Truth vs Hype

So far, the ISIS threat to India, while making for sensational headlines, has not been taken very seriously mainly because the numbers of Indian Muslims said to be fighting alongside the ISIS seem minuscule in relation to their population. But the arrest of 14 men in a nationwide sweep - accused of links to ISIS, and of plotting terrorist attacks - appears to be the first indication that India might have its own ISIS franchise. This week, we travel to 4 cities to examine these arrests in great detail - both the claims made by investigators , as well as by the families and neighbours of these men - to ask what this means for India.

One of the big global headlines this week was a report by the global advocacy Oxfam that points to how inequality has steadily worsened - about a handful of people own as much as the bottom half of the world - a report meant to coincide with the World Economic Forum at Davos. The report once again underlines how inequality remains a burning challenge to the world - not just in poorer countries like India, but even developed ones. This week, we examine the riddle of inequality: why is inequality, despite all the hand-wringing over it - on the rise? How does this tally with the decline in poverty? What sort of threat does it pose to India and the world? And how do you get rid of it?

Imagine being treated by a doctor who is not fully trained, because his/her college used what is known as ghost faculty, private practitioners who are rented out to medical colleges - not to actually teach - but to simply to get the permission to operate. This business - of renting doctors, even patients - is an organised racket across India, but we investigate it in Punjab, where a group of insiders are attempting to expose it. The government, far from showing interest, appears to be hushing it up, which only shows the extent to which the tentacles of this enterprise has penetrated the system.

The appearance of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi in court has escalated the politicking around the National Herald case. We step away from the noise and try and dissect the often confusing set of claims and counterclaims being made about the case, which centres around allegations that the Gandhi family attempted to wrongfully capture the real estate assets of a legacy newspaper.

This week we traveled to Bundelkhand, one of the 50 districts in Uttar Pradesh where drought has been officially declared, and where repeated crop failures has pushed people to the brink of hunger. The most dramatic example of this was the revival of long-abandoned habits of eating rotis made of grass. But when our story aired, the Uttar Pradesh government attempted a rather clumsy cover-up, trying to 'sanitise' the village on which we had based our report. This ignores the reality we discovered, of a collapse of government safety nets meant to protect the rural poor, not just in one village, but across an entire region.

As the waters rose to dangerous levels in Chennai once again, the focus has justifiably been on the human scale of the disaster; focusing attention on getting help to those stranded across the city. But watching the images of the city drowning, it was impossible to ignore what we had discovered from just a week ago, of how much reckless, unchecked urban planning had aggravated the extent of the crisis. This time, even though the rains seem more intense than earlier, and new records for rainfall are being set, activists and environmentalists say that once the immediate crisis tides over, it is all the more critical to focus once again on the man made dimension of the crisis. And that the images from Chennai should be a warning, not just for that city, but for urban centres across India.

In flood-hit Chennai, as the rains recede, questions are being asked whether the crisis that hit the city was a natural disaster, or - as many hare arguing - man made. This week, Truth vs Hype investigates how reckless planning, unchecked growth, and the familiar proximity between politicians and developers may have exacerbated the impact of the floods, and how there is little evidence of lessons being learned.

The attack on Paris has centre-staged more than ever the menace of ISIS, and also the complexity of tackling it. This week, we look at the Truth vs Hype of the commonly held perceptions about what led to the attacks, and how to fight back. Does Paris suggest that ISIS is on the rise, or is ISIS is on the retreat, desperately trying to stay relevant? Are more air strikes the answer, or will that strengthen sympathy for the militant cause? Will stemming the flow of refugees into the West reduce the risk of terrorism, or will that play into the hands of the terrorist group? (Video courtesy: France 24, Sony Six, @sylla98)

In the aftermath of its defeat in Bihar, the BJP's once-cohesive image seems shaken. This week on Truth vs Hype, BJP insiders speak up about what led to the unravelling of the Modi-Amit Shah formula, raising questions as to whether the party be able to contain the mutiny.

With just a few days left for the Bihar campaign to end, it remains as enduring a riddle as it was when it had begun. Political parties on both sides are supremely confident of victory. But public opinion - always anecdotal - is clearly divided. This week, inside the constantly shifting tactics and counter-tactics of this high stakes, fiercely contested political battle, on one hand, the Prime Minister has launched a massive but late surge to almost single handedly tilt it in the BJP's favour. And on the other, his former strategists, now crossed sides into the Nitish Kumar camp, are determined to outwit the Modi juggernaut.