'In less than a week after National Herald had exposed that the Delhi government has been fudging the death data, the Aam Aadmi Party-led government has stopped including the hospital-wise death data from the daily health bulletin. This will inevitably lead to more cover-ups in the death data from the National Capital and also enable the government to avoid questions about number of deaths in specific hospitals. Additionally, the government has also been under-reporting the number of Covid-19 patients on ventilators in hospitals...'
'To Narendra Modi, Covid-19 is not so much a disease as a deus ex machina. Before he announced the largest lockdown in human history on 24 March, the Indian prime minister was submerged in a pool of self-engineered crises. Citizenly protests against his legislative disfigurement of Indian secularism had erupted in every major city, more than four dozen lives were devoured at his doorstep in February in the worst religious bloodletting in Delhi since the 1984, unemployment was soaring, and the economy was poised to post the slowest pace of growth in a decade.
'The number of coronavirus casualties reported by Lok Nayak Hospital, Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, Lady Hardinge Medical College and the Delhi and Jhajjar centres of AIIMS stands at 116, according to data from these hospitals and confirmed by their officials to The Indian Express. This is higher than the Delhi government’s official Covid-19 death toll, which stood at 66 until Thursday night. According to the Delhi government’s daily bulletin, a total of 33 deaths have been recorded from these specific hospitals...'
'It’s the season for politics over train tickets, even as migrant workers across the country are confused, and struggling to reach home. The BJP on Monday claimed that the Indian Railways has subsidised 85% of ticket fare for special trains being run to transport migrant workers. It’s only the remaining 15% that the state governments have to pay, they said. This development comes after Sonia Gandhi, interim-Congress president, earlier in the day said that state units of the Congress party will take care of the train fares which migrants are being forced to pay in many parts of the country.
'In the late evening on 21st April 2020, Arnab Goswami, the Editor-in-chief of Republic TV, in purported exercise of his right to freedom of speech and expression guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution of India, made certain comments against former Congress President, Sonia Gandhi. He stated that Mrs. Gandhi is "happy" and will be sending a "report to Italy" in order to gain "praises" as she has gotten "saints" killed in a State which is governed partly by the political party she belongs to.
'On April 18, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal gave a 10-minute speech on the coronavirus situation in New Delhi. It was also live-streamed on YouTube. At the 2:00 mark, Kejriwal pointed out that some people in coronavirus hotspots area continue to step out on streets and visit their neighbours. He said in Hindi (from 2:00 to 2:44), “Yesterday in a containment zone at Jahangirpuri, 26 members from one community (translated from कुनबा) tested positive for corona… all members are from one family.
'After an appeal for donations to the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund (PMNRF) from the University Grants Commission and the Delhi University, one day’s worth of DU staff salaries were deducted for this purpose. However, the DU Vice Chancellor Yogesh Tyagi has now said that the collected money — amounting to more than ₹4 crore — was sent to the PM-CARES Fund instead. The change was made on the basis of direction from the Ministry of Human Resource Development, according to a senior DU official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity...'
'On Friday, April 17, Hindi media outlet News24 shared a video on Facebook titled, “कोरोना ने बदला इबादत की तरीका,दिल्ली के जामा मस्जिद का माहौल क्या है?” This translates to – “Cororna has changed the ways of worship, what is the atmosphere in Delhi’s Jama Masjid?” The broadcast started with the anchor informing that the coronavirus scare has caused Islamic nations across the world to alter the ways of offering prayers. “People are being advised to offer namaz at home.
'On April 10, India Today TV aired a “special investigation” on Newstrack, a primetime show hosted by its news director, Rahul Kanwal. Called “Madrasa Hotspot”, it “stung” caretakers of three madrasas in the National Capital Region – Madrasa Darul-ul-Uloom Usmania and Madrasa Islahul Mumineer in Madanpur Khadar, Delhi, and Madrasa Jamia Mohammadia Haldoni in Greater Noida... The report showed that students were staying in the madrasas amid the nationwide lockdown. It also had at least one teacher accepting that he had bribed the police to keep them at bay.
'Like the rest of the world, India is battling the coronavirus pandemic. However, here the public conversation over the past week has focussed inordinately on only one facet of the disease: its link with the Tablighi Jamat, a Muslim religious group. A Tablighi Jamat event, held in early March in Delhi, was attended by foreign delegates from South East Asia as well as members from all over India. A few attendees, it later turned out, were coronavirus carriers. When the event finished, many people went back to their home states, carrying the virus with them.
