After the Philippines government approved the purchase of BrahMos cruise missiles, India’s weaponry exports are seeing a surge under the Narendra Modi government.
From Rs 1,521 crore in 2016-17 to 8,434.84 crore, India’s defence export increased in 2020-21 to Rs. 38,500.25 as the government has set an ambitious goal of exporting aerospace and defence items and services worth over 35,000 crores ($5 billion).
India at present is second only to Saudi Arabia in terms of imports which in one way is a powerful foreign policy bargaining chip when it comes to acquiring state of the art weapons platform from multiple countries.
In the recent past, India and Armenia signed a $40 million agreement wherein the state-of-the-art weapon locating radar systems, designed and developed in India will be supplied to them.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) research has named three Indian firms in the top 100 defence corporations in the world in 2020 and they are Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Ordnance Factory Board, and Bharat Electronics Ltd. (BEL).
According to the study conducted by SIPRI, “Their combined arms sales of $6.5 billion in 2020 were 1.7 per cent higher than in 2019 and contributed for 1.2 per cent of the top 100 total,”.
The ink on the dotted line on the sale of Brahmos cruise missiles is expected to be signed on January 28 at the Philippines’ National Defence Department headquarters in Quezon City.
The $375 Million dollar deal is the biggest sale as of yet and defence exports are an important component of the Modi government to not only increase India’s influence in the world and also achieve self-sufficiency in the defence industry and a boost to Atmanirbhar Bharat.
That is why the Modi government has taken various steps to increase defence exports, including changing a section of the Special Chemicals, Organisms, Materials, Equipment, and Technologies (SCOMET).
By amending the SCOMET list India can now lawfully export parts and components of small arms and body armour for civil use after due consultation with the foreign ministry.
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In a recent update to the minor Hindu girl suicide case from Thanjavur, a new testimony video of the girl has surfaced, in which the child speaks about how she was tortured, but does not mention conversion.
In this video, which was published by the India Ahead Tamil YouTube channel, an unknown person is video-graphing the child as she narrates the circumstances that led her to consume poison. After mentioning her name and her parents’ name, she moves onto convey the incidents. “I always secure the first rank in my class. But, this year, due to a family situation, I was not able to go to school for a few days. I started going to school a little late. The Sister at my boarding school would always ask me to do mathematics. She would never listen even if I told her that I couldn’t understand the concepts because I joined late, and that I would complete the mathematical problems later. She would say that it’s okay and will always make me write something or the other.
Even if I write it correctly, she would say it is incorrect and make me sit for an hour, to solve just one math problem. I was not able to concentrate at all. Due to this reason, I was securing lesser grades. As this continued, I thought that I won’t be able to study and therefore I consumed poison,” she says in the video.
The unknown person who is taking the video then asks the name of the sister for which the child replies, “Sagamary”. He then goes onto ask her if the name of the Father (Pastor) of the school, for which she says there is no Father. Then, when he asks for the name of the school headmistress, the child says that she is not involved in any of this. On insistence, she then names the headmistress as Arogyamary.
The videographer then asked her if she was asked to do any other work, for which the child replied, “They would ask me to lock the gate, They will ask me to do all the chores. I have to open the gate when everybody wakes up in the morning. I have to turn on the motor, and check if water is available after everybody finishes eating. Warden sir makes me do all the work. When I ask him why I should do all the chores, he would say that only I was responsible.”
The person then asks if they ever told her not to wear a Bindi in school, for which the child says no. And then when the person asks he if she came home for Pongal, she says, “When I asked them for going home, they told me that I needed to study and made me stay there (in school) itself. They sent me home for Pongal because I was feeling unwell.” He then asks her if they were aware of her consumption of poison, for which she replies that they were unaware.
It is to be noted that the incident of “forceful conversion” has not been mentioned anywhere in this video. However, the child has claimed that she was tortured and was made to do all the chores.
In the earlier video which went viral (believed to be a portion of this video), the girl had mentioned that there was attempt to convert to her two years ago.
(With inputs from India Ahead Tamil)
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In the provisional rank list for MBBS/BDS 2021-2022 session (government quota) released by the Tamil Nadu government, it has been found that a majority of the rankholders belong to the Backward Community (BC) category.
Of the first 1000 rank holders, 669 belong to the BC category while 167 are from the Most Backward Community (MBC) category.
Those belonging to the Open Category (OC) number just 98, not even amounting to 10% of those who have made it to the top 1000. Most OC candidates either belong to the linguistic minority community or religious minorities (Muslims and Christians).
In all, 902 of the first 1000 rankholders are reserved category students.
While a whopping 66.9% of the ranks have been cornered by those belonging to BC, only 19 students (a meagre 1.9%) belonging to Scheduled Communites (SC) have secured a place in the first thousand ranks.
The Dravidian parties of Tamil Nadu have been against NEET claiming that it goes against the principle of social justice but data seems to show otherwise. Tamil Nadu is also the only state which has 69% reservation with 31% for BC alone and another 20% for MBCs.
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DMK MLA T.R.B. Raja who also recently took over as the head of the party’s IT wing, shared a picture of Karnataka’s tableau with an insulting innuendo.
In his tweet, he shared a picture of Hindu God Kamadhenu who is also highly revered in Karnataka, saying “which freedom fighter is this?”
Recently, the DMK and its sympathizers in the media have been creating a fuss that Central government ‘rejected’ Tamil Nadu’s tableau from being part of the Republic Day Parade.
A clarification was issued by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh that tableaus are selected by an expert committee through a rigorous selection process and also pointed out that Tamil Nadu’s tableau was part of the parade in 2017, 2019, 2020 and 2021.
Despite the clarification, the DMK has been playing politics over the matter with CM Stalin announcing that the allegedly ‘rejected’ tableau would be part of the Republic Day celebration in Tamil Nadu.
In light of this, the DMK has also been taking a jibe at the tableau of other states especially those that portrays Hindu culture.
DMK MLA from Mannargudi T.R.B. Rajaa (son of DMK MP T.R. Baalu) posted the tweet with an insulting innuendo.
However, the picture that the DMK MLA shared was that of 2013 when the DMK was part of the United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre. This year, Karnataka’s tableau had depicted the theme of ‘Karnataka: The cradle of traditional Handicrafts’ with 16 GI tagged traditional handicrafts of the state featured in the tableau and a large bust of the ‘Mother of Traditional Handicrafts in India‘ Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay placed at the rear of the tableau.
The DMK MLA had also retweeted tweets that mocked Uttarakhand’s tableau which had model of Badrinath Temple along with a sadhu.
Also Mr.@TRBRajaa above tableau is of Karnataka Govt.’s 2013 Republic Day during UPA Govt. at the Center & your #DMK was part of the Central Govt. If your party is against such a tableau you should’ve spoken it then?? Oh wait, holding on to Ministries were important? Understood.
Tamil speaking Hindus worldwide celebrate an annual event called “Thai Poosam”. In Ventura
County, a Tamil-Hindu book club organized the event this year. It involves devotees carrying semicircular wooden structures (Kavadi) and pots of milk. At the end of the spiritual walk, the Kavadis and the pots of milk were let go at the feet of the Hindu Deity Murugan.
Kavadi (Kaa-wa-Dee) representsthe need for balance and harmony in the world. Both Kavadi and pots of milk represents the community or personal burden. The Kavadi usually weighs the same as the person carrying it.
The Tamil-Hindu community walked for miles around the Hindu temple in Thousand Oaks. More than 100 people attended the dedication service at the end of the walk.
“Thai Poosam” denotes a special day in the Tamil-Hindu calendar. “Thai” is the name of the month, which falls between mid-January and mid-February. Poosam is the Tamil name for the Beehive cluster located in the constellation Cancer. It is a lunar asterism having special significance to Tamil-Hindu community world over. This is the day in which the spiritual walk explained above is done. This practice originated more than 2,500 years ago in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
The Tamil-Hindu book club intends to continue holding spiritual walk every year.
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Lavanya, 17 year old girl studying at Sacred Heart Higher Secondary School in Thirukattupalli near Thanjavur, committed suicide by drinking pesticide after she was allegedly tortured to convert to Christianity by the school.
Now, a new information has now emerged that the staff of the Christian school had kept insisting Lavanya not only for conversion but also to become a nun.
Speaking to a news channel, Lavanya’s step mother had said that the school had asked the girl become a nun and had offered incentives for that.
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Shocking truth emerging in #JusticeForLavanya ! School Management & Teachers kept insisting Lavanya not only for conversion but also to become a Nun. Both she & her parents refused such a proposal & because of #COVID they couldn't change the school as they underwent this torture.
However, the DMK’s School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi in an interview given to The Hindu has given a clean chit to the school by saying that none of the other students in the school complained of conversion.
“Christian students in that area accord priority to education. They have not made use of the opportunity to convert students to Christianity. Truth will come out only after a thorough enquiry.”, the DMK Minister had said.
Lavanya in her dying declaration, a video of which went viral on social media, the girl said that she was asked to convert to Christianity by the school if she wanted to continue her studies further.
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Recently, the controversial movie Jai Bhim, and its actor Suriya, have been making headlines with relation to the so-called Oscars. However, what is being spread and celebrated as great news for the movie, seems a little farfetched are rather distorted (deliberately). Half-truths are being reported by popular media channels, and it is actually being believed that the movie has reached the gates of The Academy. Well, the reality behind these news stories are completely different.
1.Jai Bhim’s scene published in Oscar’s official YouTube page:
A few days back, news channels celebrated the fact that a scene from Jai Bhim, had made it to The Oscar’s official YouTube channel. It seemed like a great height reached, for a movie that was not one of the best made ones, according to film critics.
Now, on research, it has been found that anybody who pays ₹3,72,000 can get their ticket to feature their movie’s scene in the official Oscar YouTube channel. According to the channel’s guidelines, if the filmmaker/producer wishes to submit their movie’s clipping to the channel for a spotlight, then they have to pay $5000 as submission fee. In addition, the guidelines also says that the clipping can be 15 minutes or a maximum of 20 minutes.
This feature of the Oscar’s official YouTube page is called “Scene At The Academy” and it is just an opportunity for spotlighting the filmmaking and creative process behind movies. This is open to all, and does not have any qualifier or filter, or any other kind of competing process. If the required amount is paid, the scene will be featured on the YouTube channel. However, no news channel has covered the truth behind this news. They have been spreading the news as though the movie reached this height through some kind of jury selection.
2. Did Jai Bhim make it to The Academy Awards?
The general nomination list for Oscar, is not the one that is determined by the Oscar jury. Instead, it is the list of all films submitting their entries, asking that they should be considered for the Award. There are rules such as, “Movies should be more than 40 minutes. They should have a specific pixels and sound quality,” that act as qualifiers for films to even apply for the Oscar awards. The Oscar then releases a list of all movies that basically qualify these rules, called as a ‘Reminder List’.
Into the #Oscars race!#JaiBhim makes it into the 276 films shortlisted by @TheAcademy for the 94th Academy Award nominations 💪
In such a manner, a Reminder List consisting of 276 films have been released for 2022. Movies like Marakkar and Jai Bhim amongst others, are a part of that list. It is to be noted that the Reminder List is neither the Awardee List, nor the Nomination List. It is just a list of films that have qualified to apply for the award. So, the film’s team submitted Jai Bhim for this list, and claimed that ‘Jai Bhim has been qualified for the Oscars’. They basically only shared news about half of the truth, making people believe that the movie has actually received that much appreciation.
In reality, a movie called Koozhangal was selected to represent India for the Best Feature Film category of the Oscars this year, but it was not selected by the Academy Awards jury.
3. Suriya and Jyotika to receive Global Community Oscar awards:
A news about Actors Suriya, Jyotika and Udhayanidhi Stalin winning a Global Community Oscar Award next month in the United States of America, was being circulated all over Social Media. Some Media houses has depicted this news as though the actors are actually going to receive an Oscar award, also called as The Academy Awards. However, the story behind the award their receiving is entirely different.
The following invitation is found on Google, when searched for Global Community Oscars.
This Award is being presented by VGP (A) Dr. Vijay G Prabhakar, who is an NRI Tamil, living in America. The award is presented by a foundation called AMEC. This Vijay Prabhakar, is the son of former IAS Officer Prabhakar, from Tamil Nadu. His grandfather’s name is Phillip, former Salem District Deputy Collector. Vijay Prabhakar’s father-in-law is also a former IAS officer called Newton Devasagayam. In addition, Manne Lingiah, an Alumnus of IIT Madras, is also a part of the Jury for this Award.
Congratulations to @Udhaystalin on being awarded International Rising Star of the Year 2021 by @RepDannyDavis and @amec_usa for harnessing the energies of youth for nation building.
Award to be presented at 11th Congressional Global Community Oscars on February 19,2022 in USA. pic.twitter.com/Iq1bAjEFUA
Therefore, it is a private award function, organised by some individuals. However, the media and some Twitteratis have portrayed it as though the three have actually bagged the Academy Awards itself.
So, it is very evident that Jai Bhim’s team is trying very hard to promote their film, so much that they’re resorting to fraudulent means and agenda-set news coverage, in order to set a narrative. This is being shared and spread along with the narrative by the media channels of Tamil Nadu.
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Police in Kerla on Monday (January 23), arrested Mohammad Haroon, one of the key conspirators behind the brutal murder of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) worker Sanjith in Palakkad.
Haroon is a native of Athikkode near Kozhinjampara and allegedly associated with the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) in Kerala.
As per the investigation, Haroon was one of the key planners of the murder of a Sanjith and there was already a lookout notice issued against him.
Kerala | Main accused arrested in connection with the death of RSS worker Sanjith. Total 10 people arrested in the case: Palakkad Police https://t.co/rHNQefnKLC
Palakkad District police chief R Viswanath also said that it was Haroon who had selected the assailants for the murder and then also helped them to escape and the police are still looking for four more accused who are on the run.
In November 2021, the Police had arrested three more accused named Subair, Salam, and Isahak and linked the role of SDPI and Islamist outfit Popular Front of India (PFI) in the murder case of Pramukh Sanjith.
Many RSS workers have been murdered in Kerala but the brutal murder of Sanjith took place right in front of his wife in broad daylight who is a material witness and moved to the Kerala High Court and sought an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which led to the court that has directed the state to file a report on the status of the investigation.
Also, Sanjith’s widow, Arshika said that she could identify the murderers as none of them were masked when they were traveling on a motorbike when her husband was brutally attacked by the SDPI members without any fear and also in front of many people who were witness to this act of terrorism.
Later, Police had recovered blood-stained swords suspected to have been used in the murder of the RSS worker, and the Kerala BJP and RSS had pointed out the involvement of SDPI and PFI in the murder.
Immediately SDPI had rejected the allegations, as the BJP State president, K Surendran met Union Home Minister Amit Shah in New Delhi seeking a probe by the National Investigation Agency into the killing.
In a letter to the Home Minister written by Surendran, he alleges that 10 RSS-BJP activists have been killed in Kerala by the Islamists in the state in the last 5 years and further states in his letter that so far about 50 RSS activists have been killed by SDPI in the State.
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As India and Israel commemorate 30 years of establishing full diplomatic relations, both nations have said that they would give further impetus to this rapidly evolving engagement as Noar Gilon, Israel’s envoy to India has said “there is no anti-Semitism in India; this phrase doesn’t just exist,”.
2022 also marks the 5 years of strategic partnership which was established during the first visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Israel.
A special logo for the celebrations of India-Israel@30 years was unveiled today by Amb. Sanjeev Singla and Amb. @NaorGilon virtually. Happy to note that the logo was designed by Indian designer Nikhil Kumar Rai from NID. #IndiaIsrael30pic.twitter.com/AiaqKd5scm
As anti-Semitism is now on the rise again in the West, the Israeli ambassador said, “Jews have lived in India for over 2000 years in total equality and peacefully, and as someone who arrived after serving quite an extensive period in Europe, I was very much surprised at how much love and appreciation there is in India towards Israel,”.
Sanjeev Singla, the Indian envoy to Israel, who was also present at the event, said, “our two peoples are connected by civilizational bonds that go beyond trade and economic ties. The Jewish people have thrived in India for centuries and, in fact, enriched the composite culture of India. Maharaja Jam Sahib of Nawanagar saved the lives of several Jewish children during World War II by providing them with shelter and taking care of them.”
The Indian envoy then went on to talk about the large India-Jewish community which he called an organic link and said, “organic link and bridge that continues to grow between the two sides,”.
At present, there are approximately 85,000 Jews of Indian origin in Israel who are Israeli passport holders and the majority of them are from Maharashtra (Bene Israelis), Kerala (Cochini Jews), and Kolkata (Baghdadi Jews) and some Indian Jews from the North-Eastern states of India (Bnei Menashe) have been immigrating to Israel.
He said, “2022 provides us an opportunity to not only look back and take account of the bilateral achievements of the past 30 years, but also the last 5 years when the relationship was put on a qualitatively high trajectory.”
On January 29th, 1992, under then Indian Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao, India, and Israel established full diplomatic relations, and this year both sides will commemorate 30 years of ties that have led to rapidly evolving engagement in all kinds of fields.
At a virtual event on Monday (January 25), a commemorative logo was launched that features the Star of David and the Ashoka Chakra and forms the numeral 30, depicting the 30th anniversary of bilateral relations.
Calling relations between India and Israel “exceptional,” Israeli envoy to India Naor Gilon said, “relationships did not start just 30 years ago” and “more than 900 Indian soldiers are buried in the land of Israel, those who fought during the First World War as part of the Indian British army, to liberate the area which later became Israel.”
The role of the Indian soldiers during the 1918 battle of Haifa only got recognition recently when during the 2018 visit of the then Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, the name of Delhi’s Teen Murti Chowk was formally rechristened as Teen Murti Haifa Chowk in his honor.
As part of the 30-year celebrations, several high-level visits including the median visit by Israeli PM, Naftali Bennett who travel to India later this year celebrate 30 years of diplomatic relations.
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As the number of drone incursions on our border has increased, the Border Security Force (BSF) will soon be equipped with handheld ‘Anti Drone Guns’ to prevent Pakistani drones from entering the Indian Territory.
According to an official in the Ministry of Home Affairs, a Draft Qualitative requirements (QRS) have been forwarded by BSF and they have invited comments from vendors and possible manufacturers to ensure market availability of the subject item.
“These handheld anti-drone guns will be useful for patrolling teams in border areas who sometimes see drones flying but couldn’t do more as it is out of their firing range,” said a senior BSF officer.
“Anti-Drone Gun should be Hand Held, easily transportable and operable in day and night environment. The system should be easily deployable with ease and should be a lightweight UAS (Unmanned Aircraft System) countermeasure solution designed for one hand or two hand operations,” he added.
“Entire border can’t be covered under anti-drone devices but handheld anti-drone guns with the patrolling team could help to detect and bring down the drone,” said the BSF officer.
The BSF is looking for a system that should have the capability to cut off communication between the visually detected UAV and the remote controller by jamming data links to the UAV/RC and it should be capable of neutralizing the flying object (UAV) or group of UAVs (Swarm attack) from a distance (as specified or better) of at least 2,500 metres.
“The gun should be capable to neutralize the flying object by jamming its radio and GPS links and force landing the UAV at its place of operation within 10 seconds after detection,” the BSF document sent to the Home ministry reads.
In the new year, there are around 60 drone sightings of unmanned aerial vehicles near Punjab already and many more remained unreported.
The drones are now becoming the carriers of explosives and small arms from the Pakistan side on the Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab border and even a small percentage of explosives or small arms make it across the border, it can create a serious security problem in both states, particularly Punjab were election is to be held next month.
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