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A year when the country changed fundamentally, but not the media: Top 10 lies spread by the mainstream media in 2019

Editorial Desk
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A year when the country changed fundamentally, but not the media: Top 10 lies spread by the mainstream media in 2019

One of the most monumental years in the history of Independent India is drawing to a close. Although the country has changed fundamentally in many ways, one institution hasn’t changed all that much: The Fourth Pillar of our Democracy. Thus, as we are poised to enter a new year, it is a good time to revisit some of the worst lies the mainstream media spread over the last 12 months.

1. The Wire uses 2015 survey and laces it with lies to say mental health issues on the rise in Kashmir post abrogation of Article 370

The report resorts to a classic propaganda method. It tries to add useless information in order to obfuscate from what the headline claims, that is, mental health deteriorating after the abrogation of Article 370. While the article includes a host of useless information that has nothing to do with the subject, it then uses conjecture and speculation to tie it all together and somehow, assert that Kashmiris are facing mental health issues after the abrogation of Article 370.

The Wire headline clearly asserts that there is a mental healthcare crisis in the state owing to the decision of the central government, however, at the very outset of the article, The Wire simply admits that it is a mere prediction by doctors, who have not been named in the entire article. They then proceed to spin a yarn that would leave the readers dizzy. The Wire talks about a 2015 survey that they use as an indication of the mental health issues prevalent in Kashmir.

The Wire article uses the statement of an anon physician to make a conclusion that the data does not support. Firstly, The Wire article proclaims that the number of health issue cases have gone up since the abrogation of Article 370. Then, they quote a physician to say that the actual effect of the move on mental health will be visible only a few years from now. Then, they use the lie about Kashmiris having no access to healthcare to insinuate that while mental health issues have increased, the cases in August are low because of no access to healthcare, however, since the cases were even lower in May and the highest in June, the data is inconclusive.

2. Shekhar Gupta and The Print sell their soul, blame Yediyurappa for a Kumaraswamy era scandal that names Congress leaders

Most people had imagined that the Media industry had already fallen as far as they possibly could deep into the abyss of irresponsibility, paid news, propaganda and just blatant lies. However, Shekhar Gupta, the chief of Editors Guild and his ‘news’ portal The Print come as a stench of the rotting soul when they manage to stoop further at every given opportunity. Shekhar Gupta and The Print managed to blame the Yediyurappa government that was recently sworn in Karnataka for a scandal that had broken during the tenure of JDS’ Kumaraswamy and names Congress leaders like Ahmed Patel.

While Tweeting a line from the transcript that said ‘Ahmed Patel said I will make him commissioner, Revanna will support’, Shekhar Gupta, the head of The Print and chief of Editors Guild, went on to peddle lies and allege that this was the first scandal that had hit the newly sworn-in Yediyurappa government. The line tweeted by Shekhar Gupta himself mentions senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel who is close to Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi and Revanna, who is the brother of former Karnataka Chief Minister from JDS, HD Kumaraswamy. The Print story itself started off by spreading lies and telling its readers that this scandal has turned the heat up on the BJP government in Karnataka.

3. How media glossed over the fact that dancers were asked to strip at an Eid celebration and not just any ‘cultural event’

In a horrific incident, girls of the rainbow dance group were invited to perform for an event celebrating Eid and were then heckled by a mob and forced to strip naked and dance. One vehicle of the dance group was also attacked by axes and steel digger bars, causing substantial damage to the vehicle.

The Rainbow dance group’s director Arup D Rabha filed an FIR with Boko police station regarding the incident, where he has named Kuddus Ali, Sayed Khan, Atikul Islam, Samajuddin, Jeherul Islam and Abbas Ali, along with all the members of the organising committee of the event as the accused in the case. Shahrukh Khan and Subahan Khan were arrested as well.

The reportage surrounding this horrific incident was nothing short of shameful, to say the least. The Media has conveniently glossed over the fact that the horrific incident actually took place during an Eid celebration, staying true to their tradition of underreporting crimes related to the minority community.

4. ECI explains in detail why reported ‘mismatch’ of data and allegations of ‘ghost votes’ being polled is fake news

Website NewsClick.com had published a malicious report peddling the ‘EVM hacked’ theory. The report alleged that thousands of phantom votes are suspected in several Lok Sabha constituencies in Bihar, UP, Delhi and MP. The website, which is a promoter of dubious Hate Crime Watch in association with FactChecker.in, says they analysed eight constituencies, where they found that excess votes recorded in these seats are more than the winning margin. OpIndia had fact-checked the NewsClick report to show how these conclusions were drawn based on fake data using provisional data on the ECI website as the final voter turnout numbers. Later, the ECI issued a detailed clarification as well.

5. Times of India spreads fake news, says Meerut student Umam Khanam was “harassed” for “not wearing a BJP cap”

Times of India, one of the leading publications of the country, which often indulges in propagating fake news, was yet again caught peddling half-truths regarding the suspension of 22-year old Meerut Law Student.

In a report, Times of India journalist Piyush Rai resorted to false propaganda to target the BJP by reporting that the 22-year old Meerut Law College student was suspended after she refused to wear a BJP cap. He further claimed that the “inebriated” students who had allegedly molested Umam Khanam for ‘refusing to put on a BJP cap’ were also rusticated.

However, ground reports by Swati Goel Sharma of Swarajya and conversations OpIndia had with Khanam’s classmates proved conclusively that the entire thing was a giant hoax. In due course, the series of events as they panned out exposed the lies spread by TOI as well.

6. Winner of Nobel Prize in Economics rubbishes ThePrint report about him helping Rahul Gandhi on election promises

On 31st January, ThePrint ran a report by one D. K. Singh who claimed that Angus Deaton, a British economist who won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2015 along with French economist Thomas Piketty were advising the Congress on its minimum income guarantee program.

ThePrint states that according to party leaders, the party reached out to the two economists since Rahul Gandhi had “studied their work”. However, when OpIndia reached out to Deaton, he denied being associated with Congress or Rahul Gandhi. In a one-line email, Deaton said that he has had no contact with Congress on this or anything else.

The French economist Thomas Piketty, however, did confirm “exchanging with Congress about how much it would cost and how to implement this”. He added that “it is high time to move from the politics of caste conflict to the politics of income and wealth redistribution.” Thus, Shekhar Gupta’s ThePrint ran a story without confirming or verifying independently with the Nobel laureate and based it on what Congress leaders fed the journalist.

7. The Print indulges in scaremongering, spreads fake news about the shortage of polio vaccine in the country

On January 24, 2019, The Print published a rather alarming report saying that India doesn’t have polio vaccine for the next round of immunization. The report said that the country is facing acute shortage of polio vaccines, and due to that reason, the Modi government has indefinitely postponed the next polio immunization on February 3. According to The Print, there was a shortage of both types of vaccines, OPV and IPV (Oral Poliovirus Vaccine and Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine, which is given by injection).

The report published by The Print was fake, the government clarified that there was no shortage of polio vaccine in the country, and the immunisation programme had not been postponed indefinitely. They later updated their article with the clarification from the ministry, but the fake claims that they made in the report were still there.

8. ‘Journalist’ Abhisar Sharma spreads fake news by morphing images to target other journalist, deletes after getting caught

In his show on HW Network, a platform used by molestation accused Vinod Dua to propagate fake news as well, Abhisar Sharma edited images of the content of a show to target Aaj Tak journalist Chitra Tripathi. He posted a propaganda video to question the silence of some of the journalists after another controversial journalist and hero of Indian ‘liberal-secular’ media – Ravish Kumar won the Ramon Magsaysay award.

Questioning their integrity, Abhisar Sharma put out an image of a show hosted by Chitra Tripathi in which it can be seen that the title card of the show has been carefully edited out by Abhisar Sharma to convey that the anchor credited Prime Minister Modi for the success of Chandrayaan-2 mission. However, in reality, there was no reference to PM Modi in the show.

Chitra Tripathi’s show on Aaj Tak had a title “Ab Chaand Hamara Mutti Mein (Now, the moon is within our reach)”. But, Abhisar Sharma, who has an inherent hatred towards Prime Minister edited out the title part to “Ab Chaand Modi ki Mutti Mein (Now, the moon is within Modi’s reach) to target Chitra Tripathi.

9. Shivam Vij and The Print brazen out allegations of inventing quotes, Shekhar Gupta says ‘we need to own up to failures’

Well, Shekhar Gupta did not say ‘we need to own up to failures’. Certainly not in the context of Shivam Vij, contributing editor of Shekhar Gupta led The Print who concocted quotes and then brazened it out. Shekhar Gupta actually said this in 2007 when he was with the Indian Express. But since The Print believes in attributing decade-old quotes to current scenarios, we thought it would be a fun exercise to see how time changes context.

Shivam Vij, the contributing editor of The Print, has been accused of inventing a quote out of thin air for his report titled ‘Why Kashmiri Pandits may never return to the Valley’. Shivam Vij used a conversation he claims to have had with author Arvind Gigoo in order to peddle his agenda. The son of the Kashmiri Pandit “quoted”, Siddhartha Gigoo, came out on Twitter and accused Shivam Vij of lying, saying that his father never gave such a quote and has never spoken to The Print.

Shivam Vij claimed that the quote is accurate and was taken in 2010-2012. That is almost a decade ago when terrorism in Kashmir was at its peak. When Gigoo confronts Vij, shamelessly and brazenly, Vij asks Gigoo if ‘he has gone crazy’. The Print and Shivam Vij seem to be of the opinion that a decade-old opinion when the times and situations were different can simply be quoted out of context to suit their current propaganda. After this shameless display of arrogance by The Print and Shivam Vij, the publication led by Shekhar Gupta sneakily changed the paragraph where Arvind Gigoo was quoted.

10. Half a million or 1 million? While media peddles fantastical claims, here are the actual number of troops deployed in Jammu and Kashmir

One of the pet propaganda theory which emanated long back from Pakistan is that India has 700,000 troops deployed in Kashmir valley with the express purpose of holding down the people of Kashmir. As Ajai Shukla notes in a piece on this very subject: “Pakistani propaganda and Kashmiri human rights organisations, such as the influential J&K Coalition of Civil Society, repeatedly state that India controls Kashmir by deploying 700,000 security-men across the state. It is often alleged that half the Indian Army is based in J&K”.

However, the situation has now further evolved. The latest number of Indian security personnel in Jammu & Kashmir is 1 million! Yes, that’s 1,000,000 troops deployed in Jammu & Kashmir with the express purpose to hold the local population, according to media that doesn’t much care about facts. Some others have a more nuanced approach; they claim that 500,000 or half a million troops are deployed in Kashmir (as against Jammu & Kashmir) to hold the province and ‘subjugate’ the local population.

However, the actual numbers are very different. Read our story.

You can read all our fact-checks here. 

This is why the decade is ending in 2019, and not in 2020. Some Maths and lots of history

OpIndia Staff
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This is why the decade is ending in 2019, and not in 2020. Some Maths and lots of history

As the day comes to an end at midnight, the year 2019 will end, and the world will welcome the year 2020. But this time people are not just welcoming a new year, they are also welcoming a new decade. It is widely believed that the current decade began on 1st January of 2010, and will end on 31st December 2019. But although it is widely believed, not everyone accepts that, as many people say that there isa year left in the current decade, which will end on 31st December of 2020.

This is not the first time this debate is happening, this happens every time the last digit of the year changes from 9 to 0. But these debates became big after 1999-2000, as people could use chatrooms and social media on the internet, instead of just writing letters to editors. This time, digital media house Mashable has raised the bar of the debate by several notches, by declaring that if a person believes that the decade will on 31st December 2020, that person is an a$$hole.

So, when does the decade actually end? There is no definite answer to this. Whether you think it begins in 2020 or 2021 depends on what is more important for you, technically correct or convention. This fight between team zero and team one is actually a fight between mathematics and history.

If we go by the technically correct option, the decade will end after the end of the year 2020. Because, in the current Anno Domini system, there was no year 0. The current AD system was devised by a monk named Dionysius Exiguus. He had identified the birth year of Jesus Christ as 1, not 0. As a result, the calendar directly goes from 1 BC to 1 AD, there is no year zero in between.

Therefore, the first decade of the AD era should be year 1 to year 10, and the second decade began on year 11, and so on. If we believe that the current decade ends after 2019, then it means that the first decade had ended after the year 9. As that decade had started on year 1, remember there was no year 0, this means that the first decade had only 9 years, a huge mathematical anomaly. Moreover, people start learning counting numbers from 1 to 10, not 0 to 9. Therefore, it seems natural that the zero year should the last year of a decade, not first.

Read- From exposing Rahul Gandhi’s links to an arms dealer to Bofors and interview with Balochistan rebel: Here are 10 OpIndia Exclusives

Therefore, the team zero has solid technical point in their side, but it is the team one that always wins. Because technicalities are not always important in day to day life, what is important is the convention in this regard. As Mashable says, technically tomatoes are fruits, but we don’t go by that scientifically correct definition, and refer to lots of fruits as vegetables, refer to lots of berries and nuts as fruits, and so on.

Historically, a decade means the year 0 to 9, like 1950 to 1959, 1980 to 1989 etc. They are called the 50s decade, the 80s decade etc. The digit in the tens place of the year determines the decade, and when it changes, the decade changes. Therefore, the 2010-2019 is one decade, the 10s, and the next decade will be 2020-2021, the 20s. Now if we want to be technically correct, we will have to rewrite lots of history that took place in zero years, as for example if something happened in 1980, they will need to be moved from the 80s decade to the 70s decade. When someone is botn in 1990, we say she was born on the 90s, not 80s. Here, 1990 is the first decade of the 90s decade.

As the term decade is used to refer to a period of ten years, it becomes less confusing when the digit in the tens place is the same. And with that convention, 2019 marks the last year of the current decade.

In conclusion, technically the decade will after the year 2020, but as per convention and common use, the decade is ending tonight itself. Just like we don’t call brinjals and cucumbers fruits just because they are botanically fruits, people ignore the science of the decades and use what is commonly used system. Here the common use wins over science.

Muslim cleric threatens to block Kolkata airport if the Citizenship Amendment Act is not revoked in the state

OpIndia Staff
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Muslim cleric threatens to block Kolkata airport if the Citizenship Amendment Act is not revoked in the state

A Muslim cleric in West Bengal has threatened to block Kolkata airport if the Citizenship (Amendment) Act is not revoked. Claiming that the citizenship law is unfair to the Muslim population of the country, the cleric, Abbas Siddiqui from Furfura Sharif, in Jangipara, Hoogly, West Bengal, urged Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to either move Supreme Court challenging the contentious citizenship law or bring a resolution against the Act in state Assembly.

Speaking to Times Now the cleric said he has asked Mamata Banerjee to take immediate steps to stall the Act or else “she risks losing the support of Muslims in West Bengal.” He added that all the protests that the West Bengal CM is leading in the state might be satisfactory for other people, but they are not enough to satisfy the Muslim population.

On December 22, West Bengal minister and state president of Jamiat-Ulema-e-Hind Siddiqullah Chowdhury had also threatened to disallow Union Home Minister Amit Shah to step out of the airport whenever he visits the city if the Citizenship Amendment Act is not immediately withdrawn.

Read: West Bengal: Days after Mamata’s cabinet minister Siddiqullah threatened Amit Shah, Bangladesh Govt denies Mamata’s Minister Visa

“We may not allow him (Shah) to step out of the city airport if necessary. We may gather one lakh people there to stop him,” he said at a Jamiat-Ulema-e-Hind rally against the CAA.

The speakers at the rally also thanked Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for hitting the streets to register her protest against CAA and NRC.

Reacting to his remarks, BJP’s West Bengal unit chief Dilip Ghosh had told PTI that Chowdhury has made such “provocative comments” in the past, too, with the “tacit support of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.”

Inspired by the Chief Minister’s outcry against the central government’s decision to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act in the country, several Muslims in West Bengal have resorted to extreme violence, arson, stone-pelting in the pretext of protesting against the Citizenship Law.

Mamata Banerjee, probably scared of losing her vote bank, has been extremely critical about the recently legislated Citizenship Amendment Act, asserting that she would not allow CAA and NRC to be implemented in her state West Bengal. A concerted campaign was run by the Trinamool Congress party to slam the Citizenship Law that aims to grant citizenship to persecuted non-Muslims from three neighbouring Islamic countries – Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Posters were put up by TMC claiming that CAA and NRC will not be implemented in West Bengal. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has at least on four occasions hit the streets to register her protest against CAA and NRC.

From exposing Rahul Gandhi’s links to an arms dealer to Bofors and interview with Balochistan rebel: Here are 10 OpIndia Exclusives

Editorial Desk
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From exposing Rahul Gandhi’s links to an arms dealer to Bofors and interview with Balochistan rebel: Here are 10 OpIndia Exclusives

2019 has come and gone and the OpIndia team worked throughout the year to bring its readers stories that no mainstream media channel would report. With the increasing decay in the mainstream media, the questions that needed to be asked were not asked, the papers that were longing to be found were not found and the stories that were itching to be told were buried. OpIndia, this year, tried its best to ensure that the truth does not get lost in the cacophony.

Here are 10 Exclusives stories that OpIndia brought to its readers in 2019.

1. As Rahul Gandhi continues Rafale lies, his own link with an arms dealer could spoil his pitch

2019 saw the loudest cacophony by the opposition parties led by Rahul Gandhi on the Rafale deal. Congress led by Rahul Gandhi and aided by the media hurled umpteen baseless allegations against the Indian government alleging corruption in the purchase of Rafale jets. Rahul Gandhi even went on to allege that it was the Prime Minister who was directly involved in this fantasy corruption. Those allegations were summarily shattered by the Supreme Court no once but twice. The Rafale deal with completely exonerated by the Supreme Court and Congress ended up with muck on its face.

However, while the Rafale saga was on, OpIndia found papers that linked Rahul Gandhi with the notorious arms dealer Sanjay Bhandari, who is also a close aide of Rahul Gandhi’s brother-in-law, Robert Vadra.

Through a web of dubious land deals, OpIndia managed to connect Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra with one HL Pahwa who is in turn inextricably connected to the Arms Dealer. They are both close associates of Robert Vadra as well. This story by OpIndia created a storm with BJP picking up this story and doing a press conference on its basis. After the story was published, HL Pahwa was all set to be investigated by ED for the lands sold to Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Robert Vadra.

Read: As more property papers emerge linking Vadra-Gandhi family to HL Pahwa, here are questions Rahul Gandhi can’t escape

After the initial story, more papers were published by OpIndia linking Priyanka Gandhi Vadra to the same nexus. While the Congress admitted to the land deal, it is yet to answer questions that had arisen from these dubious transactions.

Read the full investion here. 

2. Christian Michel documents: Rafale delayed because of Eurofighter lobbying and Sweden’s Bofors ‘leverage’ over Gandhis?

In 2019, one just had to wonder if there some truth to the allegation that lobbying for the Eurofighter resulted in the delay of Rafale deal during the Congress regime and it is that lobbying because of which Rahul Gandhi is attacking the Rafale deal today.

Rumours had gained strength after an ABP journalist revealed that Rahul Gandhi had met Eurofighters representatives while he was in Germany. However, these were merely in the realm of speculation as no solid evidence had emerged to link Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and the lobbying for Eurofighter.

OpIndia accessed documents that established a direct link between lobbying for Eurofighter and Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi. The documents also establish that the Congress government may have delayed the Rafale deal because of Sweden’s ‘leverage’ over the Gandhis. These documents are secret notes faxed by Christian Michel to Guido Haschke. 

Read the detailed OpIndia investigation here. 

3. Papers long buried, questions that were never asked: Was Sonia Gandhi’s Italian family involved in the Bofors scam?

The Congress party has long held that the Bofors scam is a non-issue post the late 1980s when the story was first published. However, the skeletons have continued to tumble out, revealing a new layer to this multifaceted scam every time papers emerge. While so far, only Rajiv Gandhi has been in the eye of the storm and the only connection to Sonia Gandhi has been the fact that Quattrochi, the middleman in the scam was a close friend of Sonia, now, another layer has been revealed that ties Sonia Gandhi to the Bofors scam a little more closely.

OpIndia accessed evidence in 2019 to show that Sonia Gandhi’s Italian family could have been involved in the Bofors scandal, with their names carefully hidden from the public eye. The documentary evidence also points towards the fact that perhaps, the government of India (GOI) under Rajiv Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi himself had knowledge of the alleged involvement and actively tried to cover it up.

Read the full investigation here. 

4. Interview: Former RAW officer makes further shocking revelations about Hamid Ansari after alleging that he endangered lives of RAW officers in Iran

Former RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) officer had recently made explosive allegations. He had alleged that former Vice President Hamid Ansari who has served as Indian Ambassador to Iran between 1990-92, endangered the lives of RAW officers in Tehran and even ended up exposing the RAW set-up in Tehran. Journalist Chiranjeevi Bhat conducted an interview with Former RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) officer NK Sood who made further revelations about his time in Iran, Hamid Ansari and the vilified scientist Nambi Narayanan.

Read the full interview and the shocking revelations here. 

5. Ulrik McKnight, Gautam Makkar, Sonia Faleiro, Congress, a defence deal and how it all relates to Rahul Gandhi

When trying to find out details about Rahul Gandhi’s nationality, we stumbled upon a mysterious, elusive name, Ulrik McKnight. Since his name appeared in the document shared by Congress as ‘proof’ of Rahul Gandhi’s nationality, it is only imperative that we try to dig deeper. And deeper we did dig.

You can read our detailed investigation here. 

6. The Bofors scam angle to Rajiv Gandhi’s vacation on-board INS Viraat

When the conversation around INS Viraat and Rajiv Gandhi’s impropriety started, it was only about Rajiv Gandhi using Indian Naval assets for his personal use. However, as our investigation into the series of events revealed, with Walter Vinci and Arun Singh’s family vacationing with Rajiv Gandhi months after Walter Vinci and Val de Moro’s names came up in the Bofors scandal and were hidden from the JPC, several other more serious questions about not only impropriety but compromisation of national security and quid-pro-quo arise.

You can read our detailed investigation here. 

7. Dr Allah Nazar Baloch of BLF speaks exclusively to OpIndia

Allah Nazar Baloch was born on 2 October 1968 in Mashkai, Awaran District, Pakistan. He has a premedical degree and now heads BLF, which has been designated a terror organisation by Pakistan. Dr Allah Nazar Baloch is perhaps one of the most wanted men in Pakistan as he has been at the forefront of Balochistan’s struggle for independence. In July, he gave an exclusive interview to India where he spoke of the manner in which Pakistan was plundering Balochistan and appealed to Prime Minister Modi to support their freedom struggle.

You can read the complete interview here.

8. The Hauz Qazi Temple Desecration

On 30th June 2019, in the very heart of Delhi, the ugly truth of ‘Ganga Jamuna Tehzeeb’ was exposed. A strong Muslim mob proceeded to desecrate a temple in Hauz Qazi, break the idols, and allegedly, urinate in the temple. The fight apparently escalated from a fight over parking space. We published a ground report on the entire matter that documented the manner in which a communal mob rioted and desecrated the Temple and tale of a missing boy and the agony his parents were in. Fortunately, the boy returned afterwards.

You can read the detailed report here.

9.Rahul Gandhi’s lucrative and seemingly clandestine means of income and his links to scam accused FTIL, Unitech

Rahul Gandhi’s assets per his election affidavits went up from Rs 55,38,123 in 2004, to over Rs. 2 crores in 2009 and finally, over Rs 9 crores in 2014. It must also be remembered here that in 2011-12, there are allegations that Rahul Gandhi had escaped incomes of Rs. 155 crores through AJL for which, the IT department has slapped a Rs. 100 crores tax notice on Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi.

With such astronomical increase, one is bound to wonder what Rahul Gandhi source of income is, considering, the only legitimate income according to his public record is that of the salary drawn by him as Member of Parliament, and that interest he earns of his deposits.

While disclosing one’s source of income is not asked for in the affidavits, Rahul Gandhi was neither a professional before getting into politics nor has any declared interests in any legitimate business.

We tried to dig into and piece together what Rahul’s source of income might be and realised, that his source of income was tied to scam-tainted companies.

You can read the detailed OpIndia investigation here. 

On the basis of this story, then Finance Minister, Late Arun Jaitley conducted a press conference. The presser was blacked out by several channels including ABP News. In his interview to ABP News, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had mentioned the OpIndia story and questioned the media.

10. The BHU Saga

OpIndia was the first media outlet to come out in support of the students of SVDV, BHU who were protesting over the appointment of a Muslim in their department. The students wanted Hindu Dharma to be taught by someone who actually believed in Hindu Dharm. We published a comprehensive rebuttal to each and every claim that was made to portray the students as bigots. After our reporting, many people who had falsely believed the BHU students to be bigots had changed their opinion on the matter and came to the conclusion that theirs was a very fair demand.

We interviewed scholars and alumni of BHU who had come out in complete support of the protesting students and helped clear the air around the controversy. We published a series of reports from the ground and kept our readers updated on the entire saga. Eventually, the Muslim Professor was shifted to a different department within the BHU and that was the students demanded.

Our entire coverage of the matter can be read here.

100 obscure organisations unite under the banner ‘We The People of India’ to protest against NRC, NPR and CAA

OpIndia Staff
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100 obscure organisations unite under the banner ‘We The People of India’ to protest against NRC, NPR and CAA

At least 100 organisations, many of them obscure, will unite to protest against the National Population Register(NPR), National Register of Citizens(NRC) and the enactment of the Citizenship Amendment Act, said the Swaraj Abhiyan Party President Yogendra Yadav at a national coordination committee meeting held in TISS on Monday.

The discussion which was held to chart the future course of action regarding protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) was attended by Rashtriya Seva Dal President Ganesh Devi, student leader Kanhaiya Kumar, United Against Hate member Umar Khalid, Kavita Krishnan, Medha Patkar and the controversial activist Harsh Mander, known for constituting skewed hate-tracker.

According to Yadav, the meeting saw participation from about 100 organisations across the country during which a month-long campaign was planned to be held across the country, under the banner ‘We The People of India’. The organisers asked all the protestors to hold protests under the same banner-which is also the first four words of the Indian Constitution.

As of now, at least six national-level protests have been planned to happen in the month of January. The first protest is intended to happen on Savitribai Phule Divas, January 3, 2020. The next protest is a planned Bharat Bandh on January 8. The third protest is envisaged on the Youth Day (January 12) while the fourth one is planned on the death anniversary of Rohith Vemula/social justice day (January 17). Fifth and sixth protests will be held on January 26(Republic Day) and January 30(Mahatma Gandhi’s death anniversary).

Accusing the government of repressing the voice of the people in connection with the recent clampdown on the rioters by the police in different parts of the country, Yadav asserted that the protest will entail a call for a boycott of NRC, NPR and CAA by the participating organisations. He also added that a request will be made to the government to declare their intentions regarding the implementation of the NRC in a standard formalised manner.

Rajasthan: Eight refugees from Sindh in Pakistan who fled fearing religious persecution receive India citizenship

OpIndia Staff
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Rajasthan: Eight refugees from Sindh in Pakistan who fled fearing religious persecution receive India citizenship

Days after enactment of newly amended Citizenship Act, eight Pakistani refugees, who were living in Kota, Rajasthan since 2000, have been given Indian citizenship on December 30 (Monday). All refugees had come from Sindh in Pakistan fleeing religious persecution. They all received certificates from the district collector of Kota.

Though the Congress government led by CM Ashok Gehlot had refused to implement CAA and NRC in the state of Rajasthan it is being believed that since most of the Hindu migrants in Pakistan have connections in Rajasthan, there is immense pressure being put on the Chief Minister by the people waiting to get the Indian citizenship to consider the implementation of the Act in the state.

Though the local administration has called it a routine process of granting citizenship, this pressure from the Hindu migrants has probably compelled the Rajasthan government to recognise the newly introduced Act.

Read: Gujarat: Amidst CAA row, Haseena, a Muslim woman from Pakistan granted Indian citizenship

Expressing their happiness, the Hindu immigrants said that they’re very happy about it. “We came here because our families are already here. We are very thankful to India for giving us citizenship. I am so happy and I have no words to express it,” said one of them.

Another one said, “We have been living here since 20-25 years. We have never faced any problems here. And all the Sindhis living there want to come to India. We are very happy here. We have not faced any kind of problem here until now.” He further said that they were supported by everyone even before they became citizens of India.

They also said that Sindh is not a place where minorities can stay and that they had no other option to flee there and come to India. They expressed relief about the fact that now they can lead lives according to the Indian constitution as an Indian citizen.

The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill was passed by the Indian Parliament earlier this month and became an Act with Presidential assent on December 12.

The new Act seeks to grant Indian citizenship to non-Muslim refugees who came from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan on or before December 31, 2014. It applies to those who were forced to seek shelter in India due to persecution on the ground of religion. It aims to protect such people from proceedings of illegal migration. The cut-off date for citizenship is December 31, 2014, which means the applicant should have entered India on or before that date.

From fake ‘Jai Shri Ram’ hate crimes to CAA: Five big battle of narratives that the ‘Liberal Establishment’ lost in 2019

Editorial Desk
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From fake ‘Jai Shri Ram’ hate crimes to CAA: Five big battle of narratives that the ‘Liberal Establishment’ lost in 2019

The year 2019 witnessed a massive Battle of Narratives. It also witnessed the collaboration between the mainstream media and opposition parties to target the ruling dispensation without even bothering to hide their intentions. However, despite the continuous barrage of propaganda directed against the NDA government, the ruling dispensation still managed to come out on top every single time. In this article, we look at the 5 big Narrative battles of 2019 and the manner in which the propaganda was defeated.

1. The ‘Jai Shri Ram’ Fake Hate Crime Hysteria

In 2019, there was a spate of ‘hate crimes’ which gained great press coverage. However, despite the media hype, they turned out to be fake. In spite of that, such stories continued to fly thick and fast to build the narrative of ‘Dara Hua Musalman’. We documented a list of a dozen fake hate crimes, some of them with ‘Jai Shri Ram’ knitted into their story. In most of these cases, the crimes that were committed, if any, had nothing to do with the religion of the victims but they were deliberately distorted in order to turn them into communal crimes. The list of fake hate crimes can be read here.

In other news, IndiaSpend’s faulty FactChecker.in, which was infamous for having a track record of manipulating facts to suit their preconceived notions and agenda has finally decided to shut their propaganda shop ‘Hate Crime Watch’ after being exposed several times for Hinduphobia and bias. Faulty FactChecker.in announced that they are ‘moving’ their propaganda machinery ‘to a new home’ and effective and immediately ending their association with it. They claimed that they had identified a ‘gnawing gap in crime reporting’.

2. ‘Dara Hua Musalman’

A lot has been said over the narrative of ‘Dara Hua Musalman’. The secular camp has carefully constructed the narrative with its abundant resources, initiatives have been launched which maintain a dubious ‘hate tracker’ record to further the narrative.

We have often seen how crimes involving a Muslim and Hindu where Muslim is victim, at least as reported, take mammoth proportions as the ‘liberal’ coterie scream “Hindu extremism” at every given pretext. The attempt to create a narrative that India is a majoritarian state that heaps atrocities on its minorities, especially Muslims, is rampant.

The basic premise of the ‘dara hua Musalman’ narrative is that the individual Muslim is scared to profess his religion in Modi’s India and is under attack for no other reason but because they are Muslims. That the Muslim community is docile and powerless in front of the Majority Hindu population that has turned fascistic after the Prime Minister came to power.

To further this narrative, every crime by a Hindu, even ones not motivated by religious motivations are amplified and hate crimes committed by Muslims in the name of their religion are ignored. The “secular” narrative is hurt by the truth and thus, the truth is often hidden under the rug.

To bust this narrative, we documented 50 genuine hate crimes committed by Muslims against Hindus that bust the narrative of ‘Dara Hua Musalman’. There are several incidents that we may have missed in this list, nonetheless, this list accurately represents the larger picture of how crimes committed by Muslims often don’t feature in the outrage priority list of the “liberals”. The entire list can be read here.

3. Dalit-Muslim Unity

Politicians from the so-called secular establishment have been making a concerted attempt to create a ‘Dalit-Muslim unity’ narrative. The mainstream media, its propaganda wing, has been aiding their efforts by furthering a favourable narrative. However, as the results of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections have amply demonstrated, such efforts are destined to fail.

We documented the ‘community crimes‘ committed by Muslims against Dalits in recent years that make the much fantasized ‘Dalit-Muslim vote-bank’ nonviable. We documented 25 such hate crimes that can be read here.

Furthermore, only yesterday, Shehla Rashid demanded that Dalits sacrifice a portion of their reservations by accommodating ‘Dalit Muslims’, a category that does not exist in the real world.

4. The Fake Narratives over abrogation of Article 370

A host of fake news was peddled after the abrogation of Article 370 by the mainstream media. And regularly, their narrative was busted by the Indian Government and other media outlets. As early as merely three days after the abrogation of Article 370, the USA had to come out and deny a report published in The Print that claimed that the Indian government had briefed them about their decision to abrogate Article 370.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta cited an OpIndia report in the Supreme Court which debunked the lies being spread by IndiaSpend on the Kashmir issue. The OpIndia report that Solicitor General was referring to in the Supreme Court was an article that debunked the lies spread by IndiaSpend and The Wire after the abrogation of Article 370. In the article, IndiaSpend had twisted data and laced it with lies to claim that mental health issues were on the rise in Kashmir after the abrogation of Article 370. The OpIndia report can be read here.

The Liberal Establishment spread numerous lies regarding the abrogation of Article 370 that include the claim that the effective repeal of Articles 370 and 35A nullify the Instrument of Accession signed between JK Maharaja and India and Manmohan Singh’s blatant lie that the Congress voted in favour of the abrogation of Article 370. The J&K administration also rubbished an India Today report that claimed that SPOs in Kashmir may be involved with terrorists and their weapons had been seized.

5. The Anti-CAA Campaign

From the very beginning, it was obvious that the anti-CAA protests were driven primarily by Islamic Extremists and political parties and they were not ‘spontaneous’ as they were made out to be. However, the mainstream media continued to project the protests as ‘secular’ and ‘spontaneous’.

OpIndia exposed the manner in which the Congress party was instigating protests across Universities. We also exposed the unholy nexus between Islamic Fundamentalists, ‘Urban Naxals’ and foreign funded NGOs behind the anti-CAA campaign. The anti-Hindu and Islamic Extremist nature of the protests were exposed by the protesters themselves. We documented 9 such occasions when the protesters revealed the ugly hatred that is driving them. It was also revealed that the Jamia ‘Shero’ had given a call for Jihad before violence erupted across the national capital. We also documented why the Jamia Milia Islamia University could not be disassociated from the violence that erupted across Delhi and why the entire campaign was Khilafat 2.0.

The mainstream media narrative over the anti-CAA protests collapsed so spectacularly that the entire edifice of the Liberal Establishment is falling apart. The alliance between Islamic Extremists, Secular Political Parties, the Mainstream Media and the Leftist Intelligentsia is falling apart as has been demonstrated by Shashi Tharoor’s backtracking and Shehla Rashid’s Twitter meltdown.

Maharashtra: Uddhav Thackeray inducts a minister Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamana had accused of having close Dawood links

OpIndia Staff
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Maharashtra: Uddhav Thackeray inducts a minister Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamana had accused of having close Dawood links

The Uddhav Thackeray-led Maharashtra government expanded its cabinet yesterday, with the inclusion of 25 ministers and 10 Ministers of State(MoS). The expansion of the cabinet, almost a month after the government formation in the state due to disagreement between the alliance partners has drawn criticism from several quarters for the inclusion of contentious ministers.

One of the newly incorporated legislators in the extended cabinet is Abdul Sattar, who according to Shiv Sena’s mouthpiece, Saamana, had close ties with the gangster Dawood Ibrahim and his underlings. In a scathing article published in Saamana in 1994, it alleged that Sattar, who was then in Congress, was in thick with the Dawood Ibrahim gang, the conspirators of the Mumbai Bomb Blasts 1993.


However, despite the allegations published in its mouthpiece about 25 years back, Sena supremo Uddhav Thackeray not only offered membership of the party to Sattar but he also went ahead to anoint him as a Minister in the newly expanded Maharashtra cabinet.

Besides Sattar, the inclusion of Congress MLA Aslam Shaikh too attracted staunch criticism from the opposition parties as they alleged that Sheikh had been at the vanguard of the campaign demanding clemency for the terrorist Yakub Menon, one of the co-conspirators of the Mumbai Bomb Blasts 1993, and who was awarded death penalty by the highest court of the country.

Read: Maharashtra Cabinet expansion: Sanjay Raut upset over brother Sunil Raut’s exclusion from the cabinet

Shaikh, the Congress MLA from Malad West, had earlier written to the erstwhile President Pranab Mukherjee, seeking mercy for Menon in the serial bomb blast case. Shaikh, along with several current and former legislative office-bearers of the Congress such as Naseem Khan, Amin Patel, Shaikh Asif, Shaikh Rashid, Muzaffar Hussain, Husanabano Khalife, Yusuf Abrahani and Javed Juneja had made this demand to the President.

It is also noteworthy to mention that Shiv Sena party, which is currently in alliance with ideological rivals-NCP and Congress in Maharashtra had then welcomed the capital punishment against Menon.

Reddit user claims to have spent lakhs on hacking ‘BJP IT cell’ polls, many offer support

OpIndia Staff
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Reddit user claims to have spent lakhs on hacking ‘BJP IT cell’ polls, many offer support

As the debate over the CAA, NRC and NPR continue both on streets and on social media, it has emerged that huge amounts of money are being spent on rigging polls and public opinion against the initiatives of the government. A Reddit user, who goes by the username onosmosis, has claimed to have been running dozens of web servers on the Internet to run campaigns against the BJP government at the centre.

The Reddit user posted the following message on r/india subreddit, informing about his ‘project’:

For the last three months, I have been running more than 40 servers on AWS to analyse social media, particularly Tweets from 2 lac+ bot accounts and run a campaign against the IT Cell of the current regime. This has been a resource-intensive task, and as you can see in the screenshot attached, it has been expensive as well. But the report and results of the campaign are showing. It’s consistently defeating the rigged Twitter polls of the IT Cell and giving more energy/voice to the people protesting against this draconian law. I will publish this extensive report later tomorrow on my blog for you all to consume. What makes me happy is that government with so much power and money are not able to do a thing if men and women are willing to think. Let’s keep protesting. I am contributing with my technology skill till I can.

The user claims that by running as many as 40 servers on Amazon Web Services to campaign against the government, he is able to consistently defeat “rigged Twitter polls of the IT cell”. Which means the technological resources are being used to vote on polls to defeat the IT cell. The user claims to be running or manipulating more than 2 lakh bot accounts on Twitter, which if true, is more than enough to rig any Twitter poll.

In a follow-up post, the user says that as we are not living in an ideal scenario, he decided to monitor and manipulate Twitter accounts of bots run by the IT cell of BJP. He adds that it took a lot of money and energy, but it was worth it. He has promised to release the results of his manipulation soon on his blog.

Read- The Citizenship Amendment Act is constitutional: Here is how the anti-CAA propaganda has no legal basis

He also attached a copy of transactions with Amazon Web Services for the 40 servers he has rented. It shows that an amount of ₹2,00,361.42 was paid on 20th November, and another amount of ₹2,11,869.90 is due to be paid. This means more than Rs four lakhs have been spent in just two months to manipulate Twitter polls to show that people are not supporting CAA and NRC.

The posts received responses from numerous Reddit users offering their help in ‘defeating BJP IT cell’ by using technology. Many of them claim to be highly qualified in the fields of data science, programming, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, software development, and other areas of information technology, offering their help in collaborating in the ‘project’. Many of them also suggested moving the discussion to Slack or Telegram so that it can’t be seen by others. Some users also offered help in reducing the AWS bill, and many suggested running a fundraiser campaign to pay for the bills.

Going by the Reddit posts and the huge number of supportive comments they have received, it can be said that full fledge campaigns are being run to defeat BJP on the Internet. When some online poll shows people voting against CAA or NRC, it may because of more than 2 lakh hijacked bots voted against them, not real persons. And this is just one user, there may be many such online resources being dedicated behind the curtains.

Uttar Pradesh DGP seeks ban on radical Islamist outfit PFI for instigating anti-CAA riots, Deputy CM seconds proposal

OpIndia Staff
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Uttar Pradesh DGP seeks ban on radical Islamist outfit PFI for instigating anti-CAA riots, Deputy CM seconds proposal

After it has been established by the Uttar Pradesh Police that radical Islamist groups like Popular Front of India (PFI) and mainstream political parties conspired to perpetrate violence and unleash riots during the anti-CAA protests in various parts of the state on December 20, the Uttar Pradesh DGP, Om Prakash Singh, has written a letter to Home ministry, requesting to ban PFI in the state as soon as possible.

While the Home Ministry of Uttar Pradesh government will go through the recommendations to ban Islamist outfit PFI before sending the letter to the Centre, the deputy CM of Uttar Pradesh, Keshav Prasad Maurya has come out to second the proposal made by the Uttar Pradesh DGP Headquarter.

He clearly implied that since there is sufficient proof that PFI was behind the anti-CAA riots in the state, it leaves no doubt that the organization should be banned.


The request was made in the backdrop of a probe conducted by the Uttar Pradesh Police which found PFI’s involvement in the violent protests against Citizenship (Amendment) Act and National Register of Citizens (NRC) that took place on December 19. OP Singh said that objectionable material was found with people associated with PFI.

Read: Radical Islamic organisations PFI, SDPI along with Samajwadi Party workers instigated violence in the state: UP Police

In wake of violent protests in the state against the Citizenship Amendment Act, the Uttar Pradesh Police has said that it has devised a strategy to neutralise the Popular Front of India (PFI), seen as the inciter of most of the violence, and if all goes as per plan, the organisation will not be able to counter the action taken by them.

In a conversation with IANS over the phone on Monday, Om Prakash Singh had said: “We arrested as many as 23 PFI activists from various violence-hit areas and this makes clear who was the primary instigator. We have got significant information from the arrested PFI members but cannot disclose it at this point in time…..much of this information is shocking and destabilising. First of all, we need peace and amity. If peace is there, then only can there be law and order.”

Read: CAA exposes nexus between Congress and Islamists: Intelligence report says PFI, SIMI behind violent protests

The state police have obtained enough evidence and witnesses to build a tight case for banning the organisation,” furthered DGP OP Singh.

The UP Police had on December 26 asserted that members of radical Islamist organisations – Popular Front of India (PFI) and its political front, Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI), including political parties like Samajwadi Party were involved in instigating Muslim mobs to indulge in violence across the state during the anti-CAA protests.

Three people associated with the radical Islamic organisation PFI, including UP state head Waseem, had been arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police for orchestrating violence by spreading misinformation through social media platforms.

Read: Ramalingam murder case: NIA arrests Myden Ahmed Shali, head of the ‘Dawah’ team linked to PFI

The PFI is currently active in seven states of India. According to Uttar Pradesh police, PFI has been active in different parts of India since 2010 and the members of this group have been involved in disrupting the peace and harmony in the country.

According to Singh, rioters have damaged public property worth around Rs 100 crore in seven districts during the protests. Singh said the UP police have arrested 865 people and filed 135 cases in connection with the protests.

Following the violence, the Uttar Pradesh government had taken strict actions against the culprits by attaching their properties for causing violence.

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