'The claim that Hindi unifies our country is absurd. That language is not the mother tongue of a majority of Indians. The move to inpose Hindi on them amounts to enslaving them. The Union Minister's statement is a war cry against the mother tongues of non-Hindi speaking people'
In the wake of the Supreme Court rejecting Kerala's contention in the dispute with Tamil Nadu over the Mullaperiyar dam, the state on Monday sought Centre's mediation and a presidential reference to the apex court to address its anxiety over the issue.
According to the draft, in the northeastern states the threshold is at Rs 500,000.
More than 50 students supported the cause by participating in this fest late on Sunday night. Earlier on May 27, Students' Federation of India staged similar protest in Kerala by eating beef outside University College, Trivandrum.
Second-line AIADMK leaders and cadres alike say that by starting the talks first with the BJP and committing the party to an alliance without discussing seat-sharing, the leadership might have commenced the coalition discourse at the wrong end. According to them, even 20 seats for the BJP may be too many, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Sharad Pawar on Friday evening announced that he was not stepping down as the president of the Nationalist Congress Party.
Amid slogan shouting by MPs from the Trinamool Congress, the Congress and other opposition parties from the Well of the House, Modi began replying to the debate on the motion thanking the President for her address to the joint sitting of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha at the start of the Budget Session, and accused the Congress of adopting only 'tokenism' to solving problems the country faced.
'I don't think we will need to support or get support from the Congress. I hope there is no such political exigency. The Congress will be gone from the political scene. There is no lesser evil. The BJP and Congress are the two sides of the same evil coin,' anti-Koodankulam nuclear plant activist and new AAP member S P Udaykumar tells Rediff.com's A Ganesh Nadar.
On the face of it, the first round has gone to Edappadi K Palaniswami. Not only has he been named chief ministerial candidate, that too by his one-time bete noire Panneerselvam, he also gets one member more in the steering committee than OPS. He can now hope to wean away one or more members of the OPS team in the steering committee just as he had done with other leaders in the latter's camp, post-reunification. That was also OPS's concern, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Rahul Gandhi's birthday greeting to the DMDK supremo signifies that the Congress vice president is expanding his ambit of functioning and graduating from handling just organisational affairs, reports Anita Katyal.
We should be ready beforehand and I agree that if we have to go for alliances then the formalities of those alliances should be completed as soon as possible
The monsoon session of Parliament is likely to begin in the third week of July and end by mid August.
'Delhi 2015 is a warning of an intensifying nightmare in the offing.'
The Joint Parliamentary Committee report on 2G spectrum scam, which was to have been tabled in Lok Sabha on September 30 is further delayed until the Winter Session of Parliament.
The ruling party seems in far better shape than the Congress, which is yet to finalise seat-sharing agreements in several states.
Congress general secretary Digvijaya Singh speaks about the shortcomings of the Grand Old Party, and puts up a brave defence for party vice president Rahul Gandhi in this freewheeling chat with the Indian Express
Sidhu made the sharp retort amid speculation that the former cricketer is himself eyeing the top post if the Congress wins next month's assembly polls.
Back of the envelope calculations put government expense on each of the new schemes promised by the DMK and the AIADMK at tens of thousands of crores. But then, neither party has said how they are going to also address the mounting debt burden either, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The application, filed through advocate AP Singh, said, "The Acts were passed hastily without adequate discussion... Inherent weaknesses of the agricultural sector cannot be addressed by way of monetization of farmers."
The OPS camp believes Sasikala's family still calls the shot in the EPS camp.
The lower house has been witnessing daily disruptions since the winter session began last week. It had passed a bill on transgender rights on Monday.
By changing the nation's name from India to Bharat, would this landmass overnight lose the emotional and cultural linkage that had been built over generations, centuries and millennia, asks N Sathiya Moorthy.
Party leaders, sources said, maintained that Congress cannot afford to have a new leader at the helm for rebuilding the organisation at this juncture and that the responsibility for the defeat is collective and not individual.
In her letter to Congress President Sonia Gandhi three days ago, Kidwai said she was relinquishing charge as party general secretary and Mahila Congress chief as he felt that Rahul Gandhi should be given the necessary space to bring in younger leaders of his choice
More and more Congressmen are breaking their silence and coming out in the open blaming party vice president Rahul Gandhi for the poll drubbing. Renu Mittal reports.
Reviving their anti-nuclear stir, leaders of People's Movement Against Nuclear Energy on Friday began an indefinite fast at Idinthakarai to press for implementation of some of their demands including scrapping plans to set up units 3 and 4 of Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant.
The Centre has imposed a ban on the Popular Front of India (PFI) and several of its associates for their alleged terror activities.
70-plus years after Independence, 'Hindu India, metamorphosised as 'Hindutva India', is proving the British right -- and for all the wrong reasons. Mohan Bhagwat should have answers for the why of it, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Over a month at the helm, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday said he was working towards "visible changes" in administration and asked his ministers to be honest enough to have the "moral courage."
His likable boy-next-door face and casual approach to public speaking have a unique appeal for the younger generation, but it stops there, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Leading an agitation at the Egmore Railway station in Chennai, Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam General Secretary Vaiko and VCK Chief Thol Thirumavalavan, along with several workers including those from the Left parties, blocked an express train.
Leading the Opposition attack over the Adani-Hindenburg issue in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday linked Gautam Adani's meteoric rise to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's coming to power and said "magic" happened after 2014 that propelled the businessman from the 609th to the second spot on the global rich list.
The RSS wants three nominees inducted: Tejaswi Surya, the young BJP MP from Bengaluru South, Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, a Rajya Sabha member, and former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.
Hundreds of migrant workers from Delhi, Haryana and even Punjab reached Anand Vihar, Ghazipur and Ghaziabad's Lal Kuan area after taking arduous treks of many kilometers on foot to take buses to their respective native places
'We were supposed to be a united nation based on unity and diversity.' 'Now what we are doing is there will be a class called Marathas, Dangars, etc.' 'The 100 per cent of our nation's population will be in classes and you will be allocating the nation's education and service resources in terms of classes.' 'How does it work out in terms of equality? Where is your equal nation?'
Ending suspense, the Bharatiya Janata Party has picked actor-turned-politician Smriti Irani to take on Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi in Amethi.
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam President M K Stalin will try his luck once again from Kolathur constituency in Chennai in the April 6 Tamil Nadu assembly elections while his son Udhayanidhi will make his electoral debut by contesting from the Chepauk-Triplicane segment in the metropolis.
'Wisdom demands Modi moves to restore the critical institutions of the State and dial back on the cult building around his persona,' say Sonali Ranade and Shealja Sharma.
On this one issue that touches the raw nerve of Tamil Nadu, Modi had better heed M Karunanidhi's sage words conveying "the desire and appeal of all well-wishers of the nation that Prime Minister Modi should focus on accelerating economic growth and social development" and not, let me add, let his ministers embark on disruptive escapades, says B S Raghavan.
Kerala is one state where the Congress may do well in the general election and it where Rahul Gandhi has demonstrated why he is serious about rebuilding his party, says T V R Shenoy.
