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Rajyavardhan Rathore write to Rajasthan CM, demands CBI probe into SHO Vishnoi’s suicide case

OpIndia Staff
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Rajyavardhan Rathore write to Rajasthan CM, demands CBI probe into SHO Vishnoi’s suicide case

The demand for a CBI probe into the suicide of Churu’s Rajgarh SHO Vishnudutt Vishnoi has gained political momentum. Former Union minister Col Rajyavardhan Rathore has written a to Rajashthan CM Ashok Gehlot demanding a CBI probe into the suicide case.

He said that the death of an honest, fearless and dedicated officer has raised questions on the state government’s administrative laws. Rathore said that a fair and prompt CBI inquiry into the case would serve as an assurance to the rest of the dedicated and honest police officers in the state and reinstate trust in the state government.

He urged Gehlot to take up the matter seriously and order prompt CBI inquiry into the case.

Rashtriya Loktantrik Party demands CBI probe in SHO suicide case

Prior to Col Rajyavardhan Rathore, Rashtriya Loktantrik Party Wednesday also demanded a CBI probe in the suicide case of a police inspector, and handed over representations, addressed to Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and administrative officials in all districts.

RLP convener and Nagaur MP Hanuman Beniwal said that the party workers handed over the representations in all the districts to press for the demand of a CBI inquiry. “The SHO was under political pressure and the state government should refer the case to CBI for investigation,” he said.

SHO suicide case: Political pressure alleged

Vishnudutt Vishnoi, who was posted as the SHO of Rajgarh police station in Churu, had committed suicide by hanging himself in his quarter on Saturday. As per reports, Vishnudutt Vishnoi was probing a murder case, for which he had to go to the police station at 3 AM in the night on Saturday. After that, he went to his quarter in the police station compound to sleep. But when he didn’t come out till 9 AM in the morning, people started doubting that something was wrong. His cook informed the police station about it. When police arrived at the quarter, they broke open the door and found Vishnoi hanging inside.

The SHO had written a suicide note addressed to the Churu SP in which he said that he was not being able to bear the pressure created around him.

Earlier Vishnoi had also sent messages to his lawyer friend Govardhan Singh on WhatsApp saying that he has been trapped in the whirlpool of dirty politics.

Now politics have heated up the issue, as it is alleged that a Congress leader is responsible for the pressure that the police officer was facing. It has been alleged that the SHO was under pressure from Congress MLA Krishna Poonia, which led to his suicide.

Cricket Australia releases dates for India’s tour of Australia in December-January

OpIndia Staff
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Cricket Australia releases dates for India’s tour of Australia in December-January

Amidst the pandemic of COVID-19, Cricket Australia has released the dates and venues for Australia-India Test series which will take place in December this year. The Indian team will play its first test at the Gabba, the traditional ground for a series starter in Australia. India is also scheduled to play its first day-night test in Australia.

Last time India played a Test match at Gabba was in 2003. In January this year, Indian captain had said he has no problem in playing anywhere.

“Whether it is the Gabba or Perth, it doesn’t matter to us,” Kohli said.

“We have the skillsets as a team to compete against anyone in the world anywhere, whether it is a white ball, pink ball or red ball. We are absolutely up for it.”

Australian team believes that they play to dominate the game at Gabba more than anywhere else. The Australian captain has already cleared his view on playing the first test of the summers at Gabba – “We can’t wait to come to the Gabba, knowing that Australian sides play well and win a lot of Test matches here. We have to be able to do it on any surface and any venue, and that’s something we are building towards. “It’s where we traditionally like to start so it feels like the Australian summer when you get together and get out on the Gabba. It’s a great place for us to play – the wicket suits Australian sides really well so to start here is fantastic and the boys are really looking forward to it.”

Australia is also set to play a one-off test against Afghanistan in November 2020. There is no decision that has been taken yet about postponing World T20 which is due to held in Australia in the month of October-November.

“Reports of a postponement of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2020 are inaccurate and planning for the event continues whilst a number of contingency plans are being explored in light of the rapidly changing public health situation caused by the COVID 19 virus,” the ICC statement read.

Men’s Test v Afghanistan

Only Test: November 21-25, Perth Stadium (day-night)

Men’s Test Series v India

First Test: December 3-7, Gabba

Second Test: December 11-15, Adelaide Oval (day-night)

Third Test: December 26-30, Melbourne Cricket Ground

Fourth Test: January 3-7, Sydney Cricket Ground

The Hindu’s ‘Readers Editor’ rebuffs a reader’s genuine concern because he interrupted the paper’s anti-India propaganda: Read how

S. Sudhir Kumar
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The Hindu’s ‘Readers Editor’ rebuffs a reader’s genuine concern because he interrupted the paper’s anti-India propaganda: Read how

The Hindu has an office of Readers Editor. To summarize their long list of “terms of reference”, this office is responsible for publishing relevant corrections and clarifications and the Readers Editor (RE) will write a regular column “addressing one or several aspects of readers’ concerns, suggestions, and complaints, the content to be determined independently…”

The current Readers Editor writes a weekly column that seldom addresses the concerns of the readers. His articles are a bore and have no relevance to the “terms of reference”. I don’t even have to dig into older articles about him because he begins his latest article mentioning the same – “Some readers ask how my columns about the larger information ecology and about social media are linked to the journalism of this newspaper.”

He gives some random explanation for this query and proceeds to cite two examples – “A few recent complaints regarding this newspaper’s reportage on renewed militancy in Kashmir and border skirmishes with China clearly fall into this category”.

What follows is pure poison. 

There was an “analysis” written by Ananth Krishnan in the newspaper on May 20, 2020. The Readers Editor informs us that those who read the article wrote back to him saying that since the erstwhile state of J&K has now been split into two union territories, the report should have mentioned Ladakh, especially given that the report was about “a changed dynamic along India-China border” and Ladakh infact borders China. 

The error seems inadvertent and the feedback seems very genuine right? Somehow this feedback riled up the Readers Editor. It riled him up so much inexplicably that he started an unbelievable rant questioning the very split of J&K. RE writes in response – “They (readers) failed to recognize that J&K includes not just Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh, but also a huge swathe of territory across the Line of Control.”

Really, “they failed to recognize” that J&K includes Ladakh? Where does this arrogance stem from? How does J&K include Ladakh now? The Parliament of India has decided that J&K and Ladakh will be two different UTs. The editor is free to propagate his lies and illusions on his own time without getting riled up at readers who took the pain the read the article and write back to him on an obvious glaring error. 

He also tells us that J&K includes “a huge swathe of territory across the Line of Control.”. We now come to his next shocking line – “The Indian state calls the region “Pakistan-occupied Kashmir”. Really? Here is the latest political map released by the government of India. Can the editor point out Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in this map? Can the editor point out which part of Jammu and Kashmir has borders with China? Can the editor point out how Ladakh is a part of J&K. The Indian state has often said that it doesn’t recognize PoK so where from does he get the gall to write a lie like this and blame the reader for being correct? It is still mind boggling how he thinks that Ladakh is still a part of J&K and the readers (who took the pain of reading) are wrong!

He doesn’t show any signs of ending – he drops his next bombshell. “A newspaper has to take a holistic view instead of shoehorning its analysis into the official narrative.” Holistic view? Official narrative? That J&K and Ladakh are two different entities now is an “official narrative”? Denying their existence in now called a “holistic view”? J&K has no border with China. That’s a plain simple fact. Insulting the people of Ladakh by claiming to take a “holistic view” is journalism? 

Instead of accepting an extremely well-meaning and legally correct clarification, the unwarranted rant by The Hindu’s Readers Editor is yet again exposes the poison that is groomed in the offices of The Hindu. Does he end there? No. He moves onto his next rant of not wanting to call soldiers killed in line of duty as “martyrs”. In May 2020, he quotes his own article on March 2019, in which he says “Ethical journalism will report the killing of a soldier as the killing of a soldier and refrain from using loaded propagandist words like martyr”.

This clear lack of respect for both the lives of the brave soldiers who made the supreme sacrifice and for simple acts that define our own country is really painful to read. By using heavy words in long sentences such as – “To be a megaphone for governmental propaganda and keeping people in the dark is the role of the fifth column.”–  these people may live under the illusion that they wrote something intelligent but simply fail to understand that these words merely expose their arrogance, ignorance and incompetence. 

Speaking of “propaganda”, The Readers Editor is supposed to be correcting the newspaper and taking the side of the readers. He is not supposed to be the propaganda mouthpiece of the newspaper. How he misses this irony while lecturing readers who are correct, is a big mystery! 

Google deletes nearly 7 million negative reviews from Play Store in a week to improve the rating of TikTok

OpIndia Staff
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Google deletes nearly 7 million negative reviews from Play Store in a week to improve the rating of TikTok

The tech-giant Google has come to the rescue of controversial Chinese social media platform TikTok by deleting millions of negative reviews from its Play Store, in an attempt to improve the rating of the application.

According to the reports, Google has removed nearly than 7 million negative reviews for TikTok which has ultimately improved its rating. Last week on May 20, the ratings of the controversial app had plunged to 1.3 starts after millions of social media users had massively downrated the Chinese app for enabling its users to promote and glorify various horrific crimes and anti-Hindu propaganda.

TikTok review on Google Play store on 20 May 2020

A screenshot of the TikTok app’s page on the Play Store included in an OpIndia story on 20 May show that the app had 27,606,482 reviews on that day. However, at the time of writing this story, the app has only 20,356,083 reviews on the Play Store, indicating that Google has removed close to 7 million negative reviews reported against the Chinese app. The ratings of the app have now been upgraded to 4.4 stars from 1.3 stars a week before.

tiktok google play store
TikTok review on Google Play store on 28 May 2020

The above two images clearly show that on 20 May, majority of reviews that the app got was 1 star, but now 5 star reviews are highest, while 1 star reviews get a distant second place.

Nobert Elekes, a verified Twitter user and a data analyst, had also made similar allegations against Google and also posted images of tech-giant deleting reviews against TikTok app. Taking to Twitter, he had said, “Apparently, Google deleted over a million TikTok reviews overnight, that’s why the rating increased from 1.2 to 1.6 stars.”

His tweet showed a screenshot in which Play Store showed 28 million reviews and the rating was 1.2 stars. In another screenshot, it can be seen that the reviews were a million less, however, the rating of the app had gone up to 1.6 stars.

Downgrading of Chinese app – TikTok

The downgrading of the Chinese app emerged after a war had broken out some days ago between the TikTok’s so-called social media ‘influencers’ and the Youtube content creators that led to a series of revelations about the way TikTok is being used to incite and glorify the worst crimes.

Following that, several social media users had reported how the Chinese app is propagating hate crimes by enabling ‘TikTok influencers’ to glorify hate crimes against Hindus. Ever since the coronavirus epidemic spread across the country, the Chinese video-sharing service gained prominence in India.

The Chinese app which was misused, on multiple occasions, by anti-social elements, put out video inciting crimes against women. Amidst the Coronavirus outbreak, several Muslim creators on TikTok were seen encouraging people to flout social distancing guidelines under the garb of Islamic preachings.

A social media user named Faizal Siddiqui had also shockingly recreated a disturbing scene of an acid attack, leaving social media users angry. A complaint was also registered against the ‘TikTok influencer’ for promoting acid attack as a means to avenge lost love by jilted lovers.

‘Tere baap ke baap ke baap ko bhi baat karni padegi’: SP MLA Abu Azmi humiliates senior lady police officer, demands her suspension

OpIndia Staff
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‘Tere baap ke baap ke baap ko bhi baat karni padegi’: SP MLA Abu Azmi humiliates senior lady police officer, demands her suspension

Abu Azmi, the president of the Maharashtra state branch of the Samajwadi Party has been sitting on dharna, shouting slogans outside Nagpada police station in Maharashtra, demanding the suspension of a senior lady police officer, Shalini Sharma.

In a video which has gone viral on social media, Abu Azmi is seen addressing a huge gathering outside the Nagpada police station. Flouting all social distancing norms, Azmi can be heard shouting slogans against the lady officer. Scores of people are seen sitting together in close proximity, while Azmi stands amidst them criticising the lady officer and demanding her suspension.

“Yeh aurat kehti hain aapne police par ilzaam lagaya hain mein aapse baat nahi karegi, uske baap ke baap ke baap ko bhi baat karni padegi”, roughly translated as (This woman is saying that we have accused the police so she will not talk to us, but her forefathers will also have to speak to us), shouts Azmi while demanding her suspension.

Samajwadi Party leader Abu Azmi has alleged that the officer insulted him when he questioned her about the police’s apathy towards migrant workers.

Abu Azmi gets into an argument with Nagpada police

In another video of the preceding incident, during an argument with the Nagpada police officer, Azm can be seen questing and castigating the lady officer in a harsh tone. While he speaks to her in an unpleasant tone, another person accompanying the MLA is also seen asking Shalini Sharma not to raise her finger at Azmi, “ungli neeche rakh kar baat kigiye, yeh hamare adhyaksh hain”. The lady officer appears to be composed while Azmi shouts on her.

Sharma is heard telling Azmi, “sir aapko itna gussa nahi hona khahiye” (sir, you should not get so angry). Azmi tells Sharma that he will approach the Home Minister. Azmi had blamed the police of mismanagement and misbehaviour with migrant labourers.

Miffed by the incident Abu Azmi sat on a dharna outside the Nagpada police station demanding the suspension of the lady officer Shalini Sharma.

Azmi’s allegations

Azmi has alleged that the senior woman officer had refused to listen to his complaint and asked him to leave. He stated, “”I am a public representative, I am not a common man. I have been elected by the people and we will raise their questions in front of the government. The whole world is criticising India for its handling of the migrant worker crisis.”

He alleged that no one has listened to his suggestions regarding the migrant worker crisis and migrant workers are not being treated well.

Madhya Pradesh: Rs 2,000 fine for first time home quarantine violators, repeat offenders to be put under institutional quarantine

OpIndia Staff
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Madhya Pradesh: Rs 2,000 fine for first time home quarantine violators, repeat offenders to be put under institutional quarantine

The health department of the Madhya Pradesh has decided to impose a penalty of rupees 2000 on the first time violators of the home quarantine.

A large number of migrant workers are returning home from other states are being put under quarantine. The majority of them are put under home quarantine who are often seen violating the quarantine norms. That has increased the risk of spreading if some of them are infected with the virus.

The state of Madhya Pradesh is already reporting a surge in the number of cases of coronavirus on a daily basis. Meanwhile, the return of migrants from the other states, some of them from red zones, has created a possible risk of the increasing number of cases in the state.

State health Commissioner Faiz Ahmad Kidwai ordered all the district magistrates to seek the consent of all those who are under home-quarantine. It is decided that those who will violate the home quarantine for the first time will be fined for 2000 rupees and if the same person is caught violating the quarantine protocol again, then he/she will be put under institutional quarantine.

Madhya Pradesh has reported 7261 cases of coronavirus till 28 May with a surge of 237 cases in the last 24 hours so far. 3927 persons have been recovered while 313 casualties have been reported due to Wuhan coronavirus disease.

Zaira Wasim, who had left acting for Islam, now quotes the Quran to insinuate that locust infestation in Rajasthan is ‘Allah’s wrath’

OpIndia Staff
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Zaira Wasim, who had left acting for Islam, now quotes the Quran to insinuate that locust infestation in Rajasthan is ‘Allah’s wrath’

Former Bollywood entertainer Zaira Wasim, who had quit ‘acting’ Islam has claimed that the locust attack across the country was ‘Allah’s wrath’ upon ‘arrogant people’.

On Wednesday, Wasim made a rare appearance on social media, to stoke yet another controversy in an attempt to gain some cheap publicity.

Quoting a verse from Quran the former actor claimed, “So We sent upon them the flood and locusts and lice and frogs and blood: Signs openly self explained: but they were steeped in arrogance- a people given to sin.”

The insensitive tweet made by the former Bollywood entertainer enraged the netizens as there have been dangerous locust attacks across the northern parts of the country since last week.

Netizens slammed Zaira Wasim for her bigotry and illogical claims at a time when lakhs of farmers are worried about the destruction of their crops and vegetations due to the locust attack. Social media users asked how could Zaira Wasim be such a religious bigot who is spreading hatred over a locust attack that is threatening poor farmers.

Social media users also mocked Zaira Wasim for unscientific tweets claiming locust attack was due to Allah.

Locust swarms in Pakistan since November

Several areas of Eastern Africa and Pakistan have been facing locust attacks for the last several months. Several areas of Sindh, including Karachi, have been facing attacks by massive swarms of locusts since November. These locust swarms had affected border areas in Gujarat in February too. Recently, such locust swarms have been seen in parts of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh too. However, it is not understood why the former actress is insinuating these locust attacks as some sort of Islamic curse upon a specific group of people whom she refers to as ‘arrogant’.

Zaira Wasim’s quest for publicity

The 19-year-old Srinagar-born former actor, perhaps, has been craving for media attention ever since she said goodbye to her ‘acting’ career that saw a total of 3 films. She had quit acting by claiming that it was taking her away from ‘Islam’.

Earlier too, in her quest to come into the limelight, the actor had attempted to mislead the public on the issue of the normalcy of Kashmir as she went on to make incorrect claims on the status of the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir in an Instagram post.

Recently, she had urged her social media fans to ‘stop praising’ her because the praise endangers her ‘Iman’.

Nehru was smitten with Jacqueline Kennedy, had her photograph on his bed stand: Watch what former CIA analyst had said

OpIndia Staff
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Nehru was smitten with Jacqueline Kennedy, had her photograph on his bed stand: Watch what former CIA analyst had said

A video of a public event featuring Bruce Riedel, author of ‘JFK’s Forgotten Crisis: Tibet, the CIA, and the Sino-Indian War’, has recently gone viral on social media where the CIA analyst can be seen discussing his book on former US President John F. Kennedy. In the context of the book, Riedel narrated an interesting incident that involved Jawaharlal Nehru and JFK’s wife, Jacqueline Kennedy. In the clip, Riedel says that the first Prime Minister of India was ‘smitten’ by the First Lady of the United States.

The video is from 2016 when Bruce Riedel, who has a thirty-year experience working for the CIA and was adviser to four US presidents on South Asia and the Middle East, was speaking of the contribution Jacqueline Kennedy made towards establishing cordial relationships with India and Pakistan for the USA at a public event. He said, “Nehru, I would say, was smitten by the first lady. For the rest of his life, he had a photograph of her on his bed-stand.”

Realising how inappropriate the gesture was, Bruce Riedel quickly added, “Now that’s, you know, a little unusual, I don’t wanna dwell on it too much but it’s another example of how the First Lady in this case played a role that I think is quite unusual in American diplomacy.” The audience broke out into peels of laughter when Riedel was speaking about Jawaharlal Nehru. The discussion took place at the International Spy Museum.

Jawaharlal Nehru has a reputation for being ‘smitten’ on several occasions. His alleged relationship with Edwina Mountbatten is a matter of much gossip and speculation. It is, however, to be remembered that Jacqueline Kennedy was forty years younger to Nehru. Bruce Riedel is a senior fellow at the Brookings Intelligence Project and was the director at the time when he revealed Nehru’s infatuation with Jacqueline Kennedy.

BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra hospitalised in Gurgaon after displaying Coronavirus like symptoms

OpIndia Staff
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BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra hospitalised in Gurgaon after displaying Coronavirus like symptoms

Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) National spokesperson Sambit Patra has been reportedly admitted to a Gurgaon hospital after displaying Coronavirus like symptoms.

Sources indicate that Sambit Patra has been admitted to the Medanta hospital in Gurgaon after displaying symptoms of Coronavirus.

Sambit Patra is a surgeon by profession and is the national spokesperson for BJP. He is frequent on several television debates where the vociferously defends BJP.

As soon as the news broke, several messages of well-wishes flooded social media.

Sambit Patra had tweeted birthday wishes to Suhel Seth only two hours before he was hospitalised with Covid-19 like symptoms.

Rana Ayyub shares Hindustan Times report to claim a child’s death in Bihar was due to ‘starvation’, gets fact-checked by Indian Railways

OpIndia Staff
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Rana Ayyub shares Hindustan Times report to claim a child’s death in Bihar was due to ‘starvation’, gets fact-checked by Indian Railways

Even after being called out repeatedly for spreading false news, some leftist media portals and journalists do not abstain from using an existing crisis for their political propaganda.

Hindustan Times had published an article dated May 27, 2020, titled: “Migrants’ kid dies as father hunts for milk at railway station”, claiming that a four-and-a-half-year-old son of migrants from Bihar based in Delhi died of hunger at the railway station on arrival by a ‘Shramik Special’ train.

Report by Hindustan Times

This report was shared by journalist Rana Ayyub. She immediately took to Twitter to further the lie by sharing the report captioning her Tweet: “The four-and-a-half-year-old son of migrants died at the railway station on arrival by a ‘Shramik Special’ train, while his father desperately hunted for some milk he believed will save his child”, insinuating that the lack of adequate arrangement of basic facilities like food and water on board and on platforms led to the death of the infant.

Rana Ayyub’s Tweet

As evident from Ayyub’s tweet and the report by HT, the incident of the child’s death was portrayed as one due to hunger. However, the Ministry of Railways took to Twitter to confirm that the child was previously suffering from an ailment and that he was travelling with his family from Delhi after getting treatment for the disease. It also added that the child passed away 5 hours after deboarding the train. It warned the journalist against sharing or posting unverified news.

Rana Ayyub: A repeat fake-news peddler

Yesterday, Rana Ayyub took to Instagram to hold the government in the dock for being accountable for the death of a woman, who she claims died because the government did not provide her with food and water on board and the interminable delays caused by the train.

Ayyub claimed that the woman “collapsed” on the Muzaffarpur railway station and died of starvation. However, the truth about the passing away of the concerned woman starkly contrasts with her figment of the imagination. According to Railways Ministry, the woman, who was travelling with her sister, husband and two children, was suffering from a prolonged illness and had died on the train during the journey.

Despite multiple clarifications, a certain section of the media is working overtime to prove that the government is negligent.

Railways calls out misleading reports that claim lack of food and water on Shramik Trains

Indian Railways has called out the misleading reports that are attributing deaths due to prior ailments to negligence by the railways. On Wednesday, May 27, 2020, Jagran published news claiming that four people died on Shramik Express due to negligence. The report states that the migrant workers onboard Shramik Express have been deprived of food and water and cast aspersions that some of the migrants who died on these trains died due to lack of food and water.

However, the Indian Railways took to Twitter to rubbish the misinformation being spread regards to deaths on-board. Indian Railways asserted that medical assistance is provided to every passenger in case of emergencies. Moreover, food and water are provided on the Shramik Express trains for all passengers.

On Tuesday, Indian Railways had rebutted a Dainik Bhaskar report which had claimed that lack of food and water on Shramik Express trains is leading to the death of migrant workers. In its report, Bhaskar chalks up deaths of passengers to negligence observed by the railways. However, the Indian Railways categorically rejected the assertions made in the Bhaskar report, claiming that the cause of death of others onboard cannot be ascertained till the postmortem reports are out. One of the dead, a 4-year-old Mohammad Irshad, had passed away while boarding the train from Muzaffarpur to Betiya. The Railways clarified that the child was ill and was returning from Delhi after treatment.

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