The journey of Abhijit Avasthi, the former national creative director of Ogilvy & Mather, is as amazing as it is unbelievable. Read on!
Born and abandoned in Mumbai, reborn in Sweden, Erika Sandberg says she is Indian on the outside but feels Swedish on the inside. Vaihayasi Pande Daniel narrates her tale.
'For so long as the rulers of Pakistan remain committed to confronting and vanquishing India, they will sustain delusions, breed terrorists, and export them.'
'The obsession of the Pakistan army with India leads to several destabilising things. Support for the Taliban in Afghanistan. Support for groups like the Lashkar-e-Tayiba, that have attacked India. Every time you get an attack like that there is a possibility of a war. And then the build up of the their nuclear arsenals. Chances of a nuclear weapon landing in the hands of a terrorist group, or a nuclear war breaking out, are tiny. But they are higher here than anywhere else in the world.'
Muzzling NGOs is unbecoming of a democracy. Self-confident democracies encourage, indeed applaud, the involvement of citizens' associations, including NGOs, in social and political decision-making and development planning. Instead, our paranoid government bullies and terrorises them, says Praful Bidwai.
'Many sepoys fought with distinction, winning some of the first Victoria Crosses to be awarded to Indians; and indeed, as in any army fighting under such inhumane conditions -- standing in the freezing sludge, with shrapnel tearing through bodies and being subjected to gas attacks -- some buckled under pressure.'
Only three percent of Indians pay income tax; our tax-GDP ratio is among the lowest in the world. This must change. Our elites must realise that India's poverty has damaging consequences for them, and that they can help decrease it. The food security bill, with all its limitations, will hopefully contribute to generating such awareness, says Praful Bidwai.
Rediff.com reproduces the 1997 feature about Laxman, his passion for crows, and of course, his genius.
'He is an extraordinarily focused, determined, full-time politician, who from the moment he wakes up to the moment that he goes to sleep is looking at the job in hand.'
A theory that is doing the rounds is that with election nearing, this depreciation of the rupee will allow politicians of all hues to bring back their ill-gotten wealth.
Very few old-style RSS workers-turned-leaders have survived Narendra Modi's political ambush in state politics. Harin Pathak's end closes the chapter for Modi who started his post-2002 riots journey with a new mix of profit-centric development and middle class-pleasing commerce, technology-driven communication with voters, and an unspoken Hindutva that speaks only through posturings and symbols. Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt reveals the real reasons for the Modi-Pathak rupture.
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