Home Blog Page 7280

Dear Arvind Kejriwal, you owe one more apology

Rahul Raj
-
0
Dear Arvind Kejriwal, you owe one more apology

Dear Arvind Kejriwal

I was part of the anti-corruption movement spearheaded by Anna, which led to your political birth on the national scene. To me, you and your movement was the ray of hope amongst dark clouds of corruption and apathy. Finally, we saw the nation’s collective consciousness being woken up by a frail old man, and a young ex-Government officer, who were both fed up with the system. Today, unfortunately, I am fed up with you.

You told us that you will never contest elections. You said with a straight face, out of your own free belief. We believed you. Later you joined politics. Nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They rationalised it by saying, maybe he needs to be in the system to change it.

You told us that you will never ally with Congress or BJP. We felt finally we have an alternative. Finally, you took the support of Congress to form your 1st Government. Nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They rationalised it by saying, maybe he needs to be in power to achieve his goals.

You told us Delhi would be your priority, you wanted to clean up Delhi. You quit and decided to go All India with hardly any base in any other state. You promised the moon to everyone, including Varanasi, from where you contested. You lost miserably. Nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They rationalised it by saying, maybe it was a tactical error, but your intention was good.

You kicked out the core members of AAP: Prashant Bhushan, Shanti Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav. We still remember the days when they all would be your close associates. Nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They rationalised it by saying, maybe the recent debacles of AAP were due to the presence of these multiple power centres. Maybe now there will be stability.

During the surgical strikes episode, you indirectly tried to raise doubts over the actions of the Indian army. This action of yours had the potential to demoralise our army. But nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They felt that this stand was necessary to counter Modi’s growing popularity.

You had openly attacked corrupt politicians of India like Laloo Prasad Yadav and Congress leaders. Eventually, you joined hands with them at some forum or the other. But nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They felt this was a political necessity. Even your well-educated supporters are doing full-time whataboutery. Is this the way you wanted to change politics?

To get support during Punjab elections, you tried to play caste politics. You flirted with Khalistanis, again, to gain traction. This was the exact type of politics the youth was fed up with, and expected you to stop. But nobody from your party asked you to apologise. They felt that it was needed to defeat larger enemies. Today you do not even remember Punjab or its problems.

Now soon after apologising to Majithia, you have now apologised to Gadkari and Kapil Sibal. These were the people who you had abused and attacked till no end to gain political mileage. Now, fearing adverse court rulings in defamation cases, you have gone back on your allegations and apologised to them. Instead of proving your claims with conviction, you have by default admitted that your charges had no basis.

Today, you represent all that you wanted to change in India politics. We have not seen your level of arrogance or narcissism in Indian politics for a long time. No wonder most of your IAC associates are no longer with you. Instead you are surrounded by Yes men and sycophants. You have normalised hooliganism in the name of activism. You have swiped your victim card so often that now you are bankrupt.

But the biggest problem is this: You have destroyed the hope in the minds of youngsters, who had hoped for a clean alternative in Indian politics. The fairy-tale story of a clean, IAS officer changing the Indian system has disinterested into a thug who calls IAS officers to his apartment at 12 am, only for him to surrounded and allegedly beaten up. No youth will ever trust an activist now. Every movement and leader will be looked at with the same disdain with which we see regular politicians with.

Along with your apologies to rival politicians, you owe an apology to the youth of India. For taking them for the worst possible ride. For showing them starry dreams of idealism while proceeding with gutter level politics. For directly or indirectly encouraging your supporters to also follow in your misguided footsteps. Apologise to us Arvind, who toiled in the IAC movement thinking that this could be the start of a new era.

Apologise!

Has Cambridge Analytica already breached your privacy for Congress?

Piyush Kulshreshtha
-
0
Has Cambridge Analytica already breached your privacy for Congress?

On March 16, 2018, when Facebook suspended Cambridge Analytica from accessing its services, it raised 101 questions with respect to methods employed by Cambridge Analytica to help its clients win the elections. While Facebook claimed that the Data of 2,70,000 Facebook users, while legally obtained, was unethically shared with other parties by Aleksandr Kogan, the whistleblower who had helped set-up Cambridge Analytica, Christopher Wylie, revealed that through these 2,70,000 Facebook users, Cambridge Analytica managed to breach the privacy of 50-60 Million Users.

Facebook has refused to acknowledge this breach, while the perpetrator of this crime is admitting the full extent of the damage caused by Cambridge Analytica. What Christopher Wylie claims is that through ‘thisisyourdigitallife’ application built by Aleksandr Kogan, Cambridge Analytica managed to penetrate into the private data of the friend’s network of those 270,000 Facebook users who allowed access to this application to access their FB Data. This friends’ network of these 270,000 Facebook users reached a number upwards of 50-60mn users.

Interestingly, it was reported early on that the Congress party and Rahul Gandhi are in talks with Cambridge Analytica for 2019 elections. Now, with the reports on unethical practices of the firm surfacing, it becomes necessary to analyse their methods keeping Indian elections and the Congress party in mind, even though the Congress party or Rahul Gandhi never confirmed or denied these news reports, especially, in the face of how his Twitter resurgence was tomtomed by the media.

Questionable methods of Cambridge Analytica

Sharing the details of Cambridge Analytica’s style of functioning, Christopher Wylie says, “We spent a million dollars in harvesting 10s of millions of Facebook profiles and those profiles were used as the basis of the algorithms that became the foundation of Cambridge Analytica. The company itself was founded on the use of Facebook Data.”

The extent of the breach was the status messages, likes and their private messages

When asked what Cambridge Analytica was trying to do with so much data, Wylie explained the questionable methods of Cambridge Analytica, saying “We were going to combine micro-targeting, which was already existing in politics, and a new construct on psychology. And in order to scale that we’d be needing a lot of data on people, so that we could build a psychological profile of each voter in a particular region or in this case whole of United States”

He further adds, “We would know what kind of messaging you would be susceptible to, including the framing of it, the topics, the content, the tone, whether it would be scary or not. So, what you’d be susceptible to and where you are going to consume that and how many times we need to touch you with that in order to change how you think about something.”

Expanding further on the kind of team employed and the process followed at Cambridge Analytica, Wylie says, “In addition to having data scientists and psychologists, strategists, they also have an entire team of creatives, designers, videographers, photographers. They then create that content. That gets then sent to the targeting team, which then injects it into the internet. Websites would be created, blogs would be created, whatever we think this target profile would be receptive to. We will create content on the internet for them to find. And they see that and they click it and they go down the ‘rabbit hole’ until they start to think something differently.”

In effect, if reports of Congress and Rahul Gandhi hiring Cambridge Analytica is true, they will be doing something on the lines of what Wylie says these politicians are doing to destroy a democracy, “Instead of standing in the public square and saying what you think and then letting people come and listen to you and have that shared experiences to what you are, you are whispering into the ear of each and every voter and you may be whispering one thing to one voter and another thing to another voter. We risk fragmenting society in a way where we do not have any shared experiences and we do not have any more shared understanding.”

Rahul Gandhi’s Insensitive alleged Electoral Advisor

When asked if users whose data had been picked up had any idea about it, Wylie confirmed that the users had no idea. When asked he and Cambridge Analytica had any reservations about breaching the privacy of so many Americans, the answer was, “We were solely focused on getting this data and doing this ‘experiment’.” This is the insensitive outlook of Rahul Gandhi’s Electoral Advisors, Cambridge Analytica when they describe the data breach and psychological profiling of Voters as a mere ‘experiment’.

What does this mean for Indian Voters?

Breaching data privacy to build a psychological profile of voters in each of 543 Lok Sabha Constituencies will be the very first task Cambridge Analytica would have done, as per their own process, after allegedly receiving a mandate from Congress Party.

In other words, data of 250mn Indians on Facebook must have been breached by now, and Facebook may not even admit that, as they have not admitted so in case of US. What we know today is all thanks to the whistleblower Christopher Wylie, who was deeply involved with these operations of Cambridge Analytica. Let us be clear, as Wylie has explained earlier, Cambridge Analytica was founded on Facebook Data. If they have started operations for Congress Party in India, by now, Indian Voters data and privacy has already been breached.

Trump Campaign paid $15mn through Robert Mercer to get Cambridge Analytica to work on US Elections. They had to basically sell one single candidate to, say 200 million registered Voters in the US.

India is a far more complex game. They have to psychologically manipulate approximately 900 million voters in India and sell them 543 Candidates from Congress Party in India with Rahul Gandhi as their Pan India leader gunning for Prime Minister-ship.

Considering their tremendous success in US Elections, hence a certain premium to their brand, the complexity of the operation in India and selling a hugely unpopular and ridiculed politician like Rahul Gandhi, I suppose Cambridge Analytica might have charged anything in the range of $75-$100 million. That’s equal to nearly Rs. 500-650 crores. Of course, this is just a guesstimate.

The source of such funds, the method of such payments, is a subject of speculation. But more than that Indian voters are about to be psychologically manipulated by a Foreign Agency who may be catering to the interest of an enemy nation, and that is far more disturbing.

Interestingly, the whistleblower has mentioned how one of the prime methods of Cambridge Analytics is to whisper one thing in one section of voter’s ear, while the complete opposite in another section’s ear. This deception is not far from the Congress’ modus operandi. It stands to reason that perhaps the messaging to the Kannada’s would be how North Indian’s are living off south taxes, as the Congress party has already done, and tell the North Indian’s that the Kannada Vijay Mallya stole the North’s money and ran away. While peddling soft Hindutva for one section, Congress has been stirring the Lingayat separate religion pot and divide the Hindus on the basis of caste. While on one hand, Congress wants to appease the majority, on the other, Congress beats the ‘Hindu terror’ drum and appeases the minority. It thus stands to reason that Cambridge Analytica, if hired by the Congress would pander to exactly what the Congress has been doing to dirty domestic politics, their messages, however, would be far more effective.

We have already seen that in November 2015, Congress Leader Manishankar Aiyar was seen on television requesting Pakistan for help on removal of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Simply put, it seemed like he was requesting Pakistan to use its intelligence agency ISI to conduct clandestine operations in India for “removal” of Indian Prime Minister in order to undermine India’s Democratic Process.

This disdain for Indian voters in the Congress has been marked previously too. But leaving that for another day, Congress’ hiring of Cambridge Analytica has created a definite cause of worry for Indian Voters.

With such dangerous practices being reported, it becomes necessary for the Congress party to either come out in the open and confirm that Cambridge Analytica was never hired by the party and the reports were untrue, or confirm that the firm was indeed hired and be answerable to the people of the nation, if at all our data has been breached.

After Bikram Majithia, it’s Nitin Gadkari and Kapil Sibal that Arvind Kejriwal has apologised to

OpIndia Staff
-
0
After Bikram Majithia, it’s Nitin Gadkari and Kapil Sibal that Arvind Kejriwal has apologised to

Delhi Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal, has formally apologised to Union Minister Nitin Gadkari for the allegations of corruption levelled against him following which a case of defamation was filed against him in the Court. Arvind Kejriwal and Nitin Gadkari have both approached Delhi’s Patiala House Court for withdrawal of the case against the chief of the Aam Aadmi Party. Interestingly, it was in the defamation case against Kejriwal filed by Gadkari where the AAP supremo had refused to furnish the bail bond and had ended up in jail.


Kejriwal’s apologies to those concerned were along expected lines as a close aide had admitted that the Chief Minister of Delhi wanted to end the myriad of cases filed against him in various cases as a conviction would render him unable to contest elections in future. According to the aide, the cases were hindering Kejriwal’s focus on the governance of Delhi. However, AAP MLA Kapil Mishra said it was a merely an excuse as the case involving his allegations against Bikram Mathijia did not require his physical presence and he would have to attend only 3 days of Court in the next 4 months


Meanwhile, Arvind Kejriwal has also sought an apology from Congress leader Kapil Sibal.


The apology to Bikram Mathijia had sparked an internal feud within the Aam Aadmi Party with its leaders from its Punjab unit heavily criticizing the move. Again, AAP MLA Kapil Mishra had alleged that the Punjab unit had become a burden for the Delhi Chief Minister and he wanted to end the unit in a deal with Congress which would involve an alliance between the two parties for the General Elections next year. The apology to Nitin Gadkari and Kapil Sibal might further deepen the rifts within the party.

While the Delhi circus never sleeps, especially with Arvind Kejriwal at the helm, Shivraj Singh Chouhan has an interesting advice for Delhi Chief Minister.

I read this article in service of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, and I’m impressed with the service

Nirwa Mehta
-
0
I read this article in service of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, and I’m impressed with the service

Following the insensitive ‘fabulous dinner’ hosted by Sonia Gandhi for united opposition on the day of Sukma attacks, the recently concluded two-day Congress Plenary session gave us more insights into what is stored in in the run up to the 2019 general elections.

If this article by pro-Congress journalist, Pallavi Ghosh, who was earlier roasted for a soft ball interview with Rahul Gandhi, is anything to go by, Priyanka Gandhi has taken charge of the grand old party and how!

I was really impressed. With Pallavi, more than with Priyanka. So here I am summarizing the article for you.

She starts off her article with saying that Rahul Gandhi was in a rare form, the credit to which should go to his younger sister Priyanka Vadra. This in itself is revolutionary and remarkable as Pallavi usually gives credit to Rahul Gandhi for everything. She mentions how Priyanka Vadra had taken personal interest in the plenary, including ensuring the venue is mosquito-free.

Ghosh cites a ‘top source’ and says how Priyanka noticed empty chairs on the first day and asked a worker to ensure that next day more people are called in to fill the chairs. Though, not sure if this strategic move will get them seats in 2019.

At end of day one, people had complained about mosquitoes at the venue. So what did Priyanka do? She personally went to the venue and oversaw the fumigation process for over two hours. Priyanka, the strategist, also decided the speaker list and it was her brilliance that ensured only Rahul Gandhi and the logo of Congress are visible on the dais when Rahul goes on the stage.

Ghosh then mentions how the plenary sent out a ‘powerful message’ by doing away with the traditional ‘gaddas’ (mattresses), which used to be there at Congress plenary over the years. Of course, removing mattresses in favour of chairs is a phenomenal move. After all, that might be the only chair most of the Congress leaders may get to sit on after 2019 elections.

The slogan for the plenary was ‘Change is Now’ and Ghosh mentions this is why the delegates were made to sit below the stage. Even as I tried to figure out what is the correlation between the tagline and delegates being made to sit below the stage, Ghosh explains how Priyanka has been instrumental in forging alliance with Akhilesh Yadav and also oversaw the Gujarat election campaign, both of which Congress lost.

Ghosh claims that in the run up to the 2019 elections, Priyanka’s ‘hidden hand’ will become more obvious. Considering Rahul Gandhi’s ‘charm’ isn’t really doing the trick, we can only wait and watch what magic the hidden hand creates. In the meantime, I request Priyanka Gandhi to do something about the mosquito menace at my home as well.

Congress includes self-goal by Rahul Gandhi in its official document – brazenly lying or officially foolish?

K Bhattacharjee
-
0
Congress includes self-goal by Rahul Gandhi in its official document – brazenly lying or officially foolish?

A draft proposal on Agriculture, Employment and Poverty Alleviation at the 84th session of the All India Congress Committee (AICC) states that, “The wealth of the richest 1% has gone up by 73% while the wealth of the bottom half of the population has grown by just 1% during the BJP regime.”

However, the claim made in the proposal can be demonstrably proved to be false and it appears to be just another canard the Congress has come up with in recent times.

According to the Credit Suisse Wealth Data Books, the share of the wealth of the top 1% has actually shrunk between 2014 and 2017 (under Narendra Modi government) while it had increased in the period between 2010-2014 (under UPA government headed by Congress).

In 2010, the share of the top 1% in the wealth of India was 40.3% in 2010, which increased to 49.0% in 2014 and then decreased to 45.1% in 2017. Thus, it goes to show that the rich had actually a better time during the rule of the Congress party, though the party is trying to paint Modi government as pro-rich.

Furthermore, the share of wealth the top 5% and 10% had increased during UPA-2 as well but decreased during the rule of the Modi government. Also, the wealth of the bottom 90%, which had a negative Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 3.75% during UPA-2, has grown at the rate of 12.43 CAGR since the Narendra Modi came to power in 2014.

However, it wasn’t the first time that the Congress Party has goofed up on the issue. Rahul Gandhi, himself, in one of his tweets after Prime Minister Modi’s speech at the World Economic Forum, appeared to claim that the top 1% owned 73% of the wealth in India, which turned out to be a self-goal.

Not only Rahul Gandhi had shared an article that quoted from a report titled ‘Indian income inequality, 1922-2014: From British Raj to Billionaire Raj’ — thus indicating his own dynasty and party rule — the data showed that the situation had become better since Congress lost power in 2014.

But the Congress party had more goof-ups to offer at its plenary session apart from its draft proposal and Sonia Gandhi impeccable Hindi.

P Chidambaram, former Union Finance Minister, went to the extent of claiming that the NDA government inherited a strong economy in 2014 despite the fact that India was among the ‘Fragile Five’ at the time. The Fragile Five, a term coined by Morgan Stanley, refers to economies which are too dependent on unreliable foreign investment to fund their growth ambitions. India was taken off the list in 2015 only after the NDA came to power in 2014.

The former Finance Minister had said, “Modi government inherited a strong economy. The task of development has to be continued by future generations. However, today, the Indian economy is decoupled from the world economy which is growing.” One sometimes wonders where does Mr Chidambaram get these ideas from but then the face of Rahul Gandhi comes to mind and everything begins to make perfect sense.

India’s GDP grew under Narendra Modi has been growing at consistently at over 7% barring the blip in 2017 when it registered an annual growth of 6.72%, and is projected to grow at 7.4% in 2018-19 and will reclaim its tag of the fastest growing economy in the world. The growth rate is expected to further rise to 7.5% in the next fiscal year as a consequence of the economic reforms undertaken by Narendra Modi.

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, whose rediscovery of his voice remains the greatest example of ‘Vikas’ under Narendra Modi, sang the same tune at the Plenary Session. He stated that the BJP-led NDA government had “messed up” the economy. Of course, one would imagine close proximity to Rahul Gandhi has had a significant impact on how he perceives reality. It appears that Manmohan Singh’s idea of a well-functioning economy involves a huge spike in NPAs, corruption at levels the country had not witnessed before, and an honourable mention among the ‘Fragile Five’ economies.

The Congress party’s allegations of mismanagement of the economy by the Bharatiya Janata Party is fast losing credibility. They compromise on basic facts to score political points against Narendra Modi but time and again, only end up embarrassing themselves. Or perhaps they have got brazen as they know that no one in the mainstream media will call out their lies. Recently, the owner of India Today network was seen grovelling before Sonia Gandhi.

Despite the extreme pessimism spread by the party regarding the economy, the world continues to regard India as a ‘bright spot‘ in the world. And one has to admit, transforming a ‘Fragile Five’ economy into a ‘bright spot’ remains a stunning achievement of the NDA government under the leadership of Narendra Modi. But perhaps Congress believes in repeating a lie multiple times till it becomes the truth.

Lalu Prasad Yadav convicted in fourth fodder scam case

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Lalu Prasad Yadav convicted in fourth fodder scam case

A special CBI court in Ranchi pronounced RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav guilty in the fourth fodder scam case today.


Former Bihar CM and another accused in the case Jagannath Mishra was found ‘not guilty‘ in this fourth case. Lalu Prasad is currently lodged in the Birsa Munda Prison in Ranchi where he is serving a 13.5 years jail term. He was admitted to the Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences on Saturday after he complained of health issues. The sentences for this fourth case are yet to be announced.

RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav has already been convicted in three of the fodder scam cases previously. Former CM Jagannath Mishra, who has been found guilty in two of the previous cases which led senior journalist Shekhar Gupta had tried to insinuate a cast bias in the judiciary, has been acquitted.

The trial of the case relating to fraudulent withdrawal of Rs. 3.76 crore from Dumka treasury between December 1995 and January 1996. However, the pronouncement of the judgement got delayed since Lalu Yadav moved an application alleging involvement of former Accountant General PK Mukhopadhyay, former Deputy Accountant General BN Jha and former Director General in AG office Pramod Kumar in the scam. Lalu Yadav had urged the court to make the three of them accused in the case under section 319 (power to proceed against other persons appearing guilty of the offence) of the CrPC.

Hearing Lalu’s plea, the judge in the special CBI court, Shivpal Singh, had ruled that the allegations on the three named above are grave and asked Lalu to obtain prosecution sanction against the three officials from the concerned authority and set April 16 as the date for the next hearing.

Lalu had mentioned the statements of several witnesses recorded by the CBI and the statements of the CBI’s own officials citing possible involvement of the AG office in the fodder scam.

A special CBI court in 2013 had convicted Lalu in the first fodder scam case involving the withdrawal of Rs 37.7 crores from the Chaibasa treasury. Lalu was pronounced guilty in another fodder scam case involving the Deoghar treasury of Rs 89 lakhs in December last year.Jagannath Mishra had been acquitted in that case. Both Lalu and Jagannath Mishra were found guilty of the third fodder scam involving the Chaibasa district treasury of Rs 33.67 crores. Lalu Prasad was sentenced to five years of jail term and a fine of Rs 10 lakhs.

Gorgeous visuals of the grand Gudi Padwa celebrations across Maharashtra

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Gorgeous visuals of the grand Gudi Padwa celebrations across Maharashtra

The First day of the month of Chaitra is celebrated as the Hindu New Year in many states in India. In Maharashtra, it is celebrated as Gudi Padwa while for Telugu and Kannadiga people it is celebrated as Ugadi. Gudi Padwa in Maharashtra is celebrated with much fanfare and every year, the festival brings glimpses of the rich traditions and proud Maratha heritage.

The Gaon Devi Maidan saw a huge Rangoli made with 900 kgs of colour and hard work of 70 artists:

Photo courtesy: ANI

The people of Nashik however, saw people taking up the task of converting the serene banks of Godavari into artistic landscapes.

photo courtesy: @winsplit via twitter

The celebrations were not limited to Rangoli alone. Maharashtrian women dressed in traditional attire and carrying saffron flags took out rallies riding two-wheelers. The visuals have all the aspects of feminine beauty and power captured in frames. Shobha yatras or rallies are an essential part of Gudi Padwa celebrations and Maharashtra saw a lot of it yesterday.

shobha yatra on Gudi Padwa: image courtesy Paresh M Kanade via twitter

 

Photo courtesy: @RanaRan61082983


Hindu festivals are always the celebration of colours and vibrancy of nature. The visuals of Maharashtra are another reminder of our rich cultural heritage.

Harsh Mander’s article shows how ‘seculars’ are the real bigots and believers of the 2-nation theory

Nithesh S
-
0
Harsh Mander’s article shows how ‘seculars’ are the real bigots and believers of the 2-nation theory

Recently, an article titled ‘Sonia, sadly’ written by ‘activist’ Harsh Mander was shared by Pakistani politician Imran Khan with a comment thanking Jinnah. In the article, the activist Harsh Mander writes about the ‘political marginalisation’ of Muslims. This is strikingly similar to one of the key reasons cited by Jinnah for a separate country. This attracted the attention of Twitter users. Some of them tacitly approved the comment, while others opposed it.


The story of partition has been brushed under the carpet in India’s discourse. India has never made attempts to highlight the villain that Jinnah was in the history of the subcontinent. Jinnah’s two nation theory argued that Hindus and Muslims were two separate nations and hence both had to have a separate country after British left India. The Congress party disagreed with the theory though it accepted a partition of the subcontinent. Pakistan became an Islamic state and India a secular state.

Post partition, one would have believed that Muslims would integrate into Indian society, accept common laws and place their Indian identity above their religious identity. The process has been stymied by the community’s staunch adherence to personal laws and opposition to the national song ‘Vande Mataram’. In spite of this, the participation of Indian Muslims in elections and all other fields of the society has been active and constructive in most cases. India’s most loved President-Dr APJ Abdul Kalam was elected by a BJP led alliance. India’s favourite music composer is AR Rahman. One can go on listing prominent Muslim figures in all fields.

Instead of forging unity over the decades, secular parties in India went ahead with their appeasement policies for the sake of garnering votes. They not only compromised principles of fairness but also went on to shed tears for terrorists. These secularists are blocking reasonable reform in Muslim society like Triple Talaq bill. Their attempts to bury the demand for a Ram Temple are also well known. The fall of ‘secular’ parties has been so drastic, that a former president of Congress had to admit that her party was now perceived as a Muslim party because of BJP.

This comment has led to deep sorrow among secular-liberal ecosystem as they see their career prospects in ‘activism’ and anti-Hindu bashing declining in future. Thus they are now writing obituaries to the ideals that had once found credence in the corridors of power. Mander, in his article, writes (emphasis added) :

Muslims are today’s castaways, political orphans with no home, for virtually every political party. This despite India being home to a tenth of the world’s Muslims, around 180 million people, making it the largest Muslim country after Indonesia and Pakistan. There has never been a harder time to be a Muslim in India, not since the stormy months that followed India’s Partition. 

The phrase ‘largest Muslim country‘ used by Mander underlines the mindset of the secular liberal ecosystem. It is a Freudian slip that shows that it is people Mander who believe in the two-nation theory. For them, any strategy to play the victim or attack RSS is valid, even if it jeopardises the national identity and unity of India.

Mander writes :

“Open expression of hatred and bigotry against Muslims have become a new normal, from schools to universities, workplaces to living rooms, internet to political rallies. Even worse, they’re forced to live with the everyday fear of hate violence.”

Mandar makes sweeping generalizations about hatred and bigotry against Muslims, while the same about Hindus can be argued equally emphatically. An example can be cited of the ‘secular’ Hartosh Singh Bal who wanted Brahmins to be targeted by Islamist mobs in Kashmir and the state to not waste resources on their protection.

Or how the secular motivated campaign like #NotInMyName turned severely anti-Hindu. When a Hindu boy is brutally murdered, the secular Karnataka government called it a “normal death”, and none seemed to bat an eye. Heck, even speaking for Hindu riot victims in Bangladesh was called “Hindu Nationalism” in the most derogatory fashion.

Mander provides no data for violence, and any attempt to provide data has been found to be manipulated, partisan or simply fraudulent. Take the ‘HT Hate Tracker for example’. We had demonstrated earlier how the tool was openly bigoted and biased considering Hate crimes against people belonging to certain political or religious inclination were conveniently ignored, and so are crimes perpetrated by people belonging to certain political or religious ideology. It was even pointed out that Hate Tracker 13 out of 15 Muslim-on-Dalit hate crimes basically shielding Muslim perpetrators.

Or how can we forget the man who spread fake gau-rakshak attack story and later admitted he lied because he hates Hindus? How can we forget how his story was lapped up by the secular-liberal ecosystem simply because it painted Hindus in bad light, no questions asked?

He sees Sonia Gandhi’s comment on ‘Muslim party’ as a final nail in the coffin of appeasement politics. He is indirectly sending an SOS to political parties not to ditch appeasement politics. He writes :

But now it is not just the BJP that shuns Muslims. Most political parties are accepting the premise that the majority Hindu vote will sour if a party is seen to be close to Muslims. In her 19 years of leadership of the Congress, Sonia Gandhi never faltered in her secular convictions. But when even she declared recently that the Congress suffered because the BJP persuaded people that it was a Muslim party, many Muslims felt their expulsion to the political wilderness was complete. [..]

Minorities have become “a taboo for the big parties” which seek to “dissociate with any step that can come across as minority appeasement”. This “shows us what is in store in the future”. It is for Hindus to decide now, he believes, “whether they want India to become a Hindu Rashtra or remain secular”. 

This commentary makes one wonder if secular intellectuals are on their way to create a separate nation of ‘Hindus’ and ‘Muslims’ in India using the strategy of Jinnah in 1940s. While the BJP and PM reiterate the ideology of Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas, these activists go around peddling the story of ‘political isolation’ in Muslim community. BJP has ensured that its policies are not meant for any religion. It has supported Muslim women in their fight against Triple Talaq. The theory of political isolation is a figment of Harsh Mander’s imagination, which was, in turn, picked up by Pakistan to prop itself up and undermine India. In effect, Mander also gave an excuse to Pakistan to whitewash how terribly they treat the Hindu minority there. The comparison is unthinkable, but Mander’s hollow scaremongering defeated their cause.

Activists like Harsh Mander, who pen articles like this not only cater to domestic propaganda but also find a cheering audience in Pakistan. The same ‘activist’ is a part of the liberal-secular ecosystem that signed a mercy petition for Yakub Memon. This would anger any sane Indian as terrorism cannot be tolerated in the larger interest of the nation. Indian secularists are blocking every avenue which could make India a harmonious society. The dangerous communal violence bill, the campaign to retain Triple Talaq and attempts to torpedo a settlement in Ram Janmabhoomi case by secularists are some examples.

Even if this ecosystem becomes politically irrelevant, its ability to damage the country remains intact. Therefore, eternal vigilance is essential to keep India on the path of progress and protect the unity of the country.

Watch: MNS workers pull down Gujarati signboards in Vasai after Raj Thackeray’s ‘Modi-Mukt Bharat’ call

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Watch: MNS workers pull down Gujarati signboards in Vasai after Raj Thackeray’s ‘Modi-Mukt Bharat’ call

Following the attack by Maharashtra Navnirman Chief Raj Thackeray on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, where he accused media of using Sridevi’s death to divert attention from the Nirav Modi-PNB scam, the MNS workers have reportedly vandalised shops with Gujarati signboards in Vasai, Mumbai.


In his speech yesterday, Thackeray had reportedly mentioned how Vasai ‘feels like Gujarat’ these days. This is not the first time MNS has attacked people from other states in Maharashtra. MNS has regularly attacked migrant workers from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar and there have been reports of shops being vandalised for no displaying signboards in Marathi.

In July last year, too, it was reported that MNS workers had vandalised Gujarati signboards in Dadar since they felt the Gujarati signboards ‘sidelined’ Marathi language.

Survey shows West Bengal and Kerala worst in providing information to the public

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Survey shows West Bengal and Kerala worst in providing information to the public

Research by two NGOs has brought to highlight many gaping holes in the functioning of India’s Information Commissions (ICs). As per the revelations made by the “Report Card on Performance of Information Commissions in India” by Satark Nagrik Sangathan (SNS) and Centre for Equity Studies (CES), there are 1,99,186 pending applications in the 23 Information Commissions from whom data was sought.

The Information Commissions were established after the landmark 2005 RTI Act and the two NGOs sought information from the ICs themselves by filing RTI applications. A total of 169 RTI applications were filed with the Central Information Commission (CIC) and individual State Information Commissions (SICs). The information obtained showed some concerning statistics.

The assessment showed that as of December 2016, a total of 1,81,852 applications were pending. The total number had surged to a whopping 1,99,186 by the end of October 2017. UP the most populous state had 41,561 cases pending followed by Maharashtra at 41,178.

The SNS and CES then used the data for monthly disposal rate of the state ICs and number of pending applications to calculate the average time it would take for an application filed on November 1, 2017, to be disposed of by each state ICs. The results painted a grim picture.

The analysis showed that In West Bengal, it would take 43 years for an applicant to see his application disposed of and queries answered. While for Kerala the time was 6.5 years. Odisha followed next with more than 5 years average time period.


The data also revealed that several states have a vacant post of Information Commissioner for prolonged periods and in many cases, the SICs remains non-functional for months together. Reduced capacity was found to be prevalent among almost all the ICs. It also states that after the Chief Information Commissioners retire, the post remains vacant for months. The state of Andhra Pradesh which had a common SIC with the separated Telangana till May 2017, saw the IC become defunct after the chief retired and though the state government issued order to constitute a new SIC in Aug 2017, no commissioner has been appointed so far. Currently Maharashtra, Nagaland and Gujrat are without a Cheif Information Commissioner. In Kerala, a lone commissioner is in charge of handling the 14,000 currently pending applications.

According to the RTI Act, the SICs can impose a penalty on the Public Information Officers up to Rs 25000 for violations of duties. The data analysis has shown that though a total penalty of Rs 4.4 crores by 22 ICs during the period of review, the recovery is at a meagre 49.73 lakhs. The state ICs of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu & Uttar Pradesh did not provide information on penalties imposed and recovered.

Another concerning fact was that while the RTI act was all about transparency and availability of information to the public, 18 of the 19 ICs did not publish their annual report for 2016 on their websites. In fact, the Punjab SIC has not published an annual report after 2012, while Jharkhand, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh have not published annual reports since 2013.

In terms of the number of cases disposed of, the CIC remained at the top with 54,219 applications disposed of and UP followed at second place with 42,911.

While the communists and opposition, in general, blame the BJP for being opaque and denying the public their right to know, from this survey it appears that the public’s right to know is thwarted maximum in the two states that have a dense communist presence, West Bengal and Kerala. A whopping 43 years wait in West Bengal while 6 years 6 months in Kerala. Who is the fascist now?

1...7,2797,2807,281...7,677Page 7,280 of 7,677