In the Majnu Ka Tila area in New Delhi, Children carrying tricolour burst crackers and shouted 'Bharat Mata Ki Jai'.
Thackeray recalled former prime minister Vajpayee as saying, Ab Hindu maat nahi khayega (Hindus will not be defeated now), and added, "Hindus will not sit silent."
Since the historic judgment of the apex court that paved the way for the construction of a Ram temple by a trust at the disputed site in Ayodhya, and ruled that an alternative five-acre plot must be found for a mosque in the Hindu holy town, a large number of devotees have been flocking to Ayodhya, several among them making their maiden visit to the city.
While Ayodhya resembled a city under seige earlier during the day, the scene was no different elsewhere in the state with police and central forces keeping an eye over the security situation and Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath personally monitoring it from a hi-tech control room in the state capital.
'A hugely dangerous game which she thought she had mastered has now found a stronger opponent,' points out Payal Mohanka.
Braving scorching heat, a multitude of sadhus along with their disciples chanting 'Jai Shri Ram' took 'shahi snan' (royal bath) at Ramghat in Shipra river in Madhya Pradesh's Ujjain on Friday.
The man, who identified himself as 'Rambhakt Gopal', was subsequently overpowered by police and detained. The gunman went live on Facebook before the brandishing the gun.
Minority conference organised by the JD-U turned out to be a poor show with few from the Muslim community attending it, exposing the falling credibility of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar as a secular leader, says M I Khan.
On Tuesday, 49 people, including award-winning filmmakers Aparna Sen and Mani Ratnam, and historian Ramachandra Guha, wrote to PM Modi, urging him to intervene in cases of hate crimes and atrocities against minority communities.
The matter was brought into public domain by the BJP's West Bengal unit president Dilip Ghosh who took to Twitter to slam the government for its directive.
Kapil Baisala and his father joined the AAP in early 2019, police said. DCP (Crime Branch) Rajesh Deo said his mobile phone has been seized and they have retrieved his WhatsApp data and photos of him and his father joining the party. Baisala's police custody has been extended by two days.
'Indian secularism doesn't deserve a tombstone. It needs a new shrine,' argues Shekhar Gupta.
'One does not understand why you should launch your attack against the Constitution, against Gandhiji, against the Left and Congress regimes at a moment when the Hindutva regime needs such attacks against them.' 'By doing so, don't you think you are playing into the hands of Hindutva forces?', Mohammad Sajjad, who teaches history at Aligarh Muslim University, asks Sharjeel Imam who was arrested on charges of sedition on Tuesday, January 28.
State party leaders admit that Hindu consolidation by itself was not good enough to unseat Didi.
Two first information reports were registered by the police at Siyana police station in Bulandshahr -- one over cow slaughter and the other on the mob violence in which a village man was also killed.
'The government must consider that Modiji's vision of India turning into a $5 trillion economy will happen only when there is rule of law in the country.' 'Investors will not invest if these lynchings keep happening.'
'The humanity displayed by ordinary, lower middle class residents of north east Delhi -- Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs -- will be remembered perhaps even more than the evil wrought in the riots,' notes Jyoti Punwani.
Tired of living under the restive shadow of communalism, Ayodhya residents, be it Vijay Singh or Mohammad Azim, do not want any fresh political trigger for communal disharmony.
When Nirmala Sitharaman and Narendra Tomar arrived in Shimla, they could not have anticipated the scene that awaited them.
The movie presents a version of Modi that the bhakts wants the rest of us to see, feels Utkarsh Mishra.
'The story of how Modi won a re-election in the face of severe agrarian crisis, mounting unemployment, looming economic crisis, is the story of how the power of the message can be put to devastating effect in the hands of a strong leader,' says Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
He, however, asserted that all infiltrators will be thrown out of the country.
A total of 1.71 lakh earthen lamps were lit up at the grand event while a chopper decorated as the mythological 'Pushpak Viman' descended on the Ram Katha Park with artistes decked up to resemble Lord Ram, Sita and Laxman.
Vibhishan was a seeker of justice who risked it all to be on the side of truth, says Sudhir Bisht.
Mohammad Sajjad raises important questions about the response to lynchings.
'Isn't it obvious that the BJP government in Jharkand and its police force care two hoots about the Supreme Court's orders?', asks Jyoti Punwani.
A total of 13 motions were moved in support of Birla.
'I will not say that the AIMIM is a 'B' team of the BJP. But due to the AIMIM, the BJP benefits for sure'
Gupta was demanding that a fact-finding committee report on an alleged water tanker scam during Sheila Dikshit's tenure be made public and a calling attention motion on the matter. Speaker Ram Niwas Goel rejected the demand.
The apex court said the faith of Hindus that Lord Ram was born at the site was undisputed, and he is symbolically the owner of the land.
'It disappoints and saddens me no end that Mahua has allowed herself to be carried away by the Goebbelsian onslaught mounted on the BJP and Narendra Modi by certain vested interests which find themselves exposed and thrown out of the gravy train,' says B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
'The BJP will take time to come to power in Andhra.'
'It must be rendering Modi, Amit Shah and Adityanath speechless that the Indian diplomat who lifted the Azhar trophy at the UN in New York is also a Muslim. 'Yes, this is the wonder that was India,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Despite the Congress having nearly four times as many members in the Rajya Sabha as the TMC (48 to 13), Derek O'Brien has been informally leading the coordination of Opposition parties, rallying other parties to demand a discussion on electoral reforms and to protest the government's disinvestment plans, report Rahul Jacob and Archis Mohan.
'A second defeat in a Hindu heartland state will be disastrous for its morale and political fortune.' 'There is no alternative for the BJP, therefore, but to play the patriotic card with gusto.'
On Tuesday, police in Suri in West Bengal's Birbhum district used batons to disperse a rally where 'Jai Shri Ram' slogans were raised.
'What the BJP will have to ensure in order to score an ideological victory is to demonstrate not only its commitment to the rule of law -- which is the first prerequisite -- but to introduce a sense of compassion,' says Amulya Ganguli.
'Gods of different religions haven't warred, so we shouldn't either.'
Cracks in the Mahagathbandhan in Bihar is frittering away the ground gained in social justice and contributing to increasing polarisation in the state, says Mohammad Sajjad.
A bench headed by CJI Dipak Misra agreed to hear on Tuesday the interim applications of both the states.
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