'If you look through the optics of BJP leader Kapil Mishra, he was standing with a deputy commissioner of police while giving a hate speech.' 'Immediately, the message goes down that the police is 'with us' so let's start rioting.'
Our problem is that we look at these words from a non-Indic perspective, says Sanjeev Nayyar.
'Nobody is killing you in Kerala because you are Hindu unlike in North India where Muslims have been killed only because they are Muslims and were carrying some meat.'
'What we are today witnessing is the final act of the Pakistani army trying to retain its turf,' argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'In UP, the CM actually announced that his administration would 'take revenge' against rioters.' 'That must have been music to his police force's ears for it substantiated what the police always do: Take revenge on an entire community for the violence of a few,' points out Jyoti Punwani.
The affidavit, filed by B C Joshi, Director in the Ministry of Home Affairs, said the CAA does not confer any arbitrary and unguided powers on the executive as the citizenship to the persecuted minorities of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh would be granted in a manner as specified under the law governing grant of citizenship.
As CAB was tabled in Lok Sabha, West Bengal CM said she will never allow NRC in the state.
The party has always advocated abrogation of Article 370 and has also been speaking against Article 35A, but its renewed pitch during elections assumes significance.
Attacking the Bharatiya Janata Party and Narendra Modi over election expenditure, Rahul Gandhi on Saturday alleged that corporates were pumping money into the saffron party's campaign and asked it come clean on the source of funds.
As a Congress-Bharatiya Janata Party war of words broke out over Sardar Patel's legacy, Congress on Thursday portrayed Narendra Modi with his "designer clothes and branded glasses" as a contrast to India's Iron Man, "who saved Muslims during 1947 riots" and was "humility personified".
'There are communal overtones in the chargesheet.' 'Hindus and Muslims live peacefully in Jammu and by highlighting such facts in the chargesheet they are committing a conspiracy against Jammu.' The reason: A Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the Kathua rape-cum-murder case (see box below) and the deportation of Rohingya immigrants. Speaking to Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf, B S Salathia, Jammu Bar Association explains their call for a bandh and the communal divide it has brought about in Jammu.
Khan in his maiden speech at the 74th UNGA session suggested that nuclear-armed Pakistan may not have much of a choice if a conventional war were to break out between Pakistan and India which he described as a country seven-times its size.
'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 MHA put out a set of FAQs on the Act, seeking to counter a 'misinformation campaign'. It said the Act doesn't have anything to do with the deportation of any foreigner in India.
The foreign minister said he has other engagements in Bangladesh while the home minister cancelled the visit due to ongoing protests against CAB.
'Like in cricket, M S Dhoni was the captain and Virat Kohli played under him.' 'Then Dhoni played under Kohli.' 'Now imagine, having a second switch.' 'That is the analogy here, and I find no other example in Indian politics, or even world politics.'
Banerjee also alleged that the BJP is manipulating electronic voting machines to increase its vote share.
Canadians see India as a fast-growing economy and believe the country's growth is an "important opportunity" for Canada, but most of them can't identify who Narendra Modi is, according to a new poll.
'Till today, the RSS only speaks of Hindu Rashtra but never explains what it means. It cannot, because it would be unacceptable to even a majority of Hindus, forget the Indian Muslims and Christians,' says Aakar Patel.
Pressures in the BJP-Akali Dal alliance have created grounds for a rise in extremism.
'For a long time Pakistan dreamt that India would break up and that it would be the predominant power in the region,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'The EC seems to have killed the joy of elections by stretching it interminably.' 'Imagine watching Andhadhun in a six-hour format and you will get the point,' says Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
"They cry victim when they actually are the perpetrators," she said, rejected Pakistan's charges against India on the issue at the 42nd session of the UNHRC.
The Bharatiya Janata Party president also accused successive Congress government's of having alienated the region from the rest of the country.
Here's a look at some of the other darbars in the hard-to-please city of Amritsar, known for its appetite for food and drink and its insolent humour:
'People feel concerned about the future, whether it is the land or the jobs.' 'The BJP came to power in Assam with promises of maati, bheti (home, hearth and identity), land, jobs and culture.' 'Are these going to taken care of? I think those are real concerns.' 'The Assam chief minister (Sarbananda Sonowal) was one of the leaders of the All Assam Students Union which fought for and is one of the signatories to the Assam Accord.' 'Today, his comrade-in-arms (Samujjal Bhattacharya, chief advisor, AASU) is leading the opposition in the streets.'
'Our modern icons have assumed infallibility and think course correction or admission of a mistake as taboo.' 'Much will depend on the sagacity of the national leadership to show humility that our Gods showed.' 'Else, we are doomed in the coming year to divert our attention to firefighting rather than the task of nation building,' warns Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Hitting out at Narendra Modi over his veil of secularism remark, Congress said the "cloak of secularism" envelopes all faiths while the veil of communalism is sectarian and the country is witnessing a clash of these two visions.
'Why should she involve Islam in it?' 'We are living in a secular democracy and she has the right to do what she wants. but why bring Islam into it?'
'At no time since Independence this issue of whether we are a secular country or whether we are a Hindu Rashtra has come up in this manner.' 'This is the most important issue which is going to decide whether we remain together as one country or not.'
'In this season of inspired mean-spirited campaigning, it still seemed remarkable that we are more likely to learn civics lessons from school children than our leaders,' says Rahul Jacob.
Rediff reader Charan Singh, 82 tells us he first saw his lady love 70 years ago.
'If the museum in his memory inspires and instils among Brahminical British Indians an attitude of equality towards Dalits, the edifice would be worth it,' reports Ashis Ray.
'I hope he will continue to be what he is. And doing so, he won't be much different from those whose example he is being given right now,' says Utkarsh Mishra.
He said it was due to the degradation of moral values that social evils such as rapes, cow slaughter and other evils are happening in the society.
Sharing the dais with arrested Congress candidate Imran Masood's wife, Rahul Gandhi on Saturday disapproved of his controversial comments threatening to chop BJP's prime ministerial candidate Modi "into pieces" saying they militated against the party's ideology.
'No one talks about the Mumbai riots anymore, though like Delhi 1984, the guilty have not been punished. In Gujarat, many powerful leaders of the state's ruling party are in jail for their role in the riots... In Mumbai, only one politician of the Shiv Sena, a former MP, was convicted of hate speech, along with two other Shiv Sainiks, one of whom was a corporator and the other a junior functionary... So why the apathy? Could it be because despite these statistics and the widely-publicised findings of the Srikrishna Commission, what remained in public consciousness was the violence by the Muslims, thanks to a highly efficient Sena propaganda machine? There's no demand for it, but would an SIT probe into the closed cases of the Mumbai riots help today?' The fadeout of Mumbai's riots from public debate can be called a triumph of the communal State, argues Jyoti Punwani.
The PM said that a lie is being spread that this govt had brought the law to snatch people's rights. He dared rivals to find anything discriminatory in his work.
'India is a strange place.' 'On the one hand we have the most advanced science working on our origins and our ancestry.' 'On the other we are at war with ourselves over a temple to a god whom our first ancestors knew nothing of,' says Aakar Patel.
Civil rights activist Lakshmi Sridaran argues why South Asians must stand on the right side of history and resist the Trump administration's "systematic attack on the entire spectrum of the US immigration system."
