'Potent nationalism doesn't just distract from the economic task at hand; it actively undermines it.'
'Hindu voters in coastal Karnataka lean more towards Hindutva than Hinduism which explains why the Siddaramaiah government's perception as anti-Hindu worked wonders for the BJP in coastal Karnataka.'
While the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party hit out at the MLA and the Congress government, Shivakumar seeking to clarify, said no guarantee scheme will be stopped and it will be continued for five years.
'Are we so ready to believe that in this country whose virtues we constantly shout from the rooftops, there is no single person -- other than Modi -- in a minimum of 272 elected MPs with the talent and ability to lead this country?' asks Prem Panicker.
As the campaign peaked, AAP leaders evidently realised they had to deflect their chief opponent's attempts to polarise the electorate over religious identity, explains David Devadas.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has honoured Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh and Jain refugees by giving them citizenship through Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), Union home minister Amit Shah said on Tuesday and maintained there is no provision of stripping of anyone's citizenship in the new law.
Saturday's voting will mark the end to the marathon polling process that began on April 19 month and has already covered 486 Lok Sabha seats in 28 states and Union territories.
Gujarat was labelled Hindutva's crucible and Modi was to become the chief 'chemist'. A revealing political saga excerpted from Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay's The Demolition, the Verdict and the Temple: The Definitive Book on the Ram Mandir Project.
All arrangements, including heavy security, are in place for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 45-hour stay at the famed Vivekananda Rock Memorial in Kanyakumari on Thursday, as he would sit on meditation at the place named after the revered Hindu saint.
He was trolled during the Lok Sabha poll campaign, but despite the tactics by his rivals, action hero Suresh Gopi rose to national stardom in cinema style on June 4, winning the Thrissur seat on a BJP ticket and scripting history for the saffron party in Kerala.
In Delhi, Kumar's family lives in the Majnu Ka Tila area and they are engaged in small-time business. He said a total of five people got Indian citizenship in his locality on Wednesday. Over a hundred had applied for it, he said.
In the past five years, UP's Opposition remained passive and defensive against the BJP, a trend that does not augur well for the impending battle.
In an indirect reference to Labour's perceived anti-India stance over the issue of Kashmir, he noted: "There can be no place for racism or anti-India sentiment of any kind in this country."
'Modi is not assuring the nation that if he gets back to power in 2024 and remains in power till 2029, he will not change the Constitution.'
'The Hindu electorate is more or less in the BJP defined space now.'
The survey indicates that the Congress -- one of the main opposition parties to the BJP -- was the top choice among Muslims (30 per cent), Christians (30 per cent) and Sikhs (33 per cent) in 2019, reports Aditi Phadnis.
They then vandalised the premises, breaking CCTV cameras and locking the main gate before leaving, he said.
Struggling to gain political traction on issues of corruption, the West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party is shifting its focus to emotive topics such as the Ram Temple in Ayodhya and the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in a bid to achieve its target of securing 35 out of the 42 Lok Sabha seats from the state.
'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.
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.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday claimed that the Congress and Samajwadi Party will run a bulldozer over the Ram temple if elected to power, and asked them to take 'tuition' from Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath 'where to run bulldozers'.
The party had supported CAB in Lok Sabha. Sena MP said the govt did not give satisfactory answers to the concerns raised by the party.
'There will be millions of us who will feel fear and insecurity because of the menace of majoritarian ideology.' 'It is for the wellbeing and security of those of my fellow Indians, who are affected and who I care for, that I have voted,' says Aakar Patel.
'It is only because of the Congress that we became a secular republic.' 'As we enter a period where another political force has became dominant, it will be interesting to see if this legacy of Nehru and the Congress is sustained or we are taken in a new direction,' says Aakar Patel.
Rana's blistering attack came in response to AIMIM MLA Akbaruddin Owaisi's controversial speech in 2013 that it would take them only '15 minutes' to balance the 'Hindu- Muslim ratio' in the country if the police were removed.
'The BJP is scared it may lose the Delhi municipal elections where they have been in power for the last 15 years.'
As news of Hasina's departure spread, hundreds broke into Hasina's residence, vandalising and looting the interiors, providing dramatic expression to the anti-government protests that have killed more than 100 people in the last two days. At the centre of people anger is the Hasina government's controversial quota system reserving 30 per cent jobs for families of veterans who fought the 1971 liberation war. With volatile crowds taking to the streets -- some clambering on Hasina's father and Bangladesh founder Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's statue and smashing it with hammers in a lasting image underscoring the fickleness of history -- Army chief General Waqar-uz-Zaman announced that the 76-year-old prime minister has resigned.
The Delhi battlefield may not be a cakewalk for the Rhodes Scholar.
The Ayodhya verdict heralds not the beginning of theocracy or Hindu rashtra (that never existed in 5,000 years), but marks the end of a divisive phase of our history.
The controversial issue of Muslim girls wearing 'hijab' in educational institutions, which had hit national headlines last year with a government pre-university college in Udupi banning it inside classrooms, does not appear to be a serious campaign issue for the May 10 elections to the Karnataka assembly.
'When our daughters, wrestlers Sakshi Malik and Vignesh Phogat, were protesting at the Jantar Mantar, the police kicked them with their shoes.'
Afwaah is a sum of Sudhir Mishra's thought-provoking reflections and appeal to question what's real, what's rumour, notes Sukanya Verma.
Campaigning for May 13 elections in 96 Lok Sabha constituencies across 10 states and Union territories including all seats in Andhra Pradesh, where assembly elections are also being held concurrently, and Telangana concluded on Saturday evening.
As their parties are locked in a fierce battle for Bengal, Tathagata and Saugata Roy, siblings who belong to the BJP and the TMC respectively, answer the same questions put to them about the assembly election.
BJP sources suggest that the upcoming elections will likely revolve around the renewed enthusiasm for the temple unless another theme with religious and nationalist undertones emerges.
Modi believes that the Congress leadership does not have the political sagacity to undertake a course correction because of its preoccupation about not losing its current gains in the voter base, observes Shekhar Iyer.
'If we want real democracy, the economy itself will need to be democratised.'
'The anti-Muslim discourse creates an atmosphere of fear.'
In a strategic move, the BJP has welcomed prominent Christian figures like Anil K Antony, son of Congress stalwart AK Antony, and seasoned Kerala politician PC George, into its fold.
The best-case scenario is that the BJP will top out at around 50 seats in UP -- a drop of 12 from the 62 it had won in 2019. Taken in tandem with Maharashtra and Karnataka, this is what is likely to put paid to the BJP's ambitions of a third term for Modi, argues Prem Panicker.
