'There is no democracy, and in fact, there is some kind of monarch ruling.' 'They are protecting themselves and they are scared.''
'Certainly if Advani had agreed to Vajpayee in sacking Modi, then we would never have been talking of Modi today.'
'Who is the government to decide about my religion?' 'We are governed by the Constitution. The Constitution has given me the independence to follow my religion.'
'In the first elections, Hindutva forces got only 6% of the votes and won only 10 seats.' 'It was a great defeat for them.' 'They have held that grouse against Nehru since then.'
Syed Firdaus Ashraf walks the streets of Mahim, where Yakub Memon grew up and lived till the day before the serial blasts in 1993, on the day Yakub was hanged and discovers an undercurrent of unease and restrained anger.
'If they were really serious (about conferring the Bharat Ratna on Savarkar) what were they doing for the last five years?' 'Why do they have to take so long?' 'Gandhi himself never got the Bharat Ratna so it does not really matter.'
'The central and Assamese governments want to get 35 lakh to 40 lakh Bangladeshis (Hindus) to come to Assam and make the Assamese people a minority.' 'They want to make Assam a Bengali state.' 'Bengalis by nature are BJP supporters whereas Assamese people don't support the BJP.'
'The home minister of India has given his assurance to the MP of Lakshadweep.'
'Second-class citizenship would have been meaningless to a Hindu in the Mughal empire.'
'Earlier, Sri Sri told me we (Muslims) must give up our claim to the Babri Masjid site and be large-hearted.' 'Sri Sri has always taken sides on this issue, and isn't neutral at all.'
'It is impossible for a decent man to live in Kairana town.' 'Any man who is not able to pay extortion money has left Kairana.' 'The people involved in this extortion want it to become a Hindu-Muslim problem.' 'The intention in Kashmir was that if Pandits leave Kashmir, all the property left behind will go to Muslims. The intention is the same in Kairana,'
'Both Pavan Varma and Prashant Kishor questioned the party president in a public forum.' 'That is why we had to show them the door.'
'The Congress-JD-S alliance will be intact for the next three years, for sure.'
Mulk, 67, is likely to be sworn in on Friday, June 1.
'If it is not possible for the Indian Railways to have separate non-vegetarian and vegetarian compartments, then what is the harm in railways serving only vegetarian food?'
The PCB banned Shehzad for violating anti-doping regulations after he tested positive for a prohibited substance in May and his suspension was scheduled to end on November 10.
The Malda riots occurred on January 3, a day after the Pathankot terror attack. Common sense must dictate that an attack on the nation deserves more coverage than a local riot, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
The BJP could win only 16 out of 57 seats where Shah campaigned.
'There is a design of fundamentalists that the north east must become an Islamic country.'
'Education in private and public schools should be in English and in one regional language; it will solve the entire reservation issue.'
There has been a steady rise in the number of youth taking up arms in the Valley since 2014 onwards as compared to 2011, 2012, and 2013.
'The Congress shall have to take some brave-tough decisions to give a new social face to the party and its leadership composition,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
The 66-year-old leader was recovering after the operation at Princess Grace Hospital in London and was expected to be conscious in a few hours.
'When real issues hit everybody, the frenzy of Hindutva will start fading.'
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani on Wednesday pitched for a coherent regional strategy to deal with terrorism
'Islam insists on sameness, which is fine but can run the danger to jihad against those who are not the same.' 'Brahminical Hinduism insists on difference, which is fine but can run the danger of an oppressive internal hierarchy: Caste oppression, for instance.' 'In actual fact, humans need both sameness and difference to exist.'
'While they claim to cherish Bapu's ideals, they cherish Godse as fervently.'
'When Nawazuddin Siddiqui -- one of India's finest actors -- was told not to perform in a Ramleela, I realised how much Hinduism has been hijacked by Hindutva forces in the last 30 years,' says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'I don't practise yoga. How am I less of a nationalist than the person who practises it? Is it a crime if I don't practice it?'
'There are many able, good, police officers in Bengal who are capable of handling this situation, but without Mamata Banerjee nothing moves.'
In the dangal of UP politics, much as Muzaffarnagar wants to leave its past behind, the shadows are never be far behind.
'Painting opponents as the enemy of the State, using fake news, making wild allegations about rival parties, curtailing civil liberties and challenging the Constitution itself are worrying developments.'
'If some Europeans do not allow Muslims to assimilate into European national cultures, some Muslims also refuse to try and adopt and assimilate.'
'For the last 10 years the Congress made the RSS an idea of intolerance, anti-minority, especially anti-Muslim, and an idea of fascism.' 'That has been demolished now by Pranab Mukherjee.'
Syed Firdaus Ashraf traces the trajectory of Lal Kishan Advani from the highs of the 1990s to the present, when he may have to watch the elections from the sidelines.
'It is precisely because of the apprehensions about Lalu's revival that the upper castes have started re-thinking their electoral preferences. Out of confusion, they are simply deciding to vote for winnable candidates from their respective castes of any of the three parties -- the BJP, JD-U or RJD. This is what has considerably neutralised the NaMo wave in Bihar and resulted in Nitin Gadkari's remark that "Caste is in the DNA of Biharis". This is why Giriraj Singh, the BJP candidate from Nawada, made provocative statements,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
'Shraddha tries hard to rescue the film, but the script totters so badly in the second half that any salvage seems impossible,' says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
Four Indians and an American, were killed during the five-hour long siege that ended early Thursday morning.
Sanju is a blockbuster, but did it get all its facts correct? yed Firdaus Ashraf reveals seven facts Director Rajkumar Hirani overlooked in Sanju.
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