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Truth about Modi government ‘taking credit’ for women travelling alone for Hajj

OpIndia Staff
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Truth about Modi government ‘taking credit’ for women travelling alone for Hajj

In November last year, it was reported that the Modi government had lifted the ban on Muslim women, aged above 45 years, travelling to Hajj without a male guardian (Mahram). The same was said by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his radio address Man Ki Baat yesterday.

While the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) objected to this move by the Modi government (their objection came only after Prime Minster mentioned it in his radio address to the nation), some journalists and ’eminent personalities’ have been peddling a totally different narrative:

As seen in the above image, an article published on India Today’s DailyO claims that Saudi Arabia and not the Modi government should be receiving credit for women being able to travel alone for Hajj. The article in the content quotes these guidelines provided by Saudi Arabia, when it comes to women Hajj travellers:

“Women over the age of forty-five (45) may travel without a mahram with an organised group. They must, however, submit a no-objection letter from her husband, son or brother authorising her to travel for haj with the named group. This letter should be notarised.”

Even though the article was giving credit to Saudi Arabia for letting women travel alone, it strangely didn’t mention as to when did the Saudis actually bring in such a reform.

A journalist associated with the Telegraph though claimed that the rule was changed by the Saudis, ‘last year’:


As a result of all this, many, such as this ‘journalist’ and senior Congress leader, decided to attack the Modi government:


So what is the truth of the matter? Did the Modi government unfairly claim credit for a reform, where he played no role in?

It is true that the government of India can not change the rules for entry into Saudi Arabia. However, unlike what is claimed by the Telegraph journalist, Saudi Arabia had not made any visa rule change ‘last year’ to enable women above the age of 45 to go to Hajj without a male guardian. Such a rule appears to have existed for long.

This article published way back in 2001, which sought to guide United States’ Hajj pilgrims about the procedures to get a visa for their pilgrimage, talks about this relaxation for women above 45 years of age.

Apart from this, even a 2012 CNN report talks about Saudi Arabia sending back 1000 Nigerian girls for not being accompanied with male guardian, stated that, “Saudi law requires each female pilgrim under the age of 45 years to have a male sponsor during the pilgrimage journey, regardless of nationality” i.e. a distinction for women above 45 years of age was available much before ‘last year’ as some journalists are claiming.

This ironically was also confirmed by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi, who said that such a regulation was issued ‘many years ago’ by Saudi Arabia:


Owaisi though contradicts himself when he blames Modi for taking credit while acknowledging that such a regulation was issued many years ago. Then shouldn’t have a Prime Minister changed the rules ‘many years ago’ to bring it in sync with Saudi visa rules? Why were rules not changed untill Narendra Modi became the Prime Minister?

This though raises another question, what ‘ban’ did the Modi government actually lift, when as per Saudi regulations there was no such ban at all?

First of all, rules have been changed for those applying through the Hajj Committee of India i.e. those seeking the Hajj subsidy and wanting to travel though the official travel channel between Saudi Arabia and India. These rules are framed by the Government of India, and not by the Saudi Arabia.

Kamal Farooqi, a member of the committee that recommenced to do away with the requirement of having a Mahram for women above 45 years of age, had said in October last year that this was done after consulting various stakeholders. Nowhere he said that this change in rule was required because of any change in visa rules by Saudi Arabia.

Further, if one checks the website of Embassy of Saudi Arabia where Hajj visa details are given, the clause about Mahram requirement has not been changed at least since 2013 (older snapshots are not available on archive.org and in all probabilities the rules would have been similar to those for other countries i.e. women above 45 years of age allowed without Mahram when traveling in groups).

So the claim that there was any “recent change” in visa rules specific to Mahram requirements for women above 45 years of age does not appear to be based on any documentary evidence. It is more likely a rhetoric to put Modi government in an embarrassing position.

Essentially, Saudi Arabia allowed Indian women above 45 years of age to travel in groups without a Mahram for many years, but the Hajj Committee of India had stricter rules. These rules could have been relaxed earlier, including during the UPA years, but was done only this year. And if Modi government is taking credit for it, it is not unfair.

Javed Akhtar’s Twitter meltdown should not be missed

Nirwa Mehta
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Javed Akhtar’s Twitter meltdown should not be missed

Lyricist Javed Akhtar has been spending his new year’s eve defending plagiarism charges for some of his blockbuster hits like Sholay in a full fledged Twitter meltdown that has now entered its third day.

It all started when Javed Akhtar gave a vile response to a Twitter user who was disappointed by Akhtar’s stand. Akhtar’s arrogant tweet got Twitter users riled up who pointed out to him that even his most celebrated work, Sholay, has parts which are lifted from various movies.


When a user pointed out a scene which seems to have been inspiration of the famous scene of Thakur family murder in Sholay, Akhtar wasn’t too happy.


When Twitter users pointed out that Akhtar should really be ashamed of plagiarising content for the classic film Sholay, he threw some more attitude around.


When another user pointed out the irony over Akhtar getting upset when Ram Gopal Varma directed the bizarre film Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag inspired from Sholay, when Sholay itself had scenes lifted from other films, Akhtar’s response reeked of arrogance.


After the ‘father’ jibe, he even did a ‘nephew’ taunt.


Rather than being humble and apologising for his abusive remarks, Akhtar continued his tripe on Twitter, assessing people’s IQ.


But as another user pointed out, perhaps the money couldn’t buy dignity.


This is not the first time Akhtar has had a rather public breakdown on social media. Earlier this year, the master of words Javed Akhtar had called Gold medal winning athletes as “hardly literate” persons. Just because they seemingly differed from his world view on an issue.  The same Javed Akhtar has been slammed on social media time and again for his blatant shows of hypocrisy (1)(2). More recently he was exposed on social media, as he tried to defend Triple Talaq by bringing in false equivalence.

Social media is indeed a great leveller.

Why we can do without the hypocrisy of Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson

Nithesh S
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Why we can do without the hypocrisy of Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson

Whenever , Gopalkrishna Gandhi picks up a pen to write , he somehow manages to produce articles that are filled with hypocrisy. Throughout his life, he has failed to call out the fraud of Jawaharlal Nehru and his daughter , who fooled the country by using his ancestor’s surname. When his political masters are in power, he enjoys their patronage. When his political masters are out of office, he indulges in blatant propaganda. If the Mahatma was alive today, he would have truly admonished, junior Gandhi’s behavior.

There are three important reasons why we must call out so called  pseudo-secular intellectuals like Gopalkrishna Gandhi. Firstly, they fail to criticize the Congress party for corruption during their tenure in office. Secondly, they shamelessly collude with the Congress party of the day, which is morally, ethically and ideologically bankrupt. Lastly, intellectuals like Mr Gopalkrishna Gandhi lack vision and original ideas about the future of India. They always piggy-back on the quotes of Mahatma Gandhi and Tagore or memories of independence movement to further their own political propaganda.

In the editorial of The Hindu titled On another New Year’s Day: Mahatma Gandhi’s ‘khorak’ a 100 years ago, he quotes a part of the speech given by M.K. Gandhi on 1st January 1918, in Ahmedabad:

It was about securing three basic necessities which he spelt out as: “Air, water and grains.” He spoke in Gujarati and his key sentence was: Hava pani ane anaj e khorakna mukhya tattvo chhe (air, water and grains are essential to human nourishment). If Swaraj, he said, means self-rule, then securing these three khorak means securing Swaraj. Explaining himself with typical concision, Gandhi said: “Air is free to all but if it is polluted it harms our health… Next comes water… From now on we must take up the effort to secure water. Councillors are servants of the people and we have a right to question them.”

Mr Gandhi goes on to write about climate change, water crisis and hunger in India. He gives credit to some of his activist-friends for their pro-farmer activism. And then, he plunges into his regular propaganda of intolerance, majoritarianism and polarization with these lines:

While these three essential khorak essential for India to ‘simply live’, as Mr. Sainath has put it, struggling for breath, what are we getting instead, and on a priority? Three other khorak: the hava of intolerance, the pani of polarisation and the anaj of uniformity. And why? Because these distract, they divert attention from the real life-and-death crises.  Intolerance, blowing strong since 2014, is likely to blow stronger in 2018. Polarisation, tried and tested in the 2014 election, then fielded formally in Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat, is likely to be tried with greater impunity in the elections due in 2018. And as for uniformity, the India of many-grained people, all secure in their plurality, is now being dispossessed by an India which believes in codes being uniform rather than civil.

Real life and death crises were existing even when Manmohan Singh was in office. They were there even when Gopalkrishna Gandhi was governor of West Bengal. As per 2011 census, income of 21.9% of the population was  below the poverty line [pdf]. In 2014, 18,452 villages did not have access to electricity. As per 2011 census, 53.1% of the households in India do not have a toilet in their homes.  Life and death issues are not new people under the present day BJP government. For a change, some good work is being done to address them.

Polarization was, and has been the favorite tool of INC. Sonia Gandhi’s famous phrase ‘maut ke saudagar’ was nothing but blatant polarization. Intolerance for organisations like RSS is deeply rooted among Congress leaders. Mr Gandhi’s attempt to stamp these traits as features of the BJP alone are a mockery of facts and logic.

Apart from the hollowness of Mr Gandhi’s analysis it is absolutely essential to assess the three khoraks on which Mr Gopalkrishna Gandhi and his pseudo-secular bandwagon survive on.

The Gandhi scion must have forgotten that he and his masters in the Congress party survive on the hava of dynasty. Without it, they would have failed to make it to the second page of any local newspaper. This hava  of Nehru-Gandhi dynasty is kept alive by servants of the durbar in media houses like NDTV. If not for these loyal journalists, nobody in their right minds would consider a person of Rahul Gandhi’s caliber as Prime Minister- material.

Mr Gopalkrishna Gandhi’s political masters in political establishment survive on the pani of pseudo-secularism. How else could a secular government get into perverse schemes like Haj subsidy. Which sane government would have reversed the Shah Bano judgement? Who has created vote banks in the name of BJP -scaremongering ? Which party’s MP argued in Supreme court in favour of the practice of Triple Talaq? The answers are well known. Mr Gandhi’s political masters have held on to power in the country using the policy of divide and rule, which was originally devised by the British.

The secular bandwagon to which Mr Gandhi belongs, survives on the anaj  of corruption and crony capitalism. Otherwise , how could they survive for so long in office ? Who sold out national resources like 2G spectrum and coal blocks? Who got kickbacks in Bofors scam and Agusta Westland episode ? Who is out on bail in the National Herald case ? The politicians whom Mr Gopalkrishna Gandhi serves have sowed the seeds of corruption deep into the political system of this country.

So, on the very first day of this year, I would like to say, no thanks to the advice and lectures of self-proclaimed left-liberal intellectuals screaming against intolerance, majoritarianism and polarisation in this country. No thanks, Mr Gopalakrishna Gandhi. This country can do without yet another hypocrite like you.

Muslim law board objects to Modi govt’s decision to let women go to Haj without male guardian

OpIndia Staff
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Muslim law board objects to Modi govt’s decision to let women go to Haj without male guardian

On 19th November, the Union Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, took to twitter to inform that, 4 Muslim women from the state of Kerala had applied to go to Haj without an accompanying male guardian who is also known as “Mehram”.

This as per Naqvi was a result of the Modi government lifting the ban on Muslim women travelling to Haj without a male guardian. This ban was lifted on women aged above 45. Earlier these women only got government permission for Haj travel, if they fulfilled that particular condition.

When a panel constituted by the Ministry of Minority Affairs had made the recommendation for the same, it was criticised by a number of Muslim clerics who termed it as “un-Islamic” and “against Sharia”. But it was accepted by the government anyway.

Now it seems that the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), isn’t happy with this decision of the Modi government and has objected to the same.

As reported, Maulana Abdul Hamid Azhari, the secretary of AIMPLB has stated that this is a religious matter and not something which can be brought up as a legislation to be passed in the Parliament.

As per Azhari, Islam states that a woman cannot travel for more than 78 miles or longer than three days without a male guardian to any place, including Haj. He also claimed that 99% of the Muslims follow their religion based on guidelines of religious authorities.

While addressing the possibility of a woman not having a male guardian or not being able to afford taking a guardian along, Azhari said that the woman as a result is ‘exempted’ from having to travel to Haj.

This isn’t the only time, the AIMPLB has decided to come in the way of reforms favouring the Muslim women.

The board had decided to put up a stiff resistance to protect the practice of instant Triple Talaq, which included engaging senior lawyer Kapil Sibal, to argue its case in the supreme court.

When the practice was eventually banned by the apex court, the AIMPLB decided to protest against the bill to criminalise Triple Talaq. If the bill is passed into a law by the Rajya Sabha they have already made their intention clear about approaching the Supreme Court against it.

Ishrat Jahan, one of the Triple Talaq petitioners, joins the BJP

OpIndia Staff
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Ishrat Jahan, one of the Triple Talaq petitioners, joins the BJP

Ishrat Jahan, one of the five petitioners in the landmark Supreme Court verdict which pronounced instant triple talaq invalid, joined the BJP yesterday in Howrah. Recently, the Lok Sabha has passed the Triple Talaq Bill which criminalises Triple Talaq. Jahan said she joined the BJP since it supported the cause she was fighting for.

Jahan had faced social boycott and character assassination in Howrah after the Supreme Court verdict invalidating instant triple talaq. Jahan was also being ostracised by her in-laws and neighbours in Howrah’s Pilkhana.

30 year old Jahan’s husband divorced her in 2015 from Dubai, over the phone and allegedly took away her 4 children. Thankfully, the children, who were allegedly taken to Ishrat’s husband’s relative’s place were later on traced by Kolkata Police. In her fight for social justice, she has faced financial losses and now she has to face abuses as she is called “dirty woman”, “enemy of men” and “anti-Islam”.

She had written a letter to West Bengal Chief Minister accusing the West Bengal Police of not providing enough safety and security to her. A copy of the letter was also sent to  Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu, West Bengal Governor K.N. Tripathi, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, the chairperson of National Commission for Women Lalitha Kumaramangalam and Howrah Police Commissionerate, among others.

TMC leaders Siddiqullah Chowdhary and Idris Ali had allegedly used derogatory words for Ishrat after the triple talaq verdict. The leaders, however, maintained that they had only voiced their opinion criticising the Supreme Court’s verdict and had not used abusive language for Ishrat.

The party leadership had since asked the TMC leaders to not voice any of their opinion on this subject matter without keeping the leadership in the loop.

In 2001, when Ishrat was 14, she was married in Bihar, where she and her husband lived before shifting to Pilkhana in Howrah. She was one of the five petitioners who filed a petition in the Supreme Court against triple talaq.

Since the August verdict, Ishrat has removed the naqab and shown her face to the world. “I realised that I am not a victim anymore. I want other women to see me and understand that if an ordinary woman like me can fight for her rights, so can they,” said Jahan, reported Times of India explaining the reason why she decide to remove her naqab.

Jahan had added that just a court verdict will not change anything unless the society and community brings about a change where people help a vulnerable and helpless victim instead of assassinating her character. She said instead of coming out in support of her, people had mocked and ridiculed her for standing up for justice.

Top lies spread by the mainstream media in the year 2017

Editorial Desk
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Top lies spread by the mainstream media in the year 2017

Year 2017 has been like every other year for Indian media. Imaginary reports, blatant lies, gross malicious misreporting have been the hallmark of the year, yet again. What was perhaps different this year, was the supposed alternate media too joined the main stream media in spreading malicious propaganda laced with lies. We bring to you, the Top 10 media lies of 2017:

1. The Jay Amit Shah story : Low on facts, high on innuendo

The leftist propaganda website ‘The Wire’ published a shoddy hit job against Amit Shah’s son, Jay Shah. The story was so shabby, that it took our team merely a few hours to counter this story and completely shatter the narrative that The Wire wanted to create. In fact, after our story was published, The Wire selectively altered its story multiple times to make it remotely believable and credible. This expose of ours became the most read story in our Media lies section.

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2. How journalists and politicians united to spread a lie about the new UP CM

Yogi Adityanath being announced as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh was unsurprisingly a major jolt for the secular liberal coterie which includes certain ‘journalists’ and politicians. As soon as this decision was made public, the coterie got busy is spreading lies about Yogi. One of those lies was how the Yogi Adityanath said that the dead body of muslim women should be raped. We had countered this lie, making it one of our top two exposes.

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3. NDTV and Nidhi Razdan conduct and entire debate based on fake news

Nidhi Razdan, the poor man’s Barkha Dutt is known for pushing fake news from a news channel, which is notorious for the same reasons. Her visceral hate for Narendra Modi is no secret. And to further that hate, sometimes, as an operational hazard, she resorts to lies. This time, Nidhi ran an entire debate based on absolute fake news. The topic of the debate was : “Eat what you order : Modi government to fix portions of food served in restaurants”. It didn’t take us very long to realise this was a blatant lie.

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4. Scroll spreads lies about Kabab shop closing down due to UP Govt’s ‘crackdown on meat’

When Yogi Adityanath decided to shut down illegal slaughterhouses, many people went batshit crazy. In that frenzy, Scroll, a leftist propaganda website, decided to publish a news article titled “Lucknow’s legendary Tunday Kababi downs its shutters as meat crackdown intensifies”. The article was incorrect on multiple levels. Firstly, there was no meat crackdown, and secondly, Tunday Kababi was only shut for one hour due to shortage of raw material. There was certainly no national emergency as it was made to sound. This article became one of our top exposes of 2017.

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5. MP EVM controversy mostly a result of low IQ journalists and vile politicians 

Democracy has died a million deaths ever since the BJP has gone on an electoral winning streak. Low IQ journalists and politicians have been repeatedly casting aspersions on how reliable EVMs are despite repeated clarifications from the Election Commission. One such lie was spread during the Madhya Pradesh polls and it didn’t take us much time to puncture holes in the story considering it was a shoddily crafted fairytale by low IQ journalists and vile politicians.

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6.  Media and politicians spread sensational lies about renewed Chinese aggression in Dolam

In June 2017 India and China were engaged in a stand off or sorts in the Dolam area. India displayed immense patience and a steely spine during the entire stand off. It finally for resolved after India and China both decided to withdraw troops. Of course, a diplomatic victory of India against China, with all the Chinese propaganda going around, was unpalatable to some usual suspects. By October, Indian Express’ Sushant Singh started spreading unsubstantiated lies about renewed Chinese aggression in that area. He was joined in by politicians in spreading this lie. @UnSubtleDesi busted these lies in a few hours.

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7. How lies were used to claim that PM Modi lied about GDP projections

At a function of Insitute of Company Secretaries of India, in October 2017, Prime Minister Modi said that RBI had predicted a 7.7% growth for India in the coming quarters. Journalists and Politicians got together to claim that the Prime Minister lied about these projections. We busted those lies making this article one of our top exposes of 2017.

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8. FactCheck : Can Banks gobble up your deposits as per the new proposed ‘bail-in’ Bill

Another lie that was spread far and wide by the media was that per the new ‘Bail In’ Bill, the banks would gobble up all the money that the common man has saved in bank accounts. This lie was aptly and comprehensively decimated by Ashutosh Muglikar.

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9. After OpIndia report, DNA updates misleading story on Dr Kafeel Khan

We had reported extensively about Dr. Kafeel Khan’s involvement in the Gorakhpur tragedy where many children died. We did so despite the Media cacophony exonerating Dr. Khan without even a thorough investigation or a hard look at the facts. Soon, DNA came out with a misleading report that insinuated that Dr. Kafeel Khan has been exonerated and he is “not a villain”. We busted the lies soon, as only a couple of charges had been dropped against him, while other remained. After our expose, DNA altered its headline.

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10. Tragedy scavenging by The Hindu after the Eliphinstone stampede

There was a tragic stampede at the Elphinstone station at Mumbai where many died and some were injured. But media persons, who indulge in tragedy tourism for the sake of TRPs, looked for something to milk in this also. Soon, The Hindu published a report that while a woman lay dying in the stampede, a man tried to molest her. The video that was plugged, was very clearly edited. Social Media soon questioned the veracity of these claims and Nirwa Mehta questioned The Hindu’s assertion.

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After our report, The Hindu retracted its story and issued an apology.

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After our expose, the I&B Ministry had also issued a show cause notice to The Hindu making these string of articles one of top Media exposes.

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In 2018, we hope to continue being Media watchdogs and striving to dispel myths, lies and propaganda spread by the Main Stream Media. Happy New Year folks!

BMC slammed for mercilessly destroying plants during its Kamala Mills demolition drive

OpIndia Staff
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BMC slammed for mercilessly destroying plants during its Kamala Mills demolition drive

On Friday, two upscale restrobars in Kamala Mills, Mumbai were ravaged by a fire which resulted in the death of 14 persons. As a result of the tragedy, the Shiv Sena led Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, decided to buckle up and order the safety audit of pubs and restaurants in the city. The civic body also started to demolish illegal structures in six parts of the city.

An illegal demolition drive also started in the Kamala mills area but the BMC officials soon came under the scanner for their unusual demolition choices:


During any demolition drive, the structures usually demolished are illegal building constructions, hazardous electric wiring among others. But these BMC demolishes in Kamala Mills decided that, potted plants too came under the purview of an illegal construction and ruthlessly decided to demolish them:


People as a result weren’t happy with the BMC and decided to react:


It wasn’t clear as to why the BMC officials couldn’t simply relocate these plants to a safe area, in a day an age when green spaces are fast disappearing from Mumbai. It also raises the question as to what laws were the plants violating by being present there, and whether they would come under the purview of ‘license raj’ in the future.

Gujarat Political Turbulence: Nitin Patel sulks over portfolio allocation, finally gets his way

OpIndia Staff
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Gujarat Political Turbulence: Nitin Patel sulks over portfolio allocation, finally gets his way

After photofinishing Gujarat Assembly elections held earlier this month with a seat tally in double digit figure of 99, as against 115 in 2012, the Gujarat deputy chief minister Nitin Patel will finally take charge of his office after sulking for few days over portfolio allocation.

Patel, who was earlier brooding over stripped of key portfolios of finance and urban development, had refused to take charge of office till his ‘prestige is restored’. Patel had even threatened to resign if the party leadership didn’t bring a solution to his concerns.

On Sunday, however, he finally assumed office as deputy Chief Minister of Gujarat after discussing with party leadership who agreed to give him ‘suitable departments’.


Patel had met RSS leaders and held talks with BJP President Amit Shah, who agreed that the process for allocation of his portfolios is on.


Meanwhile, other political parties and politicians came out to support Nitin Patel in breaking away from the BJP. Hardik Patel, who spearheaded the Patidar agitation two years back, and had explicit support of Aam Aadmi Party’s Arvind Kejriwal before he joined hands with Congress, even offered to ‘talk to Congress’ to get Patel a ‘good position’.


However, following assurances by Shah, Nitin Patel has ended his 3-day political drama and assumed office.

Mediacrook Twitter Suspension: Is Twitter India again targeting popular Right Wing accounts?

OpIndia Staff
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Mediacrook Twitter Suspension: Is Twitter India again targeting popular Right Wing accounts?

Mediacrooks and other popular twitter account suspended

During the end of 2016, reports had started to emerge that predominantly Right Wing accounts in India were soon getting suspended after criticising the Aam Aadmi Party.

This was also noted a few months after the aforementioned report, when a popular Right Wing user was suspended allegedly for questioning Kejriwal and anti-nationals. Things became slightly more brazen when it was seen that, a total of 7 ABVP accounts were suspended by Twitter. They were reinstated only after a heavy protest.

A few months down the line, Right Wing accounts were seen experiencing a new form of ‘apartheid’ when twitter started to deverify them citing ‘new guidelines’. One of this new policy’s first victim was Tommy Robinson from England.

Coming back to the present, judging by the events that transpired yesterday, this allegation of, “Twitter India targeting Right Wing accounts” might again start gaining traction.

As noticed by various twitter user, popular Right Wing accounts like @mediacrooks and @SZaidHamid were suspended on Saturday:

Of these two, @mediacrooks was also known for running a popular “Media watchdog” blog. @MediaCrooks is widely considered to be a trendsetter in building the ‘anti main stream media’ narrative. At a time when the Indian ‘right’ was at its nascent stage on Social Media, MediaCrooks fought the lies and propaganda that was continuously and maliciously spewed by the usual suspects through his incisive blogposts with razor sharp wit.

@SZaidHamid was popular parody account which used to crack jokes like this:

It isn’t yet clear as to what, ‘Twitter rules’ these twitter accounts were violating, which ‘warranted’ such a suspension and what exactly prompted the Twitter authorities to take such an extreme step.

Many twitter users were predictably miffed and decided to react:


It doesn’t really take a rocket scientist to figure out what might be going on here. Both accounts that have been suspended today were offensive. But the last time we checked, being offensive was a part of free speech, as argued by the very liberals who seems to celebrate these suspensions today. The very liberals who wanted ‘Bharat tere tukde honge’ to be covered under free speech and protested against the account suspension of a leftist bigoted troll who even celebrated the death of CRPF jawans, are today rejoicing as “abusive Mediacrooks” has been suspended. The ones who proudly stood for free speech absolutism, are today happy that limits have been set. Lines have been drawn. Boundaries declared. Which is, to say the least, amusing.

While it is true that @MediaCrooks was prone to being abusive at times, what one wonders if why the many celebrity handles, political and otherwise, who are regularly abusive have not been suspended yet, if this in fact, is Twitter’s policy? From Sanjay Rajoura, who calls himself a comedian, politicians like Digvijay Singh and Manish Tewari to abusive trolls like Swati Chaturvedi masquerading as journalists have used the choicest abuses on Social Media without facing consequences.

MediaCrooks almost weaponised words in a way very few have managed to do. He weaponised his words to hurt the liberals, the Lutyens elite, the pens for hire, the propagandists masquerading as journalists, and the ones who hid their hypocrisy behind the carefully crafted veil of neutrality. One may agree with him or not. One may like or dislike him. Fact remains, more than the offended right, he tore through the leftist and Islamist charade. As did the @SZaidHamid parody account that got suspended.

Biting sarcasm, razor sharp wit and a penchant for delivering the most brutal truth with a hint of humour is what these two handles stood for. The naked, unadulterated, bitter truth.

One recalls the immortal lines from the movie “A Few Good Men” :

Col Jessep: I’ll answer the question. You want answers?

LTJG Kaffee: I think I’m entitled to them.

Col Jessep: You want answers?!

LTJG Kaffee: I want the truth!

Col Jessep: You can’t handle the truth! You don’t want the truth because deep down in places you don’t talk about at parties.

The liberals of the world don’t want the truth because deep down in places, they don’t talk about the truth at parties. We use words like “honor,” “code,” “loyalty.” We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. They use them as a punch line. And thus, it would bode well if these self proclaimed free speech absolutists drop the charade. Their activism is hollow and self-serving. Perhaps, it would bode well, if their declared their ideological preference, the one that they fight for ever so quietly. Perhaps it’s time they accept what they truly stand for : Convenient speech. Not free speech.

2017 must be remembered for this life changing reform which impacts real Bharat

Vighnaraj Kuloor
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2017 must be remembered for this life changing reform which impacts real Bharat

The above tweet from Dr. Dinesh Arora, Founder Head of Rural Electrification Mission, which shows 7 people carrying an electricity pole and a 7-8 year old kid running with them, somewhere in the hills of Assam caught my imagination. I was that boy, back in 1982-83 in my remote village in Kerala – Karnataka border, running with the villagers as they carried electricity poles, dug pits to erect them and pulled the power lines from pole to pole. We kids used to look at KSEB (Kerala State Electricity Board) linemen, overseers and engineers as people who had descended from heaven to bless us with light!

It is not easy for most city dwellers and elitists of today to understand what transformation having access to electricity can bring to village houses and farms. I still remember me and my 3 elder siblings sitting next to the kerosene lamp reading and doing our homework. After one hour, our entire body would smell of kerosene smoke and inside the nostrils, you could easily notice a thick black layer of soot. You bend a little more while you read, purr… the tip of our hair would touch the flame and give out dirty keratin burning smell. Come rainy season, thousands of flies and insects would descend around the lamp and make our lives hell.

It is a shame that what I went through as a child 35 years back is the story crores of households even today, thanks to the family that ruled the nation for most of the last 70 years. The apathy of these rulers towards the real “gareeb” of this nation is abominable. They had schemes for everything under the sun but in reality, nothing happened on the ground.

This is why out of all the work that is being done by Narendra Modi government, the one that has caught my imagination is Grameen Vidyutikaran Mission under Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grama Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY). Anyone with little exposure the rural areas, especially the far-flung villages would know that the real task is to get the poles, power lines & transformers in and have the first few houses electrified. Once that is done, it is not a herculean task to electrify other houses in the village if the intent is there.

As on April 1, 2015, nearly 68 years after India’s independence, 18,452 villages, i.e. about 3% of all villages in this country had no access electricity, a basic amenity. Modi and his Power Minister in 2015, Piyush Goyal, seem to have taken this situation as a challenge. I have been tracking the progress under DDUGJY from the day the Garv App and the website www.garv.gov.in were launched and the progress made has been commendable.

The first thing that power ministry seemed to have done was to collect actual data on the current situation. Once the current situation was understood, the ministry seemed to have worked closely with different state governments (of different political parties) on rolling out the plan. There was complete data transparency up to the village level. Names and contact numbers of Grameen Vidyut Abhiyantas (GVAs, who played a key role in rollout) were accessible to everyone. The central government also successfully kept the motivation levels of the GVAs high.

The outcome is there for everyone to see. As I write this article, Bihar has just announced that all of its 2747 unelectrified villages have been electrified today. The race to zero that started from 18,452 has now reached 1,635 (as on December 27, 2017). The table below gives the progress made so far.

Well begun is half done. Next challenge for Modi government would be to provide access electricity to every rural household under Saubhagya scheme by 2019. As on October 11, 2017, of the 18.02 crore rural households, a shocking 4.13 crore (23%) have no access to electricity. Can the success of the step 1 be replicated in step 2?

One may love or hate Narendra Modi for his own reason, you have to give him the credit for changing the status quo when it comes to changing lives of crores of “gareeb” people of this country. He and his Government may be credited with various reforms, such as GST or Insolvency Code or other actions, but in my view, this one scheme trumps them all. While other schemes may improve the situation for people who already have it easy, rural electrification is one scheme which simplifies life for those, who are suffering the most.

They are the ones who do not have any lobbying bodies. They are the ones who do not get called on prime time debates. They are the ones who are living decades behind their counterparts in cities. They are the real India, they are Bharat. For every village that gets connected today, 100s of kids will get an opportunity to give a fair shot at life, like me. To me, this is “Antyodaya” in the real sense.

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