People may line up to see Rahul Gandhi, given he is currently, the only major politician speaking of inflation and unemployment in an India bombarded daily by Right-wing delusion. The challenge is how to transfer the goodwill into votes when the object of curiosity is surrounded by usual suspects and sycophants, observes Shyam Menon.
The Gomti Riverfront Development project, the Agra-Lucknow Expressway, the Jai Prakash Narayan International Centre and the efforts towards the beautification of Old Lucknow are some of Akhilesh Yadav's initiatives that are the subject of investigation.
India tops the world with 11% of global deaths in road accidents while we have only 1% of the world's vehicles.
No immediate relief appears in sight as the India Meteorological Department issued a red alert for six districts which have been already pounded by downpour, forecasting "extremely heavy" rainfall and recommending preventive actions.
Bank shares were the top gainer in early trades with Bank of Baroda up over 4%.
Forget about interim Budgets, one cannot easily recall even a full Budget of any government in recent times having rolled out benefits of this order to such a large number of people, says A K Bhattacharya.
Defying prohibitory orders, protests were held in Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and several other cities. Protesters, mostly students and activists, were detained on a large scale in national capital and other places.
Governments must give companies a hearing before blacklisting them.
'If the Chinese military gets hold of some western sectors on the India-China boundary, it will give them added military advantage.'
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.
The government shouldn't hide behind the veil of making a domestic giant out of the HPC-ONGC deal, rather it should just say it needs cash from this divestment exercise, says Sudhir Bisht.
The Centre on Monday earmarked a separate Rs 2,217 crore for 42 urban centres to tackle air pollution and announced the much-awaited voluntary vehicle scrapping policy to phase out old and polluting vehicles, even as it shrunk the budgetary allocation for the environment ministry from the last fiscal by nearly eight percent. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her budget speech for 2021-22, announced a total of Rs 2869.93 crore for the ministry, Rs 230 crore less than the last fiscal. Officials said the outlay has been lesser this time as the economy is recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.
There will be pressure on the fiscal situation, especially at a time when the monsoon can also disappoint. More populist expenditure is on cards if the mandate is a hung Parliament or a coalition government.
The larger virtue of maintaining fiscal credibility should not be unduly diluted by quibbles on the fiscal math, says Sajjid Chinoy.
'The MEA, hopefully, made it clear that the Indian PM can't be seen in Xi Jinping's company when China has, for all intents and purposes, annexed over 1,000 sq kms of Indian territory in eastern Ladakh, and essentially that the Wuhan spirit and the Mamallapuram spirit have turned into vinegar.'
Sheela Bhatt drives from New Delhi to Agra and Firozabad to capture the stories of an India under lockdown.
The IMD has also issued a red-coded warning alert to the Odisha and West Bengal coasts.
However, the budget arithmetic is slightly optimistic.
That's the only way to convince those who have money to return to the bank fold, ditching other asset classes, says Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The formal notification of handing over the case to the NIA is expected to be issued by the ministry soon, an official privy to the development said.
'If the nub of India's sensitivity over the Chinese presence in Doklam is the enhanced threat to the Siliguri Corridor, a vital link to the northeast, does it serve the national purpose to have the districts along it, and then much of the tribal northeast, in turmoil?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
Alleging that he has been "harassed" and served with a chargesheet on "frivolous" grounds, Punjab's Commandant General, Home Guards, Kultaran Singh Ghumman has sought premature retirement from service.
Markets surged on hopes that the exit polls would show that the BJP winning majority in the general elections.
Nearly 6,000 passengers were stranded as train services on the Konkan Railway route in Maharashtra's Ratnagiri district were suspended on Thursday after a river overflowed following heavy rains, while incessant downpour badly hit road and rail traffic in several parts of the state, including around Mumbai, as authorities called in NDRF to help the administration in rescue efforts.
Train passenger fares may soon be linked to inflation rate, sources say, adding that the new model may be based on the Wholesale Price Index.
'India is still hierarchical, but not as much as Japan and people appreciate a flat working culture,' Charles Frump, managing director, Volvo Cars India, tells Pavan Lall.
The ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu had begun seeing Governor Ravi's decisions and actions as a part of the state BJP's non-stop criticism of its government and directed from Delhi, a view strengthened by the governor's decision to return the NEET exemption bill, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
At least 14 people were killed in Laptap village when their homes were swept away in the landslide on July 11.
If the Opposition has any chance at the prime minister's job, it can happen only if they all stop dropping names and work at the grassroots-level, state-wise, suggests N Sathiya Moorthy.
Investment in infrastructure was necessary for the economy, as power shortages, inadequate transport and poor connectivity affect overall growth performance, as per the Economic Survey 2019-20 tabled in Parliament by Union Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. "To achieve GDP of USD 5 trillion by 2024-25, India needs to spend about USD 1.4 trillion (Rs 100 lakh crore) over these years on infrastructure so that a lack of infrastructure does not become a constraint to growth," it said.
Repromulgation is a perennial malaise; and judges must clarify -- indeed, revisit -- the rules that govern this practice, argues Shubhankar Dam.
'The Chinese have been moving in step by step; inch by inch for the last 40 years.'
Hemant Shivsaran lists the number of projects the Modi government has announced since August to woo Gujarat voters.
Many in the specialised force feel they are not being treated on par with those in the armed forces. Sahil Makkar reports
Hundreds of migrant workers from Delhi, Haryana and even Punjab reached Anand Vihar, Ghazipur and Ghaziabad's Lal Kuan area after taking arduous treks of many kilometers on foot to take buses to their respective native places
India's good fortune, experts in the US feel, is not the result of a fundamentally strong economy, but because it is the best of a bad set of options.
If a feasible business model is worked out for cable operators, they will not only build the last-mile networks, but also market them among the local population telling people the benefits as well as how to utilise them
'It is possible elements within the Pakistani establishment felt bad about eating humble pie and wanted to avenge the humiliation through a terror attack.' 'After all, lodging an FIR in Pakistan about the Pathankot attack amounted to an admission of Pakistani involvement,' says Rajeev Sharma.
The government's predicament is a result of its own doing: That of not ensuring adequate buy-in by the stakeholders before passage of the laws, notes Vivek Gumaste.
The cases reported on Wednesday include a couple and their two-year-old daughter in Rajasthan who had recently returned from Italy. The patients belong to Rajasthan's Jhunjhunu and had returned from Italy on March 8.
