K. Annamalai, one of the most talked-about faces of the BJP not just in Tamil Nadu but across South India, has left the party. He has announced that he will be launching a new party and will now lead a people’s movement in Tamil Nadu and contest elections. He relaunched his We The Leaders foundation as his new political movement.
After his exit, social media has been buzzing with the claim that the BJP abandons its leaders or allies midway through the journey.
However, we will examine in this article how much truth there is to this. Let’s start with the BJP and Annamalai himself. He could have easily resigned from Tamil Nadu, but that’s not what happened.
The BJP made continuous efforts to keep him in the party. From party president Nitin Nadda to Home Minister Amit Shah, they spoke to him, understood his grievances, and assured him of continued support. But things didn’t work out, and Annamalai had his own reasons too.
It was the BJP that gave Annamalai the opportunity to lead the party in Tamil Nadu and put its full strength behind him. On public platforms, from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to senior BJP leaders, the way they addressed him with such warmth made it clear that they saw him as a future leader. But if this partnership didn’t last long, the BJP alone cannot be held responsible.
The allegation is that the BJP finishes off its allies, gradually weakens them, and eventually takes over their political space. This charge has been repeated so often that many people have almost accepted it as fact. But is the picture really that simple? Did the BJP sideline its allies in every state, or in many cases did it give them leadership, respect, and space even when it held the upper hand politically?
If we understand Indian politics not just through accusations but through examples and the sequence of events, another side becomes clear: a major foundation of the BJP’s coalition politics has been the strategy of taking allies along. This strategy hasn’t always succeeded. There have been differences and broken relationships, but calling it the BJP’s inherent nature to destroy allies looks like an incomplete argument in the face of facts.
Let’s look at Bihar first. The relationship between Nitish Kumar’s JD(U) and the BJP is a long-standing one. Nitish has been the Chief Minister of the state alongside the BJP for a long time. In the 2020 Assembly elections, the BJP won 74 seats while the JD(U) was reduced to 43. The BJP had clearly become the bigger party. Normal political arithmetic would suggest the Chief Minister should have been from the BJP, but that didn’t happen.
Nitish Kumar remained Chief Minister. Despite its strong mandate, the BJP prioritised coalition dharma and kept the ally’s leader in the top post. This was no small political event. Power in Indian politics often runs on numbers, but here the BJP put the coalition above numbers.
Later, in 2022, the JD(U) itself left the NDA and joined the Mahagathbandhan, meaning the initiative to break the relationship did not come from the BJP. Now both parties are together again, and the JD(U)’s political space remains just as strong.
Bihar is not limited to just the JD(U). The BJP has consistently given political space to Jitan Ram Manjhi’s Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM). Mukesh Sahni’s VIP party was also accommodated in the alliance, and Chirag Paswan’s LJP (Ram Vilas) has remained in the NDA with continued political relevance.
These were parties with limited seats of their own, yet the BJP gave them political relevance. If the goal was only to finish off allies, why would the BJP accept the compulsion of sharing seats and its vote bank with smaller parties?
Maharashtra’s example is equally interesting. The relationship between the BJP and Shiv Sena was not a 5-10 year one but lasted nearly three decades. From the late 1980s, both parties came together and formed an ideological partnership in Maharashtra’s politics.
In the 2019 Assembly elections, they contested together and secured a majority. The BJP won 105 seats and the Shiv Sena 56. But during government formation, there was a dispute over the Chief Minister’s post, and Uddhav Thackeray decided to form the government with Congress and NCP. Here too, the initiative to break the alliance did not come from the BJP.
Yes, later there was a split in Shiv Sena, and the Eknath Shinde faction joined the BJP. Critics may call this the BJP’s strategy, but an equally big fact is that the BJP could have kept the Chief Minister’s post for itself if it wanted, yet it made Shinde the Chief Minister. Even as the biggest force in Maharashtra, putting forward an ally’s face was part of the BJP’s coalition style.
In Punjab, the Shiromani Akali Dal was the BJP’s oldest ally. Their relationship lasted more than two decades. Differences grew over the farm laws, and in 2020 the Akali Dal decided to leave the NDA. It is another matter that the pressure of the farmers’ movement and Punjab politics forced the Akali Dal to take this decision, but the fact is that the announcement to exit the alliance came from the Akali Dal’s side. The BJP did not push out its oldest ally; the ally itself chose a different path.
In Uttar Pradesh, the BJP’s politics also shows a model of keeping allies together. Whether it is Anupriya Patel of Apna Dal (S) or Sanjay Nishad of the Nishad Party, the BJP has not treated these parties merely as election-time necessities.
They were given representation in the ministry, a share in seats, and space in social equations. The BJP has always understood that politics in a huge state like Uttar Pradesh cannot be fought alone; expanding the social base is only possible with allies.
In the Northeast, the BJP’s coalition policy is perhaps most clearly visible. In Nagaland, the BJP contested with the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP) and accepted regional leadership. In Assam, the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) was kept along.
In Meghalaya and Manipur too, a model of shared power with regional parties was adopted. The BJP could have played ‘big brother’ politics based on its national strength, but in the Northeast it chose the path of coordination with local leadership and regional aspirations. This is why the NDA expanded fastest in the Northeast.
Andhra Pradesh is a new example. After 2024, when Chandrababu Naidu’s TDP emerged as an important ally for the NDA, the BJP not only gave them importance but also tried to keep the alliance stable. At the national level, the BJP publicly acknowledged the importance of allies in the majority equation. This is the same politics that signals ‘take everyone along’ instead of ‘go it alone’.
Interestingly, the people who level the most accusations against the BJP are the ones who forget Congress’s coalition politics. History is full of such examples. Recently, in Tamil Nadu too, something similar was seen. Congress had been with the DMK for years, but as soon as the political equations changed, distances grew. Congress stabbed the DMK in the back and joined hands with Vijay’s TVK.
It is also true that coalition politics is not always an equal relationship. The bigger party is naturally more influential. The BJP is no exception. Many allies have become weaker, and the mass base of some parties has been affected by the BJP’s expansion. But the question is whether this was the BJP’s ‘conspiracy’ or the natural outcome of Indian politics.
What is clear is that the BJP has, on many occasions, even when in a position of political advantage, given leadership to allies, stepped aside from the Chief Minister’s post, shared seats, and given space to smaller parties in national politics. Examples like Nitish Kumar in Bihar, Shinde in Maharashtra, Apna Dal and Nishad Party in Uttar Pradesh, and many others do not seem like mere coincidences.
Therefore, when it is said that the BJP ‘swallows’ its allies, one should also ask: if that were the case, why do so many regional parties keep returning to it again and again?
Note: This is an English translation of the original Hindi article published on OpIndia Hindi
For a few days, social media has been filled with the news of how Punjab achieved the number 1 position in the education sector. But this recent achievement of securing the top position in school education has triggered a political debate over who deserves credit for the success. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government has presented the ranking as evidence of its education reforms, with Arvind Kejriwal stating that Punjab rose from 27th place to the top position under the Bhagwant Mann government. However, former Punjab education minister and Congress MLA Pargat Singh has disputed this claim. He argues that Punjab’s improvement had already begun under the previous Congress government and was visible in major education surveys conducted before AAP came to power in 2022. The disagreement reminds me of the old debate that emerged in Delhi years ago, when Congress leaders accused AAP of taking credit for improvements in education that they said were built on reforms and infrastructure created during Sheila Dikshit’s tenure. The Punjab controversy has once again raised the question of who should get credit for long-term educational progress.
What is AAP claiming?
The controversy started after the Punjab government highlighted its performance in the latest ranking and claimed that the state had emerged as the top performer in school education. Arvind Kejriwal and Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, with other AAP leaders, credited this achievement to reforms introduced after the party came to power in 2022.
The government pointed to initiatives such as Schools of Eminence, teacher training programmes in countries like Finland and Singapore, teacher and staff recruitment, expansion of smart classrooms, and improvements in school infrastructure. According to AAP, these measures have helped transform Punjab’s government schools and contributed to the state’s rise in education rankings.
Kejriwal also highlighted that Punjab was ranked near the bottom in previous years and has now reached the top, presenting this as evidence of the success of the AAP government’s education model.
Reality Check: Did Punjab’s Rise Begin Before AAP Came To Power?
While AAP has claimed credit for Punjab’s rise in the education sector, the timeline suggests the state’s improvement may have begun before the party came to power in 2022. The AAP government was sworn in in March 2022. But some key surveys or studies have cited the data prior to 2022. It raises the question: Does the AAP government deserve the actual credit, or are they riding on someone else’s work?
For example, the National Achievement Survey (NAS) 2021, which measures students’ learning levels nationwide, was conducted several months before the AAP formed the government. Punjab did well in the survey, ranking among the better-performing states. Similarly, Congress leaders have cited earlier Performance Grading Index (PGI) reports to claim that the progress in education in the state was already evident before the change of government.
This does not necessarily mean that the current government played no role. Since coming to power, AAP has launched its own initiatives, including Schools of Eminence, teacher training programmes, recruitment drives and infrastructure upgrades. However, education reforms generally take years to produce measurable results, making it difficult to attribute long-term improvements to a single government alone.
Therefore, the timeline suggests that Punjab’s educational rise was already underway before AAP assumed office, even as the current government has continued to introduce its own reforms.
Another important point that is often missed in the political debate is that Punjab has not been declared India’s overall No. 1 state in education. The ranking quoted by the AAP government concerns school education indicators and learning outcomes. It does not measure the entire education sector, which would include higher education, universities, research output, faculty quality, employability and other parameters. So, Punjab may have done well in school education rankings, but to claim that it is India’s No. 1 state in education is entirely wrong. Advertising these claims will spread misinformation, but the reality cannot be hidden for long.
The Delhi Parallel: A Similar Debate Over Educational Credit
Taking credit is the old disease from which AAP has been suffering for a long time. So, the debate unfolding in Punjab is not entirely new. A similar argument was made in Delhi after the AAP government began promoting its education model as one of its biggest achievements. Delhi was governed for 15 years by former Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, before the AAP came to power. During her tenure, the government invested heavily in school infrastructure, built new classrooms, expanded school facilities and increased spending on education. After coming to power, AAP introduced several new initiatives, including teacher training programmes, curriculum reforms and large-scale school modernisation projects.
However, Congress leaders often argued that AAP was taking credit for improvements that were built on foundations laid during the Sheila Dikshit era. According to them, many of the gains showcased by AAP were made possible by investments and reforms undertaken by the previous government.
AAP rejected this criticism, maintaining that it had transformed the education system through its own policies and reforms. The disagreement eventually became a larger political debate over whether educational success should be credited to the government that started the reforms or the one that expanded and publicised them.
Now, with Congress making similar allegations in Punjab, the debate over who deserves credit for long-term educational progress has resurfaced.
Conclusion
Punjab’s recent education ranking has undoubtedly strengthened the AAP government’s claim that its reforms are delivering results. However, the political dispute surrounding the achievement highlights a larger question: who deserves credit for improvements that take years to materialise?
The available timeline suggests that Punjab’s educational progress did not begin overnight after the AAP government took office in 2022. Data from surveys and assessments conducted before the change in government indicate that the state was already showing signs of improvement. At the same time, the current government has introduced several initiatives of its own to further strengthen the education system.
The controversy also mirrors an earlier debate in Delhi, where Congress leaders accused AAP of claiming credit for gains built on foundations laid during the Sheila Dikshit era. Whether one agrees with that comparison or not, both cases underscore that educational reforms are usually the result of efforts spanning multiple governments.
It is also important to note that Punjab’s latest performance pertains primarily to school education indicators and learning outcomes. Therefore, it is wrong to claim that Punjab is now India’s No. 1 state in the entire education sector. Such a claim would require comparisons across higher education institutions, universities, research output, employability, and other educational parameters
On 2nd June, the American News agency Bloomberg claimed that the Reserve Bank of India may have sold nearly $12 billion worth of its gold reserves in the two weeks leading up to 22 May. It was quite a shocking claim. How big a claim it is can be seen in the other condition: in 1991, it was the last time India pledged about 67 tonnes of gold to raise emergency funds and avoid a sovereign default. The Bloomberg report claimed that the central bank of India appeared to be reducing its gold holdings while simultaneously increasing its foreign-currency assets, possibly to shield India’s foreign exchange reserves from the fallout of rising geopolitical tensions in West Asia.
Given these claims, it was clear that opposition parties and left-wing influencers would respond, even seeking scrutiny. It was presented as an emergency and a time of high economic uncertainty. The conflict involving Iran had pushed crude oil prices higher, the rupee had come under pressure, and concerns about capital outflows from emerging markets were growing. Against such a backdrop, a report suggesting that India’s central bank had drawn on its gold reserves to support the economy appeared plausible to many observers. The story was soon amplified by sections of the Indian media and widely circulated on social media, where it was presented as evidence that the RBI had taken an extraordinary step to manage stress in the country. However, within a day, the RBI and the Press Information Bureau both rejected the claim.
The central bank stated that its physical gold stock remained unchanged at 880.52 metric tonnes and described reports of any gold sale as incorrect. Bloomberg later retracted its original story, admitting that the analysis had relied on an erroneous valuation methodology. Let’s examine the claims that Bloomberg made and why they have to retract the story.
Why the Claim Mattered
At first glance, a report on the RBI’s gold reserves may seem like a technical issue that concerns only the country’s economists, but the reality is far deeper. In reality, the claims were significant because gold plays an important role in India’s financial security. Gold is the key component of India’s foreign exchange reserves, alongside assets such as foreign currencies and government securities. These reserves act as a financial shield for India during economic uncertainty, helping it withstand external shocks and stabilise.
As of April 2026, the RBI held 880.52 metric tonnes of gold, making India one of the world’s largest official gold holders. Because of this, any suggestion that the central bank has reduced its gold holdings is bound to attract attention. The timing of the Bloomberg report also contributed to its impact. The claim surfaced amid rising geopolitical tensions in West Asia, concerns over higher oil prices, and fears of volatility in global financial markets. The report was quickly picked up by leftist media outlets and circulated widely on social media. For many readers, the story portrays India as having sufficient economic pressure to require extraordinary measures from its central bank.
However, as later developments would show, the controversy was not really about whether India had sold gold. It was about whether a change in the value of the gold reserves had been mistaken for a change in the quantity of gold held by the RBI.
Gold Quantity and Gold Value Are Not the Same Thing
Before analysing the report, we need to understand some basic concepts overlooked by many reports. A central bank’s gold holdings and the value of those holdings are not the same thing. Gold holdings refer to the physical amount of gold held by a country’s central bank. Gold reserve value refers to what that gold is worth at current market prices. Basically, the gold holdings can remain the same until we buy or sell the gold, but the gold reserve value changes with the current market prices. The relationship is simple: Gold Reserve Value = Quantity of Gold × Market Price.
Let’s take the example: suppose a central bank owns 100 tonnes of gold. If gold is priced at $100 million per tonne, the reserve is worth $10 billion. If the price falls to $90 million per tonne, the reserve is worth $9 billion. The value has fallen by $1 billion. But the central bank still owns the same 100 tonnes of gold. Nothing has been sold. This difference is crucial as a decline in the reported value of gold reserves does not automatically mean that the quantity of gold held by the central bank has fallen. The change could simply be due to a different gold price being used for valuation.
How Central Banks Value Their Gold Reserves
To examine where the controversy began, it is necessary to understand how central banks value their gold reserves. Gold held by a central bank is not valued using local jewellery rates or retail market prices. Instead, central banks typically rely on internationally recognised benchmarks that provide a uniform, transparent way to assess the value of their gold holdings.
One of the most important benchmarks of the gold market is the price published by the London Bullion Market Association, the leading authority on precious metals, which is widely used by central banks, financial institutions, traders, and governments around the world.
The RBI also follows a prescribed methodology for valuing its gold reserves. According to its reporting practices, the value of gold holdings is linked to internationally recognised benchmark prices rather than day-to-day fluctuations in local gold markets. This ensures consistency in the reporting of India’s foreign exchange reserves. As a result, the value of the RBI’s gold reserves can change even when the amount of gold held remains exactly the same. This is why fluctuations in the reported value of gold reserves are perfectly normal and occur regularly. Such changes often reflect movements in gold prices rather than any decision by the central bank to buy or sell gold.
Understanding this valuation methodology is important because the controversy surrounding Bloomberg’s report ultimately stemmed from the benchmark used to calculate the value of the RBI’s gold reserves. As Bloomberg itself later acknowledged, a different pricing method produced a different conclusion about India’s gold holdings.
Where the Bloomberg analysis went wrong
Having understood how gold reserves are normally valued, it becomes easier to see where Bloomberg Economics ran into trouble.
On June 2, 2026, Bloomberg Economics published an analysis by economist Abhishek Gupta suggesting that the Reserve Bank of India may have sold nearly $12 billion worth of gold reserves in the weeks leading up to May 22. The report was based on a comparison between the reported value of the RBI’s gold reserves and the value Bloomberg’s analysts expected. But when the RBI fact-checked the report. Bloomberg acknowledged that the analysis used the wrong benchmark to value the gold holdings.
The original analysis was published on Bloomberg Economics, a research platform available exclusively to subscribers of Bloomberg Professional Service on the Bloomberg Terminal. It was a Terminal note that appeared on the Terminal screens and was not a publicly available web article. Bloomberg News had published a short excerpt of the report.
In his analysis, Gupta had examined weekly or periodic movements in India’s foreign exchange reserves breakdown, specifically the reported value of gold holdings vs. foreign currency assets. He noted an apparent decline in the rupee/dollar value of RBI’s gold reserves over the two weeks ending May 22, 2026, estimated at around $12 billion, even as foreign currency assets rose by about $7.5 billion.
The economist noted that the recent hike in gold import duties should have boosted the valuation of RBI’s bullion holdings, and broader gold price trends and other factors were also expected to support higher valuations. Therefore, he concluded that the drop in gold’s reported value, coupled with the rise in FX assets, suggested active sales of physical gold to reallocate into more liquid foreign currency reserves amid pressures like capital outflows, rupee weakness, oil prices, and Middle East tensions.
Notably, Bloomberg had added that this was an interpretation of RBI’s publicly available data. However, Gupta made a major mistake in crunching the numbers, and arrived at the wrong conclusion.
According to the retraction posted by Bloomberg News, the Bloomberg Economics report used the same-day domestic gold price while calculating the value of the gold reserves of RBI. However, the RBI uses a completely different methodology. RBI relies on the previous day’s gold price published by the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA), the internally recognised benchmark for bullion valuation. This difference may appear technical, but it had a significant impact on the final conclusion.
More importantly, RBI values its official gold reserves using approximately 90% of the previous day’s LBMA gold price in USD per ounce, converted to INR using the relevant exchange rate.
Because the analysis used a different gold price from the one in the RBI’s reporting methodology, it produced a lower valuation of the reserves. Bloomberg Economics interpreted this gap as evidence that the RBI had reduced its gold holdings. However, once the calculation was repeated using the correct LBMA benchmark, the apparent decline disappeared.
In its retraction, Bloomberg stated that using the previous day’s LBMA price showed that India’s gold holdings had remained unchanged during May. In other words, what appeared to be a reduction in reserves was not the result of gold being sold, but the result of using a different valuation method.
The error was therefore not about the quantity of gold held by the RBI. It was about the price used to calculate the value of that gold. Once the correct benchmark was applied, the report’s central conclusion no longer held.
What the RBI Data Actually Showed
While Bloomberg Economics’ analysis suggested that the RBI may have reduced its gold holdings, the central bank’s own data told a very different story. After the report was published, the Reserve Bank of India clarified that its physical gold stock had remained unchanged. Referring to figures published in its Monthly Bulletin, the RBI stated that it continued to hold 880.52 metric tonnes of gold, the same quantity reported earlier.
The clarification was important because it addressed the central claim underlying the Bloomberg analysis. If the quantity of gold held by the RBI had not changed, then there was no evidence that the central bank had sold any portion of its reserves. The Press Information Bureau (PIB), the government’s fact-check arm, also rejected reports claiming that the RBI had sold gold reserves.
The RBI’s published data, as reported by PIB, stated that the central bank’s gold holdings remained unchanged and that reports suggesting otherwise were based on an incorrect interpretation of reserve figures. The RBI’s Monthly Bulletin further supports this position. While the value of gold reserves can fluctuate due to changes in international gold prices and exchange rates, the quantity of gold held by the central bank is reported separately.
The bulletin showed no reduction in the RBI’s physical gold stock during the period in question. This distinction is crucial. The controversy was driven by an apparent change in the value of the gold reserves, not by any documented change in the amount of gold held by the RBI. Once the official data was examined, the claim that India had sold a portion of its gold reserves found no support in the central bank’s published figures. In other words, the RBI’s records showed that the gold was still there. What had changed was the valuation, not the quantity.
The Retraction That Changed Everything
As criticism of the report increased and the RBI publicly denied selling any gold, Bloomberg eventually withdrew its original analysis. In its retraction, Bloomberg News stated that the report had been based on an incorrect analysis by Bloomberg Economics. It is believed that the original by Bloomberg Economics report is also being retracted, however it could not confirmed as it is not available to non-subscribers.
According to the correction, the analysts had erroneously used the same-day domestic gold price to value the RBI’s gold reserves. When the calculation was redone using the previous day’s London Bullion Market Association (LBMA) price – the benchmark used in the RBI’s methodology the conclusion changed completely. Bloomberg statement in its correction that “Using the previous day’s London Bullion Market Association price shows that gold holdings were unchanged in May,”
This point is crucial. The retraction did not simply revise a number or make a minor adjustment to the analysis. It overturned the story’s central conclusion. A report that initially suggested the RBI had sold nearly $12 billion worth of gold ended with Bloomberg acknowledging that India’s gold holdings had remained unchanged. Therefore, it was not about an undisclosed gold sale. It was about a calculation that led to a conclusion that the underlying data did not support.
Why the Episode Matters
The Bloomberg episode shows the importance of methodology when interpreting financial data. Central bank reserve accounting follows established practices, and even small changes in valuation methods can produce very different results.
What makes this case notable is that the error did not merely affect the size of the estimate; it changed the direction of the conclusion itself. An apparent decline in gold reserves disappeared once the correct benchmark was applied.
The incident also demonstrates how quickly a narrative can spread once it is published by a globally influential financial outlet. The original claim was widely reported and discussed, while the subsequent correction received far less attention. By the time the retraction appeared, the story had already shaped public discussion around India’s reserve management.
More broadly, the episode serves as a reminder that changes in the reported value of reserves do not necessarily indicate changes in the underlying assets. Understanding the methodology behind the numbers is often as important as the numbers themselves.
The real lesson from the controversy is not about India’s gold reserves. It is about how a valuation assumption, once treated as fact, briefly created a narrative that the underlying data did not support.
All India Trinamool Congress (AITC or TMC) continues to feel the ripples of its humiliating defeat in the recently concluded West Bengal Assembly Election at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). TMC is on the verge of a split, as 58 out of its 80 MLAs have already backed expelled lawmaker Ritabrata Banerjee as the leader of the opposition. A strong revolt is also brewing against the authority of former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s nephew and Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha MP Abhishek Banerjee.
Furthermore, the party has been forced to dissolve all its committees, frontal organisations in the state as the problems continue to intensify without any sign of relief. Meanwhile, the party’s once-loyal support group, which stood by its side since the rise to power appears to have deserted it at the most pivotal moment.
The Bengali film industry, referred to as Tollywood, was pampered by the TMC and shared a very close relationship. A generation of these public personalities, such as actors, producers and directors, became leaders, candidates, spokespersons, campaigners and more for the party. They proudly highlighted this bond and were even captured with top leadership, including Mamata Banerjee. However, the tied has dramatically shifted after the electoral loss as those who used to serve as official or unofficial faces of TMC and endorsed it have chosen to jump out of the sinking ship.
Tollywood’s strong affiliation with TMC
TMC and Tollywood existed in a mutually beneficial relationship for more than a decade. The latter did not merely extend indirect or passive support, but many of its key figures, such as Deepak Adhikari alias Dev, Saayoni Ghosh, Sayantika Banerjee, Kanchan Mullick, Soham Chakraborty, June Malia, Aditi Munshi and Raj Chakraborty formally joined hands with the party as its campaigners, candidates and star symbols. They even reached state assembly and parliament through this route.
Their fame has been inextricably linked to Mamata Banerjee’s political efforts. Hence, with the BJP holding power, this ecosystem is evidently unsettled as its political clout has been diminished. On the other hand, artists who refused to conform and preferred to work independently were regularly marginalised. They accused that Tollywood resembled an extension of the state’s political patronage structure rather than a free industry. These concerns were voiced quietly because of the fear of political retaliation from the TMC.
The nexus between Tollywood and TMC was also enthusiastically promoted by media outlets opposed to the BJP. In a 2021 article, The Scroll reported on how Mamata Banerjee distributed election tickets to various members of Tollywood prior to the assembly poll. The article mentioned that Bengali film director Raj Chakraborty and others were in high spirits after her press conference.
“The film personalities were in a celebratory mood. All of them had joined TMC a week ago. All of them appeared in the candidate list,” it read. The association was so profound and enduring that every time she put together a list of candidates, speculation began about which Tollywood celebrity would receive a nomination. At the time, she nominated 6 Tollywood movie and television stars.
“In the past, actors like Moon Moon Sen, Tapas Pal, Satabdi Roy, Sandhya Roy, Dev, Mimi Chakraborty, Nusrat Jahan, Deboshree Roy, Chiranjeet Chakraborty have contested on a TMC ticket. They were either elected to the Parliament or the state assembly,” the piece informed.
Throughout the years, Mamata Banerjee meticulously chose actors and actresses from both the older and younger generations to win crucial constituencies in the Lok Sabha and assembly elections. These ties are further emphasised by the fact that she had to intervene to resolve a deadlock between directors and technicians in relation to the boycott of director Rahool Mukherjee’s shoots in 2024 after a meeting with three prominent Tollywood names: Prosenjit Chatterjee, Dev and Goutam Ghose.
Moreover, the majority of state-sponsored cultural programs were dominated by Bengali cinema and television performers. She invited them to her party meetings and rallies and took advantage of their celebrity status for her political purposes. They also enjoyed the front-row seats on stage at the annual Martyrs’ Day rally arranged by the TMC in Kolkata on 21st July, making it a star-studded occasion.
Mamata Banerjee also used awards as a means to reward those who aligned with her. Her government bestowed the “Mahanayak Samman” and other accolades to Bengali film and television professionals “for outstanding contributions in the world of cinema” since 2012. It was given to Rachana Banerjee, TMC’s Lok Sabha MP from Hooghly and singer Nachiketa Chakraborty in 2024. Interestingly, Mamata Banerjee made an appearance in the popular Bengali TV series “Didi No 1” ahead of last Lok Sabha election hosted by Rachana.
Likewise, Prosenjit Chatterjee was conferred with a special award in recognition of his contributions to the Bengali film industry over the past forty years and similar honours were handed over to actors Rukmini Moitra, Ambarish Bhattacharya, and Subhasis Mukherjee. Every year, rewards were given to people who showed allegiance to the party.
The symbiosis ruptures after TMC’s removal from power
The mutual predation had an expiry date of 4th May as the fissures erupted disclosing the real nature of the relationship. TMC loyalists from Tollywood who not only remained silent but also reveled in the political violence directed at the opposition, particularly the saffron party, suddenly distanced themselves and sought to appear neutral. They adopted a defensive stance, started to play victim and transformed into champions of freedom and impartiality.
On 2nd May 2021, TMC achieved victory in the assembly election and unleashed unprecedented violence against BJP workers, including women, compelling them to abandon their homes and relocate to Assam for the sake of their safety and dignity. However, actors Parambrata Chatterjee and Swastika Mukherjee took pleasure in the bloodshed. Chatterjee remarked, “Let today be designated as world ‘rogorani’ thrashing day,” to which a gleeful Mukherjee replied, “Let it take happen.”
The tweets generated massive criticism, and a First Information Report (FIR) was registered against the two at the Gariahat Police Station in Kolkata, based on a complaint filed by advocate Joydeep Sen after BJP formed the government in the state.
The complaint asserted that the tweet “appears to abate, encourage, incite and instigate large scale violence at such time when violence against BJP workers had already started to circulate. In fact, around an hour after this tweet, one Abhijit Sarkar of Beleghata was brutally murdered by TMC cadres, in which case the culprits have already been sentenced.”
Afterwards, Chatterjee, a loud BJP detractor, argued that he needed to make compromises for his newborn son which drew further condemnation. “There was joy in working in this industry, but over the years, many of us were forced to compromise. I did it as well, keeping the future of my newborn child in mind. No one should have to face this,” he insisted.
However, people outlined that the child was born in January 2025 and the actor-director’s controversial conduct happened well prior to that.
“The industry should be a place where people can work freely without fear or unnecessary restrictions,” Chatterjee commented. “Many people might not have spoken openly earlier, but conversations around these issues are now becoming more public,” he added about the issues inside the industry.
Saayoni Ghosh, the TMC Lok Sabha MP for Jadavpur, accused of posting derogatory anti-Hindu post on social media in 2015 also argued that she was not the one who made it. “It was not done by me, and I have always maintained that. I publicly apologised in 2021. No one should hurt anyone’s religious sentiments. I am myself a Hindu. It is a 2015 post. I was 22 years old then, and Twitter was new for me,” she stated.
“I did not post it, and I did not even create the cartoon. So, if anyone needs to be investigated, it should be the person who made the cartoon. When this issue was brought to my attention in 2021, seven years later, I immediately ensured that the post was removed. I also apologised publicly,” she emphasised.
Kolkata, West Bengal: On an earlier post allegedly linked to hurting religious sentiments, TMC MP Saayoni Ghosh says, "It was not done by me, and I have always maintained that. I publicly apologised in 2021. No one should hurt anyone’s religious sentiments. I am myself a Hindu.… pic.twitter.com/yaEXoLKHGR
The post which was uploaded around Maha Shivratri featured cartoon showing a female character placing a condom over a Shivling. Ghosh received extensive condemnation for it, but she offered the bizarre explanation and claimed innocence in the lead-up to the 2021 state assembly election.
So, TMC leader Saayoni Ghosh has now claimed that the cartoon of a condom on Shivling was not posted by her on twitter (X) in 2015.
If you look at the caption of the post, the word couldn't is written as 'cudnt'.
Ghosh also gained notoriety for her pandering to the Muslim community before the recent assembly poll when she sang, “Ekbar chede de nouka majhi jabo Medina (Rower, let the boat move. I will go to Medina). Amar hriday majhe Kaaba, nayane Medina (Kaaba is in my heart, Median is in my eyes),” during an event. However, things are rapidly changing following TMC’s ouster from power.
Likewise, others including TMC’s Ghatal Lok Sabha MP Dev used carefully calibrated words after the election result. He welcomed the fresh BJP government while also advocating for artistic freedom and advising against cultural retaliation and “bans,” reflecting a clear survival strategy rather than a political message.
“I would earnestly request the new government to uphold the spirit of unity and artistic freedom by ensuring that the culture of bans and divisions within the Bengali film industry becomes a thing of the past,” he urged.
Actress Nayana Bandyopadhyay is the only TMC person in Tollywood who managed to succeed in the assembly election. Other glam candidates, including Bratya Basu, Raj Chakraborty, Indranil Sen, Soham Chakraborty, Arpita Ghosh, Sayantika Banerjee, Birbaha Hansda, Aditi Munshi, Lovely Maitra and Shrreya Pande failed.
The great churn
Tollywood consistently demonstrated its aversion to the saffron party. A platform called “No Vote to BJP” was launched against the party before the 2021 assembly election. A collection of artists also released a music video as part of the promotion. Notable Tollywood personalities include Parambrata Chatterjee, Anirban Bhattacharya, Anupam Roy and Riddhi Sen were part of the drive.
Chatterjee similarly declared. “The 2026 election is no ordinary election. This is a fight for Bengali self-respect. Every Bengali should be part of this fight.” However, he conveniently revisited his stand following the poll result. He indicated that he would be happy if the government worked to advance the state’s businesses and industries, particularly Tollywood. He hoped that the government could accomplish all of these goals while taking into account disagreements in political ideologies.
This actor has been one of the shrillest voices against the BJP. So much so that he didn’t open his mouth during the post-poll violence of 2021 when BJP workers were being raped and killed. He is now simply trying to curry favour with the new government,” senior lawyer of Calcutta High Court, Joydeep Sen Chattopadhay pointed out in a conversation with ThePrint.
The majority of Bengali movie stars who supported Mamata Banerjee are publicly distancing themselves from her party. Interestingly, Tollywood unions under TMC’s tight control are rapidly disintegrating, creating fresh dynamics in scripting and production and novel scripts with major “Hindu themes” are being fervently explored.
Additionally, Aroop and Swarup Biswas have come under fire over their suffocating grip on the industry and embodying a culture of political involvement, restrictions, and directives. Actor Papia Adhikary defeated former minister and Tollygunje candidate Aroop who, along with his brother Swarup, monopolised Tollywood. Producers were under pressure over hiring, exhibition and release as dissenters ran the possibility of being expelled.
The Federation of Cine Technicians & Workers of Eastern (FCTWEI), led by Swarup, routinely slapped unwritten directives. A set number of employees were expected to be recruited by producers. Prime slots were to be assigned to projects supported by political figures. Actors like Anirban Bhattacharya and directors like Subrata Sen and Indranil Roychowdhury were “banned” after legally challenging the system.
“We fought this regime since 2016, when no one was willing to speak, Eskay Movies did. Shoots were stalled even in London, bans were imposed, and letters to the then chief minister went unanswered. What happened in Tollywood wasn’t union activism. It was a political stranglehold dressed up as worker protection. Tollygunge has voted for change. Now let Tollywood breathe,” conveyed producer Himanshu Dhanuka, reported The Times of India.
“We have to end the tyranny of the Biswas brothers and their yes-men. People were scared to invest in Bengal because of their arm-twisting. BJP’s cultural wing will ensure that Tollywood’s golden age is revived,” director-producer Pijush Saha submitted. Satadeep Saha, a distributor and exhibitor, stated that he received a notice from the government enquiring as to why he was not showing “Korpur,” which starred former TMC minister Bratya Basu and Kunal Ghosh instead of “Dhurandhar: The Revenge.”
In addition to abolishing the ban culture, it is now demanded that Nandan (government-sponsored film and cultural centre) should be reformed and the larger power structure that, according to many, converted Tollywood into a place of fear rather than artistic freedom be dismantled.
Conclusion
The assembly election results have not only revealed the problematic actions of pro-TMC Tollywood figures against those who remained neutral or were not part of their camp but have also highlighted the opportunistic nature of the umbilical cord that bound them to the party. and easily severed by the BJP’s triumph in Bengal. The conditions have evolved bringing about a stark modification in fidelity as TMC and its top brass, including Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek, have been rapidly deserted by the celebrities who were nurtured and coddled by it for years for political objectives.
On the 3rd of June 2026, market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) issued an interim ex parte order prohibiting Bengaluru-based gems and jewellery firm Rajesh Exports Ltd (REL), its promoter-chairman and managing director Rajesh Mehta, from accessing the securities market.
This essentially means that Rajesh Mehta cannot directly or indirectly buy, sell or deal in REL shares, until further orders.
99% of Rajesh Exports Ltd revenues are fictitious: Why SEBI initiated action against the Rajesh Mehta-led gold exporter
The SEBI has accused Rajesh Mehta and the REL of massive revenue misstatement or misrepresentation totalling nearly Rs 15.15 lakh crore between FY 2020-21 and FY 2024-25.
In simple terms, around 99.8% of REL and subsidiary-attributed revenues of the company’s reported revenue during FY 2020-21 and FY 2024-25 were fake.
“From the aforesaid, it is prima facie evident that while REL’s consolidated financial performance is almost entirely (approx. 97%-99%) dependent on its overseas subsidiaries, particularly Valcambi SA, the company has systematically withheld the financial statements of these entities from the public domain. Furthermore, it has failed to provide the necessary underlying data (party-wise details of vendors, customers, etc.) to the Investigating Authority despite repeated summons,” the 109-page SEBI order reads.
According to SEBI, Rajesh Exports Ltd failed to provide financial statements of its subsidiaries or step-down subsidiaries, including REL Singapore for FY 2023-24 to FY 2024-25, Bab AL Rayan Jewellery LLC for FY 2020-21 to FY 2024-25, GGR for calendar years 2024 as well as standalone financial statements 2020 to 2024, Valcambi USA Inc for calendar years 2020 to 2024, standalone financial statements of ACC Energy for FY 2022-23 to FY 2024-25.
Further, the SEBI order stated that Rajesh Exports Ltd failed to provide the sales register, purchase register, breakup of customer-wise debtors, breakup of vendor-wise creditors, and list of related parties and transactions, all pertaining to REL’s subsidiaries, for the time period under investigation.
“By failing to provide the above information, despite multiple emails and summons, REL obstructed the investigation and impaired SEBI’s ability to verify the authenticity of consolidated financial statements, thereby violating Section 11(2)(ia) and 11C(3) of the SEBI Act, 1992. Further, by failing to upload the audited financial statements of its subsidiaries/ step-down subsidiaries on its website, REL violated Regulation 46(2)(s) of the LODR Regulations and Section 136(1) of the Companies Act, 2013,” SEBI stated.
What the prima facie findings of the SEBI investigation into Rajesh Exports Ltd revealed
The SEBI analysis of the financial records of Rajesh Exports, Valcambi, and other subsidiaries showed that while REL reported revenue in lakhs of crores on a consolidated level, only a small fraction of it was on a standalone basis.
In 2020-2021, while REL’s consolidated revenue was Rs 2,58,306 crore, the standalone revenue was merely Rs 2,060 crore. While both consolidated and standalone revenue grew between 2020-2021 and 2025-26, the disparity in both figures also continued. In FY 2025-26, REL’s consolidated revenue stood at Rs 7,78,716 crore, and its standalone revenue was Rs 9,189 crores.
REL claimed that this huge difference in consolidated and standalone revenue is because most of their revenue is linked to their foreign-based subsidiaries, including Valcambi SA, which is REL’s core operating entity. The data shows that most of the other REL-linked entities, including GGR, are either holding companies with zero business operations or companies yet to commence operations.
Based on the scrutiny of the financial records of the REL and its subsidiaries, SEBI’s prima facie findings indicate that 97%-99% of REL’s consolidated revenues were attributed to overseas subsidiaries and step-down subsidiaries.
REL allegedly failed to furnish verifiable records supporting such revenues despite repeated summons.
Moreover, SEBI states that REL Singapore and other subsidiaries admittedly had little or no substantive operations.
“Valcambi SA, projected as the principal operating entity, disclosed only negligible standalone revenues in its audited financial statements on account of value addition/ processing charges,” SEBI stated.
“The inflated unaudited revenues disclosed by GGR at the consolidated level is not supported either by audited standalone financial statements or by underlying transactional records or the concept of accounting,” it added.
The market regulator stressed that the issue is not only the unavailability of certain information, but mainly that the revenues disclosed by the REL at the consolidated level appear incapable of independent verification despite repeated regulatory requisitions and opportunities granted over an extended period.
“The failure of REL to furnish transaction-level records, customer details, vendor confirmations, invoices, inventory trails, or other primary evidentiary material, coupled with the negligible standalone revenues disclosed by only the overseas operating entity and the absence of demonstrable substantive operations by others, renders the consolidated revenue figures of REL commercially implausible,” the SEBI order stated.
The SEBI investigation revealed that REL has prima facie misrepresented approximately 15,15,385 crores, representing 99.80% of its revenues, which are attributed to subsidiaries during the period FY 2020-21 to FY 2024-25.
“The aforesaid conduct appears to have prima facie enabled REL to portray an inflated and misleading picture of its operational scale, consolidated financial position and financial health before investors and the securities market,” SEBI stated.
Besides revenue inflation, the SEBI investigation also delved into the alleged non-genuine transactions linked to REL. The gold retailer reported sales of Rs 11,487 crore and purchases of Rs 11,488 crore with Affluence Shares and Stocks Pvt Ltd. This company, however, denied having any client relationship with REL and claimed that it dealt with Rajesh Mehta personally.
Allegedly, company funds were routed to Mehta-linked entities and then to his personal accounts. While mirrored in the company books, some funds were used for personal derivative trading without board approval or proper related-party (RPT) disclosures. Some of this money was later returned.
There are many other red flags highlighted in the SEBI order, including a Rs 10,35 crore investment in African gold mining. In this case, there was an apparent lack of proper documentation, valuation reports, and other data pertaining to customer, vendor, and subsidiary financials.
Notably, the investigation into Rajesh Exports was launched in March 2024, after SEBI received a shareholder complaint, which highlighted unusually large trade receivables outstanding for more than two years. Now, SEBI has issued an order barring Rajesh Exports and its managing director, Rajesh Mehta, from accessing the securities market.
While REL denies all the allegations brought against the company, the SEBI action has severely impacted not only Rajesh Exports but also Life Insurance Corporation (LIC). REL’s shares hit the 5% lower circuit on 4th June, trading at around Rs 104. The REL stock has already lost more than 80% in the last three years.
Meanwhile, LIC, which holds 10.8% stakes in REL, worth Rs 334 crore, witnessed its shares dip. As per reports, the broader investor losses since 2023 are around Rs 12,700 crore, impacting 194,000 shareholders.
From having a classic success story to SEBI at his doorstep: Who is Rajesh Mehta?
Born in Bengaluru on 20th June 1964, Rajesh Jaswanth Rai Mehta, is a self-made businessman from a Jain family, originally from Gujarat’s Morbi. Aspiring to become a doctor, Rajesh Mehta attended the National College; however, he did not complete his higher education. Mehta joined his family business and in 1985, he and along with his brother, Prashant Mehta, started a silver trading company from the money borrowed from their other brother, Bipin.
The Mehta brothers bought jewellery in Chennai and sold profitably in Gujarat and South India. Gradually, Rajesh Mehta built a wholesale jewellery business. Mehta popularised ethnic Indian designs across markets and operated Rajesh Art Jewellers for bartering.
In 1989, Rajesh Mehta established Rajesh Exports in a Bengaluru garage with just 10 workers. Reports say that this was India’s first organised gold jewellery manufacturing unit. Rajesh Export’s operations focused mainly on exports to the UAE, UK, Oman, Kuwait, the US, and Europe.
By 1992, Rajesh Exports recorded a turnover of Rs 20 million, which skyrocketed to Rs 1.2 billion by 1998. Rajesh Exports became India’s largest gold jewellery exporter or wholesaler by 1994.
In 1995, Rajesh Exports’ IPO raised Rs 10 crore. The company soon expanded into a full gold value chain, which comprises refining, manufacturing, and retailing. Rajesh Exports operates the Shubh Jewellers retail chain.
According to REL’s website, the firm processes 35% of the gold produced in the world.
Rajesh Exports stunned market experts when it acquired Switzerland-based Valcambi SA in 2015 in an all-cash $400 million transaction. Valcambi was the world’s largest gold refiner at that time. Valcambi, however, faced separate scrutiny post-acquisition allegation linked to alleged processing of ‘dirty gold’ from Dubai. Valcambi was even reported to have quit the Swiss Gold Association amidst the controversy.
Rajesh Exports was once a company ranked in the Fortune 500. It was touted as one of India’s largest listed firms by revenue, although it now turns out that most of the revenue in recent years was allegedly inflated, fake, to be precise.
From Udyog Shree, Jeweller of the Year (Karnataka government), Outstanding Businessman (China), to being enlisted among Forbes’s India’s richest 2017 list, Rajesh Mehta won many awards throughout his career. Rajesh Exports received government schemes and was among the awardees of Rs 18,100 crore PLI scheme for Advanced Chemistry Cell battery storage in 2022.
While Rajesh Exports came under SEBI scanner in 2024, many analysts and investors have been voicing suspicions about the extraordinarily high revenues, cash balances, and subsidiary opacity. Some even compared the story of Rajesh Exports to the Geetanjali Gems collapse, a major jewellery export scam.
In India, the pattern of some elements within the Muslim community offering namaz at Hindu religious, historical, and cultural sites and then gradually seizing possession of those places is a deeply concerning trend. It always begins in a seemingly very ordinary and insignificant way. Sometimes they step into the temple premises to escape a light drizzle, and sometimes under the pretext of resting from fatigue. Once inside, they quietly perform namaz or ibadat there.
As soon as these acts surface on social media or local Hindus raise objections, a particular section of the country, which we call “liberal Hindus”, immediately begins beating its chest. These liberals loudly lament: “If someone offered namaz and prayed to Allah inside the house of God, what’s the big deal? God is one, after all.”
But history and present-day events scream the truth: this is not innocent worship at all, but a meticulously planned chronology. It is precisely the fallacious arguments of these liberal Hindus that give the greatest strength to such extremist thinking. Soon the matter goes far beyond mere namaz. Within a few years, the entire site gets entangled in disputes like the Kans Fort in Malihabad or the Bhojshala in Dhar. In the end, Hindus are forced to fight decades-long legal battles for their own ancient places.
The greatest irony is that throughout this entire process, the very Hindus who speak of their constitutional and religious rights are the ones showered with abuse. The liberal social fabric never questions those who quietly or forcibly occupied the place.
Bulandshahr: Namaz inside Hanuman Temple
To understand the entire controversy, we must first look at the latest incident in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh. Here, an ancient Hanuman temple complex was brazenly turned into a namaz site through conspiracy. On 31 May, during house construction work, the intention of Muslim mason Asar Mohammad and his companions suddenly changed. As soon as the opportunity arose in the afternoon, they entered straight into the Hanuman temple.
They used the excuse of drizzling rain. They staged a drama of helplessness. Taking full advantage of the situation, Asar Mohammad offered namaz inside the sacred temple premises. His companion Nazar Mohammad stood guard as a security shield throughout this audacious act. This was clearly a stab in the back of Hindu religious tolerance and the aggressive beginning of an attempt to capture a centre of faith.
As soon as the video went viral, seeing the seriousness of the situation, the police administration immediately deployed heavy forces on the spot. The police swiftly acted after sensing the conspiracy. An FIR was registered under serious sections against the main extremists Asar Mohammad, Nazar Mohammad, and the house owner Rajkumar who supported them. The main accused, Asar Mohammad, was promptly challaned and sent behind bars.
The suicidal logic of liberal Hindus: The mindset that supplies oxygen to extremism
Whenever incidents like Bulandshahr occur in any corner of the country, the secular and liberal brigade becomes active on social media. Their arguments are so hollow and self-destructive that they directly numb the cultural consciousness of the majority community. Let us understand the main arguments of these liberals.
“God and Allah are no different”: This is the very first and favourite argument of liberal Hindus. They say that a temple is also the house of God, so if someone remembers their Allah with a sincere heart there, the temple does not become impure. They present it as the most beautiful example of “Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb” (syncretic culture).
“The excuse of lack of space or compulsion”: In the Bulandshahr case too, the same argument was given — it was raining outside, so the Muslim labourers went inside the temple. Liberals emotionally write, “Is it a crime to give a thirsty person water or two yards of space to a person offering namaz?” They completely frame it as a humanitarian issue and divert attention from the real danger.
Labelling opposing Hindus as “extremists”: Any Hindu who opposes such unauthorised namaz and seeks legal recourse is immediately branded by these liberals as “hateful Chintu”, “communal” or “fanatic”. According to them, it is the people protesting who are spoiling the atmosphere of the country, not those who are violating the sanctity of the temple.
It is precisely because of these suicidal and cowardly arguments that the confidence of the occupying forces grows sky-high. They realise that a large section of Hindu society itself will stand up to defend their encroachment.
Our protest is not baseless: Why Hindu society has now become alert and aggressive
The protest by Hindu society is not based on hatred or unfounded fear. Behind it lies hundreds of years of bitter experience and the continuous deceptions surfacing in the present. Hindu society has now clearly understood that every such “innocent beginning” ends in a massive dispute and the eventual loss of their sacred sites.
When the same kind of deception has been repeated throughout history, it is natural for future generations to become vigilant. Hindus have seen how their straightforwardness and generosity have been shamelessly exploited. Today’s Hindu society knows full well that if they remain silent today over namaz being offered inside the Hanuman temple in Bulandshahr, tomorrow the other side will stake a claim on the sanctum sanctorum itself. This fear is not imaginary; behind it stand dozens of living and simmering examples like Malihabad and Dhar.
Malihabad’s Kans Fort dispute: How three years of “ibadat” snatched the rights of the Pasi community
The most accurate example of this entire strategy is in Malihabad, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. The historic “Raj Pasi King Kans Ka Kila” (Kans Fort) is located in the Kansmandi area here. This fort is a symbol of the glorious history of the Pasi community and is an extremely sacred centre of faith for them. But what happened here is eye-opening.
About three years ago, a person named Maulana Jameel Ahmed from Bahraich district came here and started living in one part of this historic fort. In the beginning, he very normally sought permission to clean the fort premises. After that, he quietly began offering namaz there. Local Hindus, showing generosity, did not protest at the time. But gradually, Maulana Jameel turned this historic heritage into a complete centre of Muslim activities.
On 28 March 2026, the dispute fully erupted when an organisation called “Lakhan Army” filed a formal complaint at Malihabad police station. The complaint revealed shocking details. Maulana Jameel Ahmed had illegally occupied King Kans’s fort and started running an illegal madrasa named “Sulemania School” there. Around 20 Hindu children from Nabipnah village were being brought to this madrasa. Under the guise of education, they were being brainwashed and a major centre for religious conversion was being developed. Lakhan Army demanded that the police immediately remove this illegal occupation.
After this, the situation worsened further. On 26 May 2026, tension over the so-called disputed structure at the Kansmandi Kala site became so intense that the administration had to deploy heavy police force. The Pasi community had announced a Sundarkand recitation in the Kans Fort premises on the occasion of Bada Mangal. But the administration, citing law and order, did not permit Hindus to recite Sundarkand. The president of the Pasi community was placed under house arrest, and other supporters were not even allowed near the fort.
Even namaz on Bakrid had to be stopped. The police issued notices to 15 senior leaders of the Pasi community and warned of strict action. Now the situation is such that the very Pasi community to whom the fort belonged is being stopped from going there — and all this happened because of a “innocent namaz” that began just three years ago.
Dhar’s Bhojshala dispute: From the invasions of Khilji and Dilawar to today’s legal battle
A similar historic and painful example is the “Bhojshala” in Dhar district, Madhya Pradesh. Bhojshala was originally a grand and sacred temple of Vagdevi (Goddess Saraswati) built by Raja Bhoj in the 11th century, along with a great Sanskrit university. It is a supremely revered and cultural heritage symbol for followers of Sanatan Dharma.
But cruel Muslim invaders like Alauddin Khilji and Dilawar Khan mercilessly trampled this sacred complex. They made every effort to destroy the temple’s grandeur, but they could not completely erase its Sanatan religious marks. Later, the Muslim side staked its claim on the entire premises and began calling it “Kamal Maulana Masjid”.
This dispute has remained an open wound for Hindus even in modern India. On 21 May 2022, the Madhya Pradesh High Court admitted an important petition filed by “Hindu Front for Justice”. This petition challenged the controversial order issued by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) on 7 April 2003, under which ASI had permitted Muslims to offer namaz inside this ancient temple complex every Friday.
Hindu organisations strongly opposed it and presented solid historical evidence before the court. Hindus demanded that the original idol of Goddess Saraswati be reinstalled in the Bhojshala premises. They also demanded modern videography of the entire complex and radio-carbon dating of the ancient artefacts and idols found there by the central government so that truth could be separated from falsehood. The Madhya Pradesh High Court eventually ruled that Bhojshala is a Vagdevi temple and granted Hindus the right to worship, but only after a long legal battle.
Sitaram Goel’s historic document: Over 1,800 mosques built by destroying temples
The argument that “Muslim rulers or fanatics never occupied temples” is completely false and anti-historical. In 1990, renowned historian Sitaram Goel, along with scholars like Arun Shourie, Harsh Narain, Jay Dubashi and Ram Swarup, published a highly authentic and research-based book titled Hindu Temples: What Happened To Them.
In its two sections, the complete raw account of the historical atrocities committed by Muslim invaders and rulers was laid bare. Sitaram Goel identified more than 1,800 specific sites, mosques, dargahs and disputed structures across the country that were either built by directly demolishing Hindu, Jain and Buddhist temples or constructed using the debris, pillars and artefacts from those destroyed temples.
In the second part of the book, The Islamic Evidence, irrefutable proof is given by citing contemporary Muslim historians and official Mughal-era documents showing how centres of Hindu faith were erased and Islamic victory symbols were erected in their place. The state-wise list provided in this book is enough to awaken today’s Hindus.
The statistics from Sitaram Goel’s book narrate a bitter story from different states of India. First, Uttar Pradesh: there are 299 such places where temples were damaged. The Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi is a major example, it was built by demolishing the ancient Vishweshwar temple. The Teele Wali Masjid in Lucknow was previously the Lakshman Teela temple. The Jami Masjid in Meerut was built on a Buddhist vihara. The Ram temple dispute in Ayodhya was also part of this.
Major statements have also emerged on these disputes in Uttar Pradesh. On 31 July 2023, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath clearly stated that calling Gyanvapi a mosque is wrong; a trishul and Hindu religious symbols still exist inside it. The ASI survey also found a Shivling there. On the other hand, on 6 August 2020, just a day after the Ram temple bhoomi pujan, All India Imam Association president Sajid Rashidi gave a controversial statement. He threatened that the temple would be demolished again and a Babri Masjid built in its place, citing the example of Hagia Sophia in Turkey.
Now let’s talk about the states of South and West India. Karnataka has 192 such places. Its ancient Hindu cities of Bidar and Bijapur were completely turned into Muslim capitals. The Sola Khamba Masjid and Jami Masjid there were entirely built from the debris of Hindu temples. Tamil Nadu has 175 such places. The Nathar Shah Vali Dargah in Tiruchirappalli was built by demolishing a Shiva temple. The sacred Shivling of the temple was used as a base for placing lamps in the dargah.
The same happened in Gujarat and Rajasthan. Gujarat has 170 such places. Ancient temples were destroyed to give Ahmedabad a Muslim character. The Jami Masjid of Ahmed Shah is a direct example. Many mosques in Dwarka and Somnath were also built on temple sites. Rajasthan too has 170 such places. Ajmer was destroyed and the “Adhai Din Ka Jhonpra” and the dargah of Moinuddin Chishti were built there in 1199. The Topkhana Masjid in Jalore uses stones and material from the Parshvanath Jain temple.
The situation in Central India and other states is no different. Madhya Pradesh has 151 such places. The Jami Masjid in Bhopal was built on the site of an ancient Sabha Mandap temple. Maharashtra has 143 places. The famous Mena Hajjam ki Mazar in Mumbai was built by demolishing the Mahalaxmi temple. Andhra Pradesh has 142 places. Its Jami Masjid was built by destroying the Venugopalaswami temple. West Bengal has 102 places where Hindu capitals were destroyed and Muslim cities established.
Even in states with smaller numbers, the same method was followed. Bihar has 77 places where Jain and Hindu temples were turned into mazaars. Haryana also has 77. Hisar was built by Firoz Shah Tughlaq using debris from the temples of the ancient Agroha city. Delhi has 72 such places. The Qutub Minar complex and Quwwatul Islam Masjid were built by demolishing 27 grand Hindu and Jain temples. Odisha has 12 and Punjab has 14 such places where mosques were built on temple sites. Assam, Kerala and Lakshadweep have 2 each. Lakshadweep’s situation is that its population is now almost 100% Muslim. Diu and Himachal Pradesh also have one historic example each where material from ancient temples was used to build mosques or gates.
Bharuch’s Jama Masjid dispute: The truth emerging from the pages of history
Sitaram Goel’s same book records the case of the “Jama Masjid” in Bharuch district, Gujarat. On 7 January 2026, this historic Jama Masjid in Bharuch city once again came into controversy. Saints from the “Akhil Bharatiya Sant Samiti” alleged that despite being under the protection of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), illegal construction was being carried out rampantly here and the strict rules of the archaeology department were being openly flouted.
The saints staged a major protest outside the masjid along with these serious allegations. The situation became so tense that the police and district administration had to intervene. The administration sought two months’ time, assuring the saints of appropriate action, after which the saints ended their protest.
After this dharna, the relevant portion of historian Sitaram Goel’s book again came into discussion. It clearly states that the construction of Bharuch’s Jama Masjid in 1321 was done by demolishing extremely ancient Hindu and Jain temples located there. The pillars and columns still standing inside the masjid loudly testify to their Jain and Hindu origins.
Was the intention really only praying? The bitter truth of attacks on idols and temples
Those liberal and secular intellectuals who argue that “Muslims’ intention is only ibadat and they respect Hindu places of worship equally”… must answer for the attacks and desecration of idols that have occurred in various parts of the country in recent years.
Attack by Muslim mob on Pirana temple in Ahmedabad (8 May 2024) — A violent Muslim mob suddenly attacked the historic “Prerna Peeth Nishkalanki Temple” in Pirana, Ahmedabad. Vishva Hindu Parishad released a video of the attack. In the video, hundreds of Muslims wearing latticed caps are seen entering the temple premises armed with wooden sticks and iron rods.
The fanatical mob vandalised the site. Then the Muslim side claimed that a dargah existed there earlier, even though a Hindu temple had always stood there. Rumours were also spread that the temple administration had removed some ancient graves. After this, a mob of local Muslims gathered and unleashed violence. In the attack, many sacred idols of Hindu deities installed in the sanctum sanctorum were smashed.
Kicking the Devi idol with feet in Moradabad (23 September 2023) — A hateful incident occurred in Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh. Suresh Kumar, a resident of the village, was working as a labourer at a new Devi temple under construction on 21 September. In the evening, Saddam, son of Gafur, arrived with two companions Niyazi and Abrar. Saddam started an argument by asking about the temple gate and pipes. When Suresh objected, Saddam began hurling filthy abuses at Hindus.
He then entered the under-construction temple and kicked the sacred Devi idol that was to be installed there with his feet. He threatened, “Pick up this idol and take it to your Hindu neighbourhood, otherwise your fate will be very bad.” Later the police arrested Saddam.
Stone-pelting on Durga temple in Darbhanga, Bihar (23 July 2023) — A dispute arose between two communities in Darbhanga, Bihar, over installing a Muharram flag. A mob of fanatics deliberately planted a religious Muharram flag right in front of an ancient Maa Durga temple. When Hindu devotees present in the temple peacefully protested, some people from the Muslim side began raising religious slogans. Soon, an Islamic fanatic mob began pelting stones targeting the Durga temple. The Maa Durga temple was completely damaged in the stone-pelting and several devotees were injured. The police had to carry out a heavy lathi-charge to bring the situation under control.
Stone-pelting from mosque on Kanwariyas in Bareilly (23 July 2023) — On the same day, in Bareilly district, a group of Kanwariya pilgrims on their sacred Sawan journey was suddenly attacked. According to “Hindu Jagran Manch”, when the Kanwariyas were passing near the Balkhandi Nath temple, stones were pelted at them from inside a large mosque located there. Large stones were thrown from the mosque’s roof, injuring many Kanwariyas badly. The attackers deliberately targeted the Kanwar yatra from inside the mosque.
Vandalism and arson inside temple in Chandni Chowk, Delhi (2 July 2019) — In Delhi’s Chandni Chowk area, late at night, after a minor dispute, a mob of hundreds of Islamic fanatics turned violent. The Islamic mob broke the door of an ancient Hindu temple in Chandni Chowk and entered inside. The fanatics completely destroyed the sacred idols of God installed inside the temple.
The temple curtains and religious materials were set on fire. The thick glass shields installed for the protection of the idols were smashed with bricks. Shoes, slippers and bricks were scattered all over the temple premises. The attackers continuously raised religious slogans of “Nara-e-Takbeer, Allah-hu-Akbar”. When police intervened, the Islamic mob also pelted stones at the policemen.
The conspiracy of occupation hidden under the guise of offering namaz
Looking at all these incidents, one thing becomes clear: offering namaz at Hindus’ sacred places is not a mistake, but part of a well-thought-out conspiracy. If their only intention had been to worship Allah, they would not have occupied Hindu temples. It is obvious that their real aim is to erase the symbols of another religion. They want to stamp their faith on these sacred places. Our country’s liberal Hindus see this as great generosity. But fanatics see it as the weakness and cowardice of Hindus.
History is witness that any society that does not remain vigilant loses its existence. In the Bulandshahr incident, today’s Hindu society is taking immediate action. They want to get an FIR registered with the police and end the matter quickly. Even a slight carelessness today can give birth to a major dispute tomorrow. In past cases, we have seen endless legal battles like those in Malihabad and Bhojshala, in which generations of Hindus kept running to courts to prove their rights on their own land. Therefore, instead of trusting such cases now, it is better to understand their intention immediately and crush the conspiracy.
Democracy has its own flaws, but it is better to have a flawed “by the people, of the people, for the people” democratic system of governance than a perfect-from-the-outside autocracy. People across many countries have protested, fought, and even died in pursuit of overthrowing autocratic regimes. One such courageous but unsuccessful movement took place in China in 1989. The 4th of June marks 37 years of the Tiananmen Square massacre, which the Chinese Communist Party downplays and calls the ‘June Fourth Incident’.
The Tiananmen Square protest began in mid-April 1989 and culminated in a violent military crackdown between 3rd and 4th June 1989. China has, despite the undercurrents, never witnessed such massive pro-democracy protests again.
As the CCP continues to sell China as a Communist Utopia, it is pertinent to remember the dark chapter in China’s history that shows the CCP regime got itself a new lease of life in 1989 by murdering thousands of its people.
The Tiananmen Square protests: In pursuit of democracy
In 1949, Republican leader Chiang Kai-shek retreated to Taiwan after Communist leader Mao Zedong won the civil war and established the ‘People’s Republic of China’. From Chiang Kai-shek, Mao, Deng Xiaoping, and during the Tiananmen Square massacre, to President Xi Jinping now, China has never seen democracy. The only major attempt at establishing democracy in China began in April 1989.
The pro-democracy protests were triggered after the death of a reformist former Communist Party General Secretary, Hu Yaobang on 15th April 1989. He was seen as sympathetic to students. Mourners gathered in large numbers in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. This gathering soon evolved into broader protests against inflation, corruption, censorship, and demands for political reforms, including freedom of speech, press freedom and overall accountability from the Communist regime.
While tens of thousands of university students gathered at Tiananmen Square, the CCP mouthpiece, People’s Daily, labelled the protests a “conspiracy to sow chaos”.
By May 1989, nearly 1 lakh students gathered at the Square, and a hunger strike began on 13th May. The protesting students received massive public support, and workers and ordinary citizens soon joined them. While moderate leaders like Zhao Ziyang visited the protestors sympathetically, Paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, and Premier of China, Li Peng prevailed.
Martial law declaration and the infamous Tiananmen Square massacre
Deng Xiaoping and other Communist Party leaders saw the Tiananmen Square protests as an existential political threat and agreed to use coercive measures.
Acting out of the paranoia of losing if the Tiananmen protests extended to other parts of the country, the State Council declared martial law on the 20th of May and deployed over 300,000 troops on the streets of Beijing. The martial law was formally declared by Li Peng, the Premier of China.
The armed troops moved inside Beijing and advanced into central parts of the capital city in the wee hours of the 4th of June 1989. These People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops killed both demonstrating students and ordinary civilians. The Chinese soldiers did not even spare the bystanders.
While the Chinese official figures claim that around 200-300 people, including PLA soldiers, died in the crackdown, independent sources estimate the death toll to be above 10,000. Thousands were injured or arrested by the CCP after crushing the threat to its throne.
The CCP-PLA crackdown killed thousands of Chinese citizens and crushed the hope for a dawn of democracy. Zhao Ziyang, the political leader sympathetic to the movement, was purged and placed under house arrest.
The Tiananmen Square massacre was a turning point in the recent history of China; the CCP ensured that political liberalisation halted. The CCP regime rolled out economic reforms, which experts read as an effort to make the people forget the massacre of their own and move on in the glitter of the economic boom.
Dissent had no space in China, not in 1989 and not even in 2026. Every year, the Chinese government shows its gratitude to the forces for their sacrifice. However, with justifications, villainization, ‘foreign conspiracy’ propaganda, and every other tactic at hand, the CCP have tried their best to wipe out the history of the Tiananmen massacre.
The CCP pays tribute to the PLA soldiers who were killed while they were out to murder the protestors; however, it often places restrictions on Tiananmen Mothers, the mothers of the students who were killed during the 1989 massacre, to visit the Wanan cemetery, where their children are buried. The CCP’s heartless ban imposed on 4th June 2026 has been widely criticised across the world.
Over the years, the CCP has attempted to concoct an apocryphal narrative that the protesting students were pro-US and were acting against the Communist regime at the US’s behest. The Communists have long been trying to establish a narrative that the Tiananmen Square protests were a US regime change operation that they thwarted with an iron hand.
Indian communists sided in silence with their Chinese comrades as the latter killed students in 1989
Indian communists harbour deep loyalty, respect, and ideological commitment towards Communist regimes across the world, especially China. The Communist leaders in India look up to China as an ideal state. Perhaps, it was due to this delusion that Communists in India chose convenient silence over the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre rather than joining the international community in condemning the CCP’s slaughter of its own dissenting people.
After two years of disgraceful silence, in January 1992, the CPI(M) adopted a resolution at the 14th Congress, Madras. The party lauded the CCP for “successfully” crushing the Tiananmen pro-democracy protests.
The same CPIM in its 20th congress document- “Resolution on certain Ideological issues”, downplayed the Tiananmen Massacre by calling it an “internal turmoil” in China and instead of calling it a massacre, called it “Tiananmen Square development”. The CPIM dismissed the Tiananmen protests and the massacre as China’s internal matter, and even called the protestors ‘troublemakers’.
“Such an imperialist attempt to internally subvert socialism in the People’s Republic of China in 1989 was successfully thwarted by the CPC and the PLA,” the CPIM said.
Communist student groups in New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University used to call the Chinese students who protested at Tiananmen Square, ‘CIA lackeys, juvenile delinquents, and bourgeois reactionaries’. While many celebrated the PLA crackdown, others simply dismissed the massacre as nothing but lies spread by the communism-hating Western media.
In fact, Sitaram Yechury, a known communist leader, had even claimed that “not a drop of blood was shed at Tiananmen Square.”
Communists in India have always prioritised ideological loyalty over human rights. The CCP does the same. Apparently, it is in the Communist ideology itself.
The CCP ensured near-total erasure of the Tiananmen events domestically, banned discussions, commemorations, or even indirect references online and offline. The CCP even deploys AI tools to scan for patterns or indirect references to the Tiananmen Square massacre. The Chinese youth know little to nothing about the 1989 massacre due to internet firewalls, sanitised school curricula, and media control. Mourners, activists, martyrs’ families, all face harassment and arrests even decades later for daring to even talk about the events of the Tiananmen Square killings.
In 2021, Xiaohongshu, an Instagram-like startup of China, shared a post on June 4, the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, and wrote, “Tell me loudly, what is the date today?” The post was taken down quickly, and the company faced an investigation from local authorities.
Not much has changed in China. The Communist regime saw the Tiananmen protests as an existential threat to its power, and three decades later, they continue to see the truth and the memories of the 1989 massacre as a threat to its power.
The blazing Indian summer has arrived, sending people in search of relief under fans, coolers and air conditioners. While many try to stay behind closed doors to escape the scorching heat, another threat rears its head, putting lives at risk during this time of the year. The reliance on ACs to fight the rising temperatures has grown to become a necessity for people. However, this comfort is coupled with underlying safety issues that are causing multiple mishaps.
On 28th May (Thursday), Dhanendra Kumar, an 80-year-old retired IAS officer and the first chairman of the Competition Commission of India (CCI), perished in a fire, following a suspected AC burst at his house in Delhi’s Hauz Khas. The event is the most recent in a string of similar incidents involving air conditioners that have been reported in the National Capital Region this season. According to reports, a split AC blew and started a fire on the 15th story of a residential tower in Indirapuram, Ghaziabad.
Last month, 9 people lost their lives in a fire in a residential complex in Shahdara of East Delhi. The preliminary findings suggested that an AC blast might have been responsible for it. The possibility of such accidents is escalating as the demand and supply of AC surges annually due to the extreme heat.
The application of potentially dangerous refrigerant gases, like R-152a or combinations including R-152a, in the secondary refiller market amplifies the danger opposed to the usage of safe and non-flammable refrigerant R-22 or modern and effective substitutes like R-32 and R-410A.
In February 2024, a devastating instance took place in Delhi, resulting in the death of an 83-year-old grandmother as she tried to escape her burning flat alongside her granddaughter. The Fire Department stated that the cause was a gas leak originating from the AC compressor. It emphasised potential hazards connected to specious refrigerant gases.
A cold storage owner and his driver were killed in 2023 after the refrigerant gas cylinder at their Telangana cold store detonated as they were attempting to replace it. According to the police inquiry, the explosion happened as they were changing an outdoor unit’s refrigerant cylinder.
It highlighted how dangerous it is to handle a combination of refrigerant gases without the right expertise. Moreover, there have been numerous instances of these disasters occurring while replenishing or servicing air conditioning appliances.
What are refrigerant gases and how do they work
A chemical utilised in cooling system for mechanical devices including walk-in freezers, air conditioners and refrigerators is known as a refrigerant gas. The majority of refrigeration equipment rely on its chemical interactions to remove heat from enclosed spaces. Many gases are employed as refrigerants.
These act as a heat-transfer medium rather than cold air. The refrigerant helps the air conditioner maintain acceptable interior temperatures for extended periods of time by absorbing heat from the room and transporting it outside rather than directly spitting chilled air. The system effectively controls temperature and pressure because refrigerant alternates between liquid and gas states.
The gas used in air conditioners is crucial to cooling performance during hot summer days because of these frequent phase transitions that assist in the transfer of heat outdoors. The refrigerant flows through the unit’s expansion unit as a high-pressure liquid before decreasing to a low-pressure liquid caused by a pressure drop.
Afterwards, it passes through air conditioner’s evaporator coils, which takes heat and converts it into a low-pressure gas. After circulating through compressor and developing into a high-pressure gas, this refrigerant passes through condenser coils before cooling down into a high-pressure liquid that starts a new loop.
Mechanism of cooling (Source: Figaro)
The refrigerant industry uses a variety of gases, including R-22, R-152a and modern R-32 and R-410A. These gases are unique to the appliance and cannot be substituted. R-22 has long been employed in older air conditioners due to its dependability and safety. It is a traditional refrigerant gas with a faintly sweet odour and no colour. It is chemically stable and non-flammable but operates at higher pressures.
However, R-22 was to be phased out by January 2025 in Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) under the international convention dubbed as the Montreal Protocol, because there are safer and better alternatives on the market to replace it in a number of refrigeration and air conditioning (RAC) sectors.
In many regions of the world, R-152a is often put as an aerosol propellant in deodorants and hair sprays. It presents a safety issue when used as refrigerant alone or in combinations in air conditioners owing to its flammable qualities. It is not suitable as a refrigerant for ACs because it produces harmful gases including carbon monoxide and hydrogen fluoride upon combustion.
The switch has been executed towards newer and improved options, R-32, R-410A and R-290, which facilitate superior cooling properties while being more environmentally friendly than R-22. R32 enables effective cooling with better compressor performance and reduced charge volume. It is used in many inverter air conditioners to improve power efficiency and temperature stability. It is mildly flammable and non-toxic.
R410A offers stronger cooling output, balanced pressure and smoother heat transfer. This refrigerant is used by several mid-generation split air conditioners to offer consistent performance. Propane or R290, is marketed as a non-toxic, eco-friendly and viable replacement for other refrigerant gases.
Compared to gases like R32, it has a lower Global Warming Potential (GWP) index. It is an excellent natural refrigerant with remarkable thermodynamic efficiency that has minimum effect on the environment. However, R290 has to be handled carefully because of its high flammability.
The threat imposed by R-152a gas
A major issue is the infiltration of spurious gases, primarily R-152a, which have been taking the place of authentic gases in refrigeration and air conditioning (RAC) equipment in the secondary refiller market. The prevalent use of air conditioners in homes and businesses birth grave fears of public safety if they contain the gas or its blends.
The expected demand for genuine R-152a end-uses in India is 1000. However, data mentioned that an alarming amount of R-152a, roughly 5000 tonnes, was entering the nation even after the product fell within the category of prohibited imports.
The reservations arise from the inherent perils associated with employing R-152a as a refrigerant in air conditioners when it is not appropriate. It requires different handling and safety standards, such as physical and chemical qualities. It is also extremely flammable. Anyone operating an air conditioner without being certain of the refrigerant gas inside is exposed to danger due to the lack of information about it. A gas swap involving R-152a could possibly endanger his life.
Oblivious users, consumers or technicians in charge of the equipment’s maintenance could be critically harmed, stressing the pressing need to address this impending threat.
Massive imports of refrigerant gases from China
It is noteworthy that Beijing is the primary supplier of AC components and refrigerant gases to New Delhi. Interestingly, a 2016 post titled “The Fraud in Chinese Air-Conditioners” relating to an experience around procurement of these devices for Saudi Arabia highlighted, “China is not an origin for high quality refrigerant gasses and there is no way to proof what the factory put in there. A low-quality refrigerant will sooner or later blow up your compressor.” It asserted, “So far my conclusion is that it is impossible to buy high quality and performance verified air conditioners from a factory out of China.”
The post charged that the “Chinese have mastered the art of gaming the system” as there is no practical method for the certification body to quality test every single unit that comes off the production line. Hence, the approvals are based on samples, and the manufacturers exploit the situation. It mentioned that “all quality certifications are self-policing means the manufacturer makes a voluntary commitment to abide by them. The certification agency has no mechanism to enforce this compliance.”
Similarly, American heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) contractors were firmly cautioned against illegally imported R-22 knockoffs from China or other countries. It was warned, “While there are plenty of genuine, viable alternatives to R-22, counterfeit products can be flammable, explosive, and even deadly.”
Moreover, 5 illicit production facilities, 11 storage warehouses, 2 sales offices and 18 members of 4 criminal gangs were apprehended in China in 2015. 20 tonnes of raw materials and more than 28,000 canisters of counterfeit R-134a and other refrigerants were seized. There was between 15% and 30% added methyl chloride in the bogus R22 and using it could prompt serious corrosion alongside compressor failure.
The aforementioned illustrated how counterfeit and dangerous refrigerant gases in compressors manufactured in China have been posing a great risk to the safety and lives of consumers.
How to confront the issue
The centre must take action to stop the excessive importation of R-152a into India. Stringent import regulation and enforcement must be put in place in line with the actual end-user demand. The unlawful practice of creating a cocktail of fake gases for a quick profit has to end. Thus, enforcement agencies should take strong action against vendors and refillers of these fake gases on the secondary market to ensure adherence to safety norms.
It is necessary to educate consumers about the severity of the problem by creating awareness of the hazards that accompany the use of R-152a and other such gases. The government, of course, needs active support of the public as well. In fact, both must join forces to deal with this menace successfully. A decisive and attentive strategy is needed along with proper comprehension of the challenge. No purchase should be made without adequate inquiry and understanding of the product.
The fight against contaminated gases calls for coordinated action for public safety, maintain market fairness and guarantee the proper use of refrigerant gases in India. This can also provide a suitable opportunity for the government to advance its “Make in India” initiative and lessen foreign dependency.
Imports of R134a refrigerant from China were subject to anti-dumping levies last year by the government. The Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) of India conducted investigations and discovered that R134a was acquired at a discount, resulting in dumping that did major damage to the domestic industry through price undercutting.
Several estimates suggested that the focus on the “Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan” program contributed to a decline in reliance on air conditioner imports. The nation reportedly recorded a 65% decrease in imports of split air conditioners or air conditioners between October and November of 2020.
India has to get rid of its ongoing reliance on China for enhanced control over quality and the introduction of better standards to counter the threat posed by the adulterated gases in ACs. It is a feasible goal that can be accomplished through public backing and strong implementation of a well-defined policy.
A claim doesn’t have to be true to go viral. It only has to sound shocking. In recent days, a figure claiming that 8,056 people died in Uttar Pradesh during a five-day heatwave has spread rapidly across the media reports and social media discussions. The study was published in Frontiers in Environmental Health. The number carried the authority of a peer-reviewed study and the capability of mainstream media coverage. Yet a closer examination shows that the figure was not a recorded death toll at all.
It was an estimate generated through a chain of assumptions, extrapolations, and modelling choices that transformed data from 10 cities into a nationwide mortality projection. The study has been presented as a district-level estimate of heatwave deaths across India. However, its conclusions are based on several assumptions about climate, population, mortality patterns and heatwave scenarios. The real question is not whether heatwaves are dangerous – they certainly are. The question is whether a figure like 8,056 deaths in Uttar Pradesh can be treated as a reliable estimate when it is derived through multiple layers of modelling and extrapolation rather than actual death records. Let’s examine the study as a whole and debunk the claims that are causing misinformation among the public.
The paper never measured deaths in 765 districts
At first, the study portrays that researchers analysed heatwave-related deaths across all the districts of India. However, the reality is much different. The authors did not collect data on Heatwave-related deaths across all 765 districts. Nor did they examine how many people actually died during the recent heatwaves in each district. In fact, the study did not use the district-level temperature and mortality data to directly calculate the heat-related districts. Instead, the researchers relied on assumptions that worsened the picture. The assumptions are based on an earlier study conducted in just 10 Indian cities. They then used those findings to estimate what might happen nationwide.
Each district was assigned the mortality risk observed in one of those cities based on climate similarities. As a result, the figure of Uttar Pradesh’s estimated 8,056 deaths is not recorded as deaths from Uttar Pradesh itself. They are projections generated by applying a small amount of city data to hundreds of districts across India. This distinction is crucial. The study presents district-level numbers, but they are not derived from district-level mortality data. They are the result of a nationwide modelling exercise built on extrapolation rather than direct measurement. If deaths were never directly measured in all 765 districts, how much confidence should be placed in district-specific estimates running into thousands of deaths?
The entire model rests on data from just 10 cities
One of the biggest limitations of the study is that a research paper can analyse or estimate data for the whole country based on only 10 Indian cities. The researchers did not analyse heatwave-related mortality data from hundreds of districts across the country. Instead, they relied on a previous study that examined heatwaves and deaths in just 10 urban centres between 2008 and 2019. These cities include Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Pune, and a few others. The mortality patterns observed in these cities were then used to estimate heatwave deaths nationwide. In simple words, the study assumes that if a district has a climate similar to one of these cities, it will also experience a similar increase in deaths during the heatwave.
This raises an obvious question: Can data from just 10 cities accurately represent the diverse conditions across 765 districts? A district’s vulnerability to heat depends on several factors beyond climate, including healthcare access, population density, income levels, housing conditions, electricity availability, access to cooling, and the proportion of people engaged in outdoor work. These factors can vary dramatically from one district to another.
Yet the study’s estimates for the entire country ultimately stem from mortality patterns observed in only 10 urban centres. As a result, the district-level figures presented in the paper are not based on local observations but on the assumption that the experience of a handful of cities can be extended to the rest of India.
Climate similarity is not mortality similarity
A key assumption of the study is that districts with a climate similar to that of a particular city will also experience a similar increase in deaths during a heatwave. This assumption is the backbone of the entire model. To estimate heatwave deaths across India, the researchers first grouped districts by climate zone. Each district was then matched to one of the 10 cities studied earlier, and the heatwave mortality risk observed in that city was applied to the district. However, climate is the only factor that determines a population’s vulnerability to extreme heat. Two villages may have similar temperatures but very different living conditions.
One district may have better hospitals, more reliable electricity, greater access to cooling, and cleaner drinking water, but another district may have poor healthcare facilities, frequent power cuts, and a large number of people exposed to heat for long hours. These differences can significantly affect how many people fall sick or die in the heatwave. For example, a resident of a major city with access to air conditioning, better hospital facilities, and emergency services may face a very different level of risk than a farm worker in a district without basic facilities. Despite having similar temperatures, the conditions for both people will be different.
Yet the bulk of the study works on the assumption that districts with similar climate characteristics will also share similar mortality patterns. In simple terms, similar weather does not necessarily mean similar health outcomes. Therefore, using climate similarity as a proxy for mortality risk introduces significant uncertainty into the study’s estimates.
The study effectively guessed heatwave risk for rural India.
The most significant limitation of the study is that it extends findings from a handful of urban centres to vast rural populations across the country. In the limitations section, the authors acknowledge that, while assigning heatwave mortality risk to districts, they did not account for several important factors, including occupation, income, healthcare access, overall health, nutrition, age, and gender. This is a major concern because it plays an important role in heatwave-related deaths.
One person living in Ahmedabad with better living conditions must face different problems than the person working as an agricultural labourer in rural Punjab, who spends long hours outdoors and has limited access to healthcare. Yet the study applies mortality risk estimates derived from urban populations to districts across India, including predominantly rural regions. In effect, it assumes that the relationship between heat and mortality observed in a city can serve as a proxy for areas with very different economic, social, and healthcare conditions.
As a result, the estimate of 8,056 excess deaths in Uttar Pradesh is not based on observed mortality patterns in Uttar Pradesh’s rural population. It assumes that heat-related mortality in those areas can be approximated using data from a limited number of cities. Whether that assumption holds true remains uncertain.
The study’s definition of a heatwave is different from what most people understand
Another important point often missed in media reports is how the study defines a “heatwave”. Most people think of a heatwave as temperatures exceeding 45°C or an official heatwave declaration by the India Meteorological Department (IMD). However, the study does not use either of these standards. Instead, the researchers define a heatwave as a period when temperatures exceed the 97th percentile of a district’s historical temperature record between 2008 and 2019.
In simple terms, a heatwave occurs when temperatures are unusually high compared to those the district has experienced in the past. This means the study’s heatwave threshold is a statistical benchmark, not necessarily the temperatures that people commonly associate with extreme heat. As a result, the study is not based on IMD-declared heatwaves. It is not based on a fixed temperature such as 45°C and nor is it based on actual temperatures recorded during the 2026 summer.
This distinction is important because many readers may assume that estimates such as 8,056 deaths in Uttar Pradesh are linked to recent weather conditions or specific heatwave events. In reality, the figure is based on a hypothetical scenario defined using historical temperature thresholds.
The authors acknowledge that their model is based on a historical baseline from 2008–2019 rather than on current-year heatwave events. Therefore, the study should not be interpreted as evidence of a specific number of deaths during a recent heatwave. In short, the paper models what could happen under a specific statistical heatwave scenario. It does not calculate deaths from an actual heatwave event that occurred in Uttar Pradesh in 2026.
Huge uncertainty is hidden behind seemingly precise numbers
One of the striking aspects of the study is the difference between the popular headline figures and the uncertainty acknowledged by the paper itself. According to the media reports, the prominent highlighted numbers are 29,967 excess deaths nationwide and 8,056 excess deaths in Uttar Pradesh. It is presented in a way that makes the figures appear highly precise, almost as if they were based on actual counts.
However, the study itself admits that there is a significant margin of uncertainty. According to the authors, the estimated national death toll for a five-day heatwave could range from 18,000 to 43,000 deaths. That is a difference of approximately 25,000 deaths between the lower and upper estimates. In simple terms, while headlines focused on figures like 29,967 or 8,056, the study’s own calculations suggest the true value could vary substantially depending on the assumptions used in the model. It raises the important question.
If the uncertainty range spans tens of thousands of deaths at the national level, how meaningful is it to present figures such as 29,967 or 8,056 as if they are precise estimates? The issue is not that uncertainty exists – Uncertainty is a normal part of scientific modelling. The issue is how that uncertainty is communicated. Media Houses like India Today, encountering a figure like 8,056, are unlikely to realise that it emerges from a model with a very wide range of possible outcomes.
In effect, the study presents estimates to the nearest individual while simultaneously acknowledging uncertainty that spans tens of thousands of deaths. This creates an impression of precision that the underlying methodology may not fully support.
The model was never tested against real-world outcomes
One of the most important questions for any scientific model is simple: does it match reality? In this case, a key question would be whether the study’s estimates correspond to what actually happened during past heatwaves. For example, did the researchers compare their district-level projections with real mortality data from previous heatwave events to see how accurate their model was? The paper does not provide such a nationwide validation exercise.
According to the authors, they estimate heatwave-related deaths across all districts by combining mortality data, climate classifications, and risk coefficients from 10 cities. However, the study provides no evidence that these district-level estimates were tested against actual district-level mortality records from past heatwaves. As a result, it is difficult to know how accurately the model reflects the real-world conditions. For instance, the model could be overestimating heat-related deaths by a significant margin. It could be an underestimation of the true impact of heatwaves. It could accurately estimate some regions while performing poorly in others.
Without comparing the model’s predictions to observed outcomes, there is no clear way to determine which of these possibilities is correct. A model can generate numbers that look precise, but unless those numbers are tested on real-world data, their accuracy remains unproven.
In the case of Uttar Pradesh’s estimate of 8,056 excess deaths, the study provides a projection, but it does not explain that similar projections have successfully matched actual mortality outcomes in the past. That missing validation is an important limitation when assessing how much confidence to place in the final numbers.
How a modelled estimate turned into a viral “death toll”
The controversy surrounding the study highlights how easily a modelled estimate can be transformed into a viral narrative. The debate began after media reports, including one by India Today, highlighted the study’s claim that Uttar Pradesh could account for approximately 8,056 excess deaths during a five-day heatwave. To an average reader, the headline gave the impression that thousands of people had actually died during a recent heatwave.
The report was soon picked up by Librandu Mohammad Zubair, who shared a post citing India Today, which pointed out that most districts in Uttar Pradesh had not recorded temperatures above 42°C in recent days and that only a handful of districts had crossed 45°C. The India Today report was subsequently deleted, with critics arguing that it presented a hypothetical estimate as an actual death toll.
However, the controversy also exposed a deeper problem. The study itself never claimed that 8,056 people had died during a recent heatwave in Uttar Pradesh. The figure was generated using a model based on a hypothetical five-day heatwave scenario in which temperatures exceed a district’s historical 97th percentile threshold. It was not calculated using actual temperatures recorded in Uttar Pradesh during the past few days, nor was it based on observed deaths.
This means that both the headline and much of the criticism were talking past the study. India Today’s presentation blurred the difference between an estimate and a real death toll, while the temperature-based rebuttal did not directly address the methodology that produced the estimate in the first place.
The real problem is how the false narrative spreads on social media. By quoting the wrong study and portraying it as the reality, to create panic among the citizens
By the time the number “8,056” reached the public, most of these caveats had disappeared. What began as a model-generated projection was interpreted as a documented death toll, while the subsequent debate focused on recent temperature readings rather than the study’s underlying assumptions. The episode serves as a reminder that scientific estimates, especially those built on extensive modelling, should not be confused with measured facts. These practices help the So-called activist to create the panic where they can show how it is an authoritarian government that is destroying everything, and people are dying from it.
Conclusion
Heatwaves are a serious public health challenge, and there is little doubt that extreme temperatures can contribute to excess mortality. There is also growing evidence that heat-related deaths are often underreported because many fatalities triggered by heat are ultimately recorded under other medical causes. However, acknowledging these realities does not mean that every estimate should be accepted without scrutiny. A close examination of the study reveals that its headline-grabbing figures, through which many media houses and So-called influencers used to create the panic.
This study is not based on observed deaths, district-level mortality records, or real-world heat wave outcomes. Instead, they are a generated chain of assumptions: extrapolating mortality patterns from just 10 cities to 765 districts, assigning districts based on climate similarity, applying urban risk estimates to rural populations, relying on COVID-era mortality data, and modelling hypothetical heatwave scenarios that differ from how most people understand or identify heatwaves.
The figure of 8,056 deaths in Uttar Pradesh, therefore, should not be mistaken for a documented death toll. It is a model-generated estimate whose accuracy depends entirely on the validity of the model’s assumptions. The episode highlights a broader problem in modern information ecosystems. Complex scientific models are often reduced to sensational figures, stripped of their limitations and presented as established facts. Such reporting does not improve public understanding; it creates confusion, fuels alarm and distorts the very science it claims to communicate.
Scientific estimates have their place in policy discussions, but they must be presented honestly and with full context. When projections are reported as facts and assumptions are treated as evidence, the result is not informed debate but misinformation. The real lesson from the controversy is not about heatwaves alone; it is about the responsibility of researchers, journalists, and activists alike to ensure that modelled estimates are not transformed into unquestioned truths.
For many years, OpIndia has been highlighting the fact that the so-called ‘free encyclopedia’, Wikipedia, is neither free nor fair in any respect. Wikipedia allows anti-India and anti-Hindu editors to use the platform for publishing biased and misleading information about individuals and entities. New research by the Neutral Point of View (NPOV) Media reveals how the anti-Hindu editors have peddled propaganda against the US-based Hindu American Foundation (HAF) on Wikipedia.
Certain Wikipedia editors have linked various activities of the Hindu American Foundation to Hindutva, in an attempt to push a narrative that HAF furthers a pro-Hindu political agenda.
According to the HAF’s Wikipedia page, the Hindu rights organisation is ‘rebranding’ Hindutva as “Hindu rights” by highlighting Hindu persecution in the US, opposing cultural appropriation of the Hindu practice of Yoga and opposing laws that weaponise imaginary caste discrimination to target Hindus.
“The organization alleges that its advocacy focuses on protecting rights of Hindus in the United States, drawing attention to Hindu persecution abroad, pushing back against the cultural appropriation of yoga, and opposition to laws prohibiting caste-based discrimination. However, these efforts largely function as an attempt to rebrand Hindutva as “Hindu rights” in order to better suit the mainstream politics of multiculturalism in the United States,” the Wikipedia page of the Hindu American Foundation reads.
In a report published on 3rd June, the Ashley Rindsberg-led NPOV Media highlighted how a small cluster of anonymous editors controlled more than 80% of the HAF’s Wikipedia page.
There are four editors, responsible for 80% of the biased information appearing on the HAF’s Wikipedia page. These editors are TrangaBellam, Kautilya3, Llightex, and Shahinshah121.
Vanamonde93, a notorious Hindu-hating editor, has also intervened to support the editors cluster involved in creating an interconnected ecosystem of pages surrounding HAF, its critics, and the organisations aligned against the Hindu rights group since 2021.
“The effort to reshape the narrative about HAF began in early 2021. It was then that a small cluster of highly active Wikipedia editors began constructing an interconnected ecosystem of pages surrounding HAF, its critics, and the organizations aligned against it. These users include TrangaBellam, Kautilya3, Llightex, and Shahinshah121. Another users, Vanamonde93, one of the most powerful administrators on the site, frequently intervened in ways that appear to support the core cluster,” the NPOV report titled Wikipedia’s India War reads.
It must be recalled that it was in 2021 that Audrey Truschke, a notorious anti-Hindu ‘historian’, launched a major online attack on the HAF, and accused the group of promoting ‘Hindu nationalism’ in the US. In May 2021, the HAF filed a lawsuit against the Mughal fangirl.
All this while, the Wikipedia page of the Hindu American Foundation was being besmirched by several anti-Hindu editors, and new material was being churned out in a coordinated attack on the Hindu rights advocacy group.
The NPOV Media research found that just two months before the HAF filed a lawsuit against Truschke, George Soros-funded Hindus for Human Rights and the Islamist group, Indian American Muslim Council, “TrangaBellam created the Wikipedia biography of Audrey Truschke, and on which is still by far the dominant user, with over 57% authorship (compared with under 5% for the third-ranked user on the page).”
On one hand, the HAF’s page was being edited for inserting biased information against the Hindu rights group, on the other, Audrey Truschke’s Wikipedia page was embellished with her own claims of victimhood. On X (formerly Twitter), in her articles and speeches, Truschke would claim that she was receiving threats from ‘Hindu nationalists’.
The interesting part? Wikipedia editors cited a Washington Post opinion piece co-authored by Audrey Truschke as their “source” for the claim that Truschke was being subjected to harassment by “people affiliated with Hindutva” The other source was the “Hindutva Harassment Field Manual” created by South Asia Scholar Activist Collective (SASAC). This group was co-founded by Audrey Truschke.
In a nutshell, Truschke claimed that she was being victimised by Hindu rights groups like the HAF, repeated the same lies in her articles, trashy ‘manuals’, etc, and Wikipedia editors just picked up whatever claims she made and inserted them in her Wikipedia page. TrangaBellam and other anti-Hindu editors basically wanted the page visitors to either ignore the source of the victimhood bogey or see it and believe that since ‘Audrey Truschke is saying that Hindus are harassing her, then it must be true.’
“Within weeks, her Wikipedia entry did not just carry this same messaging, but was structured around it, with the claim made in the very first sentences of the page. “Truschke has been a frequent target of harassment by supporters of Hindutva,” the lead section reads, “who accuse her of having prejudiced views on Hinduism, and making offensive statements; scholars reject the charges,” the NPOV report stated.
The Wikipedia entry that Truschke was being subjected to harassment by Hindu ‘extremists’ was made on 10th July 2021 by TrangaBellam. As per the NPOV report, it was on the same day the account added that Truschke had formed a “collective to combat increasing harassment of South Asian scholars.”
“This addition took place just nine days after the domain for the group was registered, according to WHOIS records—and only four days after the first recorded snapshot of the site being live on Archive.org. In this space of time, an editor presumably unrelated to the group had not only become aware of this nascent, highly obscure organization and its brand-new website, but had also found time to write it into the factual record on Wikipedia—a remarkable coincidence,” the NPOV report reads.
It further highlights how just days later, TrangaBellam made its first and most important edit to the Hindu American Foundation’s page. TrangaBellam floated the claim that the HAF’s lawsuit represented an unprecedented attack on academic freedom. The biased editor inserted various false claims against the HAF on HAF’s Wikipedia page and, in clear violation of the platform’s rules, cited the website of Hindus for Human Rights—a litigant in the suit filed by the HAF.
In addition to TrangaBellam, one Shahinshah121 added various links from Truschke’s days-old SASAC website, began editing the HAF page, inserting claims of anti-Muslim sentiment among some of the group’s members.
Before this, on 8th July 2021, Shahinshah121 attempted to create a Wikipedia page for Truschke’s SASAC. This attempt was made just two days after SASAC registered its domain. Shahinshah121 made three more such unsuccessful attempts.
Shahinshah121 24 edits to the HAF page, six edits to its second most edited page, Hindutva. This editor’s half of the lifetime edits were to the HAF’s page, second-most to the Hindutva page, while on the rest of the work, Shahishah121 made only single edits. Shahinshah121 essentially indulged in behaviour of what Wikipedia calls a “Single Purpose Account”.
The NPOV analysis deduced that the edits by TrangaBellam, Shahinshah121 and others from the cluster, established a narrative that the Hindu American Foundation is an RSS-linked and pro-BJP Hindutva extremist group masquerading as a mere Hindu rights advocacy group.
The report further cites a 2025 incident to demonstrate how the Wikipedia editors relied on vague letters and random news reports to peddle an insinuation that the HAF was somehow on the US Department of Justice’s radar.
“In 2025, the HAF was named in a complaint to the Department of Justice, alleging that the HAF operates as an unregistered foreign agent of India’s BJP…” the HAF’s Wikipedia page reads
The framing gives an impression to the readers that the Hindu American Foundation was investigated by the DoJ for being an “unregistered foreign agent”.
In reality, however, a pro-Khalistan Fremont Gurdwara Sahib had, through a law firm, written an unsolicited letter to the DoJ making the ‘foreign agent’ claims.
The incident was covered by a propaganda outlet, Mother Jones, Khalistani rag Baaz News, and the UK-based anti-India newspaper, The Guardian.
Shahinshah121 mentioned this episode on the HAF Wikipedia page; however, the editor deliberately withheld the key information that DOJ never announced any investigation against the HAF. There was no confirmation that the DOJ even read the letter sent by the Fremont Gurdwara Sahib.
Another major anti-Hindu editor who transformed the HAF Wikipedia page significantly to make the Hindu rights appear like a deceitful nationalist extremist outfit was Kautilya 3.
“The organisation has its roots in the Hindu nationalist organisation Vishwa Hindu Parishad America and its student wing Hindu Students Council. According to its critics, the HAF has repackaged the Hindu nationalist agenda in the language of “Hindu rights” in a way to suit mainstream American politics,” an edit by Kautilya3 to the HAF Wikipedia page reads.
In addition to contributing to the HAF page, Kautilya 3 also holds 25.3% authorship of the Wikipedia page for the Indian American Muslim Council.
Kautilya 3 also holds 41.4% authorship of the Wikipedia page on caste discrimination in the US. In January 2026, Uday Reddy aka Kautilya 3, edited out the critical remarks by the Indian Americans against the SB 403 and Equality Labs survey.
Notably, the SB403 was a so-called anti-caste discrimination legislation that is making its way through the Californian state legislature. California Senator Aisha Wahab tabled the bill. The dubious organisation Equality Labs is one of the bill’s biggest supporters. The bill was completely based on the Cisco caste case. While the bill passed through the state legislature in September 2023, Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed in October 2023.
Notably, Kautilya 3 is a UK-based Wikipedia editor, Uday Reddy, who was booked by Manipur police in 2024 for promoting enmity between communities in Manipur and propagating anti-Meitei hatred. He received criticism from some Wikipedia editors for attempting to label the blockbuster Dhurandhar films as a piece of pro-Modi and anti-Pakistan ‘propaganda’.
Back in 2024, OpIndia published a dossier detailing how Wikipedia is not a free, editorial-intervention-free encyclopaedia which relies on the voluntary work of thousands of unpaid, passionate volunteers across the globe, as claimed by the Wikimedia Foundation.
OpIndia concluded that Wikipedia’s “NPOV” (Neutral Point of View) guidelines do not mean that the entire spectrum of views would find equal representation in the article.
Kautilya 3 has consistently been pushing the Islamo-leftist agenda on Wikipedia. Earlier, a section on the 2020 anti-Hindu Delhi Riots was added to the Hindu terror Wikipedia article. In this section, Kautilya 3 added that a police investigation into the incident had revealed that the perpetrator belonged to AAP and therefore, it was a ‘conspiracy’ to create strife. Basically, the Wikipedia editor stated that the Delhi Police investigation should be removed since the Delhi police specifically is not a reliable source of information, while the left-leaning media is.
Reddy was booked by the Manipur Police over accusations of publishing inflammatory posts and statements on social media platforms. His X handle was withheld in India.
The complaint against him alleged that Reddy may have links with Khalistanis elements in Canada. The complaint stated that Uday Reddy has been working online to create tensions between Meitei and Kuki communities on religious grounds in Manipur. The FIR has been registered with a police station in Imphal East district under Sections 117 (abetment), 295-A (insulting religious sentiments), 153-A (promoting enmity between communities) and other relevant provisions of law.
Manipur Police had issued a statement wherein it said that Uday Reddy used to host spaces on social media platforms and allegedly directs people in Manipur on how to create unrest and trouble against law enforcement personnel.
Previously, Reddy was criticised for spreading propaganda about the Meitei community, particularly in the context of the Manipur crisis.
In April 2022, he accused Hindus of “weaponising” Ram Navami against Muslims. In a post on X, he wrote, “Hindutva nationalist organisations, spearheaded by RSS and BJP, have weaponised the festival to create Hindu-Muslim frictions, causing riots and deaths, in which the Muslims have been the major sufferers.”
Contrary to Reddy’s claims, it was Muslims who attacked Hindus across India on Hindu festivals like Ram Navami and Hanuman Jayanti. In fact, processions related to festivals of Saraswati Puja and Ganesh Chaturthi too have been attacked, which are benign festivals related to the celebration of wisdom and knowledge.
The anti-Hindu bias of Wikipedia editors is also evident from its page about the 2002 Godhra carnage, in which 59 Hindus were burnt alive in a bogey of the Sabarmati Express while returning from Ayodhya. The train bogey was set ablaze by a Muslim mob. However, if one searches for it, a Wikipedia page titled “Godhra Train Burning” shows up. Wikipedia calls it ‘train burning’ since they do not believe that the fire was indeed set by a Muslim mob, essentially to burn Hindus alive.
In addition to TrangaBellam, Shahinshah121, and Kautilya 3, the anti-Hindu cluster of Wikipedia editors includes one Vanamonde93, who, besides other anti-Hindu Wikipedia edits, made significant interventions on the HAF page as well. It is notable that Vanamonde93 is among the only 32 admins on Wikipedia who are both checkusers and oversighters.
“On September 16, Vanamonde93 stepped in to make yet another seemingly minor change that would, in practice, have lasting impact. They did so by renaming a section heading from “Alleged Hindu Nationalist Ties” to simply “Hindu nationalist ties.” In a single minute, the claim went from an allegation to an accepted fact,” the NPOV report reads.
Back in 2018, Audrey Truschke had published a Tweet calling Lord Ram a ‘misogynist pig’. She ‘roughly translated’ a version of the Valmiki Ramayan to claim that Goddess Sita called her husband Lord Ram a ‘misogynist pig’ during the Agnipariksha episode.
After backlash, Truschke claimed that she merely cited a translation of the text by Berkeley Sanskritist Robert Goldman. However, Goldman has issued a strong statement rejecting Truschke’s blasphemous characterisation of Lord Ram and said, “Truschke was ‘in no way quoting our translation’, and that her language was ‘extremely inappropriate’.
Fast forward to September 2021, Vanamonde93 edited the portion on this controversy, “he stripped out the references to Goldman’s response—the “shocking and extremely inappropriate” language, and the surrounding context around the controversy. His edit summary asked: “how is this remotely an acceptable source for unattributed controversial assertions in a BLP?” the NPOV reported.
The analysis pointed out that material criticising Truschke was subjected to intense scrutiny; however, content hostile to the HAF, including self-published activist material, like Truschke’s ‘Field Manual’, etc, was not.
More recently, Vanamonde93 made a series of edits to the HAF page on 23rd February 2026. Vanamonde93 removed a public statement from HAF’s executive director, Suhag Shukla, regarding the lawsuit against Truschke, H4HR, and IAMC. The Wikipedia editor cited the platform’s policy against primary sources for the changes made.
“Kautilya3 had used the same rule in January 2021 to strip out HAF’s self-defenses. HAF’s own statement about its own lawsuit was deemed off-limits. The activist sources and op-eds framing the lawsuit as an attack on academic freedom stayed,” the NPOV reported.
The NPOV Media report also highlighted shenanigans of another Wikipedia editor, Llightex. It was Llightex, who created the page of the Sunita Vishwanath-led anti-Hindu outfit, Hindus for Human Rights, had previously worked there. Llightex edited not only H4HR’s page but also that of IAMC’s page, created a separate Wikipedia page for Sunita Vishwanath, while the HAF lawsuit was ongoing. After the lawsuit was over, Llightlex made edits to the HAF’s page as well, further portraying the Hindu rights group in a bad light.
Executive Director of the Hindu Amercian Foundation calls the vandalisation of the HAF’s Wikipedia page an “insider job”
In reaction to the NPOV’s explosive exposé, the HAF Executive Director Suhag Shukla said that the defacement and vandalisation of the Foundation’s Wikipedia page was an insider job.
Taking to X, Shukla wrote, “It was an inside job! We’ve watched our @Wikipedia page completely defaced & vandalized for 5 years that rendered @HinduAmerican unrecognizable. This investigation by @AshleyRindsberg, @npovmedia blows the cover off of what appears to be a concerted attack on HAF by a cabal of 4 editors—two of whom are apparently tied to Audrey Truschke & the fringe group, Hindus for Human Rights.”
Highlighting the role of the four Wikipedia editors in vandalising the HAF Wikipedia page, Shukla wrote, “Trangabellam, Kautilya3, Lightex and Shainshah121 are responsible for 80% of the entire content of the HAF wiki page. Who are they? Trangabellam created, protected & shaped Audrey Truschke’s Wikipedia page while they defaced HAF’s with unsubstantiated slurs. Lightex actually disclosed “past work with “Hindus for Human Rights,” created that group’s wiki page (against wiki’s own rules) & then attacked HAF’s wiki page changing the lead to cast HAF as a “far-right nationalist organization. Shahinshah121 added false allegations that HAF is “Hindutva” & “under investigation by the DOJ for acting as a foreign agent” while promoting Truschke’s “South Asian Scholars Collective” within hours of it being formed. Kautilya3, the 2nd most active editor of the HAF page, erased all information that provided an HAF perspective to allegations, including that “HAF has absolutely no links” to various foreign orgs. He then added the line that “HAF repackaged the Hindu nationalist agenda in the language of ‘Hindu rights’ to suit mainstream American politics.”
It was an inside job!
We’ve watched our @Wikipedia page completely defaced & vandalized for 5 years that rendered @HinduAmerican unrecognizable.
Answering an expected “Why are you crying about this on Twitter—do something about it”, reaction, Suhag Shukla said, “Well, read the full article and see how one of Wikipedia’s 32 most powerful editors, Vanamonde93, blocked attempts to balance the HAF Wiki page and actually defaced it further. question in advance.”
Wikipedia is not an unbiased intermediary but a biased publisher: What OpIndia research found
In 2024, OpIndia released an extensive dossier detailing how Wikipedia is not a free, editorial-intervention-free encyclopaedia which relies on the voluntary work of thousands of unpaid, passionate volunteers across the globe, as claimed by the Wikimedia Foundation.
OpIndia’s research paper revealed that the structure of Wikipedia itself gives unmitigated power to a handful of individuals who are called ‘administrators’. There are only 435 active administrators in the entire world who have the power to ban editors, blacklist sources, ban contributors and decide the edits that should be made or reverted on articles.
Soon after OpIndia released the dossier, Facebook, another Left-leaning platform that has been accused of election interference in the USA and many such instances of furthering the political interest of a certain ideology, banned the dossier to restrict its viewership.
Wikipedia claims to be an intermediary which depends on the wisdom of the crowd without content intervention and editorial line, based on ‘reliable sources’ and maintaining a neutral point of view. This, however, is far from the truth, as evidenced in OpIndia research. Wikipedia meets all the standards of publishers. They collate information on current events and historical events, they pay their editors and administrators, and they are easily accessible by the people at large on the internet.
Given that Wikipedia has an editorial stand based on the personal opinions and biases of its editors and administrators, the evidence cited in the OpIndia dossier suggests that they are no longer eligible to be considered an intermediary. OpIndia recommended that once declared a publisher, Wikimedia would have to have its offices in India, set up a grievance redressal system and submit to Indian laws about illegal content which undermines the sovereignty of India or creates disaffection.
The findings of the research paper prepared by OpIndia Editor-in-Chief Nupur J Sharma reveal that despite not having offices or presence in India, Wikipedia has been funding entities and individuals with anti-India ideology and even links to Islamists and Khalistanis, to further its own business and ideological interests in the country. Wikipedia not only collects funds from India in the form of donations but also spends millions of dollars in India and toes an absolutely biased and rigid editorial line, all while claiming to be an intermediary and not a publisher to escape any accountability before the Indian law.
Besides, declaring Wikipedia as a publisher, OpIndia also recommended that Wikipedia’s financial transactions be scrutinised. The OpIndia dossier titled Wikipedia’s War on India can be read here.
Wikipedia co-founder, Jimmy Wales, once said Wikipedia’s mission was to “make the sum of all human knowledge available to everyone.” Today, that mission appears conditional, as knowledge is welcome only if it conforms to one side of the political spectrum. The very guideline that demands “Neutral Point of View” has been hollowed out, because neutrality now depends entirely on which sources are allowed into the conversation.
As the OpIndia dossier concluded, “If the pool of reliable sources itself is tainted with ideological bias, the ‘Neutral Point of View’ merely remains a requirement where all versions of the Left are prominently added.”
In an interview published by Politics Home in October 2025, Wales unapologetically defended Wikipedia’s own internal censorship, that is, the blacklisting of sources he has personally deemed unreliable in the past. He insisted that “the idea that we should take sites that routinely publish crazy conspiracy theories and nonsense just doesn’t make any sense.”
Previously, Jimmy Wales himself admitted as well that he is the final arbitrator of content on Wikipedia. “Final policy decisions are up to me, as always,” he once said.
According to Wikipedia itself, “The contributors or editors of Wikipedia participate subject to many policies and guidelines governing behaviour and content. These rules are supervised by various authorities: Jimmy Wales, nominally in a position of ultimate authority, although he has deferred in most instances to the leadership of Wikipedia, the ~34 present Bureaucrats or Crats, the ~700 active Administrators or Admins, and another group called the Arbitration Committee or ArbCom with 15-18 members or Arbs, depending upon the rules adopted each year. In July 2012, there were 14 active arbitrators identified, all of whom were administrators, although this is not a set rule. The Wikimedia Foundation or its designated agents also have the authority to impose bans against IP addresses for pages, topics, or the entire site. The Arbitration Committee “has no jurisdiction over official actions of the Wikimedia Foundation or its staff”.
In fact, Larry Sanger, the co-founder of Wikipedia, has categorically stated as well that Wikipedia has a pronounced Left bias. In several interviews and talks, he has spoken extensively about how Wikipedia skews the scale of balance, leading to the information being an inaccurate representation of reality, ridden with Left bias.
Jimmy Wales created an Arbitration Committee, which is essentially Wikipedia’s Supreme Court. This Committee is an extension of the decision-making power he formerly held as CEO of Bomis Inc., to take over his role in resolving complex disputes between users. Bomis Inc was a for-profit private company which was co-founded in 1996 by Jimmy Wales for ventures like Nupedia and Wikipedia.
By 2007, the for-profit company was shut down, and all the Wikipedia-related sources were transferred to Wikimedia Foundation, a nonprofit charitable organisation, also founded by Jimmy Wales.
The content on Nupedia, the predecessor of Wikipedia, was less extensive in comparison to Wikipedia. For example, in its first year, Nupedia had only 21 articles while Wikipedia had 200. However, Larry Sanger has criticised how Jimmy Wales sacrificed authenticity for volume while shifting from Nupedia to Wikipedia. The Wikimedia Foundation was established in 2003, 2 years after Wikipedia was started by Jimmy Wales. OpIndia dossier highlighted the relationship between Google and Wikipedia, and how the former granted millions of dollars as ‘gifts’ to Wikipedia over the years through Tides Foundation.
Tides Foundation is notorious for funding several anti-Hindu, anti-India organisations and elements. The Foundation gave grants to Hindus for Human Rights (HfHR), which has links to Islamists and Khalistanis, and was formed in 2019 by two Islamist advocacy groups, the Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC) and Organisation for Minorities of India (OFMI). Tides also funded AMAN Public Charitable Trust (AMAN). This trust is connected to the NewsClick-China funding scandal, where it is alleged that Chinese entities funded NewsClick, a Delhi-based pro-China propaganda outlet funded by CCP stooge Neville Roy Singham, to disrupt Indian sovereignty.
From the page of the Hindu American Foundation, Bengal Files, The Kashmir Files, The Kerala Story, Dhurandhar films, OpIndia, to the recent online gimmick Cockroach Janta Party, Wikipedia is platforming anti-India and anti-Hindu Islamo-leftists, who are creating, vandalising, or decorating pages of various individuals and entities based on their own ideological alignment, all while Wikipedia claims to be an editorial-intervention-free encyclopaedia.
