A 24×7 blur of headlines, breaking news and shouting matches, notifications and pop-ups — news, views and opinion have become an overwhelming flood that follows us all the time.
Plugged-In from ThePrint is a new feature that sifts through the mountain of content and explains the big headlines and commentary from across media — briefly, intelligently. A one-stop quick-read put together by the best minds in the business for the news junkie on the go. With links to the key pieces in case you want to read more.
So get Plugged-In every morning, Monday to Friday, for your daily capsule of the news and views that matter.
Front Page
Exclusive at ThePrint: So, the fake news directive wasn’t the only attempt by the government to try and leash the media. As Amrita Nayak Dutta reported for ThePrint, the government may be able to track journalists’ movements in and out of government buildings and offices. About three months ago, the Press Information Bureau (PIB), which is the official communication arm of the central government, “had asked the union home ministry if government accreditation cards for journalists could instead be replaced with radio-frequency identification (RFID) cards”, Dutta reports.
The major dailies can’t seem to agree on what the most important news is today:
The Indian Express leads with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement about
B.R. Ambedkar. The PM said it was “the NDA government of Atal Bihari Vajpayee that decided to develop two places in Delhi in memory of Ambedkar”, adding, “But the governments that followed… Everyone rushes to do politics in the name of B.R. Ambedkar but the works decided upon by the Atal government were never completed.” Modi’s statement came as he inaugurated the Western Court Annexe, which will serve as transit accommodation for MPs. It was made two days after Dalit protests rocked several states, and his government moved the Supreme Court to seek a review of its order on the SC/ST Act.
For The Hindu, the mystery of the leaked CBSE exam papers continues to take centre stage. It reports that the human resource development (HRD) ministry “has constituted a high-powered committee to examine the system of conducting Class 10 and Class 12 examinations to prevent question paper leaks”. The panel will review the security checks in place as well as loopholes in the system.
Hindustan Times flap reads ‘Free speech vs fake news’, and the national daily brings us an overview of fake-news-related laws passed by different countries. In light of the government’s foiled plan to “combat fake news” after criticism that it would curtail press freedom, the article highlights measures taken by Germany, Malaysia, the United States, UK, Indonesia and Italy, among others.
The Times of India looks a little bit like ‘Times of Delhi’ on its front page today. “Garbage has been piling up in Karol Bagh and other colonies as a section of North corporation sanitation workers has been on strike for the past four days,” reads the caption for a photograph of a towering garbage pile. The Delhi sealing drive is also likely to continue, it reports, as the “Supreme Court asked the Centre Wednesday to seal large shops, showrooms and restaurants being run illegally in residential colonies”. Slums and unauthorised colonies were spared.
Oh, and also, the opposition may submit its impeachment motion against Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra to Rajya Sabha Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu today. Maneesh Chhibber reports for ThePrint that “the requisite number of signatures by Rajya Sabha members have been obtained, and some more parties may join in”.
Meanwhile, the 2018 Commonwealth Games have begun. P.V. Sindhu leads the Indian contingent at the opening ceremony of the games at Gold Coast, Australia, Wednesday.
Trump and Xi can’t seem to stop their passive-aggressive fighting. China has compiled a list of yet another 106 US products “that will be subjected to a 25 per cent tariff, in retaliation to Washington’s intent to impose fresh tariffs on Chinese products worth $50 billion”, The Hindu tells us. The targeted items are soya beans, cars, chemicals and aircraft. The list has triggered “fears that the world’s top two economies may be locking horns in a major and escalating trade war”.
Diamantaire Nirav Modi has a lot more explaining to do. The fugitive billionaire allegedly duped several farmers in Maharashtra between 2011 and 2013, getting them to sell him their land at throwaway prices after convincing them it would eventually be taken over by the government for a bird sanctuary. Now the “farmers from Ahmednagar want Modi to return their 85 acres”, The Indian Express reports. There’s more, do read the article to get a clearer idea.
Looks like Gurmeet Ram Rahim may lose his properties too. “The Haryana government has withdrawn its orders that had exempted 11 properties of Gurmeet Ram Rahim, the controversial head of Dera Sacha Sauda who is now in jail, from ‘change-of-land-use’ approvals, and declared them illegal,” Chitleen K. Sethi reports for ThePrint.
Remember the accusation that Salman Khan shot two poor blackbucks in 1998? “A Jodhpur court will (finally) pronounce a verdict in the 20-year-old poaching case against actors Salman Khan, Saif Ali Khan, Sonali Bendre, Neelam and Tabu” today, The Times of India reports. If convicted, the minimum sentence is six years.
Business Class
Responding to the alleged ICICI Bank-Videocon deal, Chanda Kochhar’s husband Deepak Kochhar rejected all allegations of wrongdoing and conflict of interest, reports The Economic Times.
Citing local media sources, Reuters reports that Amazon.com Inc may offer a rival deal to buy Flipkart in India. The Indian e-commerce company is already in talks with the American retail giant Walmart for a tie-up.
News it’s kind of cool to know
“62-foot giant Hanuman stranded on Bengaluru highway,” The Times of India lets us know. A 300-wheel vehicle carrying the “62-foot, 750-tonne half-done statue of Hanuman from Kolar to Kacharakanahalli in east Bengaluru was stranded when police allegedly stopped it on NH-48 Monday night, citing it as a potential violation of the model election code of conduct”.
Rahul Gandhi and Amit Shah’s aircraft were searched by officials “after they landed at Hubballi airport in north Karnataka”, News18 reports. The exercise was justified as being in line with the Election Commission’s directive to ensure free and fair elections in Karnataka.
‘Women who wear jeans and degrade their womanhood in the process give birth to transgender and autistic children’, according to Dr Rajith Kumar, a ‘health awareness’ professor at a college in Kalady, Kerala. The Deccan Chronicle tells us that the man believes “good children are only born to those men and women who live their lives as men and women”.
So, it looks like the AIADMK isn’t entirely sure how a hunger strike works, because it definitely doesn’t include biryani for lunch. Tamil Nadu’s ruling party went on a day-long statewide hunger strike Tuesday to “condemn the Centre” for not setting up the Cauvery Management Board (CMB), but the event turned farcical after photographs surfaced of party cadres gorging on biryani to beat hunger, Hindustan Times reports. A debate ensued on social media on “whether the protesting AIADMK men had biryani or tomato rice”.
India’s engineers can’t keep up with their counterparts in Russia or China. “A study has found that Russian and Chinese engineering students are better than those in India,” The Economic Times tells us, carrying an Indian Express report on a government study from Tuesday. “Indian students make substantial gains in mathematics and critical thinking skills in the first two years of their education, but their overall higher order thinking skills are ‘substantially lower’ than the Chinese and Russians,” the report adds.
Point of View
The Shivraj Singh Chouhan-led Madhya Pradesh government accorded five godmen the status of ministers of state. The Indian Express, in its editorial today, writes, “Babas are ranged far above us. To bring them down to the level of worldly politics is to demote and devalue.”
Violence across the country during the protest against the Supreme Court ruling on the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, caused massive loss to life and property. The Hindu, in its editorial today, emphasises the need to re-examine the ruling.
The constitutional validity of polygamy has been challenged in the Supreme Court. Former chairman of the National Minorities Commission, Tahir Mahmood, writes in his column in The Indian Express that polygamy has no place in law or religion. He adds, “Over the centuries, men have interpreted Quranic references to polygamy as it suited them…”
Former union minister Kapil Sibal, in his column today in The Indian Express, writes, “The supremacy of the law is under attack.” He further adds, “The rights recognised by the Constitution are being muffled: Freedom of speech is a victim. The institutions of representative democracy are paralysed.”
BJP leader and MP Anurag Thakur has written a column in The Times Of India emphasising the need to promote tourism in the country. He writes on the need to set up a ‘sustainable tourism interventions council’, adding, “The council shall include the union tourism minister, state tourism ministers, and members from academia and private sector.”
Some parties are trying to bring a no-confidence motion against the government in the Lok Sabha. But because of the unruly behaviour of some MPs, the Speaker has repeatedly expressed her inability to take the process forward. M.R. Madhavan, co-founder and president of PRS Legislative Research, in his column in The Hindu, criticises the approach of the Speaker.
