'They were only chanting one slogan, "Ghar jaana hai (we want to go home)".'
Ambrose D'Mello, the Independent candidate from Bengaluru South, has been on maun vrat for 15 years. He does not own a house, does not wear footwear and sells books to earn a living.
Our government has failed the country on several counts. All this must change for India to redeem itself in six months, says Naushad Forbes.
India's most powerful prime minister in five decades gets publicly admonished -- if gently -- by the US vice-president. The question is, would this make him reflect on how and why, or which ones of his government and party's missteps exposed his flank like this? asks Shekhar Gupta.
India has too many small companies and this is inefficient. It should instead have only a handful of very large players running its economy and these giants can then compete with the world, observes Aakar Patel.
'He has a gift none of his eight predecessors, from Manmohan Singh to Rajiv Gandhi, had: Being able to speak directly and convincingly to a large enough section of Indians who will take his word for gospel,' notes Shekhar Gupta.
'I would like to express my anger at the way party affairs have been handled by some people.'
Iran's decision to keep India out and welcome China to the scene is a huge strategic setback for India, observes Dr Rajaram Panda.
''He had given tools to fight all forms of homogenisation.'
The PM's visit would signal a strong intent towards making sure India becomes a beneficiary as vaccines become a massively traded commodity in the coming years.
Autorickshaw drivers and families from Kalyan reveal how the lockdown has rendered them jobless and deprived them of bare necessities.
'And Sir, you are at fault if they don't like you. 'You don't boast of your government's efforts to be the first one to bring in thousands of Indians back home without thinking for a second about their race, religion, language, orientation, or even citizenship,' says Sarang, a reader of Rediff.com.
'A national government will help us to harness the totality of national resources to fight the war against the coronavirus most effectively,' state Lieutenant General Ashok Joshi (retd) and Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'He can at least invite them for tea in small groups once a month on Sundays.' 'If nothing else, he will have the pleasure of ruining their weekend,' suggests T C A Srinivasa Raghavan.
'If the Modi government doesn't act now, it will demoralise and hurt the people who voted in hope of a better times,' argues former BJP MP Tarun Vijay.
'The return of India to its own civilisational values can never endanger freedoms as pluralism is the bedrock of our culture,' assert Lieutenant General Ashok Joshi (retd) and Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'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.
The Congress surveys, at least until now, have indicated the nationalistic fervour over the Pulwama terror attack is more an effort by mainstream media outlets, like news channels and newspapers, to shape a particular narrative, when the people on the ground are still asking basic questions of livelihood, jobs and better price for farm produce.
'The time has come to substitute the present Constitutional set-up with an alternative democratic framework,' argues B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
Strengthening the portfolios of the home minister and the finance minister is a message that should not be missed, points out A K Bhattacharya.
We understand the electoral compulsions, the desperate need for the BJP to have at least 50 per cent of the Hindus vote for them in Uttar Pradesh in a few months. For that, you need polarisation, put your own Muslim compatriots on the 'other' side. This is how your domestic politics runs contrary to your national, strategic interest, warns Shekhar Gupta.
So, how does Pompeo's check list look like? In a broad sense, he is coming here 'to make sure that we have economic openness'; to ensure that 'we have to deliver'; to understand that 'we have to execute' what we promised to do; and, to 'broach some tough topics', points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The PM's choice of ministers is interesting, to say the least, says Jyoti Punwani.
'100 per cent, the BJP will form the government in Madhya Pradesh and Shivraj Singh Chouhanji will be once again chief minister.'
'There will be very strong interest in cooperating with India under any future American administration, but on the margins India will need to be careful not to tip its hand regarding the election.'
'India cannot allow Beijing's policy of stabilising and destabilising the border at will to perpetuate its own ends.' A riveting excerpt from Manish Tiwari's 10 Flashpoints; 20 Years National Security Situations That Impacted India.
For the 2019 polls, the BJP chief deployed over 7,000 leaders to oversee the work of polling committees on the over 400 seats the BJP contested. These committees were asked to focus on 120 seats the party had lost in 2014, but believed it could win in 2019.
Power is held to effect change. Modi has shown himself incapable of affecting it in the positive sense. On the economy, on the border, on employment, on the epidemic, observes Aakar Patel.
'It is not clear how the NDA government -- including Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, backed by senior IAF officials -- claimed that the 36 Rafale contract with Dassault in 2016 cost the IAF 20% less than Dassault's 126 Rafale offer,' notes Ajai Shukla in the first of a three-part series.
Our precipitous decline is being noticed and recorded abroad with alarm. It is strange that within India we are carrying on as if it is business as usual, observes Aakar Patel.
'There was no need for opting for such an elaborately and expensively organised spectacle,' says B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
150 BJP elected local representatives in Beed resign in protest against Pritam Munde's exclusion from the Union ministry.
Modi seems to have an innate faith in his capabilities to handle the myriad challenges confronting the nation and would rather manage the affairs of the nation as a CEO would of a large industrial-business empire, observes Virendra Kapoor.
Had India agreed to join the trade pact, Indian markets would have been flooded with cheap Chinese products.
'But for Rajiv's bloopers, the Hindutva campaign would not have got off the ground,' Amulya Ganguli points out.
'Modi's advent has made the mass of Indians realise that there was absolutely nothing wrong or objectionable in proclaiming nationalism as the masthead of the polity and Hinduism as its centerpiece,' says B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
Important for Chinese President Xi Jinping will be Zhao's discussions on the issues of Tibet and the Dalai Lama and his assessment of the likely results of India's coming national elections, notes former senior RA&W officer and China expert Jayadeva Ranade.
How Modi retrieves the situation and how he enlists new allies in the next two years will show if the BJP is fighting fit, report Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari.
'I didn't know exactly how to move from a world of gray back into a world of vibrant colour, but one day I figured out one simple thing I could do: I could stop hiding and re-engage with life.'
Prime Minister Modi felt there were too many silos with no arrangement to take a comprehensive view on national security. The PM has entrusted NSA Ajit Doval to evolve a comprehensive roadmap and get it implemented, reveals Nitin Gokhale, Editor-in-Chief, Strategic News International.
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