Here's a glimpse of all that happened around the world last week, in 16 images
When Meenakshi Arvind and Mookambika Rathinam took an epic car journey from Coimbatore to London, they encountered a world that was more good than bad. In the cry for freedom in a dark corner of the globe, they discovered that The Mahatma remained India's greatest icon.
The Vermont Senator and Texas senator are closing in on the lead that their competitors - Clinton and Trump hold.
Everything about ISIS had indicated that this would be a violent Ramzan. A violent, divisive Ramzan sends out exactly the message that ISIS wants to send to religious Muslims outside its folds: It plays on their faith and fears, says writer Tabish Khair.
What better way to rekindle your passion than a road trip right? Anita Rao Kashi suggests these five routes:
There will remain those, though, who will remain in opposition to this massive endeavour for world peace with an aim not to improve, but to scuttle the project. But for the rest of us, a cultural and spiritual event of this significance and scale is a feast for the mind and soul, say Sankrant Sanu.
"Manna Dey sang some of the most soulful songs for my films" is how late actor Raj Kapoor described his association with Manna Dey.
Rajiv Satyal is a standup comedian. He resides at the intersection of Indian comedy and Seinfeld quotes. So you can imagine what a Seinfeld show in India affected him!
Israeli jets on Tuesday pounded 50 Hamas targets on the Gaza Strip injuring at least 17 Palestinians as part of a military offensive code-named 'Protective Edge' after a barrage of rockets hit southern Israel amid escalating tensions in the region.
Could Mumbai have been saved from terror on November 26, 2008? Perhaps, had the intelligence agencies of India, United States and Britain worked together.
Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Tayiba's technology chief had posed as an Indian businessman while negotiating to buy from an American company a Voice-over-Internet Phone service that was later used by the LeT handlers to communicate with 26/11 attackers while concealing their actual origin.
'An operation such as the Mumbai attacks, which needed expert technical assessment, money and time to prepare, could not have been carried out without the knowledge of the ISI's leadership.'
Sony World Photography Awards recently announced the winners of its first-ever mobile phone photography category.
Netanyahu's right-wing Likud party has claimed a stunning victory in the election.
'Islam insists on sameness, which is fine but can run the danger to jihad against those who are not the same.' 'Brahminical Hinduism insists on difference, which is fine but can run the danger of an oppressive internal hierarchy: Caste oppression, for instance.' 'In actual fact, humans need both sameness and difference to exist.'
The key to every Daniel Day-Lewis performance was a big theme and a thousand details. And in the final phase of his acting career, says Sreehari Nair, America became his big theme, and the details... well, he just popped them out like waffles.
'It is important to destroy, to undermine, to debunk the narrative of ISIS,' Olivier Roy -- one of the world's leading experts on radical Islam -- tells Rediff.com's Vaihayasi Pande Daniel in an exclusive interview.
'They are not affected by ISIS' sentiment of avenging the suffering of the global ummah.' 'They have a huge ummah of their own in India, a huge Muslim population.' 'And because of that, they have to take into consideration the political and social conditions of Muslims in India.' 'They have to express themselves in a more political way and not through terrorism.'
"We have diplomatic ties with both nations. Any discourteous reference can impact our relations with them," says External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj
Former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon died on Saturday at a hospital near Tel Aviv after being in a comatose state for the past eight years following a stroke. He was 85.
'Eat dhoklas, walk on Juhu beach and eat pani puri -- and not tell my parents because I will get sick!' Kal Penn shares his game plan for India with Vaihayasi Pande Daniel/ Rediff.com
'While military acts such as the Uri surgical strikes are one option, cultural, economic and diplomatic isolation should also be part of the arsenal,' argues Sankrant Sanu.
Indian Americans speak up about the daunting challenges on the 16th anniversary of the tragedy.
"South Asian studies" academics in the US would do well to introspect how they wittingly or unwittingly become part of Pakistan's proxy war in wielding influence over academics and policy, says Sankrant Sanu.
December 22 marks the 129th birth anniversary of Srinivasa Ramanujan, the greatest Indian mathematician of our time. Just 32 when he died, Ramanujan has fascinated mathematicians, writers and filmmakers for nearly a century.
'Patriotism is like love: When it has to be enforced, it isn't real.' 'And the enforcement of a homogeneous view of love for the country is a particularly divisive feature that has ripped apart societies throughout history.'
The collector king Sayajirao Gaekwad III, who lived a century ago, put together a fantastic world of Indian and European art for his subjects.
Asked to declare a holiday on the Hindu festival, the school board in Millburn Township, New Jersey, instead comes up with a solution that angers many. Rediff.com/India Abroad's George Joseph reports.
Israel on Tuesday resumed air strikes on Gaza after an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire failed to stop the escalating violence that has killed 192 Palestinians in nine days of fighting as Hamas continued to fire rockets at the Jewish state.
The Wolf of Wall Street has its moments but it is director Martin Scorsese's weakest attempt at film-making, says Aseem Chhabra.
Some 800 million or more Indians gaze at their mobile phones all day. Whoever can crack what's news on the mobile phone for them and their families, for a nominal payment of Rs 10 a month, is a winner, says Ajit Balakrishnan.
Iran and the Islamic State are "competing for the crown of militant Islam," Netanyahu said.
We continue to be what we were before 26/11-- sitting ducks, says Mahesh Vijapurkar.
Even as France mourns the bloodiest terrorist attack for 20 years, let's take a look at some major standoffs witnessed in the past:
From the Syrian civil war to the Ukrainian crisis to the terror unleashed by the dreaded Islamic State, there was no lack of news in 2014. In this five-part series,rediff.com presents a selection of the year's most enduring moments year from around the world.
'The Indian and Israeli rabbis were singing a small departure song for brave little Moshe, who had spent many, likely, heartbreaking but bittersweet hours at this home of his babyhood, looking at the drawings his mother had made for him, that were still up in his room.'
Here are some of the best photos from around the world in the month gone by...
As the political battle for the future of Maharashtra's political quinquennial future nears its electoral conclusion, Shreekant Sambrani looks at the intertwining nature of national and regional interests and the place for and value of inclusiveness in electoral politics.
