We have our own problems for sure and they are not trivial, but for now, our economy is in not too bad a shape, our politics is as personality-driven and authoritarian as that of most countries in the world. We must make the best of what we have and not be excessively unhappy looking at the grass on the other side of the septic tank which may not be greener after all!, observes Shreekant Sambrani.
Rakesh Tikait, the 51-year-old Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) leader from the hinterlands of Muzaffarnagar in western Uttar Pradesh, welcomed the support from international artistes and activists, including Rihanna and Greta Thunberg, but acknowledged he does not know them.
A new Congress leader may make an electoral impact by his very presence. Congress voters who had moved away from the party, after being influenced by the BJP's 'family rule' campaign, can now return with a certain moral satisfaction, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
NH-925 is India's first national highway to be used for emergency landing of IAF aircraft.
Eleven rounds of talks have been held over the contentious farm laws but the impasse continues as the farmer unions remain firm on their demands -- the repeal of the three laws and legal guarantee for Minimum Support Price.
Democracy is the heart of our body politic and elections are its life blood. Because there is some disease that affects it, we cannot apply leeches to drain it off, killing the body in the process, asserts Shreekant Sambrani.
The move comes three months after Jammu and Kashmir was bifurcated into two UTs -- Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
The farmers lifted blockades on highways at Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur borders and took out a 'Victory March' to celebrate the repeal of three contentious farm laws and the Centre's written assurance to fulfil their other demands, including constituting a committee for legal guarantee on minimum support price (MSP) for crops.
Though a number of Jat leaders and farmers said they would vote against the BJP in the upcoming panchayat election, slated for April, they remained non-committal on supporting opposition parties in the assembly polls next year.
"It was a rehearsal for the proposed January 26 tractor parade," Bharti Kisan Union (Ekta Ugrahan) leader Shingara Singh Mann told PTI over the phone.
The surge in wheat export from India owing to the Ukraine crisis has once again demonstrated how farmers in states that have flexible marketing frameworks and low taxes benefit more from an emerging situation. The bulk of the wheat exported from India, trade and industry sources say, is being sourced at rates significantly higher than the state-mandated price of Rs 2,015 per quintal in Madhya Pradesh (MP), Uttar Pradesh (UP), and Gujarat - states which have low mandi taxes compared to Punjab and Haryana. This is not only benefiting farmers there but could also lead to significant savings for the states in procurement costs in the months to come.
He recalled that the state was home to Vaishali, said to be the oldest republic in the world.
The former army chief-turned-minister did not provide any evidence to support his statement. He said China historically never accepted any war casualties including in the 1962 conflict with India.
Cases with the Omicron variant have already been detected in Karnataka and Gujarat.
So far, 50 people have also been injured in these incidents, the government said in a statement.
The next meeting has been scheduled for January 22, a day after the farmer unions hold their internal discussions on Thursday, farmer leaders said after the 10th round of talks ended at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi after nearly five hours of talks, including two breaks.
After successfully fighting for the decriminalisation of Section 377, lawyers Arundhati Katju and Menaka Guruswamy have now decided to fight for legalisation of gay marriage in India, through The Marriage Project.
Harman Preet Singh had claimed in his petition, filed through advocates Ashima Mandla and Mandakini Singh, that Delhi Police on January 27 said that it has detained over 200 persons in connection with the violence in the national capital on January 26 and 22 FIRs have also been registered thus far.
As stringent sanctions imposed by the European Union and US are crippling business and trade, desperate Russian oil companies are offering huge discounts to India, provided a payment mechanism to bypass the SWIFT ban is quickly approved by the government. According to sources familiar with the development, Russian oil firms are offering 25-27 per cent discount to the dated Brent crude prices. State-run Rosneft is one the biggest oil companies that supply crude to India.
Wednesday's expansion shows that Modi still has a keen eye on Bengal. The BJP is gearing up for the panchayat elections in Bengal next May and the Lok Sabha elections in 2024.
New Union minister L Murugan's declaration of Kongu Nadu as his native place, instead of Tamil Nadu, may be part of a grand BJP strategy to create new states out of existing ones, particularly those that have anti-BJP governments, mulls N Sathiya Moorthy.
There is no direct impact of the Russia-Ukraine crisis on India in terms of bilateral trade but a surge in oil prices poses considerable risk to the economy, an analyst report said on Friday. International oil prices which have surged past $100 per barrel "pose risks to external stability and currency movement," a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report said. Russia has launched military operations against Ukraine, stoking fears of significant disruption in the region, including loss of life. The West is ramping up financial sanctions against Russia and support for Ukraine.
Protesting farmers will block key roads and occupy toll plazas during their 'chakka jam' protest from 11 am to 3 pm.
'I am committed to my country if there is respect for democracy and human rights. If not possible then I will prefer to stay in India or any other western country'
As many as 19 people have been arrested and 25 FIRs lodged in connection with the Republic Day violence in the national capital during the farmers' tractor rally in protest against the three new agri laws, the Centre informed the Delhi High Court on Wednesday.
Elections to the 40-member Goa Assembly are due in two months. Recent visits by Banerjee, Kejriwal and Prime Minister Narendra Modi heated up things in the otherwise "susegad" atmosphere in the small state.
A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India Sharad Arvind Bobde will hear the application on January 18 along with pleas raising the issue of farmers protesting at Delhi borders.
Sources in the security establishment said the force is also set to get sanctions from the Union Home ministry to raise at least nine fresh battalions soon. They said in order to bolster troop numbers along the 3,488 km long Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China, as many as 60 companies have been ordered to move towards the front in various areas like Ladakh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.
Singh also said that Indian troops are standing firm braving extreme weather and hostile forces to defend the country's territorial integrity.
The Americans have expended a lot of diplomatic energy to coax India into toeing their line but India has refused to buckle under pressure. As Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said, India has not taken anyone's side but its own side, points out Virendra Kapoor.
According to an official statement, Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari said the 19 other places in the country include Phalodi-Jaisalmer road and Barmer-Jaisalmer road in Rajasthan, Kharagpur-Balasore road in West Bengal, Hashimara-Guwahati road in Assam, Bhuj-Naliya road in Gujarat, Leh/Nyoma area in Assam and on the Jorhat-Baraghat road, among others.
As cracks began to appear in their ongoing agitation against the agri laws, farmer unions on Wednesday cancelled their planned march to Parliament on February 1 when the Budget would be presented.
'Now, it feels like the darkness has descended again.'
This is the first time in past several decades that suburban trains have been stopped. Earlier in 1974, the suburban and long distance train services were stopped for around 20 days due to trade union strike.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the UK will hit Russia with a "first barrage' of economic sanctions, warning that President Vladimir Putin is fixed on a "full-scale invasion of Ukraine".
'The way the society functions, I don't know, they are more concerned about animals than humans.'
Modi called for timely evacuation of those involved in off-shore activities.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a tweet said the rights to peaceful assembly and expression should be protected both offline and online.
The government's negotiations with protesting farm unions hit a roadblock on Friday as the farmer leaders stuck to their demands for a complete repeal of three farm laws they find pro-corporate and a legal guarantee for minimum support price (MSP), even as the Centre asked them to reconsider its proposal for putting the Acts on hold for 12-18 months.
Supporting the Taliban means supporting anti-India, anti-humanity, anti-women and anti-children acts, Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath said on Wednesday, cautioning people to be wary of sympathisers of the Islamic extremist group.
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