Sunita Kejriwal, the wife of Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, has recently been admitted at Max Super Speciality Hospital, Saket, New Delhi. She had tested positive for COVID-19 on April 20.
CM @ArvindKejriwal जी की धर्म पत्नी सुनीता केजरीवाल जी के कोरोना के कारण साकेत के मैक्स अस्प्ताल में भर्ती होने की खबर चिंताजनक
मां जगदम्बा से प्रार्थना है कि सुनीता जी को जल्दी स्वस्थ करें
On April 20, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s wife Sunita tested positive for the deadly coronavirus, following which she isolated herself at home. Kejriwal also claimed to have isolated himself after his wife tested positive, however, days later, he visited an ITBP-run Covid Care Centre when he should have remained in isolation
Kejriwal had a COVID scare last year after being unwell for a while. He went into home isolation after a spasm of fever and throat pain before taking the test which turned out negative.
Delhi is currently in the midst of a rampaging second wave of the coronavirus outbreak, spreading at an alarming rate. Prominent personalities have contracted the virus. On Thursday, the national capital reported 24,235 cases with a positivity rate of 32.82 per cent, and 395 deaths due to coronavirus, the highest since the pandemic began a year ago. This was the eighth day in a row that Delhi has recorded over 300 deaths due to Covid-19.
Even as the COVID-19 outbreak in Delhi is surging at an alarming rate, BKU leader Rakesh Tikait on Thursday asserted that the ‘farmers protests will continue and insisted that his drama at the border will continue despite the sharp uptick in the coronavirus caseloads.
Addressing a Kisan maha panchayat in Bhiwani’s Prem Nagar village in Haryana, Tikait said on April 29 that farmers would not leave the protest sites at Delhi borders amid a ferocious second wave of the COVID-19 outbreak.
“Government is trying to suppress the voices of farmers amidst the increase in COVID-19 cases. We are ready to hold talks with the government and the same are expected to be held by November and December. Farmers in Gujarat are the worst affected and if the farmers’ issue won’t be resolved, the BJP government will implement this Gujarat model across the country,” Tikait said.
Tikait also added that donations for Ram Mandir should be used for the construction of a new AIIMS instead. “Instead of giving donations for Ram Mandir, a donation drive should be started to build new AIIMS. The Haryana government has failed to build a medical college in Bhiwani even after remaining in power for the last six years,” he said.
Another farmer leader Gurnam Singh Charuni echoed Tikait’s assertions, stating that the protests will continue even if the government imposes Section 144 of CrPC across the country.
‘Farmers’, majorly from Punjab and Haryana, have been protesting for the last five months against the newly introduced three farm laws. They have squatted on the highways leading to the national capital, demanding the repeal of the three agriculture bills that were passed by the Modi government in September last year.
The three laws are the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020, the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance, and Farm Services Act, 2020, and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020.
Earlier, it was reported that the ‘farmers’ protest along the Delhi borders and a number of Kisan rallies, meetings conducted in Punjab may have contributed to the alarming rise of COVID-19 cases in Delhi and surrounding states. The UK strain of the coronavirus, which is markedly more virulent, is more prevalent in several northern states, including Punjab, the genome sequencing data from the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) revealed. Two scientists from central government labs asserted that large gatherings in Punjab were responsible for the widespread transmission of the variant in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.
The national capital is among the worst-hit city due to the coronavirus outbreak. On Thursday, Delhi recorded 395 deaths due to coronavirus, the highest since the pandemic began a year ago, and 24,235 cases with a positivity rate of 32.82 per cent, according to a bulletin issued by the city health department. This was the eighth day in a row that Delhi has recorded over 300 deaths due to Covid-19.
‘Shooter Dadi’ Chandro Tomar has passed away after being infected with the novel Coronavirus. She breathed her last at the Anand Hospital in Meerut on Friday.
शूटर दादी चंद्रो तोमर @realshooterdadi का मेरठ के आनंद अस्पताल में #कोरोना से निधन। वे कोरोना संक्रमित थीं। ईश्वर उनकी आत्मा को शांति दे । ?
Tomar was admitted to the hospital on Monday after developing a breathing problem. She gained widespread popularity after she picked up shooting after crossing the age of 60. She also inspired a Bollywood movie and is believed to be the oldest sharp shooter in the world.
Chandro Tomar popularly knows as ‘Shooter Dadi’, passes away
She was admitted to a Meerut hospital on April 26 after she tested positive for COVID19 pic.twitter.com/GskaCzQYL5
One journalist had prematurely tweeted the news of her death in 2019, prompting her to respond, “You’re in a hurry.”
Chandro Tomar, nicknamed ‘Shooter Dadi’, is a sharpshooter from Johri village in Bagpat, Uttar Pradesh. She learnt shooting in 1999 when she was in her 60s and has won over 30 national championships.
Chandro Tomar was 90 years old at the time of her death. People on social media are expressing their sadness and shock over her demise.
As the coronavirus crisis in India deepens, some left-leaning ‘intellectuals’ are revelling in the tragedy porn to attack the Modi government. One such left-leaning ‘intellectual’ and anti-India propagandist is Arundhati Roy, who recently penned an article in British daily ‘The Guardian’ that was replete with lies, misinformation and propaganda.
Exactly a year ago, Arundhati Roy had claimed that the Covid-19 is not even a crisis in India, and the Modi government is only misusing it to kill Muslims.
While being deceitful is second nature to Arundhati Roy and lying her favourite hobby, the extent of lies she peddled in The Guardian at a time when India is grappling with a ferocious second wave of COVID-19 is particularly egregious. Here are the three appalling lies that Arundhati Roy peddled in her recent article in The Guardian:-
Arundhati Roy spreads lies and misinformation about PM Cares Fund
In her article which was published on Thursday, Roy spread lies and misinformation about the PM Cares Fund, the Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund. She alleged that the PM Cares Fund operated like a ‘private trust’ and had no accountability.
Relevant section from The Guardian article
As it turns out, Roy’s assertions about the PM Cares Fund are nothing but plain and unadulterated lies. PM Cares Fund is a relief assistance fund headed by the Prime Minister and its trustees include Minister of Defence, Rajnath Singh, Minister of Home Affairs, Amit Shah, and Minister of Finance, Nirmala Sitharaman in the Government of India.
In addition, the PM Cares Fund is independently audited, and its audited statements are publicly available. But these facts don’t stop Roy from drawing false equivalence between a government relief fund and a private trust.
Interestingly, the likes of Arundhati Roy, who casts aspersions on the PM Cares Fund, have no qualms with foreign based unverified NGOs. They have more trust in unverified and murky foreign NGOs than the PM Cares Fund, and have actively protested against the government’s crackdown against foreign-based unlicensed NGOs.
Besides, Roy’s lies maligning the PM Cares Fund comes at a time when it is being extensively helpful in procuring oxygen concentrators, ventilators, protective gears and other important equipment to find the resurgent wave of the coronavirus outbreak. Moreover, over 80% of the cost of vaccines in the first phase of Covid vaccination was borne by this fund.
Roy’s rhetoric of ‘PM Modi owning shares in air supply’ are hollow and meaningless. They don’t even make sense.
Arundhati Roy lies about India’s vaccination drive and COVID-19 vaccines produced by SII and Bharat Biotech
Another lie that Arundhati Roy peddled in The Guardian article was related to the COVID-19 vaccination. In her article, Roy alleged that Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech, two of the organisations underpinning India’s vaccination drive, will make “obscene profits” from the sale of their vaccines. She alleged that both are being allowed to roll out two of the most “expensive vaccines in the world”.
Relevant section from The Guardian article
Roy here conveniently fails to mention that more than 160 million people have been already vaccinated free of cost in India. The central government will continue to give vaccines for free to people who cannot afford them at the government centres. However, in her attempt to criticise the Modi government, she failed to acknowledge it in her article.
Serum Institute of India is charging Rs 300 per dose($4) from states and the Bharat BioTech has kept its prices at Rs 400 per dose($5.5). These prices are among the cheapest in the world. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are expected to cost around $20 per dose, but Arundhati Roy continued to peddle lies that Indian-made vaccines are the most expensive in the world. Several states in the country have already announced that they will be providing the jabs for free to their citizens, but this again was conveniently not mentioned by Roy in her article.
And to increase the capacity of vaccine production, the organizations have to make profits so that the amount earned can be invested back to increase the production. India, by the dint of its size, needs the SII and Bharat Biotech to expand its manufacturing capabilities multifold. But the leftists like Arundhati Roy, whose understanding of economics can be best described as grotesque, do not want the organizations to earn even modest profits that would help them in upscaling their operations.
Also, India is a free market economy and not a socialist economy as the left-leaning ‘intellectuals’ like Arundhati Roy desire it to be. Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech are private entities and they have a right to earn profits unless Arundhati Roy is advocating the Centre to expropriate them just like Yogendra Yadav, Ram Guha and others suggested the government appropriate private properties in the fight against coronavirus.
Arundhati Roy peddles propaganda about the West Bengal elections
In her bid to spite the Modi government, Roy also found a way to push propaganda about the West Bengal elections in her article in The Guardian. According to Roy, the elections in West Bengal is should have completed in a single phase, citing that it is geographically a small state.
Relevant section from The Guardian article
While West Bengal may be geographically a small state, Roy fails to highlight that it has a massive population of more than 100 million. The state has a complex riverine geography and has witnessed extreme political violence in the last few years, not to mention the threat of radical Islamic terrorism from the porous border it shares with Bangladesh. But as expected, these facts were swept under the rug by Roy. They were not mentioned in the article to give readers a context about the decision taken by the Election Commission to organise elections in 8 phases.
2011. 2016 elections in Bengal had 6 phases too
Roy also did not mention that this is not the first time that Bengal is seeing elections in multiple phases. The state has long been a hotbed for political violence. Even the 2011 and 2016 elections were also held through 6 phases, with the first phase divided into two days.
Hundreds of political leaders and workers have been victims of violence in West Bengal. But for Arundhati Roy, those deaths do not warrant a mention because most of the victims belonged to the opposition parties.
In fact, Arundhati Roy also had a problem that BJP campaigned vigorously for the West Bengal elections. As a political party, the BJP is well within its rights to contest in a democratic election anywhere across the country, especially in West Bengal where dissent has been suppressed and hundreds of its workers have been victims of violence perpetrated by TMC goons. Roy pontificating that BJP should not have run a high voltage campaign in West Bengal reveals her underlying fear that the saffron party may well be poised to make major inroads in West Bengal politics and pose a threat to Mamata Banerjee’s political hegemony.
The Union Finance Ministry has decided to provide an additional amount of upto Rs 15,000 crore to states as interest-free 50-year loans for spending on capital projects. The Department of Expenditure has issued fresh guidelines in this regard on the “Scheme of Financial Assistance to States for Capital Expenditure” for the financial year 2021-22.
Under this Scheme, financial assistance is being provided to the state governments in the form of 50-year interest free loan. Earlier in October last year, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced Rs 12,000 crore interest-free 50-year loan to states for capital projects in a bid to boost the economy. The loan was to be spent entirely on new or ongoing capital projects. This was part of the measures announced by the Narendra Modi govt to stimulate the economy following the Covid-19 lockdown.
The finance ministry said that out of Rs 12,000 crore announced last year, Rs.11,830.29 crore was released to the states. This helped to sustain state level capital expenditure in the pandemic year.
The new scheme for special assistance to states for capital expenditure for 2021-22 has three parts. The part 1 is for the North-East and hill states and an amount of Rs 2,600 crore has been earmarked for this part. Out of this, Assam, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand will get Rs 400 crore each while remaining states in this group have been allocated Rs 200 crore each.
The part 2 is for all the remaining states, and the total amount allocated for them is Rs 7,400 crore. This amount has been allocated amongst these states in proportion to their share of central taxes as per the award of the 15th Finance Commission for the year 2021-22.
The part 3 of the scheme is for providing incentives for monetization/recycling of infrastructure assets and disinvestment of the State Public Sector Enterprises (SPSEs). An amount of Rs 5,000 crore is allocated for this part of the scheme. Under this part, states will receive interest free 50 years loan ranging from 33% to 100% of the amount realised by them through assets monetization, listing and disinvestment.
The finance ministry has said that the funds provided to the states under the scheme shall be used for new and ongoing capital projects, for long term benefit to the state. The funds may also be used for settling pending bills in ongoing capital projects.
This scheme will help the states in boosting their economy at the time of Covid-19 pandemic by making capital expenditure on creating infrastructure. Capital expenditure creates employment, especially for the poor and unskilled. Moreover, it has a high multiplier effect, as it enhances the future productive capacity of the economy, and results in a higher rate of economic growth. Therefore, despite the adverse financial position of the Central Government, it was decided last year to launch a “Scheme for Special Assistance to States for Capital Expenditure”, the finance ministry said.
Senior Aaj Tak journalist Rohit Sardana passed away on Friday after testing positive for the Coronavirus. He suffered a heart attack early morning. Since the news of his untimely demise broke out, condolences have been pouring in from all ends of the political spectrum.
Barring one. Islamists on social media are celebrating the death of the journalist and hurling the worst kind of abuses at him. Some of them even have verified accounts on Twitter.
Newslaundry columnist Sharjeel Usmani called him a ‘pathological liar’ and ‘genocide enabler’ and said that Rohit Sardana shall not be remembered as a journalist.
Source: Twitter
Mohammad Ibrar, who is a correspondent for Times of India as per his Twitter profile, said, “Death doesn’t absolve crimes.” According to him, Sardana’s “misdeeds” should be highlighted while offering condolence.
Source: Twitter
BrumbyOz, an Islamist account which has great following among liberal sections of Twitter, called Rohit Sardana ‘Godi media’.
Source: Twitter
Another such account with the username @deepsealioness justified people celebrating his death.
Source: Twitter
Zainab Sikander, columnist at Shekhar Gupta’s The Print, was less tactless than the rest but she did allowed herself the opportunity to shower ‘laanat’ upon Rohit Sardana without naming him explicitly.
Source: Twitter
Indian Express journalist Anya Shankar expressed her displeasure at the ‘whitewashing abhiyan’ that had begun, taking a swipe at the messages of condolence pouring over Rohit Sardana.
Source: Twitter
Congress party’s ‘youth icon’ from Alwar, as per his Twitter profile, felt jubilant over his death as well.
Source: Twitter
Apart from them, there were numerous others who posted celebratory messages about the journalist’s death. Some communists joined the fray as well.
Source: Twitter
Source: Twitter
‘Godi media’ was a popular theme among such people.
Source: Twitter
There are those that are calling him Rohit ‘Dangana’.
Source: Twitter
Some Islamists are unable to contain there glee at his demise.
Source: Twitter
Then there are those who have restricted themselves to giving ‘laugh’ react on Facebook posts.
Rohit Sardana was renowned for his straightforward manner of reporting and not hesitating to speak truth to power. He did not permit himself to be constrained by the bounds of political correctness and was loved by people for it.
Amidst the 2nd wave of Coronavirus outbreak in India, miscreants are exploiting the acute shortage of the life-saving Remdesivir injection. Several cases of black marketing have come to light. The drug used for treating Coronavirus patients with severe co-morbidities is being sold illegally at high prices. At the same time, fake Remdesivir injections are also doing the rounds amidst rising Covid cases.
On Monday (April 26), IPS officer Monica Bhardwaj took to Twitter to help families of Coronavirus infected patients distinguish between fake and genuine Remdesivir injections. She is the DCP of the Delhi Police Crime Branch. IPS Monica Bhardwaj has pointed out a total of 6 identifiers that can help differentiate between a counterfeit and authentic Remdesivir jab.
According to her, a fake Remdesivir vial will not have the word ‘Rx‘ in it. Derived from the Latin word ‘recipe’, it is used as a customary heading in each prescription. Second, the fake Remdesivir vials will have several Capitalisation errors. In images shared by the IPS officer, it can be seen that the words ‘100 mg/vial’, ‘india’, ‘for use in’ are written in small letters. A genuine Remdesivir package will instead have the words written as ‘100mg/Vial’, ‘India’, ‘For use in’, and so on.
Attention!! Lookout for these details before buying Remdesivir from the market. pic.twitter.com/A2a3qx5GcA
Third, a fake package will have multiple alignment errors. For instance, the fake vial (as seen in the image) has an increased gap around the Company name label ‘Covifor’. Fourth, the warning label in a genuine package of Remdesivir will be in red while a fake one may be of a different colour altogether.
Fifth, an original package will have the key licensing information ”Gilead Sciences, Inc” along with the brand name. It can be seen that this crucial information is missing from the fake package. Lastly, one must watch out for spelling mistakes. For instance, ‘Telangana’ in the counterfeit vial is written as ‘Telagana’.
In another tweet, Monica Bhardwaj clarified, “The tweet is for educational purposes. No such complaints received yet.” She had also shared the image of a genuine Remdesivir package for netizens to be able to visually distinguish it from the fake one.
Fake Remedsisvir racket busted in the constituency of NCP chief Sharad Pawar
After receiving a tip-off about black-marketing of Remdesivir, the Pune rural police arrested four persons for allegedly selling fake Remdesivir injections in the Baramati area. A police official informed that three injection vials labeled as Remdesivir, filled with a liquid form of paracetamol were seized from the accused. Baramati is the hometown of NCP chief Sharad Pawar who also represents it in the Lok Sabha.
Narayan Shirgavkar, deputy superintendent of police, Baramati division informed that the accused were selling the fake drug at ₹35,000 per vial while its authorized market price is ₹1,100. “We have arrested four people under relevant sections of the IPC, Essential Commodities Act, Drug & Cosmetics Act and Drugs (Price Control) Act,” he added. According to the information given by the police, Prashant Gharat (23), Shankar Bhise (22), Dilip Gaikwad (35) and Sandeep Gaikwad (20) have been arrested.
The four accused have sold seven duplicate injections to the relatives of Covid-19 positive patients until now. The police also fear that the patients to whom the fake injections were sold might develop some side effects. The police are now tracing the relatives of seven patients, to whom the injections have been sold. The arrests were made after laying a trap upon receiving information, where the police recovered two Remdesivir vials. The vial seal was broken when the injection was examined and injection holes were visible in the rubber caps.
Even as the apex court regularly fines people for filing frivolous petitions, there is no end to such petitions when the courts are already overburdened with a larger number of current and pending cases. In one such case, the Supreme Court of India today slammed a youth for filing a petition on Covid-19 despite having on qualification the matter.
Suresh Shaw, who identified himself as an unemployed, had filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking to issue directions on medication and treatment of Covid-19. He had approached the apex court after the Calcutta High Court had dismissed his petition on the same matter. Shaw had filed the petition pleading that the court should direct what tests and medicines should be prescribed for Covid-19 patients.
The matter came before a bench of Chief Justice of India NV Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and AS Bopanna today, and the bench said that it is a frivolous portioner. “It is a frivolous petition. You have come here after Calcutta High Court dismissed your case,” the bench told the petitioner, who was present during the hearing.
The court had also imposed a cost of Rs 10 lakh for the petition, but when Shaw pleaded that he is unemployed with just Rs 1,000 in his bank account, the bench reduced the cost to Rs. 1000.
The hearing in the court went like this:
Bench: Are you a doctor?
Suresh Shaw: No. The petition is based on scientific papers.
Bench: You are not a doctor or medical student? What’s your knowledge of Covid? What is your qualification?
Shaw: I have Masters in commerce.
Bench: You want to prescribe covid medicines to whole world? A commerce student will teach medical professionals all over the world how to treat covid? How much cost should we impose for such frivolous plea. We’ll impose cost of 10 lakhs for this.
The petitioner then pleaded that he can’t pay Rs 10 lakh as he is unemployed.
Bench: Petitioner wants us to Direct what type of tests and treatment has to be conducted for treatment of covid. We’ll impose cost. Yes how much cost should we impose?
The court responded that this is a frivolous plea filed who doesn’t have any knowledge about the subject. The court said, “petitioner wants us to direct what type of tests and treatment has to be conducted for treatment of covid. We’ll impose cost”. The bench then asked the petitioner how much cost should be imposed.
When the petitioner informed that he has only Rs 1000 in his bank account about, the bench imposed the same amount as cost and dismissed the petition.
The official Twitter account of Dasna Devi temple head-priest Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati has been suspended. In response to the suspension, Saraswati wrote an email to the social media behemoth, asserting that he has never tweeted with the intention of targeting or harassing others.
Saraswati conjectured that his account may have been suspended as a result of a coordinated attack by some miscreants. He said he has used the platform only to express his views on a variety of matters as one is free to express his/her views on Twitter.
“My account @Narsinghvani has been suspended for the reasons best known to you. Although I have never violated any guidelines of Twitter. I think my account has been marked as spam by some miscreants. I have never done any tweet with the motive of targeting or harassing anyone. I have only shared my views over different matters as one is free to express his/her views here. I think you have suspended my account by mistake. Kindly reconsider my request to unsuspend my account,” the email Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati wrote to Twitter challenging his account suspension.
Yati Narsinghanand’s account was mass-reported
No sooner after Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati was de-platformed from Twitter, several social media users rejoiced on the microblogging website for being successful in getting his account suspended. The celebratory messages on Twitter confirm Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati’s apprehensions that his account was mass-reported by miscreants, eventually leading to the suspension.
A troll Twitter account named @BhaktendraNodi is being credited to run the spam campaign against Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati for getting his account suspended. The account took to Twitter to allege that Saraswati has been removed from Twitter.
Source: Twitter
Many Twitter handles credited the aforementioned Twitter account for getting Yati Narsighanand Saraswati’s account suspended.
Source: TwitterSource: Twitter
The group named Team Saath, who have been targeting twitter handles who have different political and ideological views were seen calling for the suspension of Yati Narsinghanand’s account. They were found celebrating the suspension.
In other news, the hàtèmônger @narsinghvani has been suspended by @Twitter, finally.
Self-proclaimed ‘fact-checker’ Md Zubair who often peddles fake news, and Rahul Gandhi’s dedicated fan Sanjukta Basu were found celebrating too.
Tweet by Md Zubair of AltNews Tweet by Sanjukta Basu
Yati Narsighanand Saraswati’s recent remarks on Prophet Muhammad had earned him a lot of hate and open threats from Islamists and their supporters. Saraswati had not minced his words in criticizing Prophet Muhammad, which has earned him the ire of Islamists online and offline. While specific Twitter groups targeted his account online, many Islamists have been openly calling for his beheading with ‘sar tan see juda‘ slogans. It is notable here that the ‘sar tan se juda’ slogan is a clarion call for Muslims to behead anyone who criticizes Islam’s Prophet.
Rohit Sardana, popular news anchor at Aaj Tak, has passed away on Friday. He had tested positive for the Coronavirus and suffered a heart attack on Friday morning.
Rohit Sardana passes away
The news was also confirmed by Sudhir Chaudhary of Zee News. He said that he never thought the virus would take away someone so close to him. He said he was not prepared for this.
अब से थोड़ी पहले @capt_ivane का फ़ोन आया।उसने जो कहा सुनकर मेरे हाथ काँपने लगे।हमारे मित्र और सहयोगी रोहित सरदाना की मृत्यु की ख़बर थी।ये वाइरस हमारे इतने क़रीब से किसी को उठा ले जाएगा ये कल्पना नहीं की थी।इसके लिए मैं तैयार नहीं था।ये भगवान की नाइंसाफ़ी है.. ॐ शान्ति
Condolence is pouring in from across the board over the passing away of Rohit Sardana. People are shocked upon hearing the news. Sardana was hugely popular due to his straightforward manner of reporting.
The last few posts on his Twitter account shows that Rohit Sardana was trying to help people even while suffering poor health himself. He was sharing SOS calls of people who were in need of amenities amidst the second wave of the Coronavirus pandemic.
His death has come as a shock to his friends and colleagues.
