'Now that the Ram mandir is done, we need to move on. And grapple with COVID-19, a sputtering economy, a belligerent China...' 'The temple may win a few more elections for the BJP, but by itself it won't solve the nation's growing problems of economic and social distress,' notes Virendra Kapoor.
"I challenge BJP to prove corruption charges against me. If proved, I will resign from politics," said Hemant Soren.
Ahead of the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly polls, Keshav Prasad Maurya, Deputy Chief Minister announced that roads would be constructed in the state after the name of 'kar sevaks' who died in 1990 during Ram Mandir movement in Ayodhya.
Sunday's yatra proved that it needs both the maturity of locals as well as the police doing their duty, to ensure that a religious procession doesn't turn ugly.
'The allegations of government involvement in targeted assassinations abroad are likely to help, not hurt, the ruling party.' 'True or false, they convey a sense of muscularity and, in some quarters, are celebrated as a harbinger of 'great power' status.'
Nakul Nath's move has added fuel to rumours swirling for the last few days that he, along with his father, are defecting to the Bharatiya Janata Party.
'It is entirely possible that there are many treasures of our history and our faith buried deep underground,' points out Rajeev Srinivasan.
Rediff readers tell us how they celebrated the festival.
The prolonged delay over electing J P Nadda's successor possibly stems from the RSS leadership wanting a person who is at least equidistant from the Sangh as well as the Modi/BJP edifice, observes BJP-RSS watcher Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
The Delhi assembly results have underscored that a section of Arvind Kejriwal's committed supporters abandoned him because they were let down by his refusal to take a stand on crucial issues that impinge on the security and Constitutionally enshrined rights of the people, notes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
An FIR has been lodged against 10 named and 200 unidentified individuals in connection with a clash and stone-pelting incident during a religious procession in Jharkhand's Hazaribag. The clash, involving two communities, broke out over the playing of an objectionable song. Police fired two rounds into the air to control the situation. The incident led to uproarious scenes in the Jharkhand Assembly with BJP MLAs demanding action against the perpetrators.
"Bapu, I am here today not as a Prime Minister, but as a Hindu," said Sunak, opening his address at the gathering.
'They know that if they do not tie up with the Congress, then the minorities will move to the Congress.'
'Why were they silent when over 128 temples and shrines including Shivlings were broken down at the time of the construction of the Kashi Vishwanath corridor?' a Varanasi resident asks Rashme Sehgal.
The Ram Mandir issue continues to be on Bharatiya Janata Party's "core agenda", the party said in Mumbai on Wednesday.
South Africa's premier left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj is confident that slow bowlers will play a vital role on flat decks expected to be on offer during the upcoming ICC T20 World Cup in the Americas in June.
Bhagwat presented Sangh's views on a number of contentious issue while answering wide-ranging written questions on the last day of the three-day conclave, including on matters like inter-caste marriages, education policy, crimes against women, cow vigilantism.
'It was really difficult for Laluji to expel his son from the party and sever family ties with him.'
Much drama is likely to continue in the coming year, within the Sangh Parivar as well as involving the Opposition parties and, of course the BJP's allies, predicts Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
The push to develop Ayodhya as a tourism centre, accompanied by large-scale infrastructure projects, comes on the back of years of limited income growth and tourist inflows.
The temple was totally destroyed by the Pakistani Army's operation codenamed 'Operation Searchlight' in 1971, targeting the resistance movement in the country.
Mayur Munde said the temple was his tribute to the PM who "built Ram temple at Ayodhya".
Stepping up pressure for the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad has said the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party at the Centre cannot afford to fail its electors on the "core issue" and must deliver on it.
No one wants to curb the enthusiasm being seen among the people, but at the same time officials feel nothing should be left to chance, as the flood of humanity thronging the temple area poses problems for security personnel.
Sections of our media and elites take Western reports/judgements at face value and are ready to condemn the targets without understanding the deeper power linkages behind such actions, asserts Colonel Anil A Athale (Retd).
'When our daughters, wrestlers Sakshi Malik and Vignesh Phogat, were protesting at the Jantar Mantar, the police kicked them with their shoes.'
With Ayodhya issue stuck in the quicksand of political and legal quagmire, a retired high court judge is spearheading a movement to resolve the issue peacefully and has claimed to have got the backing of over seven thousand locals -- both Hindus and Muslims.
Political battle over 'Pujari Granthi Samman Yojna' announced by Aam Aadmi Party supremo Arvind Kejriwal intensified on Tuesday, as he launched registration process for the scheme at a temple in Kashmiri Gate in New Delhi.
As BJP leaders went all out to project the event as a moment of national pride, some leaders were directly critical of the ceremony with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, belonging to the Communist Party of India-Marxist, slamming the state's role in the Ram Temple consecration, saying the line that demarcates religion and state seems to be 'getting thinner and thinner'.
Mahesh Sharma Lord Ram looked set to occupy political centre-stage in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh despite the Bharatiya Janata Party's claim of a temple to the deity not being on its agenda
By all yardsticks 2024 isn't expected to be like 2014 or 2019. But with the mandir expected to be ready in time for the next Lok Sabha polls, Modi will have a new ally in Ram to see him through, observes Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Why did Modi single out the Congress and its leaders for the most pugnacious verbal assault while sparing other regional adversaries? If he is trying to get some parties to break the Opposition ranks, it means that the BJP's present bravado is for effect. Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay, author of Narendra Modi: The Man, The Times, begins a new column for Rediff.com.
'I stood in the line for potty. So there was no extraordinary feeling that I had become a hero.'
Banners terming Kejriwal "anti-Hindu" and showing him wearing a skull cap surfaced in Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Surat, and Vadodara cities on Saturday.
Prasad said the Bharatiya Janata Party never linked the Ram Mandir issue with polls.
Invitees to the 'pran pratishtha' consecration ceremony at the Ram temple started arriving Sunday in Ayodhya -- once a sleepy town now resplendent with new infrastructure and gripped by heightened religious fervour on the eve of a seminal event in India's political and religious history.
The PM urged all citizens to light diyas in their houses on January 22 so that the whole country basks in glory.
'If we want real democracy, the economy itself will need to be democratised.'
Tharoor said that if the "omission" was inadvertent, "a correction would be reassuring".
Political parties have slammed Bharatiya Janata Party's manifesto especially over inclusion of Ram temple and other 'Hindutva' issues, saying it was only aimed at hoodwinking voters.
