Pratik Sinha | SabrangIndia https://sabrangindia.in/content-author/pratik-sinha-14448/ News Related to Human Rights Sat, 05 Aug 2017 09:17:05 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.2 https://sabrangindia.in/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Favicon_0.png Pratik Sinha | SabrangIndia https://sabrangindia.in/content-author/pratik-sinha-14448/ 32 32 FAKE: Video of IT raid on T&T law firm made viral as money found at Congress Minister DK Shivkumar’s home https://sabrangindia.in/fake-video-it-raid-tt-law-firm-made-viral-money-found-congress-minister-dk-shivkumars-home/ Sat, 05 Aug 2017 09:17:05 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2017/08/05/fake-video-it-raid-tt-law-firm-made-viral-money-found-congress-minister-dk-shivkumars-home/ A Twitter handle called DurgaMenon which is followed by PM Narendra Modi, Power Minister Piyush Goyal and many other senior BJP leaders has posted a video on her Twitter timeline. The accompanying text says, “DK Shivkumar’s home with just one Locker room opened..Congis whr will u hide ur faces???“. The video posted by this Twitter […]

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A Twitter handle called DurgaMenon which is followed by PM Narendra Modi, Power Minister Piyush Goyal and many other senior BJP leaders has posted a video on her Twitter timeline. The accompanying text says, “DK Shivkumar’s home with just one Locker room opened..Congis whr will u hide ur faces???“. The video posted by this Twitter handle shows a locker full of cash and more bags full of cash on the floor.

 
 

This same video is viral on Facebook as can be seen in the video below. The identical text “Shivkumar home with just 1 Locker room opened” across most of the Facebook posts also indicates that this video is crazily viral on WhatsApp and is being uploaded by users to Facebook after they received this video as a WhatsApp forward with the aforementioned text. Even DurgaMenon states in tweet that she got the video via WhatsApp.

 

In reality, the video that is being passed around is that of an Income Tax raid on T&T law firm in Delhi founded by Rohit Tandon. In total, 13 crores worth of cash was found in raids on Rohit Tandon’s law firm and residences in Delhi in December 2016. The video that is now being shared as cash found in DK Shivkumar’s house was originally posted by a journalist Shiv Sunny on his Twitter timeline on December 10, 2016. He posted the video with the text, “Video of over Rs 8 cr cash (Rs 2 cr in new currency) seized by Delhi Police from T&T law firm in Delhi’s GK.“. The video can be seen below.

If you like our stories, do follow Alt News on Facebook.

The cash allegedly recovered from T&T law firm in Delhi’s GK. Around Rs 2 cr in new notes. Total over Rs 8cr. @the_hindu @abaruah64 pic.twitter.com/s7j8wQu5sm

— Shiv Sunny (@shivsunny) December 10, 2016

 

Recently, after a RSS Karyakarta Rajesh was murdered in Kerala, a fake video from Brazil claiming it to be Rajesh was circulated. Every newsworthy political issue is almost invariably followed by a fake video these days, and more often than not, these videos are circulated with a narrative that directly or indirectly benefits BJP as a party.

Courtesy: Altnews.in
 

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BJP Ministers, MPs, MLAs, Spokespersons can’t stop gushing about the launch of Arnab Goswami’s Republic TV https://sabrangindia.in/bjp-ministers-mps-mlas-spokespersons-cant-stop-gushing-about-launch-arnab-goswamis-republic/ Mon, 08 May 2017 06:30:20 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2017/05/08/bjp-ministers-mps-mlas-spokespersons-cant-stop-gushing-about-launch-arnab-goswamis-republic/ In November 2016, while delivering the vote of thanks during Ramnath Goenka awards, Indian Express’s Editor-in-Chief Raj Kamal Jha had regaled the audience with an anecdote. He told the gathering that once when a Chief Minister told the group’s founder Ramnath Goenka, “Aap ka reporter bahut achha kaam kar raha hai (Your reporter is doing […]

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In November 2016, while delivering the vote of thanks during Ramnath Goenka awards, Indian Express’s Editor-in-Chief Raj Kamal Jha had regaled the audience with an anecdote. He told the gathering that once when a Chief Minister told the group’s founder Ramnath Goenka, “Aap ka reporter bahut achha kaam kar raha hai (Your reporter is doing good work)”, Ramnath Goenka had sacked the reporter. Raj Kamal Jha stated that criticism from the Government was a badge of honour. What people witnessed on Twitter today as part of the launch of Arnab Goswami’s Republic TV is the exact opposite of the Ramnath Goenka school of journalism.
 

Arnab

From BJP Union Minsiters, to BJP MPs, to BJP MLAs to BJP Spokersperson, to BJP supporters, everybody seemed overjoyed at the launch of Republic TV.
 

BJP Union Ministers

Delighted to see Arnab back on TV. Compliment and best wishes to @republic for scaling new heights in Indian journalism #May6WithArnab
Arnab very best to you for new venture,u always set bar high & you excel,sure u will better own record @republic #ArnabGoswami #republictv
Congrats and best wishes to Sh Arnab Goswami and his team on the occasion of launch of #Republic TV.

BJP MP

Congrats #Arnab & Team @republic on your News Channel launch. The nation looks forward to good,insightful & factual journalism. Best Wishes!

BJP MLAs

Congratulations & Best Wishes to Team @republic led by #ArnabGoswami. Nation looks forward to true journalism back on the centre stage.
Welcome Back Arnab Goswami. Wish a Grand success for Republic TV. The Nationalist Media with International vision.@republic

BJP Spokespersons

"Being a Nationalist is a prerequisite to being a Journalist" - @republic. Wish every Journalist, every Indian thought like that.
Welcome back Arnab @republic
The unprecedented amount of love showered on Republic TV’s launch by folks from BJP is not surprising though considering Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar who is NDA’s vice-chairman in Kerala is a prominent investor.
MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar biggest investor in Arnab Goswami's republic

It is to be seen whether Arnab Goswami exposes the politician-mafia nexus in BJP ruled statues just like he has in a non-BJP state like Bihar with his Lalu Prasad-Liquor don Shahabuddin story. Bihar has had a liquor ban for just about 2 years, Gujarat has had one for many decades and everybody knows what goes around here.

For a long time now, Arnab Goswami’s journalism has looked like an extension of BJP’s propaganda arm. Recently, after the Sukma attack, he tweeted four times targeting everyone except the Government.

Arnab Goswami's tweets after Sukma attacks
In 2014, when a Naxal attack had happened in the same region, he had questioned the role of UPA’s Home Ministers namely P Chidambaram, Shivraj Patil and Sushil Kumar Shinde.

 

Since Arnab refused to question the ruling BJP Governments in Chhattisgarh and Delhi for the Sukma attack, he’s probably seen as an ally and which is possibly why everybody in BJP’s rank and cadre can’t stop gushing about his new channel.

Courtesy: Alt News
 

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Rahul Kanwal’s views on Donald Trump vs Yogi Adityanath – A textbook case of hypocrisy https://sabrangindia.in/rahul-kanwals-views-donald-trump-vs-yogi-adityanath-textbook-case-hypocrisy/ Fri, 24 Mar 2017 07:06:38 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2017/03/24/rahul-kanwals-views-donald-trump-vs-yogi-adityanath-textbook-case-hypocrisy/ Trump says “When you’re a star, you can do anything, grab them by the p*ssy”. Yogi Adityanath while referring to inter-religious marriages talks about how if ‘they’ take one Hindu girl, then we’ll take away 100 Muslims girls. Trump mocks a reporter for his disability because the reporter is critical of him. Yogi Adityanath warns […]

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Trump says “When you’re a star, you can do anything, grab them by the p*ssy”. Yogi Adityanath while referring to inter-religious marriages talks about how if ‘they’ take one Hindu girl, then we’ll take away 100 Muslims girls. Trump mocks a reporter for his disability because the reporter is critical of him. Yogi Adityanath warns that if ‘they’ kill one Hindu, we won’t file an FIR but will get 10 ‘such people’ murdered. Trump labels Mexicans as rapists and criminals while Yogi Adityanath labels Muslims as Jehadis. Now, how does one choose between these two forms of extreme bigotry? Well, apparently some people can and Rahul Kanwal, the managing editor of India Today, is one of those who has this unique ability to choose between these two forms of bigotry.

Trumph and Yogi

Let us first look at Rahul Kanwal’s views vis-a-vis Donald Trump as expressed via his tweets about the American President.

Donald Trump is crazy. Says a lot about US politics that he gets taken so seriously & has tomes written about him.

So, Rahul Kanwal thinks that it says a lot about ‘US Politics’ that a person like Trump is taken seriously. He’s essentially trying to point out at the degradation in US politics because a person like Trump was taken seriously. These were his views before Trump was elected as the President. In the last month, after Trump officially took over the charge as the US President, many people of Indian origin in the United States have faced racial attacks. In one incident, an Indian citizen, Srinivas Kuchibhotla, was shot down after being asked to go back to India by an American military veteran. This happened in a bar in the state of Kansas. What does Rahul Kanwal think about that?

Spoke to my brother in New York. Seems quite rattled by the Kansas shooting. Trimmed his fancy beard. But bigotry is a dangerous landmine.

He thinks that the bigotry that Trump has brought with him is a dangerous landmine, an opinion influenced by the fact that his brother felt rattled because of his ‘fancy beard’. In fact, Rahul Kanwal’s dislike for Donald Trump is such that he even recommends an application that will block anything related to Donald Trump.

An app a lot of people will find very useful. There is now an app to block anything related to Donald Trump

So, if bigotry is a dangerous landmine as Rahul Kanwal claims in reference to Donald Trump, something which Yogi Aditynath has in abundance, you’d think that Rahul Kanwal would have a problem with Yogi Adityanath becoming the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh? If bigotry is a landmine, and you’re opposed to it because your brother is ‘rattled’ because of the consequences of that bigotry, surely you wouldn’t want your fellow citizens to be a victim of such bigotry? So, what does Rahul Kanwal think about Yogi Adityanath?

By some measure, @yogi_adityanath is far & away the most popular mass leader of BJP in UP. UP will be hottest story for next several months.

Oops! Apparently, not. Rahul Kanwal thinks that Yogi Adityanath’s version of bigotry deserves ‘a chance’. Rahul Kanwal thinks that a man who has given speeches in which he’s warned that “If they kill one Hindu, we will kill 100 of theirs” deserves a chance. Rahul Kanwal thinks that a man who thinks that inter-religious marriages are a case of Love-Jihad deserves a chance. Rahul Kanwal thinks that a man who offers Guns to Hindus in Dadri after the murder of Mohammad Akhlaq deserves a chance. Rahul Kanwal thinks that a man who demanded for the release of all the accused in the Dadri case deserves a chance. “Give him a chance, See what he does. And judge him for his work as UP CM”.

 

If only Rahul Kanwal’s brother with his ‘fancy beard’ was in Mau district during the 2005 riots when Yogi Adityanath’s Hindu Yuva Vahini reined terror, he probably would have used the adjective ‘bigoted’ at least once in reference to Yogi Adityanath.

Courtesy: Alt News

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GOI’s Lucky Grahak Yojana and Digi-धन Vyapar Yojana Website Down for over 40 hours, but has anyone noticed? https://sabrangindia.in/gois-lucky-grahak-yojana-and-digi-dhana-vyapar-yojana-website-down-over-40-hours-has-anyone/ Sun, 26 Feb 2017 14:56:23 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2017/02/26/gois-lucky-grahak-yojana-and-digi-dhana-vyapar-yojana-website-down-over-40-hours-has-anyone/ On December 15, 2016, Nitiayog had announced the launch of two schemes, Lucky Grahak Yojana and Digi-धन Vyapar Yojana, to encourage cashless transactions by giving cash awards via a lucky draw to consumers and merchants who utilise digital payment instruments. The scheme was to run for over 100 days and Union ministers Arun Jaitley and […]

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On December 15, 2016, Nitiayog had announced the launch of two schemes, Lucky Grahak Yojana and Digi-धन Vyapar Yojana, to encourage cashless transactions by giving cash awards via a lucky draw to consumers and merchants who utilise digital payment instruments. The scheme was to run for over 100 days and Union ministers Arun Jaitley and Ravi Shankar Prasad inaugurated the first draw of lots in Delhi on December 25, 2017. A website (digidhanlucky.mygov.in) was created so that consumers and merchants could check if they are the lucky winners by inputting their mobile numbers and an OTP code.

 

However, the website of Lucky Grahak Yojana and Digi-धन Vyapar Yojana (https://digidhanlucky.mygov.in/) has been down for over 40 hours since Alt News started monitoring it and continues to be non-functional. We used uptimerobot.com, a service that monitors the uptime status of various websites, and the monitor setup for digidhanlucky.mygov.in shows that the website has been down for over 40 hours since the time we setup the monitor.

digidhanlucky.mygov.in website down for 40 hours
Coincidentally, PM Modi in his Mann Ki Baat monologue today encouraged those who won prizes in Lucky Grahak Yojana and Digi-धन Vyapar Yojana to become ambassadors of these schemes.

Doesn’t the GOI utilise basic services such as the aforementioned uptimerobot to monitor the status of their websites? How does a website go down for over 40 hours without anyone in the Government noticing it? Digital India?
 

 

 

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Media Bias: It’s ‘Hate Crime’ in the US but not Back Home, in India https://sabrangindia.in/media-bias-its-hate-crime-us-not-back-home-india/ Sun, 26 Feb 2017 14:30:18 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2017/02/26/media-bias-its-hate-crime-us-not-back-home-india/ The rise of right wing brings along with it hate crimes of various hues – from verbal attacks in public to brutal killings. Ever since BJP and Mr Modi were voted to lead the country in May 2014, India has seen a series of hate crimes and hate campaigns, from murders over beef to campaigns […]

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The rise of right wing brings along with it hate crimes of various hues – from verbal attacks in public to brutal killings. Ever since BJP and Mr Modi were voted to lead the country in May 2014, India has seen a series of hate crimes and hate campaigns, from murders over beef to campaigns such as Love Jihad. A similar trend can now be seen in the US, one which started right from the days when Donald Trump started his presidential campaign to the brutal murder of an Indian techie Srinivas Kuchibhotla a day ago just over a month after Mr Trump assumed office. In India, the mob lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri, Uttar Pradesh, with sticks and bricks shocked many across the country.

 

 

While Akhlaq was killed on the night of  September 28, 2015, Srinivas was killed on the night of 23rd February 2017 according to Indian Standard Time (IST). Since the killings happened at night, Indian newspapers covered neither of the crimes the day after. While Akhlaq’s mob lynching was covered on 30th September 2015, Srinivas’s murder has been covered by Indian Newspapers on 25th February 2015. In this post, we present a pictorial comparison of how Indian Newspapers covered the two crimes. Let’s start with Times of India, Delhi edition on the day after Akhlaq was lynched.

Front page of Times of India the day after Akhlaq
was
lynched

The front page of Times of India on 30th September 2015 could only afford a tiny space on the left column on the front page of its newspaper regarding Akhlaq’s mob lynching. How did Times of India, Delhi Edition, cover Srinivas’s murder?

Times of India’s coverage of Srinivas Kuchibhotla’s murder.

Times of India dedicated a front page lead story for the murder of Srinivas Kuchibhotla. Next, let us look at Hindustan Times, Delhi Edition, coverage of Srinivas’s murder.

Hindustan Times coverage of murder of
Srinivas
Kuchibhotla

Again, a front page lead story. How did Hindustan Times cover Mohammad Akhlaq’s mob lynching on 30th September 2015?

Hindustan Times couldn’t find any space for Mohammad Akhlaq’s lynching on their front page.

As one can see, Mohammad Akhlaq is nowhere to be seen on the front page of Hindustan Times, Delhi Edition, on 30th September 2015. In fact, this incident was relegated to the 3rd page. Let us look at Mail Today front page next on 25th February 2017 to see how they covered Srinivas Kuchibhotla’s murder.

Mail Today's coverage of murder of Srinivas Kuchibhotla
Mail Today’s coverage of murder of
Srinivas
Kuchibhotla

Mail Today, being a tabloid newspaper, featured it as one of its lead stories. How did Mail Today cover Mohammad Akhlaq’s lynching on 30th September 2015?

Mail Today, like Hindustan Times, skipped Mohammad Akhlaq's story entirely on 30th September 2015
Mail Today, like Hindustan Times, skipped Mohammad Akhlaq’s story entirely on 30th
September
2015

Mail Today not only skipped Mohammad Akhlaq’s mob lynching on 30th September 2015 on its front page but they failed to feature it anywhere at all on that day. They wrote about it on 1st October 2015 and that too in one of their inner pages. In fact, the only newspaper that did justice in their news coverage to these hate crimes was Indian Express. Here’s a comparison of their coverage of Akhlaq’s murder vs Srinivas’s murder.

Indian Express's coverage of mob lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq
Indian Express’s coverage of mob lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq
Indian Express's coverage of Srinivas's murder.
Indian Express’s coverage of Srinivas’s murder.

From the above examples, one can see a clear bias in the coverage of Mohammad Akhlaq’s mob lynching vs the coverage of Srinivas Kuchibhotla’s murder in the US. Why this bias? Why did Indian media have to wait for a pan-national outrage to feature Mohammad Akhlaq in the news cycle? Why wasn’t adequate space given to Mohammad Akhlaq in newspapers the day after he was brutally murdered? Is it because Indian media is hesitant in highlighting right wing hate crimes? These are some of the troubling questions that Indian media needs to answer.
 

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An Independent RSS Handle, followed by PM Modi on Twitter, advocates for economic boycott of Muslims https://sabrangindia.in/independent-rss-handle-followed-pm-modi-twitter-advocates-economic-boycott-muslims/ Sat, 04 Feb 2017 06:02:32 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2017/02/04/independent-rss-handle-followed-pm-modi-twitter-advocates-economic-boycott-muslims/ An Independent RSS Twitter Handle @RSS_Org, followed by PM Modi and other top BJP leaders like Meenakshi Lekhi etc, today advocated for complete economic boycott of Muslims over a span of 3 tweets. This twitter account has over 1 lakh followers and they describe themselves as “An independent initiative by RSS Swayamsevaks” according to their […]

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An Independent RSS Twitter Handle @RSS_Org, followed by PM Modi and other top BJP leaders like Meenakshi Lekhi etc, today advocated for complete economic boycott of Muslims over a span of 3 tweets. This twitter account has over 1 lakh followers and they describe themselves as “An independent initiative by RSS Swayamsevaks” according to their Twitter bio.
 

 

rss-boycott-economically-muslims

At some point of time, they deleted the above tweets and retweeted the same content but took out the “Muslim” reference.

Bfore expctng Modi to do some James Bondish act, Can u pls start boycotting Illegl immigrants Maids, rickshaw, auto, Kabadiwala, Barber etc?
— RSS (@RSS_Org) March 28, 2016

However, it was pretty obvious that their actual target were Indian Muslims and not Illegal Bangladeshis because neither Karim’s in Delhi is run by any immigrants nor can you figure out whether a person is an immigrant or not just by asking their names as suggested in their tweets.

This was not the first time when this handle, followed by PM Narendra Modi, blatantly targeted the minority community. Sometime back, they had suggested that “weapons need to be stocked” for protection from Jihadi attack while characterizing the outpour over the lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri as a “Jihadi attack”.

Independent-RSS-handle-followed-by-Narendra-Modi-on-Twitter-is-asking-people-to-stock-up-on-weapons-to-show-strength

Yet, PM Narendra Modi continues to follow these accounts thus boosting the acceptability of such bigoted accounts. And the list of bigoted accounts that PM follows is pretty long. Just yesterday, we wrote about how PM follows various accounts which spread dangerous communal canards regarding the murder of the 40 year old Dentist, Dr Pankaj Narang, in Delhi. Previously, we have written about how PM Modi follows people who use photo-shopped images to spread communal hatred. And also how PM Modi follows people who hurl sexists abuses at women.

The social media team that handles PM Modi’s accounts could well to do some spring cleaning. After all, he’s the PM of India and it doesn’t look very good when PM follows such perverse accounts, irrespective of how many times they chant “Bharat Mata Ki Jai”.

Courtesy: Truth of Gujarat
 

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