Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday came forward to back Alt News co-founder after Delhi Police arrested him under sections 153 and 295A for hurting religious sentiments and attempting to incite riots.
Rahul Gandhi took twitter and shared an infographic by far-leftist portal The Wire, and tweeted, “Every person exposing BJP’s hate, bigotry and lies is a threat to them. Arresting one voice of truth will only give rise to a thousand more. Truth ALWAYS triumphs over tyranny. #DaroMat.”
Even as Gandhi came out in support of Mohammed Zubair, it is worth noting that the arrest of the Alt News co-founder came weeks after his old social media posts where he had made derogatory references against Hindu Gods and Goddesses surfaced online. Zubair quickly deleted his Facebook page. Days later, he also removed disparaging tweets that insulted Hindu Gods and Goddesses, needless to say fearing the consequences.
Several old posts and tweets of Mohammed Zubair surfaced in chains, here are some of the examples-
On 13 June 2022, days after India witnessed violent protests that saw Islamists running riot, indulging in violence over the alleged insult of Prophet Muhammad, Twitter user The Hawk Eye (@thehawkeye) shared a collage of past tweets and posts by Mohammed Zubair mocking Hindu Gods and beliefs.
In one of the tweets shared by The Hawk Eye, Zubair is seen mocking Shivling and comparing it with the top view of the Vatican City. He said the post comparing Shivling with the Vatican City inspired him to come up with a parody Facebook page ‘Unofficial: Subramanian Swamy’ in 2014.
Apparently, one of the posts on the Facebook page ‘Unofficial Mohammed Zubair‘ mocks Arun Govil to take a swipe at Lord Ram, suggesting that ISRO must consult the actor because he would know more about the rocketry.
Another post by ‘Unofficial Mohammed Zubair’ shows an aeroplane under the water with the caption: “Breaking: Underwater Pushpak Vimana used by Raavan 5000 years found in the Indian Ocean.”
Besides ridiculing Hindu Gods, Zubair has also mocked and made fun of Hindu beliefs and tooka dig at Sanskrit, regarded as one of the most important languages of Hinduism and the means of communication by the Hindu Gods.
Despite his Hinduphobic posts, the Congress party and one of its foremost leaders, Rahul Gandhi, have firmly stood with the Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair following his arrest. This generosity, in part, comes from the pro-Congress reports of Alt News which has routinely extended to political figures, parties and communities such as Rahul Gandhi, TMC and Muslims, under the pretext of carrying out dispassionate “fact-checks.” The another co founder of Alt news Prateek Sinha tweets supports whats being said.
While Sinha took strenuous efforts to paint AltNews as a bastion of truth and neutrality, in reality, Sinha’s tweets revealed that his organisation is anything but. Instead, his inordinately long Twitter thread only ended up reinforcing the prevailing belief around AltNews: that is a propaganda website with a strong predilection for Congress, Rahul Gandhi, TMC and Muslims, and a deep aversion to the BJP, Hindus and PM Modi.
An article published on Alt News, notorious for peddling propaganda and fake news, gave a clean chit to the Congress party by declaring that the ‘toolkit’ was created on a forged document. According to them, AICC Research Department chairman Rajeev Gowda had given documents and statements to Alt News to proclaim the toolkit to be fake.
Given Alt News’ historical antagonism toward PM Modi and the BJP, it came as no surprise that Rahul Gandhi chose to support Mohammed Zubair, perhaps to return the favour his organisation has been doing for the Congress party, and in the process, attack the Modi government.