'For Modi and Shah, the humiliating setback is bigger than the electoral defeats in New Delhi and in Bihar in 2015.'
'There has never been a problem between Hindu and Muslims in Kairana.' 'We are a people that smoke from the same hookah.' Once the seat of an influential tradition of Indian classical music, Kairana has become a metaphor for the exodus of Hindus.
'Potent nationalism doesn't just distract from the economic task at hand; it actively undermines it.'
'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.
The government on Monday ruled out any terror or "external aggression" link to the communal violence in Jammu and Kashmir and asserted that there will be no repeat of 1990 when Pandits were forced to leave KashmirValley.
Refuting allegations of divisions in the Congress in Rajasthan, Corporate Affairs Minister and Member of Parliament from Ajmer, Sachin Pilot, speaks to Kavita Chowdhury on a range of issues, including the Congress's prospects in the coming Rajasthan Assembly polls.
'Any Muslim who shows even the slightest hint of revolutionary thought is marked as 'infected'.' 'At that point, he is taken to the nearest Detention Centre where a procedure called Reconditioning awaits him.' 'Areas with a high Muslim population have been designated as Scheduled Religion Zones.' 'To be an active participant in this social cleansing ritual, there is only one prerequisite: You have to be an undying patriot whose friend and family is his country.'
Imam Umer Ahmed Ilyasi, chief imam of the All India Imam Organisation, who led a delegation of 30 Muslims to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on June 3, tells Prasanna D Zore/Rediff.com how the meeting came about and what was discussed during the 75-minute convivial meet.
Here is a look at some of Aseem Chhabra's favourite memories of 2020 in Hindi cinema, performances by well-known and new actors, special moments in films and shows.
'When Hindus converted through inducements there was no hue and cry, but when reconversions took place, everyone cried foul. If re-conversions are bad, so are conversions.' 'Our government is not getting involved either in conversions or re-conversions. The BJP has nothing to do with it.' Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu in a candid interview.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday disagreed with those in the Congress who were dismissive of the challenge posed by Narendra Modi but asserted that the party would approach the 2014 Lok Sabha polls with self-confidence, irrespective of the results of the just concluded elections in five states.
Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Friday replied to the Election Commission notice over alleged model code violation with controversial remarks that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence was in touch with Muzaffarnagar riot victims, denying the charge.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's maiden speech from Red Fort last Independence Day outlined some grand programmes. Shehzad Poonawalla does a quick check on the progress made.
Gujarat Chief Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi is the top-most target for all four major terror outfits in India, according to Indian Mujahideen's recently-arrested chief Yasin Bhatkal.
'Much can be done by India under the provisions of the treaty to make full use of its rights it has.' 'The impact of that will be felt downstream.'
'The Congress era was already over anyway! The real question is: Has India opened a new, post-coalition era and I'm very doubtful about that,' Christophe Jaffrelot, author of several books on Indian politics, tells Archana Masih/Rediff.com, analysing Mandate 2014.
Former Delhi chief minister and Kerala governor Sheila Dikshit, speaking for the first time after her gubernatorial resignation, tells Kavita Chowdhury there is a need for Parliament to codify rules for governors if they are required to demit office with a change in the central government. Edited excerpts
Sensing the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's attempts to rekindle Ayodhya sentiments, the Akhilesh Yadav-led government in Uttar Pradesh has banned a meeting to mark the 25th death anniversary of brothers, Ram and Sharad Kothari, who fell to police bullets while performing the symbolic kar sewa on November 2, 1990 -- two years before the Babri Masjid was brought down.
In the past four years, neither the BJP nor the VHP has shown any interest in the mandir or Lord Ram. Now that elections are nearing, it is attempting to whip up communal passions, says Minister of State for Home R P N Singh in an interview to Anita Katyal
A curfew was on Sunday clamped in three more districts of Udhampur, Samba and Kathua in Jammu region and army staged flag marches as tension prevailed following outbreak of communal violence in Kishtwar on Friday that left two persons dead and scores of others injured.
'...that it takes fantasy seriously as a part of real life'... A fascinating excerpt from Jonathan Gil Harris's book, Masala Shakespeare: How A Firangi Writer Became Indian.
The NDA candidate tells the Election Commission that the Maoists plan to kidnap him.
'The test of true secularism in India is when a girl in your family decides to marry someone from another religion. If you accept her decision happily, then you are truly secular. If you don't, it means your secularism is fake,' argues Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'We also urge you to take steps to control the activities of groups, such as the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh,' said the letter signed by 34 top American lawmakers.
An upcoming film on Mohammad Azharuddin promises to be a potboiler, though not a true biopic.
The Delhi police made several arrests of key members of banned Indian Mujahideen this year including its chief Tehseen Akhtar but faced major law and order challenges with Trilokpuri riots and a 100 per cent spurt in crime graph in the national capital.
Imagine being a part of a country, but being discriminated against by the majority community and atrocities being committed against you by the state. This is the deplorable conditions that the Rohingyas of Myanmar live in where they are cut off from their livelihoods and sources of income, unable to access markets, hospitals and schools, and have little or no access to relief aid. In order to understand the situation and the genesis of the tragedy unfolding, Rediff.com's Archana Masih speaks to Ambassador Vijay Nambiar, the United Nations' Chef de Cabinet (Chief of Staff), who had served a long stint with the UN in New York on the issue.
Notwithstanding Congress' reprimand, Union Steel Minister Beni Prasad Verma on Saturday intensified his attack on his friend-turned foe Mulayam Singh Yadav accusing him of conniving with the Bharatiya Janata Party to flare up communal passions and dared the Samajwadi Party leader to a public debate on Babri issue.
'Both the governor and the President enjoy an enormous array of 'grey' powers.' 'All parties criticise these when in the Opposition. But why does no government dismantle them when these parties come to power?' asks Aditi Phadnis.
We present our alphabet of 2020, pulling in everything you'll remember about this year we'd rather forget.
'The spread of barbarity in Muzaffarnagar's villages makes administrative complicity so very evident that your government is rightly alleged to be imitating what the Modi-led administration did in Gujarat in 2002,' Mohammad Sajjad tells UP Minister Azam Khan.
'What has taken the wind out of its sails is the government's own expectation management and its inability to strategise on delivery,' says Vikram Johri.
Members of various organisations on Friday held protests at Ambala in Haryana and Delhi against the proposed screening of controversial film Messenger of God featuring Dera Saccha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh in the lead role.
The Manmohan Singh government has agreed to provide 2,800 additional paramilitary personnel to contain the unabated tension that continues to prevail in and around the riot-torn Muzaffarnagar district of Uttar Pradesh where 32 persons were killed in the 48-hour-long communal violence that broke out on Saturday.
'It was a deliberate conspiracy. The mob targeted large houses, burning down ACs, fridges, almirahs and furniture.'
Hours before Narendra Modi's scheduled rally in Bahraich, the district administration gave a conditional permission to the Bharatiya Janata Party to hold the meet on Friday.
The ruling Samajwadi Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party in Uttar Pradesh seem to be making the most of the prevailing crisis in Moradabad to serve their political ends.
'One can understand this prejudice in the minds of policemen against Muslims, without accepting it. But what tilts the balance disproportionately is the police's blind eye to offences committed in the name of the majority.' says Jyoti Punwani.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan makes a gallant attempt to deflect accusations against the United Progressive Alliance's record in his freewheeling conversation with Business Standard's Aditi Phadnis over lunch.
By ending the Shiv Sena's political untouchability, the Congress is creating a level playing ground for itself in the political battle of Hindu identity, explains Sheela Bhatt.
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