There are 2 false myths being propagated in Britain right now about @BBC's documentary "India - The Modi Question". 1. It is damaging to communal harmony in Britain. 2. It has turned 1.4 billion Indians against the UK #Bollocks. @BBC needs to stand firm.
If Indians are turning against the UK, we'd see a sharp tailing off of university admissions applications from India. Race relations are fine, all the Govt needs to do is clamp down on the extremist elements from BOTH sides. ask @Hindus4HRUK who these elements are
The other false story being put about by the right wing press and TV anchors (they're worse than Tucker Carlson) in India is that :@RishiSunak rubbished the BBC docu-series and defended India's Prime Minister in @HouseofCommons. That is false. He did nothing of the kind.
In reply to the final Question during PMQs last week The Prime Minister, @RishiSunak said, see next tweet:
""The UK Government’s position on that is clear and long standing, and it has not changed. Of course, we do not tolerate persecution anywhere, but I am not sure that I agree at all with the characterisation that the hon. Gentleman [Imran Hussain, Bradford east] has put forward."
The answer was effectively a bland non-reopsonse to the Question pout by @Imran_HussainMP , MP for Bradford East which was: (taken directly from the record in Hansard)
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India is not in great company by banning the now famous BBC Documentary. 1. BBC correspondents were banned by apartheid régime of South Africa. 2. Mugbae banned he BBC from Zimbabwe for eight years until a year after the 2008 elections. 3. Myanmar banned it 2007-2011
Other countries to have banned restricted BBC include:
Uzbekistan, China, and Pakistan.Iran vblocked the Persian language service for a while. The BBC News website was made available in China again in March 2008, but as of October 2014, was blocked again.
In June 2015, the Rwandan government placed an indefinite ban on BBC broadcasts following the airing of a controversial documentary regarding the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Rwanda's Untold Story, broadcast on BBC2 on 1 October 2014.
I think it is a shame that the British PM has been so dragged into a controversy in India and among Indian dispora about the Gujarat riots. The BBC documentary was historical and factual. It reported events from archival footage and first person accounts from all sides.
It was the last Q in the weekly #PMQs that the Prime Minuister faces every week. Basically the MP was inviting the PM to agree with him his own diplomats' assessment of the Gujarat riots. The PM, @RishiSunak replied:
It's important rto understand the niceties and the ultimate futility of PMQs as a vehicle to get the PM to give a strauight answer. That never happens except when it is a 'friendly question'. The 'hon. Gentleman' in @RishiSunak's carefully worded answer refers to Imran Hussain
Do read this thread. The court order that pulled down 14 articles in The Wire Science (incl one by me) was issued in response to a complaint by @BharatBiotech. But here's the thing. The Court's order was issued WITHOUT the complaint being even SERVED on the respondents.
My article - the one that @BharatBiotech listed in their complaint as somehow defamatory in fact said nothing about Covaxin that was not already published by BB and @ICMRDELHI scientists either in a pre-print or in a proper journal. It was in fact sparked by this tweet.
@BharatBiotech@ICMRDELHI The Lancet paper that ICMR was heralding as something of a REMARKABLE validation of Covaxin was in fact the same as the pre-print of a Phase 1/2 study publisbhed as a pre-print paper months earlier.
So what was the ICMR so keen to jump up and down about it?
Hindu pride and India's 'Soft Power must not be based on and cannot be built upon lies and fakery. Hinduism is bigger and better than that. A thread. @NDTV ran this story
It showed a tweet on the occasion of #Pongal (#Sankranti) by British Prime Minister @RishiSunak (see pic), and claimed that the PM hosted a meal for his staff that was served by men in #veshti on banana leaves in the traditional style.
The original source for the story in @ndtv appeared to be a tweet by the BJP Rajya Sabha MP, Sonal ManSingh.
She is a noted Odissi classical dancer. She tagged the Indian prime Minister and her Party's official handle. It uncertain who she meant by "UK PM Office and defence"
This view is WRONG.
But it is hugely popular among many educated Indians.
We need to combat such simplistic thinking that
a) mixes up cause and effect
b) attacks the socially marginalised groups on the basis of a populist trope.
The fact is:
India is not poor because not enough people pay direct taxes.
Rather
Not many Indians pay direct taxes because India's economy leaves them too poor to come anywhere close to the income threshold at which they are liable for income tax.
Such inversions of cause and effect are not at all unusual in popular thinking. For instance we think that pearls are expensive because men have to dive in deep waters to find them. Think a bit: men risk their lives and dive deep for pearls BECAUSE they fetch a high price.
If India's expanded purchases of Russisn crude at heavily discounted prices led to cheaper fuel for Indian citizens, that could at least be justified as 'enlightened self interest'. BUT, I understand the rise in purchases of Russin crude parallels the export of refined petrol
The biggest Refinery is in '#Jamnagar owned and run by Reliance. Are they the only ones to benefit from India's Russian crude adventure?