From Mathura to Udaipur, we tell you the places to head to this month.
Ambassador Venu Rajamony, who served as press secretary to President Pranab Mukherjee during his tenure, salutes the statesman and political legend, who passed into the ages on Monday.
'The current BJP leadership believes the party's expansion across India, and thus their own survival at the top, depends on injecting communal tension into areas where it has so far been largely controlled,' argues Mihir S Sharma.
'If there is one thing our politicians, especially those with their ear to the ground, understand, it is the reality that their voters want three things from their children's schooling: English, English, English', notes Shekhar Gupta.
Trinamool leaders have claimed the NRC process and subsequent verification is vote bank politics. Other critics call it as modified ethnic cleansing. But putting poll rhetoric aside, the issue dates back to a time when many of these leaders had no political relevance.
'If Mr Modi and Mr Shah have made a poisonous, polarising campaign their brahmastra for 2019, Mamata Banerjee is showing them its limitations,' says Shekhar Gupta.
Girish Karnad lived several lives not only on the stage but also as a scholar, theatre personality, an actor and director in a career spanning over five decades.
'Some reckon his bitterness results from wanting to stay relevant despite a waning career.'
'The BJP will take time to come to power in Andhra.'
'The BJP and RSS may realise it is much easier for the ICHR to rewrite textbooks and for the ICSSR to float its bizarre interpretations on social themes than to keep people away from their favourite dishes.'
'I'm a rascal, I'm going to play a paramahansa?!'
'The current government must act sooner rather than later,' asserts Vivek Gumaste.
Shashwata Chatterjee on watching the football World Cup, spending days in the MP's Delhi home and the day his Dadu came to visit him in his college in Los Angeles.
Keya Sarkar outlines some of the challenges faced by a low-income father determined to educate his daughter.
Senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha has made a veiled attack on Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on the issue of rescuing Uttarakhand victims from his state alone, saying no politician should be parochial in his approach while saving lives of the stranded people.
'Communalism and communal riots happened in India only during and due to colonialism. Pre-colonial India didn't have this problem of communal conflicts and religious strife.'
Sukanya Verma takes us down beautiful bridal history.
.jpg)
The Indian author had made a dramatic escape from the Taliban in 1995. She was the subject of a 2003 film called Escape From Taliban, starring Manisha Koirala.
Opponents of the CAA and NRC have gone to town accusing the BJP of an ulterior motive (read, disenfranchisement of Muslims) in implementing the NRC. By the same token it can be alleged that anti-CAA opponents have a nefarious agenda in mind that would be scuttled by the implementation of the NRC: Namely the accrual of dedicated vote banks and the restoration of Muslim hegemony over at least parts of India, especially Bengal and Assam, argues Vivek Gumaste.
The BJP doesn't want to focus entirely on an anti-Mamata campaign.
'As a great democracy, we must be responsible and uphold the rights of those who come to us seeking shelter.' 'Everything in the Hindu faith tells us that this is obligatory on us,' says Aakar Patel.
Who do you think nailed the bridal look better than anyone else this wedding season?
'Here was a man who played a major part in helping the Bengalis of East Pakistan create a new nation, secured the merger of Sikkim into the Indian dominion and built R&AW into a formidable outfit, comparable to the best in the world.' Rameshwar Nath Kao shunned the limelight, hated to be photographed and preferred to work behind the scenes. A revealing excerpt from Nitin A Gokhale's much awaited book, R N Kao: Gentleman Spymaster.
In a moving encounter, Francis blessed them, held their hands and intently listened to their heart-rending tales of escape from the Buddhist-majority nation, in an apparent show of public solidarity towards Asia's worst refugee crisis in decades.
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.
'Bangladeshi Muslims want to increase their population in India.' 'They have made colonies in India.' 'Rohingyas are doing the same.' 'This has to stop.'
Pandit Ravi Shankar was George Harrison's link into the Vedic world.
'Why is the RSS trying to destroy the indigenous culture of Assam and its language?' 'If these migrants settle in Assam, they will overwhelm the 47 per cent of people who speak Assamese.'
The four-member Appellate Division bench headed by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha pronounced the single-word judgement at the tense courtroom.
A look at the top tweets from your favourite Bollywood celebrities.
'It is the regional parties and their leaders who are the ones we have to watch.'
The mystery over incidents of chopping of braids in Delhi and other states continued as more such cases were reported.
'Muslims, like people of all other faiths, are quite comfortable with the idea of nationalism and democracy today. But are they following Islam in its spirit? That is a different question.'
'The principles on which a modern Republic should be governed are changing and taking dangerous turns,' warns Uddalok Bhattacharya.
'I don't think the state administration has shown the resolve to enter Muslim neighbourhoods and arrest offenders in the last decade.'
'The significance and timing of the PM's start of the campaign journey from Silchar is a clear message that the Barak valley is a priority in his scheme of things,' notes Subimal Bhattacharjee.
The BJP chief began his speech with the slogan of uprooting the TMC government from Bengal and said in order to do that, he would visit all the districts of the state.
Right in the midst of bustling Kolkata lies what might be the most prominent population of Britons in India.
'For some South Asians, it may be tempting to think "I'm not Muslim, this doesn't really affect me".' 'But please know, it affects all of us,' says Arun Venugopal, a reporter at WNYC in New York.
Bharati Dutt witnessed life-changing events that shaped India on the threshold of freedom. Her memories are an account of how ordinary Indians saw India change.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances