'The debate, by being mostly in Hindi, lost much of its educative relevance to the southern states.' 'All the prime minister's debating skills and oratorical prowess went over the heads of the South Indian audience,' points out B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
'Modi's visit is path breaking in the sense that India has come out of the closet and is prepared to deal with Israel openly and in a host of fields, military as well as civilian,' says P R Kumaraswamy, one of India's leading experts on the Middle-East, currently in Israel.
Senior Supreme Court advocate Ranjit Kumar, considered an expert on constitutional laws, was appointed as the solicitor general on Saturday. The law ministry issued a notification appointing Kumar, who has defended Gujarat in a number of cases, as the next solicitor general of India.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is being accused of wrong things. His main problem is his view of himself, says T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan
'The next prime minister will be from an Opposition party and not from the BJP.' 'The BJP may be the single largest party, but not with a majority and there will be a fractured verdict.' Anti-Modi and non-BJP parties will be in a majority.'
The finance ministry website that lists the total disinvestment revenues to be mobilised during the current year already shows that no receipts are expected from strategic sales in the current year.
Did Xi deliver a message to Modi at Mamallapuram, which though couched in a velvet glove was time-bound? What was that message? It is clear Indian/Israeli/US spy satellites would not have missed detecting Chinese troop movements towards the Ladakh-Tibet frontier. Then why did some important functionaries in the Government of India choose to only ask the Russians about this in April 2020? Was Russian reassurance of Chinese troop movements being part of a routine exercise the reason that the Leh-based XIV Corps did not mobilise itself for its annual summer exercises near the LAC? A fascinating excerpt from Iqbal Chand Malhotra's new book Red Fear: The China Threat.
'What Trump and Kim have demonstrated is that leaders need not remain prisoners of the status quo and they can, by showing the necessary will and courage, break out of the hang-ups and constrictions of the past and carve out a new pathway for themselves,' says B S Raghavan.
"Even when Vajpayee is ill in hospital, I was the first one to visit him, since the Congress believes he has contributed to the country," he said.
KCR is now having to resort to the lowest common denominator in elections: Reservations.
In UP, the BJP focused carefully on the sub-caste divisions within the Dalits and also gave a large number of tickets to SC candidates from sub-castes.
No prime minister of India ever had greater experience of running a state than Narendra Modi.
Culinary legend Satish Arora hangs up his apron after almost 5 decades of service at the Taj group of hotels.
'No one institution can cleanse it: Not the courts, government or activists.' 'And least of all the Indian Police Service,' argues Shekhar Gupta.
'The leak is likely to continue for some time before it becomes stable, but this is something that NPCIL, who is the plant operator, will have to do. For this, we have to plan very carefully.'
The major driver of Mod's foreign policy can be gauged from his economic priorities such as creating employment opportunities for the youth bulge. Related to this is emphasis on manufacturing, and infrastructure development, which in turn raises the issue of FDI. He has already articulated his views on all these issues, says Rup Narayan Das.
'I suggest Rahul Bajaj come out in the open and give us his own white paper on the perceived sense of fear that he thinks haunts corporate India,' says Dr Sudhir Bisht.
The note ban is Modi's make-or-break gambit for 2019. Opposition leaders see a vulnerability and won't gift pre-eminence to the Congress, says Shekhar Gupta.
Under attack over the alleged power projects scam in Arunachal Pradesh, Union minister Kiren Rijiju on Tuesday rejected allegations of wrongdoing and said those who have "planted" the story against him "will be beaten up with shoes".
Popular Telugu film star Pavan Kalyan launched his Jana Sena party with a 'call to the nation' to 'wipe out' the Congress party on Friday.
Four specific areas will be watched carefully in the first half of FY16
Contradictions have emerged over the death of eight SIMI men, who were gunned down in an alleged encounter with the police on the outskirts of the Bhopal hours after they escaped from the high-security Bhopal Central Jail killing a security guard.
The prime minister had violated the model code of conduct by holding a 'roadshow' after voting in the Gujarat assembly polls, Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala alleged.
For successive governments the Election Commission remains a 'holy cow', where unhealthy precedents are allowed to be nurtured since Independence, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'You can see the essential contours of his new Pakistan strategy. Rather than keep engaging with or humouring them, he'd rather work on taking their four biggest supporters -- the US, China, the UAE and later Saudi Arabia -- away from them.' 'In his calculation,' says Shekhar Gupta, 'with the total support of all four of these, Pakistan will be forced to moderate its policies.'
There was no breakthrough in US Secretary of State John F Kerry's India visit, but no breakdown either, says C Uday Bhaskar.
The remarkable feature of those reforms unveiled in 1991 is that none of those decisions has been disowned by subsequent governments in the last 25 years.
The critics of Prime Minister Modi's latest project are not looking at the future but living in the past, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
The prospects for strong, sustained economic reforms do not appear to be promising in India.
'Going by his political conduct over the past 15 years since first becoming chief minister, he has made enough enemies among equals as friends and followers.' 'They could gang up and that could mean a lot for AIADMK politics to handle,' says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Two US lawmakers write to the House Speaker asking to extend an invitation
Mamata Banerjee was on Friday sworn in as the chief minister of West Bengal for the second consecutive time, heading a 42-member ministry.
'The cooperation of Yakub with the investigating agencies after he was picked up informally in Kathmandu and his role in persuading some other members of the family to come out of Pakistan and surrender constitute, in my view, a strong mitigating circumstance to be taken into consideration while considering whether the death penalty should be implemented,' B Raman had written in August 2007.
The apex court said it has imposed certain conditions on Purohit while granting bail.
Manmohan Singh, reveals the former President, was keen that either P Chidambaram or Montek Singh Ahluwalia be the finance minister.
Repromulgation is a perennial malaise; and judges must clarify -- indeed, revisit -- the rules that govern this practice, argues Shubhankar Dam.
The next prime minister must ensure that the mistakes made by Manmohan Singh during his tenure are not repeated, notes A K Bhattacharya.
Foreign exchange reserves as a percentage of India's total external debt were 73 per cent at the end of December 2015.
Israel is determined to take the bilateral engagement to a different level that goes beyond defence hardware and intelligence software. Kanchan Gupta reports exclusively from Tel Aviv for Rediff.com
As India strives to make its Act East Policy a comprehensive politico-diplomatic and economic success, Brunei gains more salience, says Dr Rahul Mishra.
