'It is high time that the 'war on terror' is removed from our diplomatic toolbox.' 'Certainly, our parliamentarians have no role in it,' asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
An IB report says some 25,000 preachers of the extreme Wahhabi form of Islam came to India last year as visitors, reports Vicky Nanjappa.
The Intelligence Bureau has sounded alarm bells in a secret report about the growth of radical Wahhabi ideology across India.
'The alliance between the mullahs of the Wahhabi Al-e Shaikh and the rulers of Saudi Arabia, the Al-e Saud, is like the oppressive nexus between the Christian Church and the monarchy in medieval Europe. It is proving to be a curse for Muslims.'
Ustad Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf, Afghan president Hamid Karzai's first choice as the speaker of the new Afghan parliament, is at once the perfect bridge the latter needs to reach out extensively in the Islamic world and Pakistan, says former diplomat MK Bhadrakumar, possibly the first and last India to have met Sayyaf in his native village
According to an IB report, preachers of the extreme Wahhabism form of Islam are trying to take over madrasas and masjids, which is a cause of deep concern, says Vicky Nanjappa
Chastened by the Kargil conflict, Pervez Musharraf will be remembered for gradually lowering the profile of terrorism and seeking a realistically negotiated settlement to the issue of Jammu and Kashmir, notes Ambassador G Parthasarathy, who served as India's high commissioner to Pakistan when Musharraf seized power in a coup in October 1999.
125 Indians on watch-list, Intelligence Bureau agents tell Vicky Nanjappa/Rediff.com
'If JNU students are anti-national, why do we send in the police? Why not send in intellectuals like M V Kamath to have a debate and discussion?'
India and Indians can ignore Pakistan, but that cannot be said of other nations in the neighbourhood, where New Delhi's 'Neighbourhood First' policy constantly reverberates. Four of the eight SAARC member-nations are Muslim -- Afghanistan and Pakistan, Bangladesh and the Maldives. The rulers decide the nation's India or anti-India policy in the first two, and street-opinion contributes to the same in the latter two, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The United States has been successful in engaging with India on tracking money used by radical groups to penetrate into the country, the Barack Obama administration has said as it praised Indian Muslims for demonstrating a great deal of "resilience" against overtures by terrorist groups.
'Modi has visited all these three countries (the UAE more than once, inexplicably) but has left out Kuwait and Oman, the two Gulf countries that are closest to India in their political, cultural and civilisational ethos,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'Once accession to Pakistan appeared unlikely, the British instituted Operations Gulmarg and Datta Khel respectively to foil possible accession to India.'
The government will have until June 24, 2018, to implement the new decree
'The stage is set for increasing tensions in a highly volatile region as crucial as ever from a geopolitical standpoint,' predicts Claude Smadja.
'The Saudis are in the driving seat in navigating the relations with India; they set its compass and calibrate its pace,' points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Syed Firdaus Ashraf speaks to Haji Syed Salman Chisti, Gaddi Nashi, Dargah Ajmer Sharif, the hereditary custodian of the dargah and the 26th generation descendant of Khwaja Garib Nawaz (as the Pir is known) to understand the meaning and significance of the gesture.
'We have seen in India that radical ideology has by and large not been successful in taking root.'
Armed forces and the police can only ensure that violence is kept under control but for any kind of lasting peace, politicians will have to find an answer to the perception that the Indian State is anti-Islam. Therein lies the biggest challenge to the Modi government, says Colonel Anil A Athale (retired).
'The osmosis between Hinduism and Islam that really gave birth to the Hindustani or Indo-Islamic civilisation was due to the conversation between Muslim mystics and yogis.'
The Al Qaeda, the Islamic State or Daesh, as it is also called, will continue to exploit the fault lines and the many contradictions in the approaches of different countries, says Hardeep Puri.
'Will this communal pendulum, which is swinging towards the extreme of division and violence, ever swing back to its position of the '60s and '70s within my lifetime?' 'Or will my children, and their children, have to continue to suffer the consequences of the country, that we all love, torn apart along communal lines,' asks Najid Hussain in anguish.
'In India foreign policy is generally handled by the prime minister.' 'One can clearly see the Vajpayee stamp on all this.' 'Only a person with poetic imagination can weave such a complex web,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'Now is the time for India, our biggest neighbour and oldest friend, to bring the full array of international policy instruments to bear.'
Despite the Indian government's recent efforts anecdotal evidence indicates that there has been little change in the extortionist behaviour of a significant proportion of tax and police officials, says Jaimini Bhagwati.
The winds of revolution are blowing all over the Arab world. A bit, slowly in Saudi Arabia, perhaps, but nevertheless. Some women did drive, defying the ban and were duly arrested. But the day is not long, may be, just another century at most, when women can actually drive, in women-only lanes, of course, says B S Prakash.
'Even apart from the Bengal famine, there was a great deal more bloodshed and deceit than I was prepared for.' 'Almost every one of the acquisitions was won by extreme extortionate methods and what came out was that these relatively honest officers found themselves doing very dishonest things.'
'Xi Jinping got a dose of Modi's medicine inside the tent where he was being hosted on the banks of the Sabarmati river.' 'Modi reportedly told him, looking deep into his eyes: "This was not expected of your country. Can you tell me when the troops are withdrawing?".'
Even if I completely disagree with what Gulmehar says, I must, as a father, as an Indian, protect her rights and her dignity. Otherwise I am not entitled to be called an Indian, says Tarun Vijay.
Not with standing the Western nations' zeal to wage a war against the group, unless its source of funding is known and curbed, its rampage will likely continue.
Little has changed in Digital India. The issue that rocked the nation 100 years ago still creates a furore in Indian society, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'What we are today witnessing is the final act of the Pakistani army trying to retain its turf,' argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
What does Pakistan mean for a young Indian? Devanik Saha attempts an answer.
'The rise of IS and intolerant Wahabism are the real dangers to Indian democracy and pluralism, not the RSS,' says Rajya Sabha MP Tarun Vijay.
'There were assurances that Jaish-e-Mohammad was being reined in as was the Lashkar-e-Tayiba, but Pakistan's security forces could not risk opening too many dangerous new fronts,' notes former foreign secretary Ambassador Shyam Saran, who has just returned from a visit to Lahore.
'It should be of concern that some youth in Kashmir have started raising Daesh flags along with those of Pakistan.'
Tarun Vijay visits 20 Durga Puja pandals in five towns in Bangladesh and comes back impressed.
'Pakistan needs to be constantly at war with somebody, ultimately resulting in it waging war on itself and its own people,' says Shekhar Gupta.
The time is over when United States President Barack Obama thought he could afford to make a joke about the ISIS.
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