Rahul Gandhi claims PM Modi is all show, no substance: Is that true? Experts debate
Rahul Gandhi claimed that after meeting PM Modi two to three times and "sitting with him in the same room," he had figured that the Prime Minister was never a "big problem." He then went on to say, "Dum nahin hai" (He doesn't have guts). Is that true? Watch as experts discuss this and more on the show.
Also on the show, watch India Today's special investigation that uncovered illegal madrasas and hawala funding along the India-Nepal border, revealing radicalisation efforts involving extremist material and videos of controversial preacher Zakir Naik.
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The Hindu
22 minutes ago
- The Hindu
Chinese e-commerce platform AliExpress' doormat with Lord Jagannath image sparks outrage; Odisha demands apology
A major controversy erupted in Odisha as it came to light that Chinese e-commerce platform AliExpress was selling doormats featuring the image of Lord Jagannath. The State's Deputy Chief Minister Pravati Parida criticised as "offensive" the act of printing the image of Lord Jagannath on doormats and selling the products, and demanded an apology from the firm. Taking to X, Ms. Parida said, "Mahaprabhu Jagannath is deeply connected to the soul and emotions of every Odia. I strongly condemn Chinese e-commerce platform @AliExpress_EN for selling doormats featuring Mahaprabhu Jagannath's image. @AliExpress_EN must remove the listing immediately and apologise to devotees for this offensive act." AliExpress, in response to an X post by Odisha's Congress MLA Sofia Firdous, said the product has been removed. "We appreciate your report. The item has been reviewed and removed. Community input helps us improve our platform and strengthen our content checks. Thank you for helping us create a safe and friendly online shopping experience," it said. Ms. Firdous, in her post, stated, 'Strongly condemn the blasphemous act of selling doormats with the sacred image of Lord Jagannath on @AliExpress_EN. This is a grave insult to millions of devotees and a serious attack on cultural and religious sentiments. Immediate action must be taken to remove the listing and issue a public apology.' Eminent sand artist and Padma Shri awardee Sudarshan Pattnaik also condemned the act. "Jai Jagannath. We appeal to all devotees worldwide to raise their voice against this unacceptable act. The sacred image of Mahaprabhu Jagannath on a doormat sold by @AliExpress_EN is deeply offensive. Remove it, apologise, and ensure this never happens again," he said. Former MP and BJD leader Amar Patnaik also condemned the e-commerce platform. "I vehemently condemn the egregious act of selling doormats with the sacred image of Lord Jagannath on AliExpress! This shameless profanity is an affront to the deepest sentiments of millions of devotees, trampling upon the revered iconography with utter disregard. "It's a desecration of the highest order and those responsible must be held accountable. The fact that Lord Jagannath's image is being used as a mere commodity is a stark reminder of the blatant disrespect towards Hinduism. Immediate action is imperative to rectify this egregious wrongdoing and restore dignity to the revered deity," he said.
Indian Express
22 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Malegaon order: BJP seeks Congress apology for ‘tainting' Pragya Thakur image
After the acquittal of all seven accused in the 2008 Malegaon blasts case, the BJP Thursday said it is 'a very historic day' and demanded a public apology from the Congress leadership, including Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, for 'conspiring' to impose the narrative of 'Hindu terror' on the country. Senior BJP leader and national spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad hailed the verdict, which he said decimated a 'calculated conspiracy' to 'peddle a narrative around 'Saffron terror' across the country'. He said it was hatched by the Congress, which was in power at the Centre at that time, for the sake of 'votebank politics'. A special court in Mumbai Thursday acquitted all the accused in the case, including former BJP MP Pragya Singh Thakur and Lt Col Prasad Shrikant Purohit, nearly 17 years after a powerful bomb blast in Maharashtra's Malegaon killed six people and injured more than a hundred. The court's verdict in the case, the BJP MP said, clearly states that there is a lack of adequate proof against all the accused and the prosecution could not prove it, demanding restitution for an attempt to taint Pragya Thakur's 'image of a sage' and 'decorated Indian Army veteran' Lt Colonel Prasad Shrikant Purohit. 'Colonel Purohit, a highly decorated army officer who had waged a big battle against terrorism in Kashmir, was implicated in it; RDX was (allegedly) recovered from his house… Pragya Thakur, a very good Sadhvi leader; it was said that from her motorcycle, a bomb was brought,' he said. 'For 10–12 days, she was tortured so severely that even walking was difficult for her later on; you all have seen that, and other Army officials, too, were implicated. It was a well-calculated conspiracy of the Congress party for sheer votebank politics,' he alleged, adding that the BJP welcomed the verdict and was happy that 'this conspiracy was destroyed' despite a 'diabolical design'. Prasad asked whether the prosecution would apologise to Sadhvi Pragya for 'torturing her' even as he sought compensation for all the accused in the case for having 'lost 17 years of their lives'. 'Pragya Thakur's entire personality as a sage was tainted, and Col Purohit, a very brave soldier of the Indian Army, who was bestowed with several medals and commendations for work against terrorists in Kashmir, what award or prize can he look forward to?' asked Prasad. Recalling the remarks on 'Saffron terror' by former Union home ministers P Chidambaram, Sushil Kumar Shinde and incumbent Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, Prasad said he had countered these by challenging the ties of Saffron with Hindu mythology and tradition. He also referred to the 2004 Ishrat Jahan encounter killing case, alleging that Union Home Minister Amit Shah, who was then a minister in Gujarat then, had been implicated in it based on the testimony of 'two sold-out witnesses' and had to spend months behind bars. 'Possibly for over a year (he remained in prison) and when he got bail, the Supreme Court made him dar-badar (translocated) from Gujarat… That judgment of the Supreme Court was wrong; I have examined it legally as per my experience – there was no evidence against Amit Shah,' he said. 'In the Ishrat Jahan case, the then-Union home secretary was pressured by Chidambaram sahab to not term her a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) agent in the government's affidavit when LeT itself had claimed that she had been one,' Prasad said, accusing the Congress of being willing 'to go to any extent for its votebank'. 'Chidambaram sir does not give certificates only to Pakistan,' he said, referring to the senior Congress leader's recent remarks on the terrorists involved in the Pahalgam terror attack on April 22. Chidambaram had said that 'there is no evidence' that the terrorists came from Pakistan. 'As home minister, he calculatedly raked up the issue of Saffron terror and sought to peddle a new narrative of conspiracy in the country, misusing the entire government machinery to implicate people in it… The BJP demands that Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi apologise to the nation,' he alleged. Jatin Anand is an Assistant Editor with The Indian Express. Over the last 15 years, he has covered bureaucracy & politics, crime, traffic & intelligence, the Election Commission of India & Urban Development among other beats. He is an English (Literature) graduate from Zakir Husain Delhi College, DU & specialised in Print at the Asian College of Journalism (ACJ), Chennai. He tweets @jatinpaul ... Read More
The Print
22 minutes ago
- The Print
India's diplomatic failures aren't just Trump's fault. It's the price of Modi's narcissism
But as recent events have revealed, this is Modi's ' phata poster, nikla zero ' moment. Donald Trump has claimed to have engineered the ceasefire between India and Pakistan, 30 times and counting. And our prime minister has failed to directly call him out or even say his name, preferring to ramble on about the choices Jawaharlal Nehru might have made over six decades ago. Political consensus over Operation Sindoor turned into a heated exchange in Parliament because Narendra Modi has turned India's foreign policy into a personal image-building exercise. The 'vishwaguru' media blitz worked for a while. India's G-20 leadership and photo-ops with world leaders were used to claim Modi's grandeur and portray that it is India's great fortune to have him as PM. Observe a familiar pattern. The nation unites after a horrific terror attack. The Opposition takes the national interest seriously, so it offers full support to the government for a strong response. But be it Balakot or Sindoor, immediately after an opaque military action, the BJP switches to election mode, evading all accountability and painting all those who ask questions as unpatriotic. The costs of this narcissism are clear to see. Obsession with the PM's image has led to the Modi government remaining mum on widespread reports of Indian aircraft losses, and even attempting to pin the blame on the Indian Air Force. Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan admitted, on 31 May, that India lost aircraft in Operation Sindoor but ascribed these to a 'tactical mistake'. Ten days later, India's Defence Attache to Indonesia, Captain Shiv Kumar, attributed the aircraft losses squarely to 'the constraint given by the political leadership to not attack the military establishment or their air defences'. In other words, not only were Indian pilots sent into battle exposed to enemy air-to-air and surface-to-air missiles, they were also prevented from firing back because of political constraints. The diplomatic failure is equally glaring. For all the 'energetic' engagement and multi-party delegations going around the world, there was surprisingly weak international endorsement of India's military actions. Most countries called for 'mutual de-escalation', in effect hyphenating India and Pakistan. Also read: Geopolitical forces beyond New Delhi's control are at play in Trump's approach to India Trump's agenda The icing on the cake was when the country whose civilians were murdered in cold blood had to watch the presumed sponsor of the terror attack, 'Field Marshal' Asim Munir, having lunch with President Trump in the White House. In Trump's words, the agenda of the lunch was to 'thank him for not going into the war [with India]' and 'ending the war' and that he 'was honoured to meet him today.' Compare this with what Barack Obama said in his 2010 address to India's parliament: 'We will continue to insist to Pakistan's leaders that terrorist safe-havens within their borders are unacceptable, and that the terrorists behind the Mumbai attacks be brought to justice.' Howdy Modi? And now the US has announced a 25 per cent tariff on Indian exports from 1 August, while its talks with Pakistan continue. A trade deal may still emerge in the coming days, but Trump's hard negotiating stance is clearly targeting India. Not to forget how the US announced sanctions on six Indian firms for trading Iranian petrochemicals yesterday, the same time as Trump announced a deal for a US firm to develop Pakistani oil reserves. It just isn't cricket. This is a gigantic setback to Indian foreign policy under Modi, and cannot be pinned on Trump's unpredictability alone. When you personalise foreign policy and prioritise image-building, you hand your partners and adversaries a tool with which to manipulate you. This ranges from superficial public gestures that play well on PR photos to sweetheart deals for favoured Modi cronies. The Modi government first put all its eggs into the US basket when the unipolar moment was clearly over. It subsequently overcorrected, accommodating an aggressive China by ceding buffer zones in eastern Ladakh and agreeing to Chinese concurrence for Indian patrols that earlier had free access to various patrolling points. Meanwhile, China gave full support to Pakistan during Operation Sindoor, giving it 'live inputs' on Indian operations, and turning India into a testing ground for network-centric warfare and new weapons systems. It has restricted critical exports to India and made moves into the northeast through the world's largest hydropower project on the Brahmaputra. To put it bluntly, Nehru's nonalignment sought investment and aid from both the US and the USSR. Modi's nonalignment has accepted economic and political penalties from both the US and China. Amitabh Dubey is a Congress member. He tweets @dubeyamitabh. Views are personal. (Edited by Theres Sudeep)
