Bharat Rakshak

venkat_kv wrote:it seems people are filling the blanks with their pet peeves/thought process in the absence of any info that comes from the sources they trust or from the govt.

Prem Kumar wrote:Today is a crappy day @ Twitter

1) @totalwoke - hands-down the best satire handle, was suspended by Twitter. Our new IT Minister seems as useless as his predecessor. Useless, with a Wharton degree

2) Sushma Swaraj's husband had someone file an FIR against @bharadwajspeaks, the best history teacher in India. This was because of his amazing thread about the history of Mizoram. Bharadwaj has deleted his Twitter account

India needs a deep-cleanse of our internal vermin, followed by the external ones

The Delhi High Court (HC) affirmed on Thursday that Twitter has been totally non-compliant towards the amendments to the Information Technology (IT) Rules and even queried whether the social media giant wants to comply with the new guidelines or not.

Moreover, the HC added that Twitter’s way of putting across its stand was ‘unacceptable’ and that the company was worsening its case in the courtroom.

Actually, Twitter Inc filed an application in the court saying that its new chief compliance officer (CCO) and resident grievance officer (RGO) are ‘contingent workers’.

After examining the same, Justice Rekha Palli mentioned, “I am not happy with this affidavit. You are not using the word ‘interim’ but are now using the word ‘contingent’. In fact, it sounds much worse. Appointment has been done from a third-party contractor.”

The HC asserted that the new rules require a key managerial individual or a senior employee to be appointed as the CCO-cum-RGO. On the other hand, Twitter hired a contingent worker from a third-party contractor.

“He (CCO) is categorical (in his affidavit) that he is not an employee. This itself is in the teeth of the rule,” the judge mentioned, as reported by the Times of India.

The court added that sanctity must be given to the rules and that there should be some seriousness with respect to the same. It straight up asked Twitter whether it is serious regarding complying with the rules.

Twitter asked for two additional weeks to submit a better affidavit. The judge made it clear that the company is being given a long rope and that they shouldn’t expect the court to continue going on the same way.

Thus, they have been given another chance to place a better affidavit that puts more responsibility to the individual who is appointed as the CCO and the RGO.

Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) has been hit with a record $886.6 million (746 million euros) European Union fine for processing personal data in violation of the bloc's GDPR rules, as privacy regulators take a more aggressive position on enforcement.

The Luxembourg National Commission for Data Protection (CNPD) imposed the fine on Amazon in a July 16 decision, the company disclosed in a regulatory filing on Friday.

He was convicted on terrorism charges in 2016, which included inviting support for the terrorist group Islamic State.

Reacting to the news of his ban, he told Sky News: "That was quick, a record, just five days after I set up my account."

Prem Kumar wrote: And no: the IT Ministry is gauged by their repeated failures over the years to stand upto Western electronic media. Their track record is there for all to see. The new guy hasn't seem to have done much either - all we see is news every 3 days that Twitter is in violation of Indian IT Laws. Ok, so what is the IT Ministry doing about it? Nothing.

The latest incident is yet another example of Twitter left bias & arbitrariness.

Organisation of Big Tech companies that operate anti-terror database labels BJP as non-violent extremist fringe group

GIFCT, an organisation formed by Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft and YouTube, listed the world’s largest political party Bharatiya Janata Party under the Right-Wing fringe groups that indulge in non-violent extremism.

On page 62 of the 177-page report titled Broadening the GIFCT Hash-Sharing Database Taxonomy: An Assessment and Recommended Next Steps, BJP has been listed with two other right-wing non-fringe groups, Australia First party and National Socialist Movement.

nachiket wrote: Even POTUS could not do anything about his own account getting permanently banned from FB and Twitter. What superpower do you think the Indian IT minister has to stop an anonymous satire handle from suffering the same fate?

NEW DELHI: Google received 71,148 complaints from individual users in India in May and June combined, which resulted in the removal of more than 1.54 lakh pieces of content, as per the company's latest monthly transparency reports.

The US-based company has made these disclosures as part of compliance with India's IT rules that came into force on May 26.

jamwal wrote:...Former governor of Mizoram, @governorswaraj a megalomaniac who still uses "Governor" in his twitter handle long after retirement, threatens Bhardwaj with a police case and bullies him claiming that the tweets threaten the fragile peace in state. ..

Manish_P wrote:

jamwal wrote:...Former governor of Mizoram, @governorswaraj a megalomaniac who still uses "Governor" in his twitter handle long after retirement, threatens Bhardwaj with a police case and bullies him claiming that the tweets threaten the fragile peace in state. ..

Isn't the retired Governor the widower of Smt. Sushma Swaraj?

m_saini wrote:Do trust the current GoI but don't understand what's so special about Twitter? Why the special treatment? Is it because we don't want to piss off woke America?

...

The single-judge bench of Justice Rekha Palli took objection to the submissions.

“What is this term contingent worker?” she asked Poovayya. “What does this mean? This gives an impression that his duties are based on some contingencies.”

She said that appointment of the officers through a third-party contractor did not amount to compliance of the IT rules and asked Twitter to file a fresh affidavit within a week. “I don’t know what your company wants to do...If you want to do it, comply wholeheartedly,” Palli remarked.

...

srin wrote:If BJP has any self respect , then it and its leaders must quit Twitter and FB and Instagram

Sonugn wrote:Organisation of Big Tech companies that operate anti-terror database labels BJP as non-violent extremist fringe group;

Sonugn wrote:

Manish_P wrote:
Isn't the retired Governor the widower of Smt. Sushma Swaraj?

Yes, he is the same person.

He has also worked a lot on the Mizo peace accord when he was in office.

Vayutuvan wrote:[
I don't disagree. But this govt. should be mindful of the resentment that might be building up what with post-poll violence in WB with BJP workers at the receiving end, Kerala Bakrid lockdown lifting while stopping kavadi yatra, etc. Of course, I am mixing up domestic with ecternal. But how many people, who are impatient, would be willing to make such a finer distinction?!

sanjayc wrote: He has gone native with Mizos. He doesn't allow any criticism of Christian bigotry and persecution of Hindus in Mizoram despite given evidence. He is also having illusions of grandeur. Has got the word "governor" in his Twitter handle and pretends he is some kind of a big shot ("I don't read tweets myself, my staff presents the tweets to me that I should read"). He is living in past glory and his mind is stuck in the time when he was in Mizoram. Also looks to be hungry to be counted among the power elite.

disha wrote:...and GOI has decided that twitter will be whipped back and submit to Indian laws like any incalcitrant truant student is made to.

disha wrote:...
Google, Facebook and everyone else came and said that they will follow Indian IT laws. Only Twitter has been recalcitrant. And Indian Judiciary will step in and whip their butts.....
...This is going to be a slow process. The reason is simple, this cannot be unwound by a whim of some dynast.

AshishA wrote:I have recently switched to brave browser and duckduckgo search engine. I don't have a account on Facebook, Twitter, reddit or Instagram. I only use YouTube, whatsapp and telegram. I use VPN whenever I go on the internet. So what more can I do to switch from the big tech platforms? Any suggestions?

chetak wrote:

rsingh wrote:

chetak wrote:[img]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E756TWZUUAE ... =large[img]

I see the name "Kabir" in most of Indian films. Most of Bollywood people giving neutral names to their kids. Apart from "Taimur" bachoo, names are neutral. Not Hindu definitely and not Musilm either. Aryan ,Ayan , AbRam,Suhana , Yug , Nysa ,Aarin ,Hreann, Hredhaan, Klaan , Saierea , Shakya , Mahika , Mahira, Araia,Nitara, Araia, Adira, Riaan,Nevaan, Imara and more (did some research . Most of the names look like coming from desert tribes. It seems parents are parking their kids in the acceptable zone as future Bollywood fauna and fora. More Muslim and liberal type producers and directors are going to populate Bollywood. I personally , am pained by strange out of world names in film these days.

Post independence we gave Education in the hands of Missionaries & History in the hands of Communists. We left the films, theatre & arts in the hands of Jihadi's & the country in the hands of Nehru-Gandhi dynasts.

They all together tried to wipe out the centuries old glorious heritage, culture & history of this great land in these past 70 years. Mughals became Indians & the Indian's became Kaafir's.

Akbar became tolerant & Maharana became a facist. Afghani infilrators became Kashmiri's & Kashyap Rishi's lineage, Pandits became refugees in their own land. Western looters became rich & the prosperous rich nation became poor.

British stooge Nehru became the PM & the nationalist freedom fighter Savarkar became a terrorist. Maoist became Intellectuals & the learned became Bhakts. Terrorist became activists & the army became killers.

Conversion became secular & Ghar Wapsi became communal. Yoga became scientific & Yogi's became unscientific. Propaganda became the truth & reality of Mughals became lies. Appeasement became right & being right became Facism. Sold out journalists became the the torch bearers of truth & the truthful became hate mongers.

Jai Shree Ram became conservative & Bharat Tere Tukde Honge Inshallah became liberal. For the sake of our motherland act now & learn to be unapologetic.

Social history of a Lutyens' Liberal (a thread):
Your great grand uncle was a protégé of Motilal Nehru and even went to jail in 1923. Your grandfather, however, joined the ICS. They said he looked almost like a gora saheb when he donned his sola topee. (1/n)
There he is, in the third row in the annual Gymkhana Club tennis association photo, taken in 1942, standing with other Indians while the goras sit on chairs in the front row. Your mother said her father was "very fair-skinned", but he looks brown as a nut in the photo (2/n)
Your maternal grandmother came from an illustrious family. They were very close to Tagore and the poet had even named your grandmother. There were several ICS officers, famous doctors, one of the first Indian High Court judges, and other luminaries in your lineage. (3/n)
Your mother, the youngest child, was born in 1951. She grew up in London, since Nehru sent your grandfather there to work at the Indian High Commission. The old ties with Motilal helped him recognise your grandfather’s merit. "He's a good fellow," Nehru told Krishna Menon. (4/n)

Your grandfather returned to India in the early 60s & rose to become foreign secretary as a young Indira became PM. By the time he retired Mrs Gandhi was beginning her coup against the Congress 'syndicate'. The PMO was increasingly being run by PN Haksar & Romesh Thapar (5/n)
Meanwhile, your mother met your father in DU – he in St Stephen’s College & she in Miranda House. Together they had gone on protests against the Vietnam War, listened to the Beatles and fallen in love. They got engaged and left for England for 'higher' studies (6/n)
Your father studied economics at Oxford, often spending time with JR Hicks in the Nobel laureate’s rooms in All Souls. It had a great influence on your father’s attitude to the economy when he was to join the Finance Ministry & later the planning commission (7/n)
Your mother read literature at Cambridge, and attended drama lectures by Raymond Williams. It made her a quasi-Marxist, critical of USSR, but still firmly on the Left. She later joined Delhi University as a professor and wrote several books on Indo-Anglian writers. (8/n)

Your childhood was spent hearing about nation-building & uplift of the poor. You took piano lessons & played Fur Elise for guests on your grandmother’s old piano, beneath the Jamini Roy original. You went to a top private school in Delhi & your friends were just like you (10/n)
Your weekends were spent reading in the leafy gardens of your Lodhi Road bungalow. Famous writers, artists, scholars and activists, flitted in an out of your home. They were mostly your mother’s friends & they all knew each other as well. (11/n)
Weekend lunch was often at the Delhi Gym or at the IIC. After that, your mother sometimes took you to the Cottage Industries Emporium near Connaught Place. Her own mother was a friend of Kamladevi Chattopadhyaya, and she loved Indian handicraft (12/n)
Then the mid-80s happened. Your parents took you on a trip to London. Your hair looked different after that. You picked up some London slang & pretended that's the way you always spoke. You began calling all desserts ‘pudding’ – including the Rasmalai that the cook made. (13/n)
All your friends tuned into BBC radio’s UK Top40 at night, to learn which songs were ruling that week. You began to get pirated tapes from Palika Bazaar and spent nights playing and rewinding them to write down the lyrics of the latest chartbusters. (14/n)

When you finished school & joined Stephen's, several big things were happening around you. Rajiv Gandhi lost his massive mandate. Your mother backed VP Singh openly. Your father, being a senior bureaucrat, kept it to himself. The USSR collapsed & the Berlin Wall came down (15/n)
Your mother began questioning her faith in socialism. Your father too began saying that India needs market reforms. Your parents had acquired a new set of friends – economists at World Bank or IMF, officials at CII & FICCI and even a newly minted RBI governor (16/n)
Then came Mandal. College shut down for a while, as Hindi-speaking students from the hinterland took to the streets. There were heated discussions on Merit vs Affirmative Action in your drawing room. Your mother backed reservations, your father was ambivalent. (17/n)

You were pro-Mandal, but wanted some restrictions in skilled jobs: No reservation in medicine or building bridges. That’s what all your friends believed too. You had all just ‘discovered’ that you were Brahmins or Kayasthas and railed against caste injustice (18/n)
What made you even more opposed to the anti-Mandal agitators (“all upper-caste Biharis” you told your mom) was that they were also campaigning for a Ram Mandir at the Babri Masjid site. You cried, hugging your friend in the D-School café, the day the Masjid was demolished. (19/n)
Your mother didn’t eat that night. “This is not the India my parents and grandparents fought for,” forgetting entirely that they were ICS officers during the Raj. “You need to leave the country,” she told you. “Don’t over-react,” your dad said. “This is just a fringe.” (20/n)

You were going abroad in any case. You won the Inlaks Scholarship to do a PhD at Oxford. If you hadn’t got that, you’d have managed the Rhodes or Nehru-Cambridge or something. Everyone on the board knew how good you were. They had known you from the time you were a child. (21/n)
Like your mother, you had studied literature. Your PhD thesis was going to be a Derridean look at Magical Realism. Your mother frowned upon your post-modernist proclivities, but proudly told her friends and colleagues that you were a genius at literary theory. (22/n)
You moved to a multi-disciplinary post-Doc at Chicago under Homi Bhabha. When Bhabha moved to Harvard, many believed, he will bat for you to get tenure as well. Things didn’t turn out like that, and after a low-paying part-time gig at NYT, you returned to India (23/n)

You got a job as a senior-assistant editor on the op-ed page in a leading newspaper, almost immediately. All the senior editors knew you. “Don’t thank us, we should thank you for agreeing to join us,” one of them said. The 2004 elections were round the corner. (24/n)
You celebrated when the results came in. The way Delhi had changed, had made you too believe that India WAS Shining. Thankfully, it wasn’t, & the Congress came back to power. “India is secular at its core,” your mother said that evening. “Aberrations cannot survive.” (25/n)
The new UPA govt dragged your parents out of retirement. Your dad was made an advisor to the Planning Commission. Sonia Gandhi herself called your mother and told her to be part of a committee on education that was to help the National Advisory Council. (26/n)

Everyone you called ‘uncle’ or ‘aunt’ was getting involved. They wanted to 'help' Manmohan Singh’s govt & ensure that the ‘communal parties’ couldn't return to power. IIC & Gymkhana Club were once again abuzz with the sound of forks & knives & pretend kitchen-cabinets. (27/n)
You had graduated to India Habitat Centre. It was more chic, especially when friends from NYC were visiting. Some college friends were minting money on Wall Street. When they visited, they took you to Spice Route and Wasabi by Morimoto (28/n)

Your own salary was now ridiculously high. The credit-fuelled investment drive & the stock market boom had pushed up media company valuations as well. It translated into big pay packets for senior journalists, and you were now the OpEd editor (29/n)
You were eating at top restaurants, flying business class, staying at top hotels abroad, indulging in LV bags (“no logo on it, please”), & filling your South Delhi home with Good Earth cushions & crockery. “It's traditional Indian craft, Ma,” you’d say, “just finer.” (30/n)
When you needed to renew your passport, you called your dad’s junior colleague in the MEA. You called your friend Jyoti (Scindia) when your electricity meter caught fire, and the BSES chaps wouldn’t respond. If the minister can’t help you in need, who can? (31/n)

Of course, you hated nepotism and corruption. Taking help from friends when it’s an emergency (like passport renewal) is a different matter altogether. Needless to say, you backed the Anna movement & Arvind Kejriwal. The UPA had become corrupt, & needed to be reformed (32/n)
By 2013, it was clear that the UPA wasn’t going to return for another term. You began re-connecting with your old mates at NYT. One of them was now a senior editor. Is there any chance of a job? “No way,” he said. “The job-market is terrible here. Print is dying.” (33/n)

You gradually changed your mind about Narendra Modi. Your OpEds were now about how India’s strong institutions will make the Gujarat CM a more moderate PM. By now, you had accepted that his victory was inevitable. You started posting friendly tweets, to cosy up to him. (34/n)
You kept up your attempts at a reproachement in the first few months after the Modi govt had taken over. But, to no avail. The PM & the new team at the centre simply weren’t going to let Lutyens’ liberals like you back into the corridors of power. (35/n)
By 2016, you had learnt your lesson, and became more vocally critical of the Modi govt. The PM gave you many occasions to believe that he was finished – demonetisation, GST, unemployment. You wrote furiously against it all, convinced of the importance of your opinions (36/n)

But the newspaper’s proprietors had other ideas. First, your editor-in-chief lost his job. Then, a few months before the 2019 elections, it was your turn. “Modi is losing,” you told your best friend, over an Artichoke Panini. “They’ll beg me to return then, but I won’t” (37/n)
Then 2019 happened. “It’s the EVMs,” you all agreed that night. You had spent the day in TV studios and in fending off RW trolls on twitter. “India is finished,” you said, “I could’ve been a professor at Harvard. What a mistake to have returned.” (38/38)