Pairokar

               Planting fake and false news is not new to journalism. This practice has been going on for quite a long time but the scale and frequency with which it is being resorted to these days by a cross-section of motivated people and organisations are too much to recount. The sad part of it is that those who claim to be the champions of the cause of truth and objectivity are also indulging in this nefarious practice.  Some time ago we have seen that an operator of a Utube channel, who boasted himself to be the fact checker floated a wild rumour about himself having been shortlisted for the Nobel Peace Prize. Many news channels became a willing and collusive parties to give credence and wide publicity to the wild rumour.    A few years back a TV Channel spread the false news about a schoolteacher running the flesh trade and using the girl students at the school to make money. The said rumour spoiled not only the ...

     Live streaming of the proceedings of some of the High Courts and three Constitution Benches in the Supreme Court has already given an inkling of how the courts (mal) function in India. If one can see the erudition, courtesy and learning of some of the judges and the advocates then at the same time the tantrums and arrogance of some of the judges and bluffs and bragging of some advocates can also be witnessed. Some of the judges look grotesque with their unbecoming attitude and they give of the appearance of a headmaster in the courtrooms. Instead of asking searching and incisive questions from the advocates and clients, their arrogance and ill manners come into display.   When we were campaigning for the live telecasting of the court proceedings, many used to oppose it tooth and nail. Their only logic was that the judges and advocates should not be exposed to the mockery or merriment of the general public. They came forward with all sorts of asinine logic ag...

  A constitution bench of the Supreme Court of India is engaged in hearing many petitions filed against the demonetisation of the currency notes of Rs 500 and 1000 denominations. One thing is clear the outcome of these petitions will be definitely infructuous at the cost of a huge judicial time. There is no denying that demonetisation largely curbed the flow of black money.  Be that as it may, demonetisation has given a great push to the digitalisation of payments. The Narendra Modi government must be credited to have incentivised and encouraging the Apps like GPay, Payfone and Bhim etc. One can move around without carrying cash. It is the swiftest mode of receiving and making payments without any hassle.  Think of those days when a term was used by the newspapers like ‘money order economy ’. It was very cumbersome and a delaying mode of remittance. The Post offices used to tell at the very outset that any complaint for non-delivery of the money ordered amount would b...

                  Two conmen- Prateek Sinha and Mohammad Zubair- should be complimented for having spread the false news that both of them have been shortlisted for Nobel Peace Prize and many believed them. They also got some congratulatory messages from the echo system of which they have been the part and parcel. The mockery is that they claimed to be awarded for running a fact-checking portal called Alt news, which is more known for the notoriety of peddling fake news. It was this portal which was responsible for creating an atmosphere of communal frenzy in India. These Johnnies were successful in ploughing the hate campaign against a BJP leader, which had resulted in an all-India chorus for ‘tan se juda’ slogan by a section of a community.   It is said that rumours have no legs but only wings. By the time, the truth is known the rumours already get caused enough damage. It would have been most incredible fiction, ev...

               Untold Stories of the Framing of the Indian Constitution: An Absorbing Book      ‘Bhartiya Samvidhan Unkahi Kahani’ by the journalist Ram Bahadur Rai is a highly informative book on the making of India‘s Constitution in a very lucid and anecdotal style. What prompted Shri Rai to go for this book has been elucidated in the preamble of his book. It must be mentioned here that the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly for the framing of the Constitution took place on 9 th  December 1946, more than nine months before the country achieved independence on 15 th  August 1947. Obviously, this Constituent Assembly was not elected by the people, yet its legitimacy was beyond any reproach. Initially, there were 389 members of this Assembly out of it, 292 were elected through the Provincial Legislative Assemblies: 93 were the representatives of the Indian Princely States, and four members represented the C...