The sectarian killings by hit-and-run groups have revived and sharpened communal fears among the victims while the Poonch encounter reveals how deep the terrorists have dug in without getting noticed in the porous border area, notes Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished commentator on Kashmir affairs.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday mocked Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray for "handing over the remote control" of the party to the Congress as he took poll battle to Mumbai with less than a week left for voting in Maharashtra.
'The world is silent because your rhetoric is dishonest and rings hollow,' says former RAW officer Tilak Devasher.
Niazi, hand-picked by his party chief Imran Khan, resigned on Thursday after 25 lawmakers of his party moved a resolution of no-confidence motion against him to replace him with party's regional president Sardar Tanveer Ilyas.
'No country or society ever prospered or remained secure by marginalising more than one-sixth of its own,' warns Shekhar Gupta.
Indian police arrested seven students in the Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) region under anti-terror laws for allegedly celebrating Australia's victory over India in the men's Cricket World Cup final earlier this month, police said on Tuesday.
Every trick in the trade is being tried unabashedly.
In simple arithmetical terms every possible 'arrangement' is being made to deny a majority to its rivals. A split verdict would hand a vital advantage to the BJP which is adept at extracting the best out of such a situation, notes Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished commentator on Kashmir affairs.
'What matters to me is that the film is reaching out and touching hearts.' 'An 85-year old man and his 75-year wife, who had never stepped into a cinema, went to see The Kashmir Files.' 'That is my real achievement.'
Top Muslim body Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind (JuH) on Thursday passed a resolution stating that Kashmir is an 'integral part' of the country and said the welfare of the people in the valley lies in their integration with India.
'If Modi had followed Vajpayee in Kashmir, then there would have been absolutely no problem in Kashmir.'
'If, as happened in Baramulla during the 2024 Lok Sabha election, the youth in the Valley get triggered enough to jump into the wider fray, the end result would be difficult to predict, especially as the state's post-August 5, 2019 political format remains substantially fragmented and foggy,' points out Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the veteran commentator on Kashmir affairs.
Over 100 writers, translators, and publishers have signed an open letter accusing the "JCB Prize for Literature" of hypocrisy, highlighting the British bulldozer manufacturer's role in demolitions across India and Palestine. They argue that the JCB's involvement in these projects contradicts its purported support for marginalized and diverse writers. The letter was released ahead of the announcement of the JCB Prize for Literature winners on November 23.
'You are a Kashmiri first. You are not an Arab.' 'Revisit our traditional sufi thought.'
Narsinghanand has several cases against him, including for allegedly making a hate speech at a conclave in Haridwar in December 2021, and was out on bail.
'The people of Jammu and Kashmir are your own people. Do not use them as cannon fodder in your laboratory.'
"Everything may look normal in Kashmir. Everything may look normal here. We may be celebrating the victory, although of course some people believe that that victory or that success of 2024 was perhaps only marginal, perhaps a lot more needs to be done," he said.
The Ameer-E-Shariat Karnataka, Maulana Sagir Ahmad Khan Rashadi, has called for a state-wide bandh on Thursday over the verdict of the high court ruling that the hijab was not essential to the practice of Islam.
'Once the violence is contained, the politicians must play their role, but unfortunately that is not happening.'
Ahead of a crucial meeting on Jammu and Kashmir, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval on Thursday met Union Home Minister Amit Shah and is believed to have discussed the security situation in the Union territory which has witnessed a spate of targeted killings since May 12.
After a Kashmiri Pandit shopkeeper was shot at by terrorists in Shopian in Jammu and Kashmir on Monday, his family received immense support from his Muslim neighbours who not only rushed him to a hospital but camped at his house as well to ward off any further trouble.
Jammu and Kashmir BJP chief Ravinder Raina, seeking re-election from Nowshera assembly constituency of Rajouri district in Jammu and Kashmir, is facing a major challenge from his former party colleague Surinder Choudhary.
At least 12 people have been detained as police have formed a Special Investigation Team, while deputy commissioner Vishesh Paul Mahajan has assured the protesters that stern action will be taken against the accused.
'.. if the cost is its own survival,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
The people in both places have lived in a state of denial, refusing to accept the bald fact that resorting to violence against an infinitely superior force is suicidal, observes T N Ninan.
The home minister, however, said the government will make an exception in case someone from a family comes forward and informs the authorities that his or her close relative has joined a terror outfit.
'We do not want Kashmiri Pandits to migrate from Kashmir.'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said he wants the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance to win 400 seats in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls to ensure the Congress does not bring back Article 370 in Kashmir and put a 'Babri lock' on the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
'We know how to kill a terrorist, but we do not know how to stop an innocent boy getting radicalised.'
'This Ram Navami -- the birth anniversary of Lord Ram -- presents the majority community an opportunity to shed its minority complex and offer an olive branch and discrimination- free society to the minority,' suggests Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'Earlier we had been told we were the crown of India.'
Braving the heat, hundreds of protesters, including women and children, gathered at the Jantar Mantar to protest against the killings of Kashmiri Pandits in the valley.
'In both places the minority was disproportionately powerful.' 'Few people acknowledge it but at its core the Tamil Nadu problem between the Brahmins and the rest was one of power.' 'In Kashmir the Hindus held most of the land and the accompanying political power, while the Muslims were the peasants and powerless,' notes T C A Srinivasa Raghavan.
Modi referred to the Lok Sabha polls as a "Kurukshetra (battle)" in which "there is development on one hand and 'vote jihad' on the other".
Four persons, including a Pakistani terrorist and his accomplice, were killed in a gunfight in Hyderpora locality of Srinagar late Monday evening. The dead also included the house owner and a doctor, whom police dubbed as 'terror associates'.
At a time when the Kashmir valley has been shut down, it is perhaps appropriate that we remember Lal Ded, Kashmir's best known spiritual and literary figure, someone remembered with divine adoration both by Hindus and Muslims in Kashmir. A fascinating excerpt from Sandhya Mulchandani's For The Love Of God: Women Poet Saints Of The Bhakti Movement.
At the moment, there appears to be no alternative political narrative to the one lying buried under the debris of havoc caused on this front by the fallout of 'August 5, 2019', asserts Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished commentator on Kashmir affairs.
70-plus years after Independence, 'Hindu India, metamorphosised as 'Hindutva India', is proving the British right -- and for all the wrong reasons. Mohan Bhagwat should have answers for the why of it, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Today, there is pervasive fear in society; an uncertainty of what might happen.' 'This has forced Muslims to shrink further into mental ghettos, with many considering extreme measures like pretending to change their identity.'
The former chief minister urged the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh not to be disheartened or lose hope over the apex court's decision.
