In a hilarious turn of events, Global Times, which feels more like a parody of a media controlled by a totalitarian state rather than a media house controlled by a totalitarian state, shared a spoof of PM Modi shooting down Chinese apps and labelled it ‘terrorism’.
The video produced by India Today showed PM Modi as a Rambo-like cowboy figure decimating Chinese apps.
Global Times wrote: “The video, which is widely circulating on Chinese social media, led to widespread condemnation and ridicule, with many Chinese netizens posting comments such as: "Modi slaughtering unarmed people, is the Indian media trying to advocate terrorism?" and "India is coerced by nationalism, what a pity." In the two-minute video, Modi parachutes from a plane and lands in a Chinese-style camp, then kills unarmed people representing Chinese apps, such as WeChat and TikTok, with two guns. After a big fight with his opponent PUBG, the cartoon Modi wins and defiantly deletes the app from his phone.”
An assistant professor of Indian studies at Tsinghua University told GT: "The image of Modi is well portrayed in the video. Using the state machinery to crack down on private enterprises shows the true colors of the Bharatiya Janata Party in mobilizing populism. It caters to the taste of the public but also damages the interests of the public.”
The Indian government recently banned 118 apps, including the immensely popular PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG) Mobile, Baidu and several VPNs that allowed access to TikTok that was earlier banned.
The action came after the fresh Chinese incursion attempts in Indian territory at Pangong Tso in eastern Ladakh.
The PUBG game now has more than 600 million downloads and 50 million active players globally, not including the Chinese mainland where a rebranded version of the game is called 'Game for Peace'.
PUBG has millions of users, especially young, in India.
The ban on PUBG came as it announced the arrival of a new gaming era with its 1.0 version, along with global mobile esports tournament PUBG Mobile Global Championship (PMGC) with a grand prize pool of $2 million (about Rs 15 crore).
