Rakesh
1.6K posts
It just struck me that I was a media professional for 20 years but still don't know what the Press Club looks like from inside.
Nikhil J. Alva@njalva
I find the hypocrisy of my friends in the media ranting about privilege and the Delhi Gymkhana Club, while chugging subsidised alcohol in the Press Club, built on public land generously gifted to them and their ‘privileged’ brethren by the Government, in the heart of ‘Lutyens’ Delhi, that no ‘ordinary’ Indian may dare seek membership of, extremely amusing.
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@ShivAroor Sir, let us blame the "system" while absolving those who wield power.
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@tavleen_singh If it is a private club then what are they doing on public land. Let them pay the Market price.
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Most people demanding the closure of the Gymkhana Club seem angry about being denied entry. It is a private club. Having known it well since I was a child it puzzles me that it suddenly became a ‘national security threat’.
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@bainjal @prasoonjoshi_ @DDNational मैडम, आप भी दिन भर इंडियन मुस्लिम को जिहादी बताती हैं, तो भाई ने भी बहती गंगा में हाथ धो लिया। अब आप ज्यादा भोला न बनें।
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Forget him but, what kinda mindset calls a kid a “Pakistani” uses his pulpit to turn a hate mob on a kid virtually a digital lynching & yet @prasoonjoshi_ @DDNational paid for by tax payers takes no action? How hate filled are the Modi Panna Pramukhs
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@MrsGandhi @grok what was the price of petrol in the US in May 2025 (in rupees and litres)?
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@MrsGandhi Tell me what was the price of petrol in the US in May 2025 and what were we paying? Don't run away.
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Don’t confuse outrage with truth. Facts remain facts, even when drowned by shouting.
Fact is that India has recorded the smallest fuel price hike of all major economies anid West Asia war. India is in very good hands!!
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@KiranKS @TVMohandasPai When the basic of IAS was 2200-4000, 10 Lakhs loan was luxury.
Inflation was 10% and bank deposit rates were 12-13%, mostly non taxable.
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@ThinkingRakesh @TVMohandasPai How much was the inflation in 1996?
How much was the average salary in 1996?
Factor those two and you will get a full picture of paying 18.75% interest on home loan.. that too most didn't even qualify with SBI then!
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30 years ago in May 1996, if you wanted a ₹10,00,000 home loan from SBI, the interest rate was 18.75%.
That was after ~ five decades of socialist policies and mostly dynastic rule by Congress.
Check today's home loan rates. Decide if the middle class got better or worse.
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पश्चिमी देशों में युद्ध की आंच से दुनिया के सभी देश प्रभावित हो रहे हैं, भारत भी उसी में से एक है।
इस दौरान बीते एक सप्ताह में भारत में तेल के दाम जितने बढे हैं, उसके दोगुने दाम मोदी सरकार ने पहले कम भी किए हैं।
मोदी जी की नीयत और राष्ट्रहित, जनहित की कार्यशैली पर कोई शक नहीं कर सकता।
ये आंकड़ें प्रमाण हैं! दुनिया के हर देश में तेल के दाम बढे, यहाँ तक कि फ़रवरी-2026 के बाद कई देशों में पेट्रोल के दाम में 90% तक की वृद्धि हुई लेकिन भारत में सिर्फ 6% दाम बढ़े।
आज सभी को पेट्रोल-डीजल मिल रहा है, कहीं कोई किल्लत नहीं है, जबकि भारत 85% निर्यात पर निर्भर है। वरना कई देशों ने तो लिमिट तय कर दी है।
हिन्दी
@KiranKS @TVMohandasPai Was it due to lack of power generation?
Partly, but not mainly.
India already had a supply-demand gap then, but the blackout itself was more about:
poor grid management,
overloaded transmission,
and coordination failure.
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India's peak power demand reached 271 GW this week. Most youngsters are not realising how this country is providing power for such a demand!
Not sure how many remember. In July 2012, ~ 62 crore people went without power for 13.5 hours!
Peak demand in 2012 was 135 GW only.
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People you might want to bookmark this. It’s the first time I’ve encountered someone so shameless that he is even distorting Romila Thapar’s words. 😂
I called out Neo-Buddhist supremacist Tenzing’s blatant falsification of Shree Bankim Chandra's views on the origins of Jagannatha Ratha Yatra - where he deliberately omitted Chandra’s conclusion to mislead readers into thinking that he agreed with Cunningham’s bogus theory that Rath Yatra had Buddhist origins.
But as I began reading the rest of the same thread I noticed that he has even deliberately misrepresented the words of - Romila Thapar!
He claims that Romila Thapar declared that Hindu king Pusysmitra Śunga demolished 84,000 Buddhist stupas built by Ashoka - but when you read the relevant excerpt in Thapar’s book - she clearly contradicts this theory and instead says:
“The idea of Pusyamitra being violently anti-Buddhist has often been stated, but archaeological evidence suggests the CONTRARY. Buddhist literature relates that Pusyamitra ……decided that he would gain fame by destroying these 84,000 stupas. Yet, an archaeological study of the stupa at Sanchi proves that it was enlarged and encased in its present covering during the Sunga period. The Asokan pillar near it appears to have been wilfully destroyed, but this event may have occurred at a much later date. It is more than likely that the Ashokavadana legend is a Buddhist version of Pusyamitra's attack on the Mauryas, and reflects the fact that, with the declining influence of Buddhism at the imperial court, Buddhist monuments and institutions would naturally receive less royal attention. Moreover the source itself in this instance being Buddhist, it would naturally exaggerate the wickedness of anti-Buddhists.”
Here Thapar has clearly made several important points:
1. Archaeological evidence does not show Pushyamitra as destroying Buddhist monuments - in fact it suggests the contrary, the Buddhist Sanchi Stupa was enlarged and enhanced by his Hindu Śunga descendants.
2. The Ashokan pillar was likely destroyed at a much later date after Pushyamitra.
3. The Buddhist source Ashokavadana which described Pushyamitra attacking Buddhist stupas - was a biased hagiography written by Buddhists who were angered at losing royal patronage under the Śungas. Also since Buddhist sources tend to exaggerate against non-Buddhists vastly, any such description of Pushyamitra’s wickedness is not reliable.
It’s amazing that Tenzing continues to be so brazen in his blatantly fraudulent distortion of historical sources. Imagine even falsifying Romila Thapar to push your Hinduphobic lies.
Unbelievable. 😂
Tenzing Lamsang@TenzingLamsang
According to historian Romila Thaper, the Hindu ruler, Pushyamitra Sunga, demolished 84,000 Buddhist stupas which had been built by Ashoka the Great (Romila Thaper, Ashoka and Decline of Mouryas, London, 1961, p 200).
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CBSE's revaluation nightmare has stretched into a third straight day, with Class 12 students and parents battling crashing portals, failed payments, unreadable scanned copies and growing fears over evaluation quality. Amid JEE, NEET and CUET pressure, many say CBSE's rechecking and post-result process has turned into a mentally exhausting mess.
Read More: intdy.in/eml802
#CBSE #Class12Result #Rechecking | @roshnism
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There is no point beating around the bush and lying to ourselves - the performance of the MEA spokesperson when confronted with a belligerent journalist in Norway was pretty abysmal and very subpar. We must have the courage to face our own inadequacies.
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@YRDeshmukh @RuhiTewari The media's job is to "target" politicians.
Dr Singh faced strong media scrutiny.
Trump is taking blows from unfavorable media.
But they never shied away.
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Agree with everything you said, just extending the last line with a different PoV. I totally agree with you that this is total contempt towards media for sure, which is rooted in his personal experience on how he was treated by the same media twenty years back. He felt targetted. Let's agree on one thing that our much celebrated editors way back then were equally compromised to the other side of spectrum, so I can't really blame him for that contempt. Modi realised he can't trust the media for his messaging and opened up a direct line of communication with voters. The new age social media platforms came handy in that process. And all of a sudden the role of media became redundant in that context. So all in all, the fault isn't his alone, imho. Yes, in a civilised constitutional democratic norms, we would have loved an open press conference. But looking at way Donald Trump is treating American media in his open press conferences, it feels like almost a saving grace that we are getting a contempt of non-engagement. Not sure if a certain Amit Shah or Yogi or Himanta Biswa Sarma or even Kejriwal or DK Shivkumar for that matter would be any different from Trump treatment if they were to occupy the top post some day.
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It’s astounding how a democratically elected & by all accounts, popular, prime minister has not held ONE open press conference in 12 years. There have been addresses to the nation, election speeches, monologues at public rallies, there has been a lot of ‘mann ki baat’, but not one free Q&A session with the press.
For a leader who has had overwhelming voter sentiment in his favour for a decade, holding an unscripted conference should never have been an issue. And yet, here we are.
This isn’t lack of confidence. This is complete disdain for the press — a message to us that I will never allow you to ask me questions and yet, you will report on every single word I say. It is a message of contempt. It is a misplaced sense of power.
Manisha Pande@MnshaP
The Norway and Netherlands episodes are consistent with a communications posture Modi has maintained throughout his more than a decade in power: no open, unscripted press conferences, at home or abroad.
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@RShivshankar What were the petrol prices in the US in May 2025?
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3% fuel hike in India.
Here's the INDIA VS WORLD comparison.
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