New Delhi: Shadow ads are thriving on Facebook in India in the current election season, raising questions about the platform’s “defences against election manipulation”, Washington Post’s Joseph Menn reports.
The report says Facebook is “reaping a significant portion of an estimated $16 billion in campaign spending” in India, where gaps in Facebook’s vetting process have given rise to a “thriving black market in accounts approved to run political ads”. “Meta has failed to enforce its own policies” in India, says Menn, noting that the company took a year to remove “a propaganda operation run by the Indian military in Kashmir”.
A Financial Times report from Patna takes a deeper look at why the Opposition has promised to hold a nationwide caste survey if it wins the election. Quoting Rahul Gandhi as saying “This is our new revolutionary mission”, FT correspondents Benjamin Parkin and Jyotsna Singh write that the Opposition campaign builds on a count in Bihar last year, showing a large majority of the population belongs to the lower castes and remains deprived despite policies aimed at redressing caste inequalities.
The Bihar example indicates that lower castes “may make up a greater share of India’s 1.4bn population than officially acknowledged”, and the Opposition hopes to win them over by highlighting that “Hindu nationalism” is “leaving marginalised behind”. However, according to analysts, “the Opposition could struggle to convince voters on the merits of a nationwide caste census”.
A report in The Globe and Mail claims, “India refused to let Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s plane land in Punjab during a visit in 2018 unless he and his defence minister agreed to meet with a government official to air grievances about Sikh separatists in Canada.”
The report adds that at the time, the Canadian delegation received “a dossier containing the names of about 10 Sikh activists whose activities the Indian government wanted curtailed”.
However, former Canada defence minister Harjit Sajjan, who was a part of the Canadian PM’s delegation in 2018, has denied the claim. “One thing I can tell you is that that report is not correct. But I think it’s safe to say that India has spread a great deal of false information and misinformation about people in my nation, including my family and me,” he said.
In the South China Morning Post, journalist Junaid Kathju reports on India-US relations, explaining how despite differences over the US State Department’s report on “human rights” in India, Biden clubbing India with other “xenophobic” countries and allegations of India plotting an assassination, Biden wants to “keep India close in order to counter China”.
“The spectre of China remains a unifying force for India and the United States,” says the report, adding that “the strategic capital Washington places on India as a counterweight to growing Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific region would ensure bilateral relations do not spiral out of control”.
Kathju quotes Walter Ladwig, a senior international relations lecturer at King’s College London, talking about the “extraordinary efforts taken by the Biden administration to compartmentalise the aftermath of the Pannun assassination plot” and the US role in ensuring “India’s G20 presidency was a big success”.
A DW video report calls unemployment a key issue in India. The Modi government, it says, promised job creation but “failed to deliver”. Journalist Shalu Yadav argues how the Indian job market is already saturated, resulting in high levels of unemployment among the educated youth, who end up selling clothes at flea markets or SIM cards or juice on roadsides.
The report quotes economist Santosh Mehrotra, who calls the situation “grim” where manufacturing has not yet picked up and Indian youth are looking for jobs in wars and workers abroad (Russia and Israel).
AstraZeneca withdraws COVID-19 vaccine, 2 countries go to poll
Citing commercial reasons, AstraZeneca has withdrawn its COVID-19 vaccine, halting its manufacture and supply. This came months after the pharma giant admitted the vaccine caused side effects. To know more, read The Telegraph’s report.
The Balkan nation of North Macedonia goes to polls today, and counting is underway in the African nation of Chad. To know more about these elections and their geopolitical importance, read Politico and Al Jazeera’s reports.
Also read: Canadian police arrest 3 Indian nationals in Nijjar killing, say ‘ties to govt of India’ under probe