'While Modi is undoubtedly the star of the show, the online sphere has found in Modi the champion to re-engineer what it means to support the right.'
'The deeper problem is big government -- a giant monster with a giant appetite, which requires it to put more and more pressure on tax officials to extort. 'And the monster is getting bigger by the day. But then, Mr Modi too knows this,' says Debashis Basu.
'A close relationship between India Inc and the government cannot help the BJP win elections.' 'While Opposition parties may feel good about Mr Bajaj criticising the Modi regime, the BJP should be seeing the indictment as a political boon,' says A K Bhattacharya.
Columnist T N Ninan wonders when there is real progress to talk about, why our ministers make exaggerated claims.
'The biggest danger is that majoritarianism is getting normalised, insidiously and overtly... We are bringing the worst, not the best in us... We are looking for new enemies - Muslims, urban Naxals, tukde tukde gang, some enemy or the other which keeps this majoritarian wheel turning,' says journalist Rajdeep Sardesai.
'As we reach 2022 we are creating a very new, different India where the Citizenship Amendment Act will be passed, NRC will be pushed through, Article 370 scrapped...'
After spending 40 years in the Indian Army, Lieutenant General Subrata Saha marches into the electoral battlefield as the BJP candidate from Rashbehari.
We might not have been seeking out baubles, says Kishore Singh, but there's nothing Nirav Modi liked more than surprising you with them.
We Indians simply cherry-pick those aspects of other cultures we like and reject what we consider unsuitable. Most of us recognise it as globalisation, says Kanika Datta.
'I was told that Agra has never been cleaned, spruced and scrubbed like it has been for Trump!' A tourist who visited the Taj Mahal over the the weekend gives an account of how the city is gearing up to welcome the Trump Parivar.
'All that Mr Modi needed to do was to call Urjit Patel over for a cup of tea and ask him nicely, and this fuss would never have happened.'
'Mr Modi has the necessary initiative, necessary motivation, necessary national thinking to push things forward. Here's a man with proven ability... India can become a superpower provided we shed a lot of things that have plagued us for the past 60 years. One of them -- a major one -- is how the country has been divided for vote banks. We need to sort that out, it will take time, but I am sure once that is done a lot of things will happen which will make this country good and powerful,' says General Vijay Kumar Singh as he battles for the people's vote in Ghaziabad, only the second army chief to contest an election.
Growing foreign travel is one sign of the radical change in rising India's vacation dynamic.
'It was a result of a fundamental Jewish value of kindness and concern.' 'A value that extends beyond our own and on the premise that when we are ok, we are supposed to look up and look around to see who is not.' 'And do something about it.'
An occasional quiz to improve Narendrabhai's grasp of Indian history...
Labour sector needs bigger reform than the PM revealed.
The data shows that the state has reduced poverty and malnutrition, sex ratio has improved and the quality of education is improving.
Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde on Tuesday rejected Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi's demand for a 'white paper' on internal security and said the government was following a two-pronged strategy of development and offensive action to tackle Naxalism.
"Troubled" and "dismayed" at Wharton University withdrawing its invitation to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said the varsity's decision to change its mind "under pressure" was "very wrong". Addressing the Wharton India Economic Forum via video-conferencing, Kejriwal, who began his indefinite fast against "inflated" power and water bills today, said he was "dismayed" at the decision.
'Sounds familiar? Barring inflation, much else looks, sounds, and feels more than a bit like 1974.' 'A phenomenally popular leader, with a party of unquestioning followers, a broken Opposition, a nationalist high and an economy in free fall, crippling joblessness,' recalls Shekhar Gupta.
For those who think India's democracy is just fine and there has been no change in the last few years, perhaps it would be instructive to see what has happened on a few issues, observes Aakar Patel.
'At a time when the economy is depressed, a pandemic is raging, and the Chinese are making noises on the border, the NRC could be resuscitated.'
'If there were no Ahmedabad programme -- no flashy town hall event in a huge cricket stadium with thousands cheering him on -- then Trump may well have decided not to go to India.'
'Gloom is nowhere in sight, with healthy foreign exchange reserves, a strong rupee, healthy tax collections, corruption and crony capitalism under check,' argues Gopal Krishna Agrawal.
'The need of the hour is to build on the positives and control the negatives,' says Colonel (Dr) Anil A Athale (retd).
The purposeful Narendra Modi who won the election has been replaced by a prime minister who looks quite lost, says T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan
Mr Modi should welcome the rupee's fall as overdue, not criticise it.
Hitting back at Gujarat Chief Minister for his comments on Sir Creek, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid today said Narendra Modi should not 'compromise on national interests' for electoral gains.
Aam Aadmi Party national convenor Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday said his invitation to Wharton India Economic Conference and cancellation of invitation to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi were not linked.
'The air force continues to be short of planes.' 'So, more than a decade after the last selection round got under way, the same process is about to start again for the same kind of aircraft, naturally with the same likely bidders,' points out T N Ninan.
'In the Indian context it is not easy for rival parties to come together, especially pre-elections.' 'Having pulled it off, they should be taken seriously.'
Godfrey Phillips, controlled by his father K K Modi, paid Rs 1.7 crore despite him not attending a single board meet
PM Modi's China visit may strengthen ties between both the countries.
'I would like to extend a heartfelt mea culpa to Mr Modi and his associates.' 'I'm sorry for having been so critical -- I didn't know, I didn't know...' says Mitali Saran.
A resolution against Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his "allegations" of terrorism against Pakistan was today blocked in the Assembly of Punjab province, ruled by Premier Nawaz Sharif's PML-N party.
Rajdeep Sardesai's 2014: The Election That Changed India, will make him a ton of money, says Shreekant Sambrani, but admits he is more interested in knowing whether the book lives up to its title.
Even a doomsayer like Nouriel Roubini says India is in a sweet spot. If only we'd live up to the promise, says Shekhar Gupta.
'Mamata will beat the living daylights out of BJP workers with the result that people who are not totally committed, they will promptly leave the party and go back to Trinamool.' 'Or when they find they cannot get what they came to the BJP for they will go back to Trinamool.'
To believe that the key job of his senior ministers is to ensure that his image be kept intact whatever be the outcome of his policies is to expect too much even of someone as ambitious as Narendra Modi, asserts Rashme Sehgal.
'Anyone can string together a few alliterative words, but are they a substitute for serious thought?' 'And do they make for a strategy or plan for coherent action?' asks T N Ninan.
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