After his revolt against elevation of Narendra Modi last month, senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani on Thursday attended the first Parliamentary Board meeting along with the Gujarat chief minister to discuss the strategy for the next polls.
Between 2001 and 2011, the number of rural habitations with population of less than 1,000 has declined sharply
'Everything was sacrosanct when the BJP was led by Vajpayee and Advani.' 'That was a different culture. But with Modi and Amit Shah nothing is sacrosanct.'
'Why should the people of Odisha divert water from the Mahanadhi when 13 out of 32 districts are chronically drought prone?' 'Water is a state subject. Can you really nationalise rivers for which you need drastic amendments in the Constitution?'
Slamming the Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliance in Assam as coming together of "two dangerous forces of communalism and divisiveness", Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of "insulting" people of the state
Uttarakhand was a tragedy that none of us will forget. As experts analysed the tragedy, it became clear that the disaster was more man made. The intergovernmental panel on climate change in its Assessment Report 5 states that human influence on the climate system is clear and this is evident from the increasing greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, positive radiative forcing, observed warming, and understanding of the climate system.
'Irrespective of their politics, people feel happy.' 'One of the best compliments I have received is that I have made it from Kashmir to Karnataka.'
Rahul Gandhi is behaving as if he has come from planet Mars, Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi said on Monday taunting the Congress leader for levelling accusations on others, instead of accounting for his party's 10-year rule at the Centre.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday hit back at Narendra Modi, comparing him to Hitler and said his desperate dream to unfurl national flag at Red Fort would remain unfulfilled.
Pixie, boycott, bob cut, buzz cut -- short hairstyles rule!
'We know many things are going to happen.' 'People should be preparing for sea level rise, for increased cyclonic activity, for drought.' 'One reason I wrote the book is to alert people to the dangers that they face.' 'For example, Mumbai faces enormous threat.'
Taking note of large-scale deaths because of the heat wave in various parts of country, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has asked a Group of Ministers to discuss and decide on its inclusion as natural calamity.
'The jobs that are being created now are the delivery boy jobs which are of extremely poor quality, or contractual jobs where you hire a person on a per piece basis.'
'The Mughals became completely Indian in every sense and united the vast Indian subcontinent, not only territorially, but also the hearts and minds of people with multiple religio-cultural, linguistic and ethnic diversities' 'The Mughals, arguably, made India an enviable superpower in the then world.' 'Are the Hindutva rulers of today scared of acknowledging Mughal accomplishments?' asks Mohammad Sajjad.
Noting that oil prices had gone down after the BJP-led government came to power in May 2014, before they went up, Prasad said it is a problem whose solution is not in its hands.
Charging that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has "no time" to meet farmers and hear their woes, Congress on Sunday said it would take the fight on the "anti-farmer" land bill to the states.
With all its ups and downs, 2015 is now concluding. And the New Year will bring new expectations to all of us. So tell us your expectations from 2016:
In an address that was telecast live on national broadcaster Doordarshan, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat on Friday patted the Narendra Modi government for initiatives on national security, economy and international relations in a short period of four months.
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.
'When it is an open ballot, the division taking place in the open house will be for all to see.' 'As they say sunlight is the best disinfectant, this (aspect of the order) brings in transparency and it's in keeping with the best democratic principles.'
Two people, one legally assisting the affected people because of their exclusion from the National Register of Citizens (NRC), and another whose relative has been declared a 'foreigner' by the quasi-judicial Foreigners' Tribunal (FT), talk to Rediff.com about the issues on the ground that people excluded from the NRC are facing and how it can turn into a long-drawn legal process.
'It would be very easy for me to say, it's only the Pakistanis that want the Kashmir issue to remain alive.' 'Trust me, there is a vested interest on the Indian side in keeping the issue of Jammu and Kashmir alive.'
Cautioning against various threats facing the subcontinent, President Pranab Mukherjee on Friday said it was imperative for India to have an effective deterrence and strong defence to promote development and it must be prepared to use its "might" if the need arises.
According to the 2011 census, 67 per cent of rural households and 13 per cent of urban households defecate in the open.
'In the final analysis, all Budgets everywhere are like the schemes hatched by A A Milne's lovable Winnie-the-Pooh.' 'They may be well-intended, but often go awry.' 'Although Pooh and his friends agree that he 'has very little brain', he is occasionally acknowledged to have a clever idea, usually driven by common sense.' 'This Budget at a first glance does not appear to belong to that latter category,' says economist Shreekant Sambrani.
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The outgoing Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Tuesday hinted at an intriguing possibility of supporting his party National Conference's bitter political rival PDP in forming a government in the state after the hung verdict in the Assembly polls.
Political parties are getting battle-ready, nominating their best candidates to contest Election 2014... Rediff.com's incomparable Sheela Bhatt begins a new column where she reveals the ground realities in the Battle for India, as only she can. Don't miss it!
The notes argue that it will widen the talent base available to govt to deliver increasingly complex services to a demanding population.
Kadvi Hawa has some very bad news for us all.
'People wondered aloud why she had given up on the aging, getting-day-by-day-more-infirm avatar. And was freshly blooming.'
'Kaala's sin is not that it is presented as a mouthpiece for its director Pa Ranjith's political viewpoints, but that it makes a travesty of them.' 'Ranjith turns Marx into merchandise, all the while functioning as a hired hand for Brand Rajinikanth,' points out Sreehari Nair.
'Human rights violations are there in rural areas and in cities. In rural areas it is crude and in the open. In urban areas it is well hidden.' 'Awareness has grown several fold. India has 160 national and state human rights institutions. No other country in the world has this.' 'Unfortunately the right to association, right to assembly, freedom of expression, right to protest and discuss are all being curtailed systematically one by one.'
Clusters of policemen and television journalists alertly anticipated the arrival of Mumbai's joint commissioner of police, who, it was confirmed by most people I asked, does not visit court often. No one could remember when they had last heard of Deven Bharti appearing as a witness in a murder trial.
Driving a Tata Nano covered with banners about his son's killing by the Mumbai Police, Kundan Prasad Singh is fighting his first election to get justice for a dead son.
There should be one comprehensive and credible report on weather for India since a major part of the economy is dependent on it, says 'weather man' Angshujyoti Das.
'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.'
A report submitted by the consortium of seven Indian Institutes of Technology on way to rejuvenate the Ganga river is at heart of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ambitious plan to restore the glory of the river.
The average land given to the rural landless is small and falling, from 0.95 acres in 2002 to 0.88 acres in 2015 - a 7.4 per cent drop over 13 years-and a slowdown is evident in the process of taking land away from rich landlords, the RTI data reveal.
'It marks the start of an era where the BJP must now campaign on its own record rather than against the misrule of another party.'
As the Jan-Dhan scheme completes a month since its official launch, reports coming in from various parts of the country suggest the stated target of 75 million new accounts will be achieved much before January 26 next year.
