Who would have thunk it? That of all people, New York Times will give BJP and the right-wing ecosystem the biggest talking point in years. Of course, we knew. There was nothing new in the NYT expose. Maybe some minor details, which I am pretty sure the government already knew just not released while investigations were on.
The Facebook and Pegasus saga was a bit too esoteric. Ordinary Indians will scratch their heads reading all those technical jargon and may just move on. The ecosystem could brazen it out.
But will they be able to brazen this one out too? That too when it involves not just one but so many of them. Signs are that this is exactly what they are trying to do – look at the omerta that hangs heavy like a fog even on a hot summer day. Try finding “fearless independent journalists” tweeting or talking about this.
Let us see.
Without repeating a lot of stuff that is already out there and boring you, let me instead focus on a few points that I think are worth thinking about. Forgive me if they are sort of random…there is a pattern though. If you can read between the lines.
First things first. I must replug my old article, repeating the suggestion I made then – ALL donations from overseas, by non-Indians, MUST go to a common central fund that will be distributed to states as per population weightage.
We can never “prove” certain things. WhatsApp chats, emails etc are easy to destroy or conceal. Mobiles can be thrown away. How do you prove a sold-out treacherous mindset? Does Kim Jong Un issue daily instructions to his media to sing his tune? Does Xi Jin Ping tell his coolies in India what narratives to peddle? No, they KNOW what to say. A wink and a nod don’t qualify as evidence in courts.
The best way is to stop the money trail. Bomb the supply lines. Then we are left with a few hardcore ideologues, not the battalions of brown noses, bootlickers, and hangers-on that just need to fund their Chianti bottles and London trips. They will move to greener pastures.
The second point worth noticing is the startling similarities between the way the jihadist Islamist cabal operates and the way their “all-weather, sweeter than honey” leftist allies do.
We have dog-rearing, whisky-sipping Generals in Pakistan earning millions of dollars in various corrupt ways and living luxurious lives, telling poor Muslim boys that they must wear suicide jackets and go die for Islam. And many boys, mostly from poor families and lower social ranks, do.
And then we have these Chianti-sipping urban upper caste charlatans live like Princes, tweet from Paris cafes or London pubs, wear Rs.15 lakh Nirav Modi necklaces, that collect “salaries” in lakhs (the amounts floating around in the net are mind-boggling) from shady sources, fly to Europe at drop of hat – telling poor lower caste village Maoist boys, to become cannon fodder because theirs is a “just struggle”.
I have written about this too. Poor Muslims believe these frauds too and get incited by their incendiary propaganda, supposedly in their interest. The chaos, riots and violence that result mean more donations for these frauds to spend on themselves. It is time they open their eyes.
Making ordinary Indians understand the motives, agendas, methods, and chicanery of these urban Naxals is a HUGE challenge for BJP as well as all right-thinking Indians.
How many Indians know that what is being sold to them as fearless independent journalism is Chinese propaganda by a Stalinist Maoist ideology that has only resulted in rapist savagery and mass murders on a horrendous scale in India and globally? How to explain the alliance of convenience between these forces and fascist looter families?
We cannot afford to lose this battle.
Ease of doing business!
I read that Gautam Navlakha and Prabir Purkayastha incorporated a company to receive funds! Assuming that is true, that must be thanks to Modi’s reforms. We are blessed to live in an India where revolutionaries start incorporating companies and not blast railway tracks. No wonder India’s rank is up in these ease of business rankings. A welcome change indeed. But I am just curious were shares issues with the poor proletariats that fight in the jungles? Are they given dividends out of YouTube earnings and “export of services” earnings? I guess not.
Now back to my favourite topic of babudom.
There are many ways to fund these scams. Outright donation is a problem because it can be taxed. Unless you float NGO, get tax exemption. But “fascist” Modi tightened that screw. Plus a news magazine cannot be an NGO.
One other trick is to issue shares to foreign “investors” at a huge premium. For a newly floated private company that has no revenue, and no listing plans or products, a Rs10 share will be sold for, say, Rs.11,000. That is supposed to be capital receipt not income – so not taxed.
Out of that money, payoffs will be made to whoever the boss from abroad says needs to be paid – that will be shown as a loss in the books. Or reduce income – so there is tax savings there too.
To be fair, the UPA regime was aware of this. They faced the Church-funded anti-Kudankulam protests and several other attempts to sabotage vital infrastructure projects. P Chidambaram brought in the dreaded tax terror law of treating such dubious receipts as income. But then this affected lots and lots of genuine startups who were forced to pay tax on what was a genuine share sale. To catch the 1% and fail even in that, we harassed 99%. Some were even forced to close shop because ITOs froze their bank accounts.
Sadly, both AJ and NS have not only NOT removed this but made it worse.
There are significant legal and regulatory challenges that confront the government – be it CONgress or BJP. How do you catch them? Today as we read about Newsclick, it may seem these nonsensical laws are needed but we can do better. But our babus must be told to come up with better suggestions. If not get rid of them and get private talent. They will know how to leave the 99% alone but get the 1% – not the other way around as it is now. That is how Singapore does it. We can too if we try.
Avoid heavy handed action
As I mentioned, taking them on with evidence is a challenge. Any government action must ultimately end up in courts where hard evidence matters and where sympathies are entirely with the leftist cabal, as we have repeatedly seen. Ordinary Indians languish in jails for decades for petty crimes even without a hearing, but these people get midnight hearings on priority.
What can be done?
In my honest opinion, any ham-handed action will only give these frauds license to play the martyr. NYT will flip on a dime and disown the entire story – and blame Modi for attacking free media. Editors Guild, which has been remarkably silent on this saga, will join the chorus tune. UN, Rihanna, Biden admin, BBC, Al-Jazeera, and Trudeau will all be summoned to come to the aid of the party.
The ecosystem is too big.
Modi sarkar must take the case direct to people of the country.
In my simple mind, I can think of simple actions GOI can do. Lay out and make public evidence on the money trail. With a clear indisputable paper trail. How much was paid, and by who to who? There do not even have to be associations of guilt with such payments. Just show proof of payments.
Then the martyrs become the defendants. They must say why they were paid so much and for what. The ordinary public will stop believing them. More importantly, other coolies of the same ecosystem, that lick for much less, will start demanding more. There will be catfights. One such fight broke out when a prominent Islamist fake NGO fundraiser was disowned by a few other fellow frauds. Because ultimately it is about money. They may start leaking juicy details.
It will be fun to watch.
Another variation of the “bedha” tactic is to carefully observe the tension within the left cabal and make use of it. The very fact that NYT chose to publish this and not bury tells us many things. Their key priority is to get Biden or a woke re-elected. A few brown coolies thrown under the bus hardly matter. It also means woke left in the USA unlike the Beijing serfs of the Indian left, sees China as a national security threat. Again I’ve written about this.
Indian Stalinist left ‘activists’ know this and have carefully camouflaged themselves, removing all overt symbols and adopting woke lingo. Some even started declaring pronouns to get a lick of Soros orifices and the funding that can flow.
I think this must be done at the higher levels of government. While Modi sarkar is working lock step with West and Biden Admin, be it arms procurement and joint manufacturing, QUAD or ending China’s stranglehold on medicine APIs, tech manufacturing, it cannot allow the efforts to be sabotaged cheaply by China.
Highlighting and convincing the American woke left about Indian leftists’ obedience to Beijing – a birth defect that can’t be fixed – and it’s agendas and narratives, a lot of evangelist and even leftist woke funding routes will dry up. Hope this plan is being worked on. I don’t see much evidence of that though.
And if clear evidence is found by which we can draw a thick line from Beijing to the bank accounts, come down like a ton of bricks. Show no sympathy. Treat them as Mao or Stalin would have treated them for such offences.
More importantly, DON’T let this get out of the news. Control over the media/academia ecosystem, Wikipedia etc., gives leftists enormous ability to erase news and facts from our conscience. My suggestion to BJP spokies is simple – EVERY TIME they are called to discuss ANYTHING on TV, by the GOXI media (thanks Karthikeya Tanna), mention this saga. At least until May 2024. Point out their hypocrisy and omerta.
Let them squirm. Let them protest. Let them shout. But it will stay in the news.
