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Mass Promotions of students due to Coronavirus lockdown: How an ‘Easy way out’ can tun into a “Way out”

Eshaan Ganpule
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Mass Promotions of students due to Coronavirus lockdown: How an ‘Easy way out’ can tun into a “Way out”

After the University Grants Commission (UGC) announced its guidelines to conduct exams of the final year students, the debate surrounding exams took a turn for the worse. Calls for mass promotion intensified, digital smear campaigns, co-ordinated spamming exploded onto the Social Media sites and confusion became the new normal for the students.

Historically our nation has fought against many socio-political divides. Our fighting spirit comes from our legacy of struggle for Independence and social equality. But even after our glorious strides in the past seven decades, some bad elements trying to exploit our nation’s fault-lines do exist a plenty. And I believe creating a faultline between promotee and non-promotees will result in an unbridgeable class-divide. The consequences of which no entity can predict right now.

As the Coronavirus cases refuse to signal its retreat, many student outfits of some political parties are hellbent on receiving mass promotion for students. The student community is left helpless to the political wolves trying to capitalise on student’s peril. NSUI, a student body affiliated to Congress, has been shepherding the effort while student bodies of other political parties play second fiddle. The hysteria surrounding pandemic and with no normalcy in sight, students across India are stricken with fear. The abovementioned student bodies are trying to encash this fear to sub-serve their own political agenda. Mass Promotion aside, they have gone as absurd as demanding 10% bonus marks too. The people demanding Mass Promotion are either unable to comprehend the ripple effect of this or are purposefully sacrificing student’s future to gain political ground.

If we take a look back into the period of 1973-74, The ‘Navnirman Andolan’, a student-led agitation against corruption, was blooming in Gujrat. The exams of year 74 were made voluntary and Mass Promotion was in effect. Those who went in and gave exams received marks accordingly, those who didn’t were promoted. Story of two batchmates from L.E. College in Morvi, which was the epicentre of Navnirman Andolan, tells a telling tale. One whose father was a principal in another college, explained to him about perils of promotion and he gave exams, another didn’t and was promoted. After completing his education, the later applied for a job with Tata Motors in Pune. He was turned down explicitly because he was ‘Mass Promotee’. PSU’s denied Promotee scholars in favour of others and even though foreign education was not as prevalent as today, the aspirants suffered the same fate. In the end, those who took the easy way out literally chose the ‘Way Out’.

The carrot of promotion which is being dangled in front of students to gain political momentum effectively divides students into two classes. Branding one of them as rejects, freeloaders or worse. The realities of the job market are harsh as is, but the inherent disadvantage of walking into it as a promotee makes them even worst. As the example shows, for an employer you who accepted mass promotion cease to exist as a person. Your talents, aspirations, dreams and desires are no more, and you just become another brick in the wall of promotees. A wall on which others step on to climb high while you don’t. No human should go through this but those who are gambling for their own gains might commit large section of students to this future if they succeed in canceling all exams. ‘Promoted due to COVID-19 circumstances’ is already showing up on students marksheets, marking the beginning of a new class divide!

With justifiable fear for health controlling students, is it okay to give into their demand of Promotion? Is it necessary to create a generation of ‘Rejects’ to be passed on and ignored in favor of their contemporaries who by no fault of their own are being made to experience this trauma?

The overpoliticization of the issue also doses not help. The political leadership demanding mass promotion be it Congress-Left or the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra are fearful of being ousted, and instead are trying to court the public instead of leading them out of this crisis. Choosing what’s popular over what’s right seems to be their mantra in order to maintain their already shaky grip on the power. States who have already failed to contain the outbreak in the first place are now capitalizing on the fear and legitimate health concerns of the students. This is an elaborate scheme to sweep their failures under the rug. This deliberate attempt to sabotage education may seem like an easy solution right now, but this feels like a sinister ploy to engineer a new class divide which come election can be harvested as a vote bank. The political parties who have lost their significance post 2019 may see this as an opportunity to disenfranchise this class, create discontent and win next elections. And here we see, the Brits may have left India, but their tactic to divide and rule still prevails at the cost of student’s future.

When all apex bodies of various professions already rejecting mass promotion, the student is now confused, scared, angry and rightly so. But one thing they must remember, two years down the line it is they themselves who will have to fight the stigma of being a ‘Promotee’, It’s their degree which will have to face harsh scrutiny and fight the stigma attached to it, not some politician. And in the end their degree should reflect culmination of their hard work and not some stamp forced on them by petty politicians. It is in our hands to choose whether to be a victor or a victim.

So, with hoping for the better future I appeal to the student community, that we learn from the past, see through the smokescreen of Social Media outrage and make an informed choice. Choose courage over fear, patience over panic and evaluation over promotion.

Meet Radhika Vaz: The abusive feminist comedian who performed nude on the stage, hates Hindu festivals and wishes to don Hijab and Burqa

OpIndia Staff
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Meet Radhika Vaz: The abusive feminist comedian who performed nude on the stage, hates Hindu festivals and wishes to don Hijab and Burqa

The past few weeks haven’t been too good a time to be a stand-up comedian in India. It all started with the Agrima Joshua controversy but soon escalated into a free-for-all digital slam-dunks on comedians. Screenshots of tweets and clips of their performances went viral on social media, following which, quite a few of them deactivated their account on micro-blogging site Twitter.

The whole affair, which was a stellar advertisement for Prime Minister Modi’s Digital India campaign, came to an end with ‘edgy’ comedians, drunk on the intoxicating fervour of revolution, apologised profusely, not to the BJP who they accused of being fascist, but the Maha Vikas Aghadi alliance and the MNS.

One so-called comedian whose tweets and videos went viral on social media is Radhika Vaz, a generally obnoxious woman who disguises her lack of manners under the guise of humour. When her tweets started going viral on the platform, she defended herself saying that she had only ‘questioned’ man-made traditions and did not mock any religion. Needless to say, she was not very revolutionary when she started feeling the pressure.

Tweet by Radhika Vaz

There were times, however, when Radhika Vaz was feeling pretty revolutionary, enough to perform on stage without any shred of clothes on her body. In an act in 2015 that was titled ‘WHAT THE F**K SHOULD I WEAR?’, she demonstrated her ostensible confusion by not wearing anything at all on stage.

Unfortunately, however, the jokes were not up to the mark and her performance was not strong enough and therefore, one could not be sure whether the audience was laughing at her or her jokes. And largely, it came across as gross moral sermon rather than humour.

In another clip of hers that went viral, Radhika Vaz could be seen mocking the Hindu festival of Karwa Chauth in an extremely derogatory manner. She also referred to the Hindu women who observe the fast for the health of their husbands as ‘bi*ches’. Throughout the clip, which was about two minutes long, the ‘comedian’ could be seen speaking of the sacred festival in an extremely disgusting fashion.

Radhika Vaz also has an extremely unorthodox sense of humour, to put it mildly. For instance, she has proudly mentioned that she does not call her father ‘dad’ or anything of that sort. She calls him ‘motherf*cker’, she says.

Image Credit: Twitter

In her father’s day wish to her father, Radhika Vaz said that others could have the world’s greatest dad but she has the world’s coolest ‘motherf*cker’.

Image Credit: Twitter

Radhika Vaz also appears to harbour a rather unhealthy obsession with the female genitalia. She drags in the biological organ whenever she has to denigrate a Hindu festival.

Image Credit: Twitter

Radhika Vaz is also an extremely abusive woman and freely abuses anyone and everyone who replies to her tweets. She is as abusive as the abusive ‘trolls’ she claims to abuse, probably much worse.

Source: Twitter

While Radhika Vaz wastes no opportunity to insult Hindu traditions and festivals and hurt Hindu sentiments, she is quite appreciative of Islamic tools of oppression. In any case, for a ‘comedian’ who appears to enjoy public nudity and performed on stage wearing nothing, she also wants to try out Islamic garments such as the Burqa and the Hijab, widely seen by women across the world as a tool of oppression.

Radhika Vaz also appears to hate everything Hindu, so naturally she hates Hindu men as well. She claims that India is the 4th most dangerous country in the world for women and she blames Hindu men for it. However, it is not clear where she conjured those statistics from and how she reached the conclusion that Hindu men are responsible for it.

tweet by Radhika Vaz

Furthermore, her claim that she has never insulted Hindu religion is quite clearly wrong as she has made extremely derogatory tweets about Hindu Gods in the past. In one such tweet, Radhika Vaz said, “Goddess Laxmi was definitely in my building last. Just saw her do the walk of shame this morning.”

‘Walk of Shame’ is defined as “An instance of walking back home on the day after an unplanned casual sexual encounter, typically dressed in the same clothes as the previous evening.” It is an extremely derogatory manner to talk about Hindu Gods. Thus, her claim that she has never made fun of any religion is quite clearly a lie.

Tweet by Radhika Vaz

Given all of this, it is quite clear that Radhika Vaz is an abusive hypocrite who disguises her unpleasantness under the garb of humour. It is also clear that she targets one, and only one, religion over and over again while giving other religions a free pass. Furthermore, her ‘revolutionary’ zeal is quite hollow as she is only ever too willing to compromise with her supposed hallowed principles in order to escape legal consequences for her actions.

Video of a girl desperately seeking justice for her father’s murder in Madhya Pradesh goes viral on social media

OpIndia Staff
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Video of a girl desperately seeking justice for her father’s murder in Madhya Pradesh goes viral on social media

A distressing video of a girl desperately pleading for justice for her family and her slain father has gone viral on social media. In the video, the girl, identified as Kiran Rajput, is seen seeking justice for her father’s murder. She has alleged that the police officials of Govindpura area of Bhopal have colluded with the murderers in order to shield them.

“Is there anybody who can help us. We are very poor and a great deal of wrong is being committed against us. Even after my father’s murder, R N Chouhan of Govindpura police station has received bribery to distort the charge sheet filed in the case. In the charge sheet, I have received today, murderers’ relatives have been listed as witnesses and the depositions of the witnesses provided by us have been twisted and warped to absolve the miscreants of their crime,” the girl said in anguish.

Apparently, Kiran has been fighting for her father’s murder since mid-April but the heartrending video of her desperate appeal which was uploaded yesterday has caught the attention of social media and shook their conscience. A bevvy of netizens have expressed their support and solidarity with Kiran and have asked the Madhya Pradesh government to launch a probe into the explosive allegations levelled by Kiran. #JusticeForKiranRajput was trending on Twitter, with people extending their support to the victim who is seeking justice for her father’s murder.

Kiran’s father murdered by assailants

Kiran, who hails from Govindpura area of Bhopal, had posted a tweet regarding her father’s death on April 20. Sharing a picture of her father’s dead body, Kiran claimed that about 8 boys barged into her house and mortally injured her father, who died after being in an unconscious state for 3 days. She added that the police officials of the Govindpura police stations were on the payrolls of the miscreants who had thrashed her father, alleging that the law enforcement officials were in cahoots with the wrongdoers.

The entire sequence of the incident has been painstakingly chronicled in a blog post. Kiran says that on the afternoon of April 16, about 14 men came to her house. Out of 14, 6 of them broke into their house and dragged her father out of the house, on the platform situated outside, she alleged. According to her account, the men, identified as Deepak, Aman, Aakash, Bhura, Tomma and Raj, were the ones who barged into her house and hustled her father out. They were all armed with weapons such as batons, steel rods, hockey and baseball bats.

Her father was mercilessly thrashed by the truculent men. Even her family members, who tried to stop the attackers from beating their father, were not spared, the blog uploaded by Kiran claims. She has also added the photographs of the injury allegedly sustained while fending off the miscreants who had charged at her home and assaulted her father. After enduring the fatal injuries for about 3 days, her father breathed his last on April 18.

Kiran alleges Police of being in cahoots with the murderers

Kiran and her family members have approached the police station to bring to book the culprits who are responsible for the death of her father. However, she has levelled explosive allegations against the police, alleging them to be in cahoots with the murderers and claiming that they have all been bribed to assist and protect the criminals. Kiran has alleged that despite naming all the culprits in the FIR, the police refrained from mentioning the same in the FIR. She also added that even after giving detailed information about the weapons brought by them, they were conspicuously absent from the FIR.

“My father’s post mortem report says that his eye was smashed. His skull was seriously damaged and he had sustained severe injuries at 9 places in his body. Can this all be done without weapons?” said Kiran in the blog post.

Kiran has sought action against Special Inspector RN Chouhan of Govindpura police station, claiming that he has received bribe from the culprits in lieu of protecting them.

Sadhvi Pragya seeks details of the incident from Kiran

Taking cognisance of Kiran’s ordeal, Sadhvi Pragya, the Member of Parliament from Bhopal Constituency wrote to her, seeking details about the incident. She has provided a phone number and asked Kiran to contact her.

OpIndia has tried to contact the victim Kiran Rajput to understand the allegations levelled by her against the police but so far we have not got a response from her. We will update our story as soon as we establish contact with her.

Fire breaks out at 15th-century cathedral in France’s Nantes, grand organ destroyed, police suspect criminal act

OpIndia Staff
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Fire breaks out at 15th-century cathedral in France’s Nantes, grand organ destroyed, police suspect criminal act

A major fire broke out in the 15th-century cathedral in the western French city of Nantes on Saturday, destroying stained glass windows and the grand organ of the gothic church. According to the reports, three fires were started at the Nantes church and authorities will treat the incident as an arson. The platform of the church could collapse, the church authorities said.

As fire engulfed the ancient church, the firefighters brought the situation under control after several hours. In the viral visuals, it was seen that smoke was still coming out of the Nantes church after massive flames earlier engulfed the inside structure.

The fire broke out inside the cathedral behind the grand organ, which was completely destroyed, local fire chief Laurent Ferlay said. Stained glassed windows at the front of the cathedral were also blown out due to the impact of the fire. The incident is being treated as a criminal act, an officer present at the site said.

Local fire chief Laurent Ferlay said that 104 firemen were still at the site to ensure the fire was completely under control. “We are not in a Notre Dame de Paris scenario. The roof has not been touched,” Ferlay said. It was not the first time fire has damaged the cathedral.

Reportedly, the building had also suffered a fire incident back in 1972. The reconstruction of the roof took more than 13 years. The 15th-century church was partly destroyed during World War II in 1944 after Allied bombings.

The fire incident at Nantes church comes a year after a similar fire incident at the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris, which destroyed its roof and main spire.

‘Is gravel safe for baby penguins?’ Netizens call out BMC after it shares a picture of ‘defective’ road repair work, re-does it after being called out

OpIndia Staff
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‘Is gravel safe for baby penguins?’ Netizens call out BMC after it shares a picture of ‘defective’ road repair work, re-does it after being called out

A Mumbai resident named Naresh Ahuja took to Twitter on July 15 to share a picture of major potholes at the entrance of Ahimsa marg a Ramkrishna marg corner in Santacruz West, Mumbai, causing inconvenience to residents and commuters. Sharing the picture, Ahuja, tagged the official Twitter handle of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) in his tweet and urged them to immediately take the required action to repair the potholes, which otherwise would prove hazardous for commuters during the monsoon season.

BMC responded to Naresh Ahuja the next day. On July 16, the civic body shared a picture alluding that the civic officials had addressed the complaint within 24-hours and that the potholes at the entrance of Ahimsa marg a Ramkrishna marg were repaired.

BMC posts picture of half-finished work, invites a host of memes on Twitter

In the picture, it appeared as if the civic officials had just filled the potholes with gravel. This unproficient piece of work done by BMC officials, which appeared to be an abject failure, subjected the civic body to massive trolling on Twitter. Netizens had a field day breaking down BMC’s tweet into hilarious memes. Although many Twitter users claimed that BMC had just covered the pothole with gravel, it seemed to be gravel tar mixture. But as it was not properly compacted and levelled, it looked like loose gravel.

Although it was a gravel-tar mixture, without compacting and levelling, the gravel will come out easily, and the pothole will appear again. Therefore, it is a highly defective work which will not last much.

A Twitter user wonder if gravel is particularly safe for baby penguins!

For the uninitiated, the day before yesterday, hashtag BabyPenguin was trending on Twitter. Baby Penguin is the nickname given to Maharashtra’s Tourism and Environment Minister Aaditya Thackeray after his pet project to bring Penguins to Mumbai zoo. In 2016, Aditya Thackeray had spent around 2.5 crores on his pet project. However, Aditya Thackeray’s this ‘pet project’ bombed and since then, he is often mocked by being referred to as baby Penguin.

BMC, which claims of addressing to the issue of potholes in Mumbai within 48 hours after receiving the complaint, probably, in a haste, skipped the part of levelling the repaired portion of the road, and left the job half-done after pouring gravel-tar mixture in the pothole. This picture of half-done work shared by the civic body made it a subject to trolling on social media.

Following this, on July 17, BMC shared new pictures. This time it carefully shared pictures after the road was properly levelled and hence the pothole on the road filled completely. In the pictures, a road roller in seen standing near the repaired stretch of the road. While sharing the picture BMC said that it had removed the defective work and had re-done it.

Shiv Sena man gives Indian citizen Rs 1000 to pretend to be a Nepali, get his head tonsured and chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’

OpIndia Staff
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Shiv Sena man gives Indian citizen Rs 1000 to pretend to be a Nepali, get his head tonsured and chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’

The recent incident of a Nepali man being tonsured and forced to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’ had created quite a storm across the nation. After media outlets blamed ‘Hindu outfits’ for the incident, it came to light that the man responsible for performing the said act on the Nepali man was one Arun Pathak, who belonged to the Shiv Sena, currently a ‘secular’ party after its recent alliance with the Congress and the NCP.

Now, more details have emerged regarding the matter. Varanasi Police has now confirmed that the Nepali man in question is an Indian citizen. They also said in a statement on social media that six people have been arrested over the matter. The six arrested in the case are Santosh Pandey, Ashish Mishra, Raju Yadav, Amit Dubey, Rajesh Rajbhar and Jay Ganesh Sharma.

Furthermore, it has now been confirmed that the whole incident was a pre-planned act. As per reports, the so-called Nepali youth, identified as Dharmendra Singh, was contacted by Arun Pathak’s men 16th July and was told that his services are required for a couple of hours at Ganga Ghat. He was told that there is some event where he would have tonsure his head and chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’. For his services, he would be given Rs. 1000.

A statement issued by Varanasi police says that the person whose head was tonsured lives in a govt quarter of the Water Resource department in Bhelpur in Varanasi. Both his parents used to work in the department, and now his brother is an employee of the department. The police also state that his family and his forefathers had no connection with Nepal. Dharmendra Singh knows Arun Pathak, Rajseh Rajbhar and Jay Ganesh, says the police statement.

Amar Ujala’s report says that Dharmendra Singh has said that he was unemployed for the previous four months following the lockdown. Earlier, he used to work at a Saree Store. Thus, he thought that Rs. 1000 for two hours work was easy money and the hair would always grow back. The Police is still questioning him regarding the matter and the investigation will move forward based on his statement.

The whole incident, which is now reported to have been staged, gained widespread notoriety amidst tensions between India and Nepal. Nepal’s ambassador Nilamber Acharya even spoke to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and urged him to ensure the safety of Nepalese citizens. The incident came after Nepal Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli made the ridiculous claim that India had invented a ‘fake Ayodhya’ and the real Ayodhya was in Nepal. He had also claimed that Prabhu Shri Ram was a Nepali.

Under such circumstances, it cannot be ruled out that the paid stunt was orchestrated to embarrass the NDA Government at the Center and the Yogi Government in Uttar Pradesh. However, only further investigation will confirm whether it was the case.

‘If you don’t destroy it, your marriage will end’: Newly discovered ancient Buddha statue destroyed on Muslim cleric’s order in Pakistan

OpIndia Staff
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‘If you don’t destroy it, your marriage will end’: Newly discovered ancient Buddha statue destroyed on Muslim cleric’s order in Pakistan

In yet another shocking incident, a recently discovered Buddha statue was smashed into pieces by local construction workers and a Muslim cleric on Saturday in Pakistan. The relic was discovered while digging the foundation for a house in the Pashtun-dominated Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province’s Mardan district in Pakistan.

A video of the act, which has since gone viral on social media, showed the construction workers, along with a Muslim cleric, smashing the Buddha statue using a sledgehammer. They are seen walking over and destroying the life-sized Buddha status while expressing their acrimony against Buddhism, which they consider anti-Islam.

According to reports, the statue was destroyed on the order of a local Muslim cleric, who ruled that it is against Islam. ‘Your nikah would cease to exist and you will no more be a believer if the statue isn’t disposed of’, the cleric told the people at the site, who then followed his orders to destroy the priceless relic, which was accidentally discovered in a good condition.

Local media quoted Abdul Samad, director of the archaeology and museums, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, as saying that he authorities have located the area, where the incident occurred and those involved in vandalism would be held accountable. “We have located the area and we will have those involved arrested soon,” he said.

Four people have been arrested in connection with the case. Initially the police were slow to react to the incident. But when the video emerged on social media and a large number of people criticised the action, the police swung into action and made the arrests.

Takht Bhai was once the homeland for Buddhism

The area from where the relic was discovered is known as the Takht Bhai area, in Mardan district, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Takht Bhai is a part of the Gandhara civilisation, where Buddhism thrived until the 8th or 9th centuries when Islam first began to gain sway in the region. Since 1836, when it was first excavated, archaeologists have dug out hundreds of relics made of clay, stucco, and terracotta in the area. Due to its historical and religious significance, it is a popular destination for Buddhist tourists from Sri Lanka, Japan, Korea etc. The Buddhist monastery is included in the World Heritage List.

Similar incident in Pakistan

Last month, in a similar incident, the ancient Buddhist rock carvings in the Chilas area of Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK)’s Gilgit-Baltistan has been desecrated by Islamists, who painted Pakistani flag and slogans on the rock-cut art.

According to the reports, the incident came to light when the locals of Gilgit-Baltistan posted images on social media platforms. The Islamists had vandalised the rock carvings by writing Islamic slogans on the rock-art that belonged to 800 AD.

Convert to Islam or get ready to die and face Allah’s wrath: ISIS threatens nationalist Janam TV

OpIndia Staff
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Convert to Islam or get ready to die and face Allah’s wrath: ISIS threatens nationalist Janam TV

The Islamic State (ISIS) has reportedly threatened to deface the offices of a nationalist Kerala-based channel, Janam TV. Besides, it threatened to kill all employees working at the said channel. In light of the threats given by the terrorist outfit, State police chief Loknath Behra has ordered the police department to enhance the security at the offices of Janam TV.

ISIS sent threats to Janam TV over Instagram

The Kerala unit of Islamic State (ISIS) has reportedly sent threats to the channel over Instagram. The terror outfit intimidated the employees of the channel to convert to the religion of Islam or get exterminated. The message read, “Mujahideen’s Message to Janam TV! We invite you to convert to Islam or else get ready to say goodbye to the world and face Allah’s wrath and punishment.”

Threats to Janam TV by ISIS
Threats to Janam TV by ISIS

As per reports, Janam Tv has seen a drastic rise in TRP ratings and now features in top five Malayalam news channels in the State. The said channel provides a nationalist perspective in Kerala which id dominated by far-left media.

India-China Face-off in Ladakh and the nexus between CCP and Congress- Is China trying to bring about political upheaval in India?

Guest Author
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India-China Face-off in Ladakh and the nexus between CCP and Congress- Is China trying to bring about political upheaval in India?

India has learnt the hard way that there is much more to a war than a flare-up of hostilities and shootouts between two nations at the border. The face-off between India and China in Ladakh seemed to be only a diversionary tactic by the Chinese leadership to tighten its grip on the military-political structure of the state. However, from the developments that have recently unfolded, it is obvious that there has long been a deep-rooted evil design hatched to destabilise India, which was perceived as posing a serious challenge to China’s aspiration for regional superiority and global dominance.

Motivation – Trouble at Home

Despite the seemingly strong grip that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is having on the country, China is quite unstable. There is a growing sense of disaffection and disenchantment toward the establishment on the part of the civil society. The disastrous handling of the Covid-19 crisis by President Xi Jinping has weakened his position both among the people and the party. Voices of protest by doctors, scientists, scholars and students are increasingly heard. 

Western intelligence and media reports point to CCP being faction-ridden. Jiang Zemin of the Shanghai faction and Hu Jintao of the Beijing faction are at the vanguard of the dissenting factions, waiting to upstage Xi Jinping. There is a likelihood of secession, that too by seven provinces of the country, wanting to establish themselves as independent nations. Although all these look a long shot at present, snowballing momentum of political developments point towards cracks in the establishment and a stark possibility of a breakdown of the Middle Kingdom in the near future.

Low Hanging Fruit Option

One of the few options available to President Xi Jinping for tightening his hold on the power structure is to score political points by launching a few successful military campaigns. Being in command of the world’s biggest standing army throws open the opportunity to wage a war at will on beleaguered neighbouring countries that are preoccupied with tackling the challenge of the Covid-19 pandemic on top of a slowing-down economy. Although China has kept theatres of war open on many fronts, what better place to start with than India, which has been found on several occasions in the past a lame-duck military target? 

No More a Soft Target

India has, however, never been more prepared for a war than now. The Indian Army has never been more upbeat, what with the country having acquired in the recent past modern weaponry, equipment and the full backing and support of a stable and strong government. It has been long since the nation bade farewell to non-alignment and embarked on the path of pragmatism in pursuing reinvigorated foreign and defence policies not only in its self-interest but also in the interests of regional peace. The Narendra Modi-led NDA government has been vigorously pursuing the path of building up bridges of friendship with like-minded nations facing a common threat from China.

Resultantly, a closer understanding has been reached with countries like the US, Japan and Australia in giving shape to a Quadrilateral Defence Alliance for keeping an aggressive China at bay in the South China and East China Seas. Military pacts have been signed with Australia for the maintenance of peace in the Indo-Pacific Ocean region. India is no more a pushover that China was accustomed to bullying in the past. So, now China feels the need to subvert India’s stability by orchestrating a political upheaval.

Sinister Game Plan

Even as India-China face-off in Ladakh was staring our nation in the face, how the territorial integrity of India had been traded off in the past by some unscrupulous elements for pecuniary gains came to light. The Congress Party started criticizing the Modi government vehemently and accusing it of soft-pedalling the issue allegedly in connivance with the Chinese government to the detriment of our nation and its Army. Given the prompt action taken by the Union government in empowering and permitting the Army to thwart Chinese aggression effectively, the Congress Party’s flagrant and despicable anti-government stance was clearly incomprehensible.

Why such a vitriolic attack on the Central government when practically the whole nation was behind it? Why attribute motives and demoralise the Army? Was it merely a cheap political gimmick for the sake of opposing the ruling party? Or was it the tip of a more sinister gameplan to jeopardise India’s security and integrity? Fortunately, skeletons started tumbling fast out of the Congress closet. The nation woke up one fine morning to see the photograph of Rahul Gandhi signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Wang Jiarui, Minister of the International Department of Central Committee of the CCP in the presence of Sonia Gandhi and the then Vice President Xi Jinping in 2008.  

Conspicuous by his absence at the signing ceremony that took place in the Great People’s Hall in Beijing was then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Till the photograph was leaked by the BJP to the mainstream media, our nation had no information about this development. Nor are the details of the MoU known even now. The MoU was allegedly about exchanging information and promoting exchanges at every level. What does it all boil down to? Were India’s secrets shared with China? What was the extent of the damage caused to our nation?

It would be pertinent to recall that during the rule of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), all important government documents found their way to Sonia Gandhi, who was the de facto Prime Minister. How come the UPA rule provided level playing field to extrajudicial authorities, namely Sonia and Rahul Gandhi? On several more occasions, Gandhi family members were seen enjoying the hospitality of CCP – like during the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and their secret meetings at the Chinese Embassy in 2017 during the Doklam crisis.

Furthermore, when Rahul Gandhi visited Kailash Mansarovar in 2018, the Chinese Ambassador was present when Rahul departed from Delhi. To make matters more confounded, the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, in which Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi are members, received vast amounts of funds from the CCP through Chinese Embassy in Delhi as well as from Chinese companies in India. What were the services rendered? A probe by an inter-ministerial committee has been ordered by India government to investigate into the matter.

The Congress-CCP nexus and the proximity of the Congress first family to top Chinese leadership do not add up to any good for our country. Unfortunately for the CCP, the Congress Party is not in power currently. But the Congress Party is still striving to discredit Prime Minister Narendra Modi at any cost and sneak back, as power brokers, to the cosy comfort of CCP’s largesse. If the sacrifices by our soldiers and the territorial integrity of our nation were to be damned in the process, so be it. That seems to be the gameplan of the Congress Party. Meanwhile, the international community’s litany of charges against China now includes one more dark and grave exposé – infiltrating the government of a friendly country and plotting to subvert its stability by bribery and other unethical means.

Author- Dr Sunil Gupta

The author is a Chartered Accountant, author and blogger. He has served as an Independent Director on the Boards of India’s most influential public sector banks.

Pragya Debnath from Bengal who converted to Islam in 2009 under the influence of her ‘best friend’, arrested from Dhaka for terror links: Read details

OpIndia Staff
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Pragya Debnath from Bengal who converted to Islam in 2009 under the influence of her ‘best friend’, arrested from Dhaka for terror links: Read details

A 25-year-old terrorist named Ayesha Jannat Mohana was arrested on Friday in Dhaka by the Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) Unit for having links with the proscribed terror outfit Jamaat ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).

During the interrogation, the police found out that the woman, Ayesha Jannat Mohana, was originally a Hindu before being converted to Islam when she was in Class 9. Before conversion, Ayesha was known as Pragya Debnath and she hailed from Paschim Keshabpur village that comes under the jurisdiction of the Dhaniakhali police station of Hooghly district adjoining Kolkata. Under the influence of her best friend, who was a Muslim, Pragya had converted to Islam in her high school back in 2009.

Ayesha recruited and radicalised by Jamaat ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB)

Following her conversion to Islam, Pragya adopted the name of Ayesha Jannat Mohona and was indoctrinated by the Salafi clergymen in her hometown. A few years after her conversion, she came into contact with the JMB’s women cell and was enlisted in the organisation. According to the report, the cell’s chief, Asmani Khatoon alias ‘Bondi Jibon’ played an instrumental role in her recruitment.

After being recruited for the JMB, Ayesha was tasked with luring Hindu girls to convert to Islam and then acquainting them with radical Salafi clerics to complete their radicalisation and subsequent induction into the terror outfit.

Ayesha procured fake Bangladeshi birth certificate, Bangladeshi National Identity Card

Since 2016, Ayesha has been regularly visiting Bangladesh, a report published in The Daily Star quoted CTTC assistant commissioner Sk. Imran Hossain as saying. She had reportedly procured a counterfeit Bangladeshi birth certificate and through it, a Bangladeshi National Identity card. Along with these fake documents, an Indian passport was retrieved from her.

Primary responsibility of recruiting teenagers who could be radicalised to join the JMB

Ayesha was entrusted with the responsibility of securing funding for the terror outfit. She had recently married a Bangladeshi national Amir Hossain Saddam over the phone as he is currently staying in Oman. Heeding her husband’s advice, Ayesha started living in Bangladesh from August 10 last year. She took up residence in Dhaka and started preaching religious subjects in some madrassas in the city’s Keraniganj and Narayanganj neighbourhoods. However, her main job was to identify potential teenagers and young adults who could be radicalised and brainwashed to join the JMB.

Ayesha stopped teaching at the madrassas after her mentor Asmani Khatun was arrested by CTTC earlier this year. Instead of the religious seminaries, Ayesha started becoming more active on social media platforms to reach out to young and impressionable youth and entice them into joining the JMB.

According to the police, Ayesha had successfully recruited some girls into the JMB over the past few months. She is also accused of crossing the international border illegally many times. The report quoting the police officials who arrested Ayesha claimed that the girl was uncharacteristically calm and composed and showed no signs of anxiety or trepidation on being arrested. The police believe that the girl is highly radicalised and committed to the terror outfit.

Porous border between India and Bangladesh aides JMB’s rampant terror activities

The porous border between India and Bangladesh provides the terrorists associated with the JMB a reliable passage to recruit young and unwitting youth and continue their rampant terror activities. With the Hasina Sheikh government in Bangladesh coming down hard on the JMB, the very same passage has also provided a safe exit from Bangladesh to the terrorists. It is one of the reasons why so many JMB terrorists have been caught and terror modules busted on this side of the border.

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