Anonymous Threat to NDTV's Ravish Traced to Exporter Followed by Prime Minister Modi

[ashok321]

Anonymous Threat to NDTV's Ravish Traced to Exporter Followed by Pri

Exposé raises questions about whether the sustained abuse and threats the senior journalist is being subjected to has official sanction.


Trolls who resort to abuse and threatening language can be blocked on Twitter and can even have their accounts suspended but WhatsApp allows victims little chance of redress. Which is why altnews.in’s recent investigation into the source of abusive messages sent to NDTV anchor Ravish Kumar via WhatsApp is so important. The investigation has unearthed not just the identity of some of the trolls involved but also the fact that at least one of them is followed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Twitter.

The exposé suggests the existence of a systematic campaign by social media vigilantes to harass and intimidate journalists that the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Modi government considers unfriendly. The Wire is republishing this piece because Modi’s decision to follow the main accused here, Niraj Dave, on Twitter raises disturbing questions about the degree to which this vigilantism enjoys official approval.


“I’m sad you are alive”, is one among the many messages addressed to NDTV India anchor Ravish Kumar on a WhatsApp group. On September 22, Kumar had put up a post along with multiple screenshots on his Facebook page alleging that a group of people repeatedly add him to a specific WhatsApp group for the sole purpose of abusing him. These screenshots were from the WhatsApp group called “ऊँ धर्म रक्षति रक्षित:”.

Kumar stated in his post that even if he exits the group, he’s added back after certain political events and abusive language is used to target him.

Based on the screenshots posted by Kumar, we tried to track down the people targeting him and this is what we found.



The above screenshot has been taken from Kumar’s post which shows a person with the number “7575826300” stating, “मुझे भी दुःख है तू जीवित है (I’m also sad that you’re still alive)”. We looked up this phone number and found that it has been advertised multiple times by an export agency called Anjaney Exports.



Considering that it is an export agency, we looked for the company Anjaney Exports on Indiamart.com and found the following information.



As can be seen in the image above, the number “7575826300” from the WhatsApp account matches the tweets shown earlier from the Anjaney Exports account and also matches the details in this IndiaMart entry. Phone numbers on IndiaMart are verified via OTP (one time password). The names and address have to be put in manually by the entity who wants to be featured in IndiaMart. That would indicate that the Anjaney Exports entry along with the phone numbers and address were manually entered by the person managing the account which in this case would be Niraj Dave whose name is listed as managing partner.

The IndiaMart entry has another phone number and we looked it up on Truecaller. While the first phone number isn’t masked in this post because it is already available in public domain, we have masked the second phone number for the sake of the person’s privacy.



This Truecaller entry also shows that this person’s Twitter handle is “Nir_27”. Again, this is a verified Truecaller profile as indicated by the blue tick mark. Further, a tweet by Nir_27 account confirms that the Niraj Dave handling Anjaney Exports is the same as Niraj Dave handling the Nir_27 Twitter account.



We looked up the Nir_27 Twitter profile and it is followed by none other than the prime minister of India.



The following 2012 tweet indicates that Dave is also close to other BJP leaders like Subramanian Swamy.



Some of the other messages sent by Dave on this group can be seen below.



Other than Dave, we also investigated one of the admins of the WhatsApp group who goes by the name Akash Soni.



The WhatsApp profile image is a picture of him with Nirmala Sitharaman.



Infact, Soni’s Facebook profile and personal page has many more pictures of him with various BJP leaders.



Soni has also posted private numbers of multiple journalists like Barkha Dutt, Kumar, Rajdeep Sardesai and Abhisar Sharma publicly on his Facebook timeline.



This WhatsApp group also has Nikhil Dadhich who is followed by Prime Minister Modi and had celebrated Gauri Lankesh’s murder by tweeting – “A b*$#^ died a dog’s death”.



Alt News had recently exposed how BJP national IT cell head Amit Malviya had put out an edited video clip of Kumar’s speech to defame him. Earlier, a person unrelated to Kumar was portrayed as his sister who is charged with a corruption case. Independent journalism continues to scar those who are in power and their supporters.

 

[ashok321]

So people who want to kill journalists or like these journalists to be killed are followed by PM of India Modi.

What does it say?

 

[Joe Shearer]

So people who want to kill journalists or like these journalists to be killed are followed by PM of India Modi.

What does it say?

1. That the bhakt is not a believer in the rule of law, or in the Constitution;
2. That the bhakt is not a mob, but an organised follower of a political party and a so-called social movement;
3. That the bhakt puts out what is sought to be said by the political party or the social movement, but cannot be said for its extremely controversial nature;
4. That the political leadership of the party is complicit in this strategy of outsourcing assault and battery (please look up the legal definitions) to supposedly private individuals;
5. That there cannot be a vacuum between the level of this top leadership and the riff-raff commissioned as pit-bulls on two legs;
6. That the intervening layers are likely to be complicit as well, but that we have no proof at the moment.

 

[truthseer]

Dictator Modi who it is said was allegedly responsible for the Mumbai attacks getting a reporter allegedly threatened. Disgusting

 

[Joe Shearer]

Dictator Modi who it is said was allegedly responsible for the Mumbai attacks getting a reporter allegedly threatened. Disgusting

There is no direct connection. We think that some of his present actions are unbecoming and undignified, but it is nowhere the contention that he is himself involved in getting a reporter threatened.

 

[truthseer]

There is no direct connection. We think that some of his present actions are unbecoming and undignified, but it is nowhere the contention that he is himself involved in getting a reporter threatened.

I did say allegedly, TWICE

That makes it okay

 

[Joe Shearer]

I did say allegedly, TWICE

That makes it okay

Personally, I make it a point NOT to comment on social or political matters internal to Pakistan. It is your business, and as friendly neighbours (I count myself as one, even though I am opposed to the policy of sponsoring terrorism that your establishment has clung on to for decades), I try not to be in a place where people ask me what I am doing in that discussion.

Of course, that is a purely personal standpoint.

 

[truthseer]

Personally, I make it a point NOT to comment on social or political matters internal to Pakistan. It is your business, and as friendly neighbours (I count myself as one, even though I am opposed to the policy of sponsoring terrorism that your establishment has clung on to for decades), I try not to be in a place where people ask me what I am doing in that discussion.

Of course, that is a purely personal standpoint.

That is a very noble viewpoint, which is why I make it a point to never comment on an Indian forum

 

[Joe Shearer]

That is a very noble viewpoint, which is why I make it a point to never comment on an Indian forum

It is nice to see that we agree so closely.

 

[noksss]

So the biggest criticism after 3 years rule by Modi is him following some XYZ on twitter . Damn these Commies/Media guys are really running out of ideas

 

[T90TankGuy]

So the biggest criticism after 3 years rule by Modi is him following some XYZ on twitter . Damn these Commies/Media guys are really running out of ideas

No the biggest criticism would be what he did to our economy , there is a longer list but i doubt you would get it.

 

[noksss]

No the biggest criticism would be what he did to our economy , there is a longer list but i doubt you would get it.

Well after the failed Intolerance,Award Wapasi, Cows, Dalit/Muslim attack finally they have come to the real issues and guess what that's what is needed for the country but i doubt you would get it

 

[ranjeet]

What was the threat? I don't see any threat issued to Ravish in the OP, all it proves is that he is just a snowflake.

 

[padamchen]

No the biggest criticism would be what he did to our economy , there is a longer list but i doubt you would get it.

Most bhakts damn silent nowadays.

Can't all be banned, coz I see them flitting in and out of threads.

Don't mind naming names.

Economy se saari bhakti sookh gayi hai.

Pehle hi bola tha.

If there is one constant about Hindus, it is their pragmatism.

Cheers, Doc

 

[ranjeet]

1. That the bhakt is not a believer in the rule of law, or in the Constitution;
2. That the bhakt is not a mob, but an organised follower of a political party and a so-called social movement;
3. That the bhakt puts out what is sought to be said by the political party or the social movement, but cannot be said for its extremely controversial nature;
4. That the political leadership of the party is complicit in this strategy of outsourcing assault and battery (please look up the legal definitions) to supposedly private individuals;
5. That there cannot be a vacuum between the level of this top leadership and the riff-raff commissioned as pit-bulls on two legs;
6. That the intervening layers are likely to be complicit as well, but that we have no proof at the moment.

Any opinion on doxxing private citizens? It might not be a crime as of yet but certain section of liberal cabal believes it's harrasment and stalking.