'The “goli maaro saalon ko” slogan was back at a pro-Citizenship Act rally in Nagpur, organised, according to the news agency ANI, by the RSS, the BJP, the Lok Adhikar Manch and other organisations. A huge banner representing the colours of the Indian National Flag was carried by the demonstrators during the rally, which took place on Sunday. The crowd chanted slogans like “kisko chahiye azadi” (who wants freedom) and “desh ke gaddaron ko, goli maaro saalon ko” (shoot the traitors)...'
'A global network of pro-Indian fake websites and think-tanks is aimed at influencing decision-making in Europe, researchers say. The co-ordinated network of 265 sites operates across 65 countries, according to a report by EU Disinfo Lab, a Brussels-based NGO, The researchers traced the websites to an Indian company, Srivastava Group. The network was also found to involve groups responsible for anti-Pakistan lobbying events in Europe... EU Disinfo Lab's investigation started by looking at EP Today, a website which claimed to be an online magazine for the European Parliament in Brussels.
'Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar has made a bizarre statement that pollution is not linked to the shortening of life in India. "No Indian study has shown pollution shortens life. Let us not create fear psychosis among people," Union minister Prakash Javadekar told Parliament on Friday... The minister's statement is in sharp contrast with several studies, where the Government of India is also a party. These studies have found that a rise in pollution is linked to deaths and shorter life spans.
'Bharatiya Janata Party leader Virendra Singh Mast on Thursday dismissed reports of a slowdown in the automobile sector and claimed that traffic jams on roads were an indication of the growth, ANI reported. He alleged that the Opposition’s talks about slowdown were a conspiracy to “defame” the government and the nation. Mast, a Lok Sabha MP from Ballia constituency in Uttar Pradesh, told the Parliament that an atmosphere of economic slowdown was being created. “To defame the nation and government people are saying that the automobile sector has slowed down,” he said.
'A group of people who chose not to stand up during the national anthem were abused and heckled by another group in a Bangalore movie theatre on October 23. One of the people hurling abuses at the group – including calling them “Pakistani terrorists” – has been identified as actor Arun Gowda. In a video of the incident, Gowda and his friends can be seen trying to shame four people for not standing during the anthem. “Not able to spare 52 seconds for the country, but you have the audacity to sit here and watch a three-hour movie? Are you Pakistani terrorists?” one of them men said...'
'Union minister Jitendra Singh on Wednesday said those who “do not feel proud” of US President Donald Trump’s comment that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the “father of India”, do not consider themselves Indians. “India is being respected in a way which was rare in the past,” Singh said on the sidelines of the launch of CPGRAMS reforms in the department of posts. “People who live abroad are proud today of being Indian. This is happening due to the personality and personal outreach of Prime Minister Modi,” said the minister of state for the Prime Minister’s Office...'
'The entire debate around outsiders and foreigners has been based on the long held belief that Bangladeshi infiltrators are threatening the demography and culture of Assam. But now, as per a community wise break-up of the over 19 lakh people excluded from the final National Register of Citizens (NRC), nearly a third of the people left out of the list are actually non-Bengali people, many of whom belong to indigenous tribes and ethnic groups. Shockingly thousands of Karbis, Rabhas, Sonowal Kacharis and even Ahoms have been excluded from the final NRC!
'The authors of two scientific papers about Aryan migration endorsed a theory closer to the cultural triumphalism of the political right while the papers had themselves disfavoured it... What is surprising is that, in a press conference held in New Delhi on September 6 to explain their findings from Rakhigarhi soon after the papers were published online, coauthors Vasant Shinde, archeologist and vice-chancellor of Deccan College, Pune, and Niraj Rai, head of the ancient DNA laboratory at the Birbal Sahni Institute of Paleosciences, Lucknow, advanced the contested ‘Out of India’ theory.
'It seems almost sacrilegious to be less than sentimental about Chandrayaan 2. Such a huge and heroic effort! Such a massive investment of scientific skills! Such a national fervour worked up to a feverish pitch! The pride of 130 crore Indians! However, the truth is greater than any scientific breakthrough, and it must be reckoned with at all costs. First, the national hysteria about Chandrayaan 2 was deliberately worked up.
'...For Modi, the achievements of ISRO’s scientists are of the same order as the miracles worked by India’s mythical ancients and they serve the same purpose: the greater glory of Bharat. This is the opposite of the scientific temper: it’s science as a kind of aarti where the goddess honoured is Bharat Mata. Prime ministers are influential people, their example matters, their actions and words are cues for others. A year after Modi became prime minister the Indian Science Congress had sessions where ‘scientists’ read papers documenting interplanetary travel in ancient India.
