Domestic airports across the country are bursting at the seams. And new ones are stuck.
Businesses that either take local communities for granted or see them as an obstacle to be 'managed' are skating on thin ice.
AAP candidates from Mumbai, Medha Patkar and Meera Sanyal, are poised to play a crucial and complementary role. While Patkar gives voice to the suffering of people at the grassroots, Sanyal is articulating the key principles that could build a more just and equitable society or economy, says Rajni Bakshi.
Rediff.com presents a selection of the year's most enduring moments year from around the world
CEOs fear any change in status of the mines will mean disruption in production, loss of investment and increased production cost for user industries.
'One investor told us one leader in Gujarat had sent him to Konkan to buy land.' 'How did these people come to know about this project in advance when locals didn't know?' 'It means those who are running the country are somewhere interested in selling the country's resources to private businessmen.'
Drones may have been used for non-lethal purposes but state-sponsored assassinations and semi-covert wars are fuelling their boom and not scientific missions or creative activists, says American political activist Medea Benjamin.
'The Pakistani military has encouraged and supported terrorist organisations, especially in Kashmir, as a means of waging proxy war against the Indian military and the country's superior economic resources.' 'The evidence is irrefutable with the recent killing of 46 paramilitary troops being just the latest example.'
Corporate Social Responsibility can become a serious tool for improving the lives of millions in any structural and long term way, writes Rajni Bakshi.
Premier Li Keqiang highlighted his government's performance in the last one year and the challenges ahead in various fields. Compared to other reports by his predecessors, Li spoke more frankly about the mounting challenges faced by the country. Srikanth Kondapalli on the two recent Chinese parliament sessions.
Is it inconsistency in policy, or the lack of robust support?
'At a time when the entire India-US relationship needs to be defined by President Trump and Prime Minister Modi, a fresh look at the liability issue has become urgent,' says Ambassador T P Sreenivasan, former Governor for India at the IAEA.
It is unconscionable to choose between Sardar Patel, who united India physically, and Indira Gandhi, who gave meaning, content and pride to the unity of the nation and became a martyr at the altar of national unity, says Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
'China, which had earlier blockaded New Delhi's bid to join the Nuclear Suppliers Group by citing the nuclear non-proliferation law, finds itself in an awkward position and international isolation.' 'India needs to pursue a policy of mediation between China and the Southeast Asian countries for regional security,' says Srikanth Kondapalli.
'Why did they not raise their voice against the pollution in the Yamuna earlier?' 'Why were they quiet for so long against construction and encroachment on the flood plains.'
The Sochi Winter Olympics are meant to be Vladimir Putin's crowning achievement as Russian leader but are in danger of becoming a symbol of his country's problems.
'Sasikala, already determined to keep both the party and CM's post for herself, might not be able to do it, if she were to wait any longer,' says N Sathiya Moorthy.
According to a confidential government paper seen by Reuters, several states want to do away with obtaining landowners' consent altogether in some cases and to cut through red tape which they say holds up development.
The decision to not attend the forum attended by 28 heads of state and 130 national delegations is a clear break from its usual policy of going along with the crowd.
The trouble is largest FDI projects in India have had a tragic history.
The reported controversial remarks of President Pranab Mukherjee on Bofors issue to a Swedish daily have no bearing on his upcoming tour of Sweden, the first State visit, beginning on May 31, External Affairs Ministry said in New Delhi on Thursday.
Civil rights activist Lakshmi Sridaran argues why South Asians must stand on the right side of history and resist the Trump administration's "systematic attack on the entire spectrum of the US immigration system."
Democracies avoid serious political turbulence only so long as they ensure that the relative level of inequality between the rich and the poor does not become excessively large, says Vice President M Hamid Ansari.
The prime minister's visit to Washington should focus more on shopping for energy security and stopping the US from snooping on us, reigning in its popular and innocuously operated instruments to gather intelligence like Google, says Tarun Vijay.
National award winner Chaitanya Tamhane tells us the story behind his film, Court.
Most top industrialists rate PM's first 100 days in office as 'good', primarily due to his intentions, not concrete policy measures.
'Studying History, we come close to all of the messiness of human life -- we understand what motivates people, what makes them get along or go to war, what dreams they had for themselves and their futures.'
'The Cauvery river has become excessively politicised by all political parties.' 'They see a vote bank in an emotive issue of this kind.'
Armed with green nod and fund infusion, Gujarat govt getting ready to issue tenders to build infrastructure at the mega investment region
'The AAP is likely to take root in some metropolises -- although it won't be easy to replicate the small-scale Delhi model with equal intensity or cadre-strength in a large state,' says Praful Bidwai.
Govt says coastal road is meant to decongest Mumbai, experts believe it would be counter-productive.
'If Modi arrived like a juggernaut, he left like a jigsaw puzzle whose pieces were being dismantled bit by bit. It was as if India had seceded quietly from him.' Shiv Viswanathan's social science fiction about what India would be like in 2020.
The US foreign and security policy establishment, says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar, apprehends that Trump may compel them to exorcise the 'unipolar predicament', and bring foreign and security policies to reflect the desires and priorities of the American public.
In anticipation of a verdict to be delivered by the International Tribunal of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague on Tuesday, China has orchestrated a worldwide campaign to defuse its findings.
Shubir Rishi/Rediff.com continues his jungle adventure and narrates his day at the Kanha National Park.
The new ordinance on land acquisition will allow land grabbers to deprive millions, destroy agriculture, horticulture, rivers, forests, tree cover and mangroves to extract minerals as well as ground water, without replenishment at a pace that will not leave anything for the next generation, warns activist Medha Patkar.
The public-private partnership model is a compulsion, says the minister.
