There was a clear polarisation of Christian and (especially) Muslim votes in favour of the UDF. This caused enough misgivings to start a consolidation of Hindu votes behind the LDF, says T V R Shenoy.
With a staff in one hand and the other on his granddaughter's shoulder, the old man briskly takes the lead as the sun breaks over the horizon.
A bench of Justice N Kirubakaran, since retired, and Justice B Pugalendhi, in a recent order also said that in our country 'it is made to believe that Sanskrit alone is Gods' language'.
Hindu right-wing activist Swami Aseemanand, an accused in several terror cases, has moved a court seeking to withdraw his application to turn a witness in the Ajmer Dargah blast case even as the Rajasthan Anti-Terrorism Squad on Friday said it is planning to file a chargesheet against him on April 8.
'there is absolutely no question that the Hinduism of the mob-lynchers, the people who have actually gone and killed others because of what they are eating or how they are worshipping or the faith they belong to or what they're doing professionally, those are, to my mind, not Hindus at all.' 'Hinduism needs to be reclaimed for the Hindus who are not bigots.'
The situation in Orissa's Kandhamal district, which was hit by communal riots 3 years ago, has vastly changed and central forces have been withdrawn from there, the Centre told the Supreme Court on Monday. "The situation has vastly changed," Solicitor General Gopal Subramanium told the apex court which is monitoring the situation in the district ever since it was affected by the riots following the killing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati.
Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati, whose killing last year had triggered riots, had rejected the police's request for deployment of security personnel within the campus of Jalespeta ashram on the grounds that it would not suit its atmosphere.
While there is a debate still on whether Swami Aseemanand actually confessed on his own after being touched by the conduct of a former accused in the Mecca Masjid case or that he did so under duress, the fact remains that there is a ray of hope among many youths who continue to languish in jails after being implicated in the above mentioned cases.
Raghuram Rajan joked he wasn't expecting to win any votes or Facebook 'likes' in the position.
The head of a religious mutt in Varanasi has slammed Bharatiya Janata Party and its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi for using the temple town to further their political ambitions.
The arrest of Hindu activists in connection with the Malegaon blast has put several investigating agencies on rewind mode. If the revelations by Lieutenant Colonel Srikant Purohit are to be believed then several bomb blasts in the country need to be reinvestigated.
Rajinikanth said he stood by his comments made on Periyar, maintaining that they were factual and refused to apologise as demanded by fringe Dravidian outfits. DMK chief advised him to exercise caution while expressing views on Periyar.
RSS leader Dhanu Pradhan, who was said to be on the Maoists' hitlist, was gunned down by three suspected extremists at Kumarigaon village under Brahmanigaon police station area in Kandhamal at around 1300 hrs, sources said.
"The unity and understanding among various religions were important for the unity and development of the nation. Religious faith was important for each and every person and it was wrong to forcefully change one's religious dictum."
The first need is to stop all the rumour-mongering. The government should ensure that none of the victims who are living in the camps are forced to reconvert under duress. If they want to reconvert willingly, there isn't any problem. But the State must ensure that they are not forced, says NCM vice chairman Michael Pinto
The communal violence in Kandhmal in the aftermath of the killing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxmananda Saraswati and four of his disciples, has so far claimed 26 lives, Orissa Home Secretary Tarun Kanti Mishra said in Bhubhaneshwar on Monday.
The hypocrisies of high-caste Hindus have cost their followers very dear. Millions have left their dharma, their great religion which boasts of the loftiest philosophical ideas, says Tarun Vijay.
The Orissa government on Thursday informed the Supreme Court that the situation in Kandhamal district of Orissa, where violence broke out following the murder of Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxmananad Saraswati on August 24, has considerably improved.According to the affidavit of the state government, VHP leader Praveen Togadia was not permitted to take out a procession with the ashes of the slain Swami on September 7. There has been no fresh violence.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Orissa government to place its report, relating to steps taken to protect the lives of people belonging to the Christian community in riot-hit Kandhamal district, by Thursday.The apex court also asked the state government to submit an affidavit on whether permission was granted to Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Praveen Togadia for his proposed yatra, carrying the ashes of slain leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati.
The relief camp at Tiangia under 'G' Udayagiri block housing 500 people, was the last one to be closed on Friday, Kandhamal District Magistrate Krishna Kumar told PTI over the phone. Altogether 25,000 people were housed in over 15 relief camps during the violence in the aftermath of the killing of senior Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxamananda Saraswati on August 23, 2008, Kumar said.
'Must every believing Hindu automatically be assumed to subscribe to the Hindutva project?' asks Shashi Tharoor.
What is particularly worrying is that the vast majority will not have access to testing or even to proper treatment. These cases could have been avoided if the government had shown the political will to do so, observes Rashme Sehgal.
'Insulting the law, instigating violence, living ostentatiously and preaching godliness?' 'This vulgar hypocrisy needs peoples' rejection and a revolt.' 'If people can't speak out, then it will be a hypocrisy that they expect the government to act and speak for them,' says Tarun Vijay.
Count among The Light of Asia's many, many admirers over 132 years: Gandhi, Tagore, Vivekananda, Nehru and Ambedkar, Tolstoy and Kipling, Yeats and Eliot, Alfred Nobel, Dmitri Mendeleev and C V Raman. Jairam Ramesh reveals why he decided to write a book on Edwin Arnold, who wrote The Light of Asia.
Michael Witty, a senior member of the Guinness World Record Main Management Committee, presented the awards to Bochasanvasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sansthan under two categories: Most Hindu temples consecrated by a single person and secondly, the world's largest comprehensive Hindu temple.
The Supreme Court on Monday asked the Orissa government to ensure protection for the Christian community in the state and said withdrawal of paramilitary forces should only take place in co-ordination with the Centre
The litigants and their counsels -- altogether over 50 people -- met the three-member mediation panel on the Avadh University premises in Faizabad.
At least 58 persons, most of them belonging to Christian families, embraced Hinduism at two temples in Kerala's Kottayam district under the initiative of Vishwa Hindu Parishad on Christmas day on Thursday.
'Ayodhya will once again become Ram's city.'
'Like Nehru, too, Modi has found dealing with Beijing more and more difficult and has adopted an increasingly assertive approach towards managing India's northern neighbour.'
'How can someone who has never been associated with the movement and never had darshan of Ram Lalla mediate on the matter of temple construction? We have gone to jail for it, faced house arrest and have been fighting court cases. Sri Sri does not qualify to mediate on the matter.'
'With his envious academic record, extraordinary research calibre and unparalleled work experience, we can trust him to become the first Indian -- fully Indian, not one of those Americans of Indian origin -- to win the Nobel Prize in Economics,' says Sudhir Bisht.
The two-volume unabridged version in Malayalam Braille covers all the chapters and slokas (stanzas) of Gita.
What B K S Iyengar and U R Ananthamurthy embodied was a cultural self-confidence. This is why their sense of being Indian and Hindu was non-competitive, non-combative and even non-comparative with other cultures and religions, says Rajni Bakshi.
Modi hasn't raised or encouraged the raising of slogans such as 'Jai Sri Ram' at public meetings
Sanjeev Nayyar offers a roster of things to do to see the India of our dreams.
The Delhi high court on Tuesday dismissed a PIL seeking to make Indian citizenship a pre-requisite for a person to be appointed as the editor of a publication.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has met his match in Kanhaiya Kumar, noted writer Nayantara Sahgal has said as she praised the JNUSU president for his speech at JNU after his release from jail and his subsequent "rational" interviews to the media.
He also demanded that Ganga Sagar, a place of Hindu pilgrimage, be declared a holy place like Haridwar