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Mannargudi Jeeyar Swami – a Hindu Acharya being targeted by vested interests

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Mannargudi Jeeyar Swami – a Hindu Acharya being targeted by vested interests

Sri Chendalankara Sampath Kumara Ramanuja Jeeyar is a Sri Vaishnava sannyasi and the pontiff of the Mannargudi Chendalakara Shenbaka Mannar Matha. Pontiffs of Sri Vaishnava Mathas are referred to by the title ‘Jeeyar Swamigal’. Jeeyar Swamigal is popularly known as the Mannargudi Jeeyar, after the town the Matah operates out of.

The line of succession at the Mannargudi Matha was broken and the pontiffhood was vacant for 125 years before the current seer was ordained.

In his pontiffhood, along with his regular religious and cultural duties, the Mannargudi Jeeyar has taken it upon himself to reach out to Dalit communities and the most marginalized groups such as the Arundhatiyar, who very often live in segregated colonies in villages. Many of them are landless and work as casual labourers in agriculture and small industries. A good number are also employed in traditional occupations of public conservancy, leather and in cremation grounds.

Another cause dear to the Mannargudi Jeeyar is that of cow protection. The Matha runs a goshala taking care of 51 cows under his supervision.

Outreach to Dalit communities

The Mannargudi Jeeyar frequently visits colonies of marginalized Dalit communities. He conducts Lakshmi Pujas there and makes it a point to interact with children and visit homes in the colonies.

He has given Pancha Samskaram – an initiation into the Sri Vaishnava community for lay worshippers – to hundreds of people, including people from the most marginalized Dalit communities.

He openly speaks against conversion activities by other religions and insists on Hindu unity.

During the floods in 2015, the Matha under the direct supervision of the Jeer engaged in rescue and relief mission in Cuddalore, one of the worst affected districts.

It has been documented that natural calamities are seen by proselytisers as an opportunity to find new converts. A case in point is the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, after which many coastal communities in Tamil Nadu saw many new converts.

Intervention to stop conversion effort

A Bhadrakali Amman temple in Kallimedu village, Nagapattinam District had some dispute regarding offering of mandagapadi (custom where the village deity visits streets/homes in the village). It remained deadlocked for years.

Some elements tried to escalate this into a Dalit-Caste Hindu clash and tried to get the Dalits of the village to convert. The Mannargudi Jeeyar visited the village, called all communities to the temple, performed a Lakshmi Homam and reiterated the need for Hindus to stay united.

Interesting aside – the English language media chose only to highlight the conflict and escalation, but chose to ignore the resolution brought about by the Mannargudi Jeeyar.

Vested interests decide to target Swami for his work

Obviously, these outreach activities are irksome to various interests

  • Religious groups that focus on converting people from marginalized groups in the Hindu fold
  • Political parties that view Dalits as vote banks and that would view any outreach by Hindu leaders as an attempt to cut into their influence among Dalit communities.

They have been looking to get back at Jeeyar Swami for long, and finally they got one thanks to the ‘cow vigilantes’ narrative being pushed by the media.

Recently, Mannargudi Jeeyar was attacked by violent mobs of Islamist and communist elements. It is fast being twisted into a case of gau-raksha vigilantism. It is our intention to place the facts before the public before the event is beamed through Mainstream Media’s ‘reality distortion lens’.

What really happened

On June 29th, the Mannargudi Jeeyar was travelling near Palani in Tamil Nadu when he saw cattle being transported in cramped conditions. He brought the van to the Palani police station and lodged a complaint demanding that the transport be carried out in conditions fulfilling norms of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act.

Members of Communist organizations, Islamic organizations and the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK – an electoral party that claims to be Dalitist, Periyarist and crusading for Dalit human rights) arrived at the police station and started protesting. Even the left-leaning newspaper The Hindu has reported this incident without the usual distortion (screenshot).

Fearing for the Mannargudi Jeeyar and his entourage’s safety, the police took them into the station premises. (Tamil report in leading daily, Dina Thanthi).

In the meantime, activists from the Shiv Sena and RSS also arrived at the police station. Appropriate transport was arranged for the cattle. However, the group of Islamist, Communist and VCK cadre are reported to have indulged in stone throwing, because of which Ashok, a Shiv Sena activist, was injured.

Media distortion begins

The first step in the distortion began with a reference in a recent Frontline long-form essay. This was unattributed and the Mannargudi Jeeyar is left unnamed, since the essay appears too soon after the incident.

Clearly the intention is to pave the way for a later full-fledged distortion. The first steps were then made by VCK cadres on social media.

A complaint requesting appropriate transportation for cows has been twisted into an attempt at ‘disrupting communal harmony’.

The Facebook page of this particular individual claiming allegiance to the VCK reveals some interesting information about his views on the Indian State and he has also posted inflammatory content on the anniversary of Burhan Wani’s 1st ‘death anniversary’.

Once the distortion was spread on the social media by hateful groups, it has now been picked up by the allied elements in the mainstream media.

India Today has published a report out of Chennai, labelling the Mannargudi Jeeyar as a ‘self-acclaimed godman’ and mis-representing his complaint. Notably, they mis-represent the people opposing the Mannargudi Jeeyar’s complaint as cattle transporters’ even though it is clear that they are cadres from VCK and Islamist organisations. This is obviously filed by reporters who only had second-hand information about the incident.

A Hindustan Times report is relatively less negatively disposed towards the Mannargudi Jeeyar, but it still does not identify the persons injured in the stone pelting.

While The Hindu and Dina Thanthi are news outlets with presence on the ground in Dindigul, where the incident occurred, one wonders what the sources of India Today and Hindustan Times reports were. And one fears what else is there in the future.

It is clear that Mannargudi Jeeyar is being targeted mainly for his activities like his outreach to the Dalit community. Elements in the English language media have many times openly declared that they should focus on caste fault-lines, especially around Dalits, to defeat what they brand as ‘Hindutva’. Anyone trying to work towards eliminating these fault-lines risk being seen as people who are denying them an opportunity to defeat Hindutva, and perhaps Mannargudi Jeeyar Swami is being punished for this.

(report compiled by @dasyavevrka,  @paanchajanyaa, @Maha_Krish, @zeneraalstuff)

Media paints a converted terrorist as Hindu to propagate ‘Saffron Terror’ narrative

OpIndia Staff
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Media paints a converted terrorist as Hindu to propagate ‘Saffron Terror’ narrative

Since Monday, the Indian media has been abuzz with news headlines like:

  • Hindu LeT terrorist arrested in Kashmir [TOI]
  • Lashkar-e-Taiba has a Hindu face, his name is Sandeep Sharma [DNA]
  • What We Know About Sandeep Sharma, the Hindu LeT Militant [Quint]

All these articles reported that a Hindu man named Sandeep Sharma had become part of the terror organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba and was responsible for a variety of crimes like robbing banks, ATMs, snatching weapons and even killing cops.

He was dubbed as as the first Hindu Lashkar ‘militant’ by the media which reported that he hailed from Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh. The DNA article even carried an analysis which stated that “The fact that a Hindu is enlisted in the ranks of jihadi terrorists is a cause for major concern for the security authorities, since profiling Islamic terrorists now becomes trickier than before”. 

Media reports also claimed that the ‘Hindu terrorist’ Sandeep Sharma used to operate under the alias of Adil and used to live with two identities. So going by the reports, he was a Hindu who was using a Muslim name only to execute his work under multiple identities.

It was soon picked up by various individuals to insinuate the whole “Hindu terror” narrative:


The truth though seems to be completely different from what is being portrayed by a section of the media, especially the English language media.

According to reports [1][2] Sandeep had joined the terror organisation, after converting from Hinduism to Islam. According to these reports, incidentally appearing in local Hindi media, Sandeep had relocated to Kashmir in 2012 to work as a welder.

The reports then claim that he in that period fell in love with a Kashmiri girl, after which he changed his name to Adil by converting to Islam.

His foray into crime reportedly began when he met Kulgam resident Saheed Ahmed and those two along with Munib and Muzaffar Ahmed founded a gang. Then after indulging in criminal activity for some time, came in contact with Lashkar terrorist Shukar Ahmed, which ensued Adil/Sandeep’s association with the terror outfit.

Adil used to use both his Muslim and Hindu name to confuse the security agencies, which made it even difficult to track. However, there was no doubt that he had renounced Hinduism and become a Muslim.

Yet, for the English language media, he was “Hindu terrorist”.

This instance of terror organisations luring converted Hindus is nothing new. We had earlier reported how ISIS and its offshoots have been involved in targeting converted Hindus to spread terror operations in the Indian subcontinent. This included the 52 ISIS operatives who had been arrested by the NIA, out of which 15% were found to be converts from Hinduism and Christianity.

People were irked by this blatant misinformation spread by the media and reacted:

Amarnath Yatra attack: When Islamic terror targeted Hindu pilgrims

Saswat Panigrahi
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Amarnath Yatra attack: When Islamic terror targeted Hindu pilgrims

The terror attack on Amarnath pilgrims on Monday in Anantnag district of Jammu & Kashmir has crossed all red lines. Seven Hindu pilgrims, most of them women, were killed and 11 others injured as the terrorists targeted a bus carrying Amarnath yatris on Monday evening after they attacked a combined checkpoint of STF, SOG and CRPF in Khannabal. The attack on the Hindu devotees is barbaric, painful and dastardly to say the least.

The security forces suspect that the attack is a handiwork of Lashkar-e-Taiba and Hizbul Mujahideen. It is believed that 3-5 Pakistan backed terrorists led by one Ismael belonging to the Lashkar-e-Taiba carried out the attack. So far no terror outfit has officially claimed responsibility for the attack.

The attack was carried out despite extra security was provided for the yatra this year. Reports suggest that there was an intelligence warning regarding a terror attack, which prompted the authorities to mobilise “highest level” of security measures, including the satellite tracking. But despite all these the attack took place.

According to CRPF DG RR Bhatnagar, the bus in which the yatris was travelling was neither part of the convoy nor registered with the shrine board. “Further, the driver had floated rules for the pilgrimage which clearly states that no vehicle should ply on the highway after 7 PM,” Bhatnagar said.

But how and why the necessary safety norms were violated are matters of investigation and those who have erred must be punished.

Amidst the tragedy, it has become clear that the Amarnath pilgrims are the soft target of Islamic terrorists who want to bleed India with a thousand cuts. It is the collective responsibilities the Central government, the Jammu & Kashmir government and the security forces to bring the perpetrators of the heinous attack to justice the earliest and make sure that there should not be no such attack in the time to come.

The attack is the second major terror strike on the Amarnath yatris since the terrorism raised its head in the valley in 1990. It could be noted that Amarnath yatra was witness to several terror attacks – big and small – in the past, but despite these the Amarnath yatra continues to be unhindered.

Here is the list of terror strikes targeting Amarnath yatris:

  • On August 2000, 25 people – including 17 pilgrims – were killed when the terrorists lobbed grenades and resorted to indiscriminate firing at Pahalgam, where one of the two base camps of the Amarnath pilgrimage was situated.
  • In July 2001, 13 people – including five pilgrims and three cops –were killed when terrorists hurled grenades at a camp of Amarnath yatris and later fired indiscriminately near the Amarnath cave.
  • In July 2002, two pilgrims were killed when terrorists hurled grenades at a taxi in Srinagar which was on its way to the Amarnath cave base camp.
  • In June 2006, five pilgrims were injured when the terrorists hurled a grenade at a bus carrying Amarnath yatris near Bihama-Ganderbal in central Kashmir. 
  • In July 2007, fifteen pilgrims were injured in two separate attacks that targeted the Yatris. In one case, grenade was lobbed into a community kitchen inside a gurdwara, showcasing the hatred attackers have for Indic traditions.

Meanwhile, hundreds of yatris were set off for the Amarnath Shrine today, undeterred by the latest terror attack.

Amarnath, one of the most revered Hindu shrines, is situated 3,888 m above the sea level. According to legend, when Lord Shiva Shiva decided to tell Parvati the secret of his Amar Katha (immortality), he chose the Amarnath cave.

Amarnath is located at a distance of about 141 km from Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu & Kashmir. Thousands of Hindu devotees make an annual pilgrimage to the Amarnath cave to see the Shiva Linga formed from the freezing of water drops that fall from the roof of the cave on to the floor and grows up vertically from the cave floor.

Politicians, journalists slammed for playing politics over Amarnath Yatra attack

OpIndia Staff
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Politicians, journalists slammed for playing politics over Amarnath Yatra attack

Yesterday the country witnessed a barbaric attack on Hindu pilgrims who were returning after taking Darshan at the holy Amarnath temple in Kashmir. At about 8:30 PM on Monday, as a bus carrying 60 Amarnath Pilgrims was returning to Jammu, terrorists opened fire at it. This led to the death of 7 pilgirms including 6 women and injured 19 more.

It is believed that 3-5 Pakistan backed terrorists led by one Ismael belonging to the Lashkar-e-Taiba carried out the attack. The casualties could have been more, but according to a passenger on that bus, the driver heroically drove through a hail of bullets to ensure that the bus reached to safety.

This attack shocked the nation. While most were demanding retributive justice and accountability from the government, there were few politicians and media persons who shamelessly tried to politicise the gruesome murder to peddle their agenda:


The CPM leader whose party in Kerala allows murders of RSS workers to go on unabated, was slammed for his comment. He also conveniently forgot that pilgrims were attacked in 2006 and 2007, when his party had extended support to the UPA government:


AAP MLA Alka Lamba, who in the past had laughed about her delaying a fire rescue operation, decided to peddle a cringeworthy conspiracy theory. She was widely slammed for this comment, following which she deleted the tweet:


Modi hating ex-cop, who regularly spreads anti-India propaganda, also joined in spreading the conspiracy theory, which was shared widely by Pakistanis and anti-Hindu commentators, as generally happens with his tweets:


Even journalists didn’t want to be left behind. A comment by controversial journalist Barkha Dutt, suggesting that the Yatra should have been suspended this year, was slammed as being akin to ‘victim blaming’:


One so-called journalist, with a history of peddling unsubstantiated claims, subtly painted the attackers as ‘militants’:


Some where more concerned about ‘Kashmiri Suffering’ than hate crime against Hindus, such as senior journalist Shekhar Gupta of ‘coup’ fame:


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Muslim man announces a 2 day fast for Gau Raksha

Hemant Bijapurkar
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Muslim man announces a 2 day fast for Gau Raksha

A Muslim Man named Jabar Jat is making the news after he has announced his intention to sit on a fast for two days, as part of his efforts to promote cow protection or Gau Raksha.

Jabar who hails from Kudbay village in Kutch, Gujarat is an owner of 16 cows and 9 buffaloes. His fast would begin from 20th July.

Apparently Jabar decided to go on a fast to take up the issue of welfare for stray cows. He blamed the alleged “Gau Rakshaks” for indulging in hooliganism in the name of cow protection and urged them to accompany him in his fast. He also stated that the so called killings in the name of the cow, would never serve their true purpose.

He has written a letter to the District Collector to list out a variety of his bovine related demands. In the letter Jabar calls for a law which requires every farmer to keep at-least two bullocks and that the government provides them subsidy for the same.

He asked for grazing land to be demarcated in each taluka of Kutch. He demanded that the government take care of stray cows and bears 50% of the cost for each gaushala. He has also asked the government to buy cow dung and cow based fertilisers from the farmer to further help them increase their cow based income.

He has received support from the Salimkhan Pathan, the convener of Rashtriya Muslim Manch which is the Muslim wing of the RSS. He reportedly appreciated the efforts of Jabar and claimed that he would urge the State government for setting up an infrastructure for the welfare of cows.

Vallabh Kathiria the chairman of Gujarat State Gauseva Ayog and Gauchar Vikas Board also affirmed that the State government would make efforts to increase the economic viability of the cow, by creating a market for cow dung and cow urine which might stop the people who decide let their bovines loose in the city.

NDTV writes an entire news report mistaking a ‘fake’ Abhishek Bachchan as real

Hemant Bijapurkar
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NDTV writes an entire news report mistaking a ‘fake’ Abhishek Bachchan as real

NDTV looked like starting the week on an embarrassing note after it wrote an entire news report by mistaking a parody account of Abhishek Bachchan on Twitter to be his real account.

This is what the official twitter account of NDTV had tweeted out earlier today:

This is what had happened: Vivek Oberoi was trending on Twitter due to his upcoming show “Inside Edge” and in response to that, this is what ‘Abhishek Bachchan’ tweeted:


Somehow someone sitting in NDTV thought that it was real Abhishek Bachchan (even though his account is verified by Twitter) and wrote a report titled:

Vivek Oberoi Trends, Prompting Epic Tweet From Abhishek Bachchan

The report stated how on Monday, Vivek Oberoi’s name was unprecedentedly high up in the twitter trending section which prompted the hilarious tweet from ‘Abhishek Bachchan’. The report also claimed that it did not know who all were members in that WhatsApp group or whether Dino Morea had indeed paid heed to Abhishek’s request and removed Vivek Oberoi.

The report also decided to add a bit of ‘masala’ and pointed out how Abhishek and Vivek Oberoi being in the same WhatsApp group meant that there was no uneasiness between the two actors. This uneasiness according to the report was due to the fact that Aishwaria Rai the current wife of Abishek Bachchan had dated Vivek Oberoi in the past.

The parody account that had sent the Tweet

The only problem in this whole scenario was that the tweet which NDTV though to be from Abhishek Bachchan was actually sent by his parody account. Just by going to the description page of the account, one finds that its actually a parody and the the real Abhishek Bachchan goes by the handle @juniorbachchan and not by @juniorbacchha.

Also those who might be wondering, this joke was cracked in the context that actors like Dino Morea and Abhishek Bachchan struggle to find fame and new movies to act in, and thus no reasons for trending on Twitter.

After the parody account of Abhishek and other users pointed out this mistake, NDTV quickly deleted both the post and Google cache associated with it, in order to try removes all the traces of the article. A website though was kind enough to retain a copy which has now been archived by OpIndia, in case the media house also forces the website to remove its copy.

Dear Bengali Hindus, liberal-secular establishment doesn’t care if you die, but do you?

Abhishek Banerjee
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Dear Bengali Hindus, liberal-secular establishment doesn’t care if you die, but do you?

This is how HuffPost presented the news of murder of a 65 years old Hindu man Kartik Ghosh in West Bengal riots on their homepage:

HuffPost blames Modi

Unmissable irony between the header and the footer in that one.

Yeah, politicians should stop pointing fingers at each other. Leave it to the liberal HuffPost to tell us where we should point fingers. Because all their fingers always point at one and only one man : MODI.

In the wake of communal riots in Bengal that have become frequent of late and where Hindus bear the brunt of rampaging Islamist mobs, secular-liberal media such as HuffPost and The Wire have spent so much time talking about the BJP that they have barely managed to get in a word about the ruling party in the state.

Media agenda

Can anybody remember the name of Bengal’s ruling party at all?

Media agenda

Yeah and the Chief Minister of Bengal, who is locked … almost literally… in a “he said/she said” battle with the Governor has nothing to realize. What a poor victim she is, no?

Media agenda

Let’s get it straight:

Who is rioting? Muslims.

Who died? A Hindu.

Who rules Bengal? Trinamool Congress.

Whose fault? Modi.

Or if you follow the lead of the HuffPost, you should write ‘MODI’ in all caps, preferably in a size 500 font.

It is clear that Hindu lives don’t matter to the ‘secular-liberal’ media. Not a word for the man who was killed. Contrast that to copious tears they shed when a victim is Muslim.

The only thing remaining for liberals to do is to organise hashtag protests against “Hindu terror”, gau rakshaks, Bhakts, RSS, whatever to show how much they care about the loss of innocent human life in Bengal.

Apparently, this violence broke out over a Facebook post by a young boy that some Muslims did not like. As this article in The Indian Express describes, the boy who is a minor, was actually detained by police and subjected to an actual investigation and interrogation. Even though there were violent mobs out in the streets baying for his blood.

In sifting through all the reports about the subsequent violence, I am yet to come across one intellectual taking issue with the fact that the West Bengal police is taking action against the victim (a minor no less!) instead of going out and containing the rioters. How is this different from the police checking the meat in Akhlaque’s fridge?

Instead, I have seen media reporting on the original FB post calling it anything from “objectionable” to “blasphemous”. Is “blasphemy” a thing in India now? Define it for me, please.

Why blasphemy in secular state?

If a woman were to become the victim of a sexual assault, can you imagine a media report in a civilized society saying that the woman was wearing “objectionable” clothes?

No, it doesn’t matter what the woman was wearing. That’s an absolute. Just like it doesn’t matter what the boy wrote on Facebook about some religion. There is no excuse whatsoever for threatening him with violence. Another absolute.

Instead, they report on the arrest of the boy as a matter of course. I can’t seem to be able to find any liberal news outlets willing to take a clear and unequivocal stand that the boy is 100% innocent, that his arrest is a disastrous injustice and the only only people who should be arrested here are the rioters in the streets.

And neither can I find anyone willing to meet with the family of Kartik Ghosh and report on the tragedy they have faced.  It is as if Kartik Ghosh’s life was less real. No one wants to ask who is responsible for the loss of Kartik Ghosh’s life. Meanwhile, the death of Junaid Khan is being blamed collectively on the 1 billion Hindus of this country. Don’t believe me? See here:

Hatred for Hindus

The author here is no less an authority than Rajinder Sachar, the former Chief Justice of Delhi High Court, who headed the famous Sachar Committee report on the condition of Indian Muslims during the UPA years.

The handful of actual condemnations that have tumbled out of the liberal brigade have all come with the heartfelt requests to malcontents within the Muslim community to stop rioting in Bengal because this is giving an opportunity to Hindu majoritarianism, to Gau Rakshaks, to BJP, to RSS (see examples here and here).

What they are really complaining about is not the atrocities being committed on Hindus in West Bengal, but the fact that it’s ruining their #NotInMyName narrative. A natural corollary of this is an admission that these liberals would have been totally silent about violence against Hindus if the BJP were not in a position to use it to their advantage.

Some top liberals have been fairly open about this argument :

Propaganda by Rajdeep Sardesai

Ok, who benefitted most from Partition? Who benefits most from dividing Hindus by caste? Which party benefits most if the corrupt old order in India stays intact?

For other liberals, even the handful of condemnations of Muslim mobs in Bengal are offensive. Instead their demand is a total free hand for Muslim mobs to commit as much violence as they please. Can you believe this appeared in an Indian publication?

India Today justifies riots by Muslims

The rage of murderous mobs over a Facebook post is morally equivalent to citizens peacefully expressing their anger over gangrape! Now, we really have seen everything. Personally, I call upon India Today group to delete this article and issue an apology.

But they will not. Because they are not in opinion or journalism, they are into politics. The only thing they can see here is BJP, not a man who lost his life or not a minor who has virtually lost his future career.

Of late, as the BJP has made forays into Bengal, I have seen a stream of articles in the media discussing the so called secular ethos of Bengal and how it has never humoured Hindutva elements in the past.

Which is hilarious (in a dark way) when you consider the history of how Indian secularism has treated Bengal. This is a simple pie chart that shows what happened to the territory of Bengal in the last one hundred years.

Partition of Bengal

On August 16, 1946, the workers of the Muslim League spilled onto the streets of Calcutta to observe “Direct Action Day”. In a few hours, some 4000 people lay dead. Almost exactly one year later, “India” became an independent nation. Minus Eastern Bengal, Western Punjab and the whole of Sind.

Now, it’s a wonderful truth that Bengali greats such as Swami Vivekananda and Ramkrishna Paramhamsa were all for a Bengal where all faiths flourish in harmony, as Rajinder Sachar points out, while acting as if he is scoring a point by throwing it in our faces:

Distorting history

But Swami Vivekananda passed away in 1902. And he was not an ostrich who would have refused to see how radical Islam refuses to co-exist with other religions, and how radical Islam was becoming a norm in India, so much so, that a mythical Sufi Islam exists perhaps only in Narendra Modi’s tweets.

What hope is left for secularism once a people see nearly two thirds of their ancient land snatched away and handed over to those of one religious faith?

Is it not rational for dispossessed Bengali Hindus to worry about keeping their little leftover slice of Bengal? If Bengali Hindus don’t worry about that, it is not something to be proud about. What is so great about ceding land and dignity to a mob that demands you to be in total submission?

It is clear that these concerns don’t matter to the so-called secular-liberal establishment, which has a hold over media and academia in a way that even Modi doesn’t have over BJP. They are not thinking how to free a teenager from jail, what they are thinking is how to assassinate his character. Death of a Hindu doesn’t bother them, what bothers them is who benefits.

But I want to ask fellow Bengali Hindus; are you happy with this arrangement? Do you care for your life and dignity? Or those are blasphemous concepts against secularism?

Congress and China try to hide meeting between Rahul Gandhi and Chinese Ambassador to India

OpIndia Staff
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Congress and China try to hide meeting between Rahul Gandhi and Chinese Ambassador to India

Congress today did an extraordinary flip-flop over party vice president Rahul Gandhi’s meeting with Chinese Ambassador to India Luo Zhaohui amid the ongoing standoff between India and China.

When some media outlets reported about the meeting, Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala attached the media termed it “fake news”:


//platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsHowever, things were muddled when Dr Ajoy Kumar, another spokesperson of the Congress, replied to a Times Now tweet on Rahul Gandhi-Luo Zhaohui meeting, which suggested that the meeting indeed took place. However, he deleted the tweet, possibly as the official Congress line was to deny any meeting.

The tweet was deleted within minutes

But the party was caught lying as the Chinese embassy website had issued an official statement confirming the meeting between the Congress vice president and the Chinese envoy.

However, strangely, even the Chinese embassy deleted the statement, as if they were acting in tandem with Congress party to hide this development:

The statement on the Chinese embassy website that was later removed.

This led people to speculate even more as to why both the Congress party and China were trying to hide the meeting, after inadvertently having admitted the same.

With the screensort of the official statement of China on Rahul Gandhi-Luo Zhaohui meeting went viral on social media, Congress made a u-turn accepting that Rahul Gandhi indeed met Luo Zhaohui.

“Envoys met Rahul Gandhiji, not only Chinese envoy Luo Zhaohui but also Bhutanese envoy Vetsop Namgyel and ex NSA Shiv Shankar Menon,” said Surjewala. The Congress spokesperson said the meetings are totally “normal.”

If it indeed was a normal meeting, why did Congress initially call it a “fake news” and even the Chinese embassy removed the statement from its website? Was Congress party working with China to hide the news about the meeting? If so, what and why is Congress trying to hide? The party had not clarified on such issues by the time this report was filed.

Family of man accused of murdering Junaid claims he stabbed in self-defence

Hemant Bijapurkar
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Family of man accused of murdering Junaid claims he stabbed in self-defence

On 22nd June, 17 years old Junaid was returning home along with his brothers after Eid shopping in Delhi when he was stabbed onboard a Delhi-Mathura passenger train between Ballabgarh and Mathura stations.

The fight started over seat sharing, and later religious slurs were also allegedly thrown in the fight, but media reports highlighted this case as a ‘beef’ related lynching. Police investigations in the case though have found out that neither the complainant nor the accused talked about beef.

Police too is maintaining that the fight had started over seat sharing, which is reported to be a frequent trouble on the said train route. However, due to the communal angle, police acted with alacrity in this case and arrested 4 people, while the main accused remained at large.

Naresh, the main accused, was finally arrested on 8th July from Dhule, Maharashtra, who reportedly had confessed to the crime. Media reports claim that he was drawn into the fight after he tried to “intervene into a scuffle between a Delhi government employee and Junaid’s brothers”.

The family members of Naresh too accept that he was involved, but they claim that he acted in self-defence. ‘Had Naresh not acted in self-defence, they would have killed him’, Naresh’s 55-year-old father Inder Singh was quoted as saying.

According to the father, who is an ex-army man, Naresh got into the argument after Junaid and his friends misbehaved with an old man and also refused to offer him a seat.

His uncle even claimed that the initial argument, which only comprised of heated exchanges was soon sorted out. It allegedly turned violent when Junaid’s brother and his friends boarded the train from Ballabgarh after being phoned in by Junaid and co. They allegedly then proceeded to attack Naresh and others using belt and chains. They even took out a knife, which according to the Naresh’s uncle, was snatched by Naresh who then proceeded to stab them in self defense.

Incidentally the bit about Junaid calling his brother for help was also reported in media soon after the murder case became big headlines, but the reports suggested that phone calls were made for help, and not for revenge attack as is being claimed by Naresh’s family.

Naresh who used to work as a security guard was urged by his family to surrender but instead he chose to flee and ended up getting nabbed. The family has also accused the police of carrying a one sided investigation, while others have earlier accused the police of arresting innocent villagers.

According to the family, the police is not arresting 2 people, including a Muslim who had helped Naresh flee, owing to political pressure.

Amid Doklam standoff, Chinese media warns of troops entering Kashmir

OpIndia Staff
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Amid Doklam standoff, Chinese media warns of troops entering Kashmir

Amid the ongoing standoff between the Indian Army and China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at India-China-Bhutan tri-junction, Chinese state-controlled media argued that its troops would be entitled to enter Kashmir with the “logic” that Indian troops entered Doklam plateau.

“Even if India were requested to defend Bhutan’s territory, this could only be limited to its established territory, not the disputed area. Otherwise, under India’s logic, if the Pakistani government requests, a third country’s Army can enter the area disputed by India and Pakistan, including India-controlled Kashmir,” Director of the Center for Indian Studies at China West Normal University Long Xingchun wrote in an article in Global Times.

Indian Army and Chinese troops are locked in an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation at the Sikkim-Bhutan-Tibet tri-junction after China’s attempts to forcefully build a strategic highway through the Doklam plateau, which is Bhutanese territory. The 269-sq km Doklam plateau is strategically located at the Sikkim-Bhutan-Tibet tri-junction, the place where borders of the three countries meet.

The Global Times article suggests that Beijing can internationalise Doklam issue without worrying about western countries because the West has a lot of business to do with China.

Referring to the exchange of fire between India and Pakistani troops along the Line of Control in Kashmir, another article in Global Times said it is not a good idea for India to open “two fronts conflict”.

“Aside from the border spat with China, India is embroiled with Pakistan over an exchange of fire at the Kashmir border. Both India and Pakistan accused each other of initiating the incident on Saturday that caused civilian deaths on both sides of their controlled border in Kashmir,” the article said.

“That there are frequent conflicts and military scuffles between the areas of Kashmir controlled by the two sides. China has nothing to do with the situation in Kashmir, but it would be unwise for India to engage in two conflicts at the same time,” Lin Mingwang from the Institute of International Studies, Fudan University, Shanghai was quoted as saying in Global Times.

Another commentary in Global Times has criticised the reported move by Tibetan government in exile to hoist the Tibetan flag on the shores of Bangong Lake in Ladakh. Though there is no evidence of the New Delhi’s involvement in the reported incident, the Global Times article accused India of using the Tibet card and instigating the Tibet movement in a bid to exert pressure on China.

“Although the involvement of New Delhi remains unclear, we hope they did not send any signal of approval,” the article authored by Yu Ning read.

The article argued that India’s large-scale poverty and the need for peace and development are the reasons why “New Delhi cannot afford to mess up the China-India bilateral relationship”.

A brazen editorial in Global Times last week had called for a disintegration of Sikkim from the rest of India and promoting anti-India sentiments in Bhutan.

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