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meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
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18 Jan, 10 tweets, 6 min read
SCOOP: BARC hired a social media agency which allegedly offered services like "a troll army of verified handles".

#BARCleaks reveal how ex-CEO and ex-COO initiated trolling attacks against critics and journalists.

A story by me and @anukritimalik_
newslaundry.com/2021/01/18/bar…
INSTANCE #1

Ex-BARC CEO Partho Dasgupta asks Arnab Goswamy if he can get someone to troll a critic. He suggests Minhaz Merchant and Aditya Raj.

"Working" is what Arnab says.
INSTANCE #2

Two tweets by @rahulkanwal are shared with a very specific request: "Ask Vikas to get him trolled."

That is immediately shared with Vikas by Romil Ramgarhia, ex-COO of BARC.

Who is this Vikas? Read the story people. 😆
INSTANCE #3

Ex-COO Romil asks 'Vikas' to be ready to troll some damaging reports that are coming out about Republic's ratings.

He suggests pointing a finger at @TimesNow

READ: newslaundry.com/2021/01/18/bar…
Oh yes and on the side, Vikas was constantly sharing Republic Network's plans to boost ratings with Partho Dasgupta, who was the then CEO of BARC.

Conflict of interest max.
INSTANCE #4

After he quit as CEO of BARC, Partho wanted an agency which offered "troll army of verified handles" to share with a client. Romil offers him the agency that BARC had hired.

We found the agency and got a response too: newslaundry.com/2021/01/18/bar…
The weirdly funny thing is, this is how the name of the agency was saved in Partho Dasgupta's contacts.

Making it very obvious what was the intention, to put it mildly.
As we dive deeper and deeper into the #BARCleaks data, we are finding out how incredibly murky the ratings system of TV news is.

Conflict of interest, sure. But it gets worse than that.

Many more revealing stories, coming soon on @newslaundry.

newslaundry.com/2021/01/18/bar…
SUPPORT INDEPENDENT MEDIA AND PAY TO KEEP NEWS FREE!

Because when the advertisers pay, the advertisers are served. When you pay, YOU are served.

Do support our work: newslaundry.com/subscription
BTW, this is Saheb Singh's (from Agency 09) full response. It is a also part of the story.

Do read the FULL STORY: newslaundry.com/2021/01/18/bar…

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More from @Memeghnad

meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
15 Dec 20
One day, in a certain school, a notification was issued.

"ALL STUDENTS WILL MANDATORILY SHAVE THEIR HEADS AND WEAR BANDANAS WITH A SWASTIKA ON IT IN THE SCHOOL PREMISES."

Students and parents were like WTF just happened?
A delegation of parents tried to talk to the administration, telling them that it's unfair and they just cannot make such rules without consulting anyone.

The admin was like, "Oh it's alright we can discuss this."

"Discuss what," asked the parents.
Administration was like, "We can discuss the length of hair, the color of the bandana, when students have to wear it etc. We're damn flexible!"

"But that's not the point! We want this whole notification to be scrapped. It's complete bullocks!"

Admin:
Read 9 tweets
meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
5 Nov 20
Arnab is that babysitter who is hired when going to restaurants.

Whenever the child citizens start asking annoying questions to the adult government fam, they scream, "YOU HAD ONE JOB ARNAB! TAKE CARE OF THE KIDS!?!"

Then Arnab takes the kids to slide down the slide of bigotry.
After the kids are bored of the slide of bigotry, he'll make them get on the ideological see-saw.

After that, comes the sandpit of conspiracies where kids can make up their own fun theories.

Meanwhile, the adult govt fam are coming up with important plans like electoral bonds.
Every once in a while, Arnab will amuse the kids by telling em horror stories about how the children in this OTHER restaurant are absolute bullies, ugly and scary.

He tells them how the adult govt fam will take care of those horrible children & teach em a lesson.

Kids be like:
Read 4 tweets
meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
3 Nov 20
Sakal Media group -- owned by the Pawar family -- has been carrying out a relentless campaign of harassment against my colleague @tweets_prateekg.

Why?

Because he reported how they laid off their employees and violated government directives.
newslaundry.com/2020/11/03/how…
First, the Police showed up at his house to arrest him. They said @tweets_prateekg has 'cunningly' used Sakal's logo.

Next, after Prateek got anticipatory bail, they are trying to seize his laptop. They refuse to show him the order and say "verbal" order is enough to do so.
When @tweets_prateekg went to complete legal formalities, the SHO said, "You think you can damage Sakal? Sakal can buy 50 reporters like you. They are too big and you aren’t even a journalist. You don’t have a press like Sakal. What is Newslaundry, it is just an online thing.”
Read 5 tweets
meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
10 Oct 20
"You know what will fix this country? A dictator."

If you belong to a middle class upper caste family, you must have heard this line being uttered often.

You know why they say it so confidently?

Because the basic assumption is that this dictator is *always* on their side.
Those who say "need a dictator" think that they are the ones who are being good citizens while others aren't.

In their heads, the rowdy folk who lack discipline need to be "fixed" by using force.

This is a sign that the people who want dictatorship are ok with being slaves.
When you ask them, "alright so what do you think this dictator of yours should do to fix things?"

They'll be like, "Oh I don't know. But *somebody* will know. It's their job not mine. I toh just fill excel sheets all day."

So convenient, no?
Read 4 tweets
meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
9 Oct 20
The first sign of insecurity in a person is when you point out their mistakes, they say it's an international conspiracy.
Teacher: "Why didn't you do your homework?"

Me: "Mem this is an international conspiracy to malign me."
Mom: "Did you come home drunk last night?"

Me: "Mom this is an international conspiracy to cripple my faculties and influence my behavior. I feel maligned. :("
Read 4 tweets
meghnad 🔗 Profile picture
9 Oct 20
Storytime!

There is this restaurant. It's quite popular, especially for its Tandoori Chicken dish.

The restaurant owners ask their chefs to add copious amounts of masala to the dish, to make it more delectable.

Customers flock to it for that reason.
Another restaurant opens up in the neighborhood, and it wants to sell Tandoori Chicken too!

This particular restaurant decides to add some food coloring to it, along with the copious amounts of masalas.

Customers are impressed and then they start flocking to the new one!
And then another restaurant opens up nearby, and this one wants to sell Tandoori Chicken too!

Clearly, there's a lot of demand for it. Or so they assume.

This restaurant uses masalas, adds food color but also gives salad on the side as a bonus.

Customers now flock to this one!
Read 9 tweets

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