Sally Holkar left America and made India her home nearly 60 years ago. She went on a mission to revive a dying craft and changed the lives of rural weavers.
While naming him as the NDA candidate for the Vice President's post, the BJP had described him as 'Kisan putra', a move seen in the political circles aimed at reaching out to the politically significant Jat community which had participated in huge numbers in the year-long farmers' protests against agriculture reform measures unveiled in June 2020.
Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao will not receive Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the airport, who is arriving in Hyderabad on Saturday to participate in the two-day long BJP National Executive meeting.
Only in the event of the RSS managing to force Modi into accepting a consensual candidate, will the party not continue to 'being' the 'next Congress', observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
India needs another shot of difficult reform, of the kind only possible at gunpoint. Mr Trump holds that gun to our heads now. A drastic reduction in tariff protection, other elements of sarkari wet-nursing will force entrepreneurial India to become competitive again, argues Shekhar Gupta.
Here are some facts related to the Budget presentation in independent India.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 1 will present a record eighth consecutive budget that is expected to contain measures to shore up weakening economic growth and ease the burden on the middle class struggling with high prices and stagnant wage growth while being fiscally prudent.
'The critical event signalling a new era for India was Dr Singh's 1991 Budget in which he quoted Victor Hugo to say that no power on earth could stop an idea whose time has come,' recalls T N Ninan.
But their trajectory and direction have been largely influenced by politics and the political leadership's understanding of how the economy needs to be managed, explains A K Bhattacharya.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is set to create history when she presents her seventh straight Budget on Tuesday for the fiscal 2024-25, surpassing the record of former prime minister Morarji Desai. Sitharaman, who will turn 65 next month, was in 2019 appointed as India's first full-time woman finance minister when Prime Minister Narendra Modi won a decisive second term.
BJP says Sinha has found a new ally in the Congress.
Opposition presidential candidate Yashwant Sinha on Monday filed his nomination papers for the July 18 election, with a host of leaders including Rahul Gandhi, Sharad Pawar, Akhilesh Yadav and Farooq Abdullah accompanying him.
Other ministers who have presented five straight annual financial statements include Arun Jaitley, P Chidambaram, Yashwant Sinha, Manmohan Singh and Morarji Desai.
Congress leader Jairam Ramesh interacts with readers on Rediff Chat as he discusses the period that changed India's history, forever.
'Are we so ready to believe that in this country whose virtues we constantly shout from the rooftops, there is no single person -- other than Modi -- in a minimum of 272 elected MPs with the talent and ability to lead this country?' asks Prem Panicker.
Teen Murti Bhavan served as the official residence of India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
Alva, 80, would file her nomination papers on Tuesday, July 19 which is the last date for filing nominations for the August 6 election.
The journey for 24-year-old Akash Anand would be much tougher, because dynastic succession goes against the grain of Dalit politics that B R Ambedkar founded.
The Delhi high court on Wednesday directed former Bharatiya Janata Party Rajya Sabha member Subramanian Swamy to hand over possession of his government bungalow to the estate officer within six weeks.
After Rahul's Bharat Jodo Yatra began criss-crossing the Hindi heartland, BJP leaders have revived their attacks on 'dynasty politics' and 'family rule' in the Congress, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
If there is unity in the Opposition, it is only about regional parties other than the DMK not wanting Rahul Gandhi or any other Congress leader for prime minister, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The apex court on December 14 last year dismissed a clutch of PILs, including the one filed by former Union ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie and lawyer Prashant Bhushan, saying there was "no occasion to doubt" the decision-making process of the Centre in the procurement of 36 Rafale jets from France.
'We are not rebelling against our party.' 'We are not fence-crossers.'
Parliamentarians and legislators across the country voted on Monday to elect India's 15th president, choosing between opposition pick Yashwant Sinha and National Democratic Alliance nominee Droupadi Murmu who is favoured to win the battle to the Rashtrapati Bhavan.
'One wishes that today's 'take no prisoners' brand of politics would give way to an understanding of the national interest that is shared by both government and Opposition.'
The Modi government is notoriously honest about one fact: It does not listen to economists, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Rahul Gandhi, who is scheduled to again visit poll-bound Gujarat from Saturday, said the government can't break the back of small and medium businesses, crush the informal sector and destroy millions of jobs.
Banerjee said the two leaders discussed the current political scenario and strategies to oust the BJP in assembly and Lok Sabha elections at the 20-minute meeting at Gandhi's residence.
About 3,500 jurists, academics, actors, artistes, writers and people from other walks of life called the registration of the FIR against The Wire's founding editor an attack on press freedom.
"(Former PM) Atal Bihari Vajpayee said 'raj dharma' was not followed in Gujarat (during the 2002 riots). Now, 'raj dharma' is not being followed in case of Andhra Pradesh. We have been denied what was rightfully ours," he claimed.
He has been removed from the high-profile post on the charges of corruption and dereliction of duty making him the first chief in the history of the agency to face such action.
Naidu, a former BJP ally, said he will meet non-BJP political leader and convince them about the need to fight collectively against the BJP.
Without the handsome receipts from the sale of government equity in PSUs and sharp increases in excise revenues from oil, Mr Jaitley's fiscal consolidation drive would have become even more arduous, says A K Bhattacharya.
"All opposition parties should work together. It should be a one-to-one fight against the BJP. All opposition parties should help the strongest one in the state against the BJP," Banerjee said.
'How do we explain that on the economic, internal security and strategic fronts, India's unstable coalitions have acted more decisively and boldly than all our full-majority governments yet?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
'While the GST is structured to be an all-encompassing tax and to create a vastly expanded digital network of recorded transactions, no one knows how traders long used to avoiding taxes will apply their ingenuity,' says T N Ninan.
'By holding forth on Swadeshi economics, Bhagwat is showing his intent to fight back,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'The family is the final court of appeal, the first among unequals. If there is no family, all leaders are equal. If all leaders are equal, anyone can lead the Congress. So every time the family has stayed in the background, the Congress has split.'
The success of the government will depend substantially on the quality of its team of key ministers, officials and advisors
Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is hailed as the architect of economic reforms in the country, is a member of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance, it was announced on Tuesday.
