Swarajya Magazine has revealed the dubious intentions of India Today group and its top journalist Rahul Kanwal. According to the report, India Today on 10 January 2020 aired a sting operation that it called a ‘stupendous work of investigative journalism’.
The sting operation by India Today was to do with the JNU violence that had erupted in the campus on the intervening days and nights of 3, 4 and 5 of January.
In the sting operation, India Today claimed to unmask two ABVP activists who had supposedly indulged in retaliatory violence on 5 January 2020 in the Sabarmati hostel after they said that the Leftists had attacked the Periyar hostel.
It now appears that India Today tried to pass off a JNUSU activist as an ABVP member simply to further a narrative.
The sting operation was aired by India Today right after the Delhi Police had held a press conference and implicated several Left students, including the JNUSU president Aishe Ghosh as suspects in the JNU violence.
During the airing of the sting operation, ABVP had come out to issue a statement saying that Akshat Awasthi, the man being identified as an ABVP activist, is not associated with ABVP in any manner.
To this, Rahul Kanwal had claimed that he has ‘proof’ of Akshat attending an ABVP rally. Though this was a flimsy reason to associate someone with a political outfit since thousands of unrelated and unconnected people might turn up for a political event, Kanwal stuck to his guns.
After the sting operation was aired, Rahul Kanwal took to Twitter to publish the “proof” of Akshat Awasthi attending an “ABVP rally”.
READ THE FULL STORY HERE ON SWARAJYA