up campaign. PM Modi made many appeals to Indians (who can afford to do so) to give up voluntarily, their LPG subsidy. There was a clear explanation of rationale: that this subsidy is meant for the poor and not for those who can afford it, and it burdens the Government. The call was largely successful.

By December 2015, it was reported that over 57 lakh LPG consumers had voluntarily given up their subsidies. And that was when the next phase was implemented: Withdrawal of subsidy for those who earn above Rs 10 lacs. Here was a scheme, where the Government made efforts to educate people, get the public sentiment on their, and then brought in a rule to implement it.

Contrast this with the EPF taxation move. Sure, the amounts involved are different, the scheme is different, but see the non-existent messaging here. First see what the Finance Minister’s speech had to say on this:

Pension schemes offer financial protection to senior citizens. I believe that the tax treatment should be uniform for defined benefit and defined contribution pension plans. I propose to make withdrawal up to 40% of the corpus at the time of retirement tax exempt in the case of National Pension Scheme. In case of superannuation funds and recognized provident funds, including EPF, the same norm of 40% of corpus to be tax free will apply in respect of corpus created out of contributions made after 1.4.2016.

This is all that was said by Arun Jaitley on this issue. Nowhere, the intention of the Government was highlighted in his speech. If you don’t even tell me that what you are doing is good for me, why should even imagine that it is even remotely good? The finance bill too is silent on this. It is only the PIB clarification, which comes after a lot of outrage, which states this. Obviously, people are going to take this as an after-thought and not the main objective. Who is to blame for this?

And it gets worse. There was complete lack of coordination between what different faces of the Government said:

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(sources: Budget Speech, NDTV interview, ANI statement, Press Conference, PIB release)

Not only did the Government fail to communicate why they want to do what they are doing, they also chose a very tax-payer unfriendly means for the same, and then completely bungled up the response. The more bitter the pill, the more sugar coated it has to be, and here the forgot the sugar coating and also the candy after the pill!

AAP MLA abuses Modi Govt in public, asks crowd to support an alleged ISIS ideologue

OpIndia Staff
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AAP MLA abuses Modi Govt in public, asks crowd to support an alleged ISIS ideologue

A shocking video of an AAP MLA publically using abusive words for the Modi Government has surfaced out. A video posted on a blog named TheLotPot shows AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan jubilantly saying, “Jis tarah se ye Haramkhor Modi Sarkar…” in a public rally and gathering applause from the audience. The controversial MLA of AAP was supporting and defending Mufti Qasmi, who was arrested for delivering provocative and inflammatory speeches in support of the Caliphate.

Mufti Abdus Sami Qasmi

Not only that, as shown in the video, Amanatullah Khan also provoked the Muslim community to do gherao of the Home Minister’s residence. He can be clearly heard emphasizing on the Muslim population and provoking people in the video.

This is not the first time when Amanatullah Khan is accused of supporting anti-national activities. In 2015, Vishisht Seva Medal awardee Poonia wrote a letter to Arvind Kejriwal and alleged that AAP leader Amanatullah Khan was supporting Zia-Ur-Rehman, an alleged Indian Mujahideen operative accused of blasts in Delhi and Ahmedabad. Not only that, Major Dr Surendra Poonia also resigned from AAP over Amanatullah Khan

Major Dr Surendra Poonia

Amanatullah has also been very vocal about the Batla House encounter in the past.

It is surprising that Arvind Kejriwal wrote against Amanatullah till he was not a part of AAP, but after his inclusion in the AAM Aadmi Party, Arvind Kejriwal and AAP have maintained silence on his speeches.


The video also exposes hypocrisy of our media and liberals who wrote tons of opinion pieces and articles when Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti used Haramzade in her speech but have completely ignored the Amanatullah speech which not only contained abusive words like Hamarkhor, but entices the Muslim community to stand and support anti-national activities.

The only summary of Union Budget 2016-17 you need to read

Aashish Chandorkar
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The only summary of Union Budget 2016-17 you need to read

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presented the Union Budget for the financial year 2016-17 in the Parliament today. In the run up to the budget, financial experts had dubbed this as a make or break budget. On February 21st, Swaminathan S Anklesaria Aiyar wrote in Times of India:

“Once the Budget was the biggest event in February. Now it is just another event, not even as important as a student rally in Jawaharlal Nehru University. No longer does the Budget spell out radical economic policy changes. It has become more routine and boring.”

This budget achieves precisely this – a dull and boring budget, broadly presenting a believable picture on the numbers and outlining the priority area of government spending without doing anything fancy. Of course, every announcement is pro or anti someone but the headline commentary by Arun Jaitley points to the relative redundancy of the budget, with increased focus on implementation and things which happen outside of the budget.

Upsides of the Budget

Fiscal Deficit targets stuck to at 3.9% of GDP in 2015-16 and 3.5% of GDP in 2016-17 is the single biggest announcement in the budget. While this math is tough to relate to for the public at large, a deviation from the fiscal consolidation path would have been highly negative for global credit rating agencies, global investors, and for the RBI as well. This opens the door for an immediate rate cut by RBI – which may well come through out of turn in the next couple of days.

Focus on Rural Economy and Growth was expected, given that India is reeling with debilitating effects of two back to back bad monsoons.  Just like the Vajpayee government which focused on increasing agricultural incomes, this government has carved an ambition to double agricultural incomes by 2022. The enabling parameters are – linking MGNREGA spend to productive assets like farm ponds, dug wells, and compost pits with record high allocation of ₹38,000 crore, creation of a Long Term Irrigation Fund under NABARD at ₹20,000 crore allocation and a program with ₹6,000 crore allocation for better ground water management. The government will also fast-track 23 major irrigation projects and bring an additional 28.5 lha land under irrigation (about 20% of the total cultivable land in India). This is in addition to already announced programs on Soil Health Card which promotes optimal use of fertilizers and the Crop Insurance Scheme which broadbases the insurance  benefits to farmers.

Creation of a National Agriculture Market, to be facilitated by states amending their respective APMC acts to let farmers sell their produce anywhere in India has been announced for April 2016. This is a big move, but so far only 12 states are onboard the program, and the Prime Minister needs to push these state law changes the way he is popularizing the Crop Insurance Scheme directly.

Road Infrastructure, which has several trickle down benefits – demand of cement and steel, sale of automobiles, faster movement of goods and perishables and so on – gets a big push. The government has set a target of 2019 for full connectivity of all eligible habitations for getting a road connectivity, marking ₹27,000 crore including state share for village roads. The government will earmark ₹55,000 crore for road construction with National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) adding another ₹15,000 crore via bonds, in total bringing the road spending to ₹97,000 crore. Given that this biggest allocation will reside with Mr Nitin Gadkari, among the top performing ministers in the Modi government, the infrastructure push should yield results in the form of the desired 30 kms per day highway construction this year.

Small Businesses and Professionals have been given a boost by simplification of the tax compliances by them. The scheme where a business could declare 8% of its turnover as Taxable Income and avoid keeping any detailed records has now been extended to businesses with a turnover of upto Rs 2 crores, up from the Rs 1 crore earlier. Similar benefits have also been extended to professionals.

Focus on Job Creation directly has been given a push. The government now proposes to pay the employer contribution of 8.33% to the Provident Fund (PF) for employers creating new job opportunities, encouraging the organized sector taking on rolls its temporary, contract employees. They ahve also proposed specific tax breaks aimed at incentivising hiring. Skill development has been granted additional budgets to set up 1,500 new Multi Skill Training Institutes.

Focus on Enabling Legislation comes out at various places in the budget speech. The government proposes to create a model shops and establishment act which states can adopt voluntarily, letting small businesses remain open longer. There was a mention of Goods and Services Tax (GST) and Insolvency Bills, indicating the government has not given up on them. The FM also talked about amending the Companies Act 2013 to have easier registration for new Start Ups. A Public Utility (Resolution of Disputes) Bill has been proposed to fast track disputes related to PPPs and infrastructure projects. A Code of Resolution for Financial Firms has been proposed which will deal with “orderly unwinding” of financial firms in the event of a bankruptcy. But the biggest announcement was the government will finally legislate Aadhar and institutionalize the Direct Benefit Transfers (DBT), with FM making it clear that Aadhar will not form the basis of either domicile or citizenship – addressing the concerns of the traditional BJP supporters who saw Aadhar as the back door entry for illegal immigrants getting Indian passports.

Social Sector Spending has been given a boost this year. The opposition had picked this area up as a big gap last year. The government proposes to bring in a healthcare insurance for a large cross-section of the population in addition to expanding the program to sell generic drugs at a lower price, at 3,000 new generic medicines stores across the country. The FM also proposed a new scheme to promote expansion of dialysis facility to tackle the renal diseases that presumably have been a cause of much angst and inconvenience for a growing section of the population.

No big talk on divestment and strategic sale this year came through in the budget, though the target for revenue collection via this route is retained at about ₹36,000 crore. There are two interesting parts to this process after the government has missed this target every year successively. Firstly the Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) will be allowed to sell or use their assets for productive use. These assets can include land or other physical assets like machinery. Secondly the NITI Aayog will now shortlist the CPSEs fit for sale or divestment. Once the recommendations are taken to the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (new name for Department of Divestment), a group of secretaries will approve the proposals followed by a CCEA nod. This 3 tier structure shifts the focus away from the Finance Ministry in coming years to achieve the revenue line item goals. The FM even had a sentence around the government being fine with its stake in public sector banks sliding under 50%!

Black money reduction and repatriation has been a big topic for the Modi government. This budget allows a new scheme – which is a penalty cum surcharge scheme as opposed to an amnesty scheme – for anyone holding undeclared income or assets to come out, pay a 30% tax with 7.5% penalty and 7.5% surcharge for agriculture and regularize the accounts. The government has done a good job of not calling it an amnesty scheme or it would have been challenged right away in the Supreme Court, given the prior commitments made by Union governments on not opening new Voluntary Income Disclosure Schemes (VDIS). The provisions also establish that the government considers holding black money in India “less bad” than holding black money abroad – a similar scheme floated last year for overseas unaccounted money had higher penalties.

Focus on Direct Benefit Transfers (DBT) will continue, with the government announcing a part of the fertilizer subsidy payment moving to the DBT platform. This is however a pilot to be floated this year.

Moving away from the Plan / Non Plan Legacy has been established starting next budget with this year being the last of the 12th Plan. If we are not going to be governed by Planning Cycles, why not have a Plan / Non Plan distinction of spending? The government can now move to the Capital and Revenue expenditure model – similar to any corporate and easier to understand and follow. This is a good move for better public finance management.

Big boost for the gram panchayats and the local bodies is in store, which will get a grant of ₹2.87L crore from the budget. This translates to about ₹80L per gram panchayat and ₹21 crore per urban local body. These numbers are good enough to have some of the central programs see the light of the day. Unfortunately, no direct link has been built by the FM on how these funds will be used, when there was an opportunity to do so with respect to Swachh Bharat.

There is a boost for low cost housing, with 100% tax exemption (MAT applicable) for companies which invest in 30 sq mt (metros) / 60 sq mt (other areas) housing schemes for the next three years. The first time home buyers will get an additional ₹50,000 deduction on interest payments for property values under ₹50L. This will be a boost for many cities (except maybe Mumbai, Delhi, and Bangalore!) and rurban clusters. Additionally, those employed professionals who do not get a House Rent Allowance (HRA) from their employers, will have an increased tax deduction from ₹24,000 to ₹60,000 per annum for the rent paid. This will put ₹3,000 additional income per month in the hands of beneficiaries mostly from lower middle class segment.

Dispute Resolution for Taxation issues has been given a push by the FM. Those firms battling retrospective taxes (like Vodafone and Cairn) can pay the tax due without any penalties or surcharges and settle the disputes rather than going the international arbitration way. The rules to apply retrospective provisions have been further tightened with more scrutiny. The assessment scrutiny process will continue to become digital with the top 7 cities to be made completely digital with no face to face interaction with the assessing officer. These are good small steps, but of course the real need is to curb bureaucratic exuberance on the ground.

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Downsides of the Budget

The Picketty Budget syndrome did kick in after all, with the government making moves towards taxing the rich and bringing in new cess for retail investors. The surcharge paid by those with more than 1 cr in income will go up from 12% to 15%. There will be a Krishi Kalyan Cess at 0.5% on all taxable services going forward. It would have been easier for the FM to just raise the Service Tax rate rather than bringing in a new cess. Any cess is tough to take away and the market was anyway aligned towards a Service Tax hike in the direction of a potential consensus GST rate of 18%. This presents bad optics and additional overhead of managing a new line item. The government can always repurpose any tax collection anywhere – so the need to call a cess Krishi or Swacch Bharat is not very important if the government can demonstrate those were the real end uses.

Bank recapitalization at ₹25,000 crore is not a great statement to make. The government had already provided for ₹70,000 crore over the next three years for this purpose and shifting the needle on yearly allocation by a small amount does not help. The government will kick the can down the road waiting for the Bank Board Bureau to make its recapitalization recommendations. But overall this is a number which is neither here nor there. Sure, the government will claim that it demonstrated intent, but the situation warrants rapid and deep response, not band aids.

The Dividend Distribution Tax for the super rich has been introduced this year. Anyone who gets more than ₹10 lakhs in dividend income in a given year, will pay 10% tax on it in addition to the tax already paid by the companies distributing the dividend. Assuming a dividend yield of 5-6% on a corporate profit base of ₹1.5 trillion, the dividend base will be around ₹75 billion. Half of it may already be going to the government so any tax will be a right pocket – left pocket arrangement. Of the balance ₹40 billion, if the promoters and those with more than ₹10 lakhs in dividends corner half, we are talking about a dividend base of ₹20 billion. On this a 10% tax will yield nothing much – ₹2 billion – for the government. While the argument can also be that if there isn’t much financial impact, what’s wrong with the tax in the first place, this brings in additional procedural complications and hassles.

There isn’t much to cheer about from the Individual Tax payer point of view. Taxpayers who fall inside the sub-Rs 5 lakh income zone will get an additional  tax rebate of around Rs 3,000, as slabs remain unchanged. There weren’t any  major change in any exemptions or deductions except for those staying in rented houses, who will now get a deduction of upto Rs 60,000.

The National Pension Scheme (NPS) and the EPFO (Employee Provident Fund Organization) have now been equalized. This is a good thing in the long run as the NPS is a defined contribution scheme while the EPFO is modeled as a defined benefits organization.  For all EPFO contributions starting next year, 60% of the withdrawal at maturity will attract taxes. The budget fine print is not clear on the tax slabs applicable and the corpus taxed (employee / employer part, gains made in the scheme). Once this is made clear, the government will have a task at its hand explaining this to the middle class – this is a tough reform measure pushed through, but it will come down hard on the young people starting their careers. This is a perception game to be won or lost and hence safe to assume is not a strong point for the government!

The Tax Code continues to be complex without any roadmap for improvement. For example – fathoming the duty structure on cigarettes which is based on the length of the cigarette and the presence or absence of a filter, maybe nothing short of rocket science. This was reflected in the ITC stock price today during the budget speech. The stock went down sharply at first and then recovered after it was clear that the cigarettes which they sell may not attract a lot of extra tax! Creating slabs for corporate taxes based on the type, size and the date of incorporation of new firms makes that segment complex too. The myriad customs and excise duty changes will take time to trickle down and do not seem to be based on any great logic except the need to balance numbers.

Tinkering of duties for branded garments and additional cess on cars is exactly the kind of negative perception the FM could have avoided to retain the trust with the middle class. The organized retail has grown significantly over the last few years and has been one of the bright spots in the economy. These duties and cess will not yield much revenue, but will needlessly become the talking points for the opposition and the disgruntled supporters alike. The gains from these kinds of adjustments could have been easily made elsewhere! Increasing cost of electronics and digital items including those manufactured in India due to duty structure changes is another area of concern – on one hand the government wants to promote Digital India and on the other, the cost of almost all retail digital equipment will go up.

Protecting firms like Hindalco and others via duty increases on imports is not a great idea. The government cannot be priming “Make In India” as an import substitution program – something that has been tried and tested and has failed. The budget goes into excruciating details for duty changes on several commodities, which really cannot be linked to a yearly budget and does not outline the underlying reasons behind such arbitrary changes.

The Fertilizer Subsidy needed an urgent revamp and restructuring. While the FM will move part of it on DBT, this really should have been an area of focus, especially so with the oil bounty ending for India in the coming year. This subsidy head is the biggest source of leakage apart from MGNREGS and was an ideal candidate for greater action and push for a fundamental redesign.

The phasing of tax exemptions for the corporate has not kept pace with the tax slab change for large firms. While the professionals and smaller firms with up to ₹2 crore in revenue will have an easier tax regime via a presumed tax, the large firms will continue to pay top tax bracket with some exemptions being phased out. While no large firm actually pays 30% corporate tax – effective rates being 23-24% – some of them may actually have a higher tax incidence going forward! The FM had announced a corporate tax rationalization proposal last year and this year it was implemented only for firms with ₹5 crore in revenues. The MSMEs can rejoice but the tax rationalization roadmap gets postponed.

The government missed an opportunity to link support for states and local bodies to actual performance outcomes. While the amount given to states and the local bodies will be at an all time high this year, the government has yet again – like last year – failed to impose conditions on the states to actually make use of the extra allocations. For example, the FM talked about automation for PDS systems. This area could easily have been transformed by asking the shops to model themselves on the Rajasthan model for better stocks, limited stock outs, and DBT for those availing food subsidies. The government will rely on the states to tweak their APMC acts for a national agriculture market. This could have been incentivized through grants for setting up cold storage and supply chains for carrying farm produce across cities and states. Without some of these enabling areas, the central schemes tend to languish at state level without much accountability. The credit for the good goes to the states, with the central government tends to get the flak!

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On The Balance

The headlines may not make for attractive reading, but the details are good.

This budget may well be remembered for what it did not do rather than for what it did. The former was uncertain, while the latter was more or less a given. FM Jaitley did not take away the long term capital gains exemption or move it from 1 to 3 years for listed securities. A move on this count would have definitely spooked the stock markets. In fact, the government has reduced the long term capital gains window on unlisted securities from 3 years to 2 years, which may provide an unintended boost to private equity and venture capital transactions!

The budget presents a great case for macroeconomic responsibility, but risks losing the microeconomic battle – the attention of the core BJP support base. This is the same as last year, where the big changes will not be appreciated because the meal for two got half a percent costly and the computer monitor price went up by 200 bucks!

The budget has done the best thing possible – move focus back on executive action, legislative reform and the RBI – which may be compelled to cut interest rates in the near future based on the government prudence. Finally, it will all boil down to ensure that this (rather difficult) math on the revenue side is achieved.

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“Rangeela” Rasool can kill but “sex worker” Durga won’t

Alok Bhatt
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“Rangeela” Rasool can kill but “sex worker” Durga won’t

As Smriti Irani, in her much talked about Loksabha speech, read out the contents of a 2013 JNU pamphlet containing derogatory references of Goddess Durga; she was merely trying to score a political point over opposition that had accused Modi government of meddling in the affairs of JNU by subverting freedom of expression.

Social media, true to its reputation of being the first to react, reacted by drawing an interesting parallel with the case of Kamlesh Tiwari, currently lodged in Lucknow jail for an alleged case of blasphemy against Prophet Mohammed.

After Anand Sharma accused Irani of committing ‘blasphemy’ for ‘reading’ out the derogatory references to Goddess Durga from a pamphlet circulated by JNU staffers and students; many commentators began arguing about the concept of blasphemy itself.

Recent instance of Sharma’s party legislators in UP assembly, joining protesting Mullahs across India, to demand death penalty for alleged blasphemy by Kamlesh Tiwari made some wonder about the nature of Sharma’s accusations about Irani.

Curiously, freedom of speech champions remained mum about Tiwari’s freedom of expression vis-à-vis that of organisers of JNU festival. Evidently, Islamist’s writ of moral blackmail and threat of physical violence is enough to extend its influence over their views.

What Is Blasphemy?

Blasphemy, defined as ‘irreverence towards something considered sacred or inviolable’, is essentially an Abrahamic concept prevalent in monotheist religions. Hinduism, a faith that allows its practitioners (comprising majority of India’s population) an utmost freedom of thought and action, has no concept of blasphemy.

While two Abrahamic faiths- Christianity and Judaism have undergone and accepted considerable moderation in their views about blasphemy; Islam continues to use it as an oppressive tool against non-believers.

Borrowing from Christopher Hitchens, blasphemy is: “Islam and Islamists giving themselves permission to lie to non-believers; a vulgar paranoid thing, that an islamophobe would go around saying, something which is very easy to disprove, except that it hasn’t been.” Concept of blasphemy runs contrary to the principles of freedom of speech and consequently is a threat to the very core of a pluralistic society.

Tracing roots of Blasphemy in India

To understand the nuances of blasphemy, it is important to go back into the history and most importantly events of Lahore and Delhi, the two battleground cities for Aryasamajis and Muslims. Lahore, with a vibrant intellectual life and educational institutions, was chosen by Swami Dayanand as the headquarters of Aryasamaj and it became a hub of revivalist movements in Punjab.

As preachers of Aryasamaj went on with their job of educating masses about their teachings, Maulvis began to feel the heat and the fault-lines of the society widened further. Shuddhi movement was Aryasamaj’s answer to Tablighi movement and it didn’t go down well with Muslims either as they felt that Hindus do not have any rights to convert others to their faith unlike the Muslims.

Arya Pustakalaya of Lahore was at the forefront of Aryasamaj movement as it took the lead in bringing out their literature for distribution in Punjab and other areas. It was Arya Pustakalaya’s publication of Rangeela Rasool (May 1924) by its manager Mahashe Rajpal that led to widespread protests and greater communal discord.

However, the publication of Rangeela Rasool — written by Prashaad Prataab under the pen name of Pandit Champovati Lal — cannot be seen as an isolated case as it was written in response to Sep 1923 book titled “Unneesvin Sadi ka Maharishi” (Maharishi of nineteenth century) authored by Ali Qasim- editor of Alfaruq.

In addition to the date sequence of the publication of two books, another notable point was the response of then Punjab government to publication of both the books. While it bent backwards to address the Muslim sensitivities and ordered filing of case against Mahashe Rajpal under Section 153-A of Indian Penal Code; Ali Qasim was let off the hook for the reason that his book didn’t attract any attention. In short, threat of communal violence by the Muslims and not the content of the book was the deciding factor for the government action.

Little did anyone know then that Rangeela Rasool will bring the issue of blasphemy to the center-stage of Indian politics and will later become one of the contributing factors for the partition of India, 20 years later.

Rangeela Rasool Case

After long protracted legal battle, Lahore’s Magisterial court found Mahashe Rajpal guilty under Section 153-A and sentenced him to six-month rigorous imprisonment in Jan 1927; which was upheld by Lahore’s sessions court. Consequently, the legal battle moved to Lahore High Court, where Justice Dalip Singh turned down the lower court verdict on May 4, 1927. Justice Singh also observed that “the nature of the act, namely whether it is an offence or not, cannot be determined by the reaction of the particular class”. To Mahashe Rajpal’s credit, he fought Rangeela Rasool case through legal and peaceful means and also kept his word of not disclosing the name of the author of Rangeela Rasool till the very end.

Anger on Muslim Street

Lahore High Court’s acquittal of Mahashe Rajpal left Muslims seething with anger. Leading the charge at Delhi was Maulana Mohammed Ali, who was once hailed as “the ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity” by no less than Gandhi. Addressing a large Jama Masjid gathering on July 1, 1927, Maulana declared that “the kafir Rajpal will not go free” and exhorted Muslims to wage a jihad for the Rasool. Demanding reversal of HC judgement, he further said that any delay in reversal would be “an indicator that government wants to compel the Musalmans to take the law in their hands and such matters like this will precipitate a catastrophe which no forces on earth will be able to check.” (Hindustan Times, July 2, 1927). A demand was also made to amend the law to make cases like that of Rangeela Rasool a punishable offence.

Taking Maulana’s threat seriously, Central Legislative Assembly, within 4 months of Rangeela Rasool verdict, passed a bill to amend the criminal law by introduction of Sec 295-A in the Indian Penal Code (Sep 1927).

Killing of Mahashe Rajpal

Maulana’s exhortation to not let “the kafir Rajpal go free” yielded desired result after he was hacked to death in his own shop by a 19 years old Ilam-Din (hailed as Ghazi Ilam-Din Shaheed in present day Pakistan) on April 6, 1929.
It is important to mention here Ilam-Din wasn’t the only one who wanted to take Rajpal’s life. Before him, two more attempts were made on Rajpal’s life and that led Punjab police to accord him protection.

However, his police guard was removed following Rajpal’s visit to Haridwar and couldn’t be restored after his return to Lahore on April 4. Taking advantage of this, Ilam-Din attacked him on the afternoon of April 6 with a knife. Severity of this attack can be gauged from the fact that Rajpal received 8 wounds (4 on his hands, 1 on his head, 2 on area above spine and a punctured wound on his chest); final wound proved to be fatal as it pierced through his heart and killed him on the spot. (From A.I.R.1930, Lahore 157- Ilam-Din Vs Emperor)

After killing Rajpal, Ilam-Din proudly proclaimed to have “taken the revenge for the prophet.” It is another matter that Ilam-Din was hanged for his crime but not before Jinnah personally pleaded for commuting his death sentence before Lahore High Court.

Rajpal wasn’t the only one who lost his life to Muslim fanatics for alleged cases of blasphemy. Swami Shraddhanand and Nathuramal Sharma too had to pay with their lives at the hands of Abdul Rashid and Abdul Quayum respectively.

Muslim street’s usage of threat of violence and silence of Muslim elites

A careful reading of the events leading to the killing of Mahashe Rajpal bears testimony of the fact that Muslim community, when it comes to matters concerning religion and their Prophet, always uses the threat of violence to perfection. The statement of the official pleader in Rangeela Rasool case that “the Mohammedan community is more fanatical on the question of religion than other communities” (Rajpal Vs Emperor, AIR 1927, Lahore 592) captures it in no uncertain words. Going a step further, the defending counsel pointed out that it is wrong to punish someone merely because “the members of another community were easily excitable and very easily moved to the possibility of committing a breach of peace”.

What has been left unsaid here is how Muslim leaders channelized anger on the Muslim street to suit their political interests. While leaders like Gandhi, Lajpat Rai (an Aryasamaj leader himself) etc spoke openly against publication of Rangeela Rasool and lambasted fundamentalists; Muslim leaders like Mohammed Ali, Jinnah, Iqbal etc played their respective roles to perfection and found themselves standing (unapologetically so) on the side of a killer like Ilam-Din- all in the name of Prophet.

No wonder, country of their creation, Pakistan today is suffering massive violence in the name of blasphemy and Mullahs of that country cite Jinnah’s pleading for Ilam-Din as a case of Jinnah’s tacit acceptance of blasphemy related killings.

Kamlesh Tiwari and JNU pamphlet- Reactions of Muslim and Hindu Street

While more than 90 years have elapsed since first publication of Rangeela Rasool and Unneesvin Sadi ka Maharishi (Maharishi of nineteenth century); what hasn’t changed in post 1947 India is the reaction of the aggrieved communities. Respective reaction to Kamlesh Tiwari case and that to JNU pamphlet today mirrors that of the reaction of Muslim and Hindu community almost 92 years ago to the books quoted above.

But for Irani’s reading, ordinary Hindus wouldn’t have ever come to know of the derogatory JNU pamphlet of 2013. However, Kamlesh Tiwari wasn’t as lucky; simply because person at the receiving end of his alleged comments was Prophet Mohammed, usage of whose name by non-believers is enough to send Muslim street in a fit of violence.
Much through the winters of 2015, Muslims in cities across India thronged the streets demanding death to Kamlesh Tiwari. No one raising that demand (including Congress party’s UP MLAs) had heard Tiwari say what is being attributed to him, nor have they seen him say that. Just as the repeat of Rangeela Rasool case, liberal intelligentsia and Muslim elites not only spoke in favour of demand for stringent action against Tiwari but remained mum on the violent action/threats of the Muslim street.

Reaction of Uttar Pradesh government mirrored that of then Punjab government 92 years back; which in order to pander to Muslim galleries, arrested Tiwari and filed case against him under dreaded National Security Act and also under Section 153-A, Section 295 and Section 295-A. However, publishers of JNU pamphlet, much like publisher of Unneesvin Sadi ka Maharishi are roaming free.

By writing about the difference in the reaction of Hindu and Muslim streets to JNU and Kamlesh Tiwari respectively, I am not calling for Hindus to do Muslim street on JNU pamphlet writers; on the contrary it is an attempt to build a case for Muslim street doing Hindus on likes of Kamlesh Tiwari. For now, I know it is nothing but a distant dream.
Since history is repeating itself, chances are that Kamlesh Tiwari will be able to avoid punishment in all cases filed against him. What he can’t avoid however, is the risk of joining the likes of Mahashe Rajpal and Nathuramal Sharma; for we know that “sex worker” Durga won’t kill, but “Rangeela” Rasool will.

Over to the Muslim street now!

By Alok Bhatt

The writer is a Chartered Accountant, founder of Nature Connect Outdoors and has a keen interest in politics and economic development.

Credit- The Book on Trial: Fundamentalism and Censorship in India by Girja Kumar

The Indian media ‘Fauxars’ – Awards recognising Faux news

OpIndia Staff
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The Indian media ‘Fauxars’ – Awards recognising Faux news

As the Oscars wrap up, we decided to have our own Awards ceremony to reward path-breaking lows in journalism in the last year. Here are the illustrious winners:

1. Award for Best Script

It was a tough call, but after deep introspection, the jury decided to award the narrative of “Christians Under Attack” in Modi’s India. It takes great imagination to take a handful of incidents and weave a story around the same. This gets even harder when you realise that most of the incidents did not even fit in the narrative. It is a testament of Indian media’s indomitable spirit that they did not let such small issues as facts get in their way. The meat ban narrative came in a close second.

2. Award for Best Original Screenplay

Although “Christians Under Attack” too had a solid screenplay, as in, it played out just before the Delhi elections, the “Award Wapsi” screenplay was much tighter. The sheer intricacy of the operation in synchronising so many actors who normally do not act, the flow of the narrative and how it climaxed just in time for Bihar elections and then disappeared without a trace, these were the things which weighed heavily in the minds of the jury while awarding this.

3. Award for Best Editing

No competition here, NDTV’s Sreenivasan Jain wins this hands down, for his stellar editing in Baba Ramdev’s interview where he chose to show 2 different question and answers together to create something when nothing was there.

4. Award for Best Costume

This award is being shared by many in the media fraternity. Rana Ayyub and Sagarika Ghose share this award for designing Modi’s non-existent Louis Vuitton Shawl. It was actually a plain shawl from Vimal, but thanks to the dedication and fabrication of Ayyub and Ghose, it became a Louis Vuitton shawl, which even the brand denied to have ever made. Honourable mention to the media persons who made Modi’s suit worth Rs 10 lakh, although Rahul Gandhi has been increasing the cost of this suit in every speech.

5. Award for Best Dialogues

Writing the words which other people say is always hard. This becomes even harder when the other people haven’t even said those words. Further, this is indeed a challenge when you are writing dialogues for a former dialogue writer himself. Hence, this award goes to Rajdeep Sardesai, for claiming that Salim Khan had said some dialogues which he had actually never said:

16. Award for Best Make Up

This award is not like the traditional “Make-Up”award. This is given to the journalist/media person who “makes up” the best story out of nowhere. This award goes to PTI for “making up” the news story that Sadhvi Prachi is a BJP MP. Sadhvi has never been elected to any post via a BJP ticket, but this didn’t stop PTI from declaring her a BJP MP. What makes this feat eve more special is the fact that this story has stuck, with media houses even now, calling her a BJP MP, inspite of numerous corrections.

7. Award for Best Special Effects

This award goes to ABP News, for showing us a picture of Vasundhara Raje and  Kiran Mazumdar Shaw from an awkward angle and then claiming that this was a lip-lock.

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8. Award for Best Comedy

Comedies which are written with the intention to make one laugh are good. But the best comedies are those which make you laugh unintentionally. The award this year, goes to one such comedy written by ace writer Rana Ayyub: That RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat was behind the rape of Nun in West Bengal. It was later conclusively proven that the rapists were some Bangladeshis, and this makes it a fabulous comedy of how a journalist sitting miles away can crack a case much before the cops.

9. Award for Best Action

Some have tried, some have given up, but none can come close to the sheer number of edge of the seat thrills this man produces. Arnab Goswami is the winner of the Best Action award, for constantly giving us thrilling sequences where tempers fly, voices soar, noise ensues and some-one gets beaten up real bad.

10. Award for Best Foreign Media

Just like Movie awards have a category called “Best Foreign Feature Film”, we have an award for the best Foreign Media. We didn’t have to look far. Although it is called the “Indian” Express, it has proved many times its thoughts are far from Indians. This was best expressed when they ran a headline called “And They Hanged Him” when Yakub Memon was hanged. The clear indication that The Indian Express considers India to be “They” showed that the media house was in fact not Indian.

11. Award for Best Actor

Undoubtedly, India’s best actor from the media has been Rajdeep Sardesai. He has acted as if he cares for the facts and truth, as if he cares for India, as if he cared for the murder of Prashanth Poojary, and also as if he is neutral. 1 man playing so many roles is indeed a tough task. He even acted as if he was conducting a tough interview of Arvind Kejriwal, when behind the scenes, his bonhomie with Kejriwal was plain to see:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dyk8IYThs4]

12. Award for Best Actress

No competition here too. They say pictures speak a thousand words, and the following picture will clearly show, why Barkha Dutt deserves the award for Best Actress, for her heart-moving, stomach-churning performance here:

Nine out of Ten people failed to identify who is mourning and who is the TV journalist in this picture

13. Award for Best Production

This award in ordinarily given to the financier, the person or group which backs a media house so that they can redefine the lows of journalism in today’s scenario. But when we tried to trace down the main financial backer of most media houses, we were led to a non-media person. Hence, this award has been given to Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, for backing media houses across the country, even though he is only the Delhi CM. Kejriwal first increased the Delhi advertisement budget from a mere Rs 33 crores to a whopping Rs 526 crores. Secondly, he acted in a very unselfish manner in splurging this money across TV channels and Newspapers, not only in Delhi, but all across India. We have been told that this year if his ads spread to International Media, he may have chance to win an Oscar.

14. Award for Best Direction

This award is reserved for the head-honcho, the man behind all the successful stories of the year. And this award goes to Dr Prannoy Roy. A stalwart in his field, he has taken NDTV in a direction where it is now going towards the bottom of the TRP ladder. Not only this, he has been the guiding force behind all of NDTV’s allegedly snoopy dealings and fake stories.

P.S. We have been informed that a fair number of the awardees have already returned their awards.

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