Waquar Hasan | Clarion India
NEW DELHI — The Delhi Minority Commission (DMC) chairman, Zafarul Islam Khan has claimed that the right-wing English news channel Times Now, which has been accused of misreporting many times, has made attempts to defame the minority body by cooking up a story about the commission.
While talking to Clarion India, he informed that he is going to send a notice to the channel over the matter, as they have spread lies about the commission.
Khan alleged that the news channel has cooked up a story that the Delhi government and the Commission are conducting a census on Muslims to grant them reservations – when in reality, the commission is not doing anything of the sort. The channel stuck to this even after Khan had explained to the channel’s reporter about the matter in person.
“How farcical and untrue this reporting is, on a survey by Delhi Minorities Commission. A Times Now reporter met me, I gave him all the information. But even after that, the channel shamelessly comes up with a cooked up story. There is no Muslim census or any plan to give any community reservations under the garb of a census,” said Khan in his press statement on the issue.
The channel’s editor, Rahul Shivshankar gave a communal colour (Hindu versus Muslim) to the exercise of collecting data of minorities working in government departments and private sectors. In his program India Upfront, Shivshankar can be seen provoking communal passion while presenting the news – by literally using the phrase ‘being Hindu is a disadvantage’ in the secular state.
“For the 1st time in Muslim census, ‘Secular’ party promotes faith; Muslim identity ticket to a job. Fighting anti-Muslim bias excuse, in the heart of union of India. Being Hindu a disadvantage,” reads the tweet put out by Times Now on the issue.
“The fact is that as per the Delhi Minorities Commission Act 1999, the Commission works to mitigate problems faced by minorities, intervene on their behalf, and advise the government about measures to be taken to ensure just and equal treatment of minorities. As part of this mandate, the Commission collects data each year about the representation of all designated minorities in government departments and PSUs in NCT of Delhi, and publishes the same in its annual report which is presented to the Government of Delhi and to the Delhi Assembly,” clarified Khan in the press release.
However, the commission has widened the scale of the collecting of the data. Earlier, it used to be done in only 15 departments but this time they included all the departments and the private sectors.
“This time we have widened the net to include all Delhi government departments and PSUs working in the NCT of Delhi. Some of these departments have branches and subsidiaries and, instead of collecting information from them and sending to the Commission consolidated data, these departments wrote to their branches and subsidiaries to respond directly to the Commission and this has been construed by some as an initiative of the Delhi Government,” the press release further reads.
Khan is outraged over the misreporting and cooked up story centered around this, and giving it a communal colour on top of that. Calling the channel a ‘shameless’ and ‘conscienceless’ media, he has vowed to boycott the channel and send it a notice.
“Times Now has fraudulently given all this a communal twist. It starts with the hashtag #MuslimCensusExpose. Times Now still seems to be governed by the ghost of Arnab. I boycotted Arnab earlier, and now I will boycott Times Now too. Shame on such shameless, conscience-less media,” he said.
