'The West has always opposed a strong nationalist leader in India and Narendra Modi is no exception.' 'The West prefers weak leaders who are amenable to Western pressure and Mr Modi's independent stance is not to the liking of the West,' asserts Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Voting was underway on Friday in 102 Lok Sabha seats spread across 21 states and Union territories in the first of the seven phases of the world's largest electoral exercise, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging voters to exercise their franchise in record numbers.
'Respect the pledges you have made to the people of Kashmir.' 'Jammu and Kashmir is not like any other state of the country.'
The real risk is that the core assumption -- that the votes for a candidate sponsored by an alliance will at least equal the sum total of its parts -- proves to be facile, observes T N Ninan.
'He should not come to Kerala and fight against the CPI which is an integral part of the INDIA alliance'
The Bharat Nyay Yatra will be mostly covered by bus along with short stretches of walking.
In nearly 100 seats, the BJP stands almost no chance of winning. In 200 seats, it is a direct fight between the BJP and the Congress where the BJP has an upper hand. In 243 seats, the BJP is pitted against regional parties and it is not going to be easy. That is why 400 seats may end up as a pipe dream, states Ramesh Menon, author of Modi Demystified: The Making of a Prime Minister.
The Congress-led grouping has some reasons to feel emboldened over recent political developments.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said the people have given his government a mandate for stability and continuity for the third consecutive term after seeing its work of 10 years and accused the Congress of trying to build a narrative that it has defeated the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance in the Lok Sabha polls.
Had it not been for the slow but sure emergence of China as a threat to the western order, would India have been accepted as a near-equal partner by individual western nations, jointly and severally, questions N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Increasing Indian influence meant "people here in Washington DC, in Brussels, in London or other world capitals don't talk about Kashmir".'
'It is time to not merely assert that Kashmir is an internal problem, but begin to act on it,' argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Chidambaram pitched for greater autonomy for the restive Jammu and Kashmir yet again on Sunday, drawing stinging criticism from the Bharatiya Janata Party, with Union minister Smriti Irani calling it "shocking and shameful".
PDP said the coalition will move forward on the basis of last year's 'Agenda of Alliance' which encompasses all issues -- political and economic.
The scaling up of the India-US strategic partnership to the level of non-NATO ally with defence deals, sharing and transfer of defence technology, interoperability, joint collaboration and joint production of defence equipment has exacerbated Moscow's anxiety, notes Rup Narayan Das.
'It is not his doing, but Rahul Gandhi is forced by circumstances.' 'In taking political decisions, everything has to get his clearance.'
In a significant move to enhance its strategic resource security, India has officially released its first-ever critical minerals list, identifying 30 key critical minerals crucial to the nation's economic growth and technological development. This pioneering step aims at reducing import dependence, enhancing supply-chain resilience, and supporting the country's net-zero objectives. Union Minister Parliamentary Affairs, Coal and Mines Pralhad Joshi, while releasing the Critical Minerals for India report in New Delhi on Wednesday, said, "India is readying for an Atmanirbhar Bharat."
The best, wisest, and fairest next step in strengthening our own cause is to restore statehood to Jammu & Kashmir and allow the resumption of robust political activity. That's a box that remains unchecked on the Modi government's report card as we approach the fourth anniversary of Kashmir's Constitutional shift, notes Shekhar Gupta.
Kashmiris hope that India and Pakistan can find a lasting solution to what many call the Kashmir 'problem'.
She said poor people and farmers have been badly hit by high denomination rupee ban decision.
She also sought confidence building measures to be undertaken on the lines of those initiated in 2002.
The Congress on Thursday renamed the Rahul Gandhi-led Manipur-Mumbai yatra starting on January 14 as the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra, which will travel through 100 Lok Sabha segments in 15 states including Arunachal Pradesh, and asserted it will prove to be as 'transformative' as his earlier cross-country march.
The new PDP chief will have to work hard to keep everyone in the state happy.
There is only one perpetrator, Hamas. It is a terrorist organisation. It is obscene to argue that until the Palestinian question is solved, anybody has the right to use terrorism as an instrument of policy, argues Shekhar Gupta.
The Opposition parties need to spell out how exactly they will protect the citizen from government excess, asserts T N Ninan.
'It should be of concern that some youth in Kashmir have started raising Daesh flags along with those of Pakistan.'
Jairam Ramesh said the Congress has to be the "fulcrum" of any Opposition alliance to take on the BJP in the 2024 general elections as it is the only political force with a pan-India presence.
'There is a problem with the rise of a popular view that sees Kashmir through the prism of the larger, chronic Hindu-Muslim tensions.' 'By redefining the Kashmir problem simplistically in Hindu-Muslim terms could end up keeping Kashmir but losing most Kashmiris,' says Shekhar Gupta.
The Congress will launch a two-month door-to-door campaign across India from next week to spread Rahul Gandhi's message among the masses, senior leader Jairam Ramesh said on Friday.
'US officials must grapple with the possibility that one of its closest partners attempted an extrajudicial killing on its soil.' 'This is not something that friends typically do to friends.'
The former Union minister asserted that an objective analysis of the political situation will lead to the conclusion that the Congress has to be the "pole" around which Opposition unity in the 2024 Lok Sabha election can be built.
'The performance of any government is benchmarked on five parameters -- India's external security, the state of the economy, social cohesion, internal security, and India's relations with the world or its foreign policy. On each of the benchmarks in the past nine years, the NDA-BJP government has come up completely short'
Violent clashes broke out between a group of youths and security forces in parts of the city on Saturday, leaving a youth and a policeman injured in stone pelting as separatist groups called a strike in Srinagar condemning the police action on Jamia Masjid on Friday.
'India needs to learn in Kashmir how to spread development.' 'Pakistan needs to learn in Balochistan how to spread development.' 'China needs to learn in Xinjiang and Tibet.' 'And if they can show tangible benefits, there will be less terrorism.' 'No one wakes up in the morning saying 'I want to kill myself', right?'
'The National Conference and the Peoples Democratic Party, as recent events suggest, are quite content as New Delhi's collaborators rather than trying to be true representatives of the Kashmiri people,' says Athar Parvaiz.
'The Government of India should start a dialogue with the people of Ladakh, but the trouble is they are not willing to listen to our grievances.'
The ongoing violence in the valley is driving students to excel, but it is also making them angry, discovers Ritwik Sharma.
In the prevailing difficult circumstances, the Congress is the only party that can provide capable and decisive leadership to the country, Kharge asserted.
Neither Biden nor his successors can any longer ignore the threat China has come to pose to the US in both economic and military fields, observes Virendra Kapoor.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's JD-U launched a frontal attack on ally BJP, asking it to rein in 'loudmouth leaders' whose 'arrogance' had cost it an old partner like the Shiv Sena.
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