'As general elections draw near, the BJP and the JD-U (in whatever form it is) will do a deal -- the state to the JD-U in return for support at the Centre for the BJP.'
'No country or society ever prospered or remained secure by marginalising more than one-sixth of its own,' warns Shekhar Gupta.
Could the defeat of Vasundhara Raje, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, and Raman Singh in last year's polls in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh, respectively, augur a transition in the command structure of these states, where they reigned supreme?
'The government may backpedal for now to stave off bad international press and diplomatic demarches, but that it will go ahead with putting religion at the centre of citizenship rules is certain.' 'For it is convinced that this is the magic bullet that will ensure its return to power in 2024,' says Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Meanwhile, an independent MLA in Gujarat has declared his support to the BJP.
Court documents show that the Kerala government, whose case was treated as the 'lead case' among all the petitions filed against Adani, made four allegations to convince the court to cancel the contract for the Thiruvanathapuram airport. The state's legal team couldn't substantiate most of these allegations with documentary proof and its self-defeating arguments in court failed to convince the judges to cancel the contract given to Adani. The battle for the Thiruvananthapuram airport between the Communist-led Kerala government, the Adani group and the Modi government over the past year hasn't had a dull moment since the proceedings began. Claims of a smoking gun turned out to be a damp squib, says Sai Manish.
'Indian secularism doesn't deserve a tombstone. It needs a new shrine,' argues Shekhar Gupta.
'A perception has been built in our country that whatever Modi says you cannot challenge that.'
Rathore also credited PM for the Indian Army's operation in Myanmar and said that a nation emerges tough if its leader is strong-willed.
'China is concerned about its impact within Tibet.'
'Some of his decisions were not so good, but his intentions were always guided by a deep national interest.'
'Differences will almost certainly arise over how the minorities are to be viewed and how educational institutions are to be treated.'
'These issues would be non-negotiable for Mr Modi's BJP.' 'So he may well refuse to lead a government in which his freedom of action is constrained by others in the coalition,' feels T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan.
With four contenders for the top post in case the BJP wrests power from AAP, party sources say naming of a CM face may trigger factional fights.
'If Rahul Gandhi's authority was absolute, he could have picked his man.' 'Compare this with the ease with which outsiders like Adityanath, Khattar and Fadnavis were picked.'
'The BJP is trying to bribe or unleash the income tax authorities (on us).'
A rebel by nature, he lived the life to the fullest, donning different hats -- lawyer, parliamentarian, minister -- but was not a quintessential politician constrained by party lines.
Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar wants the Modi government and BJP to reap the profit of the surgical strikes. But electoral history suggests a political party's ability to exploit military successes for poll gains has a mixed record.
'The heart of the matter is that India is not Israel.'
Sitting Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Sushma Swaraj on Friday filed her nomination papers from Vidisha and expressed confidence about increasing her victory margin.
Why the prime minister's legacy will depend on how he governs, not the number of state elections he fights as personality contests, says Shekhar Gupta.
Dubs Modi government a "one trick horse" which will make the Hindu-Muslim issue the dominant one in political discourse; asks Opposition to field one candidate in every seat against BJP nominee in 2019 polls.
Nath had said in Bhopal, "Lot of industries are set up in which people from other states, like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, come to work. I do not want to criticise them, but the youth of Madhya Pradesh are deprived (of jobs)."
'I have done so many films but even today when I walk on the road, people call me Kaalia. I don't feel bad. I feel proud that people have seen me in Sholay and remember me.'
'Modi wants to go down in history not necessarily as India's first overtly Hindu RSS pracharak prime minister, but as a world statesman who built the idea of India as a great nation.'
We should have anticipated it on August 5 last year, when we made the big changes in J&K. Amit Shah left nothing to chance when he told Parliament that 'we will bring back Aksai Chin even at the cost of our lives'. 'Then, there were the new maps, objections to the CPEC going through Indian territory, the weather reports.' A broad territorial status quo had existed in Ladakh-Aksai Chin since 1962. India made its intention to change this public, notes Shekhar Gupta.
'Patriotism won 400+ seats for the Congress party in 1984. How much will nationalism bring in, in 2019, is the question,' asks Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Thackeray recalled former prime minister Vajpayee as saying, Ab Hindu maat nahi khayega (Hindus will not be defeated now), and added, "Hindus will not sit silent."
'Amit Shah and Modi have a disciple and guru relationship. But Modi and Jaitley's relationship was based on friendship. That's the difference.'
M Karunanidhi was a masterful practitioner of modern-day politics, wielding considerable influence beyond his own state, in the corridors of power in New Delhi, for a long time and sewing up alliances with both the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party.
'I hope he will continue to be what he is. And doing so, he won't be much different from those whose example he is being given right now,' says Utkarsh Mishra.
The desecration of Vidyasagar's statue during Amit Anilchandra Shah's rally, which the TMC projected to be a 'Bhojpuri' and 'Dhokla' invasion on West Bengal's culture, may help her gain some favour with middle-class and erudite Bengalis in the last phase of the polls.
'Your failures are not teaching you anything.' 'Your demonetisation failure is not teaching you anything; your GST failure is not teaching you anything; your (revocation of) Article 370 failure is not teaching you anything; your NRC Assam failure is not teaching you.' 'And now you have the CAA!'
The great Indian election is over and now the wait for the results is shrinking with every passing moment. Though exit polls hint at a cakewalk for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his National Democratic Alliance, there are some battles which will be keenly observed on the result day.
According to political analysts, Mayawati's social engineering to unite the lower castes with the upper ones seems to have backfired.
The Shiv Sena on Monday refused to call off the protest against the book launch of former Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri in Mumbai.
Suresh Prabhu is trapped in the 'rhetoric of his own government'.
When Nirmala Sitharaman and Narendra Tomar arrived in Shimla, they could not have anticipated the scene that awaited them.
United States President Donald Trump and US First Lady Melania Trump will be visiting India -- Ahmedabad and Delhi -- on February 24 and 25 on the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Let's assess earlier American presidential visits to India.
Articulate segments of Muzaffarpur have been at the the forefront of all anti-establishment mobilisation, which makes their silence over the atrocities in a shelter home in the town puzzling. Could it be that if those accused of horrific crimes belong to dominant castes and if the victims belong to the vulnerable groups, then the middle classes become mute, asks Mohammad Sajjad.
'Who sent Masood Azhar back to Pakistan? Who bowed down to terror and released him? Not the Congress, but it was the BJP government'
