Days after alleged journalist Rajdeep Sardesai reportedly put in his resignation at India Today TV after being lambasted for fake news reportage and also having action taken against him by the organisation, far-left pamphlet – The Wire is now all set to be the latest casualty of fallacious reporting. The portal’s founding editor; Siddharth Varadarajan has been named in an FIR by Uttar Pradesh police at Rampur, for peddling lies not just through his media entity, but also his private Twitter account.
In a tweet, Varadarajan had shared a report of the Wire, based entirely on lies, alleging that the ‘farmer’ who died at Delhi’s ITO due to his tractor overturning upon colliding with a police barricade had, in fact, passed away after succumbing to a bullet injury. Leftists and affiliated media organisations like the Wire have since then been alleging that Navreet Singh was shot by Delhi Police, leading to his death.
The Wire went a step further in alleging that Hardeep Singh Dibdibiya, grandfather of Navreet Singh Dibdibiya, who died at ITO, said he was told by a doctor, from the panel of doctors which conducted the post-mortem that the youth had died due to a bullet injury. This was a claim made in sharp contrast to reality, and calling it fiction would be an understatement.
Read More: Leftists suffer massive meltdown as Rajdeep Sardesai faces tough action for lethal fake news
The complainant says, “The post-mortem of Navreet was done by a panel of three doctors and the report was sent to the Rampur Superintendent of Police (SP) and the officials concerned in a sealed envelope. The doctors have not given any statement regarding the autopsy to anyone and the post-mortem was also videographed.” As a matter of fact, the post-mortem examination ruled out any bullet injuries.
That did not stop the Wire and its founding editor Siddharth Varadarajan from spreading lies, the cost of which they will now have to pay. The FIR, registered on the complaint of Rampur resident Sanju Turaiha, has been lodged under IPC sections 153B (imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration) and 505(2) (statements creating or promoting enmity between classes. The complainant added in the FIR that the lies peddled in the report have led to anger among the common people in Rampur and given rise to tension. The police, meanwhile, has said that the name of the reporter who wrote the news report will also be added to the FIR. The Wire has not retracted the said fake news story, leave alone apologise for it.