Sheela Bhatt, arguably India's finest political journalist, has covered Indian politics for 40 years. You can e-mail the author at sheelakb@rediffmail.com
It seems that realisation has dawned, at last, in New Delhi that the ground situation in Jammu and Kashmir has become a national crisis. The government is waking up to connect to the state, which is under the wave of violence, notes Sheela Bhatt.
Sheela Bhatt explains why the judgment in the title suit in the Ayodhya case -- despite a delay of over half a century -- still comes at the wrong time for the Centre and several state governments.
Sam Pitroda says Rahul Gandhi's support for the tribals is correct and while he backs development he says it must be done by preserving the rights and culture of the tribals.
The message that emanates from China's denial of a visa to General B S Jaswal has multiple messages, says Sheela Bhatt.
The passing of the nuclear liability bill will be a political and diplomatic victory for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at a time when he is being seen as getting weaker and his government is drifting on all major national challenges like price rise, Kashmir and Naxalism.
The Bihar assembly election and the agreement on Nuclear liability bill between Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party had a magical political impact on an Iftar event organised by Member of Parliament and BJP leader Syed Shahnawaz Hussein in New Delhi on Wednesday evening.
Amit Shah's fall has dented his boss Narendra Modi's eligibility to some day lead non-Congress centrist parties at the Centre. Here lies the real win for the Congress, as this will play as an advantage for its future leadership, says Sheela Bhatt.
Sheela Bhatt lifts the lid off a Gujarat government scheme, piloted by Law Minister Amit Shah, currently in the dock over the Sohrabuddin encounter, to offer prime plots cheap to judges
The foreign ministers' talks failed just when progress seemed on the horizon, says Sheela Bhatt
According to reports even Rahul's brother-in-law Robert Vadera and his son Rehan were with him in South Africa. The Indian Embassy in Johannesburg was also asked to keep the Gandhi family members visit secret due to security issues.
I do not agree with Parpola's unproven 'decipherment' of Indus script with the premise that old Tamil was the underlying language. It is simply a belief system and not premised on evidence of the corpus of inscriptions and the underlying cultural foundations of the civilization of 4,000 years ago, says Indologist Dr S Kalyanaraman.
The lawyers of Gujarat high court are all set to go on a strike if Union Law Minister Veerappa Moily doesn't pay attention to the issue of 35 per cent posts of judges lying vacant in the HC. In Gujarat, due to various administrative reasons and probably due to political tension between the Centre and the state, new appointments have not been made since many years. The situation has now reached crisis proportions as an increasing backlog of cases is piling up.
A nation angered may spur the the Bhopal gas victims in their seemingly endless battle to get justce, writes Sheela Bhatt.
Just months before the deadly gas leak in Bhopal killed 15,000 people, journalist Rajkumar Keswani had warned that the 'city stood on the edge of a volcano'. He speaks of his 26-year battle to get justice for the victims.
A 55-page document gathered using the Right To Information Act from the Prime Minister's Office shows how the members of United Progressive Alliance government including some senior ministers have taken a soft stance towards Dow chemicals.
In a statement issued on Thursday night, Canada has said the language used while denying the visa "doesn't reflect the policy of the Canada government."
Although Dr Manmohan Singh readily answered questions during his press conference, he gave the feeling that he is a secretive politician who doesn't reveal the story easily. More than 80 minutes of questioning failed to provoke him. He played a defensive game and didn't convey through anything new, writes Sheela Bhatt.
"Please crucify me if I am guilty. What have I done wrong?" said Praful Patel, minister of civil aviation, reacting to the criticism he has been facing in the country after the Dubai-Mangalore flight crashed on Saturday.
'See how he uses the CBI, allows telephone tapping, sustains corrupt ministers, ignores indisciplined ministers, had the cash for votes scam and used the Election Commission. Which institution has not been damaged by his government?' asks Bharatiya Janata Party leader Arun Jaitley.
"How can you rejoice when 166 people have died, when there were dozens of conspirators and you are punishing just one man? Asked Arun Jaitley, Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha and Bharatiya Janata Party senior leader.
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