The winners of the 60th annual World Press Photo Contest have been announced. The winning shot was taken by Turkish Associated Press photographer called Burhan Ozbilici, with an image he has simply titled An Assassination in Turkey. Showing Mevlut Mert Altintas shouting after shooting Andrei Karlov, the Russian ambassador to Turkey, at an art gallery in Ankara, Turkey, on December 19 2016.
'What would a composite of Dawood, Rajan, and Arun Gawli be like?' 'What if an absconding mafia boss were to land in Mumbai tomorrow, tired from all the running, and tender his final apology to the city by narrating his story and narrating it with brutal honesty?' Sreehari Nair watches Sacred Games.
'The cow is sacred to many of us, but these killings are definitely not part of the Hinduism we know and practise,' says Jyoti Punwani.
Fourteen years in the making and a incessant reminder of the horrors of the past, Flight 93 National Memorial, which opened on Thursday, is an interactive centre that employs photographs, video recordings, artefacts and graphic displays to tell the story of the doomed United Airlines Flight 93, the only jetliner among the four commandeered by terrorists that failed to reach its intended target on September 11, 2001.
'It's scary to know that those arrested passed on sketches of warships etc to the ISI.' 'Who are the people behind the masks? Are they hiding in our various defence units?'
'The irresistible Cuban cigars, which acquire their unique flavour as they are rolled on the thighs of Cuban women, have always been the ultimate temptation for cigar connoisseurs in the US.'
T P Sreenivasan was India's high commissioner in Fiji in 1987, when Sitiveni Rabuka toppled the Indian-dominated government there. Ambassador Sreenivasan stayed on for two years after the coup, fighting for the rights of the people of Indian origin before he was expelled by Rabuka. 'Meeting Sitiveni Rabuka, who had overthrown a democratically elected government, discriminated against the Fiji Indians, brought untold humiliation and suffering to them, tried to disenfranchise them, ordered me out of Fiji and closed down the Indian high commission was a difficult decision to take even after 25 years,' notes Ambassador Sreenivasan who eventually caught up with Rabuka over a game of golf.
India's Muslims need to assert their educational and economic upliftment and political empowerment rather than be provoked by communal remarks, says Mohammad Sajjad, reflecting on the Malda riot.
Pranab Mukherjee's book The Dramatic Decade: The Indira Gandhi Years takes the readers through the economic and social unrest of the period leading up to the emergency, rise and fall of leaders, many splits within the Congress, while promising to offer more in the next two volumes of the trilogy, says Nivedita Mookerji.
'The problem of 2015 is not who did it but how we should punish the guy who did it. The judicial system in our country is hugely inadequate.' Dibakar Banerjee talks about his new film Detective Byomkesh Bakshy and much more.
'After Rajan is back in India, our resident dons are almost down. I won't say that they are out. So, now the obvious question is about Dawood, and the present government, I think, is more than willing to address that issue.' 'I think the political system made this kind of people; the corporate world made this kind of people. I have mentioned in my book that even the banks were using these outlaws to get their money back.'
'Never lose your optimism. Never lose your aspiration and never -- even if India becomes a prosperous consumer society -- never ever lose that shining light in your eyes,' advises Dr Peter McLaughlin, headmaster of the Doon School.
Under threat from the Maoists, and jailed by the police, AAP's Soni Sori plunges into the election for all she holds dear. Aman Sethi reports
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?'