Disclaimer: All names, characters and incidents mentioned in this column, however believable, are entirely satirical. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, organisations and products is intended or should be inferred
Kamala Harris, aspiring to be the first woman to embarrass Donald Trump, raises close to $1 billion in campaign funding through a single Instagram live session joined by thousands of multiracial Americans, where the Democratic nominee can be seen wearing a “Stop the Genocide” t-shirt. When asked which ‘genocide’ she is condemning, Harris laughs for one minute straight, before replying: “What can be, unburdened by what has been.”
Meanwhile, Harris’s biggest critic and the self-proclaimed nemesis of the “woke mind virus”, Elon Musk, sets up a think tank called Free Speech Crusaders, which will have “the sharpest American minds fighting the Democrats’ disinformation by disseminating the greatest memes known to mankind”. Ahead of the US Presidential elections in November, Musk has also announced that he will personally monitor every US political meme that goes on X, “removing all those that aim to threaten free speech”.
Elsewhere, in yet another example of the Vishwaguru pulling its weight, India has made it harder for Chinese devices to enter the country at the same time as relaxing immigration qualifications for Chinese engineers.
Wondering what else happened as you found out that the average Chinese employee spends more time sending emails than you spend on sending reels? Here’s presenting the top stories from the week that should have been.
July 29
“Educated people are India’s third-most valuable exports in recent years, behind only petroleum products and jewellery,” reads a government statement TT archives
- Contradicting claims by the Opposition of “a job crisis for educated Indians”, the Centre has shared data showing that the PM Videsh Chalo Yojana has successfully placed “more than one lakh middle-class Indians in excellent jobs across the US, the UK, Germany and Singapore in the past 18 months”.
- The deadline for filing individual Income Tax Returns (ITR) is extended till September 30 after the ministry of finance fails to provide TDS certificates in time to 133 finfluencers.
July 30
A section of US supporters are disappointed with Simone Biles, since she hasn’t been able to fly yet TT archives
- Simone Biles, part-human, part-rubber, becomes the most decorated US gymnast at the Olympic Games after her mid-air twists leave four of the nine judges unconscious.
- Nita Ambani, India’s unofficial mascot in Paris, is spending two hours every day with the Indian contingent, training medal hopefuls on how to hold a telephonic conversation with India’s prime well-wisher.
July 31
“I’m going to take Google down, I don’t care if they make my search history public,” warns Donald Trump TT archives
- Donald Trump threatens to sue Google after search results for “Donald Trump assassination” lead to article links explaining instances of Trump character-assassinating people more famous than him.
- Israeli intelligence admits to killing Hamas’s political leader, Ismail Haniyeh (who hadn’t held a gun in six years), describing it as an “honest mistake”, as its intended target was a Tehran school where teeangers are allegedly used to make bombs.
August 1
Tabu says that the producers of ‘Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha’ turned down her and Ajay Devgn’s suggestion to shoot and promote the film as a documentary TT archives
- Ahead of the release of Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha, where Tabu and Ajay Devgn have written their own lines (for scenes where they are together), the former creates a media frenzy by revealing: “The plot of the film and the plot of our lives are quite similar. The only difference being that in real life, Ajay went off to Kajol instead of jail.”
- Ranveer Singh, Sanjay Dutt, Akshaye Khanna, R. Madhavan and Arjun Rampal have been signed for the “blockbuster of the century”, directed by Aditya Dhar, whose subject will be the different stages of beard growth.
August 2
Mark Zuckerberg is reportedly furious with developers of Llama 3.1 after it described Sam Altman as “the world’s smartest man” TT archives
- Mark Zuckerberg is forced to promote Llama 3.1 (Meta’s answer to Open AI’s ChatGPT) as free to use after the press release drafted by the AI software accidentally advertises itself as requiring no subscription. Zuckerberg, though, has proceeded to fire the 27 Meta interns in charge of proofreading the document.
- Details about the new Harry Potter TV series (shifted from Max to HBO) have flooded in faster than a group of Death Eaters. The most salient ones so far include — Keanu Reeves to play the character of Severus Snape, Daniel Radcliffe to appear in a cameo as Kreacher, a non-binary, pansexual person with xe pronouns to be cast as Hermione Granger, mudbloods or muggles to be referred as “magically challenged”, and the Great Hall at Hogwarts to serve strictly vegan food.