Anumula Revanth Reddy, Telangana Congress chief credited with leading the party to a thumping win in the November 30 Assembly polls, is the Congress high command’s choice for Chief Minister, sources have said. The sources have said the Congress central leadership, led by party chief Mallikarjun Kharge, has taken the decision. The final announcement will be made after an ongoing meeting between Mr Kharge and Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar, who oversaw the Congress campaign in Telangana.

The 54-year-old leader, who was the face of the Congress’s winning campaign, has faced stiff resistance from within the party in his journey to the top post. The swearing-in ceremony, which was to take place last afternoon, was called off after a section of state Congress veterans opposed the choice of Mr Reddy for the Chief Minister post.

These detractors include former state Congress chief N Uttam Kumar Reddy to Bhatti Vikramarka, Komatireddy Venkat Reddy to Damodar Rajanarasimha. They reportedly opposed the outright candidature of Revanth Reddy, pointing to pending corruption cases and the Congress’s poor show in Mr Reddy’s Lok Sabha constituency.

A recent report by Meta has highlighted the growing menace of fake Facebook accounts originating from China spreading fake news about India. The report sheds light on the sophisticated strategies employed by these accounts to manipulate public opinion and influence discourse. Meta, in its quarterly threat report, revealed that it dismantled a large network of fake accounts originating from China earlier this year.

The accounts, pretending to be Indians, were actively involved in spreading misleading information on Indian politics and other issues of national security.

“This network operated fictitious personas on Facebook posing as journalists, lawyers and human-rights activists. The network posted mainly in English, and to a lesser extent in Hindi and Chinese, about regional news, culture, sports and travel in Tibet and Arunachal Pradesh. Notably, the Tibet-focused accounts posed as pro-independence activists who also accused exiled Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama and his followers of corruption and pedophilia,” the report said.

“The Arunachal Pradesh-focused accounts posted positive commentary about the Indian army, Indian athletes and Indian scientific achievements, and accused the Indian government of corruption and supporting ethnic violence in the Indian state of Manipur,” Facebook’s parent company added in its report.  

The tech giant said that in order to make the content look authentic, the accounts would comment on and share each other’s posts.

Meta claimed that the network has been successfully dismantled from all their platforms.

The report also stated that another set of 4,700 fake accounts from China also targetted US politics, making posts on topics like abortion, presidential candidates and US-China relations.

Some of these accounts posed as Americans and shared links to articles from mainstream US media like HuffPost, Breitbart, the Wall Street Journal, and Fox News, the report said.

The buzz around Siddharth Anand’s Fighter is only getting louder. After Hrithik Roshan’s new poster, the makers have now revealed Deepika Padukone’s character poster.

Fighter’s character poster reveals Deepika Padukone’s Squadron Leader Minal Rathore. The actress can be seen dressed in an Air Force uniform. Her hair is neatly tied in a bun and her look is complete with a pair of round shades.

Check it out here:

Sharing details about her characters, Deepika took to her social media handle and wrote, “Squadron Leader Minal Rathore/ Call Sign: Minni/ Designation: Squadron Pilot/ Unit: Air Dragons.”

Earlier, Hrithik Roshan’s character poster from Fighter was revealed. The actor is set to play Squadron Leader Shamsher Pathania, call sign – Patty.

Fighter is all set to release on January 25, 2024.