The main culprit in vitiating the inter community/caste/class relations has been the so called 'targeted' approach. This is nothing but discrimination on the basis of faith/caste/class. When an equally poor and deprived child is denied scholarship, despite equal merit, resentment begins to brew, says Colonel (retd) Anil Athale.
The linking of biometric UID/Aadhaar number to all public services makes "We, the People of India" worse than slaves, says Gopal Krishna.
The apex court bench, comprising Justices J S Khehar and Adarsh Kumar Goel, heard senior lawyers including U R Lalit for almost two hours before saying that the high court order "does not call for" any intervention.
'India and Indian Americans cannot rely on wishful thinking about the checks and balances in the US system to magically take care of the many dangerous things that Trump could do,' says Chicago-based writer Ram Kelkar.
Anti-conversion laws are needed since thrusting the idea of a competitive battlefield of religion onto India's pluralistic traditions can only lead to greater communal conflict, says Sankrant Sanu
Why Dalit leaders cross over to the BJP
Sukanya Verma shares her exciting filmi week with us.
To persist with talks in the face of continuing terrorism that puts hundreds of Indian lives at stake is not only naive but morally repugnant and ethically unacceptable. It is time to see through this charade and abandon a path of high risk and no returns, says Vivek Gumaste.
Because of the treaty, no big dams or power projects can be built by India on Jhelum, Indus or Chenab.
Former Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar is one of the few Indian police officers to speak to Dawood Ibrahim at length after the fugitive gangster fled India. A gripping excerpt from his new book, Dial D For Don: Inside Stories Of CBI Missions.
The CPI-M leader also demanded the setting up of a House Committee to examine the latest developments in various central universities.
The year threw up quite a few shockers, some rather rude one. Below are Rediff.com's 12 picks that made us sit back and think, 'Did that really happen?'
Iraq is on the verge of collapsing and foreign military intervention is inevitable. But for those who follow the developments in Iraq and the Middle-East will understand the current situation is nothing but a culmination of US and western policies toward the region, says Dr Waiel Awwad
Following is the full text of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's address from the ramparts of the Red Fort on the 73rd Independence Day.
The government may claim planted trees compensate for forests lost, but that does not mean complex flora and fauna destroyed have been restored, points out Himadri Ghosh.
'When the cause of the leak is identified, is the AERB going to order a shutdown of all the other pressurised heavy water reactors in the country to fix the underlying problem?'
A round up of all the health news from around the world.
'Pakistan is full of 'religious entrepreneurs' like Hafeez Saeed who poison the minds of the young so that they can be motivated to become terrorists. They work in concert with the rulers of Pakistan. It is a private-public partnership.'
Two US warships fired at least 50 cruise missiles at the Ash Shai'rat airfield in Homs province in western Syria, from where the US administration believes Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad fired the chemical weapons against his own people, media reports said.
The approval was announced by Environment Minister Greg Hunt, who said "after undertaking a thorough assessment and consideration under national environment law, I have approved the Carmichael Coal Mine and Rail Infrastructure project, subject to 36 strict conditions".
'If Haider petitions the court and the government for legitimate rights it is called minority appeasement, but when Hardik orchestrates violence he is lionised, romanticised and given huge media space that ends up both legitimising and oxygenating his movement, no matter how contrary it is to the Rule of Law,' argues Shehzad Poonawalla.
The defence ministry has signed off on a national security plan that it cannot fund. Ajai Shukla reports
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I cannot agree with the sentiment that hanging rapists will make sexual harassment and assault, and other forms of violence against women, magically disappear. Misogyny has stained our culture for far too long for merely judicial recourse to be able to wash it away, says Paloma Sharma.
'The National Conference and the Peoples Democratic Party, as recent events suggest, are quite content as New Delhi's collaborators rather than trying to be true representatives of the Kashmiri people,' says Athar Parvaiz.
'We have worked to create road blocks in the path of those who thought that there was space for conventional war despite Pakistan's nuclear weapons.' 'Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme is not open-ended and aligned with India only.' 'In this unstable regional environment, one nuclear power is trying to teach lessons to another nuclear power through the medium of small arms and mortar shells on the Line of Control, and bluster.' 'A historic opportunity of a lifetime beckons the leaderships of India and Pakistan to grasp, sit together and explore the possibilities of conflict resolution.'
Mamta Rawat is one among the thousands who were rendered homeless during the June 2013 Uttarakhand floods. Six months on, however, not much work on relocation or rehabilitation has started. And money is really not the issue.
Admittedly, EVMs too have a UID number and any convergence of data can make the secret ballot system a party of history, warns Dr Gopal Krishna in the 5th part of his series against Aadhaar.
By refusing permission for the proposed ship-breaking facility, India can send a categorical message to the foreign ship owning countries that they should keep their own waste and recycle
Even in this season of political-peeing-on-lampposts, Rahul Gandhi's statement takes the cake (with due apologies to another astute observer of poverty, the much late Mary Antoinette).
'Reflex responses to Dalit student Rohith Vemula's suicide are band aids that stem the current hemorrhage but do precious little to the festering wound beneath,' says Vivek Gumaste.
WWhat Pakistan faces in the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan is virulent insurgency and terrorism, fuelled by its association with Al Qaeda
The US needs to do three things to help the newly elected Nawaz Sharif government in Pakistan, says Stanley A Weiss
Incisive Editor, brilliant scholar on Islam, and now BJP leader, M J Akbar is at his intellectual best when he dissects the Muslim world and its problems, and offers up a solution from his unique perspective, as he did in this recent speech at the 10th R N Kao Memorial Lecture in New Delhi.
'If you invest your entire capital in talks, you cannot abruptly change gear and decide on war.'
'While the government must be relentless in its efforts to curb unruly elements to ensure secular harmony and protect its goal of national development,it must not lose the moral high ground by giving in to the antics of the anti-nationalist lobby.' 'They must be countered and relegated to the dustbin of history,' says Vivek Gumaste.
'If Indian armed forces entered Pakistan and succeeded in inflicting major damage on the Pakistani army and occupied territory in the Pakistani heartland, there is reason to think the Pakistani military would use some nuclear weapons against the incoming Indian forces to compel India to stop.'
Malayalam film audiences, who had spent close to two decades waiting for something truly interesting to watch at the movies, seem to be finally getting their due.
Even a 6 percent vote-share would make AAP an important player on the national scene. The key lies in strategically concentrating AAP's vote, especially in the cities, so that it can break Narendra Modi's momentum, besides defeating an already weak Congress, says Praful Bidwai.
'You want a steady, confident, self-assured and highly skilful hand at the till. 'It is a pity that the BJP has decided to deprive itself of such a hand at this politically sensitive time.' 'It is like sacking your surgeon in the middle of your brain surgery,' says S Muralidharan.
'What if Modi becomes the fascist the leftists paints him as? What if he does suspend the Constitution and declares himself the ruler, with support from the army? What exactly will you do, Mr Leftie?' asks Rajeev Srinivasan.
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