His comments came hours after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar arrived in the Pakistani capital to attend the Council of Heads of Government (CHG) summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.
'Senior Vatican officials were pleasantly surprised at the number of Indians who had come to witness the ceremony.'
Joined by leaders from all major parties, Modi paid tributes to the Bharatiya Janata Party stalwart, who died last week, at a condolence meeting.
The AAP unanimously agreed to elect Atishi as the leader of Delhi AAP Legislative Party.
'Not just the angry families, but also the public will remember Swaraj's foreign ministership for this colossal lapse of judgment,' notes Karan Thapar.
The brief exchange and handshake between Jaishankar and Sharif took place at a banquet dinner hosted by the Pakistani prime minister at his residence in honour of the delegates attending a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.
The Delhi battlefield may not be a cakewalk for the Rhodes Scholar.
AIIMS doctors said the BJP stalwart and former external affairs minister died of a cardiac arrest.
The Aam Aadmi Party led by its chief minister designate Atishi staked claim to form a new government in Delhi on Tuesday shortly after Arvind Kejriwal resigned from the post, an effort seen as a bold gambit to seize the initiative ahead of assembly elections due in five months.
Atishi will have a brief tenure in office as assembly elections in the national capital are due in February.
Congress leader Digvijay Singh on Monday demanded a probe into alleged "business ties" of top Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Sushma Swaraj and M Venkaiah Naidu with Reddy brothers following the arrest of former Karnataka minister Janardhan Reddy in a mining scam.
Several opposition parties have claimed that the mandate of 2024 Lok Sabha elections was against the ruling haratiya Janata Party, even though it was able to form the government with support of other parties.
Bansuri Swaraj, the daughter of former Union minister Sushma Swaraj, will contest the upcoming Lok Sabha polls from the New Delhi seat and incumbent MP Manoj Tiwari from Northeast Delhi as the Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday announced the names of five candidates from the national capital, dropping four MPs -- Meenakshi Lekhi, Harsh Vardhan, Parvesh Verma and Ramesh Bidhuri.
The body of the former minister, wrapped in a tricolour, was brought to the crematorium in the afternoon from the BJP headquarters, where it was kept for few hours for people to pay their respects.
Those joining Prime Minister Narendra Modi's council of ministers for the first time include three former chief ministers -- Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Madhya Pradesh), Manohar Lal Khattar (Haryana) and H D Kumaraswamy (Karnataka).
The timing of these events give rise to the strange impression that the defence ministry has been co-opted for the run-up to the assembly election in Uttar Pradesh.
With Atishi at the helm it will not be easy for the BJP to continue using the LG's office and the bureaucracy as political instruments to hinder governance and thereby provoke the electorate's ire against the AAP, expects Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Making a strong attack against Narendra Modi, whom he termed a "megalomaniac psychopath liar", Congress General Secretary Digvijay Singh on Sunday stoked a fresh controversy saying why can the Bharatiya Janata Party not field a "better leader" like Sushma Swaraj as its prime ministerial candidate.
The trolling of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is wrong, the HM said.
"Let me explain to you that we were not trapped by your 'googlies'. Our two Sikh Ministers went to Kartarpur Sahib to offer prayers in the Holy Gurudwara", she said.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's first list of 24 candidates for Lok Sabha from Madhya Pradesh featured former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, while Bhopal MP Pragya Singh Thakur was replaced by another candidate.
Swift intervention by Ministry of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj ensured shooting ace Abhinav Bindra was accompanied by his coach, whose passport got stolen in Germany while the duo were travelling to Rio de Janeiro for the ISSF World Cup, a test event for the upcoming Olympics.
A number of high-profile electoral battles, starring veterans and debutants, formidable opponents and unlikely contestants, feature in Tuesday's outcome.
It dropped sitting MP from Guna, Krishnapal Singh Yadav, to field Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia from the seat.
There was a clear difference in the welcomes for Lloyd Austin and Antony Blinken.
Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Amit A Shah, Shivraj Singh Chouhan and G Kishan Reddy filed nomination papers for the Lok Sabha elections on Friday, April 19, 2024.
National Security Advisor Shiv Shankar Menon on Tuesday briefed senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley on the ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops along the Line of Control.
Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar and Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Raveesh Kumar were also present at Sushma Swaraj's residence.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj and Home Minister P Chidambaram will meet on Monday to decide who will become the next central vigilance commissioner. According to the Supreme Court's instructions, the PM, home minister and the leader of Opposition has to finalise the CVC together. On Thursday, Congress leader Prithviraj Chavan held an informal meeting with BJP leader Sushma Swaraj.
With the strain and anxiety of the longest Lok Sabha polls now behind the leaders, governance, with consensus, is the next step.
Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com decodes why Modi has decided to retain her in the Union Cabinet despite this controversy and their many internal differences.
'This is how Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar treated the Leader of Opposition,' Swaraj tweeted.
Swaraj had been liking posts of trolls who have been targeting her on the passport controversy, as part of her unique protests.
The motions were moved over misinformation on PM Modi's Lahore visit and the Bandung Conference.
Taking a dig at Sushma Swaraj for her statment that Narendra Modi is fit to become the prime minister of the country, Congress general secretary Digvijaya Singh on Sunday said she must first make clear if Bharatiya Janata Party veteran L K Advani also agrees with her.
Right now, in Modi's Cabinet and in the BJP, there is no challenge whatsoever to Modi's leadership but even those leaders who have some potential, who the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh can think of backing in an unforeseen circumstance, are fast turning into damaged goods, reports Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday announced Prime Minister Narendra Modi will fight again from Varanasi in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections as it named 34 Union ministers in the first list of 195 candidates.
The families say Swaraj was a constant source of support and helped them bring back the mortal remains of their loved ones which finally gave them closure.
Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Sushma Swaraj, Ananth Kumar and Balbir Punj on Saturday met a sulking L K Advani to discuss the elevation of Narendra Modi as prime ministerial candidate, a move the party patriarch is opposed to.
'For the Hindutva lobby, there is cause for worry.'
'No more than 43 per cent of the people who were asked by Sushma Swaraj to say whom they supported stood by the trolls.' 'As many as 57 per cent do not approve of the minister's traducers,' says Amulya Ganguli.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances