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China’s industrial production growth at lowest in 17.5 years amidst trade war woes

In August, China’s Industrial Production growth has been at its weakest in a 17.5 years period, at 4.4%. As per a report in Reuters, China’s economic slowdown has deepened amidst a trade war with the USA and softening of domestic demand.

A recent report published by Reuters stated that China is set to reduce some key interest rates soon to prevent a sharper slump in activities. The interest cuts, if they happen, will be for the first time in over 3 years. As per data released on Monday, retail sales and investment market have been worsening too.

Beijing is believed to be preparing to release a stimulus package to boost the economy. Despite corrective measures being rolled out since last year, the Chinese economy is yet to stabilise, the report claims.

Industrial output in August has been 4.4% lower than the same period last year, and the lowest since February 2002. Due to the ongoing US-China trade war, the value of delivered industrial exports has fallen by 4.3% compared to last year.

Following US President’s Trump’s announcement of new tariffs on Chinese goods, the Yuan has fallen further. Analysts have stated that despite the two nations resuming face-to-face negotiations next month, any significant de-escalation is not to be expected anytime soon.

However, expectations of stimulus and ease of loan interest rates are not very high either because the People’s Bank Of China is known to be much more restrained than the US Federal Reserve or European Central Bank.

While retail sales have seen mixed results, auto sales have seen a sharp fall. While investment growth in the mining and the manufacturing sectors has been easing up, infrastructure investment has shown marginal improvements. But a fall in industrial investment growth has been dragging overall figures down.

Financial analysts have also been reportedly puzzled by slow construction growth earlier this year. Some are citing deteriorating finances at the local government level as the reason.

Earlier this month, the PBOC cut the amount of cash banks are required to hold in reserve for the seventh time since early last year in order to increase funds available for lending.

Zhou Hao, senior economist at Commerzbank, as per a report in the SCMP,  suggested that while Monday’s figures from the National Bureau of Statistics were even worse than expected, they may not come as a surprise to the policymakers in the nation because they have been expecting this. Hao added that “The economic figures would not be that good even without the Trade War, The slowdown was already projected.”

Researchers from Oxford have already cut China’s growth estimates for 2020 to 5.7%, down from the 6% growth estimate set by the Chinese government.

Bollywood singers Udit Narayan, Alka Yagnik, Kumar Sanu asked to cancel event organised by Pakistani national in the US

The Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) has written to singers Udit Narayan, Alka Yagnik and Kumar Sanu to delink themselves from participating in an event organised by a Pakistani national Moazzma Hunain in the US on November 17.


In a letter written to the artists, the FWICE said that owing to the tensions prevailing between India and Pakistan, more so after abrogation of Article 370, the FWICE has insisted that the members abstain from associating with Pakistani national on any platform of cultural or professional activities in Pakistan or any part of the world. “Dignity of our country is paramountly important,” the letter reads.

Earlier this month, the FWICE had asked singer-actor Diljit Dosanjh to not perform in a show promoted by a Pakistani national Rehan Siddiqui. Dosanjh posted a message on Twitter informing that he will postpone his US tour while denying any link between the show and any Pakistani national. He ended the message with “I love my country and will always stand for the greater interest of the nation”.

Earlier, singer Mika Singh was banned and boycotted by All India Cine Workers Association (AICWA) after facing severe backlash on Twitter for his performance at an event hosted by Pervez Musharraf’s kin in Pakistan. He has been banned to perform in India by FWICE as well. However, Congress leader and actress Shilpa Shinde had supported Mika Singh and also challenged the federation to stop her if they can from performing in Pakistan.

Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) is a film industry worker’s union based in Mumbai. It has over 5,00,000 members, and it is the mother body of over 20 organisations related to various crafts of TV and cinema.

After Congress steals all BSP MLAs in Rajasthan, Mayawati accuses Congress of strengthening ‘communal forces’

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Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati today took to Twitter to accuse Congress of encouraging ‘communal forces’ within the country by weakening the voices which are speaking out against the said ‘communal forces’.


“Because of duality of Congress, the ‘communal forces’ within the country are getting strengthened because instead of weakening these forces, Congress is weakening the voices which are speaking out against such forces. Public should beware,” she said.

It seems like the former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister is finding it tough to digest that all her six MLAs in Rajasthan have jumped BSP to join Congress again. They had done the same earlier in 2009 during Ashok Gehlot’s government as well. Yesterday also she went on a rant on Twitter accusing Congress of being anti-Dalit.

Mayawati, who after the 2018 assembly elections in Rajasthan, had declared that her party will stay out of government but will give outside support, has taken to Twitter to unleash her acrimony at the Congress party. Notably, BSP continues to support the Kamal Nath-led Congress Government in Madhya Pradesh with its two MLAs.

Amusingly, in recent past, the BSP supremo has been quite vocal about her repugnance towards the grand old party. She had recently slammed the Congress party and former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru blaming them to be the root cause of Jammu and Kashmir problems.

Earlier too, Mayawati had, slammed the Congress and opposition parties over their attempted visit to Kashmir. Criticising their intention behind the visit Mayawati stated that the opposition leaders should rather have waited and given the government some time to normalise the situation in Jammu and Kashmir.

Notably, during the Karnataka crisis, the BSP supremo had snubbed the Congress-JDS coalition and asked lone BSP MLA to abstain from the trust vote.

After London, pro-Khalistan outfits and Pakistanis plan to disrupt PM Modi mega event ‘Howdy Modi’ in Houston

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit Houston on September 22 for his much-waited ‘Howdy, Modi’ event. As thousands of Indian Americans gear up to greet PM Modi and US President Trump at the event, the terror state of Pakistan is trying hard to disrupt the event by staging pro-Khalistan protests near the venue by gathering Khalistani protestors and other anti-Indian elements.

The terrorist state of Pakistan has now stitched a coalition of Khalistani terror sympathisers and pro-Pakistani outfits to disrupt the ‘Howdy, Modi’ rally similar to the attacks it had unleashed in London last month following the historic abrogation of Article 370 that gave special status to Kashmir. 


On September 14, a truck-rally event was also organised as a ‘dress rehearsal’ by Khalistani groups in which pro-Pakistan sympathisers drove their tractors and trucks decorated with flags and protest signs from the Sikh National Center in northwestern Houston to the NRG Center, where the “Howdy, Modi” event is scheduled to be held in a week.

Khalistani supporters in the USA, joining hands with Pakistan’s ISI are now planning to ransack the event on September 22. Posters have been put across the city to peddle their false propaganda against the Indian government. The Pakistani-sponsored fake protests near the event venue could also pose a security threat to PM Modi.


Prime Minister Modi will be visiting Houston before travelling to New York to speak at the United Nations General Assembly. A mega event is planned in which PM Modi will address the Indian community in the USA. The United States President Donald Trump will also be joining Prime Minister Modi in Houston during the “Howdy, Modi! Shared Dreams, Bright Futures” mega-event.

The tickets for the much-awaited community event ‘Howdy, Modi’, to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Houston has been sold out with over 50,000 people registering for the programme, the organisers said.

The Howdy event will be the largest ever event addressed by an Indian Prime Minister in North America and also the largest for a foreign leader in the US other than Pope Francis. The Howdy event will be Prime Minister Modi’s third major address to the Indian-American community after he became PM in 2014 and the first after his re-election in May. The previous two were at the Madison Square Garden in New York in 2014 and the Silicon Valley in 2016. Both the events were attended by more than 20,000 people.

This is not the first time that globally isolated and humiliated Pakistan is resorting to thuggery and vandalism to seek its vengeance against India for exposing its state-sponsored terror policy.

Last month, Khalistani goons and Pakistani immigrants in London had attacked the Indian High Commission in London on the occasion of India’s Independence Day. The Pakistan sponsored goons had resorted to stone-pelting, a personal favourite method of the jihadis worldwide to mark their protest against abrogation of Article 370 in Kashmir.

This month, the Indian High Commission in London suffered another attack on September 3 after protests over the abrogation of Article 370. A 10,000 strong mob of British Pakistanis, Pakistan-sponsored Khalistanis and some hired goons marched in London in the so-called ‘Kashmir Freedom March’. The building suffered damages as several windows and window panes have been smashed by the violent attackers pretending to be worried about Kashmir.

Ram Mandir Case: Chief Justice Gogoi instructs petitioners to finish their argument by October 18, early decision expected

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In a huge order which has massive ramifications on Ram Mandir case, the Supreme Court of India on Wednesday ordered the completion of all arguments related to the case by October 18.

According to the reports, Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi imposed a deadline for the conclusions of discussion on Ram Mandir case. He has directed the petitioners to conclude their arguments by October 18. The Supreme Court bench said that if required, an hour-long additional hearing will be held every day and on every Saturday to hear the arguments of the petitioners.

“Let us make a joint effort to conclude the same by Oct 18”, CJI Ranjan Gogoi.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court also stated that mediation can continue simultaneously along with the apex court hearing. The parties are free to resort to mediation to settle the dispute, ordered the Supreme Court.

As CJI Gogoi has now ordered for the earliest completion of the arguments, an early Supreme Court decision on the issue of Ram temple can be expected. The Constitution bench of five judges headed by Chief Justice Gogoi is hearing the Ram temple case in the Supreme Court.

Incidentally, the Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi’s term as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court will come to end on November 17. Reportedly, there is a possibility that a decision may be taken in the Ram Temple case before the Chief Justice Gogoi retires.

Tulsi Gabbard punctures fake news spread by ‘journalist’ Rana Ayyub and others about Howdy Modi event

The moment the Indian ‘liberals’ read about anyone having a negative opinion about Prime Minister Modi, they get giddy with excitement. Doubly so if the person ‘saying’ so is a Hindu and is ‘against Hindutva’.

Few days back, a shady website, ofmi.org run by one ‘Organisation for Minorities in India’, which doesn’t have much details on its website, published an article citing an ‘anonymous source within Tulsi Gabbard’s 2020 presidential campaign” that Gabbard “refused” an invitation to the ‘Howdy, Modi’ event. It claimed claimed that Gabbard had dropped out of ‘Howdy, Modi’ event after Congressman Ro Khanna’s call to ‘reject Hindutva’.

This, of course got the usual suspects extremely excited. A US Presidential candidate who is a Hindu is ‘rejecting’ PM Modi. Why to verify if it fits the narrative, right?

This article with no confirmed reports, was widely circulated by the usual anti-Modi brigade. Maharashtra Congress Sevadal and other Congress supporters too shared the link.


Filmmaker Vinod Kapri also shared the link asking Gabbard if it is true. Kapri was accused by his former colleague of cooking up ‘adoption of an infant abandoned in garbage’ story on Twitter for publicity stunt for his film. He later denied the allegations.


This spreading fake news by posing a question as if you are verifying it, is in line with various Aam Aadmi Party leaders including Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal who frequently indulges in spreading fake news by appending a question, “is this true?”

“Journalist” associated with AFP’s fact-check, too, shared the link, clearly, without verifying.


Abusive troll, Ashok Swain who was caught celebrating former ministers Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley‘s death, also indulged in spreading the fake news.


Our very own ‘journalist’ whose fiction “Gujarat Files” which she peddled as investigative journalism in Sohrabuddin encounter case, was trashed by Supreme Court saying that it is likely to be politically motivated, was also at the forefront of spreading this lie.

Tulsi Gabbard replying to fake news purveyor masquerading as journalist Rana Ayyub

By the time of this report, Ayyub’s tweet has had over 1,000 retweets and 3,500 likes. Gabbard, however, has now replied and rubbished the report saying that it is a misinformed report. “I’m not attending the Houston event due to previously scheduled presidential campaign events. However I’m hoping to meet PM Modi on his visit to discuss the importance of maintaining the strong partnership of the world’s oldest & largest democracies,” she tweeted to Ayyub.

‘Howdy, Modi!’, a mega event which will be held in Houston, Texas on 22nd September, will also be attended by United States President Donald Trump. Over 50,000 people are expected to attend the event.

The Howdy event will be the largest ever event addressed by an Indian Prime Minister in North America and also the largest for a foreign leader in the US other than Pope Francis. The Howdy event will be Prime Minister Modi’s third major address to the Indian-American community after he became PM in 2014 and the first after his re-election in May. The previous two were at the Madison Square Garden in New York in 2014 and the Silicon Valley in 2016. Both the events were attended by more than 20,000 people.

Kidnapping of a minor Hindu girl in a village near Agra triggers violence, shops torched

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Another incident of kidnapping of an underage girl has come to light in Uttar Pradesh’s Saimara village in Khandauli area near Agra yesterday. As per reports, a young man named Abid and his two friends Danish and Kaish had abducted a 15-year-old girl yesterday.

Reports say that a 15-year-old girl, a class 9 student, was kidnapped yesterday at around noon. The girl’s parents live in Eta while she was staying at her maternal uncle’s house for studies. The girl’s uncle received a phone call from a youth named Abid in the afternoon. Abid reportedly threatened the uncle that his niece has been abducted by him and warned him against reporting the matter to the police.

Following the phone call, the girl’s uncle reportedly went to the police station to lodge a complaint. Danish and Kaish, two of Abid’s friends who were seen suspiciously roaming around the girl’s house since the last few days, were also suspected to have been involved. Reports say that the police did not file a written complaint and sent the girl’s family back.

As the news of the kidnapping spread, unrest was triggered in the area that has, as per reports, seen such incidents of kidnapping earlier too. A group of villagers went to confront the main accused Abid’s family where they threatened the family and allegedly burned the house. As the unrest spread, it suddenly turned violent in the evening.

About 15 shops in a street were torched by a mob late in the evening. In retaliation, the people from the opposite side also attacked the houses and families of the former community.

Media reports have stated that while shops were being torched, a few policemen, who had come in a UP-100 vehicle and were trying to get reinforcement, stood helpless. Later in the evening, extra forces arrived and the situation was brought under control. Several shops have reportedly been damaged with fire causing even a cylinder blast in a repair shop.

Agra range IG A Satish Ganesh and many senior officers arrived at the spot later to bring the situation under control. Keeping the tense situation in mind, extra forces from several local police stations have been deployed in the area.

A report in Amar Ujala stated that the girl was recovered late in the night when the main accused Abid was trying to escape to Delhi with her. The main accused Abid is also a student in a nearby college.

Italy: Man screaming “Allahu Akbar” stabs soldier, investigation has been launched to determine if attack was terror-related

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An Italian soldier was stabbed in the throat with a pair of scissors on Tuesday by an attacker in front of Milan’s central train station and later shouted “Allahu Akbar”, reports NYPost.

According to the reports, a man identified as Mahamad Fathe, 23, fled after he attacked the Italian soldier near in Piazza Duca d’Aosta without any provocation. However, he was stopped by paramilitary Carabinieri police officers.

He shouted “Allahu Akbar!”, which meant “God is great!” as he was being arrested. The 34-year-old soldier was taken to a nearby hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, stated the report.

Interestingly, an investigation was launched to determine if the attack was terrorism-related. It seems that Italian authorities are still in a state of denial to admit that this barbaric incident is a classic case of Islamic terrorism being inflicted on non-believer societies.

The Western countries, especially the media and intelligentsia have been somewhat reluctant to accept the menace of Islamic terror that is being perpetrated on their societies. So much that recently, in one of the worst case of Islamic terrorism denial, the News York Times had blamed aeroplanes for the 9/11 terror attacks in one of the reports on the occasion of the 18th anniversary of the terror attacks.

It is no secret that the Islamic terror groups are now resorting to such ‘Lone wolf’ attacks in western societies, which they refer to as a ‘far-enemy’. The ‘Lone-wolf’ attacks have become the new modus operandi of the Islamic terrorists to inflame fear and devastate communities.

There has been an increase in such ‘Lone-wolf’ attacks across societies, especially in the West. Recently, in one such attack, an attacker had stabbed two people, killing one, in the central business district of Sydney, Australia. The attacker was seen shouting “Allahu Akbar” while he was attempting to attack people with a butcher knife. However, the Australian police did not treat it as a terror attack.

Last year in November, an attacker shouting “Allahu akbar” had stabbed a Belgian policeman several times in the neck in central Brussels. The attacker, who wielded two kitchen knives during the incident outside the city’s main police station, was then shot and wounded by two police officers. The attack, too, was not a ‘terror attack’ as per initial reports.

Twitter account of Kolkata girl hacked hours after PM Modi followed her among others

Twitter users woke up this morning to a bunch of ‘leaked’ screenshots posted by a Kolkata-based Twitter user, @seemantinibose. In a now deleted tweet, Bose had accused a few Twitter users of inappropriate behaviour.

Seemantini’s tweet, now deleted.

Soon, Twitter user @pokershash tweeted that Seemantini’s account is compromised by Pakistani hackers.


Seemantini’s tweet asking Prime Minister’s Office to take action against other Twitter users. (now deleted)

OpIndia got in touch with a visibly anxious and traumatised Seemantini who believes that her account was perhaps targetted by Pakistani hackers in a bid to embarrass Prime Minister Modi who had followed her last evening along with various other supporters. “I was browsing my timeline at around 2 AM when suddenly I started receiving OTP (one-time password). I tweeted but that tweet was deleted by the person who had taken over my account. Suddenly my account vanished from the phone,” she said. After 6 hours of ordeal, her Twitter account was finally restored some minutes back.

“Now that the Prime Minister followed me, I don’t want to put him in an embarrassing situation. I don’t want to let him down,” she says. The hacker had sent across direct messages to Prime Minister Modi and a lot of her other friends in a bid to shame her.

DM sent from Seemantini’s compromised account to PM Modi

Essentially, the Pakistani hacker was taking out his frustration over abrogation of Article 370, while trying to defame PM Modi’s supporters.

DM sent to Seemantini’s compromised account to a friend. (picture and name blanked out to protect privacy)

Bose suspects that her account was compromised to embarrass PM Modi along with the Twitter user pokershash who has been mocking Pakistani leaders on twitter since quite a few weeks now. He had recently fooled Pakistani minister Ch Fawad Hussain on Twitter by pretending to be a Pakistani with insider information on undercover RAW agent in Pakistan. After that he had tricked Fawad Hussain into believing that India had threatened Sri Lankan players that they will be ousted from Indian Premier League (IPL) if they don’t cancel their Pakistan tour.

Embarrassed that Indians got their goat (figuratively, not literally) for having Ch Fawad Hussain as a minister, Pakistani hackers hacked into Bose’s account to embarrass PM Modi and Twitter user @pokershash.

Reacting to the accusations of ‘harassment’ levelled by the hacker of Bose’s account, @pokershash said that Pakistani minister has now turned into a full-time troll. “Since government removed Article 370, Pakistani politicians started spreading fake news on Kashmir using old and unrelated videos. So we decided to send them more fake videos, mostly bollywood, in DM. From Pakistan’s Rail minister to science & technology minister, every minister is being trolled by us. Minister Fawad Chaudhury was our favourite punching bag. Indians are trolling him on Twitter and even on WhatsApp now. Fawad in his frustration started posting fake chat of Narendra Modi. Now they are using hackers to hack accounts of people recently followed by PM Modi and posting irrelevant chat to target Modi supporters.”

With this, Pakistan has again taken the Indian ‘liberal’ line who regularly peddle the narrative that PM Modi follows abusive people. Ever since PM Modi has come to power at the Centre back in 2014, the mainly leftist establishments have envisioned a brand new angle to target him. Under that angle, a leftist propaganda blog and an alleged fact-checking website attacked the PM for following individuals on Twitter who as per them hurled abuses, spread misinformation online.

This predictably gained a fair amount of traction in certain sections of social media and even the mainstream media. Incidentally, while this episode was playing out, the spotlight barely focused on similar faults of other political parties and their leaders.

Amusingly, even though former Congress President Rahul Gandhi and Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal also follow abusive trolls, the leftist establishment have their guns trained only on PM Modi.

Irony hit a new low when abusive troll masquerading as a journalist started ‘shaming’ those who are followed by the PM.


So much that she even wrote an entire book on trolls and surprisingly didn’t name herself as one.


That Pakistanis are now toeing the ‘liberal’ line in a bid to embarrass PM Modi is not surprising. They have done it before. And quite likely that they will do it again.

Delhi court sends Congress leader DK Shivkumar in judicial custody till October 1, to be shifted to Tihar once medical condition improves

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Delhi’s Rouse Avenue Court has sent Congress leader and former Karnataka energy minister, DK Shivkumar to 14-day judicial custody until October 1. He was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate on September 3 in a money laundering case.

However, owing to his serious health condition, the special judge Ajay Kumar Kuhar directed the ED to take Shivakumar to the hospital first and only after his medical condition is found to be stable could he be sent to Tihar Jail, which is also the current home of the Congress era finance minister P Chidambaram.

“It is directed that the accused be first taken to the hospital and only after his medical condition is opined to be stable, he is sent to judicial custody in Central Jail, Tihar. The accused is remanded to judicial custody till October 1,” the judge said in the order.

The court has listed Shivkumar’s bail plea hearing on Wednesday at 3.30 pm.

The judge said that in case the MLA is admitted to the hospital, his custody be taken over by the Superintendent of Tihar jail and the doctors hand over his custody only on his discharge.

“In case, he is admitted in the hospital, his custody shall be taken over by the Superintendent Central Jail, Tihar who shall provide guards for the accused. In case of his admission in the hospital, the doctors shall hand over his custody to the Superintendent, Central jail, Tihar only on his discharge,” said the judge.

The court taking into consideration the medical records of Shivakumar, who suffers from hypertension and fluctuating blood pressure and has undergone angioplasty earlier, allowed Shivkumar to take his medicines to Tihar, in case he is taken there, subject to the approval of doctor on duty in the jail.

The ED has, however, sought the court’s permission to interrogate the Congress leader during his 14-day judicial custody as the probe agency claimed in the court that his interrogation was yet to be completed.

Additional Solicitor General (ASG) KM Nataraj and Special Public Prosecutors Amit Mahajan, N K Matta and Nitesh Rana, appearing for the ED, told the court that Shivakumar’s health condition did not allow his effective questioning. Meanwhile, the Congress leader’s counsels, senior advocates A M Singhvi and Mukul Rohatgi opposed the ED plea for judicial custody and sought his bail on medical grounds.

Karnataka Congress MLA DK Shivakumar who was being grilled by the Enforcement Directorate over his alleged involvement in a money laundering case had been arrested for ‘not cooperating’. He has been arrested under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) on September 3.

The alleged money laundering by DK Shivakumar came to light after raids by the tax officials on August 2, 2017, on Shivakumar’s four flats in New Delhi, which led to the seizure of unaccounted cash worth Rs. 8.59 crore without evidence of its source of income.

The tax agencies had filed cases against Shivakumar and four other persons associated with him under Sections 277 and 278 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 and Sections 120(B), 193 and 199 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

On the basis of the charge sheet filed by the I-T officials, the ED had booked a money laundering and hawala transaction case in September last year.

Recently, the Enforcement Directorate had summoned Shivkumar’s daughter on September 10 (Thursday) in a money laundering case involving her father. The ED is investigating her trips to Singapore with her father DK Shivakumar in 2017.

The Income Tax department had found certain cross-border transactions which DK Shivakumar and his daughter couldn’t provide a satisfactory explanation to. The Enforcement Directorate believes that these transactions could be hawala transactions and therefore they have summoned Shivakumar’s daughter for questioning.