"There is no doubt we are fighting with our backs to the wall but these political bonfires in the BJP will help to consolidate our position to some extent," a senior Congress leader tells Rediff.com's Anita Katyal.
The actor-turned-politician hit out at the BJP leadership, alleging there's no place left for dialogue in the BJP anymore and the party's top brass "doesn't value its own people and views opponents as their enemies".
By changing the nation's name from India to Bharat, would this landmass overnight lose the emotional and cultural linkage that had been built over generations, centuries and millennia, asks N Sathiya Moorthy.
'It will be fascinating to see how Modi, for the first time in his political life without a majority, is able to manage the ambitions and the conflicts,' says Aakar Patel.
While PM Narendra Modi-Amit Shah dominated the national executive, senior chief ministers and 'margdarshaks' LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi were ignored
Opposition leaders believe this entire plan has been put in place to ensure that Mamata Banerjee is kept out of office in West Bengal.
Trouble is brewing for the Congress in Haryana with its Gurgaon Lok Sabha Member of Parliament Rao Inderjit Singh making a statement that Congress president Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra must be punished if he is found guilty of 'sham land deals' in Haryana. Reenu Mittal reports
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh ideologue Govindacharya said that Sushma Swaraj and Vasundhara Raje should quit on moral grounds in the wake of the Lalit Modi controversy as from common man's perception they are "guilty".
On the basis of many conversations with stakeholders on the Telangana issue, Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt presents an FAQ to help understand the politics of posturing and realpolitik on the ground to win seats. The questions are many and the answers are not straight
'If the Opposition believes the BJP is out to undermine the principles on which the Constitution rests, they had better start behaving as though they believe in those principles,' says T N Ninan.
If Narendra Modi wants to become prime minister, he needs to do better, argues Amberish K Diwanji.
'Whoever whispered in his ears that go for demonetisation, misled him completely' and the PM lacked the sagacity to know that it would not work, Yashwant Sinha tells Archis Mohan.
Karunanidhi was convinced that using the 2G cases against the DMK and reopening the fodder case against Lalu Prasad Yadav were products of the Congress leadership's short-sightedness. A revealing excerpt from A S Panneerselvan's Karunanidhi: A Life.
Amid a plethora of senior party leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah, Bharatiya Janata Party's Devendra Fadnavis took the oath of office at a mega function organised at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai.
The BJP continuing to look at the Dravidian polity through the religious prism has not worked in Tamil Nadu whereas it has yielded political and electoral results across much of the rest of the country, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Digvijay Singh's questions on Rahul's leadership, Antony's on Congress's secularism are all red herrings, says Virendra Kapoor.
Leaders hope the Ayodhya temple ceremony would pave way for harmony.
The Amritsar Lok Sabha battle is getting more and more personal. Congress candidate and former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh says merely being a Punjabi does not give his Bharatiya Janata Party rival Arun Jaitley the right to contest from Amritsar and he does not know anything about the place.
'Mr Vajapyee felt that you could pray to any god or not pray at all, but the country comes first.'
By the looks of it, the Congress cannot hope to return to power even in election 2024. What it can do is to start from the bottom, hold organisational elections, which are honest, and co-opt those elected to form teams of office-bearers at all levels, right up to the working committee. By the very nature of the elections that they are going to lose, the party should use the interim to shore up youth power, or whatever remains, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'After Vajpayee-Advani, Modi-Shah is the second best in India.'
Nirmala Sitharaman's elevation not only to full Cabinet minister but also pitchforking her to the elite Cabinet Committee on Security group with the defence portfolio is undoubtedly the biggest takeaway from Sunday's reshuffle, says Rajeev Sharma.
The 'Atal-Advani era' in the BJP is truly over, believes Karuna Shukla, the niece of party stalwart Atal Bihari Vajpayee
While the Opposition is making a belated effort to form a joint front against the BJP, Mamata's ambiguous stand has created confusion, observes Virendra Kapoor.
BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi is predicted to win both seats -- Varanasi and Vadodara. Kejriwal is places at number 2 in Varanasi, says the ABP News-Nielsen exit poll. Senior BJP leader L K Advani is likely to win the Gandhinagar Lok Sabha for the sixth time.
Interestingly, the choice of August 5 as the day of the bhoomi pujan coincides with the abolition of Kashmir's special status on the same day a year ago. Perhaps the RSS-BJP wants August 5 to be remembered as the date on which the foundation stone of their cherished Hindu rashtra was laid, notes Amulya Ganguli.
With only one day left, the Winter session of Parliament is on the verge of a washout as it failed to transact any business again on Thursday.
Dolly, who is leading from the front in Amritsar, wakes up early, plans things for her husband's campaign, oversees resources, does nukkad meetings and keeps busy -- all without getting into the limelight. Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com's fascinating insights into the battle for Amritsar!
As a member of his Cabinet, the former finance minister would give valuable inputs because of his knowledge of parliamentary and government history, Modi said, adding that he will always miss his presence and called him an "encyclopedia".
It is unlikely that Delhi's outgoing chief minister will be able to make a comeback in politics. For her, the innings is truly over, writes Pankaj Vohra.
Cassandras and Congressis may sneer at the findings, but the Times Now poll indicated that the Modi government was very much on its way to a second term.
As of now, there is nothing to suggest that the 'Michaelpatti episode' has the potential to polarise Dravidian Tamil Nadu on religious lines, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
'He failed to foresee that the campaign of hatred need not be continuous; a sporadic, scattered campaign is enough.' 'What was important is to keep the pot boiling, not let it overflow like happened during the masjid-mandir days,' notes Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Amit Shah's formal leadership of the Bharatiya Janata Party might have its days numbered, given the range of resentment now coming forth against him.
Arvind Kejriwal said that 20-25% of AAP's votes transferred to SAD-BJP.
Whose political stock is likely to rise and which leader is most likely to make an impact in the coming year?
'Mr Modi's next challenger/s will need to invent a new politics,' says Shekhar Gupta.
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.
Could the defeat of Vasundhara Raje, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, and Raman Singh in last year's polls in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh, respectively, augur a transition in the command structure of these states, where they reigned supreme?
A scrutiny of the PM's statements in the last 12 weeks lays bare a stunning lack of homework for a policy that has affected each of the 1.25 billion people of India.
