It is not much of an issue just now, but it could become one if the idea of caste census captures socio-political imagination, going beyond electoral tags and identities, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The BJP and Congress have already launched spirited campaigns for the elections.
Ministerial expansion: Focus on Purvanchal, Brahmin voters in UP.
Uttar Pradesh deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma has said the issue of the state's next CM is already 'settled' with the BJP top brass making it clear that the coming assembly elections will be fought under the leadership of Yogi Adityanath.
The TDB has decided to appoint 19 lower caste people, including 18 belonging to the scheduled caste and one from the scheduled tribe
'In 2013, Modi said his government would be of Dalits and OBCs.' 'During his tenure, the highest number of atrocities have taken place.' 'What they want is that this Ambedkar Constitution must not be practised in India in the future.'
Chief Minister Stalin seems to have drawn a line between his personal beliefs and those of others in the family, beginning with wife Durga Stalin, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The incumbent ministers put in their papers at the meeting of the cabinet, which was their last, at the secretariat in Amaravati.
The aftermath of Mani Ratnam's Ponniyin Selvan has led to an argument that there was no religion as Hinduism in Chola times.
Instead, there was only Saivism, Vaishnavism, etc, and that the Cholas were Saivites, and hence not Hindus, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Valmiki has not written anything about Hanuman's caste.' 'I want to clarify that Hanuman was not a Vanar, but an Adivasi.'
Medical seats for under-graduates and post-graduates remaining vacant in the NEET era, together with the Centre 'freezing' the number of medical colleges and seats in (Dravidian) Tamil Nadu and the launch of the PM's 'Vishwakarma Scheme' for the nation's craftsmen, are all seen as a bid to further reverse the state's progressive socio-economic agenda of and its achievements of the past hundred-plus years, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Patel was administered the oath as the 18th chief minister by Governor Acharya Devvrat at a function held at the Helipad Ground near the new Secretariat.
If we have already excluded Muslims from political office by default, and if we are already harassing them daily through laws, like Nazi Germany did and like Pakistan did, then why do we need a Hindu Rashtra or a change from the present set of laws? argues Aakar Patel.
She lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Samajwadi Party and the Congress, holding them responsible for the lack of jobs and migration from the state.
'Goa is a tiny state, but in terms of its Business of Politics, several powerful lobbies of India are involved in it, be it the mining lobby, hoteliers' lobby, casino lobby, hawala lobby, drugs lobby etc.'
Just as much as the magic of cinema, Chhello Show is about the imagination of a child and the typical Indian jugaad, observes Deepa Gahlot. Chhello Show
Fifty years ago today, December 25, 1972, Chakravarti Rajagopalachari, one of the titans of India's freedom struggle, passed into the ages. Kalki Krishnamurthy, who penned the Tamil classic Ponniyin Selvan among numerous other novels, describes his first glimpse of the man who would become an august national leader and his cherished role model.
'With the deaths of Jayalalithaa and Karunanidhi, the BJP and Congress thought that they had a chance.' 'They have conceded that power is with the Dravidian parties.'
'Muslims know they cannot defeat the BJP, why then come in its firing range?' 'And they know, ultimately it is the BJP MLA who is going to get elected and only he or she can do their work.' 'The BJP may do a different kind of politics for Muslims, but when they sit in the chair they work for Muslims too.'
Mani Ratnam is experimenting with a real-life historical in Ponniyin Selvan, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Education in private and public schools should be in English and in one regional language; it will solve the entire reservation issue.'
Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury's 'rashtrapatni' remark snowballed into a major political row on Thursday with the Bharatiya Janata Party accusing the opposition party of insulting President Droupadi Murmu and demanding that Congress chief Sonia Gandhi should apologise to the nation.
Joining hands with smaller parties with a political base in different castes was a part of the BJP strategy as it won big in Uttar Pradesh in the 2017 assembly polls and 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
Wait for a while before he does another somersault... But one thing is reasonably certain -- the twice betrayed BJP may not embrace him again, predicts Virendra Kapoor.
Mukesh Agnihotri, the leader of opposition in the outgoing assembly, was administered the oath as the deputy chief minister.
'A recent compromise by the state government is accepting NEET exams for medical entrance.'
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati has warned the people against the "communal designs" of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Bharatiya Janata Party and urged them not to lose their cool in the run-up to the 2017 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
'Welcoming her with glee reflects the BJP's desperation and bankruptcy in UP.'
The Koregaon-Bhima Inquiry Commission, probing the January 2018 violence near a memorial in Maharashtra's Pune district, has told the state government that it is suspending all scheduled hearings till the government does not provide it a "suitable accommodation" in Mumbai to conduct the probe into the case.
Bhupendra Patel can never really break free of intervention from New Delhi. But if he can win over the Gujaratis and improve the BJP's tally substantially, he will have proved that he should be taken seriously.
Words and actions like those of R N Ravi and a vocal section of the state BJP have only added to Tamil fears and suspicions, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Despite the hype over the possible candidature of All India Congress Committee General Secretary Digvijaya Singh for the Varanasi Lok Sabha seat, the Congress has narrowed down its choice to local legislator Ajay Rai and former party MP Rajesh Mishra, with the former emerging as a front runner.
Ravi Kishan, the BJP's candidate, is an outsider. The BSP-SP candidate is from the powerful Nishad community. Yogi faces a tough task in ensuring that the Gorakhpur seat, which he represented from 1998 to 2017, stays with the BJP.
70-plus years after Independence, 'Hindu India, metamorphosised as 'Hindutva India', is proving the British right -- and for all the wrong reasons. Mohan Bhagwat should have answers for the why of it, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
UP now has 16 ministers, the maximum from any state, in an apparent bid to keep the Dalit and other backward class votebank content.
Surveys suggest that the AAP would win 40 seats in the 182-member assembly if elections are held tomorrow.
"The government recruitment is frozen. Where are the jobs?" the minister said.
'Amritpal is the creation of journalists and the inaction of the government in Punjab.'
'Was he afraid that his answers during cross-examination would land him in trouble under the new ruling dispensation?'
