'Will anything change for you after the election?' And the man said 'Kuch nahin badlega.' And he had a smile on his face. He knew nothing was going to change.
Here are Aseem Chhabra's picks -- 'films that mattered to me, entertained me and will stay with me through the year.'
'This is a new phenomenon,' says Shekhar Gupta. 'Does it point to the rise of egomania, and could it also be a reason our politics is broken and Parliament non-functional? Where our biggest leaders talk not to, but at each other.'
'Where does one draw the line? At what point does your right to free speech cross the limit of civilised discourse and provoke me to take offence?' 'And if you have the right to offend, what about someone else's right to be offended?' asks Hasan Suroor.
Even as France mourns the bloodiest terrorist attack for 20 years, let's take a look at some major standoffs witnessed in the past:
In a no-holds-barred interview, 20-year-old Nikita Azad discusses the backlash she has faced after #HappytoBleed, the campaign she launched to protest a derogatory statement made by the chief of the Sabarimala Devasom Board.
In a no-holds-barred interview, 20-year-old Nikita Azad discusses the backlash she has faced after #HappytoBleed, the campaign she launched to protest a derogatory statement made by the chief of the Sabarimala Devasom Board.
'Today it is a studio being held to ransom, tomorrow it will be a government, an entire nation. I don't see anyone laughing when that happens,' says Suparn Verma.
Rediff.com's Rajesh Karkera shares his impressions from the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, India's landmark artistic extravaganza.
Meet the Indian-American comedian behind Homecoming King, which has become the toast of Netlix.
The Narendra Modi-led government has issued around 50 fresh guidelines easing conditions for industry in about six months, beside launching an online system for applying environment clearances.
'This has absolutely nothing to do with Kalburgi or anybody else, it only has to do with two words: Bihar elections. It's electioneering by other means, let's save the fig leaf of morality,' says Rajeev Srinivasan.
Cautioning against forces which fan communal tension in order to polarise the situation in their favour, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday voiced concern over the Muzaffarnagar riots and said such violence cannot be allowed to spread.
'When I saw Sridevi in Lamhe, I decided I wanted to be an actress.' Meet 3AM actress Anindita Nayar.
Another sobering number is that the total Chinese investment in India in the past 10 years amounts to $400 million.
'Pratchett's work mocked the very idea of literary limitations, going from police procedural in one book to Christmas adventure in the next, from vampires to football, from the birth of motion pictures to the examining of religion itself.'
Director Mohanakrishna Indraganti talks about his first comedy film Bandipotu.
The most thrilling, romantic, terrifying, musical and comical tring tring moments!
'If chutzpah nationalists brought the Babri Masjid down, chutzpah secularists did precious little to stop it from being torn down.' 'If chutzpah nationalists ensured carnage in Gujarat, chutzpah secularists allowed Muzaffarnagar to become their next hunting ground.' 'Chutzpah secularists readily banned SIMI, but dragged their feet when it came to banning the Bajrang Dal.'
'Sridhar had the ability to paint a vision, for an activist faced with the toughest personal problems so as to see a way out by combining one's personal desires with the needs of the movement.' Arun Ferreira remembers his fallen comrade Sridhar Srinivasan.
To some the public humiliation of Shiv Sena leader Manohar Joshi at the party's annual Dussehra celebrations in Mumbai may have come as a shocker, but his relationship with the party and the Thackerays has always been rocky, says Neeta Kolhatkar.
Even in this season of political-peeing-on-lampposts, Rahul Gandhi's statement takes the cake (with due apologies to another astute observer of poverty, the much late Mary Antoinette).
For all its conceptual highs, Her is not a film about technology, though it is partly a cautionary fable. This is a film about love. A film to love.
Street art has emerged from its rebellious underground existence to a growing art genre in its own right. Ritika Bhatia maps the Indian leg of the movement.
The Varanasi versus Azamgarh story is about the fears and insecurities of two of our strongest leaders, Narendra Modi and Mulayam Singh Yadav, says Sheela Bhatt.
Mrinal Pande remembers Rajendra Yadav, one of the most prolific fiction writers and thinkers of Hindi literature in the recent times, who passed away on Monday.
The kind of people Narendra Modi has chosen, the decisions he has taken and the rail and central budgets suggests that he is treading carefully in New Delhi. There is less of innovation and more of continuity, so far. He is not ready to rock the boat and start from scratch, says Sheela Bhatt.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who recently completed one year in office, has, in an exclusive interview with Smita Prakash, editor, ANI, said the opposition alleging that his government is a "suit boot ki sarkar" is definitely better and more acceptable than being labelled a "suitcase" (ki sarkar), and satirically added, that after ruling for sixty years, the Congress has suddenly remembered the poor.
Rediff.com reproduces the 1997 feature about Laxman, his passion for crows, and of course, his genius.
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