Reporter. Writer. Cook.
Bangalore, India
Joined July 2009
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Samar Halarnkar retweeted
“The powerful can kill one, two, or even one hundred roses. But they will never stop the arrival of spring.”
What a guy. What a guy. What a guy.
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Historian Ramachandra Guha questions the Karnataka government’s restrictions on protests at Bengaluru’s Town Hall.
“Just two weeks ago, the CM was demanding the right to protest on Delhi’s streets for Congressmen, while denying the same right to people in the state he governs,” Guha said.
He called for designated protest spaces such as Town Hall, Gandhi statue and Maurya Circle to be restored, arguing that they are essential to democratic functioning.
#Karnataka #Bengaluru @Ram_Guha
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
I almost laughed after a BJP supporter said that Pema should resign in protest against the centre's militarisation of the Siang valley, after someone commented that it is the centre's doing to bring in forces to crush the protests against the Siang upper multipurpose project. Such deep love for their spineless CM, who initiated the violent method of starting a study on the Siang without seeking the consent of the community.
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
'UP Police Need Education In Investigation' : Supreme Court Orders ₹6 Lakh Compensation To Man Acquitted After 6 Years In Jail |@mittal_mtn
“Six years have been erased from the life of a man on the strength of a concocted story," the Court noted.
livelaw.in/supreme-court/sup…
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
We all need to learn how to lie from Election Commission of India
#BREAKING on Bar & Bench
Election Commission of India files counter affidavit in Supreme Court on plea against CEC's functioning; says petition built entirely on a single news report
What ECI says:
🔹 Affidavit approved unanimously by all three members: the CEC and both Election Commissioners
🔹 All three SIR orders (June 2025, October 2025, May 2026) were unanimous decisions of the Commission
🔹 Notes, queries or suggestions by the CEC or ECs while a file moves are not decisions of the Commission
🔹 Files go to one EC, then the other EC, then the CEC. In urgent cases, approval is taken electronically and recorded on file later
🔹 Any officer issuing orders beyond delegated powers will face action
🔹 July 28 work allocation order was issued by an Additional Secretary on deputation. Both ECs wrote to the Cabinet Secretary the next day. The order was never implemented after the ECs' joint direction of July 30
🔹 Form 6 has not been amended. Only the Centre can amend it. The SIR declaration is a separate document
🔹 Admits the online display could be read as an amendment. From October 21, the online application will be split into Form 6 and the declaration, as in the physical form
🔹 Unmapped voters need not attend hearings. BLOs will collect documents from their homes. Hearings only in exceptional cases, preferably online
🔹 ECINet: no name is added or deleted except by order of the ERO. A committee with experts from IIT and IISc has been set up to check compliance
🔹 Goa: of 97 "left out" voters, 88 had already been enrolled, 6 were abroad and 3 held Portuguese passports
🔹 West Bengal appeals against inclusion of voters were filed by officers of the CEO, West Bengal, under Supreme Court orders. "These matters were not brought to the Commission"
🔹 Plea to restrain the CEC is not maintainable. CEC can be removed only like a Supreme Court judge
🔹 Commission never released or authorised the release of any internal note or file to the media
🔹 Repeated challenges to EVMs already rejected by the Supreme Court
🔹 Short reply filed due to Dussehra vacation. ECI seeks liberty to file a detailed para-wise response
#ElectionCommission #SupremeCourt #SIR
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
UP MLC Polls Ground Report: Samajwadi Party Establishes How EC Has Flouted Several Rules.
What is going on?
Is this a trailer of how UP assembly elections will be fought?
Police + admin. in service of which party?
Watch @akanksha_kumar3 's ground report
youtu.be/AmPZ8t4y9_w?si=fYZp…
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Arrest of these young activists is deeply concerning. Also CM Pema Khandu says the door is open for dialogue, but anti-dam activists continue to get arrested. This mix messaging is confusing everyone. How will people trust the government?
@tongamrina @nit_set @TanushreePande
(Prominent anti-SUMP activists arrested after Pasighat violence)
The Arunachal Times - arunachaltimes.in/article/pr…
#antiSUMPactivists #arrested #PasighatViolence #SUMP
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
First no machine readable list, then no CCTV footage and now this! Truth has a way of surfacing whatever you may do.
The Election Commission of India continues to hide information about the controversial ECINET software at the heart of the disastrous SIR, that has been used to centralise manipulation of the electoral rolls.
Today, a leading national daily revealed that the ECI has refused to provide information on the software being used in the SIR in its response to a Right to Information (RTI) application. Using flimsy excuses, the ECI has refused to name the software being used in the SIR, or confirm whether AI is being used and what safeguards are in place.
The lack of transparency around the ECINET software and the use of AI has damaged the credibility of the entire process among citizens. The ECI is repeatedly refusing to provide this information because it will reveal the reality of the massive, centralised manipulation that has taken place.
•Why did Indians find out from disclosures of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) that they developed the ECINET software? Why has this not been transparently disclosed by the ECI?
•Why has the ECI repeatedly denied the use of AI in the SIR and electoral roll revision, when it is clearly being used?
The ECINET software and the IT Division of the ECI were the focus of several objections raised by Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi. The complaints even reached the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), which comes under the Prime Minister himself.
The public knows that massive manipulation has taken place. Gyanesh Kumar must go. The SIR must be suspended forthwith.
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Neighbourhood disputes
Action against journalists
‘Drinking tea suspiciously’
CJP leaders @SauravDassss & @AshutoshRanka were the latest to be sent to jail by a police officer using powers under #Modi govt’s new criminal-procedure law
Decades of court rulings have warned against "disproportionate use” of such colonial-era preventive powers. Yet the BNSS retains them, writes @surbhi_karwa
article-14.com/post/how-the-…
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
The most enduring image of Randall Sequeira among tribal communities in the bauxite-rich hills of southwestern Odisha is that of a bearded, bespectacled, lanky doctor on a Royal Enfield Himalayan motorcycle travelling between far-flung villages to treat the sick, @Ayaskant_Das writes about him
"Doctor Babu is like a mobile hospital. He lives in a tiled hut. He visits households & provides free treatment"
Odisha police arrested Randall Sequeira, a doctor who serves Adivasi communities & supports the anti-mining movement. @Ayaskant_Das has this profile
Link👇
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
केंद्राचं पत्र आल्यानंतर वनविभागाने एकच दिवसात झाडं तोडायला कंपनीला परवानगी दिली.आणि 3 तारखेला उद्घाटनाला पंतप्रधान येणार असल्याचं नमूद करत 'स्वच्छता'करायला सांगितली. महाराष्ट्र द्रोही कोण?याचं उत्तर शोधता शोधता कर्जतच्या जंगलातून केलेला ग्राउंड रिपोर्ट👇🏻
youtu.be/RIOGQbViWfY?si=4San…
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Bro brought down his own institution and is giving gyaan about how institutions matter. What an unbelievable farce of a man
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Karnataka SIR: The data bust claims made by the BJP and the right-wing ecosystem that SIR of electoral rolls is primarily aimed at identifying illegal immigrants, particularly alleged Bangladeshi Muslim immigrants.
According to constituency wise data released by Sankalp, a political research consultancy, 108 of the 127 people flagged as Not Indian Citizen are Hindus, 12 are Muslims and seven are Christians. The figures mean that Muslims account for just 9.4% of those listed under this category, while Hindus make up nearly 85% and Christians account for about 5.5%.
english.varthabharati.in/kar…
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
EXCLUSIVE: India’s biggest news publishers including Ambani's Network18, Adani's NDTV, Indian Express, Times Internet & others mount the most high-profile challenge yet to Modi’s privacy law, warning it would “render investigative journalism a benign and neutered recorder of events.”
DNPA (@publishers_news) has taken the law to the Supreme Court. They argue it would trample investigative work and let New Delhi identify journalists’ sources.
The provisions “constitute pre-censorship which is anathema to any democracy worth its name,” the group’s 698-page filing says.
The key concerns:
🔹 Consent: requiring a journalist to notify the subject of an investigation and seek consent “would allow that subject to destroy evidence, intimidate witnesses”
🔹 Erasure: people can withdraw consent and demand their data be erased, which the group says could force publishers to unpublish or heavily redact news reports
🔹 Sources: a “nakedly unguided” power to demand information that “can extend to privileged communications in possession of a reporter or the informant”
In a letter to the government, the group said India “has chosen to grant broad exemptions to the state, while failing to extend any corresponding protection to the press.”
reuters.com/business/media-t…
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Appalling reaction from incharge Chairman, BoG, IISER Pune.
Umar Khalid has been in jail far too long, and now they are even banning his PhD thesis from academic campuses.
What are they afraid of?
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
BJP-RSS ecosystem uses “indigenous” as per its political convenience. In fact, it has mastered the art of co-opting and weaponising indigeneity. In Assam, it uses “indigenous” as a communal filter to segregate Bengali Muslims from Assamese Hindu, Assamese Muslims, Bengali Hindu, Hindi-speaking Hindus and ST/tribal communities. It does so because it generally works well in Assam. But they quickly sideline the concept the moment one of these “indigenous” communities uses the label to oppose BJP, RSS or one of their crony corporate allies. Look at Kaziranga and elsewhere, for example, where development threatens ‘indigenous’ land – just like in Arunachal.
Now, BJP supporters are upset over the term indigenous people. Check attached. Very likely, you have not heard them use the terms indigenous people or Adivasi because they feel threatened when we assert our identity. It dilutes the BJP and RSS’s distorted idea of a homogeneous India. As a reminder, the indigenous people of the Siang valley are opposed to the Siang Upper Multipurpose Project. No amount of arrests, intimidation, or RAF deployment will work on them unless they choose to accept the project.
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Massive Protest rally today,against the unlawful arrest of people's doctor Randall Sequeira, Youth tribal Singer cum Activist Laxman Naik, Adivasi leader Lada Sikaka and Eminent environmental Activist Lingaraj Azad in front of Muniguda Tehsil Office, Rayagada district of Odisha.
@tmkrishna @samar11 @TeestaSetalvad @HansrajMeena
@DhanadaKanta @Ayaskant_Das
Samar Halarnkar retweeted
Indian opposition needs to pay close attention to what happened in Brazil. Meta messed around with Lula’s social media account, ad campaigns, reach and visibility. Meta accepted that it made “mistakes”. What will stop Meta from making the same “mistakes” during India elections?
