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Sena to defend Tamil refugees

December 13, 2019

An old slogan comes back to nibble Shiv Sena, their historical ‘Bajao Pungi-Hatao Lungi’ campaign launched by Bal Thackeray decades ago forced the present generation of Thackerays’ to change their stand against the South Indians. The presence of a large number of South Indian voters in Aaditya Thackeray’s constituency, Worli will be the deciding factor of his political fortunes time and again. To appease his voters, Aaditya was forced to sport a lungi (south Indian attire). Beyond that, now the Sena is advocating the inclusion of Tamil Hindu refugees in citizenship (Amendment) Bill. With time, Shiv Sena’s politics has changed from opposing South Indians in Maharashtra to now backing them.

In the Rajya, Sabha Shiv Sena attacked its former ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) during the discussion on Citizenship (Amendment) Bill (CAB) and staged a walkout ahead of the voting. The CAB will provide citizenship to persecuted minorities – Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Christians and Parsis who got into India from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Sena took a U-turn after the Congress imposed pressure ahead of the CAB debate in Rajya Sabha. It was learnt that the Congress might pull out of the Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) in Maharashtra. In the Lok Sabha, Shiv Sena had supported the CAB as 18 of their MPs voted in favour of the bill.

In the 60’s when the Shiv Sena was formed, it had taken an aggressive stand against the South Indians. The party used to claim that South Indians were snatching the jobs in Mumbai. This political outfit was formed with an objective to provide justice to the sons of the soil. During the 60s and 70s the South Indians occupied jobs in Mumbai and government spaces thereby creating hatred among the local Marathi residents. The Sena which had released its first manifesto had completely opposed the presence of South Indians in Mumbai. The party also had given instructions against employing people from Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

Bal Thackeray had even opposed buying Tamil Nadu state lottery tickets. He also insulted them by calling them ‘Yendugendu wallahs”. With the passage of time, there was a shift in Sena’s stand against South Indians. In the year 2016, Sena was reported to have offered support to Siva Senai a Sri Lanka Hindu organisation opposing conversion to Buddhism. The party followed hardcore Hindutva ideology for expanding its foothold beyond Maharashtra.

The opposition has labelled the CAB as “unconstitutional” stating that the bill violates Article 14 of the Indian constitution. Moreover, the criticism largely focuses on the exclusion of the Muslims community in the CAB. Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut pointed out that the bill doesn’t have any provisions for Tamil Hindu refugees from Sri Lanka. However, along with him, public figures including Art of Living founder Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and Kamal Haasan have highlighted the struggle of Tamil Hindus refugees who escaped the persecution in Sri Lanka.

It is interesting to note that Sena which once ran a campaign against South Indians, especially Tamils, in Maharashtra is now highlighting the plight of Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka.

People like Bal Thackeray have no place in 21st century

Vaidehi Taman

December 13, 2019

The stance of Balasaheb Thackeray against the South Indians who started out as a cartoonist and later went to form Shiv Sena in 1966 was clear in his speeches and columns that he wrote in his weekly magazine Marmik. Often cited as a great orator, Thackeray targeted South Indians for their growing influx in Mumbai and demanded that preference be given to the original Marathis. He referred to the South Indians as ‘Lungiwala’ and ‘Madrasis’ in a derogatory manner. The Shiv Sena created by Thackeray attacked South Indians in the 1960s and 70s, and vandalised their restaurants and homes. In 2008, Biharis and UPites living in Mumbai (the bhaiyyas who eke out a livelihood as milk and newspaper vendors, taxi drivers etc.) were described as infiltrators and attacked, their taxis smashed, and several beaten up. Muslims were also vilified. This, of course, created a vote bank for Thackeray, based on hatred.

Later, Balasaheb met Karunanidhi and then stopped the opposition and agitation against the South Indians. Now we are in the early 2020s. The Shiv Sena is neither against the South Indians nor against Muslims because their political agenda does not permit them to sustain with such hate. An old slogan got revived when Aaditya Thackeray sported a lungi. It was his latest experiment to connect with voters. The electoral debut of Aaditya, the first member of his family to take the poll plunge, made Mumbai’s Worli the most talked about seat and all eyes were on how he fares. Well, after Aaditya’s win the Thackerays’ realised that the hate politics will not fetch them a fortune. Here comes appeasing all those sectors against which once they strained attacks.

Uddhav Thackeray is not much of a philosopher or thinker. He was there as the Shiv Sena Pramukh only and only because he is Balasaheb Thackeray’s son. Aaditya has future at the party only because he is the son of Uddhav Thackeray and grandson of Balasaheb. He has displayed good organisational skills but his thinking is confused and his political strategy is poor. Nobody (including Uddhav) knew at the time of formation of Maharashtra Govt in 2014 whether Sena would be backing the BJP govt. Again nobody knew what share Sena was going to get. Even at the time of the voting, nobody was sure what exactly Sena did. They were expected to sit with the opposition judging by the severity of criticism of BJP. Uddhav never bothered to clarify.

Uddhav never surprised people with his attacks on BJP and Modi, in spite of staying in the alliance. No one was really surprised when he broke the alliance and joined hands with Congress and NCP. As Shiv Sena is known to be a communal party, even the Congress is on the same lines of ideology. Congress poses as secular just for Muslim votes. It has aligned with the Muslim league in Kerala which is out and out a communal party. It has supported Abdullahs in Kashmir. So many examples can be given to nullify the secularism of this party. Even Muslims understood it and started voting for any alternative that came their way (SP, BSP, TMC etc.). Balasaheb was called Hindu Hriday Samrat.

He openly accepted that Babri Masjid was demolished by his Shiv Sainiks when BJP stalwarts shirked from doing so. In the Bombay riots, Shiv Sena was at the forefront in defending Bombay. It was not a secular party by any means. In the recent past, Sena has diluted its Hindutva to suit its new stance and to fit in with the other two parties in a new alliance. It is political parties and leaders mainly from Congress and opposition parties who are defining and giving different meanings for secularism. Congress has been the most communal party since independence till date and from Mahatma Gandhi to the present Gandhis.

Does their pro-Muslim and appeasement politics not come under communalism? With vote bank politics, all opposition parties are going in for appeasement politics only for getting the Muslim vote. Shiv Sena, though had earlier Hindu ideology, now, after getting the vote through Hindu ideology with utter selfishness for the sake of power and being power mongered, has now made complete U Turn and joined with anti-Hindu forces and become totally communal now. Congress, the ideology of the party would never change from communalism to secularism. It is most unfortunate that beyond religion, most of the political parties are dividing the people on the basis of castes and sub castes, for example Vokkaligas and Lingayats in Karnataka Reddys and Kammas in Andhra and Telangana, Yadavs and others in Uttar Pradesh. We could see some kind of awareness in the electorate in the Parliament Elections wherein at least small percentage of people cast their votes shedding the basis of caste and religion and I am sure that in the years to come we shall move more in this direction.Recently, nobody knew how Sena is going to vote for the No Confidence motion. A whip was issued to vote to support Modi govt and hastily withdrawn. Finally, they remained absent.

Maratha reservations: again no one is sure what Shiv Sena’s stand is. They opposed it initially and later on supported it if there is no violence. Only one consistency I have noted is that Sharad Pawar is a persona non grata and so is Narayan Rane. Whatever Narayan Rane proposes Sena automatically opposes it. The party staked everything to defeat Rane twice. He was finally saved politically only by getting a nomination to the higher house. Sena has made it impossible for him to win democratically. That’s the only plus and consistent point I can think of. But that does not mean Sena lost any popularity. Throughout it was contesting in alliance with BJP and taking away lion’s share of seats, by bullying BJP. BJP had to cave because of circumstances. After the two parties started contesting separately, the true picture is revealing. Sena secured 17.2 per cent votes and 63 seats in Maharashtra assembly elections and 84 seats in BMC with 37 per cent votes, whereas BJP secured 27.8 per cent and 122 seats. In BMC it secured 36 per cent and 82 seats. When we study these it comes to light that SS has over estimated itself.

Now having come to know that the Shiv Sena wants to woo South Indians and Muslim voters, this clearly indicates greed has taken over to the ideologies of their party. Uddhav is weak minded and not as strong as his father. Sena was never a secular party, owing to circumstantial pressure it is acting pseudo secular. Bal Thackeray had opposed the name change of Marathwada University to Dr. Ambedkar University. Before this movement, Sena had no presence in Marathwada. During this movement SS literally killed around 10 Dalits to suppress their demands. Moreover, Bal Thackeray had said that ‘these people do not have flour to eat and why do they need university in their name’. That was his feeling for the deprived Hindus.

Ironically SS made political alliance with RPI [the Party of Dalits] a few years back ago. Bal Thackeray openly used to say that his politics is meant for the 67 percent population [33% are Dalits]. That was his feeling for the deprived Hindus. SS has now made an alliance with RPI [a political party of Dalits]. Bal Thackeray opposed Pakistani cricketers to enter India. Surprisingly Javed Miandad entered India, entered Maharashtra, entered Mumbai and also Matoshree [Bal Thackeray’s residence at Mumbai] had a cup of tea and went back to Pakistan very safely to attend the marriage ceremony of his kid with Dawood Ibrahim’s kid. That was his power. SS discriminated the different classes within Hindus. It’s a complete misunderstanding that political parties have ideologies. Each one of them says they want to serve Indians but all of them actually loot India. Other than the politician nobody is making money. So the economy is all about who paid how much amount to whom? The common man has been wiped out of the plan. He is just a dumb voter.

(Any suggestions, comments or dispute with regards to this article send us on feedback@www.afternoonvoice.com)

Police bust call center racket, arrest 9

Hema Singh

December 13, 2019

The Tardeo police busted a call center racket and arrested nine people who were part of a gang that duped people. According to police, a resident of the area, Jitesh Parikh filed a complaint at the Tardeo police station stating that in May, he was duped by the call center of Rs. 3.5 lakh. The criminals posed as officials of an insurance company.

As per the complainant, the accused had lured him with the activation of his policy and asked him to pay the amount. The police officer said that the victim was also promised that he would receive the maturity proceeds on its maturity. To activate the policy, Parikh had to pay the amount. And in return, he would get Rs 7 lakh if he paid some more money to revive the policy.

Later on, the said amount was deducted from the complainant’s account. But he did not receive any amount from the company. Following this, he lodged a complaint. After that, the police checked all the transactions and with help of the cyber cell, the accused were tracked down from Delhi and Faridabad respectively.

Assad and Kurds can peacefully co-exist

Web Team

December 13, 2019

The Kurds have brokered a deal with the President Bashar Al-Assad government that saw the Syrian Arab Army returning for the first time to the areas controlled by the Kurds which they left since the early days of the civil war. Regime forces entered the provinces of Hasakah and Raqqa. Moreover, Assad forces also took over symbolically important city of Kobane, in the remote north-eastern countryside of Aleppo. There is growing concern among the Kurdish people that Assad’s re-entry into north-eastern Syria signals the beginning of the end of seven years of Kurdish autonomy in the area. These concerns are not totally baseless as in past Damascus had deprived thousands of Kurds of citizenship rights, banned their language and clamped down on Kurdish political activity. But lot of things has changed in Syrian political landscape since the start of civil war in 2011. Kurds even after facing immense pressure from Turkey now are better armed and organised and Syrian government is also not that much strong which it used to be before the civil war. In the post war Syria Assad and Kurds can peacefully coexist as there is lot of scope for mutual cooperation.

Syria’s Baathist state and Kurds have broadly stayed out of each other way during the conflict, despite occasional clashes. There was always a tacit understanding between President Assad and Kurds with regard to the administration of the region from which the Syrian army withdrew in 2012. For example, the state government employees serving in this region continued receiving salaries from Damascus and the regime controls the airport in Kurdish-dominated city of Qamishli and maintained some security centres in the city. This basic understanding can be used for future detailed negotiations. Though Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has vowed to take back “every inch” of his country, he still lacks the forces to do it and more than eight years of war has severally damaged the Syrian armed forces. If the battle harden Kurdish forces can be integrated with Syrian army it will be a great added advantage to Damascus. The Kurds needs help from the Assad forces to protect them from Turkey’s onslaught and the Syrian Arab Army will find Kurds essential for ruling north Syria and policing against both rebels and ISIS attack. Moreover, Assad and Kurds have one common enemy i.e. Turkey. Kurds see Ankara as an existential threat and Assad considers Turkey the biggest supporter of the Syrian armed opposition against him. Assad and Kurds can jointly stop Turkey expansionist policies in Northern Syria. A real understanding between the Kurds and the Syrian state would definitely worry Ankara.

But to reach certain accommodation both the parties have to accept the truth. For Kurds it is a hard reality that under current circumstances when they have Turkey standing on their head and they are left alone by their ally. They have to abandon the demands for extensive autonomy within a decentralised federal state in Syria and the preservation of the Kurdish forces as an independent military force as these demands will never be accepted by Damascus. On the other hand, President Assad also have to acknowledge that although he emerged as a victor in this conflict but still, he can’t rule Syria with same authoritative mindset of pre-war time. Moreover, Kurds are not unreasonable in their demands. As the two million Kurds in Syria, accounting for 10-15% of total population, has only aspired before the civil war to nothing more than a degree of autonomy an aspiration always denied to them. Syrian Kurds never thought to break away from the country. At least some of their basic demands can be fulfilled by Damascus like- cultural rights and some sort of autonomy for local governance.

Syria is a multiethnic society consisting of Sunni Arabs, Kurds, Assyrians, Armenians, Turkomans, Alwaites and Yazidis. All of them have to realise that they have to rebuild Syria collectively to ensure their own well-being. To start with this Syrian government and Kurds have to come together as the territory held by Assad and the Kurds accounts for most of Syria. It should be noted that in 2000s when President Erdogan of Turkey led his AKP party to victory in the general election and formed his first government a deal was actually reached with the outlaw PKK. Some cultural rights were granted to Kurds like- Kurdish language began to be used in broadcasting, education and in print media. In return PKK also softened their demands for a separate state for Kurds. If Turkey and Kurds can come to some sort of deal then why not Assad and Syrian Kurds. Only sincere and honest efforts are required from both the sides.

By Manish Rai

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of AFTERNOON VOICE and AFTERNOON VOICE does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.

India needs Bullet Train

C K Subramaniam

December 13, 2019

The Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project was the first casualty of the bitter regime change in Maharashtra, going by the Shiv Sena’s belligerent mood the venture may not come through. But if BJP stand united in Maharashtra, the dream of bullet train may come true. Bullet train is definitely a boost. Why then politicos are steadfast in stopping such an innovative project.

The bullet train project will teach Indians new technology. Sometimes collateral benefits far outweigh the benefits of the primary project. Unless we are willing to take a leap forward, we will remain in the shallow waters of primitive technology.
All over the world, 200 mph trains have taken the place of short haul flights. If you can shorten any city-city rail journey to 3 hours or under, that is faster, cheaper and more reliable than short haul air travel when you include travel time to each airport, security checks etc. In Europe, short haul airlines are going bust and so many people have switched to faster trains. Billions of rail journeys are now made across the world each year by 200 mph trains. For India it is new but in due course it will become the toast of train travellers in the country.

The line of argument used in “India does not need bullet train” is the same used questioning the nation on Nuclear Weapons, Space Programme etc. We see the bullet train as technology implementation. High speed transportation brings with it numerous technologies – from IT, logistics, propulsion, signaling, material science, design and manufacturing. India needs to be in forefront by converting technology into working design.

We all strongly believe that it will add value to the nation, development and its economy. Initially, there were criticism against computerisation, space technologies and other major developments. Criticism from the environmentalists need to be evaluated and try to consider their concerns and points during the implementation. Non financial benefits from such huge projects shall be higher than financial viability for short and long term prospective.

In the beginning, there were so many criticism against computerization, space technologies and other major developments. One of the main reasons was those who criticise were either directly or indirectly not part of the political parties or its ideologies of the ruling party. Governance needs a paradigm shift to take this country forward into 21st century and beyond.

India needs bullet trains and a full network of it. Current trains travelling long distance in India is extremely slow. Passengers will never get flight tickets during festival season. Also flights cannot carry such a large population as we are in India. Faster mode of mass transportation for long distance should be available by now and we are lagging way behind so far. Construction of bullet train network will also provide jobs.

Bullet train should be introduced if it is financially viable. All efforts should be made to improve the India Railways. There is dire need to improve technology and productivity. The matter of fact is in any government some sycophantic political leaders will be there to always oppose the good moves. To become a developed economy, parallel growth of several sectors is needed by implementing forward right policies. Just think in festive season, people are so eager to reach their home and they pay 1000 rupees extra for sleeper class ticket. Bullet trains will be a boost if we have a broader outlook. We need to shed our narrow outlook for the time being.

(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)

Letters to the Editor: 13 December, 2019

Web Team

December 13, 2019

Challenges for Thackeray

It is the first time that the Shiv Sena has come together with its arch rivals, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Congress, relegating the BJP to the opposition. It will have to be seen whether the Sena has indeed moved from its Hindutva worldview, or whether the NCP and Congress have moved to a more majoritarian outlook in practice. However, the voters of Maharashtra did not vote for this particular combination to come in power.

M Hasan

Rising onion prices

The price of onion has become a serious issue. The price of several other food items such as fruits, milk, pulses and cereals has also increased. The government, therefore, must take steps to check such price rise.

Seraj Ali

Bank-charges and interest-rates should be uniform for all banks

Many public-sector banks are moving towards merger from April 1, 2020 with Dena Bank and Vijaya Bank already merged with Bank of Baroda. With this mega-merger, system should be formulated whereby all requirements like Minimum Balance, interest-rates, bank-charges and other procedures may be uniform for all public-sector banks. Cover-page of pass-books should incorporate all details including even name of nominees of account-holders as submitted to the banks for convenience of account-holders so that bank-customers may not have to face problem in case of fading memory with lapse of time with account getting older.

Department of Financial Services DFS and Reserve Bank of India RBI should devise common application-forms for all types of accounts to be opened in the banks including also for government savings-schemes and 7.75-percent RBI bonds. Provision may be there that all such forms to be available on websites of all the banks, may be on-line filled on computers and e-mailed to banks like is done in case of application-form for passports. Applicants then can go to banks personally to sign such e-mailed forms and verification of documents. Provision may also be there to download the filled forms and present those to banks physically in case applicant does not favour e-mailing the filled-up form on computer.

All government savings-schemes presently available in post-offices should be available at all branches of various public-sector banks.

Madhu Agrawal

Sena settles vengeance

In the first move to checkmate the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), The Maha Vikas Aghadi government cancelled 400 political appointments, independent directors or non government members made by the Fadnavis government to settle the scores with BJP. The CM has given the approval and it appears rather ridiculous and just vendetta politics. Thus Sena wanted to share the spoils with new allies just to accommodate party supporters and sympathisers and has no face value for a change. By scrapping 400 BJP government appointments, Sena led government wanted to settle their vengeance and it looks somewhat fishy. Instead of just concentrating on development, the CM is trying his hand with unwanted reactions as a new comer to the CM’s chair.

C.K.R. Nathan

(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)

Woman stabbed multiple times by ex-lover after a day she married another man

Hema Singh

December 13, 2019

A-19-year-old man was arrested by the police for allegedly stabbing his former girlfriend multiple times a day after she got married to another man in Ambernath.

According to police, the accused Vishal Khade a resident of Vadole village not only stabbed the woman but also attacked her husband when he tried to rescue her.

As per a report, the incident took place on Thursday around 8: 30 am when the woman was returning from a public toilet near her house. This is when Vishal allegedly accosted her and stabbed her with a knife. In the scuffle, her husband suffered minor injuries.

In her complaint, the woman said that she was in love with the accused. However, she chose to marry another man at her parents’ behest.

Police inspector Sanjay Dhumal of the Ambernath police station said that the victim was admitted to a government hospital and was currently out of danger. The accused was booked under Indian Penal Code (IPC) section 307 (attempt to murder). Further probe is on in the matter.

Fact-checking journalism has faded with modern time

Vaidehi Taman

December 12, 2019

The world’s largest democracy is divided in to politics of majority and minority. The media coverage is always huge — nearly 90,000 registered newspapers and periodicals and over 900 TV stations repeat same thing in different styles. The number of Internet users is around 600 million in India. Imagine fake news or the news that is not authenticated getting viral. In the Lok Sabha elections, we saw a tsunami of fake news sweeping through, largely because of a highly polarised political mood. There is no fact checker for the public to verify the claims. Political propaganda, circulation of false news witnessed a dramatic rise in the country during the run-up to the 2019 elections. Social media, full of user-generated content is now an indispensable news-gathering tool for a journalist. As a consequence, fact checking has become a more vital element in journalism than ever. It is a deliberate strategy, media and communications experts say, and one that appears to resonate with some (mostly) conservative audiences who were already primed to mistrust the media during the 2016 campaign. The verbal attacks on reporters during the campaign, particularly at rallies where journalists were kept at distance and taunted by Modi supporters, went largely unaddressed by media managers.

On one hand media, is fighting within for the lack of infrastructure, lack of nonconformity and liberty, while many well-known media houses have robust fact-checking departments to guard against errors, they are essentially non-existent at newspapers and digital outlets. The rules of reporting, of course, come with a number of safeguards that journalists who by and large conduct their work in pursuit of accuracy to the best of their abilities follow carefully. One of the primary reasons for this is a lack of time; it is virtually impossible to rigorously report the day’s news, edit a story, and then hand it over to a fact checker to be verified in time to print a paper the next day or an article the next hour. Knowing this, one might reasonably expect that the tight deadlines and are often hyped as reliable sources of information, are fact checked. Fact checking is not built into the editing process in journalism, and it never has been. Media houses spend most of their money on advances paid directly to authors, and so can’t afford to hire fact-checking departments. And if fact checking rests on the authors, publishing houses are protected, legally.

In a world filled with new digital tricks, journalists shouldn’t forget traditional verification techniques. Journalism is abundant today and the supply of news is far more widespread: In an earlier era, the latest news was only available to a privileged few in society. News agencies could charge high premiums for providing the latest news – only the rich could afford such services. The general populace would only get to know of the latest developments at a far later point in time. Modern journalism has changed this system completely. Today, the latest news is often first available on social media and mainstream media then reports these facebook posts or twitter feeds. Whatsapp ensures that videos of the latest incidents and events are available to the common man even while he is travelling. The net impact of all this is that today’s citizens are more aware of the news than ever before in history. A better-informed society is one that can make more rational decisions, better-informed decisions. This has made it more difficult for shady governments or shady businesses to fool people. The smartphone has greatly reduced privacy and lifted the veil of secrecy: You must have heard of several cases where ordinary citizens have captured incidents and events on their smartphones and then circulated videos via social media. This has made it more difficult for those with vested interests to manipulate the truth and paint incidents in a more favourable light. Incidents of brutality and oppression can no longer be hidden or sugarcoated. The truth is there for all to see.

In such a scenario, many mainstream media channels are trying to move away from traditional models and are trying to tap into the power of smartphones and social media. Today’s citizens are better informed and hence, are less tolerant of domination. As a result, citizen driven social media fuelled revolutions may take place in many other parts of the world. Dictatorship and oppression are on the wane and democracy is on the rise. These are some of the most important ways in which modern journalism is changing the world. What must be noted here is that as people get used to receiving more and more information in real time, they will have ever-greater demand for further information and analysis. Pragmatism emerged at a time when journalism was separating from political party affiliations and becoming more accurate. It coincided with the invention of what journalists call the inverted pyramid, in which a journalist lines the facts up from the most important to the least important, thinking it helps audiences understand things naturally.

At the beginning of the 20th century, however, some journalists began to worry about the naïveté of realism. In part, reporters and editors were becoming more aware of the rise of propaganda and the role of press agents. Although journalism may have developed various techniques and conventions for determining facts, it has done less to develop a system for testing the reliability of journalistic interpretation.

(Any suggestions, comments or dispute with regards to this article send us on feedback@www.afternoonvoice.com)

Social media drives modern journalism

Afternoon Voice

December 12, 2019

In India where doubts on the credibility of journalists and accountability reporting, confounding the conversation with “alternative facts” and fueling social media disdain for fact checking is argued. Indian media houses too have their own challenges. These days most of the news is received through social platform. Tweet of politician or post on facebook or any such medium becomes breaking news. You don’t need fact check or investigations. Due to the technology boom, we hardly see investigative journalism. The reporters are seen hanging around minister’s houses and in parliament or press conferences.

Journalist Ravish Kumar of NDTV said, “I get many stories in a day, which can be very crucial. Our nation has very important issues to be discussed, but when some out of league stories come, we don’t have that kind of staff who can go and perform the fact check. Getting authentic stories with facts and figures and truth needs extraordinary investigation.”

Earlier, there were large numbers of media outlets that used to focus on fact-checking and political accountability however, modern media is totally opposite. Fact checking also has entered into the broader public consciousness. The political favouritism permits the audience to accept anything good that is shown about the party they support, and anything that is offending to those whom they don’t support.

Vipin Gaur, Editor Country and Politics said, “This is an extremely important time to be a journalist of his own choices. Never has the watchdog role been more important. But these days the actual watchdogs are thrown out of banner and running their portals on social media. Their independence is impressed on micro blogging or youtube. The irony is that now media questions the opposition but not the ruling party.”

Fact checking faces enormous challenges. The election season saw a proliferation of fast-spreading misinformation concocted to bolster or attack candidates, and “fake news” designed for profit. In this era the magnitude of news comes under question-senior journalist Rajeev Ranjan said.

As journalism has shrunk, the size of media houses to coming to a size. They have known faces everywhere but less investigators and special reports.

Political journalist Nilesh Khare said, “In my organisation we have a programme called “Viral Sach” in which we take stories from social media and verify the facts. For that we have a dedicated team that specialises in that. Talking about the other media houses, most of the media firms are now undergoing financial crisis. They mostly avoid going on the field and discuss the topic sitting in the office. They also save time by doing this.”

Nowadays several media houses don’t hire reporters to carry out an investigation and make stories by relying on social media. There is a lack of team to carry out fact verification. As a result of this, many crucial stories go unreported. Media houses have become overdependent on social media for publishing news without checking the authenticity of the news.

A senior journalist from a reputed media house said, “There was a story of a lady who worked from North East that says that one of the politicians raped her. However, we did not cover the story as we didn’t have a number of staff to reach the place and verify the facts. So we dropped that story. As going against powerful people, we need enough staff to investigate. Previously also many people had investigated and published the stories, however, it did not reach to the government. So now these journalists are blogging and using their private social media platforms to reach the public. This is one of the reasons why nobody is taking a risk of investigating the stories these days.”

Many times the information available on social media is fake but still media houses publish them thereby tarnishing their image. After publishing the story media houses receive flak from citizens questioning the authenticity of the story. Nowadays authentic news does not even find a column in newspapers. Today journalists are bound to their media houses who bow down to political parties and power holders.

2 killed, four injured as slab of government hospital collapses in Nagpur

Hema Singh

December 12, 2019

At least two people were killed including a patient while four others sustained severe injuries as the slab of the Government hospital collapsed in Nagpur on Thursday evening. According to the preliminary report, the incident took place at the Department of Dermatology and Venereology of Government TB Hospital around 5.45 pm.

Reportedly, Additional Commissioner of Police BG Gaikar along with the team reached the spot and started conducting the rescue operation.

Nagpur Slab Collapse,collapses,slabs,Nagpur,Nagpur Government,Hospital slab collapses,Hospital,nagpur hospital — Image Courtesy: Nagpur Today

The deceased patients identified as Devnath Bagde, a resident of Saoner and Vanita Waghmare who had come to the hospital to see her sick sister who was admitted to the Hospital. Police said both the deceased persons died on the spot while others suffered serious injuries.

Nagpur Slabs collapses,Nagpur,Slab,collapse,Nagpur Hospital,Nagpur Government Hospital,Hospital,slabs,collapses — Image Courtesy: Nagpur Today

As per the sources, earlier resident doctors had complained about the dilapidated condition of the slab to the hospital administration. However, the authorities did not pay any heed to it. Police are investigating the matter. Further information is awaited.

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