'Although Narendra Modi had no direct participation in the Ayodhya agitation, he would not have been in the dominant position he is now had it not been for the Ram Janambhoomi agitation.'
During a 'Main bhi chowkidar' event, the prime minister also took a jab at the Congress about its minimum income poll promise and said that first-time voters should see the track record of those pitching for poverty.
'In India, a really popular and well-entrenched leader is not defeated by a rival.' 'Such a leader has to defeat himself,' observes Shekhar Gupta.
'Once you set up a tweet-storm of vilification, labelling individuals anti-nationals, traitors, blasphemous, and foreign agents, you are creating enough justification for somebody with a gun to kill, or for a mob to lynch,' warns Shekhar Gupta.
Pranab Mukherjee's stewardship of the economy will stand out as much for the manner in which he managed controversies as for creating quite a few of them, says A K Bhattacharya.
'Why does Mr Modi only attack Nehru from the Dynasty?' 'At one level, it is pure politics,' notes Shekhar Gupta.
She lived for two-thirds of her life in India, adopted its national cause and customs, and took an Indian passport. She served a prison sentence in Lahore as part of Gandhi's protests against an Imperial power which happened to be her motherland. Freda Bedi delighted in confounding accepted definitions of identity.
'He is a BJP man among Dalits, not a Dalit man in the BJP.'
''He had given tools to fight all forms of homogenisation.'
'The BJP's constitution promises allegiance to India's secularism and socialism.' 'This is the oath that it makes all its members sign,' observes Aakar Patel.
Mulayam's last rites will be performed with full state honours in Saifai near Etawah in Uttar Pradesh
'George was a politician with a difference. He had the ability to stand alone, take a position, however extreme, and sustain that position,' remembers Arun Jaitley.
Ambitious diplomats continue to be attracted to politics but do they make good politicians, asks Jyoti Malhotra
Congress leaders are confident that Priyanka would act as a catalyst for the party and boost the sagging morale of cadres to put up a spirited fight against the BJP and also the SP-BSP pre-poll alliance which had already shut its door on the Congress, reports Virendra Singh Rawat.
Making his debut in West Bengal in the current campaign, Bharatiya Janata Party's PM candidate Narendra Modi on Wednesday launched a blistering attack on the Left parties and the Third Front, saying they will make India a "third rate" country.
With no clarity on the Congress getting the Leader of Opposition status in Lok Sabha, senior leader Kamal Nath threatened action against the Speaker.
'What a saint he was. What a godly person he was.'
The new chief minister will be one of the most closely watched politicians in the country in these media-driven times.
'Why has the phrase gone missing from Modi's vocabulary?' asks Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
In the coming days, the Congress may be run by a trimurti of Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka, with Rahul holding the primary position both in Parliament and in the party and Sonia and Priyanka helping him out as and when required.
'No one took umbrage, because they knew Laxman had no malice in him.'
'One hopes that in his second term, Modi spends more time reading serious material even if it bores him or is against his nature,' says Aakar Patel.
Shiv Sena's Suresh Prabhu makes predictions ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha polls
'The wheel does not need to be reinvented.' 'The question is whether we are prepared to put our shoulder to it to make it turn.'
The classic Third Year or Mid-Term Problem has afflicted all but two prime ministers who have lasted a full term, give or take a few months this way or that, points out T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan.
'Jim Corbett was a remarkable man. There's a history behind Corbett and he deserves the honour of the area being the Jim Corbett National Park.'
'There is a compulsion to look hard, decisive, and risk-taking; start something; and then conclude it in a way you can claim victory.' 'That is not such an easy option against China,' notes Shekhar Gupta.
The 84-year old veteran Congressman, who died from post-COVID complications on Monday, was a Nehru-Gandhi family loyalist.
As the government came under attack from the Opposition during the debate on the recent communal riots in the national capital that have claimed over 50 lives, the BJP members alleged that the violence was a pre-planned conspiracy and the home minister and authorities took pro-active steps to control the situation.
'Vaghela has said he is with the Congress.' 'The controversy that he may switch to the BJP is a creation of that party to create confusion in the Congress.'
'I reached Bhopal the day after the gas tragedy; the smell was still in the air. It was a professional hazard but I was not scared.'
Politicians, actors and eminent jurists have written a petition to the President to waive off the 1993 Mumbai blasts convict's execution, saying it 'would degrade us all'.
'During my nearly three decades of military service, both in war and peace, I have usefully drawn upon Gandhiji's storehouse of wisdom.' 'When military intelligence jobs require tightrope walking on the edge of moral and ethical dilemmas, I have looked up to Gandhiji,' notes Colonel R Hariharan (retd).
'Hum karan poochtey rahe avishvas ka, karan nahi bata payey to gale pad gaye'
Bishnoi said the Congress has deviated from its ideology and is no longer what it was during Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi's time.
'Somebody will need to blow the whistle, call the play to a halt, and convince all players that they belong on the same side of the goal,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'Mr Modi's next challenger/s will need to invent a new politics,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'Ne Win kept good relations with the Nehru family even though he did nothing to do business with India. When Indira Gandhi was assassinated, Ne Win took off to an undisclosed destination, leading to rumours that he had gone to India. But we had no knowledge of his visit and days later, we were told that he was so struck with grief that he went into meditation on an island.' Ambassador T P Sreenivasan delves into Rajiv Bhatia's new book on mysterious Myanmar.
'I came to hear you sing Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon. I am glad I have heard you sing.'
The BJP is contesting 437 seats this election, the Congress 423.
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