Syed Firdaus Ashraf offers a ready reckoner on Javed Akhtar's great great grandfather Fazl e Haq Khairabadi who fought the British empire during the 1857 Mutiny and was imprisoned in the Cellular Jail in Port Blair.
'The government's priority is not farmers.'
'If someone fiddles us on our religion then we will pay back five times more to that person. We have proved that time and again.'
'The background for the Saudi-Pakistan agreement is the fact that the regional security order has collapsed due to the Israeli attack on Doha.' 'The Americans have largely abandoned their security guarantee for West Asia and the region has no choice but to look at alternatives.'
Light a candle to their memory, to show their families and the world that we care. To show that we will not forget, nor will we forgive.
'Only a fool would put his life savings into a restaurant at 59... but I did'
'Gen Z was devoid of love stories with sad endings like Heer Ranjha, Laila Majnu or Romeo Juliet; they have never seen something like this in their lifetime.' 'Saiyaara is a rooted love story.'
Puzzled about the Waqf Bill? Syed Firdaus Ashraf explains how the amended Waqf law will plug loopholes in the existing legislation.
'40 percent of voters in Bihar will be excluded.'
'The Indian Army won't induct anyone who has killed Indian soldiers.' 'That's why the army respects these reformed men so much -- they're on the frontline now, protecting India.'
'The long term strategy is that this government wants to create a second class citizen list.'
'We cannot enter any flat in Satguru building until the watchman gives us access.'
'You've got to understand it is not easy to die by suicide.' 'People commit suicide only when they lose everything and find no other way to live.'
'Don was declared a flop because not many people turned up.' 'Luckily, Khaike Paan Banaraswala became a big hit.' 'Word of mouth publicity led to the film becoming a big hit from the second week on.'
'The Congress submitted four names to the government as the people who should accompany the delegation.' 'I don't know what happened to those names.' 'When I was approached, I told them to speak to my party.' 'I have no further involvement with this delegation.'
'I feel the murderers had done a recce of this place before murdering Raja.' 'It is isolated, there are no CCTV cameras.' 'It was a fit place to commit the crime.'
'It will be an explosion of zoonotic diseases from these places.' 'People will not be able to live or work for kilometres around these places where thousands of street dogs are kept.'
Syed Firdaus Ashraf marches through time to trace the bitter history between Russia and its West European neighbours.
'6 shooters went to kill Dawood in Pakistan.'
'They thought nobody would hit Bahawalpur and Muridke because they have nuclear weapons.' 'They used to think India cannot touch our military targets because we are a nuclear weapons country.' 'After Operation Sindoor we have called their bluff.'
The western media is going all out to prove that India suffered a major setback in Operation Sindoor and how China helped shoot down Indian fighter jets. One of the articles published in British newspaper Telegraph stated Operation Sindoor shattered the myth of India's air dominance over Pakistan. "The Pakistani Air Force, aided by Chinese targeting satellites and AWACS executed a sensor-fusion kill. The Rafales never got a lock, never even saw their adversary. When the missiles hit, it was already over," wrote the British Newspaper, The Telegraph.
Before the violence and rioting that erupted in Nagpur on Monday, March 17, over Mughal emperor Aurangzeb's tomb came provocative statements from various political leaders.
'Five hours of bombardment by the Pakistanis should not have happened.' 'India should have sent the air force to bomb the Pakistanis where they were raining fire on us.'
'The LTTE were the pioneers of that.'
'If inner line permit was in place in Meghalaya, the details of the three people who allegedly murdered Raja would have been on record.'
'Maharashtra election result is a chamatkar of EVM.' 'There has been a sudden one percent rise in the voting percentage after the counting day.' 'This is what made the difference to the election results.' 'How did this vote percentage increase after counting day?
'Afzal Guru became a victim of Pakistan's conspiracy. He was used as a means, just like all other innocent Kashmiris.'
'There were deep discussions within the Sangh Parivar before this decision was made.' 'They were convinced, and only then did the Modi government proceed with the caste census.'
At Srinagar's famed Lal Chowk, Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf meets a computer engineer who drives an auto for a living and discovers that Kashmiris are more interested in finding jobs than discussing the assembly election.
'The Pakistanis called the US state department and said we agree with India on peace.' 'It was then that US President Donald Trump jumped in and took credit for the ceasefire.'
'Even known names and social media handles went berserk by stating that Karachi has been attacked and an F-16 was shot down.'
Cirkus is not getting good reviews but its *huge* cast is quite excited to see it on big screen anyway.
'If Pakistan has fired one bullet at us then we have to respond by firing 10 bullets at them. It is our right to do so.'
'The new Waqf bill sows the seed for conflict in every town and village of India.'
'When Sikhs were killed in the Afghan-Sikh war in 1837, the Afridis used to bury their heads like flowerpots in the ground,' writer and popular historian William Dalrymple tells Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'When Sikhs were killed in the Afghan-Sikh war in 1837, the Afridis used to bury their heads like flowerpots in the ground,' writer-historian William Dalrymple, whose latest book Return of a King is a historical work based on the First Afghan War, tells Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'Sushant Singh Rajput threw Rhea Chakraborty out of his house six days before he died.'
