NB: A young friend has brought to my notice what this gizmo says about me – its a farrago of lies and half truths. This machine makes me two years older than I am (which is old enough thank you); and attributes to me new-age kind of mumbo-jumbo statements which I have never made. ChatGPT… Read More Noam Chomsky says ChatGPT is a form of High-Tech Plagiarism
Hannah Ellis-Petersen in Delhi Since Modi came to power in 2014, some journalists and other media workers have alleged that a systematic silencing of critical reporting has taken place and that journalists have been targeted as “anti-national” threats to the state. In this year’s World Press Freedom Index, India dropped down to 150 out of 180 countries,… Read More Indian journalists say BBC raid part of drive to intimidate media
By Oliver Darcy, CNN Business Fox News has been exposed like never before. A trove of newly-released text messages and emails have laid bare how the right-wing media giant operated with little regard for fact in the weeks and months following the 2020 presidential election. The correspondence reveals that the network’s senior-most executives and highest-profile hosts chose not… Read More Fox News has been exposed as a dishonest organization terrified of its own audience
Guardian revelations about the scale and reach of deliberate misinformation prove the need to reset our internet Peter Pomerantsev In 1996, John Perry Barlow, former lyricist for the Grateful Dead and guru of Silicon Valley’s hippy-tech idealists, wrote a stirring utopian manifesto about the future of the internet. Addressing the leaders of the world order gathered… Read More The web is a Blade Runner nightmare, but there is a way to stem the tide of lies
On June 25, 1975, Indira Gandhi declared a state of emergency in India that lasted for 21 months. The period saw widespread human rights violations, jailing of members of the Opposition and a clampdown on press freedom. Forty three years later, journalist Ajoy Bose, author of a newly relaunched book on the Emergency, interviews Nayantara Sahgal, who… Read More Nayantara Sahgal speaks to Ajoy Bose: ‘We have a nightmare which is worse than the Emergency’
PUCL Bulletin, June 2001 – A.D.M. Jabalpur vs Shukla Supreme Court overrules Emergency era Habeas Corpus verdict April 28th, 1976 is a day never to be forgotten by any of us Indians who love the pledges of Justice and Liberty which we gave to ourselves in the Preamble of our Constitution. It was on this day… Read More EMERGENCY Archive / When the Supreme Court struck down Habeas Corpus
Bharat Bhushan Narendra Modi’s blame avoidance has been made possible not only by his oratorical skills, but by televised proceedings of Parliament. Live-streaming allows soap-box oratory to supplant accountability Prime Minister Narendra Modi refused to address in Parliament the controversies and allegations surrounding businessman Gautam Adani’s meteoric rise and, now, his perceptible decline. By removing… Read More A masterclass in blame avoidance
NB: The Iranian theocracy is brutal, mindless and emblematic of the evil of authoritarian regimes the world over. DS An Iranian doctor and rights activist has been released from Tehran’s infamous Evin prison one week after photographs of his severely emaciated condition emerged on social media. Farhad Meysami was released from prison on Friday, according… Read More Kingdom of God: Iran frees dissident Farhad Meysami after photos of his emaciated condition cause outrage online
The Indian prime minister’s attempts to suppress a critical BBC documentary show how sensitive he is to his international reputation. (NB: The problem is that the ‘parivar’ boasts about the same thing at home which its proponents wish to deny on the international stage. DS) Mukul Kesavan The clue to the Indian government’s thin-skinned response… Read More Narendra Modi is struggling to be both anti-Muslim strongman and global leader
‘Blank Paper movement’ decrying government policies rekindles dissent after Xi Jinping’s decade of iron-fisted crackdowns. Support the Chinese peoples struggle for democracy! A 25-year-old woman who had been interrogated by police after protesting in south China tells the Guardian that even though she is frightened by police, the protests have radicalised her as she has… Read More ‘We just want to live in a normal world’: China’s young protesters speak out, and disappear
After the truth-shower 