'It is a well-thought-out decision. I feel it is difficult for him now to step back.'
'The Akali government is not responsible for the Punjab power crisis as Mr Sidhu is saying.'
'Gaumutra kills all bacteria,' says the Congress corporator from Mumbai, who wants cow urine to clean the city's hospitals.
'India's treatment to a member of parliament of Afghanistan was not good and I am very upset about this action.'
'I should not have lifted my hand, but whoever eats the meat of a cow, whom we Hindus consider our mother, these things will happen.'
Mumbai top cop Rakesh Maria's trusted man Dinesh Kadam also helped crack the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts' case, sent Abu Salem to jail and helped bust the Indian Mujahideen terror network in Mumbai.
Bharat Pardeshi, one of the leaders from the All India Railway Act Apprentice Association, spoke to Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf about why they had to resort to the unpopular move, disrupting the lives of thousands of railway commuters in Mumbai.
'I can barely see anything in the news about the farmer protests, and all I've seen of Nirav Modi is that he can't come home because he's busy, and that the CBI is writing letters begging him to please at least call the Indian embassy, no?'
'The place I used to sleep in the jail had a big window high up on the opposite side, where at sunrise and sunset time a bird would drop in every day.' 'It could be an eagle or a peacock. And sometimes a monkey.' 'Those moments calmed you, brought hope...'
'This is against the Constitution and we will oppose it tooth and nail.'
'It could backfire on the BJP and boost the Opposition parties.'
'All this while he has been maintaining that he is innocent and, if that is the case, why will he run away?'
'UCC should be across India and legally applicable to every Indian citizen.'
'Nobody is speaking up for Muslims today.' 'Secular parties too have calmed down because they feel this will hurt the Hindu vote (bank).' 'In this scenario, where does a Muslim go?'
The new government order to review the service record of employees who have completed 30 years in the job to identify inefficient or corrupt staff and retire them prematurely has invited the ire of labour unions, who believe that this is a step towards privatisation.
'The government, through the media, is saying that everything is normal in Kashmir, but I just want them to give this in writing and let a judicial commission see it.
'If the Congress party wants to take on the BJP it cannot do it in this fuddy-duddy, grand old party, style.'
Newly-elected CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechury speaks to Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com.
'The collegium system will remove any such doubts from the minds of people and the political parties.'
'Only then will we withdraw the agitation.'
'If they don't make Ajit Pawar chief minister, what can he do?'
'...by directing these draconian provisions against political and ideological opponents of the ruling group, minorities, and those who dare to dissent through and selective prosecution and prolonged incarceration as undertrials.'
'The cousins do not have a good rapport with each other in politics, though they may be having a good rapport with each other in family life.'
'A slum free Mumbai cannot happen with Dharavi at the centre of the city.'
'This trope must have been taken in 30 films.' 'The rogue agent is a common trope and not something unique.'
'The time has come for all those believe in a democratic India to stand up and be counted and to make a choice.'
'Shraddha tries hard to rescue the film, but the script totters so badly in the second half that any salvage seems impossible,' says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'This committee underscores the Indian State's longstanding conventional approach to leverage top-down conflict management in North East India in general and Manipur in particular.' 'Trying to 'manage' violent conflicts top-down has not worked in the past, and apparently does not seem to work this time either.'
An unemployed migrant becomes a much sought after Baba right before Syed Firdaus Ashraf's eyes.
'I am happy Sanjay Raut and Sharad Pawar changed the game of Maharashtra politics.'
But for the PM's decision, my teenage daughter, a child of the post-economic reforms generation, could never have imagined the Socialist India that remains so much a part of my growing up years, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'Deeply hurt by Modi's conspicuous silence for over a month-and-a-half since the outbreak of violence, people in Manipur came on the roads and crushed their radio sets to express their frustration and anger.' 'The fact that Modi's Mann Ki Baat did not have a single reference to the Manipur violence further accentuated this hurt and anger.'
The entire campaign in Lucknow is based on Narendra Modi -- there is little mention of the BJP candidate, a certain Rajnath Singh. Some locals wonder, 'Rajnathji is not coming to campaign in Lucknow. How will he take care of this city after he wins?' Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com reports from Lucknow.
'William Mustoe, the director of horticulture during British rule, named the Presidential Palace garden after the Mughals.' 'He simply kept the name because it was made on the pattern of a Mughal garden.''He simply kept the name Mughal gardens because it was made on the pattern of Mughal garden.'
From July 27, 2017, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf, my daughter will have to learn that there are only two most important things in life: Power and money.
'The BJP always said Rahul Gandhi is an 'air-conditioned leader', but after this yatra he has proved them wrong.'
Cities, roads, stations rechristened in the time of Modi.
'In many cases, I didn't take money because the Indian students had run out of cash.' 'The biggest high was the blessings that these students's parents used to give me on the phone or send messages thanking me on WhatsApp.'
'Oh god, these workers will now spread the virus! Their only concern was to think about themselves.' 'The middle class was only concerned with flattening the curve of coronavirus and they were not bothered about how these workers live in one room with 10 people or 20 people.'
She could not believe how much India had changed since the last time she experienced it first hand.
