The issue of denial of visa to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi was fiercely debated by a key Congressional committee, with an influential Republican party lawmaker questioning the decision of the US government.
United States should continue to maintain a visa ban on Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as there was "significant evidence" linking him to the violence in the state in 2002, a Congress-established independent panel on religious freedom has recommended.
India comes under attack over religious intolerance, human trafficking and slavery at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing.
The letter, to maintain the current policy of denying Narendra Modi a visa to the United States, was released just as the BJP president arrived in Washington DC for a round of meetings with US lawmakers. Aziz Haniffa reports
The EU ambassador to India hoped the principle of equality will be upheld in the CAB. He also said that Pak must take action against terror groups.
It is a difficult problem and will require the Union, state governments and civil society, meaning NGOs, to work together, points out Aakar Patel.
No nation is fully sovereign to do what it wants to do in the face of opposition from others, points out Aakar Patel.
The Mahatma's descendants differ over Modi and the BJP victory... US-based Coalition Against Genocide vows to oppose Modi... Only Hindu US Congresswoman congratulates Modi... George Joseph/Rediff.com reports from New York.
'What was predictable, but entirely missed by Modi's strident critics, is that the excessive and intemperate demonisation of Modi allowed him to assume his own metaphor -- the underdog, the martyr, the marginalised,' says Dr Aseem Shukla.
What the INDIA alliance needs is neither a counter to Modi's tall personality and undiminished charisma nor a counter-narrative to his Hindutva agenda, now centred on the Ayodhya temple consecration on January 22, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
The West has always preferred a timid, half intelligent and a dependent India rather than a decisively independent and self-reliant one. A pliable Indian leadership suits the West best, says Tarun Vijay.
'Whom do I want to marry and what decisions I make for marrying the person I love are totally personal decisions, in which neither the State nor the courts have any right to interfere.'
'... while leaving the dirty work he orders to his subordinates.'
President Maithripala Sirisena's new Cabinet was also sworn in and Rajapaksa was named the new minister of finance and economic affairs.
Pakistan's 'approach is one of getting even, an eye for an eye, or death by a thousand cuts.' 'The entire effort is to be the equal of India. Unfortunately, the reality is that this can never be the case.' 'India will always be the bigger, economically stronger, technologically more self-reliant country.' 'Therein, lies the dilemma Pakistan faces which leads it to perennial enmity with India,' notes Ambassador Gautam Bambawale in the Air Marshal Y V Malse Memorial Lecture 2019.
'This is a historic juncture when the US is in great need of an alliance with India to strengthen its hands in the fierce struggle with China in the Asian theatre,' points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Unlike the regimes of Jayalalitha, Palaniswami and Karunanidhi, ministers are actually getting to make decisions on their own, with the unmentioned rider that they would be held responsible and accountable, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Seven persons had been arrested in connection with the blasts.
'Having a voice at the table means the other side has to show up to listen. It became clear that wouldn't happen,' says actor Maulik Pancholy, one of the 10 members who resigned from the US president's advisory commission on Asian Americans.
'When you see Modi standing there at the G20, or in New York or at the United Nations, amongst all the leaders, he stands out in the crowd.' 'He looks different, he sounds different, and he has something about his quality of presentation, his oratorical skills, which clearly set him apart from the crowd.' 'The relationship between Modi and the rest of the world and India and the rest of the world has been reset as a result of the election in 2014.'
'For a long time Pakistan dreamt that India would break up and that it would be the predominant power in the region,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
In Muthuvel Karunanidhi's passing, Tamil Nadu has lost the last of its Titans.
'Many sepoys fought with distinction, winning some of the first Victoria Crosses to be awarded to Indians; and indeed, as in any army fighting under such inhumane conditions -- standing in the freezing sludge, with shrapnel tearing through bodies and being subjected to gas attacks -- some buckled under pressure.'