The decision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to be the chief guest and deliver the keynote address during the centenary celebration function of Mathrubhumi, a Malayalam daily, has upset the followers and fans of the former. On March 18, Prime Minister Modi will address the year-long centenary function of Mathrubhumi, claims the newspaper management.
The fourth oldest newspaper in Malayalam, Mathrubhumi is a virulent critic of Prime Minister Modi and has been spreading all kinds of fake news against him through its reports and columns. The editorials as well as opinion columns published in the newspaper may eclipse even the CPI(M)-owned Deshabhimani and Jamaat-e-Islami-owned Madhyamam, which are at the forefront of the anti-Modi brigade in Kerala.
The Mathrubhumi, once owned by some of the prominent freedom fighters and had persons like K P Kesava Menon, K P Madhavan Nair, Kurur Neelakantan Namboodirippadu and the Nalappattu family (the ancestral home of late poetess Kamala Das) is under the control of two business families in Kozhikode. P V Chandran, the chairman and managing editor of the daily is the son of late P V Sami, popularly known as Chena Sami (because he was the yam trader in Kozhikode commodities market) and M V Shreyams Kumar, a political Bhikshamdehi, son of former socialist party leader and planter M P Veerendra Kumar who used to spit venom on Modi through his speeches, books, and articles. Hindus in Kerala have stopped reading the Mathrubhumi long back because of the anti-Hindu stance of the daily. The weekly columns penned by Vazhipokkan (pseudonym of senior editor K A Johnny) are full of Hate Modi campaign.
Social media is full of allegations that the daily had been sold to Islamic fundamentalists and they alone determine the editorial policy of the newspaper. Of course, this is being repeated through social media postings and there are no authentication for such reports. Shreyams Kumar is with the CPI(M)-led LDF and is more Marxist than the party comrades. He also abuses and scoffs at Modi at least a dozen times daily and has become the loudspeaker of chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan.
The Mathrubhumi TV channel is also at the forefront of anti-Modi campaigners. The channel has employed Islamists and Marxists as its reporters and editorial staff who have been unleashing hate campaigns against the Prime Minister, RSS leadership, and the Indian defense forces. A news anchorperson had questioned the authenticity of the Pathankot terrorist attack terming it as stage-managed by the Indian defense forces to discredit Pakistan. The general question being asked by Modi’s fans and followers is should the Prime Minister allow his name to be misused by such a daily which would benefit the Mathrubhumi Group only.
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