Ashlesha Khadse

NY Times has essentially confirmed that Israel played a role in stimulating the violent regime change riots that left around 3000 dead in Iran this January 8 and 9, but which were marketed in the West as pro-democracy protests. It was well understood by the Mossad that those riots would help stimulate military action by Trump. Israeli intel merely needed to convince the feeble-minded president that a wave of decapitation strikes would unleash a massive upheaval to immediately topple the Islamic Republic. The January riots were presented to Trump as a preview of what was to come. Western media, including the NY Times and The Guardian, played a central role in legitimizing Israel's deception by falsely characterizing the violent regime change riots as mere protests, massively inflating the death toll and covering up the fact that many were murdered by the Israel-backed rioters themselves The whole of Western media and the Western human rights industrial complex deliberately misrepresented the real character of those riots. But now that the war they helped to instigate is going badly for the US and Israel, that same media is now free to reveal a few kernels of truth.

Hey @chetan_bhagat rupee has crossed 94, it’s a mayhem! Raise your voice!

@nit_set @reporters_co @shreegireesh Great work by Shreegirish but also huge credit to the invisible activists who fought this over the last 6 years

Modi gov't has 'temporarily suspended' the forced feeding of Fortified Rice to 80 cr poor Indians. Context: In May 2023 my @reporters_co colleague @shreegireesh unearthed the scam called Modi govt's Fortified Rice Scheme. Based on spurious science and failed pilot projects, against warnings by its own experts, Modi gov't had pressed ahead to force feed fortified rice to all of 80 crore poor in India. The orders to do so had come from the top. There were foreign business interests backing the scheme. They stood to earn thousands of crores annually from this move. Modi gov't, which otherwise makes such a hue and cry over 'foreign interests', had played into their hands to force the poor in India to consume something untested. Across the country, Shreegireesh found, the poor were complaining of this 'plastic rice' making it to their plates. He brought out a complete set of internal gov't documents to demolish the governments propaganda around the scheme. And showed who the real beneficiaries of the scheme were - Corporates backed by dubious NGOs working for the corporate interests. Now, the government has 'temporarily suspended' the scheme claiming its now learnt that fortified rice is not doing any good. We still don't know the real reasons why it has done so. We will dig those out too. Shreegireesh's reports and evidence was used in the courts. It was picked up, plagiarised, copy pasted and replicated by others in media, sometimes with and sometimes without due credit. Our reports were shortlisted for the world's biggest award for investigative journalism, the Fetisov award. We were grateful for the straight and the backhanded compliments. But, most of all, we were happy that our work had put the truth out bluntly and with hard evidence. I write this to explain, why investigative journalism is central to keeping those in power accountable. It is the essential form of journalism. It is effective, even if the wheels take time to turn. We don't know why yet the government has finally stopped the distribution of the spurious artificial rice grain. We are glad it has. Such journalism requires immense courage and resources. When you support it, you empower yourselves as citizens, to defend your rights and that of the poorest who have the least ability t hold the powerful to account. Democracies need public-funded journalism to be better democracies. Read Shreegireesh's work, if you had missed it then. reporters-collective.in/projects/modif…

@deepigoyal Unbelievable lack of accountability by a CEO who cant accept that some of the concerns raised could be legitimate…

Last one on this topic, and I have been holding this in myself for a while. For centuries, class divides kept the labor of the poor invisible to the rich. Factory workers toiled behind walls, farmers in distant fields, domestic help in backrooms. The wealthy consumed the fruits of that labor without ever seeing the faces or the fatigue behind it. No direct encounter, no personal guilt. The gig economy shattered that invisibility, at unprecedented scale. Suddenly, the poor aren't hidden away. They're at your doorstep: the delivery partner handing over your ₹1000+ biryani, late-night groceries, or quick-commerce essentials. You see them in the rain, heat, traffic, often on borrowed bikes, working 8–10 hours for earnings that give them sustenance. You see their exhaustion, their polite smile masking frustration with life in general. This is the first time in history at this scale that the working class and consuming class interact face-to-face, transaction after transaction. And that discomfort with our own selves is why we are uncomfortable about the gig economy. We want these people to look our part, so that the guilt we feel while taking orders from them feels less. We aren't just debating economics. We are confronting guilt. That ₹800 order might equal their entire day's earnings after fuel, bike rent, and app cuts. We tip awkwardly, or avoid eye contact, because the inequality is no longer abstract. It's personal. Pre-gig era, the rich could enjoy luxury without moral discomfort. Labor was out of sight. Now, every doorbell ring is a reminder of systemic inequality. That's why debates explode. It's not just policy. It's emotional reckoning. Some defend the system (“they choose it”), others demand change (“this isn't progress, its exploitation”). And here’s the uncomfortable twist: the unsaid ask of clumsy ‘solutions’ isn’t dignity. It is about returning to invisibility. Ban gig work and you don’t solve inequality. You remove livelihoods. These jobs don’t magically reappear as formal, protected employment the next day. They disappear, or they get pushed back into the informal economy where there are even fewer protections and even less accountability. Over-regulate it until the model breaks, and you achieve the same outcome through paperwork instead of slogans: the work evaporates, prices rise, demand collapses, and the people we claim to protect are the first to lose income. And then what happens? The rich get their old comfort back. Convenience returns without faces. Guilt dissolves. We go back to clean abstractions and moral posturing from a distance. The poor don’t become safer, they become invisible again: back in cash economies, back in backrooms, back in shadows where regulation rarely reaches and dignity isn’t even debated. The gig economy just exposed the reality of inequality to the people who previously had the luxury of not seeing it. The doorbell is not the problem. The question is what we do after opening the door. Visibility is the price of progress. We can either use this discomfort to build something better (which we keep doing continuously as delivery partners are our backbone), or we can ban and over-regulate our way back into ignorance. One of those choices improves lives. The other simply helps the consuming class feel virtuous in the dark.

@deepigoyal Many countries have laws for gig workers. Its sad to label those with courage to raise issues as miscreants. I pray for humility in hearts of powerful business owners that they can do better. Lets be transparent, show data of benefits, show salary slips, address real concerns.

Zomato and Blinkit delivered at a record pace yesterday, unaffected by calls for strikes that many of us heard over the past few days. Support from local law enforcement helped keep the small number of miscreants in check, enabling 4.5 lakh+ delivery partners across both platforms to deliver more than 75 lakh orders (all-time high) to over 63 lakh customers during the day. This happened without any additional incentives for delivery partners - NYE does see higher incentives than usual days and yesterday was no different than the past NYE days. I am grateful to local authorities across the country and to our teams on the ground for clear enforcement and swift coordination. Most importantly, thank you to our delivery partners who showed up despite intimidation, stood their ground, and chose honest work and progress. One thought for everyone: if a system were fundamentally unfair, it would not consistently attract and retain so many people who choose to work within it. Please don’t get swept up by narratives pushed by vested interests. The gig economy is one of India’s largest organised job creation engines, and its real impact will compound over time, when delivery partners’ children, supported by stable incomes and education, enter the workforce and help transform our country at scale.

Opening Indian markets to US agriculture and dairy imports will seriously threaten the livelihoods of millions of small and marginal farmers.@narendramodi ji, please protect Indian agriculture in the FTA negotiations. #ProtectIndianFarmers #NoFTAinAgriculture #IndianDairy

@manujosephsan Indians being interested in diaspora Indians- who are setting records- doesnt sound outlandish at all. Indian immigrants are a big part of America and they care very much about Indians and India.

That India’s balcony people now know more about Mamdani than any Indian chief minister is a natural outcome of the huge cultural surplus America has over us. We are interested in America and America has no interest in us. I don’t want to stretch a metaphor too much but maybe resistance to western culture in the samosa people is a form of cultural tariff.

BREAKING: UN rapporteurs have now declared that famine has taken hold throughout Gaza, the consequence of Israel's policy of forcibly starving the civilian population. ohchr.org/en/press-relea…

Join us for an exciting conversation on indigenous led philanthropy and the opportunities that lie ahead @1000currents

@zoo_bear @smitaprakash @ANI Sahi kaha!

Hello @smitaprakash @ANI, Finance Minister has already presented the interim budget 2024. At least now share this video on your Twitter account The guy in the video was sure you'd not share his video, He said, "Mujhe nahi pata ke TV ye dikhayega ya nai dikhayega... But a asliyat hai". And you proved him right by not tweeting his video interview.

fantastic series by @anumayhem about regulatory disasters and conflict of interest surrounding fortified rice in India which highlight the concerns raised by a citizens campaign led by @ASHAKisanSwaraj and @rozi_roti

Slept well last night? Farmers in Marathwada, Maharashtra are spending sleepless nights in their fields as #snail attack is destroying their soybean crop. Snails come out at night and by morning the entire crop is gone! Gaon Connection spent a night with the hapless farmers

@confusedvichar hahaha loved it!

My visit to Ashoka University- The Harvard of Haryana.

Revealed: In the name of doubling farmers' incomes, Niti Aayog discreetly set up a task force for corporates to promote their business models. An NRI businessman, with links to BJP, dictated the terms. Read part 1 of the series by @shreegireesh reporters-collective.in/trc/ahead-of-f…

@CECIndia2 thank you!

@ashleshak Plz check our youtube page @centreforeducationandcommu3944/videos" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">youtube.com/@centreforeduc…

Do check out our latest study on how donors can understand and resource grassroots and popular organizing @1000currents @PSJPNetwork @chandrikasahai @SinfullyAlive

Looking forward to this book about Bill Gates, one of the worlds “most powerful, least scrutinised” individuals

@SuKannaiyan @dmk_raja @mkstalin @MRKPanneer @CropfitTFA @AswiniGanesan1 @CropfitIndia 👏👏👏👏👏

🌾Presented a proposal to Mr. Natarajan,Agri Marketing Commissioner& his dynamic team to digitalize Dr.Kalaingar's Uzhavar Sandhai (farmers market)💻📈 guided by visionary leader and Nilgiris MP Thiru.@dmk_raja @mkstalin @MRKPanneer @CropfitTFA @AswiniGanesan1 @CropfitIndia

#SaveRTI under the new amendments, govt says it will not include any personal info to protect privacy of individuals. Corrupt officials could thus be protected, and this excuse of privacy could be used to prevent disclosing any info!