India Speaks Daily, in the morning, had given a video on Supreme Court’s concern over fake news on Chinese virus.
By evening, the Uttar Pradesh police has filed FIR against “The Wire” Editor Siddharth Varadarajan for peddling fake news against UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
The editor peddled the fake news to underplay Tableeghi Jamaat’s misdeed of holding Markaz at Nizamuddin, despite 21-day nationwide lockdown called by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, due to Chinese virus outbreak.
Varadarajan had swung into action soon after Tableeghi Jamaat fiasco became the hot news for the left-liberal cabal.
They ganged up to whitewash the Jamaat’s Markaz (Congregation), which had put people’s lives at stake. In fact, the very first person who dies due to the virus was an attendee of Nizammuddin Markaz. Many more participants have already been declared positive.
Varadarajan had mis-attributed a quote to Yogi which was actually stated by an expelled mahant. In a tweet, he wrongly claimed Yogi’s plans to proceed with a large Ram Navami fair at Ayodhya from March 25 to April 2.
He wrote: “On the day Tableeghi Jamaat event was being held, Adityanath insisted a large Ram Navami fair planned for Ayodhya from March 25 to April 2 would proceed as usual and that ‘Lord Ram would protect devotees from the coronavirus.”
Taking a swipe at Varadarjan’s tweet, UP CM’s media advisor, Mrityunjay Kumar warned action against him if he failed to delete the tweet.
“Delete it else actions will be taken against it and defamation proceedings will also be initiated. After that you will be forced to beg for donations for legal case along with donations for the website,” Kumar tweeted taunting Varadarajan.
Since Varadarajan refused to take down the article and apologise for the same, the UP government registered FIR. “If you are also thinking about Yogi government kindly remove such thinking from your brain,” Kumar warned others about spreading fake news about UP govt.
As of today, as many as 2,100 Muslims have been evacuated from the building in Nizamuddin and sent to isolation ward.
Investigation is going on and efforts are being made to trace those who had attended as well as those who had come in contact with them.
The Wire’s Past Misdeeds
This is not the first time Varadarajan has been in soup. Some times back, a false story on Amit Shah and his son Jay Shah’s indulgence in scam, written by The Wire’s Rohini Singh, was shred to pieces.
The article was poorly researched, which received brickbats from readers and subsequently the portal was issued a defamation notice from Jay Shah seeking Rs 100 crores in damages.
Rajya Sabha TV also had served a legal notice to The Wire for illegally possessing its copyright material and using it.
The legal notice accused the portal for possessing copyright material of Rajya Sabha TV in an unauthorised and unlawful manner suggestive of either stealing or obtaining and making use of the stolen property.
The legal notice warned that if it fails to do so, they will be liable for civil and criminal consequences.
On 17th September 2018, The Wire had published a story headlined, “RSTV benches anchor for question about Vajpayee’s role in Quit India Movement.
The notice said that the video clip used by the portal in its story is the exclusive property of Rajya Sabha TV and that the clip used by the portal doesn’t even carry the logo of Rajya Sabha TV.
The notice also said that it did not seek any permission from RSTV for the use of this clip.
A probe also was initiated in 2018 into the alleged irregularities in the functioning of the Rajya Sabha TV, specifically the expenditure incurred on the production of a film called Raag Desh, which incurred a cost of whopping Rs 13 crores.
Both editors of The Wire – M K Venu and Varadarajan – were paid Rs 15,000 per appearance on Rajya Sabha TV, which was allegedly used to spread agenda and pay them handsomely. The TV was under the control of former vice president Hamid Ansari.
The misdeeds of The Wire are many. We will come back on them later.
He needs some harsh measures to meet.
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