‘True Indology’ Responds 

I am a private citizen who is extremely interested in Indian history. The fact that I read Marxist historian, Romila Thapar’s, works at the age of 13, should indicate my fascination with the discipline. I used to be in awe of her work until I started examining primary sources. This made me aware of the huge gap between our history books and the facts as revealed by primary sources.

That is when I took a resolve to present history based on facts. It does not matter if people, brainwashed by mainstreamed Marxist history, treat what I share as ‘alternate history’. They are bound to be convinced when they refer to the primary sources that I share. That is why I spend my free time on Twitter and other social media sites and record history based on primary sources. That is what I do. A private citizen who utilises his personal time to share history.

I am not any political or social activist, nor do I harbour any notions of becoming one. Yet, I have been targeted by the mainstream media establishment through overt and covert ways.

Even so, I am not writing this post to cry victim. That is NOT my intent. I am writing it simply to show how a sections of the mainstream media suppresses those individuals who present facts that do not match this section’s opinions. Let this serve as a mirror to those ‘intellectuals’ who keep pontificating on freedom of expression on one hand and show utter contempt for the same freedom of a private citizen. They have no tolerance for the views of others, even if those views are based on hard facts.

However, I logged onto Twitter on Sunday, to find my handle featured in an TOI article titled - Faking history starts online

It began by ranting how anonymous handles on Twitter circulate falsehoods and cites the example of when an image was circulated all over the internet on Tipu Jayanti, as an image of Tipu Sultan. It names me among the list of handles who circulated the picture.

Of course, you will never find people like Manimugdha Sharma talking about these blatant inaccuracies peddled by his leftist friends. For he cares for propaganda, not facts.

I was completely shocked to read this shameless lie, for, I cannot ever ‘photoshop’ pictures, leave alone post them on Twitter. Why? Because my “photoshopping” skills don't go beyond cropping or enlarging pictures using basic tools like MS Paint.

I was sickened to see a blatant ad-hominem attack carried against me in a mainstream newspaper. Times of India (TOI), a national daily, published what one Pratik Sinha thinks about me. Imagine the depth to which a mainstream newspaper has sunk to - publishing abuse directed at me by those who are intolerant to my view of history.

The article further says:

So, what I write is "propaganda" because TOI and Pratik Sinha don't agree with it. This is how the intolerant, mainstream media establishment labels and smears those who do not share their worldview. It is laughable to see Sharma and Sinha calling my Twitter feed as "propaganda". I do not earn a penny for what I do on social media in my free time. My blog does not have any Adsense, even when it is likely my articles fetch better traffic than many TOI articles. And I am definitely not the one clamouring for donations to carry out hit-jobs like Alt News.

Sharma and Sinha are doing exactly what they are accusing me of. They are indulging in propaganda and smear campaign against a private citizen because they cannot tolerate his/her views.

Four months ago, Alt News carried a hit job against me where they scanned through my Twitter timeline to dig out a few two-year-old tweets, took them out of context, even picked a few semantic mistakes here and there and wove a series of posts with such an insipid title as "True Fraudology".

Despite being aware of the malafide intention of Alt News and its founder, I chose to pen a comprehensive response to all his lies here . I responded to each and every false accusation, even when I was answerable to NONE, for, I wanted to give them a benefit of doubt. A moral media outlet would have simply acknowledged its mistake and taken off the articles full of blatant lies and personal smearing. It has been 5 months and they have neither answered me nor corrected themselves/taken down the piece. Instead, they have used the same piece for a hit job on me in the print media.

Their intention, obviously, has never been to have a proper discourse. They have always wanted to use lies and deception to smear, abuse and harass me, a private citizen, and destroy my reputation because I am writing something that does not toe their view of history.

Coming back to the TOI article, it continues:

Did you see that? Even more generalised stereotyping. Apparently, there is a right-wing template -  show Muslims in poor light, glorify Hindus, abuse lefties and liberals.

You can see how Sharma makes fun of Vedic Hindus because they believe in vimanas and shows them in poor light. He insults Hindus and talks of "saffron weed" because saffron is sacred to Hindus. He lampoons Hindus when a cow is killed because some Hindus consider it sacred.  He even insults Lord Krishna and says that Lord Krishna uses soap made of cow dung.

At any rate, this person is doing exactly what he falsely and dishonestly accuses me of - hating and targeting one community and glorifying another.

How dare ToI and its editor insinuate that my Twitter timeline is anti-Muslim? I challenge them to show me a single derogatory tweet on my timeline about the Prophet of Islam. I am perfectly within my right to exercise my freedom of expression but I won’t write disrespectful stuff, unlike Manimugdha Sharma. These people conveniently label anyone who does follow their lead as anti-Muslim. They smear and attempt to silence anyone who calls out their ignorance and falsehoods.

Let us now look at the online communication of our “holier than thou” ToI editor. Seems like he needs to look no further than his mirror to see what an online-abuser looks like:

Yes, I did that. It is absolutely true that Congress workers killed Brahmins (I have given sources in my article to show this indisputable fact). I had actually misplaced the picture under a different folder I had stored in my computer and hence I posted a wrong picture. I have accepted this mistake of mine at the end of my article. This was one of thousands of pictures I have posted and there are bound to be a few mistakes. Despite my admission in a very public post, they used it to smear me.

I did no such thing. I gave picture of a tent to show the kind of tents Mughals had before coming to India. I have clarified everything in my long response. Of course, this TOI editor did not bother to see it. Pratik Sinha did not bother to counter it. They are not interested in any dialogue. They will only misinterpret, take things out of context and smear people who do not share their views.

Finally, the article concludes,

Another blatant falsehood written to smear me. I challenge him to show me where I said “all Mughal buildings were Hindu temples and palaces”. I challenge him to show me where I have claimed Taj Mahal was a Hindu building. All my claims are backed by scholarly sources on the basis of epigraphy and/or archaeology.

This falsehood passes off as “intellectual criticism of the Modi government” in TOI circles.

For Sharma and his ilk, Krishna could be mocked but anything relating to Krishna needs to associated with Mughals and they should be portrayed as tolerant. It does not matter even if the said object is not related to the Mughals at all.

There have been instances when I have corrected the ToI editor in order to ensure that facts are presented to the general public; instances where Sharma resorted to blatant lies (he denied there was a farman by Aurangzeb against Diwali fireworks) or partial quoting (in case of Humayun) to whitewash Mughal history and portray them as tolerant rulers.

• Rani of Chittor and Humayun
• Coin during Ghori Period
• Ban on Diwali Fireworks by Aurangzeb

Despite being a History Major, this individual, who is obviously in need of a “History for Beginners and Now” tutorial, writes in a mainstream media outlet on history and tries to smear my credibility, citing a largely discredited individual as a source. It would have been laughable, had it not been despicable.

When I punctured the pathetic series of lies concocted by Pratik Sinha and Alt News, for its falsehood, he dug his head in the sand, sot speak, and did not acknowledge my response. Not only that, when I caught him lying several times, he did not show the courage to accept his errors.

Only once did he ever come close to accepting his mistake, and even in that instance, he began by wrongly accusing me of passing off a image of of famine as that of a Hindu-Muslim riot.

This was pointed out to him months ago. Yet, the supposed ‘fact checker’ did not deem it necessary to acknowledge and correct himself.  This fake quote serves his useful propaganda to defame the Sangh and therefore he has no qualms in spreading such lies.

This is a white lie. Narendra Modi visited camps housing minorities, as reported by The Hindu article dated March 6, 10 days after the Sabarmati Express was torched in Godhra. The same was also reported by TOI. Even when he was called out by people for this lie, he neither acknowledged nor corrected his blog for the same.

There are many other lies in his blog such as this dangerous, defamatory one where it says that Modi organised a Gaurav Yatra to celebrate Gujarat riots . I offer to delete all my blogs if anyone can show any proof that Modi organised Gaurav Yatra to celebrate riots. Modi has always expressed his regret for the riots and termed them unfortunate. Such lies are fabricated to incite people, divide communities and provoke strife. Sinha was called out for this lie by the admin of the blog ‘Gujarat riots’. But what did Sinha do? Nothing. He keeps circulating these lies through his blog on the one hand, and self-attests himself as a ‘fact checker’ on the other.

When asked to clarify the reason for such preposterous, inflammatory lies on his blog, he blamed my source, namely, the Nanavati Commission report, which, according to him, was false and could be not be believed. He suggested some unclear connection with a criminal by bringing Babu Bajrangi out of nowhere!

It is surprising that a person like Pratik Sinha, who runs such a blog, questions the character of a retired Judge of the Supreme Court. I am certainly not saying that our judiciary always gets everything 100 per cent right. But it has largely been credible. Although there can be room for a wrong judgement, it is one thing to question a judgement and another to question the very idea and character of Judiciary. What Pratik Sinha says is that the witnesses were falsely quoted in the Nanavati commission report.

This is impossible. Judgements could go either way, but the entire judicial system cannot blatantly lie and attribute false statements to witnesses in their official records before everyone. If it was so, why did they not complain that witnesses were falsely quoted in the Commission report? All parties, including theirs, saw the report and had nothing to say.

Even if one were to allow some scope for the impossible and accept, for the sake of argument, that the Nanavati Commision report was deliberately lying and misquoting the witnesses, then how do we arrive at the truth? Pratik Sinha shared a file which, he claimed, had statements of the witness. Strangely, his own file gave a source that contradicts his blog and seconds the Nanavati report stating that the witnesses indeed saw outsiders throwing inflammable liquid inside the train. When this was pointed out to him, he simply had nothing more to say.

Here, he lied on three occasions.

No wonder that with so many untruths in their story, Nanavati Commision remarked that "their version is not worthy of any credence". He was also rejected by people and ended up losing his deposit in election. And this is the same person who gives out certificates of honesty and labels others "fake".

Readers who followed the hit-and-run campaign by Pratik Sinha and his Alt News would also have seen how they turned tail when their vicious lies were caught and rebutted.

Pratik Sinha continues to boast how people following history accounts are fools who cannot go beyond Google and implies it is experts like him who use textbooks instead of blogs,

Ironically, Pratik Sinha himself , in his blog which allegedly “busted my propaganda”, used as source a random China blog which contained false information and ended up claiming that I gave false information in my tweet. Unfortunately for him, I had sourced my information in that tweet not from any blog but from a scholarly article of a noted Indologist. Of course, Sinha did not have the basic courtesy to apologise for lying and defaming me using false information and false blogs. These people do exactly what they accuse right wingers of. Relying on blogs and faking content.

One would expect that after realising that I am not here to score any political goals, they would mind their own business, as I go about my pursuit of history. But no. Even after being completely discredited through my rebuttal, ToI chose to extend the same smear campaign against me in its Sunday Times.

I don’t care at whose behest such people are harassing, smearing, attempting to harm me and my reputation. But I know for a fact that faking history started as soon as India became independent in 1947 and even earlier, perhaps. It is only now that the correcting of history, based on sources, has started online and I am proud of my role in that.

I seek the truth and I shall continue to seek and share it – detractors shall be decimated by the Divine.