Kanika Datta reflects on Indians and our relationship with snaking queues from the license raj to demonetisation.
'Young Dalits are looking for better educational opportunities, more job avenues in the private sector, which need not necessarily mean job quotas, but a more welcoming corporate world that offers a liberated social environment, essentially a new India.'
With the state going to polls soon, Akhilesh Yadav needs to step out of his father's shadow and come into his own as the state's CM.
The state is trying hard to improve ease of doing business by several notches.
'If Article 35A is scrapped, then Jammu's identity will be over.'
One thing Beijing must understand is that India is not obsessed with being a threat to China but only wants a rightful place for itself in the world, says Sanjeev Nayyar.
'The BJP will get the lion's share of the Opposition vote. I would give the Congress-Left around 15 per cent.'
Opposing the verdict, several Dalit organisations called for a 'Bharat bandh' on Monday.
'People had said it will explode and everyone will die. Nothing of that sort has happened.' 'Our government has done a splendid job so far.'
No large nation has done less to feed its millions of poor than India has in the past decade or two since the beneficial effects of the Green Revolution wore off.
'Even if Akhilesh Yadav opens up the entire state treasury for us we will not vote for the Samajwadi Party... ''...I don't want to return to my village, my head will be chopped off. They want me to press the button on the lotus.' Caught between an aggressive BSP cornering Dalit votes and the BJP cornering other Hindu votes, the Muslims of Muzaffarnagar have nowhere to go, no one to turn to. Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt presents the grim situation on the ground in western Uttar Pradesh.
'I was brought up in a Brahmin Hindu family. I was brought up in places where the majority was Muslim, in Rampur, Uttar Pradesh. There was a mosque next to my house, but I never saw communal tension.' 'I am not worried. This country's religious roots are very strong. They know how to take care of themselves.'
A look into the state of Dalit entrepreneurship in the country.
'The Congress-JD-S alliance will be intact for the next three years, for sure.'
There is a leader in every man waiting for the right moment. The Aam Admi Party has found it and is already ready with its list for the Lok Sabha. The challenge is enormous but the future beckons the way it had never, before, feels sociologist Shiv Vishvanathan.
The spread of Modism is in reality spread of a personality cult and not a political ideology, says Vidyut Joshi.
'Which path should Muslims take politically as they have been completely marginalised?'
Demonetisation hit informal sector hard and caused job losses which was not addressed by the budget, Moily said.
Here are some of the best photographs clicked across the globe in the month of October.
'If the money we spend on importing pulses reach our farmers, there won't be any suicides'
'The BJP has not moved on since its 2014 victory. There is nothing new to offer. There is far too much negativity about the other side and far too little about what has been achieved by its government.' 'That may have worked when the BJP was in the Opposition but if they believe that the people of India will continue to hold them to such a low standard of expectations, they are really taking the voter for granted or misreading his pulse.'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah will soon get around to reworking their organisational set-up and administrative priorities to regain lost ground in the wake of the Delhi electoral debacle, but there's third course available to them as well. That is to introduce the presidential form of government, which prime ministers Indira Gandhi and A B Vajpayee flirted with before abandoning it. Will Modi go further than them? N Sathiya Moorthy analyses the scenario.
'Without it, it is going to be much, much, much, much worse.' 'In the meantime, we really need to work on a sort of war footing, given that it is a natural disaster, provide relief, provide essentials, till we get biological herd immunity, we need to get economic immunity, and also social immunity.'
From planning Prime Minister Narendra Modi's foreign trips to playing a key role in the Jammu and Kashmir elections, former RSS spokesperson Ram Madhav is become increasingly important in the BJP
Harsh Sethi, consulting editor of Seminar magazine, is an analyst who is always lucid and sharp in his commentaries on human rights and development and issues related to politics or nation building. In a rare interview to rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt he spoke on the broader issues related to Congress party's endorsement to a separate Telangana state.
'Look at Mr Modi. He is a part of this new middle class.' 'India has never before seen this kind of social mobility, certainly not since medieval times.' 'As a result, India's entrenched elite, which is a class of people with a strong sense of entitlement, is being tamed,' Sanjeev Sanyal tells Shyamal Majumdar and Arup Roychoudhury.
After many years of struggle and strife, Telangana has come to pass. Many lives have been lost and property destroyed because various governments at the Centre have had no defined policies for creating new states. There has to be a better way of "delivering" a state -- not by fasts, by threats or by violence unleashed by a "rent-a-crowd" but by a logical, democratic way of meeting the will of the people. Not the will of an egotistical leader who wants to establish one more political dynasty -- or one who equates state with caste.
'The previous (Congress) government at least did not veto provisions of the cattle laws.' 'The BJP is actively weakening the provisions.' 'The BJP government tried to export goats from Nagpur for slaughter to the Middle East.' 'The whole country was aghast and offended. We are a country of Ahimsa.' 'The BJP has incentivised the butcher industry so meat export has gone up, live animal export has gone up, leather export is on the rise, smuggling has gone up.'
'The Congress can't return to power unless it reins in prices, lowers interest rates, taxes the rich,' says Praful Bidwai. 'If this means sacking those most responsible for the UPA's pro-big business policies including Finance Minister Chidambaram, so be it!'
'The problem in Kashmir is not about pellets, bullets or tear gas.' 'It is the government's policy and intention to criminalise the protest.'
'Alas, in this scheme there is nothing to stop the black money flows of the future.' 'On the contrary Modi has sown the seeds of more, through the issue of Rs 2,000 notes.' 'But have you heard one politician decrying this aspect of the scheme?' 'They must be secretly rejoicing that while Modi is taking away their past, he has not shut the door on their future,' says banker S Muralidharan.
MUST READ: The speech Nayantara Sahgal was not allowed to give.
'The strange thing about the Karnataka election is that the BJP looks more like the Congress of the past and vice versa.' 'Siddaramaiah has been able to out think the BJP almost every single day on every single issue.'
'I say Modi was India's last chance.' 'Because the kind of work this government has done -- I'm talking about physical delivery -- is fantastic, like no time in our history.'
An airport in Noida could lead to higher user fees and diversion of traffic from Delhi, which has huge unused capacity.
Launching a scathing attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Opposition parties on Wednesday alleged that selective leak of information on demonetisation of 500 and 1000 rupee notes to 'friends of BJP' and demanded making public the names of those who had bought gold and foreign exchange of over Rs 1 crore since April.
The AAP has adopted policies in an ad hoc manner, without thinking them through or deriving them from a broader framework. This must change if the AAP is to become a credible alternative, says Praful Bidwai.
Indonesia, Turkey and Afghanistan also see important polls in the seven short weeks between end-March and mid-May, says Shankar Acharya
With facts and figures, the CAG report has highlighted how Gujarat was far from a role model for states across India, and that the progress made in this province in western India in improving agriculture, education, healthcare and empowerment of women and children, was not exactly creditable, says Paranjoy Guha Thakurta.
'One thing is sure: After this Budget, no Ambani-Adani tag will be attached to the government.'
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