'Panipat has all the meat for a political drama meets war movie. But in Ashutosh Gowariker's failure to process its complexity, the material never rises beyond a mediocre hurray to the Maratha manoos,' says Sukanya Verma.
The Opposition is also expected to target the Eknath Shinde-led government on shifting of mega projects like Foxconn to Gujarat, according to political observers.
World over, pluralism is in retreat. Luckily for us, Indian pluralism and its consequent tolerance of diversity is rooted in our basic values. As long as we remain faithful to these values and keep our institutions in good health, the Indian miracle of last 75 years is likely to last centuries, asserts Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Kabir Kala Manch activists had allegedly made provocative speeches leading to violence at Koregaon Bhima in the district, according to an FIR registered at Vishrambaug police station after the event.
Kangana Ranaut, Hrithik Roshan and Ajay Devgn get ready to live real lives.
'Isn't it tragic, comic as well as ironic that the people who owe their allegiance to the Constitution of India are declared deshdrohis without an iota of evidence?' 'But this mistake has to be corrected and those who actually and directly fomented the Bhima Koregaon riots and the masterminds behind these people will have to be exposed now.'
'Talwar se zyada dhaar chalane wale ki soch mein honi chahiye,' says the strategy-savvy Bajirao in Bajirao Mastani. Only if director Sanjay Leela Bansali had listened, says Sukanya Verma.
Fadnavis also reiterated that the three-party MVA dispensation will collapse under its own weight, and asserted that once that happens, his party would provide an alternative government in the state.
Nothing would please our adversaries if the court verdict sees triumphalism on the part of the majority and sullen anger of the minority, says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'There is a remarkable link between the eating of beef (or at the very least, tolerating the eating of beef) and India being a superpower.' 'In India, whenever an empire was strong, religion took a back seat.' 'Alternatively, whenever religion asserted itself, the main empire of India crumbled...'
'Aurangzeb, who had destroyed the Hindu temples of Mathura and Kashi and many others in the north, was a very different ruler when he came to Maharashtra.' 'He did not touch a single temple in Maharashtra.' 'It was possibly the greatest triumph of Shivaji's statesmanship,' notes Colonel Anil A Athale (retd), the well known military historian.
'...it gets a survey report that they are going to lose elections.' 'The fear of losing elections will make them immediately conduct a caste census.'
'The politics of Goa is moving around a sole entity, which is land.'
Bajirao, an unorthodox leader, faced much opposition during his lifetime from the Brahmins of Pune. In the last hundred years or so, he has been ignored due to caste politics in Maharashtra where he has become a 'non person' for having been born a Brahmin, says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Maharashtra has a rich wealth of forts, more than any other state in the country. 'If nothing is done, some of the small forts may simply disappear in the next 50 years.'
"Articles 15(4) and 16(4) (dealing with provision for socially and educationally backward classes, and reservation) do not put any limit on the percentage of quota and there is no constitutional hurdle in increasing the same," Sharad Pawar said.
'Facebook and Google no longer need to have infantry regiments and cavalry like the East India Company because they are inside everyone's phones listening to our conversations.'
These forts are what fairy tales are made of.
This December has a lot in common with the Diwali of 2007!
The Battle of Pratapgad can be termed the turning point in Indian history as it interrupted the continuous chain of Muslim successes on the battlefield.
'We were supposed to be a united nation based on unity and diversity.' 'Now what we are doing is there will be a class called Marathas, Dangars, etc.' 'The 100 per cent of our nation's population will be in classes and you will be allocating the nation's education and service resources in terms of classes.' 'How does it work out in terms of equality? Where is your equal nation?'
Where paneer came to India from... How sambar got its name... Gulab jamun does not have Indian roots...
'Tanhaji has so much fun recreating a bygone legend and fictionalising history, authenticity and spellings, it gets infectious,' feels Sukanya Verma.
As it celebrates 50 years of being in business, Joginder Tuteja looks at the big hits in the first part of this special.
'Shivaji was among a handful of Indian rulers to realise the importance of sea power... Not much attention is paid to his remarkable achievement: Building a modern navy and the revival of Indian maritime power.'
While it took the Congress nearly a half century to earn the hatred of other political outfits, the BJP appears set to reach there in around six years, says Arun Bhatnagar, former secretary to the GoI.
'It is a reassertion of their lost martial stride, of a history that is papered over by turning it into a memory largely of the upper castes.'
It is important for every sort of development and governance in Telangana that the people identify completely with their governing structures. This identification confers legitimacy on a government -- not just elections and number of votes. That identification has been missing in Telangana for 700 years, says Dr Gautam Pingle in the first of a two-part series on the new state.
'Terrorism is merely a symptom of a deeper disease in Pakistan's body politic,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Savarkar believed Swarajya is more than the mere geographical independence of a stretch of earth called India. There was no point in fighting and sacrificing one's life for a Swarajya (mere territorial independence) at the cost of our Svatva (self-existence) or Hindutva itself! A revealing excerpt from Uday Mahurkar and Chirayu Pandit's Veer Savarkar: The Man Who Could Have Prevented Partition.
Christopher Nolan's next, Gulzar's gussa, Shyam Benegal's Shivaji and RD's Lawrence of Arabia connection, catch all this and more in Sukanya Verma's super filmi week.
'In Pakistan there has been no problem about the installation of the statues of these men, unlike the Jinnah portrait or other controversies that seem to be present in India these days quite regularly,' says Aakar Patel.
'This is a giant film, a magnum opus drunk on its own magnum-ity, and it is perfectly clear early on, as the narrative races out the gate and gauntlets are flung up in the air and shot through with arrows, that a film like this can only work as opera,' says Raja Sen.
The post mandate comments that 'darkness has descended on India' shows the kind of opposition Modi has to overcome. It is this aspirational India that is attempting to throw away shackles of Macualayism. Make no mistake it is a tectonic shift and a beginning of the end of Maculayan mindset that has 'ruled' India for close to 60 years, says Colonel (retd) Anil Athale.
Princess Jahanara, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan's daughter, was a paragon of virtues: well-educated, well-versed in statecraft, even-tempered, beautiful. Although she was on the side of Dara Shikoh in the succession battle, it says much for her stature that after Shah Jahan's death, she was made the chief lady of the court by Aurangzeb and accorded every respect.
'The Elgar Parishad turned out to be the first rallying cry against the BJP and RSS in Maharashtra.' 'The speakers took a vow not to vote for the BJP.'
Karnad, a recipient of Jnanpith Award, was also conferred the Padma Shri in 1974 and the Padma Bhushan in 1992.
Books like Sunil Khilnani's Incarnations: India in 50 Lives, simple and straightforward though they appear, are instead powerful arguments for complexity, for empathy, and for curiosity
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