Ananth @ananth

In addition to all the useless taxes that were extracted from me and fellow citizens, I'm willing to donate few more bags of cement to fix this abomination near IKEA, which is also next to that 250cr per acre auction you've recently achieved. Kindly advise to process to donate. Cc @CYBTRAFFIC @cyberabadpolice @GummallaSrijana @MC_Cyberabad

Oh, it's Scottish Lungi!

Massimo @Rainmaker1973

5 days ago

The most interesting thing about a Scottish Highland Great Kilt is that it's a "skirt". This is how they wear a traditional one. [📹andythehighlander]

90 847 6K 215K 955

Dear @CommissionrGHMC, e-city area roads are full of loose sand and gravel. Bikers frequently skid and fall. No action from GHMC despite multiple complaints. Just need some cleaning, nothing major. Please save the engineers building India's future🙏 @CoreenaSuares2 @TelanganaCMO

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🚨 FASTag has a MASSIVE security loophole & nobody is talking about it. Today, literally anyone with access to your car & RC can get a NEW FASTag issued on your vehicle in THEIR name & mobile number. No OTP. No owner authorization. No consent from the actual vehicle owner. The moment that happens? Your existing FASTag gets blacklisted/deactivated instantly under the “One Vehicle One FASTag” policy. That’s exactly what happened to me. I’m currently transporting my car from Mumbai to Delhi & handed over the vehicle to the transporter’s driver on Saturday. He casually asked me if there was balance in the FASTag. Next morning, I received a message from ICICI saying a new FASTag had been activated on my vehicle & my existing FASTag would be deactivated. Within minutes, it was blacklisted/deactivated. Honestly, God knows what the plan even was. Maybe he thought the balance would transfer. Maybe he wanted to misuse it during transit. Maybe something worse. The scary part? The system ALLOWED this without a single authorization from the actual vehicle owner. The NETC FASTag portal was down the entire day. After 4+ hours of calls, ICICI finally told me the new FASTag was issued via Airtel Payments Bank. Later, I checked the Airtel Thanks app & guess what? The FASTag had been registered by the SAME driver who took the car. This is where things become ridiculous. Airtel Payments Bank support told me THEY cannot close the FASTag unless the person who activated it calls them personally. Read that again. The actual vehicle owner has ZERO control over the FASTag - but the person who fraudulently activated it does. The NHAI helpline at 1033 was equally useless. No emergency block. No fraud handling. No owner protection mechanism. So if someone activates a FASTag on your car, you’re basically stranded. How is this acceptable infrastructure for something linked to a vehicle owner’s identity & movement? This is no longer just a scam. It’s a massive security vulnerability in the FASTag ecosystem. NPCI/NETC urgently needs mandatory owner authorization. At the very least, mandate OTP verification from the registered vehicle owner before ANY FASTag change is approved. This needs immediate attention, @NPCI_NPCI @FASTag_NETC. Pathetic support, zero accountability, and absolutely no protection for the actual vehicle owner while someone else fraudulently took control of the FASTag. That should never be possible, @ICICIBank @airtelbank.

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Company is constructing factory in Hyderabad ecity, destroyed the sidewalk and piled up mud/sand on the road like this causing danger to commuters. Is this allowed? @CEC_EVDM @GHMCOnline @CommissionrGHMC @CPHydCity @HYDTP @hydcitypolice maps.app.goo.gl/s6v3cqWZkZFxXv…

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A Stanford neuroscientist published a paper a few years ago that quietly answered one of the oldest questions in human history, and almost nobody outside his field has heard of it. The question is why we dream. Not what dreams mean. Why they exist at all. Why your brain spends a third of its sleep hallucinating images instead of just resting like every other organ in your body. His name is David Eagleman. He runs a lab at Stanford. The paper is called "The Defensive Activation Theory", and the moment you read it the explanation collapses every other theory you have ever been taught about dreams. Freud said dreams were repressed desires. He was guessing. He had no brain scans. He had no electrodes. He had a couch and a notebook and a century of credibility that nobody has been able to fully scrub off the subject since. Modern neuroscience replaced him with the memory "consolidation theory". The idea that dreams are your brain sorting through the day, filing things away, deciding what to keep. That story is partially true. Sleep does consolidate memory. But it does not explain the single strangest thing about dreams, which is that they are almost entirely visual. You do not dream in pure sound. You do not dream in taste. You do not dream in smell. You dream in pictures. Vivid, detailed, often impossible pictures that activate the back of your brain so hard a scientist scanning you would think your eyes were wide open. Eagleman started from one fact almost nobody outside neuroscience knows. The brain is territorial. Every region holds its turf through constant electrical activity. The moment a region goes quiet, its neighbors start invading. They take the silent territory and reassign it to themselves. This is called "cortical takeover", and it is not slow. It is not a long process measured in years. In experiments where adults are blindfolded, the visual cortex starts processing touch and sound within an hour. One hour of darkness, and the territory is already being annexed. In congenitally blind people, the visual cortex is fully repurposed. It runs language. It runs hearing. It runs touch. The hardware never went unused. It was just reassigned to whoever showed up first. Now sit with the implication of that for a second. Every night, when you close your eyes and fall asleep, the sun has set. The planet has rotated. The visual cortex, which takes up roughly a third of your entire cortex, is suddenly receiving zero input. For eight hours. Every single night. For your entire life. And evolution has shaped your brain inside a planet that has been spinning into darkness for billions of years. If cortical takeover happens in an hour, the visual cortex should have been lost a long time ago. Stolen by hearing. Stolen by touch. Reassigned by morning. Humans should have evolved into a species whose vision works fine during the day and then degrades every time the sun goes down because the territory keeps getting renegotiated overnight. But that did not happen. Vision works the moment you open your eyes. Which means something is defending the territory while you sleep. Eagleman's claim is that dreams are that defense. Every 90 minutes through the night, a precise burst of activity fires from the brainstem into the visual cortex. Pontine-geniculate-occipital waves. PGO for short. They are anatomically aimed. They are not general arousal. They are a targeted volley of signal launched directly at the back of the brain where vision lives. The cortex lights up as if it is receiving real images, and you experience that artificial activation as a dream. The bizarre narrative your conscious mind invents around it later is just your brain trying to make sense of the noise. The dream is not the point. The dream is the side effect. The point is keeping the territory occupied. The evidence for this is the part that should haunt you. Newborns spend roughly 50% of their sleep in REM. Adults spend twenty. Old adults spend fifteen. The amount of dreaming you do tracks almost perfectly with how plastic your brain is. Newborns have the most plastic brains on earth. Their visual cortex is in the highest danger of being overrun by neighboring senses while it develops. So evolution gave them an enormous defense budget. As you age, your brain becomes less plastic, the takeover risk drops, and the defense system scales down accordingly. Eagleman and his co-author ran the same correlation across twenty-five primate species. The more plastic a species' brain, the higher the proportion of REM sleep. The relationship held across the entire primate family tree. Plasticity and dreaming move together. They are two halves of the same evolutionary equation. A species that ranks higher on flexibility and learning also dreams more. A species that is born ready to walk and survive dreams less. Plasticity is the asset. Dreaming is the insurance premium. And the prediction the theory makes is the one that quietly closes the case. Of all your senses, only one is disadvantaged by darkness. You can still hear in the dark. You can still feel in the dark. You can still smelll and taste in the dark. The only sense that depends on light is vision. Which is exactly the sense your dreams are made of. The defense system is targeted at the only territory that is actually vulnerable while you sleep. Memory consolidation is real. Emotional processing is real. Your brain does do those things at night. But Eagleman's argument is that those functions piggyback on a much older system whose original job was simpler and more brutal. Keep the lights on inside the visual cortex while the planet is dark, or lose it. For thousands of years, people have asked what dreams mean. Prophets wrote about them. Poets wrote about them. Freud built a discipline on them. None of them had access to the actual answer, which is that dreams may not mean anything in the symbolic sense at all. They may be the visible flicker of a defense system running in the background, the way a screen saver protects a monitor by keeping the pixels moving even when nobody is looking. The strangest thing about the theory is how cleanly it explains why dreams feel so real. Your visual cortex cannot tell the difference between a PGO wave and an actual photon. It is the same hardware lighting up the same way. The cortex does its job. It builds an image. Your conscious mind, half-awake, wraps a story around it and calls it a dream. You are not seeing your subconscious tonight. You are watching your brain defend a piece of itself from being stolen. Every animal that has ever closed its eyes on this planet has done the same thing.

Starting Monday, 11 May 2026, TV5MONDE+ is making 15 restored African films available free worldwide in a new Cinémathèque Afrique space. The collection comes from TV5MONDE and the French Institute, which manages Cinémathèque Afrique, a catalogue created in 1961 and now including more than 1,700 titles. The first restored works include: - "Afrique sur Seine" (1955) — Paulin Soumanou Vieyra and Mamadou Sarr - "Lamb" (1963) — Paulin Soumanou Vieyra - "Le Retour d'un aventurier" (1966) — Moustapha Alassane - "Concerto pour un exil" (1967) — Désiré Écaré - "Mouna ou le rêve d'un artiste" (1969) — Henri Duparc - "À nous deux, France!" (1970) — Désiré Écaré - "Nationalité : immigré" (1975) — Sidney Sokhona - "Les Princes noirs de Saint-Germain-des-Prés" (1975) — Ben Diogaye Beye - "Samba le Grand" (1977) — Moustapha Alassane - "La Chapelle" (1979) — Jean-Michel Tchissoukou - "La vie est belle" (1987) — Mweze Ngangura and Benoît Lamy - "Bal poussière" (1988) — Henri Duparc - "Tabataba" (1988) — Raymond Rajaonarivelo - "Le Trésor des poubelles" (1989) — Samba Félix Ndiaye - "Wendemi, l'enfant du bon Dieu" (1992) — Pierre Yaméogo The launch coincides with the Africa Forward Summit in Nairobi, Kenya, on 11–12 May 2026, followed by a Cannes Film Festival presentation on 17 May 2026 at the French Institute space on the Critics’ Week Beach. For viewers worldwide, visit @tv5mondeplus on their website and look for the "Cinematheque Afrique" collection. #AfricanCinema #TV5MONDEPlus #CinémathèqueAfrique #Cannes2026

IFF's Statement on web censorship accompanying the elections results in Tamil Nadu and swearing in of C. Joseph Vijay Recent reports around C. Joseph Vijay’s swearing in as Tamil Nadu Chief Minister point to a familiar problem in India’s web censorship architecture where political speech is being restricted through a mix of formal takedown notices, opaque platform enforcement, and disputed claims of government involvement. Here, the regulatory framework for this has been created by the Union Government acting through the Ministry of Electronics and IT which has continued to amend and expand censorship powers under the IT Rules, 2021. On May 8, 2026, a notice was issued by the Tamil Nadu Police Cyber Crime Wing to X Corp, directing the removal or blocking of 18 URLs within three hours. The earliest accessible press report we found is PTI’s copy carried by The Print on May 10 at 8:49 PM IST, which states that the notice invoked Section 79(3)(b) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and the IT Rules, 2021, and described the posts as “unlawful”, “provocative” and capable of disturbing public order. This sits alongside two related platform incidents. First, Rahul Gandhi’s Instagram reel and photo post featuring Vijay’s swearing in were reportedly blocked or restricted after going viral. The earliest publicly accessible report alleging such restriction appears to be Congress leader Srivatsa’s X post of May 10, which was embedded or quoted by The Week, PTI/Daily Pioneer, ANI, and IANS. These reports also record MeitY’s denial, with government sources attributing the restriction to Instagram’s internal systems mistakenly flagging the post. While the post was later restored, the brief restriction impeded its reach and virality. Second, the official X handle of the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) was reportedly suspended shortly after a purported post supporting TVK’s coalition bid. X permanently or temporarily suspended the official VCK handle, displaying the standard notice that the account “violated X rules.” No further public explanation was provided by X. Taken together, these incidents show how web censorship now operates through a blurred chain of responsibility. Sometimes a public authority or state government acts directly, as with the Tamil Nadu Police notice to X. Sometimes platforms restrict content while users are left with vague references to “legal requirements” or the IT Rules. The result is the same that political speech is interrupted at moments of democratic significance, while the public is left without clear information on who ordered the restriction, under what law, and with what remedy. Such abrupt and arbitrary restrictions also interfere with uncovering an accurate timeline or record of historical events, like assembly elections. IFF emphasises that legality and process cannot be afterthoughts. Rule 3(1)(d) of the IT Rules, 2021 requires “actual knowledge” through a court order or notification by the appropriate government or its agency under Section 79(3)(b). In Shreya Singhal, the Supreme Court read Section 79(3)(b) narrowly and held that such court orders or government notifications must conform to Article 19(2). IFF calls on all public authorities and platforms to disclose the legal notices, affected URLs, issuing authorities, timelines of restriction and restoration, and remedies available to affected users. We also call on social media companies to do better since automating content moderation on the basis of laws and rules cannot become a shield for arbitrary restriction and the IT Rules, 2021 cannot be allowed to function as a shadow censorship system in which political speech disappears first and explanations arrive later, if at all. Internet Freedom Foundation May 11, 2026 Delhi

Dear @ExicomPower @ExicomEnergy congrats for building huge facility at e-city, Hyderabad. But you should cleanup after your work. The sand and gravel on road outside your compound wall poses risk to bikers. 1 accident last week.

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Martin Scorsese on how Satyajit Ray's films were an inspiration to him: "Film is an art that can bring cultural awakenings and new waves of life to people who have never seen such cultures before, I remember going to see my first Ray film in New York at 15 and witnessing a whole new world presented visually before my eyes. Without a doubt in Ray's films the line between poetry and cinema, dissolved. I could appreciate Ray's work within my own struggles to truly represent the Sicilian heritage which I grew up in. His characters were both distinct and tragic, portraying issues which were still unfolding historically around him. His work is something that I personally cannot wait to show my own daughter, once she is old enough to understand them. In the end I believe that such work must be preserved, so that the children of the future can see what Ray was visually able to represent." ("Martin Scorsese hits DC, hangs with the Hachet", Chris Ingui, The GW Hatchet, 2002) P.S: Remembering the legendary Indian filmmaker, Satyajit Ray, on his 105th birthday! Clip from: Charulata (1964) Director: Satyajit Ray

@RevPdf are you opensource?

Coffee is one of the only drinks with strong evidence that benefits the liver. Here's what decades of research actually says about how to drink it right: Coffee genuinely lowers liver disease risk. Meta-analyses show regular drinkers have about 35% lower risk of significant liver fibrosis and nearly 50% lower risk of liver cancer compared with non-drinkers. Aim for 2–3 cups a day, minimum. The effect is dose-dependent. The Hepatology socities such as AASLD and EASL says 3 or more cups daily is reasonable for liver benefit, if you tolerate it. Caffeinated works better than decaf. But decaf still helps. Caffeine blocks adenosine receptors that drive liver scarring. Decaf lowers chronic liver disease risk too, just by a smaller margin (UK Biobank, n=494,585). The target dose: ~300 mg caffeine/day, or 3 cups. Fibrosis protection kicks in around the 75th percentile of intake, roughly 308 mg caffeine, or 2.25 cup equivalents, per day - the AASLD 2023 advises 3+ cups for liver benefit. What a "cup" actually means One standard cup = 240 ml (8 oz), not a 60 ml tiny Indian "cup." A 240 ml filter coffee has ~95–165 mg caffeine. A single espresso shot (30 ml) has only ~60–75 mg. Coffee-to-water ratio: 1:15 to 1:17. For filter/drip/pour-over: 15 g of ground coffee to 250 ml water. This is the standard brewing ratio and gives clean extraction of chlorogenic acids and caffeine. Choose medium roast, not dark. Medium roast has significantly higher chlorogenic acid (CGAs) content than dark roast. Dark roasting thermally degrades CGAs, the main antioxidant doing liver work. Arabica beats Robusta. Arabica beans are richer in CGAs and polyphenols, the antioxidants doing most of the liver-protective work. A note here: Arabica for polyphenols, Robusta for caffeine. Arabica (1.5% caffeine) has more CGAs and polyphenols. Robusta (2.7% caffeine) has more caffeine but a cruder phenolic profile. A 70:30 Arabica-Robusta blend is a reasonable compromise. Water temperature: 92–96°C. Just off a rolling boil. Too hot (>96°C) burns the grounds and extracts bitter compounds; too cool (<90°C) under-extracts CGAs and caffeine. Grind size matters. Medium grind (table-salt texture) for filter/drip. Coarse for French press. Fine for espresso. Brew time: 3–4 minutes for pour-over, 4 minutes for French press, 25–30 seconds for espresso. Filtered coffee is the safest daily choice. Paper filters trap cafestol and kahweol, naturally present plant diterpenes that raise LDL cholesterol if consumed daily in large amounts. Pour-over (V60, Kalita, Melitta) or drip machines with paper filters give you CGAs and caffeine without the cholesterol penalty. Espresso and French press: fine, but not unlimited. They retain more polyphenols but also more diterpenes (so more chances of increased lipids). Great occasionally; don't make them your 5-cups-a-day default if you have high cholesterol or heart disease. South Indian filter coffee: acceptable, with caveats. The metal filter does not remove diterpenes as well as paper, so limit to 1–2 cups/day if you have dyslipidemia. The decoction itself is rich in CGAs. Use less sugar. Skip condensed milk. BUT ULTIMATE: Drink it black. Or close to it. Sugar, syrups, flavored creamers and whipped cream cancel the liver benefit, especially if you already have fatty liver, diabetes, or obesity. Skim milk or unsweetened plant milk is fine. Instant coffee: still works. UK Biobank (n=494,585) showed instant coffee drinkers had similar reductions in chronic liver disease as ground coffee drinkers. Not as potent, but far better than no coffee. Cold brew: underrated for the liver. Medium roast + coarse grind + 6–7 hours at room temperature extracts CGAs and caffeine efficiently with lower bitterness. pH and CGA content are comparable to hot brew. Timing. Spread across the day. one at breakfast, one mid-morning, one early afternoon. Stop by 2 pm if you have insomnia. It helps across almost every major liver disease. Evidence supports benefit in fatty liver (MASLD), alcohol-related liver disease, hepatitis B and C, cirrhosis, and liver cancer. The mechanism isn't magic, it's chemistry. Chlorogenic acid cuts oxidative stress and liver fat. Caffeine inhibits stellate cell activation (that promotes scarring or fibrosis). Melanoidins and polyphenols reduce inflammation. Who should go easy. Pregnancy, children, those with uncontrolled heart rate and rhythmn issues (arrhythmias), panic disorder, or insomnia. And no, coffee does not undo a bad diet or bad choice - such as alcohol, herbal supplement or that Ayurvedic "liver tonic." Sources: Modi et al., Hepatology 2010; Kennedy et al., BMC Public Health 2021 (UK Biobank); Fuller & Rao, Sci Rep 2017; AASLD MASLD Clinical Care Pathway 2023; EASL 2016 CPG, Frontiers in Nutrition 2026 (Italian coffee cohort).

If I say, 'Liril Soap' and 'Laaa la la la la', many people may start humming the classic Liril soap ad jingle. But the shocker is that the jingle was not original, but "inspired"! The bigger shocker was that the original jingle was also made for a lime-based soap just like HUL's Liril - Henkel's Fa! Henkel's Fa ad campaign in 1968-69 by the Düsseldorf-based agency Hubert Troost Werbeagentur (usually called Troost) featured the 'Laaa la la la la' song. It was composed by the German composer Klaus Doldinger. The jingle became so popular that a vinyl single of the track (Listen: tinyurl.com/klauswildfresh) was released in 1969 under the pseudonym Paul Nero Sounds (one of Doldinger’s aliases for his more commercial/pop-oriented output at the time), explicitly tied to the Fa commercial: "Paul Nero Sounds (Klaus Doldinger) - Wild Freshness (FA Commercial)". It appeared on compilations like Pop-Shopping: Juicy Music From German Commercials 1960-1975. Liril's (the soap itself inspired by Fa) first ad was released in 1974, in cinema theaters. It featured Air India stewardess Karen Lunel, and was made by the agency Lintas, and directed by Kailash Surendranath. The jingle was credited to Vanraj Bhatia (even though he simply added some Indian elements like Sitar, as an interlude, the actual melody was a direct lift from the Fa ad jingle by Klaus) and was sung by Preeti Desai. That two lime-based soaps, across 2 countries, have almost similar visual devices (shots of the soap interspersed with bikini-clad woman bathing) and identical music, is no coincidence, and is probably part of the larger ethos of that time in India when Hindi film music too heavily "borrowed" from foreign sources without any credit. I should know, because I created an entire website listing original songs against many, many Indian film songs: tinyurl.com/itwofswebsite (many of the song links may be broken but you can always Google the titles and find new uploads on YouTube). The Fa ad plays first, followed by the Liril ad. #advertising #marketing

From the OPD: The Most Dangerous Health Misconception I See Every Day The most frustrating part of my OPD practice is not the complex neurological cases; it is watching patients lose a battle they think they are winning. Every day, I see patients with obesity, Type 2 Diabetes, or hypertension who tell me: "I walk every morning, Doctor." "I do all the household work." "I have stopped adding sugar to my tea." They feel they have done their part. But their blood work and body composition tell a different story. Here is the evidence-based reality of why "walking and quitting sugar" is often not enough. 1. The Exercise Trap: Walking vs. Muscle 🔸Walking is a great baseline, and household chores are better than sedentary behavior. However, neither is a substitute for Strength Training. 🔸After age 30, you lose 3-8% of muscle mass per decade (Sarcopenia). Muscle is your body's primary "glucose sink." 🔸Walking burns a few calories while you do it. Strength training builds the "engine" that burns glucose even while you sleep. 🔸If you are not lifting weights or doing resistance training at least twice a week, your insulin resistance will likely persist, regardless of your step count. 2. The Diet Trap: "No Sugar" is the Bare Minimum 🔸Patients often think that by cutting out "sweets," they have fixed their diet. Meanwhile, their plates are still 80% carbohydrates (rice, rotis, poha) and nearly 0% protein. 🔸Refined carbohydrates (even without added sugar) spike insulin similarly to sugar. Furthermore, a protein-deficient diet leads to muscle loss and increased hunger. 🔸Most Indian diets are high-carb, low-protein disasters. Cutting sugar but eating 4 rotis or a mountain of rice is just trading one glucose spike for another. ✅Focus on Protein Leverage. Prioritize 1.2g to 1.5g of protein per kg of body weight. When you hit your protein goals, your craving for carbs naturally drops. Neurologist’s Perspective Why does a brain doctor care about your squats and your protein intake? Because Muscle is an endocrine organ. When you strength train, your muscles release Myokines, which: 🔸Improve cognitive function. 🔸Reduce systemic inflammation. 🔸Protect against neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s. ✅ The "Metabolic Reset" Protocol If you want to see real change in your HbA1c and BP, stop settling for the "Walking/No Sugar" myth. 1. Stop "Just Walking": Add two days of resistance training (bodyweight, bands, or weights). 2. Flip the Plate: Start your meal with protein (paneer, eggs, sprouts, lean meat). Eat your carbs last, and in smaller portions. 3. Recognize Household Work as "Activity," not "Exercise": Exercise requires progressive overload. Sweeping the floor doesn't challenge your muscles the way a squat does. Dr Sudhir Kumar @hyderabaddoctor

I want to clarify something about this article @apar1984 and I wrote: An infrastructure for mass censorship is already in place, in India, and the new rules expand it. We're seeing mass censorship of accounts and posts on X, Instagram and Facebook, because of this infrastructure. This infrastructure: 1. Operates with speed: - blocking of posts has to be executed in 3 hours (govt is considering 1 hour), which means there's no scope for challenging them. This is the shortest takedown timeline in the world. Every order is an emergency order. - When platforms get 100 at a time, which happens, they act first, think never, and censor always. Impact: If someone was censored and can't understand why, this is why. No one has time to think. 2. Scale...Scope has expanded uncontested: - The reasons for which speech and posts can be taken down keeps expanding. New rules expand government powers to tweets like this one. - News websites and platforms are covered under IT Rules (illegally) - Streaming platforms are covered under the IT Rules (illegally) Impact: more types of speech is already being censored...satire, journalism, or political criticism 3. Operates without challenge, in two ways: - When you get 160 takedown orders a day (as X disclosed to a court) how many will you challenge? - Platforms don't want to react because they can lose market access in India. They're faced with unrelenting pressure from regulators, and basically choosing which hill to die on. Us being censored is not their problem. - Rules are changing frequently: 7 amendments to IT Rules since Feb 2021. By the time courts nullify one rule (and they don't always do this), new rules come up. How often will people go to court? 4. Ordering takedowns has been decentralised: - The (illegal) Sahyog portal, which is used for takedowns, is a hotline from government bodies to platforms. Thirty-three states, seven central agencies, and seventy-two companies are onboarded. 5. There is no transparency hence no accountability: - Users receive no notice. censorship orders are not provided on request. - blocking orders and the meetings of the committee that reviews them are protected by secrecy. - RTI's are not responded to. - Consultation responses are not public. 6. Government is seeking personal data of social media users using Sections 70B, 69 and 75 of the IT Act. This will lead to self censorship. 7. Lawmaking process has collapsed: - The new IT Rules consultations have a 15 day deadline. - Implementation timeline for the last one was 10 days. - Rules are being made where there used to be laws government by Parliament. The new rules mirror provisions from the Broadcast Bill which was withdrawn in 2024. Parliament is being bypassed. As we wrote: when the IT Secretary reportedly says that platforms should have started preparing to implement based on consultation drafts, it appears that outcomes are predetermined. Consultations appear to be a farce. MEITY, DoT and MIB are not accountable to anyone but the government for rules that are not in line with laws, and go against a key free speech verdict we got in 2015. That's why this is an infrastructure for censorship. It is in place, it is operational, and it is expanding. This is not just about the new rules. This is why we're sounding the alarm about: people need to know what is going on, and the Supreme Court needs to take this up. They are the court of last resort, meant to preserve constitutionality. P.s: Please keep a copy of this tweet, in case it gets censored. Or just tweet it and tag us... how many will they censor?

Sound the Alarm : IFF’s First Read on MeitY's Draft IT Rules Second Amendment, 2026 New Delhi, 30 March 2026 On 30 March 2026, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology published proposed amendments to the IT Rules, 2021, inviting public comments by 14 April, a comment period of barely fifteen days for changes with far reaching consequences for free speech and intermediary governance in India. We have conducted a quick review of the draft amendments. Despite being presented as "clarificatory and procedural," they represent a dangerous expansion of executive power over online speech. We wish to state at the outset that these proposed amendments need to be immediately withdrawn and every member in our citizenry should demand their roll back and stand with the Constitution of India. These proposed amendments come at a time of fear and increased government directed censorship, especially of online political speech that includes parody and satire of the government, including the Prime Minister. In brief the five changes are listed below: 1. Rule 3(1)(g) and 3(1)(h): Insertion of phrases within existing clauses making data retention obligations under the IT Rules additional to retention requirements under any other law. 2. Rule 3(4): Insertion of a new clause that mandates intermediary compliance with MeitY-issued clarifications, advisories, directions, SOPs, codes of practice, and guidelines, making such compliance a condition for retaining safe harbour under Section 79 of the IT Act. These are not anchored to the rule making powers of the IT Act, 2000 and provide uncanalised power to MEITY despite it stating otherwise. 3. Rule 8(1) proviso: A substitution in the proviso that expands applicability of MIB’s oversight mechanism in Part III of the rules to: (1) intermediaries and (2) users who are not “publishers” and post/share news and current affairs content online. This oversight mechanism contains the blocking powers of MIB by way of Rule 14 (Inter-Departmental Committee), Rule 15 (Procedure for issuing directions to block), and Rule 16 (Emergency blocking provisions). 4. Rule 14(2) : A substitution that expands the scope of the IDC from hearing "complaints or grievances" to hearing "matters", including those referred by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. 5. Rule 14(5) : Replaces "complaints or grievances" with "the matter" in relation to IDC examination and recommendations. A massive expansion of an unconstitutional censorship and regulatory power First and most concerningly, Rule 3(4) creates a sweeping power for MeitY to issue binding instruments which are not anchored in law such as clarifications, advisories, directions, SOPs, codes of practice, and guidelines that intermediaries must comply with as a condition of safe harbour under Section 79 of the IT Act. The Supreme Court's 2015 judgment in Shreya Singhal v. Union of India (2015) 5 SCC 1, remains the foundational precedent governing intermediary liability. It constrains the proposed amendments in several ways. First, the court read down Section 79(3)(b) to require that "actual knowledge" of unlawful content must come through a court order or government notification. Any Rule 3(4) making MeitY, "clarifications, advisories, directions, SOPs", lower the constitutional threshold for intermediary due diligence obligations. Further, the settled principle in Indian administrative law, reaffirmed in Indian Express Newspapers v. Union of India (1985) 1 SCC 641 and Confederation of Ex-Servicemen Associations v. Union of India (2006) 8 SCC 399, is that delegated legislation must remain within the four corners of the parent statute. It is important to note that the rule-making power under Section 87(1) of the IT Act is confined to, "carry[ing] out the provisions" of the Act. Section 87(2)(zg) authorizes rules for intermediary guidelines under Section 79(2), and Section 87(2)(z) for blocking procedures under Section 69A(2). Justice Chandurkar's judgement in the Kunal Kamra case clearly found the FCU amendment was not properly referable to either provision. Hence, any Rule 3(4) mandating compliance with MeitY advisories would face identical challenges since they create substantive new obligations not contemplated by Sections 79 or 87. Even though Rule 3(4)(b)(ii) states that such, “advisories” etc. need to, “clearly specify the statutory provision or legal basis under which it is issued”, since these are not required to be published or made public there is every likelihood these will be issued with secrecy and hence may just in a tautological manner refer back to Section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act. This is similar to a logical fallacy in which it is clearly observable that a student is cheating on an exam who then claims that they may be permitted to continue cheating since they are stating at the same time they are not cheating. The practical effect of Rule 3(4) is that intermediaries face a perpetual compliance threat. Any failure to comply with any MeitY-issued instrument, however vague, however rapidly issued may cost them their safe harbour. The response for an intermediary is over-compliance and over-censorship. Circumventing existing stay orders The original proviso to Rule 8(1) stated that Part III applied to intermediaries only "for the purposes of rules 15 and 16" i.e., content blocking directions and emergency blocking. The amended proviso now extends this to Rule 14, bringing intermediaries and user-generated news/current affairs content under the jurisdiction of the Inter-Departmental Committee. Under Rules 9(1) and 9(3) of the 2021 IT Rules, there is a Code of Ethics compliance requirement and the three-tier grievance redressal mechanism, both of which were stayed by the Bombay High Court on 14 August 2021 as prima facie violative of Article 19(1)(a) and ultra vires the IT Act. On the oversight mechanism in Rules 14, 15, and 16, the Bombay High Court granted the petitioners to seek relief on this rule when an Inter Departmental Committee is established. The Madras High Court affirmed this stay as having pan-India effect in its order of 16 September 2021 in T.M. Krishna v. Union of India, observing that "an oversight mechanism to control the media by the government may rob the media of its independence." Both these cases, along with other cases challenging various provisions of the 2021 IT Rules, are now pending adjudication before the Delhi High Court. The expansion of Rule 8(1) to cover Rules 14, 15, and 16 is an attempt to expand the blocking powers of MIB to both intermediaries and users who are not “publishers” but post news and current affairs content online. The IDC can now examine "matters" relating to user-generated news content on intermediary platforms without the Code of Ethics framework having been adjudicated as constitutional; the government effectively obtains the content oversight machinery that three High Courts found illegal, through a different procedural door. Transforming the IDC from Grievance Body to Censorship Apparatus The original Rule 14(2) required the IDC to hear "complaints regarding violation or contravention of the Code of Ethics." The amended version removes this requirement entirely. The IDC now hears: (a) grievances arising from decisions at Level I or II; or (b) "matters" referred to by the Ministry. Clause (b) is unconstrained since, (a) there is no requirement that the "matter" arise from a complaint, (b) no requirement that the "matter" relate to a Code of Ethics violation; and (c) no requirement that the affected party be heard before the referral. The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting can, on its own motion, refer any content-related "matter" to the IDC. The cumulative effect of the amendments to Rules 8 and 14 is to reconstruct the oversight machinery that the Bombay and Madras High Courts found constitutionally suspect, in a form designed to evade the existing interim orders. The IDC, previously limited to the three-tier complaints process under the stayed Rules 9(3), 12, and 13 framework, now operates as a free-standing censorship committee that can take up "matters" referred by the executive. Increased user surveillance through mandatory data retention directions Insertion of phrases within existing clauses making data retention obligations under the IT Rules additional to retention requirements under any other law. For instance, the mandatory data retention of user data beyond 180 days within Rule 3(1)(g) and 3(1)(h) may be prescribed for longer periods and other purposes raising risks of surveillance and even potentially data leaks of sensitive data that is stored for longer periods of time. Government mandates for data retention as to their legal authority and hence period of retention will be beyond those contained under the IT Act. SOS for Digital Rights IFF urges an urgent rollback! We are alarmed by the continuing expansion of unchecked executive power that is opposed to the Constitution of India. The present actions of MEITY smack of digital authoritarianism and we call on them to withdraw these proposed amendments. The proper course is to await judicial determination of the pending challenges, respect interim protections granted by constitutional courts, and pursue regulatory objectives through parliamentary legislation rather than subordinate instruments that exceed the parent statute. If not withdrawn, IFF will file a detailed response before the comment deadline. We call upon all stakeholders to submit their objections before 14 April 2026 at [email protected]

We added a new and final chapter to Dynamic Programming Vol II (DP2) on approximation and reinforcement learning: dp.quantecon.org. DP1 and DP2 will always remain freely available online -- give me liberty or give me death 🤟💀

India pays a premium for the privilege of not learning anything :) Every Indian car Tata, Mahindra, Maruti, all of them has a tiny computer inside called an ECU (Engine Control Unit) This computer decides everything - how much fuel to inject, when to shift gears, how brakes work, how the battery behaves in an EV. Think of it as the car's brain. India makes zero of these brains for passenger cars. All of them come from foreign companies, mainly Bosch (Germany). If you don't control the brain, you don't really control the car. Indian OEMs can't even add a simple valve to their own engine without asking Bosch for permission. They can't change a single line of code. They are selling cars with someone else engineering inside. This isn't really about technology being too hard. It's a business model designed to keep you dependent. Three layers lock you in :) First, every new car programme needs Bosch to do setup work (Rs 10-30 crore). Second, you pay full price for software Bosch already developed for Volkswagen so Bosch gets paid twice for the same work. Third and this is the killer every time you want to change anything in the software, even something tiny, it costs around $500,000. So Indian OEMs simply stop trying to innovate. They accept whatever Bosch gives them. The calibration trap means tuning the car's brain for Indian conditions, how should the engine behave in Ladakh cold vs Chennai heat? Indian OEMs outsource even this to AVL in Austria. AVL reuses work they already did for European cars, charges India full price, and transfers zero knowledge. So Indian engineers never even learn how their own cars work from the inside. What Korea did is Hyundai faced the exact same situation in 1987. They set up Kefico as a joint venture with Bosch, learned everything from the inside, and by 2015 they owned the full technology themselves. The sequence was simple - first learn calibration (tuning) → then write your own software → then build your own hardware. It's a ladder. India never climbed the first rung. Why India didn't do this - It's not a talent problem Indian engineers design ECUs at Bosch offices worldwide. It's a combination of things like Indian OEMs won't fund Indian startups to develop alternatives. They demand that Indian suppliers first prove themselves in Europe before getting a chance at home (while European companies protect their own). Middle managers won't risk their careers backing a Pune startup when they can safely pick Bosch. India spends 0.64% of GDP on R&D vs Korea's 4.9%. Private sector funds only 36% of India's R&D, in Korea it's 79%. SEDEMAC - the one exception - One Indian company (IIT Bombay founders, Pune-based) actually makes ECUs for two-wheelers and generators. They have real IP, real patents, millions of units shipped. But even they couldn't break into passenger cars. Tata Motors is literally in the same city and doesn't use them. EVs are simpler to control than petrol/diesel engines. This should have been India's fresh start. Instead, Mahindra's new EV platform has Bosch (Germany), Valeo (France), BYD (China), Mobileye (Israel), Continental (Germany) - zero Indian ECUs. The dependency just migrated from ICE to EV with different foreign names. swarajyamag.com/technology/the…

@nixcraft "just like firefox"? What did it do (or didn't )?

If a dog bites then next steps: Dog bite. Vaccination status unknown. Treat it as rabies exposure until proven otherwise. 1) Start with the wound. Immediately. •Wash under running water + soap for at least 15 minutes •Do not be gentle. Mechanical washing saves lives •Apply povidone-iodine or chlorhexidine after washing •Avoid tight suturing unless necessary (and preferably delayed) 2) Assess exposure (this decides urgency) Category II – scratches, minor bites without bleeding Category III – bites that break skin, bleeding, saliva on mucosa Unknown dog = assume Category III if any doubt 3) Rabies prophylaxis (do not delay) Rabies vaccine (PEP) Start immediately, day 0. Common schedule: •Day 0, 3, 7, 14 (± day 28 depending on protocol) Do not wait for symptoms. Once symptoms appear, rabies is almost always fatal. Rabies Immunoglobulin (RIG) : for Category III •Infiltrate into and around the wound •Any remaining volume IM at a distant site •Given once, on day 0 This provides immediate passive immunity while vaccine builds response. 4) Tetanus prophylaxis •Give tetanus toxoid if not up to date •Add tetanus immunoglobulin if high-risk wound and uncertain history 5) Antibiotics (dog bites are dirty wounds) Common choice: •Amoxicillin-clavulanate Covers: •Pasteurella •anaerobes •skin flora 6) Observe the dog (if possible) •If the dog remains healthy for 10 days, rabies risk is low •If the dog becomes ill or dies → continue full treatment without hesitation 7) What NOT to do •Do not ignore “small” bites •Do not rely on home remedies •Do not delay vaccine waiting for lab confirmation Bottom line In suspected rabies exposure, time = survival. Wash aggressively. Start vaccine immediately. Add immunoglobulin when indicated. Everything else is secondary