Had it not been for Pankaj Tripathi, who must have worked hard to get those Vajpayee intonations and mannerisms so perfectly well, Ravi Jadhav's flattering portrait of Vajpayee would have been more vacuous than what we get to see, observes Prasanna Zore.
On Jawaharlal Nehru's 61st death anniversary, Utkarsh Mishra recalls how India's first prime minister cultivated a unique role for the newly independent country on the world stage.
"Is it any surprise that the new Parliament is being consecrated with typically false narratives from WhatsApp University? The BJP-RSS distorians stand exposed yet again with maximum claims, minimum evidence," Congress general secretary communications Ramesh said in his tweet.
Times have changed, situations have changed, but the basic nature of superpower geo-politics remains the same and so also India's diplomacy -- call it non-alignment, strategic autonomy or neutrality; it all depends on the time scale, notes Rup Narayan Das.
What some of our leaders were up to over the weekend.
The foreign ministers of India and Pakistan expressed optimism and desire to improve ties.
Asserting that there is no role for politics in disaster response, the Obama administration has said it expects Pakistan to accept the $ 5 million aid offer from India for its flood relief work.
It appears the row over the article penned by senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Yashwant Sinha refuses to die down.
'If the ministers spend their time throwing Indian dossiers on terrorism and Pakistani dossiers on Kashmir and river waters at each other, they will miss an opportunity for creating a possible and much-needed turning point in Indo-Pakistan relations.'
Defending Defence Minister A K Antony on the Poonch killings issue, senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh on Thursday accused the Bharatiya Janata Party of politicising an issue concerning national security.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahamadinejad on Tuesday described India as a global leader and an economic powerhouse during a 30-minute interaction with visiting Indian Foreign Minister S M Krishna.
Amid indication that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is unlikely to attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Summit in Sri Lanka, the external affairs ministry on Saturday said no decision has been taken on the visit, which has been opposed by parties in Tamil Nadu as well as a section in Congress.
The facelift for the Shreenathji temple in Manama will kick off later this year.
Ahead of Foreign Minister S M Krishna's maiden visit to Australia, India has said it was still concerned over the safety of its students studying in the country, though New Delhi did not want the issue to 'infect' bilateral relations. Hoping that the attacks on Indian students will not affect the Indo-Australian relationship, Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor said that the matter will only die down when the attacks stop or become rare.
'My understanding is that by the time President Xi Jinping came for the Chennai summit [2019], he had already instructed his army to undertake the action in Galwan in the summer of 2020.'
Security will be a consideration, as would protocol, but given Modi's penchant for the unconventional, it should not come as a surprise if he indeed decides to attend the ceremony in Kabul, says Ramesh Ramachandran.
Allegations also cropped up against the local BJP MP that he did not respond to the SOS calls from the stranded students, a charge denied by the elected representative.
Few people know Ratan Tata as well as R K Krishna Kumar does. Widely perceived to be among the managers closest to Tata, Krishna Kumar assesses Ratan Tata, the man and business leader, in this exclusive interview to Rediff.com's Vaihayasi Pande Daniel.
The Bharatiya Janata Party parliamentary board has announced the name of Kiran Bedi as the chief ministerial candidate of the party for the Delhi assembly election on Monday. This was announced by party president Amit Shah. She will contest from the Krishna Nagar constituency in Delhi.
Many of the stories, the pictures going out of India worldwide lately with these provocative processions, taunting of Muslims, bulldozers targeting mostly their properties, the sweeping 'othering' of a community of 200 million are painting the front pages and TV screens in the democratic world. That is where most of the friends we covet lie. Soon enough, these will also make our vital friends among the Muslim nations, from Bangladesh to Saudi Arabia and the UAE, uneasy. The best time for course correction is now, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
Janata Dal-United chief Sharad Yadav, his party colleague Pawan K Verma in Bihar and senior Congress leaders B K Hariprasad and Rajiv Gowda of Karnataka were among the 12 candidates who filed their nominations on Monday on the last day for June 19 elections for Rajya Sabha berths in 4 states.
'While economic ties are making incremental progress, it is in the security and strategic domains that the India-Japan synergy is more compelling,' says Dr Rajaram Panda.
He has served BJP in several capacities, will also be a saviour for the NDA in the Rajya Sabha, where they are still in minority.
What the INDIA alliance needs is neither a counter to Modi's tall personality and undiminished charisma nor a counter-narrative to his Hindutva agenda, now centred on the Ayodhya temple consecration on January 22, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Days before Narendra Modi arrives in the US to speak at the UN, meet Barack Obama, gupshup with the likes of Nadella, Pichai, Zuckerberg, and address desis in Silicon Valley, his ministers will help set the commercial and strategic tone for the prime minister's visit.
'Misplaced national priorities have brought the economy to a cul-de-sac,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The Indian authorities have to reconfirm that Prabhakaran is dead. It may require seeking assistance from Interpol and also involve the re-opening of the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, and more so, the investigations, formally or otherwise, asserts N Sathiya Moorthy.
He said the Pakistan Air Force was detected and the Indian Air Force responded instantly.
'Under Modi Ji's 'Jan Dhan Loot Yojana', another scam!' he tweeted.
As the context of Panchsheel has changed, it is all the more essential that India and China need to reinvent and redefine Panchsheel for a new world order taking into account globalisation, and mutual economic interdependence. The new Panchsheel, in order to be relevant, needs to shed its binary approach of west verses the east recognising the seamlessness of global frontiers, which globalisation has brought in, says Rup Narayan Das.
Xi and Modi are scheduled to hold informal summit talks on Friday evening and on Saturday.
Hassan Rouhani to offer Friday prayers in Hyderabad's Mecca Masjid.
'The Himmatsinghji Report is still 'missing'.' 'It is a great loss for the knowledge of India's borders.' 'It would have an immense value at a time China is bound to shift its attention to other border fronts in the Himalayas,' notes Claude Arpi.
'The BSF and other forces will undertake a counter-action at a suitable time'
The protesters carried banners and placards reading "Shame on Pakistan" and "We will expose the real face of Pakistan". Some of the banners and placards urged Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan to protect the gurdwara, one of the holiest sites in Sikhism.
The statements made by the opposition parties after the preemptive air strike on terror camps have made only people of Pakistan happy, he claimed.
'If the government starts playing favourites, if the government acts in a manner which is not transparent, then natural resources which belong to not just you and me, but future generations, they fritter away. The anger against corruption, the anger against India's natural resources being looted is a consequence of the fact that within society there is a huge amount of turmoil and discontentment. Why should an Empowered Group Of Ministers or the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs decide the administered price of gas?' asks Paranjoy Guha Thakurta in this exclusive interview with Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt.
'Unquestionably, the spirit behind the Panchsheel agreement and the 'Hindi Chini bhai bhai' slogan were thrown overboard by the Chinese, and a trust deficit was injected between the two nations.' A revealing excerpt from General J J Singh's The McMahon Line: A Century Of Discord.
It has been said that by 2025, India could become among the top five economies in the world. If India does become a $5 trillion economy but gets all its rivers polluted, food chain poisoned and genetic pool depleted and biometric database of Indians sold or stolen at the behest of commercial czars, will it not be a pyrrhic economic victory, asks Gopal Krishna.
The Baton, which will stay in India for two days on October 12 and 13, will not, however, be taken in a relay by sportspersons, as is done normally, following IOA's decision to curtail the events here as there will not be adeqaute security arrangements in view of the Dussehra festival.
