'There is a deep stigma or taboo attached to COVID-19 in rural areas.' 'People don't want to test because they fear social exclusion.' 'Even those who test positive may not reveal and not follow the quarantine protocol.'
'Modi's campaign has been strikingly devoid of anti-Muslim rhetoric. After the kutta pilla incident, it has been several months since he said something horrible about the Muslims of India. It is the result of democratic constraints. He has to make compromises... He's trying to reinvent himself. He will politically hurt himself if 2002 becomes the definition of Mr Modi again', says political scientist Ashutosh Varshney.
'We don't know about our own treasures because we are a colonised people. We are unable to break away from that mindset because it is designed as a mouse trap - and colonised people become pigmies/mice on their own soil. We have lost the eyes to appreciate ourselves.'
Despite all of the PM's many strengths, it is increasingly clear that he does not necessarily have a coherent and clear worldview on matters of macro policy.
'One thing we have learnt is that a pandemic can be arrested at any stage.' 'Not suddenly, of course, but slowly with steady unwavering focus.'
'Not only in Kashmir, but in the rest of the country.'
Kerala Congress President V M Sudheeran on why the state needs to get sober.
'The worst case scenario for Pakistan is a full-scale Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.' 'Pakistani militants would be inspired and emboldened and seek to replicate the Taliban's successes in Pakistan.'
Captain Shikha Surabhi is the first woman to lead a formation of 36 men and 9 Royal Enfields of the Indian Army's motorcycle display team on Republic Day.
'Why did government not include a provision in the bills which categorically stated that no crop will be sold below the MSP in the open market?'
'There is little appetite in the Democratic foreign policy establishment to pick a fight with India.'
'The Chinese fault lines are tremendous and we need to exploit them.'
'Everybody should be given rations. Nobody should be excluded.' 'Without an income, the present ration quota is not enough.' They should increase it so that one person can eat adequately for a month.'
Parvathy Nair's poem about the little girl who went to graze horses and never returned has moved many Indians to tears.
'The government and railways are looking after us, but I just want to get home.'
'The honourable prime minister virtually handpicked me for the Amritsar East seat.' 'Amit Shahji announced that if I am elected, the whole of Punjab will be drugs free.'
'One provision in the Act -- immediate arrest (of those accused under the Act), made this act different from all other sections of the IPC.' 'With that provision snatched, the Dalit Act has become toothless because caste criminals feared this provision of immediate arrest the most.'
'The uneducated think of their rights as a gift. This is deeply troubling.' 'If they were educated they could claim what is rightfully theirs.'
'Whatever the BJP tries to do, they will not be able to make a big mark in Kerala.'
'It has also underestimated the striking force of the Opposition. It has been complacent and paralysed. That may be due to the compulsions of coalition politics and the arrogance of a party which looked at itself as entitled to rule,' says political scientist Christophe Jaffrelot.
'Chirag Paswan's game plan would be to push out Nitish Kumar from this alliance, but that is only possible if the BJP wins about 90 seats and the LJP wins between 25-30 seats.'
'The incidents that used to happen in our time, have they stopped now?' 'Can you imagine they made an acid attack victim consume acid? And when did this happen?' 'When the CM was inspecting the thana...' 'History tells us that a party does not remain in power permanently.' 'Finally, they will have to deliver.'
'Both have a very nationalistic view of foreign policy.' 'They think they are shrewd and clever diplomats.'
'Right now there are two battles, the one in our heads about the pandemic and 2, the actual pandemic itself.'
'The Chinese can't be trusted hence the need to verify and re-verify.'
JP was a People's Hero unmatched in Independent India. Archana Masih goes to Jayaprakash Narayan's village looking for Bihar's greatest son as the claimants of his legacy go to war in what is being called the Election of Elections.
Their families are poor and do not know what IIT is but their sons dream of IIT and working for ISRO and NASA one day. One man is helping them towards their dream. As Bihar goes to the polls, Archana Masih salutes its greatest success story.
'If you compare Rahul with Modi, then Modi seems larger.' 'The campaign has been built to show that Rahul is not mature enough to lead the nation.'
Among the better painted buildings in rural Bihar are hospitals run by the state government. Archana Masih travels to a village in north Bihar to find out what lies within. As Bihar goes to the polls, Rediff.com looks at the state through the lives of its people.
'When you look at the content of Modi's speeches, the word 'Modi' is what he pronounces the most by far, which is not a healthy sign.'
Sarmesh Kumar is the first in his family, that comes from the community of rat eaters, to go to college. Archana Masih/Rediff.com met the young man and traveled to his village -- which Bill Gates visited a few years ago -- as Rediff.com looks at Bihar through the stories of its people.
'Respect the pledges you have made to the people of Kashmir.' 'Jammu and Kashmir is not like any other state of the country.'
We are becoming more cruel and less civilised
'China is mindful of the fact that it is not confronting the Indian Army of 1962. But the sabre rattling will continue.'
Thirty-four years after he traveled to space, Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma tells Rediff.com's Archana Masih that he looks forward to Gaganyan, India's first manned space mission in 2022.
'The government's August 5 decision has impacted India-China relations, but it is not very significant or very different. Things like this have happened in the past.'
'The government's job is to enable people to live together, not tear them apart.' 'It is supposed to create spaces to work, live and survive -- this country is struggling and this government is saying you have no right of being.' 'It wants to declare human beings illegal. It is the most bizarre nonsense in the world.'
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