Tea and coffee estates, the smell of eucalyptus in the crisp mountain air, cool nights huddled in shawls, sylvan lake rides and mountain treks... Peace and tranquility is at hand!
'If you batted an eyelid and drifted the vehicle a little, you'd certainly hit the unsteady rocks and meet your end. Or so it seemed.' 'By the way, did I tell you that we were cruising at approximately 12,000 feet and above?'
'All those photographs I had seen before about Ladakh were not photoshopped.' 'Ladakh, truly, was nature's masterpiece.'
A Ganesh Nadar/Rediff.com records a heated discussion on NaMo at one of Varanasi's best-known locations.
And then came the chief moment of Friday. If the courtroom had a soundtrack, Beethoven's 9th would be playing, providing a triumphant, dramatic prologue to the production of this last clip. A woman reporter was asking Mekhail about Sanjeev Khanna. He says clearly, without mincing words, emphatically: 'Never seen him. First time I am hearing his name.'
At 19, he quit everything to work in a tribal village for free.
'Hinduism is not a religion, but a way of life, a philosophy.'
'Fearlessness, courtesy, humour, wide interests and wisdom, deep commitment to science and technology, passion for the environment, objectivity and the ability to see many things through not only a national but also an international prism.'
'Some people petitioned the adhikari (government official) and a electricity pole was unloaded here, but because we were not here at that time, some people from a neighbouring village took it to their village instead.' As Bihar goes to the polls, Rediff.com looks at the state through the stories of its people.
No-Punchline humour reminds us how in our daily lives, we all are by turns 'The Corrupt Politician we criticise,' 'The Chauvinist Male we frown upon,' 'The Rule Breaker we deride through our Facebook posts,' 'The Communal Virus we so easily lampoon' and 'The Bad Artist we spoof.' In a land where the aforesaid prototypes are our major sources of 'funny,' is there an audience for the NPL kind of humour, asks Sreehari Nair.
A round-up of Ranji Trophy matches played across India on Tuesday
In our special series revisiting great Hindi film classics, we look back at Randhir Kapoor and Jaya Bhaduri's 1972 film, Jawani Diwani.
While Mussoorie is the nerve point with all the hustle bustle of the tourist activities, Landour lies quietly reminiscent of a 19th century British suburb.
The perception about JNU being 'radical' is one that is as old as JNU itself. But the university is more than just that. At its heart, its campus is a mosaic of ideologies that allow its students to breathe politically.
The argument that a Bharatiya Janata Party government has no business marking the 125th birth anniversary of Panditji makes little sense, says Virendra Kapoor
Their families are poor and do not know what IIT is but their sons dream of IIT and working for ISRO and NASA one day. One man is helping them towards their dream. As Bihar goes to the polls, Archana Masih salutes its greatest success story.
'Promise less, exceed expectations' should be the lesson for the Modi government
Modi cannot afford to fail the Indian people and in return the Indian people cannot fail Modi. There is too much riding on this equation for failure to be an option. There is too much invested in this relationship for it to splinter, says Vivek Gumaste.
A party of newbies which had anger as fuel and hope in its own capability to work wonders suddenly finds itself not only in government but put on fast forward by everyone. These are heavy burdens for a fledgeling party, to perform under a microscope. Transparency is what they promised, and they are in a glass house now, says Mahesh Vijapurkar.
'He deserved to be field marshal because he carried the air force and navy with him in '71. Remember we were fighting on two fronts -- east and west. He stood out.'
Given her penchant for obfuscating issues Mamata is encouraging the false perception, parroted by her political hangers-on, that all refugees from Bangladesh would face the brunt of deportation once the BJP came to power. In fact, Didi's theatrics and those of all her extras, in the last few days, have been based on propagating this falsehood, says Dr Anirban Ganguly.
'In May 2014, India got its Donald Trump equivalent as prime minister in the form of Narendra Modi. Come 2016, we will know if America too gets its own version of Modi by electing Trump,' says Shehzad Poonawalla.
Business reacted with caution to the reforms of 1991, and demanded protection from multinationals and imports. Twenty-five years later, traces of that demand can still be found, reports Bhupesh Bhandari.
And here's how not to make them...
Miffed that Narendra Modi's presence has been limited in Varanasi city on Thursday, BJP leader Arun Jaitley slammed the returning officer for denying permission to the party's Bharat Vijay rallies and the Ganga aarti scheduled in the city.
Le MaxAvailable at Rs 32,999, Rs 36,999 and a steep Rs 69,999 for different variants, the pricing is surely going to throw a spanner in the sales of a Chinese phone that looks promising.
How do you even define a movie that primarily exists as an invitation to its audience -- an invitation to come and merely laze around with a set of interesting characters, asks Sreehari Nair.
What is going on?! How can an amazing country like India face such highs and lows? Where do these brutes come from? Who are these people who are hijacking the goodness of this country? Who create them? Did we? Can someone please tell me what went wrong with India.
Will the 2016 assembly election be Stalin's to lead the DMK in?
'Cultural property crimes have been linked, by the United Nations and others, to terrorism.' 'These links show the perpetrators to be associated with major criminal and terrorist networks like ISIS.
Rediff.com reproduces the 1997 feature about Laxman, his passion for crows, and of course, his genius.
Indian billionaires do not believe in sitting on their wealth.
Vernon Gonsalves, who spent nearly six years in jail after being labelled a Naxalite by the security agencies, recounts in detail his arrest, the case against him and his future plans in an exclusive interview.
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