by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh for the first time admitted in the Lok Sabha on Thursday that fake news on social media has resulted in many mob lynching incidents in the country, saying the government has asked service providers to put a check on rumour mongering on social media. Not satisfied with his response, the opposition walked out.
Earlier, the Minister termed these incidents ‘unfortunate’ and asked the state governments to take “appropriate action”. He was replying to a question raised by K.C. Venugopal of the Congress during Zero Hour.
The Congress MP said incidents of mob lynching and vigilantism have increased across the country and political opponents were also being targeted by vigilante groups.
He alleged that investigative agencies were being misused even as he hit out at BJP MP Jayant Sinha for garlanding eight people who were convicted in a mob lynching case.
“Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity as well as Swami Agnivesh have been attacked by ruling party members,” said Venugopal. He also urged the government to bring a law to check such crimes.
Replying to him, Singh said while it was true that such incidents resulting in deaths have been reported from various parts of the country, “this is not the first time that such incidents have happened”.
Condemning these incidents, he said it was the responsibility of the states to take appropriate action.
“Since law and order is a state subject, the state governments should take action. I have personally spoken to the Chief Ministers about these incidents,” said Singh.
“The spread of fake news on social media by unverified accounts is also responsible for these incidents. We have asked the social media service providers to devise a system to prevent fake news,” he added.
He also said that the Home Ministry had issued two advisories to the state governments, one in 2016 and the other a few days back, urging them to take action in such incidents.
Not happy with the Minister’s reply, Congress, RJD and CPI-M members staged a walkout.
According to media reports, 20 people have died in lynching cases across the country this year.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : The Supreme Court on Tuesday condemned mob lynching incidents across the country and urged Parliament to enact a law to deal with the crime that threatens rule of law and the country’s social fabric.
“It is the duty of the State to maintain law and order, social and pluralistic fabric of the society and the rule of law,” bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justice A.M. Khanwilkqar and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud said.
Pronouncing the judgment, Chief Justice Misra said that no one can take the law into their own hands or become a law unto himself.
Issuing a slew of directions including preventive, remedial and punitive steps to deal with the crime, the court said that mobocracy will not be allowed.
Asking the Centre to file a compliance report on its directions, the court adjourned the matter to August 20.
Th judgment came on a petition seeking the apex court’s intervention to curb the incidents of violence by the vigilante groups across the country.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : Blaming failure at the political level for increasing cases of mob violence, the CPI-M has said that communal and sectarian fault lines “which have opened up in our society lead to dehumanising and anarchic violence”.
“The unconscionable and brutal violence emanating from the child lifting scare reveals deep social pathologies,” said an editorial in “People’s Democracy”, the official organ of the Communist Party of India-Marxist.
It pointed out how in the last two months a spate of mob attacks and lynching in different parts of the country had led to the death of at least 30 innocent people in 10 states.
The mob attacks were mostly sparked off by rumours of ‘child lifting’ sent out through WhatsApp messaging service.
It said the most affected states were Jharkhand and Maharashtra which accounted for seven and nine deaths respectively.
The editorial said thia wave of violence began with the targeting of Muslims in the name of cow slaughter or eating beef in 2015.
“The atmosphere of hate built up by targeting Muslims and Dalits is now erupting in the form of the scare of ‘child-lifting’ and resultant mob violence.
“The BJP-run state governments and the RSS-BJP outfits sought to either justify or underplay the violence unleashed by the cow vigilantes. The constant hate campaign against `the other’ launched by the Hindutva forces have taken its toll.
“It is this which has encouraged the general atmosphere of impunity and breakdown of societal values.”
The editorial said that in all the affected states, the political leadership in the state government had not come out effectively rebutting the false propaganda and declaring their resolve to put down strongly such irrational mob violence.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, “who is adept at using the social media, has been conspicuously silent”, it added.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Markets, News, Politics, Social Media
New Delhi : The Union Home Ministry has issued an advisory to states and Union Territories (UTs) asking them to take measures to prevent incidents of mob lynching fuelled by rumours of child lifting circulating on social media, an official said on Thursday.
The advisory urged the states as well as the UTs to keep a watch for “early detection of such rumours and initiate effective measures for countering them”.
“The states and UTs have been asked to direct district administrations to identify vulnerable areas and conduct community outreach programmes for creating awareness and building confidence,” the advisory said.
It was also stressed that complaints of child abduction or kidnapping should be properly investigated to instil confidence among the affected persons.
The mob attacks were mostly sparked off by rumours of child lifting sent out through WhatsApp messaging service.
Five persons were beaten to death by a mob in Maharashtra’s Dhule district on suspicion of being child-lifters.
A series of similar unfortunate incidents has rocked many states, including Assam, Karnataka, Tripura and West Bengal, with people being beaten to death simply on suspicion of being child-lifters or thieves owing to false rumours on social media.
The Indian government on Tuesday asked WhatsApp to take immediate action to end the menace of spreading messages that impact the country’s law and order situation and ensure that the platform is not used for such malafide activities.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Sitaram Yechury
Kolkata : Describing as “unthinkable” and “painful” the lynching of two persons in West Bengal for transporting cows in pick-up vans, CPI-M General Secretary Sitaram Yechury on Tuesday blamed the “competitive communalism” of the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress and the opposition BJP for such happenings.
“It’s unthinkable that such things can happen in West Bengal,” Yechury told media persons here.
The two victims – Hafizul Sheikh and Anwar Hussain – were beaten to death by a mob on suspicion of cattle smuggling on Sunday at Jharsalboni area near Dhupguri in north Bengal’s Jalpaiguri district.
“I find it painful… this is a result of the competitive communalism of the Trinamool and the BJP in order to bring about a communal polarisation,” he said.
Yechury also castigated the Trinamool government for barring immersion of Durga puja idols on the Ashura or the 10th day of Muharram – October 1.
“It is only aimed at appeasing minorities. On the other hand, the Bharatiya Janata Party is stoking majority communalism,” he said.
Banerjee has announced that the Durga Puja immersion would be allowed on Dussehra/Dashami, September 30, but not on October 1 as Muslims would observe Ashura, a day of mourning in the month of Muharram on that day. However, the immersions would be resume on October 2 and could take place till October 4.
Yechury said instead of “differentiating and interfering”, the state government should facilitate meetings of the leaders of the two communities so that they could find a solution themselves.
“They took a similar decision last year. These decisions are only allowing the BJP to grow,” he said.
—IANS
