Prime Time
WhatsAppSnoopgate and #RightToBreathe were the main subjects on prime time news Monday.
NDTV 24X7’s Sreenivasan Jain directly asked on ‘Reality Check’ if there was a government link to the WhatsApp hack. News18’s Marya Shakil tested her #RightToBreathe on the streets of Delhi. Times Now also took to the streets with anchor Padmaja Joshi focusing on the police and lawyers clash at Tis Hazari courts.
The man of the day was BJP’s Delhi leader Vijay Goel who flouted the odd-even traffic rules. In interviews across channels, he called the policy a “drama”. But he was criticised by all anchors, including Times Now’s Navika Kumar, who said Goel pulled the stunt because he wanted to be Delhi’s “next CM”. “Aapko shobha nahin deti hai (Doesn’t suit you),” she added.
India Today: Anchor Rahul Kanwal on #NewsTrack debated the air emergency in Delhi. At one stage in exasperation, he exclaimed, “Who listens to Arvind Kejriwal anyway.”
Environmentalist Vimlendu Jha said, “If you look at what has been happening for the last several days or several weeks and years, it is only blame game…”
Raghav Chadha, leader of Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party, said, “Air pollution is not a Delhi issue but a north India problem… Therefore a north India solution is required.”
Republic TV: The main issue on the 9 pm debate was that anchor Arnab Goswami was missing. However, it was business as usual with the high decibel levels — Israeli software Pegasus and #SnoopgatePolitics was the cause of agitation.
Political analyst Vishal Sharma said, “Congress does not even have the moral right to raise this issue… It is the queen bee of snooping.”
Political analyst, Danish Qureshi, said, “What the government has done in the Snoopgate matter, everyone knows very well. Since the 2019 elections, the snooping is going on and on.”
India TV: “Delhi ki zahreeli hawa ki dawa kya? (What is the solution for Delhi’s toxic air),” asked anchor Saurav Sharma.
AAP’s Atishi reiterated what CM Kejriwal has been saying — Delhi’s pollution is both Delhi’s responsibility and that of neighbouring states. “The pollution due to internal reasons has been reduced to 25 per cent… It’s time for the central government to take the lead in reducing the pollution due to stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana,” she said.
BJP’s Rajeev Babbar responded, “BJP government allocated Rs 1,140 crore to both Punjab and Haryana and it has shown results. The satellite pictures from Haryana show less stubble burning in past 48 hours.”
BJP is the ruling party in Haryana while Congress governs Punjab.
ABP News: It was Ayodhya and Ram temple on ABP News after former Union home secretary Madhav Godbole claimed that former Congress leader and prime minister Rajiv Gandhi was another ‘kar sevak’ and ex-prime minister P.V. Narasimha Rao could have stopped the demolition of Babri Masjid.
Political analyst Nishant Verma disagreed: “Then UP CM (Kalyan Singh) from the BJP government had given a written assurance about the security of the mosque…”
Islamic scholar Shoaib Jamai said the communal fervor at that time was fuelled by BJP leader L.K. Advani’s ‘Rath Yatra’. “Exactly (the same as created) before the killing Mahatma Gandhi by the RSS”, he said.
RSS’s Sangeet Ragi claimed that Congress didn’t resolve the issue for its own reasons: “Hindus were fighting for their faith… Congress was fighting for its politics.”
Front Page
Mainstream newspapers Tuesday report India’s decision to opt out of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) on their front pages but Delhi pollution’s nightmare continues to be prominent.
RCEP: The headlines focus on different aspects of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech announcing the decision. The Times of India’s lays the blame with RCEP, “India opts out of RCEP, Modi says concerns not addressed”; Hindustan Times centres the PM’s conscience — “RCEP a no-go, Modi says conscience doesn’t allow”; The Indian Express is more detailed – “India drops out of regional trade pact, says not balanced, other 15 go ahead”; and The Hindu emphasises India’s reasons, “Saying RCEP will hurt farmers, India walks out”.
Modi cited “its negative effects on ‘farmers, MSMEs and the dairy sector’ and also mentions that the move comes “seven years after India joined negotiations”, writes Hindu.
Express reports that the last minute dropout comes because of “opposition onslaught, subdued results in Maharashtra and Haryana elections, and the government’s own inability to hardsell the trade deal”.
TOI records the reactions of other countries and writes, “The outcome annoyed China… and other members of the bloc who have been eyeing the Indian market”.
Delhi pollution: HT offers some good news: “Sunshine broke through thick smog… as the toxic blanket that engulfed Delhi appeared to lift because of increased wind speeds, improving the air quality to ‘very poor’ by evening”. It also had more disturbing report that stubble burning in Punjab has reached a new peak.
Ironically, on Monday, the Supreme Court ordered Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab to immediately stop stubble burning. Hindu writes that if the order is not complied with “the entire State administrative and police mechanisms” of the three state will be held responsible. TOI adds that SC termed the situation worse than the Emergency. Express said that the problem ultimately is about “a simple trade off: between more smoke and less water”. It also identifies delayed burning and wind patterns as the reason behind the smog.
TOI also reports on the odd-even scheme that began Monday – “nearly 15 lakh cars went off roads and enforcement agencies reported high compliance across the city”, it says.
Maharashtra stalemate: The uncertainty around who will eventually form the government in Maharashtra continued Monday. Express writes that the BJP is going to “wait and watch” if the Shiv Sena will make good its assertion that it will prefer to form a government with the NCP and Congress. TOI follows suit and quotes an anonymous NCP party worker saying the party is willing to join a Shiv Sena-led government with Congress supporting from outside.
However, HT reports that with the week-end deadline looming, “neither side appeared close to a majority”.
Others: “One person was killed and over 40 others, including nine women, injured in a grenade attack in Lalchowk” in Srinagar, reports Express. HT also carries the report on page 1 but reports that 35 people were injured in the attack.
In an exclusive report, Express writes, “The government has written to 11 PSUs to verify their records for any exercise of ‘undue influence’ by Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa during his tenure in the Power Ministry from 2009 to 2013.
Opinion
The Indian Express: Delhi is having its “breath taken away” with air pollution levels at a “three-year high”, Express writes in “Everyone’s problem”. While the Delhi government is blaming neighbouring states for failing to curb stubble burning, the opposition is dismissing the odd-even policy as a “gimmick”. Political “posturing” has “trumped rigorous analysis and modelling”.
Express asks if a conversation can be developed between states, and between town and country. The issue of stubble burning has been represented as an urbanisation versus “stressed” agriculture issue — between the “farmer’s right to make a living” and the “city-dweller’s right to breathe”. This is “everyone’s problem”, writes the daily.
The Times of India: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan is getting a taste of his own “religious extremism medicine”. Khan is currently the target of the ‘azadi march’ — a long protest march led by Maulana Fazlur Rehman and his political faction, the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam. The march calls for Khan’s resignation, with Rehman criticising the Pakistan Army’s decision to select Khan as Pakistan’s premier. Ironically, Khan is the target of the “same tactics” he once used against former president Nawaz Sharif’s government in 2014.
Mass mobilisation of “religiously oriented protestors” has become common in Pakistan, indicating a further “Islamisation” of Pakistan’s polity and society and “erosion” of democracy. Khan can’t support Islamist radicals in Kashmir, but oppose them at home, writes TOI. It’s not a “tap to be turned on and off at will”, but it’s “time to cut the water supply entirely”.
Everyone and I