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Another Muslim who is not Muslim enough for Alt News: Mohammed Zubair casts aspersions on the Muslimness of a Maulana for protesting against ‘Pathaan’

OpIndia Staff
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Another Muslim who is not Muslim enough for Alt News: Mohammed Zubair casts aspersions on the Muslimness of a Maulana for protesting against ‘Pathaan’

Amidst ongoing outrage over ‘Pathaan’, Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair today cast aspersions on the Muslim identity of Maulanas who did not subscribe to his worldview and protested against Shah Rukh Khan’s upcoming action movie.

In a post on Twitter, Zubair, who has, of late, fashioned himself as some authority on dishing out Muslimness certificates to Muslims online, shared some pictures to undermine a Muslim organisation’s protest against SRK’s ‘Pathaan’.

“There are reports that an organisation “All India Muslim Festival Committee” has also opposed the movie ‘Pathan’. A few pics of the ‘Maulana’ behind the organisation,” Zubair tweeted.

As protests erupted over a particularly raunchy song featuring Deepika Padukone in skimpy dresses and racy dance moves, a Muslim organisation named ‘All India Muslim Tyohar Committee’ extended its support to the demonstrations calling for a ban on the screening of the movie.

Zubair shared pictures of the Maulanas associated with the organisation from his participation in events attended by Madhya Pradesh CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan, insinuating that Muslims attending events organised by the BJP or their leaders are lesser Muslims than others and perhaps undeserving of identifying themselves as Muslims.

The tweet by Alt News co-founder, notorious for his polarising views and inveterate dog-whistling on Twitter, reflects his polarising attempt to lord over a community of more than 20 crore people who have the democratic right to align with the party of their choice and protest against a movie they deem inappropriate without questions being raised over their piety.

However, Zubair, who rose to fame after dog-whistling against Nupur Sharma, precipitated a diplomatic nightmare for India in the Islamic autocracies in the middle east and spawned widespread domestic protests, Muslims who attend events organised by democratically elected governments or socialise with politicians for the betterment of their community should be stigmatised and discredited for political choices that run counter to his dogmatic beliefs.

For Alt News and Zubair, Muslims cease to be Muslims if they do not hate PM Modi and BJP

But this is not the first time that Zubair has called into question the religiosity of a Muslim whose political ideology does not converge with his. For Zubair and his propaganda website Alt News, whose entire existence rests on vilifying the Modi government and painting the regime as anti-Muslim, it is difficult to reconcile with the fact that some Muslims might be BJP supporters and admirers of PM Modi.

When Muslims express their association with the BJP, RSS or any other party that is bracketed by liberals as parties with ‘Hindutva’ ideology, Alt News goes into overdrive discrediting such voices. It denounces the Muslims who voice their support for PM Modi and his government and raising questions over their Muslimness by highlighting the fact they are associated with the RSS. Sometimes, they don’t even have to support the PM. The mere fact that as a Muslim they do not hate PM Modi with all their guts is sometimes enough to lose their Muslim credentials.

In 2020, on PM Modi’s birthday, members of Muslim community celebrated the occasion at Nizamuddin, Delhi. The event was covered by news agency ANI. However, this did not sit well with the anti-Modi propaganda website AltNews which was quick to slam ANI for presenting an RSS-backed event as ‘Muslim community’ celebrations of PM Modi’s birthday.

In yet another report published in August 2018, Alt News slammed ANI and News 18 for reporting RSS-affiliated Muslim organisation as “people in Lucknow” celebrating Bakrid by cutting a cake. Alt News was perturbed that some of the Muslims abhorred the custom of sacrificing a speechless animal and were exhorting others to shun the practice. This provided a reasonable opportunity to the leftist online rag to cast doubt over the Muslimness of the people by pointing out their association with the RSS.

For Alt News and its co-founder Mohammed Zubair, Muslims cease to exist as Muslims if they do not oppose the BJP and the RSS. Any association of the Muslims with the aforesaid organisations automatically raises doubts over their adherence to Islam. According to Alt News, resistance and opposition to PM Modi, BJP and its affiliate organisations, is the only measure of one’s Muslimness. Any Muslim who is found defying these conventions, his Muslimness is liable to be questioned by Alt News and its self-described custodians of Muslim community.

‘WHO blamed Indian cough syrup for deaths in Gambia, but never provided any document to prove it’: Drug Controller General of India lashes out at WHO

OpIndia Staff
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‘WHO blamed Indian cough syrup for deaths in Gambia, but never provided any document to prove it’: Drug Controller General of India lashes out at WHO

On 13th December 2022, India’s Drugs Controller General Dr VG Somani wrote a letter to Dr Rogerio Gaspar who is the Director of Regulation and Prequalification at the World Health Organization. In this letter, Somani asserted that the Indian cough syrups from Maiden Pharma meet the necessary regulatory standards and are therefore harmless.

He added that the WHO’s statement blaming Indian cough syrups for the deaths of children in Gambia has impacted India’s image in the world in an adverse manner.

Somani’s letter was written in a response to the WHO’s letter dated 6th December 2022.

It is notable that the WHO had blamed India’s Maiden pharmaceuticals for the deaths of children in the Gambia in October. In October 2022, the WHO expressed fears that the children died due to the company’s cough syrup.

The letter reads, “Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) would like to reiterate its full cooperation and collaboration with WHO on the subject. In line with this spirit, CDSCO has already shared available details with WHO regularly. However, it is to reiterate that subsequent to the initial reports received from WHO on the possible causality relationship between drugs manufactured in India and deaths in Gambia, the Government of India constituted a technical committee of subject experts to examine and analyze the details of the reports/ adverse events/ COAS received from WHO.”

It adds, “India has been committed to rigorous monitoring and oversight to ensure that the highest standards of manufacturing are maintained in quality control of drugs and cosmetics. In the aftermath of the alerts received from WHO regarding the incidents in Gambia, an independent inspection was conducted in the premises of Maiden Pharmaceuticals, the firm in question.”

The letter asserted, “All control samples of 4 cough and cold syrups manufactured by Maiden Pharmaceutical were sent for testing to Government Laboratory as per extant rules and all the 4 products have been found to be of standard quality.”

Underlining the ill effects of WHO’s statements on India’s image, Dr VG Somani wrote in the letter, “The statement issued by the WHO in October 2022 was unfortunately amplified by the global media which led to a narrative being built internationally targeting the quality of Indian pharmaceutical products. This in turn has adversely impacted the image of India’s pharmaceutical products across the globe and caused irreparable damage to the supply chain of pharmaceutical products, as well as the repute of the national regulatory framework over an assumption that has yet not been substantiated by the WHO or its partners on the ground.”

Somani’s letter also reiterates that the repeated requests by the CDSCO to WHO seeking documentation or any factual information from WHO that formed the basis of their initial claim blaming the deaths in Gambia on Maiden Pharma’s cough syrups have been met with silence from the WHO so far. The letter also says that the initial claim, and subsequent mentions by WHO has only amplified this allegation without any factual basis and Maiden Pharma’s cough syrups were found to be containing no harmful substances.

Dr VG Somani further wrote in this letter, “It may be emphasized here that the Gambia informed that there has been no direct causal relation established yet between the cough syrup consumption and the deaths, and that certain children who had died had not consumed the syrup in question. We believe that WHO would now allow the technical committee of subject experts constituted by the Government of India to arrive at the conclusion based on all the facts and evidence available. We would be more than willing to consider permitting WHO representatives to interact with this technical committee.”

On Wednesday 12th October 2022, the Central Government constituted a four-member expert committee to probe the World Health Organization (WHO) reports on the deaths of 66 children in the Gambia which was hastily blamed on cough syrups made by Sonipat-based firm Maiden Pharmaceuticals Limited. Maiden Pharmaceuticals Limited firm in Sonipat was instructed to cease producing all cough syrups, according to an order from the Haryana government. A show-cause notice for 12 irregularities discovered at the company’s production facility was also issued. The letter written by Dr VG Somani also informs the WHO director about this.

In November this year, an Economic Times report stated that the specialised agency of the United Nations (UN) has failed to provide the documents, to the Indian authorities, which are required to further the investigation into the deaths of 70 deceased children in Gambia.

“The Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation(CDSCO), the drug regulator in India, has written thrice to the World Health Organisation but to no avail. It has so far received no response from WHO”, the report had added.

‘New system to appoint judges is needed, long vacations of courts not convenient for justice-seekers’: Law minister Kiren Rijiju in Rajya Sabha

OpIndia Staff
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‘New system to appoint judges is needed, long vacations of courts not convenient for justice-seekers’: Law minister Kiren Rijiju in Rajya Sabha

In a recent development in the ongoing argument between the union government and the Supreme Court on the issue of appointment of judges, today law minister Kiren Rijiju again said that the system reforms from the current collegium system. On Thursday, 15th December 2022, Kiren Rijiju said in Rajya Sabha that the nation needs a new system to appoint judges. The law minister also commented on long vacations of the courts, saying that it hampers justice delivery.

He said that the huge pendency of cases in the Indian courts is linked to the vacant posts of judges. According to Kiren Rijiju, this problem won’t be remedied until a new system for appointments is developed.

Kiren Rijiju said, “There is a feeling among people of India that the long vacation which the courts obtain is not very convenient for justice-seekers and it is my obligation and duty to convey the message or sense of this House to the judiciary.”

In response to a query on the number of court working days posed by Congress MP Rajeev Shukla in the Rajya Sabha, Rijiju stated that the country’s stockpile of cases was approaching 5 crores after reaching 4.90 crores. He added, “There are many reasons for this but the primary one is the appointment of judges and vacancies in the sanctioned strength.”

Kiren Rijiju said, “At this point, the government has very limited powers to reduce vacancies. I don’t want to comment much on the courts as it sometimes looks like the government is trying to interfere with the court’s powers. If you look at the provisions of the Constitution, the process of appointments was the right of the government with the consultation of the court. This changed after 1993. We are giving our support to end the pendency of cases, but till we don’t set up a new system for appointments, questions on the appointment of judges will keep being raised.”

Days prior to his comments in the House, Rijiju had called the Collegium system “opaque,” and the Vice-President had referred to the Supreme Court’s 2015 decision to invalidate the National Judicial Appointments Commission Act as a “severe compromise” of parliamentary authority and a disregard for the “mandate of the people.”

According to the Minister’s written response, as of December 12, 2022, the working strength of the Supreme Court, High Courts, district, and lower court was 19,192, whereas the sanctioned level was 25,011. From May 1, 2014, until December 5, 2022, he said, 46 judges have been appointed to the Supreme Court. According to the response, 59.56 lakh petitions were still waiting in High Courts as of December 1, 2022, while 69,598 matters were still pending in the Supreme Court according to the court’s own website.

Kiren Rijiju noted that although the National Judicial Appointments Commission Bill, 2014, had been unanimously approved by Parliament, the Supreme Court had overturned it in 2015, and said that it was not a correct action by the court. He said that the Collegium system, which is now in place for appointing judges, did not adequately represent the views of the general people and the Parliament. Many former justices, including members of the Constitution Bench who overturned the NJAC, he said, have since made public statements arguing that it was improper to overturn a law enacted by Parliament.

The minister responded to a follow-up question from DMK MP Tiruchi Siva regarding the proportion of women, SC, ST, and OBC judges. Kiren Rijiju said, “There was no reservation policy, but the government had written to Chief Justices of High Courts to keep in mind disadvantaged groups while recommending names for appointment as judges. Until now, there had been just one judge from the ST community.”

With regard to holidays, the minister responded that the Supreme Court has 224, 217, and 202 working days in 2019, 2020, and 2021, respectively. Similar to this, there are typically 210 working days in a year for all High Courts.

In a follow-up query, BJP MP Sushil Modi asked the Minister whether the government will approach the Chief Justice about moving away from annual holidays for the whole court to individual vacations for each judge. In response, Minister of State for Law and Justice S P Singh Baghel said, “the Supreme Court and High Courts decide their own working days and the government did not have a role. But there is no harm in talking.”

Responding to a similar suggestion by Congress MP Vivek Tankha, Kiren Rijiju said, “Definitely, there is a feeling among people of India that the long vacation which the courts obtain is not very convenient for justice-seekers. Definitely, as the Law Minister, it is also my bounded obligation and duty to convey the message or sense of this House to the judiciary. Will definitely ensure that even if there are vacations, the functioning of the court should not be stopped.”

New Delhi: Woman gets slapped with SCST Act after she complained against in-laws for fraud and assault, says they are using false documents to claim SC status

OpIndia Staff
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New Delhi: Woman gets slapped with SCST Act after she complained against in-laws for fraud and assault, says they are using false documents to claim SC status

In an uncommon case reported from the capital city of India, a Hindu woman has been booked by the Delhi police under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act on charges of caste abuse and mental harassment. The woman was booked based on the complaint filed by her father-in-law Ashok Kumar (60). However, this is after the woman registered an FIR against him and other members of her husband’s family for allegedly assaulting her and executing fraud against her.

The woman, after the complaint filed on December 12 stated that she was being implicated in a false case and that all the accusations against her were fabricated. According to a report by Swati Goyal Sharma in Swarajya, the case against the woman was filed 20 days after the Delhi Police officials declared that they could not find any evidence against her in the case for casteist abuse.

The woman meanwhile mentioned that the case that she had filed against her father-in-law and other members of her husband’s family is still pending at the Gurugram Court. Ashok Kumar, in his recently filed complaint against the woman stated that she and her family members abused him for his caste and mentally harassed him. He also said that the family members of the woman had physically assaulted him in the past.

In the FIR he mentioned that he belongs to the Julaha caste which comes under Scheduled Castes. He said that his daughter-in-law was indifferent and never cooperated after getting married to his son Yatin. “She often used to pick up fights over petty issues. Within three-four months of her marriage, she left and went to her parent’s house,” he said.

He said that the girl’s family members thrashed him in August 2019 and hurled abuses at him, calling him ‘choora and chamar.’ He also alleged that his daughter-in-law called him ‘neech’ and said that he was equal to some kind of dirt. He meanwhile submitted CCTV footage as proof and introduced his neighbour and his brother-in-law Rajesh Munjal as witnesses to the incident.

The woman has been booked under Section 3(1)(r)(s) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989. Reportedly, 20 days ago, the officials from Delhi Police had noted that they found no evidence of castist abuse against her. The Police in the Action Taken Report submitted to the National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) on a complaint by Ashok Kumar in 2021 stated that the woman used the word ‘uncivilized’ for her father-in-law. It is not a caste-based remark, they said.

According to the letter, images and CCTV video of the residence on 4 August 2019 were analyzed, but no physical attack was observed. The film also lacked audio recording, thus no argumentative comments could be heard.

The woman talked to Swarajya over the incident and noted that she got married to Yatin on March 8, 2019, whom she found on a matrimonial site. She said that Yatin worked in the Ministry of External Affairs and mentioned his surname as Arora (Punjabi Hindu Caste). However, on the wedding card, Yatin’s parents happened to mention their surname as ‘Bajaj’. “We were surprised with the ‘Bajaj’ surnames as we knew them as Aroras but did not think much of it, and we did not confront them about this,” she said adding that her father-in-law would consume alcohol daily and his behaviour towards her was not at all good.

Wedding card mentioning surname Bajaj (Image source- Swarajmag)

“I never had any problems with my husband, but I had problems with my father-in-law from the very initial days. He would show up in my washroom on the pretext of needing to talk to me. Once, he pointed to a dustbin where I had disposed of my sanitary pads and asked me what that was. I felt humiliated,” she was quoted.

On complaining about this to Yatin, he asked her to ignore it, as per the woman. Later she said she was sent to her parent’s house for some days and was never called back. The groom’s parents, according to her, made sure that she never returned home or to Yatin. The engagement soured, and in August, the woman filed a complaint with the Gurugram Police Women’s Cell, alleging that she was being harassed by her in-laws and that they would not allow her to return to her spouse after marriage.

To address the matrimonial conflict, the district court assigned a mediator. Despite many sittings, no conclusion was in sight. While she said she did not want to live with her father-in-law, he was insistent that his son would not be allowed to live apart from him. She claims that her father-in-law and other members of her husband’s family beat her up in court in November. She reported them to the Shivaji Nagar Police Station in Gurugram for assault in November 2019.

The woman stated that she and her family were harassed for dowry and were threatened that they would tear the woman into pieces. “My father-in-law slapped me in the court. He further grabbed me by my breasts while his wife Kamlesh tried to strangulate me with the gold chain she was wearing. But as she mounted pressure, the gold chain broke. I fell on the floor,” she said.

“Yatin and his father Ashok Kumar pushed me to the floor and kicked me on my chest and stomach. The staff present there intervened to rescue me. I then called the police helpline 100 at 2.11 pm and 2.19 pm for help. By the time Police arrived, they fled,” she added. The police then booked Ashok Kumar, Kamlesh, Yatin Kumar, and Ramesh Munjal under IPC sections 323 (causing hurt), 34 (crime done with common intention), and 506 (criminal intimidation).

The woman meanwhile stated that nobody was arrested after the incident. Later she learned that her husband had attained a foreign posting and was about to leave India for 3 years. “I then sent a letter to the Ministry of External Affairs to inform them about the FIR against their employee. I also marked the letter to EAM S Jaishankar. When I went to the Ministry’s office with my complaint, there, an official checked the records and told me that my husband and his father were marked in the SC category,” she said.

According to the reports, it was hard to believe that her husband and his family belonged to the SC community as the surnames they used were Arora and Bajaj, and Munjal. She wrote to NCSC in January 2020 to verify the findings at the MEA office and found them to be found true. Meenakshi filed an appeal with the commission, asking for a thorough investigation of her husband’s family. Hearings before the commission are still ongoing three years later. She said that “Ashok Kumar filed fake and falsified documents to attain the status of SC to profit from the quota.”

She claims she also filed a complaint with the Mukherjee Nagar Police Station, stating that her father-in-law got an SC certificate fraudulently, but the complaint was not processed into an FIR. However, another complaint filed at Sector-14 Police Station of Gurugram was converted into an FIR. This FIR was filed under IPC section 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 420 (cheating), on her complaint against her husband. “No arrest was made after this,” she said.

In the current scenario, the woman says that she is being implicated in a false case filed by her father-in-law Ashok Kumar. The complaint against the woman has been filed under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act on charges of caste abuse and mental harassment.

Prayagraj: Nihal Ansari arrested for sexually assaulting and forcefully converting a minor Hindu girl

OpIndia Staff
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Prayagraj: Nihal Ansari arrested for sexually assaulting and forcefully converting a minor Hindu girl

A minor Hindu girl residing in Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh, who went missing a month and a half ago, has been converted to Islam and married thereafter by a youth named Nihal Ansari. The incident came to the fore after the mother of the victim approached the police and filed a missing complaint on Tuesday, December 13. The police arrested the accused and recovered the girl.

The mother, in her complaint, said that Nihal Ansari, a resident of Tilakhwar village in Karchhana tehsil of Allahabad district in Uttar Pradesh, befriended her minor daughter by luring her with clothes and gifts. Since the victim belonged to a poor family, she fell into his trap.

The accused then forced the girl to get into a physical relationship with him. He recorded the act and started blackmailing her with the video. He sexually assaulted the minor multiple times by threatening to post the video on social media.

On October 30, Nihal went to the victim’s house and threatened the girl to come along with him. He took her to his house where he kept her locked in a room.

Besides physically assaulting her, the accused forced the victim to convert her religion and marry him. Whenever the girl resented, the accused used to beat her up.

The mother, after a lot of searching, came to know where Nihal Ansari had hidden her daughter. She immediately approached the police and filed a missing complaint. The police, in turn, registered a case against the accused on December 14 under sections 452, 366, 376 and 506 of the IPC. The accused was arrested and sent to jail while the girl was recovered and handed over to her mother after undergoing a medical examination.

Leicester Police, whose chief inspector had lied against Hindus, lets Hindus down, gives clean chit to radical Imam, shields Islamists: Details

OpIndia Staff
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Leicester Police, whose chief inspector had lied against Hindus, lets Hindus down, gives clean chit to radical Imam, shields Islamists: Details

Months after Islamists ran riots in Leicester city of England’s Midlands area, the Leicester police met members of the Hindu community on Monday (December 12) evening and attempted to downplay the violence perpetrated against them.

In a letter by Chief Inspector Paul Allen, he informed that certain events pertaining to the Leicester violence were discussed in detail with the Hindu community. He then went on to claim that an Islamic cleric (Imam), who was at the helm of peddling fake news against Hindus, did not commit any crime.

“I explained that the Imam’s conduct had been investigated, but that his retelling of the story as told to him did not amount to a criminal offence,” Paul Allen had claimed.

“To meet the definition of Incitement to religious hatred the perpetrator has to use Threatening words or behaviour or displays any written material… with intent to stir up religious hatred. As such his conduct did not meet the criminal threshold for this offence,” he justified.

The matter came to light on Thursday (December 15) when Australian researcher and activist, Sarah L Gates, posted a copy of the letter on Twitter. The archived version of the tweet can be accessed here.

Leicester Police failed to nab those who attacked Hindu homes, backed RSS conspiracy theory

The Chief Inspector of the Leicester Police informed that the law enforcement failed to identify those who selectively targeted Hindu homes. He said, “The second point was around the way in which the police identified and investigated the reports of egg-throwing at Hindu family homes.”

“I can confirm that these incidents were recorded and investigated as religiously motivated hate crimes, although at this time no suspects have been identified,” Paul Allen said.

Citing media reports, he backed the misleading statements of Leicester Mayor Sir Peter Soulsby. It must be mentioned that Solusby had met Islamist Majid Freeman, who was at the helm of the Leicester disinformation campaign and helped him set the narrative in favour of the perpetrators.

“With regard to the comments made by Sir Peter Soulsby on the Channel 4 broadcast referencing a briefing by Leicestershire Police, I confirmed that we did brief senior council officers that there was significant media reporting that extremist ideologies were playing a part in the disorder,” Paul Allen said.

“We also briefed around what was known about the ideologies, including material from research documents pertaining to Indian political and religious movements,” he further alleged in his letter

Paul Allen tried to insinuate the role of RSS and Hindutva groups in fomenting the Leicester violence, despite the conspiracy theory being debunked more than a month ago.

Paul Allen is not new to peddling fake news

In a letter to the Leicester Council of Faiths on August 31 this year, Chief Inspector Paul Allen falsely claimed that a small group of people called for the death of Muslims and Pakistan.

He alleged that the provocative slogans were raised in Hindi, indicating that it must have been the handiwork of the Indian Hindu diaspora. “Unfortunately, a small minority of people began chanting in a racially offensive way, calling for (we believe) “death to Pakistan” and “Death to Muslims” In Hindi,” he claimed.

His email, the transcript of which has now gone viral on social media, was in reference to a minor scuffle that took place in Belgrave Road of Leicester. The grave assertion made by police chief Paul Allen gave a free licence to Islamists to unleash havoc on the Hindu community.

On September 1, he issued a clarification on the matter and rubbished his own claims.

He said, “On Tuesday (August 28) afternoon it was reported that the chanting which had taken place, some of which was captured on video and was circulated on social media, included the phrases (in Hindi) “Death to Pakistan” and “death to Muslims”.

“We have investigated this and can find no verifiable evidence that there were any chants of “death to Muslims”. This is significant in terms of the context and I would encourage you to share this with interested parties,” Paul Allen stated on September 1, 2022. However, it was too late by then.

‘Don’t read Quran after my death’: Iranian protestor in his will before execution

OpIndia Staff
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‘Don’t read Quran after my death’: Iranian protestor in his will before execution

Amidst protests against the authoritarian Islamic regime in Iran, on Monday, December 12, a 23-year-old anti-government protestor was publicly executed. Majidreza Rahnavard was hanged in public in the city of Mashhad. 

Rahnavard was executed after a revolutionary court convicted him of ‘waging war against Allah’ by allegedly stabbing two members of the Basij Resistance Force to death. 

Mahmood Amiry Moghaddam, Director of a Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights, shared the video of Rahnavard before he was executed. 

When asked about what he wrote in his will, Rahnavard said, “I don’t want anyone to pray, or to cry, I want everyone to be happy and play happy music.”

A Twitter user who goes by the username @1500tasvir_en and who has been monitoring the protests in Iran ever since the tragic death of Mahsa Amini said that Rahnavard’s family was informed about his execution only after it was carried out. 

It posted the picture of the last meeting of Majidreza Rahnvard with his mother and said that his mother had no idea about the court orders to execute her son. She left hoping that her son will be released soon unbeknownst of the terrible fate awaiting her son. 

In another tweet, the Twitter user said the residence of Rahanvard’s grandmother was attacked on December 12 while his uncle and brother were arrested. “Last night (Dec. 12) the brutes of the Islamic Republic attacked #MajidrezaRahnavard’s grandmother’s residence, arresting his uncle and brother for a few hours. They took away all the banners and flowers for the ceremony and then forcefully evicted the family from their own home,” 1500 Tasvir tweeted.

On December 12, Rahnavard’s mother arrived when the authorities were burying Rahnavard’s body alone. 

Rahnavard’s execution comes a week after a 23-year-old anti-government protestor Mohsin Shekari was executed for allegedly attacking a Basij force member with a machete. He too was accused of ‘waging war against Allah.’

On October 26, a 19-year-old celebrity chef Mershad Shahidi was beaten to death by Iranian security forces after he was detained for participating in the protests in Arak city.

Iran saw a wave of protests after a 22-year-old girl named Mahsa Amini died in the custody of Iran’s Morality Police that detained her for improperly donning her headscarf. Several Iranian citizens hit the streets in solidarity with Amini. In support of the victims, a number of women, including schoolgirls, burnt their hijabs, and women everywhere chopped their hair in protest. Protests broke out in hundreds of places around the nation after her death.

Pakistani foreign minister makes a personal attack on PM Modi to counter India’s terror charge against Pakistan, repeats false and baseless allegations

OpIndia Staff
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Pakistani foreign minister makes a personal attack on PM Modi to counter India’s terror charge against Pakistan, repeats false and baseless allegations

A day after external affairs minister S Jaishankar slammed Pakistan at the UN for supporting terrorism, Pakistan’s foreign minister resorted to personal attacks on PM Narendra Modi. Using the language of Indian left-liberals and the Congress party, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari called PM the‘ butcher of Gujarat’, in response to the Indian foreign minister pointing out how terrorist Osama Bin Laden was found living in Pakistan when US was looking for him everywhere.

In his address at the United Nations Security Council, S Jaishankar reminded the world how Pakistan had hosted Osama Bin Laden and is sponsoring terror activities in India including the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament.

“While we search for the best solutions, what are those that we must never accept include the normalisation of such threats. The question of justifying what the world regards as unacceptable should not even arise. It certainly applies to states’ sponsorship of cross-border terrorism. Nor can hosting Osama Bin Laden and attacking a neighbouring Parliament can serve as credentials for sermonizing before this council,” S Jaishankar had said in his address, directly slamming Pakistan for being a pro-terrorism country.

The Indian foreign minister also said that the effectiveness of the United Nations depends on its capacity in facing key challenges of our times – be it pandemic, climate change, conflicts or terrorism.

Pakistan’s foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari addressed a press conference in New York later in the day, where he made personal attacks on the Indian prime minister while responding to a question on S Jaishankar’s criticism of Pakistan. Rejecting that Pakistan is sponsoring terrorism, Bhutto claimed that Pakistan is a big victim of terrorism, and alleged that India is trying to paint all Muslims in the world as terrorists.

Then he went on to respond to the Laden comment by Jaishankar by saying, “I will like to remind the honourable minister of external affairs of India, that Osama Bin Laden is dead, but the butcher of India lives. And he is the prime minister of India. He was banned from entering this country until he became the Prime Minister. This is the Prime Minister of the RSS and the Foreign Minister of the RSS. What is the RSS? The RSS takes inspiration from Hitler’s SS.”

He then went on to says that RSS does not believe in the ideology of Gandhi, adding ‘they hero worship the terrorist that assassinated Gandhi’. He then claimed that terrorism in Gujarat and Kashmir are being engineered by RSS and BJP. Bhutto then also claimed that they have proof that India is behind the Johar Town blast in Lahore in Pakistan.

However, the Pakistani foreign minister denied that he was in a war of words with S Jaishankar, and avoided the question on whether it will escalate the tension between India and Pakistan.

The allegations of Bilawal Bhutto against Modi and RSS are the same as the allegations being made by the Congress party and other non-NDA parties in India for a long time, along with left-liberals. In 2014, TMC had targeted Modi by calling him ‘butcher of Gujarat’. These political parties and left-liberals keep alleging that Modi had asked police to not intervene during the Gujarat riots, to allow Hindus to attack Muslims. Many even make the absurd claim that the Godhra train carnage, which had triggered the riots in 2002, was actually a conspiracy by Hindus to start the riots.

However, in multiple investigations and court cases, all these allegations have been proven false. It has been established that police had controlled the riots in a day, and it has also been proved that the people who said Modi had instructed police to stand down were lying.

In June this year, the Supreme Court of India delivered the final judgement in a crucial case that tried to blame Narendra Modi for the riots, ruling that all the charges against the then Gujarat CM were false. The apex court also said that Islamist activists like Teesta Setalvad had fabricated evidence to frame Narendra Modi in a fake case to seek the death penalty for him.

Following the verdict of the Supreme Court, Gujarat police filed a case for fabricating evidence and arrested Teesta Setalvad and others involved in the conspiracy.

The other allegation of Bhutto, that RSS is inspired by the Nazis, is also completely false and baseless. Nazis had run the holocaust to eliminate Jews and other people they didn’t like, and the holocaust was a massive organised mass killing project undertaken by the Nazis under Hitler. Therefore, RSS, or any other organisation, can’t be compared to the Nazis. It has been already proved that the allegation that RSS leaders were inspired by Nazisim is completely baseless.

The RSS’s dream of establishing a Hindu Rashtra is interpreted by Islamists and left-liberals as the dream of eliminating non-Hindus as the Nazis did. But that is a completely wrong interpretation. RSS maintains that every Indian was Hindu in the past, and they, or their forefathers, had converted to other religions from Hinduism in the past. RSS never talked about eliminating anyone, they just want that as the birthplace of Hinduism, the religion must be protected in the country.

Perhaps Bilawal Bhutto has forgotten that his country was once part of India, and after the partition of India, two Muslim countries were born, adding to dozens of already existing Muslim countries. There is not a single Hindu country in the world, but when someone talks about a Hindu Rashtra, he sees Nazism in that dream. In fact, Hindus and other minorities have vanished from Pakistan, while India has world’s second-largest Muslim population, which shows how baseless Bhutto’s allegations are.

Talking about the US rejecting the visa to Narendra Modi when he was Gujarat CM, it is well known that it was the result of intense lobbying of Pakistani and Indian Muslim groups, including the Indian American Muslim Council. Moreover, when the visa was rejected, Modi was facing cases accusing him of inaction in controlling the riots. But since then, courts in India gave him a clean chit, and the US also granted him a visa, after which he has visited the country several times. There is no relevance to that chapter now.

MP: Damoh Police move to Kerala to nab Christian missionaries booked in forced conversion, molestation case, NCPCR seeks action

OpIndia Staff
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MP: Damoh Police move to Kerala to nab Christian missionaries booked in forced conversion, molestation case, NCPCR seeks action

On Thursday, the Madhya Pradesh Police left for Kerala to arrest six Christians accused of performing religious conversion in the Damoh district of Madhya Pradesh. Out of the eight accused persons, the Police have already arrested two persons from New Delhi and are now searching for six accused who reportedly have absconded to Kerala.

According to the reports, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) last month paid surprise visits to a few places in Damoh. It also visited a Christian missionary from Kerala named Ishu Sansth in Damoh and revealed that the authorities there were engaged in luring Dalits and converting them to Christianity. The authorities at the missionary have also been accused by locals of molesting the minor girls and threatening them to convert their religion.

The Madhya Pradesh Police took action on a complaint that was filed by Rajesh Ahirwar, a resident of Bhairavbihar village in the district, and booked eight persons in the case including the Pastor. The complaint stated that the accused were running a religious conversion drive in the village and were also sexually assaulting the minors.

Also, some local Hindus told the Police during the investigation that they had been converted to Christianity in 2013 and narrated their story. They also stated that the missionary authorities molested minor girls after converting them to Christianity. The police then registered a case under various acts, including the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.

The accused booked in the case have been identified as K Bijju, Philip Mathew, Renu Mathew, Thomas, Nainan Thomas, Sajan Ibrahim, Nidhi Thomas, and Appu Thomas. Reports mention that the accused fled from the city to Kerala knowing that they had been booked in a case and that the Police were searching for them. However, two, K Bijju and Philip Mathew have been arrested by the Police from New Delhi.

Meanwhile, NCPCR in the update has served the notices to the district collector and the Superintendent of Police in Damoh and demanded an action-taken report from them. The panel has also urged the government to launch a cyber forensic investigation against Mid India Christian Services, as well as disciplinary action against the chairperson of the Child Welfare Committee, Damoh.

Notably, this is not the first incident of religious conversion reported from Damoh, Madhya Pradesh. Earlier on November 18, it was reported that a Dalit couple and their families were forcefully converted to Christianity by Bishop Dr Ajai Lall and were being harassed by the Church authorities. The Dalit victim woman alleged that the Church authorities threatened them and demanded four times as much money as they had given earlier during the time of conversion.

Also, in another such case, NCPCR chairperson Priyank Kanoongo had filed a complaint against ten members of a Christian organization named Mid India Christian Society in Damoh. Kanoongo in the complaint had said that several Hindu minor students residing in the children’s home of Mid India Christian Society were converted to Christianity and were forcefully being kept away from studies. They were being lured by the missionary authorities to become a pastor in the future.

The Police then had registered an FIR under sections 42 and 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act and 3 and 5 of the MP Freedom of Religion Act, along with 370 of IPC against the 10 members.

Elon Musk joins Twitter Spaces to inform journalists that they are no different from regular people: What he said

OpIndia Staff
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Elon Musk joins Twitter Spaces to inform journalists that they are no different from regular people: What he said

On Thursday (December 15, US local time), the new Twitter owner Elon Musk hopped on a ‘Twitter Spaces’ discussion and informed that journalists would not be treated differently if found guilty of doxxing (revealing private information) about people.

“Well, I am sure that one who has been doxxed would agree – Drawing real-time information about somebody’s location is inappropriate and everyone…will not like that to be done to them,” Musk was heard as saying.

He further added, “There is not going to be any distinction in the future between journalists and regular people. Everyone is going to be treated the same. There are no special privileges for journalists.”

“You doxx…You get suspended. End of story,” Musk emphasised. He also warned those who try to evade suspension by posting links, containing information about the real-time location of individuals.

The matter came to light when US-based journalist Jack Posobiec posted a 59-second-long audio clip of Musk’s remarks on Twitter. Jack wrote, “Elon Musk just hopped on Spaces with a group of journalists and informed them the same doxxing rules apply to them and they aren’t special.”

The Background of the Controversy

On Wednesday (December 14, US local time), Elon Musk informed that his 2-year-old son named ‘X’ who was travelling in Musk’s car was doxxed by a ‘crazy stalker’. The stalker was seen wearing a black hoodie and recording the incident on camera.

“Last night, a car carrying little X in LA was followed by a crazy stalker (thinking it was me), who later blocked the car from moving & climbed onto the hood,” Musk narrated the ordeal.

He had also posted an 11-second-long video of the alleged stalker and vowed to take action against a college student named Jack Sweeney, who used publicly available data to track the movement of the billionaire’s private jet to ‘raise awareness about carbon footprints.’

Later, Elon Musk announced that the Twitter handles which post the real-time location of individuals and compromise their physical safety would be suspended.

In a tweet, the new Twitter owner said, “Any account doxxing real-time location info of anyone will be suspended, as it is a physical safety violation. This includes posting links to sites with real-time location info.”

While responding to a Twitter user, Musk clarified that journalists would not be treated as exceptions for endangering the lives of individuals by posting links to their live location. “Same doxxing rules apply to “journalists” as to everyone else,” he reiterated.

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