Chirag Paswan is young. He is articulate. He has no political baggage. All he needs is the blessing of Chanakya, observes Asmita Bihari.
Why did we go into nationwide lockdown when we were adding 100 cases a day and why are we not going into lockdown but allowing cricket stadiums, political rallies and Kumbh Melas when we are adding 40,000 cases a day? asks Aakar Patel.
Rhea wants a stay on the Bihar police probe.
...close to the 2024 general election. The BJP calling the Congress 'seasonal Hindu' is as laughable as the saffron party sparing itself the title of 'seasonal extreme Hindu.'
How else should one describe its election campaigns of the past years?
It was typically obsessive religion and personality cult with economic development for fig leaf, asserts Shyam G Menon.
'A loss of seats for the Trinamool in this election will weaken its hold in Bengal, which will not augur well before the assembly election in 2021.'
Left high and dry, the BJP has had no option but to go for the overkill with 800 rallies, including 20 by the prime minister. In the process, it may be overplaying its card, observes Amulya Ganguli.
'The burden of the BJP's song is not development and delivery.' 'It is communalism,' argues Aakar Patel.
'These new laws give complete (impunity) to the police.' 'Whatever little accountability the police had, all that is gone now.' 'There is no accountability mechanism against the police for abusing or misusing in the new laws.'
'What do you think the Congress is today?' 'Is it a political party heading for a life-and-death battle?' 'Or an NGO, just doing its thing and hoping it will improve the state of the world?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
Revenge he will exact from a party he had led with great aplomb until the Gandhi siblings stepped in and, in order to show who was the boss, flung him aside, observes Virendra Kapoor.
Modi will utilise the Presidential poll to show that he is the only leader who matters in India, argue Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari. So the question being asked in political circles is: 'Who will be the next Kovind?'
Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf traces the journey of PM-CARES from its founding to finally admitting it is not a government fund.
'Jay Shah's tenure as BCCI secretary ended in May.' 'Sourav Ganguly's tenure as BCCI president ended on July 26.' 'Why have they not quit?'
'After a longish time being on the defensive on the Muslim issue, Mamata found in the Centre's surgical strike just the kind of battle in which she specialises -- hand-to-hand combat.' 'Having routed the once formidable Marxists by her trademark, no-holds-barred belligerence, she is now ready to employ the same tactics against the BJP,' predicts Amulya Ganguli.
'Tamil Nadu is a paradox. We have more places of Hindu worship per square kilometres than any other place in the world. 'We break more coconuts for religious reasons everyday than any other place in the world.' 'At the same time, we also have a very strong Periyar-infused movement of rationalism.'
It will be the year of preparation for the electoral test in Uttar Pradesh, due in 2022. But before that, the West Bengal Assembly election will set the mood for the rest of 2021.
The BJP has incorporated caste as a significant component of its politics.
'Since 2017, the chief minister and the RSS seem to have come closer.' 'This relationship's warmth is more from the RSS's side.'
'These guys who are running away -- they are running away from all that the BJP stands for.'
It appears that the party has some kind of political death wish, observe Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari.
Didi embarks on her new mission: To unite the Opposition to take on Modi in the Lok Sabha elections of 2024, observes Payal Singh Mohanka.
10 reasons why the Congress-JD-S government is on the brink of collapse.
The Gujarati's intolerance for diversity can be seen in India's hard nationalism which is showing itself in Kashmir and the North East, observes Aakar Patel.
'South movies have the perfect script, the perfect action and the perfect romance.' 'That's why these films are running in theatres.'
'Mr Kejriwal is almost exactly the package that Mr Modi offers: Personal aggrandisement, the building of a personality cult through full-page newspaper ads day after day, populist schemes involving subsidies (whether affordable or required), abandonment of secular principles, exaggerated claims and no checks on leadership,' points out T N Ninan.
The future challenger to Narendra Modi would be somebody who can bring the Hindus and Muslims together again. The Hindus as Hindus, not broken caste groups, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
'The BJP's problem is what rabbit can it pull out of the conjurer's hat?'
'For Modi, it's not just winning, but winning with style.'
'2019 now looks like a real contest.' 'It will not be a repeat of 2014 if the BJP has to deal with erosion of its already low vote share of 31 per cent, and also faces a united Opposition,' says T N Ninan.
'If the National Conference and PDP make handsome electoral gains in the valley and call for the restoration of the former state's lost status, how will the rulers in Delhi respond?' asks Amulya Ganguli.
Amid the growing queues of ambulances waiting for patients to be admitted with ventilators and oxygen, only time will tell if the state government has lost the plot or not.
The reshuffle had politics at its heart, so the biggest complement of new ministers, both Cabinet rank and below, came from UP, which will see assembly elections in a few months.
'None of his grandparents, and only one of his parents, was born in the US or spoke English as their mother tongue.' 'Of his three wives, one was born in Czechoslovakia and one in Slovenia.' 'Where would Trump have been if they, too, had 'rejected the ideology of globalism and embraced the doctrine of patriotism'?' asks Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
'Kejriwal has given not only Modi and Shah some food for thought, but also to jaded Opposition leaders who must now wonder whether taking on the BJP's majoritarianism by the horns, as they have been doing so far, is the appropriate strategy in such extraordinary times,' notes M K Bhadrakumar.
'Vajpayee was predictable in his ways.' 'Modi is a schemer, possessed of a shrewdness that can be rewarding in the chaotic world of politics.' 'His political journey gives reason to believe that 2019 will be another milestone in his private project,' notes Vikram Johri.
Against the backdrop of the Lok Sabha results, a much larger scale of desertion was anticipated from the TMC. 'It seems, people don't believe that the ship is sinking.'
The politics of hate does not pay. The people are too sensible to fall for such a ruse, says Amulya Ganguli.
Swami Prasad Maurya's resignation has forced the BJP to focus again on its outreach among OBCs.
It is hard to escape the feeling that solving the problems of 2020 and 2021 will require something special which at the moment is not on view, observes Aakar Patel.
