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#MeToo: Charges of sexual harassment against MJ Akbar will be examined, says Amit Shah

OpIndia Staff
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#MeToo: Charges of sexual harassment against MJ Akbar will be examined, says Amit Shah

Speaking to media, BJP President Amit Shah has come out and addressed the grave allegations of sexual harassment levelled against the Junior Foreign Minister MJ Akbar. Shah claimed that the authenticity of the allegations made have to be verified before any action is initiated against him. “Dekhna padega ki yeh sach hai ya galat,” Shah said.

Former journalist MJ Akbar is under fire after several women journalists who worked with him in the past have alleged serious charges of harassment and inappropriate behaviour against him. Weighing the allegations made against him, Shah also cautioned that Social Media has also become a place for unverifiable allegations. However, Shah said the allegations against MJ Akbar are very serious in nature and they will definitely look into the issue.

One can infer that Amit Shah’s comment alludes to the fact the party might be open to taking action against MJ Akbar considering the allegations go back several years. Shah’s remarks are the first by a senior BJP leader hinting at action against Akbar. Earlier, Smriti Irani too had come out and said that the women should be protected and not vilified for coming out with their harrowing tales. Several other members of the BJP have also commented on this

A barrage of harassment charges against MJ Akbar followed as one notable journalist Ghazala Wahab penned down her ordeal dating back to the 1990s. Several other journalists who have been his victim have concurred with the allegations made by Wahab. As per the latest account by a foreign journalist Majlie de Puy Kamp, who was 18 when she interned at the Asian Age in 2007, Akbar violated her boundaries and betrayed her and her parent’s trust.

Ramdas Athavale, Junior social justice and environment minister, has also said that while it is important to listen to Akbar’s side but he should resign from the position if the allegations are found to be true. According to him, accusations against him are serious and it’s upon BJP to take any stern action against him.

MJ Akbar is currently on an official visit to Africa and is due to return on Sunday. He is expected to meet senior party functionaries after his return and issue a statement on the controversy as insurmountable pressure seems to be mounting on him and the party. A report in India Today has claimed that Akbar will be asked to resign by the government once he is back.

We aim to fight for the truth, for the ideology we believe in, and for that we need your help

Nupur J Sharma
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We aim to fight for the truth, for the ideology we believe in, and for that we need your help

“People like to say that conflict is between good and evil. The real conflict is between truth and lies”. 

We at opindia.com have since our inception tried to bring to our reader’s news and views that matter. We have attempted to run this platform with integrity, grit, honour, honesty, and most importantly…passion. In our journalism, we have tried to be the voice of the ones that the mainstream media conveniently forgot even though they call themselves the voice of the masses. We have, several times, caught the media and the politicians in lies and told you what the truth was.

We admit, proudly, that we have an ideological leaning towards the ‘Right’. We do so because we rather be honest with your readers. We declare our standpoint upfront because we believe that the reader must have all the information before they are presented with the views that are published by the website. It is only ethical to inform the reader where our heart lies. It is, in our mind, upholding the reader’s right to know.

We firmly believe that the O’ Sullivan’s Law had it right. A portal that is not explicitly ‘right’, will over time, become ‘left’. We just choose to not hide behind the veil of neutrality and mislead our readers. We respect them too much to underestimate their intelligence.

We are but a small institution that is trying to mount a challenge to the establishment and the narrative it wants the people to consume. The establishment that often wants citizens to stay in the dark, because it is that darkness, from the depths of which they draw their power. The power to mislead the citizenry into believing what is convenient to them. The power to use the pen to confuse, not convince. Where often, the pen is used to amplify the mundane in order to blur the important. 

We aim to tell you what the mainstream media might not want to. We aim to be your voice. We aim to stay true to the truth, which we think finds root in our shared ideology.

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India elected to UN Human Rights Council with the highest number of votes

OpIndia Staff
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India elected to UN Human Rights Council with the highest number of votes

India has been elected to the United Nations Human Rights Council with the highest number of votes for a period of 3 years starting from January 1, 2019. India received 188 votes in the Asia Pacific region, the highest polled by any of the 18 countries elected in the voting.


This is reportedly the fifth time India has been elected to the Geneva-based Council, which is the main body of the UN charged with promoting and monitoring human rights. Elections were held by secret ballot in the 193-member General Assembly on Friday, although the number of candidates for all the five regions matched the vacancies making it a formality. The other regional candidates were Bangladesh, Bahrain, Fiji and the Philippines.

In the nomination pledge, India pledged that it will continue to support international efforts to combat racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance. India also presented a broader approach to human rights, emphasising climate justice, health and poverty alleviation.

India’s presence in the UNHRC is significant considering that the previous UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Raad Al Hussein had asked the body to facilitate an international commission of enquiry into allegations of human rights violation in Kashmir which was backed by his successor Michelle Bachelet and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Pakistan, a member of the Council has been campaigning for the same.

India’s Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Syed Akbaruddin later told media that India’s win with the highest number of votes reflects India’s standing in the International comity.

Blast in Guwahati near Sukleswar Temple, four injured, ULFA claims responsibility

OpIndia Staff
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Blast in Guwahati near Sukleswar Temple, four injured, ULFA claims responsibility

Four people have been injured in a low-intensity blast at Guwahati, Assam. The blast occurred beside a footpath near the Sukreswar Temple on the bank of the Brahmaputra river. The injured have identified as  Taifuddin Ahmed, Kalpajyoti Talukdar, Binita Das and Shanku Kumar Das.

Initially, the Police had stated that they do not believe it was a bomb blast due to the nature of the blast. “We don’t suspect it to be a bomb explosion as there were no splinters found and the injuries were due to stones hitting them,” said DCP Ranjan Bhuyan. “We don’t suspect it to be a sabotage or terrorist activity from the nature of the blast. It happened in a dump of sand kept for roadside drain construction. It may have had an unexploded shell which went off today,” the DCP said.

But later in the day baned organisation ULFA (I) claimed responsibility for the blast. Commander in chief of the extremist organisation Paresh Baruah called offices of few media houses in Guwahati and informed that blast was triggered by them. He said that this was done as a protest against the central government’s decision to settle Hindu Bangladeshis in the state under the amendment to the Citizenship Act. This proposed amendment seeks to give citizenship to religious minorities from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Bangladesh, which is facing a massive protest in Assam. Baruah also stated that armed struggle against the amendment will be continued by the banned outfit.

Paresh Baruah also apologised to the injured persons for their injuries. Speaking to News Live Channel, he said that the bomb went off by mistake near the Sukreswar temple, saying that their real target was some organisation opposing the NRC update process that is currently in going on in the state.

The police have refused to confirm it as a bomb before a forensic investigation of the blast site is completed. “At this time, we won’t say it was a bomb blast or a subversive act. The explosion could have also occurred from a powerful scrap. There is a heap of stones and mud at the site of the blast and the scrap was possibly underneath it. The bomb experts are coming. We will know more about the incident following an examination,” the police have said.

The injured have been rushed to the Mahendra Mohan Choudhury Hospital. It is believed that the injured were walking by the wall behind which the explosion is believed to have occurred. The blast blew away a part of the wall, damaged few two-wheelers that were parked nearby and also inflicted some damage on a city bus.

The blast site located just next to the commercial hub of the city, Fancy Bazar. And space is packed with people shopping ahead of Durga Puja. This blast will increase pressure on the city police which already on their toes due to the festivals.

Chhattisgarh Congress working president Ramdayal Uike joins BJP

OpIndia Staff
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Chhattisgarh Congress working president Ramdayal Uike joins BJP

In what may be a major setback to Chhattisgarh Congress, its working president and Pali-Tanakhar MLA Ramdayal Uike has joined BJP, just a few days after the declaration of elections dates in Chhattisgarh, claim reports. Ramdayal joined BJP in presence of BJP President Amit Shah, who is on a two-day election tour in Chhattisgarh, and CM Raman Singh.


Uike has reportedly claimed that the major reason for his leaving Congress was disrespect towards tribal leaders. During Rahul Gandhi’s recent visit to the state, Uike was not allowed to share a stage with him despite being an MLA. He was also reportedly excluded from the 7-member screening committee despite being the working president of the party

CM Raman Singh called Ramdayal’s entry in BJP as ‘Ghar Wapsi’ and claimed it will make the party stronger. Uike was a BJP MLA from Marwahi before he resigned in 1998 after the formation of Chhattisgarh. He had reportedly left the seat for the Congress leader Ajit Jogi who went on to become Chhattisgarh’s first CM.

Ajit Jogi had in 2016, formed his own party called Chhattisgarh Janta Congress(CJC), after being expelled from the Congress.

This is the second setback to Congress after, declaration of a tie-up between Mayawati’s BSP and Ajit Jogi’s CJC.

The model code of conduct has already being applied in state after election commision declared dates of polls. Chhattisgarh elections are going to happen in two phases, first on November 12 and second on November 20.

Security agencies on high alert after Delhi police gets an email with threat to PM Modi’s life

OpIndia Staff
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Security agencies on high alert after Delhi police gets an email with threat to PM Modi’s life

The Delhi Police Commissioner, Amulya Patnaik, has received an e-mail on his official id, in which there is a direct threat to Prime Minister’s life. This has sent the security establishment into a shock-wave, with the security agencies springing into action.

According to the police officials, the mail has been sent from some district in Northeast India. Though extensive search operations were conducted immediately, nothing suspicious has been found yet from the location from where the mail was sent.

The mail has a one-line message, mentioning the day and month and the year 2019 is mentioned as the year when the plot would be executed.

All the security agencies are on high alert and an extensive investigation is underway considering that previously also during the investigation of the Bhima-Koregaon violence, there were disclosures of a conspiracy plot against PM Modi.

Earlier in June, the Pune police had arrested five supposed top urban Maoist operatives from Mumbai, Nagpur and Delhi in connection which the Elgaar Parishad held at Pune’s Shaniwarwada on 31 December 2017, which is believed to have led to the subsequent Bhima Koregaon violence on 1 January. During the investigation, Pune police had recovered sensational letters from one of the suspected, arrested Maoist sympathiser and Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) alumnus Rona Wilson’s house in Delhi, wherein it was suggested that Maoists were planning a Rajiv Gandhi type assassination plot to target Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his road shows.

Over the years there have been several instances where assassination threats have been directed towards the Prime Minister. In May last year, the Coimbatore police had detained Mohammed Rafiq, 53, of Saramedu near Karumbukadai, under the National Security Act (NSA) after he was arrested on April 23 for allegedly boasting about his plan to kill Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

In addition, in June 2018, a person from Ghaziabad had threatened to shoot Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Facebook, after which an FIR was lodged against him.

After Rahul Gandhi’s HAL visit flip-flop, Congress Twitter handle goofs up while talking about the event

OpIndia Staff
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After Rahul Gandhi’s HAL visit flip-flop, Congress Twitter handle goofs up while talking about the event

There is no end to bizarre and outrageous allegations by Congress party on the Rafale deal. On the day their Party president Rahul Gandhi is trying to instigate workers of Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) to create unrest in the organisation, thereby affecting production in the crucial plant, the party’s twitter handle went into overdrive mode while covering Rahul Gandhi’s latest adventure.

While so, Congress’ official Twitter handle ended up alleging that the Modi government has “favoured Rafale over HAL”. This tweet had left many people scratching their heads, as Rafale is a fighter aircraft and HAL is a public sector enterprise which mainly assembles fighter planes with kits supplied by global defence equipment manufacturers.

The screenshot of the tweet is given below, which has been deleted by the Twitter handle of the party now.

The moment the tweet was posted, alert Twitter users spotted the apparent goof up and it became a subject of amusement for social media users. The Congress party and Rahul Gandhi often become victims of goof ups by Rahul Gandhi in his speeches, or tweets by various leaders of the party, and it was no different.


The gaffe by the Congress party was not limited to Twitter only. For last one week, it was being reported that Rahul Gandhi will meet HAL employees today. But it seems nobody had actually arranged such a meet and nobody had a clue who is organising what, creating a confusion over the entire subject.

HAL authorities said they have not even received a request from Congress to hold the meet in the organisation. After that Congress claims that retired employees of HAL had organised the meet. But the trade union of HAL had said that Congress party had approached them requesting a meeting and the union had not taken any decision yet.

At last, the authorities of HAL refused to let Rahul Gandhi meet the employees inside the premises of the company. The company also asked its staff not to attend the meet as they don’t want employees of the company to be involved in any political controversy. Due to this, the party had to shift the venue of the meet to Minsk Square in Bengaluru, where mostly retired employees of HAL attended the meeting.

NDTV journalist accused of gaslighting victims of sexual harassment

OpIndia Staff
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NDTV journalist accused of gaslighting victims of sexual harassment

The #MeToo movement has finally reached India and several personalities from all walks of life have been called out for the harassment they have dished out to several women.

One of the people accused during the movement was T S Sudhir who used to earlier work for NDTV and is currently working with India Today.

The victim took to Twitter to narrate how TS Sudhir used to send her lews messages and if the woman didn’t return the advances, she was humiliated and stories were not aired. She said that her fault was that she yielded because she was so scared. She then said that eventually, she quit her job and never returned to journalism.

Sandhya Menon, who is a journalist herself has been in touch with the victims and have been putting out their stories anonymously. Menon took to Twitter today to assert that Uma Sudhir, TS Sudhir’s wife who is a journalist NDTV currently, was reaching out to the victims and ‘gaslighting’ them. This basically means that she Sudhir has been trying to reach out the victims and playing with them psychologically in order to confuse them, presumably to protect her husband.


After the explanation by Uma Sudhir, Menon told her that she knows the messages exchanged between Sudhir and the victim and that the victim never asserted that there was physical harassment but mental and emotional torture.


Earlier, Sandhya Menon had tweeted that the investigations had begun in this case and the victim had retweeted that tweet. The victim had also tweeted one Karishma who asserted that she knows who the victim is talking about.

Karishma Asoodani asserted that her professors at college did not let her intern with the channel because of the said person, presumably TS Sudhir and his behaviour.

Shocking if true: People speculate whether Kejriwal wrote a message to himself congratulating himself for his work

K Bhattacharjee
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Shocking if true: People speculate whether Kejriwal wrote a message to himself congratulating himself for his work

Chief Minister of Delhi, Arvid Kejriwal, shared a message on Twitter that he claimed he had received from a parent on the morning of the 13th of October. In the message, the parent thanked Kejriwal for the fee rollback and said that parents were discussing among themselves that only Kejriwal could have done it and proclaimed ‘Bande me dum hai!’


People are, however, speculating that Kejriwal had himself typed the message so that he could pat himself on the back. The reason cited for such an assumption was that the red line that shows an error while typing could be spotted in the message under the word ‘mein’. Therefore, people concluded that Kejriwal had himself typed the message, took a screenshot and then shared it on Twitter himself to score political brownie points.


It could very well be that Kejriwal did receive the message, as he claims he did, and the parent did take a screenshot of the message while he/she was typing the message. However, although possible, it appears highly unlikely that such a thing could have occurred.

If the parent sent the message over email or WhatsApp or even through Direct Message on Twitter, then the ‘red line’ wouldn’t have appeared. If the parent sent him the message via a tweet, then a screenshot could have been necessary due to the character limit but then Kejriwal could have simply retweeted the tweet.

Taking all things into consideration, a case of Kejriwal calling Kejriwal is very much possible considering the downward spiral the Aam Aadmi party has been on in recent times. The suggestion also doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility considering how many times Arvind Kejriwal has tweeted a rumour with the “Is it true?” template and that information has more often than not turned out to be false. 

However, we cannot completely rule out the possibility that Kejriwal did indeed receive that message.

Indefinite strike at NIT Uttarakhand, protesting students demand permanent campus

OpIndia Staff
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Indefinite strike at NIT Uttarakhand, protesting students demand permanent campus

Students at NIT Uttarakhand have been on an indefinite strike since the 4th of October demanding that the temporary campus along National Highway-58 is shifted to a safer location and that a permanent campus is allotted soon after two students were injured on the 3rd of October in an accident.

Neelam Meena, a third-year student of B.Tech (electrical and electronics), had to be rushed to AIIMS Rishikesh after she suffered critical injuries to her brain, chest and spinal cord when a speeding vehicle rammed into her as she was making her way to her classes. Neelam’s batchmate, Nupur Munda, is said to have suffered minor injuries.

In a memorandum to the Ministry of Human Resource Development, the students’ body of NIT Uttarakhand has demanded that immediate financial support is provided to the victims and their families. They also demand that the temporary campus is shifted to a safer place with better health facilities. An allotment of land for a permanent campus has also been sought.

The institute is currently lodged on the terrace of a government polytechnic college with a tin roof instead of a concrete one. During monsoons, the classrooms apparently leak and several hostel rooms on the ground floor have to be vacated due to leaks and seepage. Many students have been housed at places far away from the campus.

In one of the official documents of the protests as per their website, the students say they had called off the protest last year after being ‘gulled’ by authorities.

They say, “The students of NIT Uttarakhand called off this week-long strike last year, 28 August 2017. As we were gulled by these administrators and officials. The efforts, hopes and dreams were curbed. We were clipped down. All we wanted was a place to call home, a campus. But we were made their victims of local politics. The strike was called off with a prophecy, that we will be rammed by vehicles. And the darkest nightmare come true.”

In a letter to OpIndia.com, students from the institute claimed that they had written several letters to the Chief Minister of the state and yet their concerns have not been addressed. They said that students were sitting on a strike despite bad weather and were conducting candle marches. They say though they are sitting in the sun for days, the hopes for a permanent campus is fading.

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