Bomb blasts on Thursday rocked Assam and Manipur during Independence Day functions injuring one person even as chief ministers asked extremists to abjure violence and return to the mainstream.
An estimated 57 per cent of the electorate cast their votes in the first phase of the Bihar assembly election in 49 constituencies on a violence-free note on Monday.
'We should not flatter ourselves that China is fixated on encircling India. She has greater goals, becoming the pre-eminent power in the world, and India as a major power is dealt with as part of that strategy.'
'Human rights violations are there in rural areas and in cities. In rural areas it is crude and in the open. In urban areas it is well hidden.' 'Awareness has grown several fold. India has 160 national and state human rights institutions. No other country in the world has this.' 'Unfortunately the right to association, right to assembly, freedom of expression, right to protest and discuss are all being curtailed systematically one by one.'
Then chief minister Jyoti Basu once told an industrialist that capitalists were class enemies and he should expect no sympathy.
'Narendra Modi could be too old to change his personality. On the other hand, his attachment to the RSS could be mostly sentimental. So one must hope that if he becomes prime minister, he is able to detach himself from the RSS view of the world as completely as Narasimha Rao detached himself from the Congress's First Family.' 'India cannot be governed by the autocratic methods by which he has governed Gujarat. If he becomes prime minister he will have to learn to speak in a more civil language about his political opponents,' historian Ramachandra Guha tells Arthur J Pais/Rediff.com
Reason must triumph over blind faith, says Praful Bidwai in this tribute to murdered rationalist Narendra Dabholkar.
Will the EC would make an example of the RK Nagar by-election, either by ensuring free and fair polls or by countermanding the same, asks N Sathiya Moorthy.
A sub-inspector of the Andhra Pradesh's counter-Maoist force was posthumously awarded the Ashok Chakra, the highest peacetime gallantry award of the country, as India celebrated its 65th Republic Day on Sunday.
'Dalits will only suffer in the days to come.'
Sanaya Dalal on feminism, France and the burqa
'Neither the Congress nor the BJP has the political will to take on the Sanatan Sanstha.'
'In the districts of Jagdalpur and Dantewada, the only time the accused walked out of jail was when they were acquitted. There is no concept of bail.' 'The women were very clear -- they had to fight. Remaining silent any longer was not an option.'
While filled with startling insights and questions, and buoyed by terrific performances throughout, Newton suffers from a lack of end-to-end clarity. It is a near-great film but one that for some reason doesn't express itself fully, feels Sreehari Nair.
'As Mumbai showed, and the Nairobi Westgate Mall attack reinforced, "guerrilla-style terrorism" has increasingly become the method-of-choice for terrorist groups,' says terrorism expert David Kilcullen.
'She hasn't done anything wrong; she fought against the bad, she fought for justice.' 'So, I know she will get justice one day.'
'The Ishrat encounter was neither genuine, nor fake. I believe it was a 'controlled killing,' says Shekhar Gupta.
Ironically, it was the members of the BJP (which the Indian press loves to dub as fascist) who resisted the assault on democracy and were jailed for 18 months. The RSS too played a stellar role in the resistance movement during the Emergency. Yet by some strange warped logic, the Indian media deems the Congress party with an established record of authoritarianism as a standard bearer of democracy while damning a true champion -- the BJP, says Vivek Gumaste
'Our experience in Nagaland and Kashmir for the last 60 years has shown our insanity, defined by Albert Einstein as doing the same thing again and again and yet expecting different results,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Vat Vrikshya -- banyan tree in Sanskrit -- helps tribal women, with absolutely zero formal education, set up businesses.
'Will anything change for you after the election?' And the man said 'Kuch nahin badlega.' And he had a smile on his face. He knew nothing was going to change.
'I want to leave behind the bank stronger and better than when I took over.'
Rajeev Srinivasan tells how he came very close to being another number in the 'disappeareds' during the Emergency.
How can a State be so criminally neglectful towards the safety of its citizens, asks Tarun Vijay.
The event was attended by senior Congress leaders such as former prime minister Manmohan Singh
'The government must make clear once and for all that promotions in the Indian Army are not the right of individuals, but a privilege given in accordance with role and function.'
It is the low cost of iron ore extracted from their adivasi homeland mines that enables steelmakers like Tata Steel and Essar, and miners like NMDC, not only to be among the most profitable companies in India, but also gives it the financial muscle to make huge overseas acquisitions. Ultimately, it is the poor adivasi who pays for it with his home and hearth and gets no credit for it! Either from the State, which connives in their exploitation, or the industry that lords over their resources, says Mohan Guruswamy.
'India is my country and we will raise our voice against anybody who harms the interests of Adivasis, be it the state government or the Maoists.'
'We have made no effort in recent years to build a national opinion on Kashmir amongst political parties.' 'At least we should speak as one country.' 'It has been a failure of our foreign policy that we have not been able to convince world opinion that something needs to be done about Pakistan.'
The Pampore attack 'has the stamp of LeT written all over it.'
'They are exactly like the so-called fidayeen of the 1999-2003 phase, when J&K witnessed a surge in suicide attacks on various important garrisons,' says Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd), who served as the General Officer Commanding 15 Corps in Kashmir.
