In dramatic scenes, Umar Khalid, the Jawaharlal Nehru University student who had been untraceable after being accused of sedition, returned to the campus late on Sunday evening. Khalid turned up at JNU's administration block, where hundreds of students began to gather, and gave a rousing speech just shy of 14 minutes, insisting that he would stand his ground and asked that all students unite against the attacks on our country. This is what he had to say.
The world's most popular author took questions from you, our dear readers.
Aseem Chhabra on his friend, the firebrand Nepali journalist Kanak Mani Dixit, who was arrested last week. Aseem, who has known Dixit for 35 years, believes the charges are trumped up.
'He has not done any harm to anyone. Yet you give him life imprisonment.' 'We were told to respect the Constitution. That is what Sai is doing; he is not doing anything beyond the Constitution.'
'What I remember best is the vigour with which she threw herself into the job, the passion she had for issues, particularly those that affected the poor.'
The plan of UID/Aadhaar-based surveillance does not end with the collection of fingerprints and iris scan, it goes quite beyond it and poses a lethal threat to the idea of India, says Gopal Krishna.
Jacob Fugger could always add value for his customers. He made himself indispensable. That kept him in the game
Imagine being a part of a country, but being discriminated against by the majority community and atrocities being committed against you by the state. This is the deplorable conditions that the Rohingyas of Myanmar live in where they are cut off from their livelihoods and sources of income, unable to access markets, hospitals and schools, and have little or no access to relief aid. In order to understand the situation and the genesis of the tragedy unfolding, Rediff.com's Archana Masih speaks to Ambassador Vijay Nambiar, the United Nations' Chef de Cabinet (Chief of Staff), who had served a long stint with the UN in New York on the issue.
Ninety-six years after women won the right to vote in the United States of America, a woman stands a chance of winning the US presidential race. Hillary Clinton -- former first lady, former US senator, and former secretary of state -- has become the first woman to capture a major-party nomination for president, taking another step in a journey that once seemed impossible, but over the last eight years has seemed inevitable. Like everything about her campaign, it was harder than expected.
State govt said it is not averse to seeking Army's help to maintain law and order.
'The nation State can thrive if all communities believe they have a stake in it; that their interests will be safeguarded; that there will be no discrimination; that there will be justice.' 'The political leadership of this country needs to decide whether it wants to mitigate these challenges to the nation by making necessary correction or whether it wants to ignore these questions that Yakub's noose has left behind,' says Ankur Bhardwaj.
At least 35 people have been killed and dozens injured in Brussels after a series of terror attacks struck the city's airport and a metro station near the European Union headquarters.
Bert Trautmann, a former German Prisoner of War who became a footballer in England and famously broke his neck playing in goal for Manchester City in the 1956 FA Cup final, died on Friday at the age of 89.
Indians in countries like the United States, China, Australia, Japan, Singapore, Egypt, Israel and South Africa celebrated the day with hoisting of the national flag and singing of patriotic songs.
A look at few gurus who have attracted controversy in recent times.
'At the back of the courtroom the three accused sat trying to catch the drift and fathom the new, inexplicable turn the case could be taking.' 'And the consequences it might have on their lives.'
A mere pair of shoes sets off the kind of harsh condemnation Indrani draws in these corridors of justice. That she being a woman who killed her daughter -- never mind that she is an undertrial and the crime has not yet been proven -- apart from making her an object of curiosity, also makes her, by perception, more evil than the men that flood these corridors, facing trial for similar or worse crimes.
Protester Sasi Perumal's death has given a new fillip to the pro-prohibition movement, which was beginning to draw attention across Tamil Nadu after different political parties began to make it a part of their poll manifesto for next year, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
News of all that's transpired on and off the football field
'it looks like India wants to follow Pakistan on the slippery slope of stupidity masquerading as religion.'
Muthayya Fernandes, a fisherman from Rameswaram, was imprisoned in Sri Lanka for crossing the International Boundary in search of fish.
'That is what Gauri was, in her essence -- the principle of free, open, forthright words, made flesh.' 'And that is what was gunned down -- her words, and with them our freedom to fashion our own opinions, to frame our own thoughts, to articulate them without fear of reprisal.'
Rampal Maharaj, the 63-year-old guru who was arrested from his fortified ashram in Haryana on Wednesday night, has been sent to jail till November 28, till his next hearing.
'I felt like a used and discarded rag.' 'The pro-dialogue constituency has shrunk in the valley.' Academician and author Dr Radha Kumar was among the three interlocutors which the Manmohan Singh-led UPA government appointed on Kashmir in October 2010, speaks of how the panel report was never acted upon.
Did the human drama provoked by the Japanese invasion of Burma and the Indian exodus from Rangoon inspire director Vishal Bhardwaj's forthcoming epic?
Trying to guess Subramanian Swamy's motives or next step has been a rather difficult exercise for decades, says Archis Mohan
Dr Rekha Shetty, who consults several corporations on long-term innovation initiatives, draws up a list.
Nilanjana S Roy compiles a list of the most eagerly awaited books next year.
Admittedly, EVMs too have a UID number and any convergence of data can make the secret ballot system a party of history, warns Dr Gopal Krishna in the 5th part of his series against Aadhaar.
Haryana and Punjab remained on high alert with officials warning that violent miscreants will be shot at sight.
Bangladesh's fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami chief Motiur Rahman Nizami was on Wednesday sentenced to death by a special tribunal for his role in the killing of thousands of people during the nation's independence war against Pakistan in 1971.
Nitin Gokhale, national security expert and founder BharatShakti.in, tells us what the controversy is all about.
An industry of scamsters is operating in the guise of call centres in India.
For the AIADMK's cadres, it is much more than an election symbol, they believe the party's electoral chances rest on owning it, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
A look at few gurus who have attracted controversy in recent times.
The United States on Wednesday said employment of domestic workers will now be on agenda for the bilateral talks with India with which it is in conversation to "determine the way forward" in resolving the 14-day-long diplomatic row.
Though Indians were no strangers to scams, spectrum loss was beyond their wildest imagination.
OPS is just now friendless in the party's second-line, but the situation could change as and when Governor Rao arrives in the state capital, and sets the constitutional ball rolling, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Wolf of Wall Street has its moments but it is director Martin Scorsese's weakest attempt at film-making, says Aseem Chhabra.
Ratan Tata was the first one to realise that Indian companies had become a prisoner to tradition and needed to radically innovate.
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