There is nothing the young Purvanchali wants more desperately than to escape to a place with less hopelessness, and some opportunity, discovers Shekhar Gupta.
How much do you know about Shah Jahan, Mumtaz Mahal and the Taj Mahal?
Son Of God is an epic fail, rants Paloma Sharma.
Superstar Rajinikanth needs a box-office hit after two successive flops in Kochchadaiyaan and Lingaa, both 2014. Yet, Kabali is being projected as if the fans need the film, and the Tamil film industry needs it even more, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
With fake products and machine-made mirrors making its way into the market, an age-old art form is under threat.
A mother-daughter duo is working tirelessly to revive the art and empower rural artisans too.
Director Gareth Edwards delivers a satisfactory reboot of the iconic monster movie, Godzilla.
Amid Trump's expected action against employment visas, India's bellwether IT firms reveal they have been preparing for this eventuality for years.
'Will the new government, largely of the BJP, whose manifesto proclaimed "India shall remain a natural home for persecuted Hindus and they shall be welcome to seek refuge here" and whose patrons never tire of the glories of our civilisation in antiquity, stand up for these long-lost cousins, the Yazidis in Iraq?'
'India today has to fight many a battle, all of which cry out for innovation. This is where the experience of the Diaspora could be the most productive well-spring.'
Going by the current pace, IT firms are likely to exceed the manufacturing sector in salary payouts over the next five years.
Here is a recap of all the big events that shaped the world last week.
Second seed Garbine Muguruza, bidding to add the Wimbledon crown to her French Open title, was sensationally beaten in the second round on Thursday by Slovakian qualifier Jana Cepelova 6-3, 6-2 in the shock of the tournament so far.
'Learning by doing is in our genes.' 'We are applying the wrong method by making our children sit in a classroom for eight hours, listening to someone talk.'
'Indian universities are giving out PhDs without adequate evaluation,' charges Dr Satya Narain Jatiya, MP.
'The government's proposal to store citizens' data including Aadhaar data under its Digital India initiative on cloud is violative of the citizens' human rights because the cloud is admittedly beyond India's jurisdiction.'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's success at courting Indians abroad have been as much a result of his old contacts as efforts by a dedicated arm of the BJP abroad. Archis Mohan reports
'There were days when there was no rice at home and we ate only jackfruit seeds.' 'They feel I, a lowliest human being, a tribal, have no right to go abroad and study.' 'The humiliation was so bad that I was broken inside.'
Categorising the original settlements of gaothans and koliwadas as slums, the authorities in Mumbai are keen to develop them into commercial complexes. The residents are unwilling to cede their rights. Ranjita Ganesan reports
Recalling her visit to Nairobi, Rediff.com's Anita Katyal speaks to immigrants she met on her trip, who say they are shaken by the incident but indomitable.
The Election Commission must ensure that soldiers, paramilitary forces and railway employees who work outside their home states are given proper avenues to cast their votes, says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Scriptwriter of Baar Baar Dekho Sri Rao gets candid about his film and Bollywood.
The new ordinance on land acquisition will allow land grabbers to deprive millions, destroy agriculture, horticulture, rivers, forests, tree cover and mangroves to extract minerals as well as ground water, without replenishment at a pace that will not leave anything for the next generation, warns activist Medha Patkar.
An excerpt from Conde Nast India's Make In India magazine.
'I have never seen anybody disliked more as prime minister than Modi.' 'What is interesting is in his prime ministership, no matter whatever happens in any corner of India, Modi is blamed for it.' 'Modi has not suspended any Constitutional liberties. No Opposition leader has been put in jail... Modi is not Hitler.'
'I rejoice in the fact that Justice Iyer has left a legacy, after all, legacies no not reside in brick and mortar, but in living humans and there are many of us who have followed in his footsteps and continue to do so.' Former additional solicitor general Indira Jaising salutes the legendary Justice V R Krishna Iyer who passed into the ages last week, the judge who restored her faith in the Supreme Court of India.
'The response to terror is not always reciprocal terror, nor is launching a conventional response the best response.' 'The best response is to make the sponsor pay a price he cannot afford,' says former RA&W chief Vikram Sood.
For all the blame-game over the flood preparedness in Chennai and elsewhere in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, this is not the first of its kind. Nor would it be the last, given the nature of the north-east monsoon, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Have you tasted Besan ke ladoo cookies?
'Madras is a Tamil word while Chennai is Telugu. Without the English, there would have been no Madras. The erection of Fort St George laid the foundations for the growth of the first modern city of India,' Historian JBP More tells Shobha Warrier.
Mar Remegiose Inchananiyil, the Bishop of the Thamarassery diocese in Kozhikode, Kerala, told a public meeting that there would be another 'Jallianwala Bagh' in the foothills of the Western Ghats if the K Kasturirangan committee report is implemented. He spoke to Rediff.com's Shobha Warrier about the plight of the farmers and why he has taken up the issue.
