Friday, November 15, 2024
Home Blog Page 5948

Lockheed Martin unveils F-21, a different multirole fighter aircraft specifically configured for Indian Air Force

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Lockheed Martin unveils F-21, a different multirole fighter aircraft specifically configured for Indian Air Force

Underlining the emergence of India as a major defence customer in the world, US aviation major Lockheed Martin has offered India a new fighter jet, designated F-21. The company made the announcement about its offer at the Aero India show in Bengaluru today. The single-engine fighter plane has been designed specifically for Indian Air Force, in an effort to win the multi-billion deal for fighter planes that India will buy.


Vice president of Strategy and Business Development for Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Dr. Vivek Lall said that “the F-21 is different, inside and out. The aircraft is specifically configured for Indian Air Force requirements”. This new offering highlights the company’s commitment to delivering an advanced, scalable fighter aircraft to the Indian Air Force that also provides unrivalled industrial opportunities and accelerates closer India-US cooperation on advanced technologies, Lall said.

The company also unveiled a video of the aircraft today.

Lockheed Martin will build the plane in collaboration with Tata Advanced Systems, the company announced. Tata Advanced Systems is already a strategic partner of Lockheed Martin, and wings of F‑16 jets are being made in India under this partnership.

As India’s bid to buy 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) was cancelled in 2015 and the Modi government opted to purchase 36 Rafale jets directly from France as a stop-gap measure, the Indian Air Force has invited Request for Information (RFI) for the purchase of 110 fighter jets. Seven contenders have responded to the RFI, Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, Dassault Rafale, Eurofighter Typhoon, Saab Gripen, Russian United Aircraft Corporation’s MiG-35, Su-35, while initially Lockheed Martin had offered the F-16 Falcon jet. Other than the Su-35, the other six were the contenders in the earlier bid for 126 jets too, which was won by Rafale before the deal was cancelled.

As per the RFI for 110 jets, 15% of the aircraft should be delivered in flyaway condition and the rest 85% will have to be manufactured in India by a Strategic Partner.

Although Lockheed Martin has said it is a different aircraft from both outside and inside, and has given it a new name, F‑21 is not a completely new design. The aircraft is most probably an upgraded version of the F‑16V Block 70. The numbering of 21 is significant, as it is just below 22, the number allotted to the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, a two-engine fifth generation aircraft used solely by US Air Force. The Raptor cannot be exported outside the USA due to a ban by the federal government to protect its stealth and other hi-tech features. The India specific F21, like the F16V, will share several components of the F22.

UNHCHR: A hypocritical, biased and defunct institution that deserves only ridicule and condemnation

K Bhattacharjee
-
0
UNHCHR: A hypocritical, biased and defunct institution that deserves only ridicule and condemnation

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) Michelle Bachelet has condemned the Pulwama Terror Attack and has called upon authorities to bring those responsible to justice.

“The High Commissioner strongly condemns the suicide bomb attack against Indian security forces in Pulwama district of Jammu and Kashmir on 14 February and calls on authorities to bring those responsible to justice,” spokesperson for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Rupert Colville said.

The UN Human Rights speech also expressed concerns about the escalating tensions between India and Pakistan and hoped that the events “will not add further to the insecurity in the region”.

Intriguingly, however, Colville said the High Commissioner is also “concerned” by reports from India that “some elements” are using the attack as “justification for threats and potential acts of violence” targeting Kashmiri people living in different parts of India.

“We acknowledge actions taken by the Indian authorities to tackle these incidents and we hope that the Government will continue to take steps to protect people from all forms of harm that may be directed at them on account of their ethnicity or identity,” he added.

The duplicity of the UNHCHR is revealed by the fact that its sermons are reserved only for India while countries that commit the most heinous of human rights violations are given a free pass. As we had reported earlier, the UNHCR had condemned India for deporting 5 Rohingyas while it maintained a stoic silence when Saudi Arabia was busy deporting hundreds of them.

As the UNHCHR’s statement on the fictional narrative of “Kashmiris under attack” shows, it has become an institution that seeks to superimpose itself upon nation states, thus undermining their authority. The Indian government has been providing Kashmiris around the country with adequate security. The only verified instances of ‘attack’ against them are incidents where legal action is being pursued against them for celebrating the deadly terror attack which quite naturally violates the sensibilities of our people. That the UNHCHR cannot condemn the Pulwama attack without mentioning the fictional narrative of “Kashmiris under attack” only reveals its utter moral bankruptcy.

Pakistan’s quite overt support to terrorists has also escaped the attention of the organization, it appears. For decades, Pakistan has been nurturing Jihadists in its soil and yet, the UNHCHR has been unable to put forth an unequivocal condemnation of the country’s political dispensation. If there was any institution on the face of the Earth which had lesser credibility than the Pakistani government, then its the Human Rights division of the United Nations.

Last year, the United States quit the UNHRC calling it a “cesspool of political bias”. Nikki Haley, the then US envoy to the UN called the institution “hypocritical” and that it “makes a mockery of human rights”.

Not just the UNHRC, the United Nations, on the whole, is proving to be a defunct global institution that serves no useful purpose. It has been utterly unable to prevent any human rights violations or wars and has been shown to bark only at those who threaten the status quo of the global order. China hasn’t been made to suffer any consequences for the tremendous human rights violations it commits, Saudi Arabia suffers no consequences for its inhuman war on Yemen, the US and other western countries have walked away without suffering any consequences for destabilizing the entire Middle East. The verdict on the matter is clear, if you have enough power, the UN will bow down and lick your feet. If you are a rising power, it will do everything in its limited capacity to thwart your ambitions.

No woman minister in the second cabinet also of KCR in Telangana, which was expanded from 2 to 12 after 66 days

OpIndia Staff
-
0
No woman minister in the second cabinet also of KCR in Telangana, which was expanded from 2 to 12 after 66 days

Almost two months after the Telangana Rashtra Samiti was elected for its second term in the assembly elections, the state cabinet was expanded, with 10 ministers being sworn in on Tuesday. Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao retained several key portfolios like Finance, IT, urban development and information and public relations.

A simple swearing-in ceremony was held at the Raj Bhavan for the Telangana cabinet expansion.

While there were 16 ministers during the TRS government’s first tenure, the cabinet, as of now, has twelve ministers including the CM and the Home Minister.

Among those who were inducted into the council of ministers were six new faces, S Niranjan Reddy, Koppula Eashwar, Errabelli Dayakar Rao, V Srinivas Goud, Vemula Prashanth Reddy and Ch Malla Reddy. Whereas, A Indrakaran Reddy, Talasani Srinivas Yadav, G Jagadish Reddy and Etela Rajender, who were part of the cabinet in Rao’s previous term, returned as ministers.

However, in a surprising turn of events, KCR’s son KT Rama Rao and nephew T Harish Rao were left out of the cabinet.

Meanwhile, it is speculated that the cabinet will be further expanded post the Lok Sabha elections which are expected to take place in March-May this year. As of now, both of KCR’s trusted associates, KTR and Harish Rao, have been tasked with winning 16 out of the 17 Lok Sabha seats in Telangana. Following the Assembly elections, the CM will take a call on either inducting them into the cabinet or give them a role to play at the national level.

Rao, who had taken the oath as chief minister a little over two months ago, delayed the cabinet formation. All this while a two-member cabinet, including the Home minister Mohammed Mahmood Ali and KCR himself, ran the show until finally a 10 member cabinet was sworn in a few days ahead of the budget session of the Assembly. After the expansion, the strength of Telangana council of ministers has risen to 12.

None of the woman members could make it to the Council of Ministers. Rao’s first Cabinet also did not have any woman minister.

Andhra Pradesh and Telangana Governor ESL Narasimhan administered the oath of office and secrecy to the newly-inducted ministers at Raj Bhavan, in the presence of the Chief Minister.

On December 11, 2018, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi came back to power after winning 88 seats out of 119 assembly seats. On December 13, KCR took the oath as the Chief Minister along with Mahmood Ali who was sworn in as the Home Minister.

Kashmiri student writes ‘This was not a terrorist attack, this is returns of what you did to Kashmiri people’, gets rusticated

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Kashmiri student writes ‘This was not a terrorist attack, this is returns of what you did to Kashmiri people’, gets rusticated

Kashmiri medical student studying at SGT Medical College in Gurugram, Haryana, was rusticated from her college after her social media post in support of Pulwama terror attack which claimed lives of 44 CRPF soldiers.

In her post, the student identified as Sadaf Zaffar, a second-year student of Bachelor of Radiology and Imaging Technology had reportedly posted “I don’t like this incident but if you rape Kashmiri women, use pellet guns, kill innocent people and make Kashmiri children blind with needles, what will you get? This was not terrorist attack. This is returns of what you did with Kashmiri people. Use love not guns against Kashmir.”

She also posted a photograph of the blast site and said, “not 40, but 400 must have been killed.”

The Office of Registrar of the institute said that the university shall not tolerate any such indiscipline inside the campus and rusticated her with immediate effect. Zaffar was then asked to leave the hostel immediately following the protest.

Read also: Scroll whitewashes celebrations of Pulwama attack, instead targets those who complained about celebrations

Following the ghastly attack on the CRPF convoy in Pulwama on February 14, even as people across the country expressed grief and mourned the dead, there were a few who were busy celebrating the terror attack. Following complaints raised by many social media users as well as the colleagues of those who were celebrating, many students and employees were suspended and arrested for the celebratory posts.

Patna HC slams ‘lifetime entitlement’ rule of Bihar government, asks former CMs to vacate bungalows

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Patna HC slams ‘lifetime entitlement’ rule of Bihar government, asks former CMs to vacate bungalows

The Patna High Court on Tuesday quashed a bill which enabled the former Chief Minister’s to live in government bungalows for life. Calling the bill as “unconstitutional and a drain on the exchequer”, a division bench of the court headed by Chief Justice AP Shahi, ordered former Bihar chief ministers to vacate their bungalows.

The HC order comes as a major setback to Rabri Devi and Lalu Prasad, who have been living at 10, Circular Road. Former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi has been staying at a Strand Road bungalow. Also, Jagannath Mishra and Satish Prasad Singh, are expected to comply with the order and vacate the government bungalows provided to them at Hardinge Road in Patna’s VVIP area.

However, the HC said that a former CM may not need to vacate a bungalow if he or she is entitled to the same category.

The Patna HC reportedly came down heavily on the rules and cabinet resolution of the Bihar government which had ensured that former CMs continue to enjoy sprawling bungalows and other perks for their lifetime.

The HC bench of Justices AP Shahi and Anjana Mishra termed the rules as “predatory instincts for misuse of public exchequer and an act of the state government going beyond its ethical and legal limits”.

The High court had also served a notice on CM Nitish Kumar but withdrew it after the state government told the court that the said bungalow on 7, Circular Road, is allotted to the Chief Secretary.

The Patna HC’ order came keeping in view the Supreme court order, which last year, struck down section 4(3) of the UP Ministers (Salaries, Allowances, and Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1981, which granted permanent accommodation to former chief ministers (CMs), saying that they aren’t eligible for government bungalows. The Supreme Court had said that the former chief ministers cannot be granted such facilities as they aren’t holding offices and asked former chief ministers in Uttar Pradesh to vacate the bungalows allotted to them when they were in power.

Following the last year’s order, former UP chief ministers Narayan Dutt Tiwari, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Kalyan Singh, Mayawati, Rajnath Singh, and Akhilesh Yadav had to vacate their official houses.

The decision by the Patna HC has come to further add to the bungalow worries for the family of Lalu Prasad Yadav. His sons, Tej Pratap Yadav and Tejaswi Yadav were both ordered to vacate their government allocated bungalows after RJD fell out of power. While Tej Pratap had left his bungalow claiming that CM Nitish Kumar had unleashed ghosts to haunt him in the building, Tejaswi had tried to hold on to his bungalow by taking legal measures.

Recently, the SC had rejected Tejaswi’s plea against the Patna HC order to vacate the bungalow immediately and also pay Rs 50,000 as a penalty.

Article 370 must go: BJP can’t pussyfoot any longer

Ashish Shukla
-
0
Article 370 must go: BJP can’t pussyfoot any longer

There is no reason why Article 370 of the Indian Constitution in favour of Jammu and Kashmir must not go.

Before we debate the legality/feasibility of abrogation of Article 370, it’s important we bring home to readers its misuse which neither seems to concern the Centre nor to the pseudo-secular gang who control the discourse in this country.

The Jammu and Kashmir assembly lasts for six years. It has a separate text for oath. Its constitution doesn’t have “secularism” or “socialism” words in its preamble. And don’t you think that Prevention of Corruption Act (1988); Indian Penal Code, Domestic Violence Act, Religious Act of 1988, Protection of Wild Animals Act, Forest Rights or Urban Land Ceiling Acts apply to J & K. Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) can’t operate without the approval of the J & K government or the High Court. Supreme Court can only hear cases on appeal.

Further, the People’s Representation Act doesn’t apply to the state. Jammu may have more population, more voters and a larger area but it’s Kashmir which has more assembly seats: 47 to Jammu’s 37. Mandal commission report has no mandate in the state. Reservations to SC/STs, provided only in 1991, still don’t allow them representation in politics and the state assembly (Ever seen Mayawati agitated on the matter?).

Says Prashanth Vaidyaraj in Swarajyamag: “Though 73rd (provision for Panchyat Raj, 1993) and 74th (provisions for local administrative bodies, 1993) Amendments in J&K have been made, the state government has refused to enact them into laws. So there is no democratic decentralization. The Panchayat Elections are still held under its archaic 1989 laws. The J&K Right to Information (RTI) Act gives more power to the state government than provided for in the Central Act. (So there remains no accountability to special employment packages or Prime Ministers package regularly provided for)”.

The subsidy to J&K meanwhile is grossly uneven even at the state level. The Kashmir Valley gets financial allocation more than what Jammu and Ladakh divisions put together are provided for. The per-capita subsidy to J & K is 16 times more than West Bengal and 12 times more than Bihar.

Freedom of press to cover legislative assembly proceedings doesn’t work in J&K. The ministers’ quota on education and employment may be 15% elsewhere in the country, in J&K it’s 30%.

And what do you think Article 370 does to Sikh or Hindu minorities?  These minorities who migrated from West Pakistan in 1947 are not considered citizens of J&K under Article 6 of the state’s Constitution as they came from outside the undivided J&K. Meanwhile, those, who left Kashmir for Pakistan during the Partition, are welcomed back and could claim their properties or suitable compensation.

About 150 families from the Valmiki Samaj were brought in 1956 for cleaning works with the assurance they would be granted the status of state’s subject. But it has come only in the case of “bhangis” (sweepers).  Presently, their residential colonies remain un-regularized. Even the interlocutors’ report of Government of India is silent on the matter. Human Rights Activists have no problem that the “Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993” is not applicable to J&K.

So what’s this Article 370 which allows J&K to function much against the national (or for that matter, it’s own) interests?

When Pakistan sent its infiltrators to J&K in 1946-47 and illegally occupied parts of it, the matter went to the United Nations (UN). But since the state’s functions couldn’t be postponed, Article 370 was temporarily introduced. It limited the power of the Parliament to make laws for J&K, but for Defence, External Affairs and Communications. Noticeably, it doesn’t make provisions for the state to have a separate Constitution.

In due course, Article 35A and Presidential Order of 1954 were added. In Article 35A, the state government of J&K has defined the term “Permanent Residents” which bars non-residents from purchasing land in J&K or access to public sector jobs or welfare schemes. This article was illegally inserted in the Constitution by Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, who made president Rajendra Prasad to amend the Constitution through his fiat instead of getting the Parliament’s mandate. The presidential order for 1954 provides that no bill to increase or diminish the area of the state or altering its boundaries can be introduced in the Parliament without the consent of the state legislature.

Article 370 was only an additional legislative measure to facilitate the transition of J&K’s accession to the Union of India. In 1950, the Government of India clarified the effect of Article 370 in a white paper on Indian states. Importantly, the Constituent Assembly was to make a recommendation to the President to either abrogate Article 370 or “direct that it shall apply with such modifications and exceptions as he may specify.”

Thus, Article 370 arms the President of India to make amendments without seeking the approval of the Parliament. Article 368 also empowers the Parliament to amend the Constitution with an additional provision in Article 370 (1) (b) and Article 370 (3).

Article 370 makes a mockery of Article 14 which guarantees equality before the law and the principles of liberty: as we have seen, not everyone living in J&K can vote in the election to the state assembly. As Supreme Court ruled in Keshavananda Bharati vs State of Kerala case, any law which interferes with the “basic structure” of the Constitution (equality of status and opportunity to all citizens of India) will be struck down as void. Further, Article 15 prohibits discrimination on the basis of religion, case, sex, place of birth or race.

In view of the Pulwama attack, it’s as good a time as any for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to take an aggressive stand on the matter. But what could you expect from the party which doesn’t harp on abrogating the 370 Article since 1998?

Clearly, the idea of providing Kashmiris with the fruits of Indian secularism is not working. Instead, the clamour of “Azadi” has gone up.

NDTV does what it does best: First spreads falsehood over Vande Bharat Express, now twists PM Modi’s statement

OpIndia Staff
-
0
NDTV does what it does best: First spreads falsehood over Vande Bharat Express, now twists PM Modi’s statement

Keeping up with their past record of twisting statements and creating fake news, the controversial media portal NDTV has again twisted a statement by the Prime Minister and made it into a misleading headline.

The controversial NDTV, often known for propagating fake news deliberately indulged in propagating false claims after it twisted the statements of the Prime Minister to suit its political narrative. NDTV, in its attempt to target the PM, reported with a misleading headline indicating that PM Modi sought punishment against people whosoever mocked Train-18.

A misleading headline by the NDTV to target PM Modi

In reality, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday had hit out at people who were mocking Vande Bharat Express, the fastest train of India, which had faced an external hit on the trial run on Saturday and stopped for a while. He had termed the comments against the train an “insult” to efforts of engineers and technicians.

The PM had said, “I salute engineering professionals, who will in future make a bullet train in India and run it too. I am getting a letter of people who are hurt”, the PM said asking them, “Is it right to insult engineers and technicians? Is mocking them right. Can they be pardoned? Should they not be given the right punishment at the right time?”

However, the PM’s statement was for the people to ‘punish’ the naysayers and mockers of hardworking Indian engineers and technicians. It is clear from his statement that he was asking the people of India to ‘punish’ the politicians by not voting for them.

NDTV’s sly attempt to peddle anti-Modi propaganda with a misleading headline was also called out by many on social media.


Congress President Rahul Gandhi, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, and many others had used the event of technical slag of Train-18 to target the NDA government. They had even gone ahead to brand ‘Make In India’ a failure and had mocked Prime Minister Narendra Modi over reports of India’s fastest train, Vande Bharat Express suffering a breakdown.

Earlier, In a rush to discredit the success of India’s fastest train ‘Vande Bharat Express‘, the Congress-backed left-wing channel had deliberately ignored the fact of the cattle hit and presented their report as if Train-18 had stopped due to an internal technical fault while trying to discredit NDA government for its successful initiative.

The Vande Bharat Express had successfully completed its first commercial run on the very next day without any snag. However, the people who were so vocally mocking the failure were nowhere to be seen to appreciate the successful commercial runs of India’s fastest train.

The report was retweeted and shared by actor-turned-politician Divya Spandana, who is also Congress IT cell chief,  to not only propagate fake news but to pass some insensitive statements regarding the recent Pulwama terror attack.

Human Rights Watch publishes report on ‘violent cow protection’ based on faulty data, NYTimes peddles it further

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Human Rights Watch publishes report on ‘violent cow protection’ based on faulty data, NYTimes peddles it further

Human Rights Watch (HRW), self-proclaimed defenders of human rights, on Monday published a report titled ‘Violent Cow Protection in India’ claiming that since the BJP came to power in 2014, the party members have “increasingly used communal rhetoric that has spurred a violent vigilante campaign against beef consumption and those deemed linked to it”.

The report asserts that the attacks led by “so-called cow protection groups” many of which claim to be “affiliated to militant Hindu groups that often have ties to the BJP”. “Their victims are largely Muslim or from Dalit (formerly known as “untouchables”) and Adivasi (indigenous) communities,” the report further states.

HRW cites faulty ‘fact-checker’ with the dubious and incomplete database, factchecker.in, for their report. The New York Times, which had earlier referred to saree as the ‘tool of Hindu nationalist campaign‘ piggybacked on the faulty report based on faulty data to peddle the narrative that the “murders of religious minorities in India go unpunished”.

Read also: New York Times uses lies to insult victims of Godhra carnage in a report on Gulbarg Society judgement

Journalist Swati Goel Sharma, who seems to have taken it upon herself as a personal mission to call out factchecker.in’s faulty database, took to Twitter to call out the flawed data.


We have earlier reported how IndiaSpend’s fact-checking website, factchecker.in in its cow-related hate crimes database, the very one which was relied upon by HRW and in-turn NYTimes, was incomplete, flawed and heavily biased. The report had mentioned how 90% of such crimes took place after Modi took office as Prime Minister. However, the database had hardly included any cow-related violence before Modi took office in its database from 2009 to 2018.

This biased reporting of ‘facts’ which are twisted as per convenience and narrative is not new. Earlier we had reported how Hindustan Times had started a similarly biased ‘hate tracker’ which focussed only on identity-based crime reporting of Dalits and Muslims. Their hate tracker also conveniently ignored hate crimes against people belonging to certain political or religious inclination are conveniently ignored, and so are crimes perpetrated by people belonging to certain political or religious ideology. The ‘hate tracker’ was supposedly tracking hate crime from September 2015 onward, but had conveniently missed out on reporting hate crimes when the victim was a Hindu or the one time when one Farooq, who identified himself as an atheist and a free thinker was killed by a radical Muslim group.

But the mainstream media has been actively promoting how the ‘cow-related’ violence has increased in India after Modi came to power. Abhishek Banerjee, a columnist with OpIndia, had written about how IndiaSpend (the same people who run the ‘factchecker’) have regularly indulged in peddling this narrative. They had earlier filed a report how 87 people had died in cow-related violence since 2010, of which 97% of the crimes happened after Modi came to power. The above ‘interactive fact-check’ map is an extension of the same report’. As can be seen even then that their ‘research’ was based on ‘Google search’ with particular keywords.

In fact, the bias is so heavy, that despite their own ground reporter who went on a fact-finding mission for an incident reported as ‘hate crime’ and finding out that there was no communal angle to the incident, factchecker.in had not even removed the ‘hate crime’ from their database after over a week. This, when the media report on basis of which the ‘hate crime’ was added to the database clearly stated that there was no communal angle. To summarize, an incident takes place in Meerut where a bunch of Muslim men attack a boy over a game of cricket. FIR is filed. To settle scores on this FIR, a fake story is created by Abid, a Muslim man, claiming that he was thrashed. Police investigated and concluded that no attack took place on Abid and he had acted on his employer’s instruction. This part is included in the Times of India report as well, which factchecker.in had taken as a base report for their ‘hate-crime tracker’.

Read also: NYT’s racism and elitism is full display after Indian company opens Manufacturing unit in the US

That NYTimes carried out the report, without following basic due diligence and journalistic ethics does not come as much of a surprise. In the past, too, NYTimes has exploited children’s deaths to malign Yogi Government’s crackdown on illegal slaughterhouses in Uttar Pradesh. In an op-ed about India that was centred around the CBI raids at the residences of Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy, the founder promoters of NDTV. The editorial was titled ‘India’s Battered Free Press’ which read like a textbook case of how it has been distorting the truth.

NYTimes’ former Delhi bureau chief Ellen Barry had also indulged in white-washing the 2002 Godhra carnage where as many as 59 people were burnt alive in a train. She had also spread lies to insult the victims of Godhra carnage in her report on the Gulbarg Society verdict. NYTimes also encourages troll-like behaviour while reporting on democratically elected public representatives where being ‘liberal’ is associated with smoking, drinking and Hindu woman having Muslim friends and boyfriend.

Congress backed Srinagar deputy mayor boasts about ISI links, says can have politicians assassinated by terrorists

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Congress backed Srinagar deputy mayor boasts about ISI links, says can have politicians assassinated by terrorists

The political and security situation in the state of Jammu and Kashmir has remained tense in the last few days after the dreadful Pulwama attack that claimed the lives of 40 CRPF personnel. In such a situation, a chilling sting video has appeared where the deputy mayor of Srinagar is seen claiming close ties with ISI in Pakistan and several terrorist groups, including their top commanders.

As reported by Times Now, the sting video, the authenticity of which is yet to be verified, shows Srinagar deputy mayor Sheikh Imran blatantly claiming that he has deep ties with Pakistan’s ISI and terrorist groups operating in the valley. He also claims that it is easy for him to get his political rivals eliminated.


In the video, Imran is seen claiming to the person behind the camera that he can “bomb his walls within minutes”. He also says that he had faked an attack on himself in the past.

He also claims that it was him who had sent former CM Mehbooba Mufti to Dubai for the Indo-Pak conference and separatist leaders Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Saeed Ahmed Shah Geelani meet only the people whom he (Imran) wants them to.

In the video, Sheikh also boasts of his ties to ISI top brass and his close links with Hizbul commander Riyaz Naikoo. In a shocking revelation, Imran also claims he can have MP Sajjad Lone and Srinagar mayor Junaid Azim Mattoo assassinated.

After the video was circulated, Srinagar mayor Junaid Azim Mattoo has expressed concern over the nefarious links between the Congress-backed politician and terrorist organisations.


Mattoo further shared that in the video, the deputy mayor is also seen boasting that he can send terrorists to the house of a corporator and force him to join PDP. He also stated that Imran’s revelations pose a grave security threat not only for politicians but also for people in general because the deputy mayor enjoys power and police protection due to his political status.

Co-founder of self-proclaimed ‘fact-checking’ blog, AltNews, spreads another fake news by using ‘cropped video’

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Co-founder of self-proclaimed ‘fact-checking’ blog, AltNews, spreads another fake news by using ‘cropped video’

Zubair, co-founder of self-proclaimed fact-checking portal AltNews, which often indulges in co-ordinated attacks against social media users with the help of Islamists, has yet again spread fake news in an attempt to incite communal violence.

Zubair, a sidekick of the founder of AltNews Pratik Sinha, who likes to stalk and doxx people, shared a cropped video claiming that some members of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) of Gonda, Uttar Pradesh had raised some anti-national slogans during a protest rally against Pakistan in the wake of Pulwama terror attack by Islamic terrorists. He urged his followers to retweet the same ‘cropped’ video so that fake propaganda can be shared across the platform to incite communal disharmony.


However, the Gonda police soon issued a statement rejecting the claims of Zubair. They clarified that there were no such ‘anti-India’ slogans which were raised at the protests. The Gonda Police in its statements said the videos pertaining to the VHP protest march is being used for ‘corrupt’ purposes and stated that no such slogans were raised during the event.


The Gonda Police also posted videos of the event to falsify the claims of fake-news portal Alt-News. In the video, it can be clearly seen that there were slogans against the terrorist state of Pakistan, contrary to what Zubair claims.


Despite the clarification issued by the Gonda police, the fake news peddler of self-proclaimed fact-checking website AltNews has neither deleted the tweet nor issued an apology for the same.

This is not the first time that Alt News has indulged in targetting national accounts for expressing their utmost respect for the country. Recently, it had resorted to doxing against nationalist account named Squint Neon (@squintneon) after it had exposed a few Islamists accounts. The Alt-News not only doxxed the details of the social media user but also let-off several Islamists to target the user, inviting a barrage of life threats to Squint neon.

Alt-News founder Pratik Sinha has been notoriously known for doxing and leaking of private information of nationalist social media users and accounts critical of Islamists, Congress party, etc. Earlier, a Twitter user had filed a case against Sinha for breach of privacy and claimed Rs 5 crore in damages. He had also displayed his stalker tendencies (the ones which could morph into even dangerous crimes if not controlled) against Journalist Rahul Roushan by targeting his wife and his newborn 2-month-old daughter.

Self-proclaimed ‘fact-checking’ website AltNews, which is funded by fake-news peddler Arundhati Roy has often been caught lying blatantly and have seldom corrected themselves. Recently, they sought to ‘fact-check’ a ‘clipped’ video of journalist Barkha Dutt but interestingly, left out the quotes where she was actually giving a context to the genocide of Kashmiri Pandits in the valley. Altnews ‘fact-checked’ a retired major from the Army, but willy-nilly refused to respond to his side of the story. Altnews fact-checked a fake image in circulation without bothering to name the ones using that fake image. One of their co-founders happily furthers genocidal accounts wishing for death upon anyone who doesn’t subscribe to the leftist cult. The co-founder of Altnews spread lies about ease of doing business rankings. He shared a fake image of BJP leader BS Yeddyurappa right before the Karnataka elections.

The website did some strange mumbo-jumbo analysis to debunk the news of several youths raising anti-India slogans. The Bihar DGP debunked Altnews claims. They are funded by a fake news purveyor, Arundhati Roy (BBC might be reluctant to admit that Roy is a fake news disseminator, but they can read up here). The co-founder doesn’t bother to fact-check even when fake news hits him in the face as long as it conforms to his political bias and the co-founder of Altnews has retweeted fake images in the past.

Altnews has debunked eyewitness accounts in the past without any conclusive proof because it suited their narrative. Spread lies about OpIndia.com itself and also about BJP’s stand, in retail FDI.

1...5,9475,9485,949...6,962Page 5,948 of 6,962

Contact: [email protected]

About us

News and opinion website that brings you reports and narrative from a perspective often ignored or suppressed by the mainstream media of India.

Follow us

© OpIndia.com