Exactly two years after the Galwan Valley standoff, the Union Cabinet in India admits that the news of the intrusion in June 2020 had been circulated among the top brass through Chinese whispers. This might explain why Prime Minister Narendra Modi was led to believe that no one had intruded into Indian territory by the time the message reached his ears. As for news about a 30-year-high inflation in the country, the Cabinet is currently playing killer to identify who killed India’s economy.
Meanwhile, following a record-breaking acquisition of the IPL’s media rights, the BCCI has told senior executives of the International Cricket Council (ICC) that they can now officially join the former’s payroll.
Elsewhere, Reliance-backed Viacom 18, which has won the digital rights for the IPL, has promised a special feature for all Mumbai Indians (MI) matches called the Cambani, a separate camera whose sole focus will be to document the reactions of the Ambani family whenever MI are in action.
Wondering what else happened while you tried to calculate how much someone might pay to stream you and your friends playing gully cricket every evening? Here’s presenting the top stories from the week that should have been.
June 13
The Yogi Adityanath government is in talks to give free bulldozers to every Hindu family in UP that voted for the BJP in the last Assembly elections TT archives
- According to Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath, latest surveys show that by 2024, UP is going to have more bulldozers per square kilometre than bulls.
- Insider reports in the Galle Street Journal suggest that the Government of India has expressed its interest in helping Sri Lanka manage a third of its external debt of more than $50 billion on the condition that the naming rights to both of Sri Lanka’s capitals are transferred to Gautam Adani.
June 14
Erling Haaland denies that there is a clause in his contract at Manchester City that prevents him from talking about the history of the club or the lack of it TT archives
- Erling Haaland confirms that his photograph in a Manchester City kit from 2009 was clicked after losing a bet. The bet had Haaland challenging his then classmate from school that he would find at least 10 Norwegians who knew that Manchester had two Premier League clubs.
- Blake Lemoine, an employee at Google, describes how he realised that LaMDa, a chatbot under development at Google, is sentient after it started seenzoning him every time he used the word “Bing”.
June 15
To make Dubai more friendly and welcoming to Western millionaires, authorities are considering renaming the city Dobuy TT archives
- The Rich People’s Association of Ideological Flexibility (RAIF) has found a magical cure to Islamophobia for Western millionaires — a golden visa to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) where tax obligations matter as much as human rights.
- At the 12th ministerial conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Geneva, more than 75 countries have come together to propose the replacement of “globalisation” with a new word that can justify what the WTO does for the next 20 years.
June 16
Donald Trump has asked Amazon Prime Video to “stop the reel” if and when he is found guilty at the ongoing Congressional hearings TT archives
- Amazon Prime Video has obtained the international streaming rights to the US Congressional hearings on the January 6 Capitol riot after being assured that they would also have exclusive access to live footage from the next assault on Capitol Hill.
- Netflix has announced that English-speaking candidates from around the world intending to take part in the new Squid Game-inspired reality show will have to prove that they use their own Netflix account.
June 17
Dakota Johnson calls Jane Austen a more seductive writer than E.L. James Netflix
- Dakota Johnson has revealed that her next film is going to be Fifty Shades of Persuasion, “a relentless romance where my lover and I share intense moments of pleasure by writing letters”.
- After watching the trailer of Brahmastra, Sonam Kapoor tweets: “No wonder my relationship with Ranbir Kapoor never caught fire.”