Anti-conversion laws are needed since thrusting the idea of a competitive battlefield of religion onto India's pluralistic traditions can only lead to greater communal conflict, says Sankrant Sanu
The million dollar question that begs for an answer is: Why is it that an amateurish attempt to convert a handful of Muslims by fringe Hindu elements garners so much attention while large scale systematic attempts to subvert Hinduism go unnoticed or are deliberately overlooked? If this is not double standards then what is, asks Vivek Gumaste.
Filmmaker Sudhir Mishra speaks to Nikita Puri about Left idealism, a driving force in Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi.
It was a historic moment for California's Hindu American community, when the senate floor at the Capitol unanimously passed the resolution on Monday designating October 2013 as Hindu American awareness and appreciation month.
'Hindu voters in coastal Karnataka lean more towards Hindutva than Hinduism which explains why the Siddaramaiah government's perception as anti-Hindu worked wonders for the BJP in coastal Karnataka.'
'Rich Indians don't give cash, they give gold. Why?' 'Because cash is spent by temples on prasad or doing some charitable work.' 'Gold remains intact with god,' says Aakar Patel.
'The Mahabodhi temple is the only example in the world where a religion's most sacred place is controlled by people belonging to another religion.'
'If the BJP wants to build a minimally inclusive and secure society, in which vulnerable groups and religious minorities don't feel persecuted, then the Sangh Parivar, the party and its government must change their ways. Or else, they risk dividing India further -- violently and irreparably -- for narrow political ends,' argues Praful Bidwai.
Maybe the new methods of measuring GDP helped us get an accurate picture.
The Bharatiya Shiksha Niti Aayog will study the present education system and suggest corrective steps to make it Bharat-centric. G Sreedathan reports
Could the Haji Ali dargah verdict be the beginning of the end of all social discrimination -- against women, against Dalits, the low castes and the caste-less, asks Durba Dhyani.
On Friday, the Bombay high court reversing the ban imposed on women entering the inner sanctum of the Haji Ali Dargah in Mumbai said, "The ban is contrary to articles 14, 15, 19 and 25 of the Constitution of India. Women should be permitted to enter the dargah on par with men." The news brought much cheer and joy to petitioner Zakia Soman who is also the founder of the Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan. Zakia spoke to Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf on what made this verdict historic and how it will bring about a change in the future.
Eminent Punjabi writer and Padma Shri winner Dalip Kaur Tiwana decided to return her award protesting "recurrent atrocities" on Muslims in the country, as another Kannada writer joined authors giving up their Sahitya Akademi Awards against "growing intolerance".
In the midst of a raging row over the conversions in Agra by Hindutva outfits, the Bharatiya Janata Party chief Amit Shah on Friday favoured a strong law to stop forcible conversions.
Rediff.com lists a few instances when BJP leaders and ministers shot their mouth off.
'What his minions do, we are not sure, but he has got to keep them under control. Pogroms against Muslims in India -- I don't think that is going to be his policy.'
'It is a great misfortune that the Nehruvian Stalinists of India have colluded with the grand project of demeaning and destroying Sanskrit. Today, the number of Sanskritists in India is low, and falling,' says Rajeev Srinivasan.
'The people of the state can be won over by love, and not by swords.'
This is just a brief reminder, dear fellow citizens, that none of us needs permission or sanction to be Indian, in whatever way we choose, as long as it doesn't break the law.
What does Pakistan mean for a young Indian? Devanik Saha attempts an answer.
Sharpening his attack on the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Narendra Modi, Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday accused them of trying to usurp the legacy of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and recalled the Congress stalwart's description of the RSS as "a venomous organisation" which could "finish" the country.
During his visit, Mukherjee visited the hotbed of Madhesi protests Janakpur and met ex-servicemen of Gurkha regiments in Pokhra.
Rajiv Malhotra's plagiarism may not be as horrifying as impersonating an exam candidate in Indore -- but they're both forms of cheating.
Cows are required for milk and as producer goods for breeding cows and bulls for the future.
Devdutt Pattanaik responds to the decision by Penguin to withdraw and pulp Wendy Doniger's book The Hindus: An Alternative History.
'In Kerala, if the Left had worked on stopping fascism the BJP would not have become a force today.'
'When you are returning your award you are commenting on the country and not the government.' 'Can we actually say that a vast majority of Indians have become communal? The data shows actually no. That is not true.' 'In religious terms India has a lot to teach the world because we are genuinely liberal, but in gender terms we have to learn lot from the West. In gender terms, we are terrible.'
In an interview to HarmonyIndia.org, the artist, who had famously said that he lived to paint and painted to live, spoke of what the 'bindu' meant to him, about his friend M F Husain and the legacy that he will leave behind.
G Sreedathan interviews Dinanath Batra, president of Siksha Sanskriti Utthan Nyas and national convener of Siksha Bacho Andolan, who shot to fame after he was instrumental in getting American scholar Wendy Doniger's book on Hinduism pulped.
'The BJP has failed to protect cows.' Why doesn't the government say it is a government for cows, mandir and the Ganga?' 'Why don't they declare the cow as a national animal?
'This is the first time a majority ruling government is nominating a Dalit for President.' 'So, the moral credibility definitely will go with the BJP, particularly Narendra Modi.'
'The fabric of democracy is fraying,' says T V R Shenoy. 'It is being attacked not just by terrorists in Kashmir or by zealots in the North-East, but is being ripped apart even in Allahabad, in the Hindi heartland.'
'We have Hindu values, Hindu customs, Hindu philosophy, Hindu way of looking at all religions as acceptable.' 'These are all great assets of India.'
Can you even imagine the fear that must have passed through Kiran Rao's mind, asks Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
The public discourse surrounding the murder of Infosys techie Swathi begs for sanity. Sadly, there are no takers for it in Tamil Nadu as conspiracy theories -- some communally explosive -- keep cropping up. R Ramasubramanian reports.
'The strange thing about the Karnataka election is that the BJP looks more like the Congress of the past and vice versa.' 'Siddaramaiah has been able to out think the BJP almost every single day on every single issue.'
The Hindu right-wing body in its mouthpiece taunts "liberals" protesting the Dadri lynching incident, asking what exactly is their idea of India.
'He was getting weaker and weaker, but his mind was all there... He was quite a strict father, in many ways... He was quite a strict person, not as liberal as it was made out to be.' Rahul Singh, editor and columnist, reveals the Khushwant Singh few knew.
The BJP's defeat in Delhi could turn into a larger national swing, but Prime Minister Modi and his party have enough time to tweak the party's policy agenda and project a more humble, secular, and inclusive image, say Ravi Agrawal and Harmeet Shah Singh
'It is important to destroy, to undermine, to debunk the narrative of ISIS,' Olivier Roy -- one of the world's leading experts on radical Islam -- tells Rediff.com's Vaihayasi Pande Daniel in an exclusive interview.
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