At a time when China is trying to make its foray into South Asia, India should use its shared history to strengthen its ties in the region, says Dr Rup Narayan Das.
Born in pre-partition Lahore to a well-off Punjabi family in 1934, Mehta lost his eyesight when he was three years old to meningitis. He, however, did not let his impairment get in the way of a flourishing career or stop him from showcasing his literary prowess to the world.
The film is tentatively titled The Viceroy's House.
Why did Mountbatten suddenly declare that the Partition of India would take place with inexplicable haste on August 15, 1947, almost a year ahead of schedule? Colonel Anil Athale (retd) explains the likely reasons for the British decision to hastily grant India independence.
'They were certainly not practising Hinduism in the Harappan culture (which includes Mohenjo Daro and other sites).' 'There was no notion of Hinduism then.'
As India's turns 70, a 70 year old -- one of India's finest poets -- decodes his relationship with her.
The Congress slammed the government on Tuesday after the passage of the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill in the Lok Sabha, with former party chief Rahul Gandhi saying the proposed legislation is an attack on the Constitution and anyone who supports it is attempting to destroy the foundation of the country.
'I just want to keep on working till they have to shoot me down.'
Mohammed Ali Jinnah did not win Pakistan as Congress leaders Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel 'conceded' Pakistan to the Quaid-e-Azam, with the British acting as an ever helpful midwife, claims senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Jaswant Singh.In his new book Jinnah - India, Partition, Independence, which will hit the stands on August 17, he recalls the events leading to the Partition as well as the "epic journey of Jinnah".
'Leaders of the Indian community in Hong Kong had broached the idea of developing the Andaman and Nicobar islands for investment and setting up manufacturing units,' points out Rup Narayan Das.
'Politicians insist on focusing on the North even though the rest of India offers a better way of engaging with our Muslims namely, live and let live.'
Gowri Ramnarayan explores the world of Kalki Krishnamurthy whose magnificent novel Ponniyin Selvan has inspired Mani Ratnam's latest film PS I.
Nawaz Sharif's appointment of a new army chief will influence India-Pakistan relations
'Our policy seems to be to give away part of J&K, even though we are entitled to the entire state.' 'The Congress has done so, and the BJP is following the same policy.' 'No one is applying their mind to the legal position.' 'Kashmir is not a part of Pakistan under its own constitution.'
'It was the Mughals who first established standard units of measurement and maintained offices of meticulous record keepers and auditors, departing from the more haphazard methods of earlier regimes.' 'By the end of the 16th century, their revenue and judicial administrations exhibited an obsessive preoccupation with order, the efficient management of time, and a spirit of rational self-control -- all of them characteristics of early modernity,' point out Sheldon Pollock and Benjamin Ellman.
'On the Kashmir and Pakistan question, it is startling that Vajpayee and Advani did more than anybody in Indian history.'
The festering dispute over the accession of Jammu and Kashmir stands out as one of the world's most volatile fault lines that divides regions, countries, societies, communities and ethnic groups, notes Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished commentator on Kashmir affairs, on Sheikh Abdullah's 39th death anniversary.
An ambitious exhibition tells the story of India as also the history of the world.
India's first female photojournalist gave this interview to Rediff.com a year before she died.
Sixty-seven years after he led India to freedom from British rule, a statue of Mahatma Gandhi would be installed in Parliament Square in London by early next year.
'The origins of the model of planned economic development adopted by independent India was a direct consequence of the war.' 'The war provided an opportunity for groups at the margins of Indian society to find new avenues for mobility.' 'The war also led to the emergence of India as a major Asian power and set the stage for it to play a wider role in international politics.'
We will continue to be enthralled by your golden oldies we grew up with, notes Shreekant Sambrani.
It's only when Gold moves away from Akshay Kumar's blundering Bangla and hockey humbug to become a story of grace among go-getters that it comes close to becoming the movie it should have been, says Sukanya Verma.
September 12 marked the 122th anniversary of one of the most incredible battles in Indian history.
The exhibition is conceived as a 'lived experience' creation, based on work with descendants and communities to collect stories related to the Jallianwala Bagh massacre on April 13, 1919.
A rare sketch by John Henry Amshewitz and correspondence to Sarat Chandra Bose will go under the hammer at a Sotheby's auction on July 11.
The BJP knows the CAA, combined with a fresh nationwide NRC process, is an idea that's dead on arrival. Where it lives on is as a divisive, polarising instrument as its rivals have to take a position against it and thereby be exposed to the charge of 'Muslim appeasement' again, points out Shekhar Gupta.
'If the museum in his memory inspires and instils among Brahminical British Indians an attitude of equality towards Dalits, the edifice would be worth it,' reports Ashis Ray.
Dr Chawla said that he just happened to be in the right place at the right time and that without him Brown would have gone blind. "He would have had no light perception in either eye. His life would have been completely different," he said.
'Modi is the first BJP leader to try to include Dalits in its fold.' 'But the rank and file of his party is backward and want to bash up Muslims and Dalits whenever they have a chance.'
'I'm 79 + now, and I've been doing all this since my late 20s.' 'Sometimes the ideological war extends to the home as well.' 'Many nights I couldn't sleep when someone close to me uttered the smallest insult.' 'It would cause me a lot of pain. But one has to be honest to oneself.'
'Any conventional conflict could trigger a nuclear war with results that neither India nor Pakistan could survive easily.' >A revealing excerpt from Shuja Nawaz's The Battle For Pakistan: The Bitter US Friendship And A Tough Neighbourhood.
'The loose use of words like foreigner or Bangladeshis obscures the fact that the post-Partition migration to Assam has been of both Hindus and Muslims.'
This election will decide in what shape and form the Akali Dal will survive.
'Whatever the legal position, it is my understanding that in practice, the Indian authorities have always treated Hindu refugees from Pakistan and Bangladesh far more sympathetically than Muslims,' notes Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
It looks like Hindi, which faces political opposition at the front door, is entering Tamil Nadu through the kitchen, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'India should pledge that it will only target those provinces of Pakistan where nuclear weapons are located,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'It is difficult to pin down any singular factor but marriage does invite the emotional investment of viewers,' observes Chintan Girish Modi.
The FIA has been tasked with probing various allegations of funding by Research and Analysis Wing to MQM.
The Nizam's descendants, Prince Mukarram Jah -- the titular eighth Nizam of Hyderabad -- and his younger brother Muffakham Jah, joined hands with the Indian government in the legal battle against Pakistan for possession of over around 35 million pounds lying with NatWest Bank plc in London.
