Wednesday, March 08, 2017

Annals of 'Post Truth': Is Rajeev Chandrasekhar The Peter Thiel Of India?

So, a rich man in India got the courts to issue a take down order to a news website, TheWIre, even before giving it a chance to explain itself. That most of our media is prostrating itself before the Modi government is not news. What is a bigger news that the rich and powerful people are being able to openly dictate what the Indian people get to read about them in the media. From Scroll.in:

The Wire took down two articles that  (Rajeev)Chandrasekhar. The first, published on January 25, was a report by Sandeep Bhushan on the Republic TV, a news channel Chandrasekhar is set to launch in association with former Times Now editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami.

The second, published on February 17, was an opinion piece by Sachin Rao on the alleged conflict of interest in Chandrasekhar being a member of the parliamentary committee on defence and investing in defence companies.

The offending articles are here but they show the take down notice instead.


All this seems familiar to the way Billionaire Peter Thiel went after Gawker, eventually succeeding in getting Gawker.com to shut down and paying loads in fine, just because Thiel didn't agree with the stuff Gawker was prublishing. In his response to a questionairre sent by Scroll.in, Chandrasekhar replied in an eerily Thiel-like manner:

“This court action is not about a take down, it is about holding those who did this accountable for their actions,” he added. 
Of course he meant that the rich and powerful are not accountable for their actions at all, only those in media who dare to speak the truth.


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posted by Pramit Singh @ 11:32 AM 0 Comments