The death toll climbed to 66,333 with 1,045 more fatalities reported in 24 hours.
GST is levied on every transaction in the supply of goods and services, barring certain exempted items
"The charge that the two ministers were pro-rapist is absolutely wrong. It was sheer indiscretion on their part," Madhav said.
In a fresh twist to the decades-old Kashmir dispute, the "president" of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir has said that talks can be held with India on any proposal for an independent state of Jammu and Kashmir.
Passage of the long-pending Goods and Services Tax bill and a unanimous resolution on Kashmir were the highlights of the "highly productive" Monsoon session of Parliament which was adjourned sine die on Friday after 20 sittings.
In democratic India, a citizen can be a patriot and at the same time be critical of the government, unlike China which promulgated a national security law in Hong Kong prescribing patriotism to contest elections, observes Rup Narayan Das.
Raising the issue of Balochistan for the first time before the United Nation, India on Wednesday accused Pakistan of widespread human rights violations there as well as in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
As per the revised return filing timeline decided by the Council, for July, the sale returns will have to be filed by September 5 instead of August 10. Companies will have to file sale invoice for August with the GST Network by September 20 instead of September 10 earlier.
'The picture only looks worse from where Bajwa sits.' 'He sees a domineering India to the east, an unravelling Afghanistan and a complex Iran to the west, an overbearing China on the north and a US which is no longer an ally,' observes Shekhar Gupta.
India and Indians can ignore Pakistan, but that cannot be said of other nations in the neighbourhood, where New Delhi's 'Neighbourhood First' policy constantly reverberates. Four of the eight SAARC member-nations are Muslim -- Afghanistan and Pakistan, Bangladesh and the Maldives. The rulers decide the nation's India or anti-India policy in the first two, and street-opinion contributes to the same in the latter two, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
ISI chief Faiz Hameed coerced the Taliban to announce an interim government guaranteed to preserve Pakistan's control over the levers of power in Kabul, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'It's not only what's been done politically. It's also the way it's been done. It's the suffocating atmosphere.'
'If development, investment, employment, implementation, credibility and commitment are ensured, security will automatically improve and subversive and militant elements will lose ground and be neutralised by the people themselves,' says B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
'The challenge before the two countries is to turn the peak into a plateau and enter an irreversible phase of cooperation,' notes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
'The people of the state can be won over by love, and not by swords.'
If we ignore Pakistan and direct our energies to more important issues at the UN, our position against internationalising Kashmir would be strengthened.
A few incidents of protests were reported in Jammu city even as mobile Internet services remained suspended and policemen deployed in strength to thwart any flare up.
While the BJP has taken a beating, its leader still stands tall, points out T N Ninan.
At least 56 seminaries and facilities being run by JuD and its wing FIF in Pakistan's southern Sindh province have been taken over by authorities.
The government's focus is on containing and controlling coronavirus the ministry of external affairs said on Thursday and advised Indians to stay put wherever they are and travel only under compelling reasons.
'Modi should not feel shy of proclaiming as the meaning of secularism regard for all religions in proportion to their numbers in tune with the spirit of democracy and adopting it as State policy,' says B S Raghavan.
Hurt by Supreme Court's intervention in deciding the fate of BCCI president-in-exile N Srinivasan, former India captain Bishen Singh Bedi said it is time the "cricket board is brought under the RTI ambit".
Now candidates can appear for NEET any number of times.
Vikas Swarup says India unlikely to give Pathankot-like offer to Pak in Uri attack probe.
National Anti-Doping Agency Director General Navin Agarwal says all the Rio Olympics-bound sportspersons have undergone testing for banned substances and are dope-free. He, however, conceded that there were issues regarding testing of a few Rio-bound sportspersons as they were not available at the 'whereabouts' provided by them as mandated under the Anti-Doping Administration Management System (ADAMS) of the World Anti-Doping Agency, but NADA was able to get their testing done later on.
'What Trump and Kim have demonstrated is that leaders need not remain prisoners of the status quo and they can, by showing the necessary will and courage, break out of the hang-ups and constrictions of the past and carve out a new pathway for themselves,' says B S Raghavan.
'Is Ansari flagging a genuine concern? Is a rectification called for?' 'And finally: Do minorities matter?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
A marathon session of over a dozen hearings on implementation of Justice Rajendra Mal Lodha panel recommendations on structural reforms in the Board of Control for Cricket in India came to an end on Wednesday in the Supreme Court, which took the Indian cricket board to task over issues like fund utilisation and avoiding of performance audits.
"Will anybody want a servant that who is on vacation when needed at home? And nobody knows where he is," he continued.
In his last column for Rediff.com, Praful Bidwai joins issues with those lauding India's covert operation against Naga rebels based in Myanmarese territory.
Indian intelligence agencies have often claimed that left-wing extremists are trying to make inroads in the militancy-hit regions of north-east to foment further unrest. But Jaideep Saikia, noted terrorism and conflict analyst, claims, "People who speak of Maoism taking roots in the north-east have not read history".
