Didi embarks on her new mission: To unite the Opposition to take on Modi in the Lok Sabha elections of 2024, observes Payal Singh Mohanka.
Legendary artist Sayed Haider Raza speaks to Payal Mohanka about roots and compassion
Payal Mohanka discovers the medieval magnificence of Prague.
'For the first time one single party is getting 49% which is a record of its own.'
It was truly heartening to see how the Sikh community had risen to the occasion during the Black Lives Matter peaceful protests and the coronavirus pandemic and selflessly served those looking for nourishment.
Once a boxing champion, life has dealt Krishna Routh a severe blow.
'I consider myself to be a 50 year old with a 16-year-young mind, ready to conquer more continents,' Dr Shuvendu Sen tells Payal Singh Mohanka.
Undeterred by the pandemic, Deep Narayan Nayak, a school teacher in a village in Bengal, changes countless lives for the better. Payal Singh Mohanka reports on this Extraordinary Indian.
'It will be normal, regular, everyday politics whether you like it or not.' That's what this country needs,' a New Yorker tells Payal Singh Mohanka.
'The EC's role in this is questionable. What is the reason for this delay? Are they waiting for instructions?'
The constitution of the Missionaries of Charity that declares, 'We shall not impose our Catholic faith on anyone, but have profound respect for all religions.'
What startles a visitor like me from India is how the 2020 US presidential election has divided families, husband and wife, parents and children, observes Payal Mohanka.
'I urged the chief minister even before she took her oath requesting her to send a tough message to the police and the administration that any violent activity, any destruction of property, any arson, loot in your area, they will be held accountable.' 'Her silence on this speaks volumes.'
One man follows Guru Nanak's visits to multi-faith sites across nine countries.
'With sufficient gaps between polling dates, the BJP will have time to convert the 'fence-sitter' votes,' observes Payal Mohanka.
'There is arson, loot, rape of women, traumatising children, destruction of property, homes, shops and offices by workers and elements of the ruling dispensation.' 'What is most painful is while all this was taking place there was stunning silence by the chief minister.' 'Not one tangible step was taken.'
'A hundred days later, it is a moot point whether the lockdown has been partially or totally effective, or, as sceptics indicate, plain ineffective.' 'Did it actually deflect infections and the loss of lives, or was it merely a hasty decision rammed down the populace's throats that choked the economy and caused the searing tragedy of dispossessed migrant workers?' ask Radha Roy Biswas and Manoj Mohanka.
'They have a voracious appetite.' 'But there are many places where they go and they lose.'
'Mamata will beat the living daylights out of BJP workers with the result that people who are not totally committed, they will promptly leave the party and go back to Trinamool.' 'Or when they find they cannot get what they came to the BJP for they will go back to Trinamool.'
Wajid Ali Shah, the last Nawab of Awadh, was not just a poet, playwright, dancer and patron of the arts, says Payal Mohanka. He was a royal who hand-created his personal calendar.
Will appeasement, rising unemployment and her dictatorial style become major obstacles in her path? asks Payal Singh Mohanka.
'I could have joined the BJP in 2014, the doors were open.' 'I stayed on with the TMC, a party I was involved with since its very inception.' 'But today enough is enough.'
'Mamata has used minorities only as her vote bank.' 'In her entire election campaign Mamata did not utter a single sentence against the RSS.'
2020 has dimmed the animated bulbs that create magical images and transform Kolkata into a mesmerising fairyland during Durga Puja.
'I am as Bengali as they come in my cultural and personal orientation and I think probably all the BJP candidates who are contesting are pretty non-vegetarian in their food and as Bengali in their cultural orientation.'
Several police officers who followed the Election Commission's orders during the recent West Bengal assembly polls get punishment transfers. Payal Mohanka reports.
'A hugely dangerous game which she thought she had mastered has now found a stronger opponent,' points out Payal Mohanka.
'If the chief minister says there are areas in her home state where she cannot enter, where has she driven the state to!'
Has Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee created a situation with dangerous overtones in Bengal? In the six years that she has been in power, her detractors feel she has overplayed the politics of appeasement.
Payal Mohanka travelled to Morocco, that magical place where the past and the present don't jostle but instead coexist rather beautifully.
Did the CPI-M and Congress' shrill campaign against 'tainted' officers prompt the Election Commission to respond with alacrity?
In 1998, the Congress asked her mother to campaign. 'We had a family discussion. We explained to our mother that you will be used, you will be discarded once you are done with the campaign.' 'A few days later I got a call from my mother. She said, "I have decided to campaign".' 'We were stunned. Why was she doing this?' Payal Mohanka listens in.
'Today it is not about seeking blessings, but seeking selfies.' Payal Mohanka listens to the 'uneducated guru' Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev explain the mysteries of life.
With her trademark cotton sari and rubber slippers and her generous doles in rural Bengal, many describe Mamata Banerjee as "ultra left."
For Aanchal Malhotra, the stories of Partition were stories that needed to be told; they needed to be chronicled.
Kolkata-based artist and co-worker of the Missionaries of Charity, Ritu Singh, who has had a long association with the order, fondly remembers the gentle Sister Nirmala, who passed away on Tuesday, sharing anecdotes that truly uplift the spirit.
Jasmit Singh, 85, recalls a horrific train journey to New Delhi on the day Indira Gandhi was killed.
Exactly 50 years ago, the first Indian team, led by Manmohan Singh Kohli, reached the summit of Mount Everest. As Kohli and his team are felicitated to mark the anniversary, he reminisces on the event that continues to inspire generations of Indian mountaineers. Payal Mohanka reports
'Koi Sardar hai? Goli se maar dalenge...' 'The only sardars who were spared in the train were the six with us. And the credit goes to the innate goodness of the passengers in our coach.' Payal Singh Mohanka remembers that horrifying train journey in the aftermath of Indira Gandhi's assassination.
