China's ruling Communist Party has cracked down on Tibetans who planned to attend the Kalachakra Puja in Bodh Gaya. But the Tibetan people have dared the Communists by listening to the Dalai Lama's sermons on the Internet and sharing videos on social media.
He was the army commander who planned Operation Bluestar. As army chief he planned Operation Brasstacks which rattled the Pakistan army. General K Sundarji was brilliant, ambitious and controversial, remembers Rahul Bedi.
The age-old Indian practice has brought people from different cultures and countries together.
A round-up of our favourite photographs of the week gone by.
The key airbase at Panagarh in West Bengal has been renamed as 'Air Force Station Arjan Singh' in honour of the Marshal of the Air Force, who turned 97 on Friday.
These natural wonders are all under threat.
From the Syrian civil war to the Ukrainian crisis to the terror unleashed by the dreaded Islamic State, there was no lack of news in 2014. Rediff.com presents a selection of the year's most enduring moments year from around the world.
A disparate global network of violent fundamentalist Islamic groups threatens India's eastern flank as much as the north and west with a real possibility of these spilling over into our borders, says Shyam Saran.
Australian photographer Warren Richardson has won the Photo of the Year 2015 award at the 59th annual World Press Photo Contest, results of which were announced on Thursday.
Let us see the problem for what it actually is: Illegal Immigration plain and simple, confined to the northeast with a definite communal slant that poses a national security risk and one that needs to be dealt with firmly and promptly by stringent identification (and deportation), says Vivek Gumaste.
'India should stop claiming that a united Pakistan is in India's interests.' 'Pakistan's break-up is a necessity for peace and progress in the region,' says Major General Mrinal Suman (retd).
'Information about the Dalai Lama's heath is normally not shared with the public. Its release on this occasion implicitly underscores the message that the window of opportunity for Beijing to recommence the dialogue with the Dalai Lama -- an advocate of non-violence -- to resolve the contentious Tibetan issue is limited.' says Jayadeva Ranade.
A single party will need at least 137 of the directly elected seats to be able to form the government on its own.
Outlining eight "pillars" for the future of India-China relations, President Pranab Mukherjee on Wednesday underlined the need for comprehensively resolving challenges including the boundary question through "political acumen" and "civilisational wisdom".
'The accusation that Pakistan risks losing sovereignty to China is emotive and has the potential to spread.' 'China will, however, remain intent on achieving its strategic ambitions of acquiring Gwadar port and securing a large chunk of Pakistan occupied Kashmir,' says former RA&W officer Jayadeva Ranade.
'Every single American act to weaken Syrian forces would only tilt the military balance in favour of ISIS whom Trump pledges to vanquish from the face of the earth,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'Did the government learn any lesson from the disasters of 2008, 1987, 1975?' 'Certainly not!' 'They are making people believe that the 2017 flood was unexpected, so no preventive effort towards reducing the loss of human lives was to be expected from the government,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
If India is to follow a smart cultural diplomacy, it has unmatched advantages over both China and Pakistan, says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'It is a pattern of behaviour of the Chinese that whenever a Chinese leader visits India or an Indian leader visits China, some incidents take place.' 'When Modi visits China, we should look out for some similar demonstration by the Chinese.'
The 5-day political stand-off between the Pakistan government and anti-Sharif protestors intensified on Monday as efforts by the ruling PML-N to reach out to Opposition leader Imran Khan and cleric Tahir-ul Qadri failed with both the leaders remaining adamant on the ouster of the embattled prime minister.
A historic railway service flounders for an inflexible privatisation policy.
ISIS suicide bombers and gunmen struck at the heart of the capital of Muslim-majority Indonesia, executing a Westerner and killing a local while blowing up a Starbucks cafe, leaving five attackers dead in the ensuing firing.
President Pranab Mukherjee's recent visit to the Pacific Island nation is path-breaking, but much more needs to be done, says Dr Rahul Mishra.
After three days of intense search, debris of the missing AirAsia aircraft carrying 162 people was found on Tuesday in the Java Sea off Indonesia but only three bodies have been retrieved so far as the mystery remained over the cause of the crash.
The US and its allies must evolve a more comprehensive long-term plan to defeat the new danger that the caliphate poses to the world order. And India too must do its bit for course correction, says strategic expert Gurmeet Kanwal.
'Xi Jinping got a dose of Modi's medicine inside the tent where he was being hosted on the banks of the Sabarmati river.' 'Modi reportedly told him, looking deep into his eyes: "This was not expected of your country. Can you tell me when the troops are withdrawing?".'
'The path to a resolution of the ethnic conflict is likely to be complicated and controversial with the majority Sinhalese community, and will become less likely if delayed.' 'It will certainly give Rajapaksa fresh political oxygen with which to revive himself and rally the opposition.'
'The danger today is that out of sheer fatigue and exasperation, the US might cut loose and exit from Afghanistan leaving it to the region to cope with the debris, which it is ill-equipped to handle,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Modi government has pledged to lay 700,000 kms of broadband cable.
52 world leaders, including Narendra Modi, will attend this week's Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, DC. Obama will meet separately only with the Chinese president.
From captivating photos of Northern Lights, sparkling galaxies, the 'man on the moon' and more, photos taken by the winners of the Insight Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2016 competition are an absolute treat.
The people who know Tibet will continue to fight the good fight. Long, hard, less than hopeful, but always peaceful.
It is time to throw an outer ring around India's national security by proactively engaging in areas immediately outside our neighbourhood. Such a ring will not only insulate India from emerging threats, but also create new leverage in securing our own neighbourhood, says Nitin Pai.
As far as India is concerned, the danger is the potential of the IS to create mischief rather than its actual capability as of now, says Rajiv Kumar
'They are not affected by ISIS' sentiment of avenging the suffering of the global ummah.' 'They have a huge ummah of their own in India, a huge Muslim population.' 'And because of that, they have to take into consideration the political and social conditions of Muslims in India.' 'They have to express themselves in a more political way and not through terrorism.'
'The creation of Pakistan was integral to Britain's grand strategy.' 'If they were to ever leave India, Britain's military planners had made it clear that they needed to retain a foothold in the NWFP and Baluchistan because that would provide the means to retain control of Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar.'
While trying to persuade North Korea to give up its provocative actions, engaging China is the first hurdle that world leaders will have to deal with, says Rajaram Panda.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Arunachal Pradesh on Friday, February 20, irritated the Chinese government so much that it summoned the Indian ambassador to register its protest against Modi visiting a territory China claims as Southern Tibet.
Muslims constitute 20% of UP's electorate. Currently, Muslim voters are divided between Akhilesh's SP and Mayawati's BSP. What will tilt the balance? Can Muslims back the winning party? Mohammad Sajjad explains the mysteries of UP's Muslim politics.
Unlike in the presidential polls, victory might not have been complete, at least as yet, for Mahinda Rajapaksa's electoral rivals. While his one-time aide and confidant, Maithripala Sirisena, became president without any issues after defeating him, incumbent Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who again may not command an absolute majority in the 225-member parliament, would have to count on his 'national government' concept to carry the day and the nation with him, this time round, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
