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Paranoia or Propaganda? Analyzing the latest outbursts of Julio Ribeiro

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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


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

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


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

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

Congress Mukt Bharat
Congress Mukt Bharat

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


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

Fake trends?

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

(This is a satirical take)

NDTV journalist exposed on social media for gross lies and misreporting

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

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

The original headline

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

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

Multiple headlines, same report

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


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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

NDTV first reported that Maneka Gandhi had said the following:

The original headline

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

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

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

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

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

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


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

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

Changing headlines

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

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

Video Headlines
Video Headlines

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Yoga day document
The government circular

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

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

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

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

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

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

Left Right and Centre
Left Right and Centre

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

Misleading tickers
Misleading tickers again

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Top Lies spread by Indian Media in April 2016

Gaurav
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Top Lies spread by Indian Media in April 2016

Big Lies:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Miscellaneous Lies

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

January 2016: 20 lies

February 2016: 22 Lies

March 2016: 17 Lies 

Is the Indian Railways charging Rs 4 crore from Latur for the Jal-Doot train?

OpIndia Staff
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Is the Indian Railways charging Rs 4 crore from Latur for the Jal-Doot train?

Last month, the Indian Railways took it upon themselves to try to help the drought situation in Latur. They sent the special Jal-Doot train, carrying water to the parched areas of Latur. They have already sent almost 6.2 crore liters to the area and the move has been applauded by all.

But yesterday, a news began being reported which was raised a few eyebrows. Media housing began to report that the Indian Railways had charged/levied Rs 4 crore a charges for sending the water to the state of Maharashtra. The news report seemed to be based on a PTI report and media houses like NDTV and the Economic Times had the following headlines:

2
NDTV
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Economic Times

Rajdeep Sardesai was quick to latch on to this story, and even quicker was Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal in Re-tweeting him:

Rajdeep's tweet Retweeted by Kejriwal
Rajdeep’s tweet Retweeted by Kejriwal

Perhaps Rajdeep Sardesai should have read the full story before he shared it. Looks like he reacted just to the headline, as many on Twitter do. In the same story, as in the NDTV and Economic Times stories, the truth was also mentioned. Central Railway’s General Manager SK Sood was quoted as saying:

“We have sent the bill to the Latur district collector as per the administration’s request, It is up to the district administration whether to pay us or seek waiver of the amount, through proper channels. We sent the water transport bill as per their request.”

So does this mean the Railways was “charging” the administration for the water? Was a bill “levied”? To completely obliterate the ambiguity, the Ministry of Railways tweeted from its official handle that only the cost was shared with district administration for their information:


From this, it was clear that nothing was being “charged” or “levied” but the district administration was merely being intimated about the cost, at their own request, and they had the option to seek waiver through proper channels as well. It was clear that Rajdeep Sardesai and others had jumped the gun after reading a badly (and deliberately?) crafted headline.

Unfortunately, instead of accepting that he jumped the gun and reacted only to a headline without reading the fine print, Rajdeep sent out the following tweet, which gives an impression that his and media’s comprehension was not at fault:


Suhel Seth calls out Ravish Kumar’s bluff

OpIndia Staff
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Suhel Seth calls out Ravish Kumar’s bluff

Commentator Suhel Seth, recently took umbrage to a remark by Ravish Kumar at a debate, and took to twitter to clarify his position. Ironically, it all started at an “awards” show for journalism, which supposedly honours excellence in journalism. Last year, Sreenivasan Jain was an awardee, in the same year when he maliciously and deliberately cut and spliced Baba Ramdev’s interview and twisted the entire conversation. And this year, Ravish Kumar himself won the “journalist of the year” award

In the event, in a panel discussion, Ravish Kumar said that even Suhel Seth abuses on social media. He said that when Suhel Seth meets him, their exchange is cordial, and when you go online, you see Seth abusing him. He did not cite any specific example, but one guesses when the “journalist of the year” says something, one must believe it.

But Suhel Seth was not one to take things quietly. He took to twitter to call out Ravish Kumar’s claims:




Of course Ravish Kumar is no longer active on Twitter so he hasn’t responded, but prima facie, Suhel Seth seems to be on the right here. We couldn’t find any abusive tweets from Suhel Seth referring Ravish Kumar. In fact, besides the above tweet, Suhel Seth had addressed only 1 tweet to Ravish Kumar, and that was a tweet applauding his work!


This is completely against what Ravish Kumar claimed at the awards show. And the date of the tweet also shows this complement was well into “Acche Din”, the time when Suhel Seth is said to have turned a new leaf.

So what was Ravish Kumar talking about? Is this the what one expects from the “journalist of the year”? Will we have another black-screen episode for this? Ravish Kumar must clarify and point to the abusive tweets of Suhel Seth to clear his name here.

An Agusta character pops up in Panama Leaks, but has ED been informed?

Ashutosh Muglikar
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An Agusta character pops up in Panama Leaks, but has ED been informed?

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) is a worldwide network of journalists who are into investigative reporting. This network boasts of 190 members from 65 Countries who collaborate while doing in depth stories. Their most famous works include the Swiss Leaks and more recently the #PanamaPapers leaks. From India, The Indian Express is the only Member of ICIJ as on today

A designated team of journalists was responsible for studying the data received from ICIJ for 8 long months, before the worldwide publication of the news on April 15 2016. Based on documents accessed through ICIJ, they wrote an extensive series on the Panama Papers Leaks.  Their articles covered vast offshore companies linked to IPL franchisees, industrialists  and bollywood stars. These articles were based on 11 Million files leaked from a data base of a law firm named Mossack Fonseca.

The details mentioned in these articles are of extremely confidential nature. Shocked at the nature and volume of these cases, the Supreme Court decided to hear a plea for a CBI Probe into these revelations. Further, these revelations also led to Arun Jaitley, Finance Minister announcing issuance of tax notices to all those named in those papers.

Cut to the other big scam narrative in India: The AgustaWestland Scam. Allegations and counter allegations were being hurled day in and day out on this topic. What stood out in all this was the fact that the prime accused had allegedly routed the kickbacks through a web of Companies which was highlighted in this article. #AgustaScam had all the ingredients against which the ICIJ members are supposedly fighting, namely

  • Cross-border crime that is in between Italy, UK and India.
  • Corruption: involving kickbacks
  • Accountability of power: allegedly the bribes were paid to high ranking defense officials and powerful politicians.

One common link eventually did emerge from Panama Leaks and AgustaWestland case: Gautam Khaitan. Khaitan has been linked to middlemen in the Agusta Deal and his name pops up in Panama Leaks too.

In an article which was published by the Indian Express a good two weeks after the first Panama Leaks piece, it was revealed that Khaitan, provided a reference letter in favour of Navin Mehra, who was a director in two offshore entities registered by Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca. But the piece stops here and doesn’t provide any more information.

The above in itself maybe a small or unimportant piece of information, and it appears Indian Express missed reporting is this: an entity named ‘Windsor Group Holdings Limited’ allegedly owned by Gautam Khaitan.

Gautam Khaitan in Panama Leaks
Gautam Khaitan in Panama Leaks

On 9th May the ICIJ team made public names of the 2,14,000 entities from the Panama leaks, and the details of this Windsor Group Holdings Limited was mentioned in the same.

The question now arises, how did the crack team of Indian Express miss this offshore company opened by an accused in the AgustaWestland scam. One would expect this information to be released in the first few tranches of the Panama Leak publications, but somehow the team at Indian Express never saw the linkage between Windsor Holding and Khaitan.

Before this, it was reported that Windsor was registered in Singapore. However Panama Papers revealed that there may be yet another Windsor Group Holdings Ltd, which is registered in British Virgin Islands and in which Gautam Khaitan is allegedly a Director and a Shareholder.

At this juncture one hopes that the Enforcement Directorate has been either tipped off by the Indian Express, which was studying the Panama documents for 8 months, or has itself realized that Khaitan may as well have 2 companies by the name Windsor, or worse yet, the Singapore entity many not even exist.

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