Hindi news media has long been an undisguised ‘kar sevak’ of #Hindutva in the gau belt. With #UPElections2022 round the corner, the line between government and party, editorial and advertorial, and journalism and propaganda has all but vanished, as owners eye a windfall. (1/3)
Exhibit A: ‘Dainik Jagran’ (2/3)
Exhibit B: ‘Amar Ujala’ (3/3)
As governments buy the silence and acquiescence of media with thousands of crores of advertising, the only resistance to this shameless abuse of taxpayers’ money is coming from unattached journalists and commentators using social media. #UPElection2022
All is maya: The @YouTube channel of 4PM that showed the thin crowds at an @AmitShah rally in Uttar Pradesh, and captured the bulldozer threat of @myogiadityanath, suddenly goes missing. Padma Bhushan @sundarpichai, please to note. @editor_sanjay
“Don’t publish anything against @myogiadityanath on the front page. Don’t give space to @yadavakhilesh inside. We will take care of all your expenses”: Sanjay Sharma, the editor of the Lucknow daily ‘4PM’, explains the genesis of the death of his @YouTube channel. @Editor__Sanjay
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Donald Trump's squeeze on USAID has sent tweetiyas into a tizzy, as their pet fantasy of a "foreign hand" trying to interfere in elections through NGOs receives the loony validation they crave.
Have they heard of what a CIA spy once revealed of their puppeteers, the RSS? (1/10)
John Smith was a US spy based in Delhi in the 1950s
When he defected to the Soviet Union in October 1967, he wrote a series of articles for a Russian weekly 'Literaturnaya Gazeta'
He revealed RSS's "close ties with CIA" to overthrow the Congress govt of Jawaharlal Nehru (2/10)
Besides the plot to dislodge Nehru, Smith claimed:
🕉️ CIA had provided "large sums of money" for RSS's anti-cow slaughter rally in 1966
🕉️ The attempt to assassinate Congress president K. Kamaraj had been the work of RSS
M.S. Golwalkar was the RSS chief at the time. (3/10)
A tailor from Poona who was also a journalist. An Editor, who, at 5.17 pm on 30 Jan 1948, crushed the Soul of India and smashed the cliche that the pen is mightier than the gun.🧵
The journalism of Godse offers a view of his mind, motives and methods---and his shadowy mentors.
In his superb biography ‘Gandhi’s Assassin’, author Dhirendra K. Jha shows how newspapers helmed by Godse laid the ground to kill India's greatest Editor-in-Chief. (2/15)
In 1943, Godse and his smoking, drinking, womanizing partner Narayan Apte, also a Brahmin, felt the need to launch a newspaper for 3 reasons.
🕉️ To create a source of income
🕉️ To propagate the idea of Hindu ‘rashtra’
🕉️ To make up for the lack of media coverage of Hindu outfits (3/15)
90 years ago, today—27 February 1933—the German Parliament (Reichstag) was burnt down. Adolf Hitler had been appointed as Chancellor three months earlier; national elections were due in six days. The arson was blamed on communists, but it was an inside job by the Nazis.
A 24-year-old Dutch communist was held responsible and sentenced to death for the #ReichstagFire. But in reality Nazi storm troopers—guided by Joseph Goebbels—had used a tunnel connecting Parliament with the President’s residence to scatter gasoline and self-igniting chemicals.
Hitler’s dictatorship began the day after #ReichstagFire, He got the President to sign a decree for the “Protection of the People and the State”. It dispensed with constitutional protection of all political, personal, and property rights. Opposition was jailed. Media was stifled.
Jo Johnson, the brother of former UK prime minister @BorisJohnson, has resigned from the board of Elara Capital—a London-based investment firm 99% of whose holdings are Adani stocks.
About time @JoJohnsonUK revealed more on how he ended up at a company linked to Ketan Parekh.
Boris Johnson visited Adani headquarters in April 2022.
Jo Johnson joined Elara in June 2022.
The timing could just be a coincidence. But what kind of background checks did Jo Johnson—a former India correspondent of ‘Financial Times—do before lending his name to the firm?
@FT reports that when Jo Johnson joined Elara last June, the firm intended to tap his expertise on investing in technology and education.
In his statement, Jo Johnson says he hoped to make a contribution to UK-India trade and investment ties.
Adani bought the Roys’ stake in @ndtv by buying up Vishvapradhan Commercial Pvt Ltd (VCPL), from two shareholders: Nextwave Televentures and Eminent Networks, for Rs 114 crore.
This gave him 29%.
3️⃣ VCPL, Nextwave and Eminent share the same 4th floor address in Gurgaon.
The common director in all three companies with the same director identification number (00548276) is a Anil Kumar Jain.
Is he an Ambani man or a front? Jain sits on more than boards.
Does India’s “most gifted businessman” @gautam_adani have a sense of humour? He has acquired 99.5% of the 29% stake of @ndtv founders Prannoy and Radhika Roy through a subsidiary called “Vishvapradhan”. Hopefully not a portmanteau of Vishwaguru and Pradhan Sevak.
Adani Media Networks Ltd CEO @sanjaypugalia is quoted as saying “AMNL seeks to empower Indian citizens, consumers and those interested in India, with information and knowledge” by acquiring #NDTV.
As a media watcher who reads ‘Manufacturing Consent’ every night, do you think?
“This is a baseless rumour. Radhika and Prannoy Roy are not in discussions, nor have been, with any entity for a change in ownership or a divestment of their stake in NDTV”
@ndtv clarification to BSE. So, has Adani made the open offer after a deal with Mukesh Ambani?