BBC’s futile attempt to tarnish the image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, unarguably the most popular leader in the world, is a manifestation of the UK national broadcaster’s frustration and envy. The sinister timing and the vicious content of its two-part documentary series, ‘India: The Modi Question’, bring into sharp focus the colonial mindset and anti-India bias of the discredited organisation. Expectedly enough, the pernicious documentary has evoked outrage among everyone in the country and the large Indian diaspora living all around the world. We, at Blitz India, have attempted to capture the magnitude of this rage by devoting almost half of the edition to reports related to the subject.
Our Cover Story encapsulates the highlights of the documentary, the indignation it has met with, and the possible motives behind the entire exercise. While the Indian Government called it a discredited narrative and the British PM distanced himself from it, the documentary has been blasted by retired judges, bureaucrats and diplomats, as also by a prominent member of the UK’s House of Lords, according to our report. However, the BBC’s design to demonise the PM has failed miserably and instead of lowering the image of Modi, the documentary has put the broadcaster in the dock, it avers.
A related report on this page takes a deep dive into the entire episode and says the very fact that the BBC is flogging a dead horse raises doubts about its motives. It then goes on to speculate as to what could be behind the BBC’s move to fabricate facts and, in the process, become a laughing stock.
The Centrespread traces the BBC’s inglorious journey from being a credible broadcaster to an organisation marred by multiple scandals and allegations of impartiality and biases. The page also includes a research-oriented piece that outlines, in chronological order, the various controversies surrounding or involving the BBC. Besides, it carries a selection of tweets, which give a fair idea of the anger being spewed on the social media. Apart from all these, we reproduce the texts of the angry letters written by Lord Rami Ranger and a group of veterans in India slamming the BBC’s motivated act. The first meetings of the G20 health and infrastructure working groups are the main reports on our G20 Podium.
Endorsing India’s global health agenda, a representative of WHO said India’s G20 presidency is an exciting moment because the country is going to decide the global health architecture for the next many decades. The core group meeting selected city planning as the focus area. In a recent interview, British High Commissioner Alexander Ellis lauded India’s G20 presidency, calling it an “opportunity” to solidify the image of a “new and modern India”. He also expressed faith in India’s potential to tackle some of the “world’s big problems”. We carry the gist of the interview, besides including a report on the setting up of G20 task force on digital infrastructure and regular columns on tweets and photo gallery.
Apart from all these, the issue comprises news coverage from home and abroad and special reports on the significance of upcoming polls in three northeast states and the New India Literacy Programme. Enjoy the package!