In a bid to control the coronavirus pandemic, Saudi Arabia said it has barred international visitors from making the Islamic pilgrimage.
Shah challenged "Rahul Baba", Mamata Banerjee and Arvind Kejriwal to show if any provision of the CAA took away the citizenship of Indian Muslims.
Karnataka IAS officer S Sasikanth Senthil submitted his resignation from the service on Friday, telling 'friends' in a letter that the "fundamental building blocks of democracy are being compromised in an unprecedented manner".
All Pakistani moves towards peace will be seen as tactical compromises, to be abandoned when the situation changes, observes Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'Jinnah developed a belief that Gandhi had stolen the tag of the leader of the Indian people from him and that he later used religion to reduce Gandhi's idea of a united India to naught was his revenge.'
'India is now surrounded on its north, west and east by unfriendly neighbours -- Pakistan, China, Nepal and Bangladesh -- some of whom are openly inimical,' notes Amulya Ganguli.
The All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat is preparing a white paper on the state of Indian Muslims languishing in jails in various terror cases, which could convince the community to vote against the Congress party, reports Vicky Nanjappa
'Modi-Shah have understood the risks their cynical mixing of domestic political motivations with strategic national interests was soon going to become counterproductive asserts Shekhar Gupta.
Congress MP Ghulam Nabi Azad during his retirement speech in Rajya Sabha on Tuesday summed up his more than four-decade-old political career in few Urdu couplets and a brief speech.
"Shouldn't they get Indian citizenship? Shouldn't their human rights be protected?" Shah asked the audience which responded with a resounding "yes".
'This is what Hindu Rashtra looks like, which has been enabled by conditions of democracy.'
'He was full of Hindustan, its tehzeeb and its culture.'
'The entire brouhaha with regard to the CAB smacks of blatant Hinduphobia, a duplicitous exercise, morally corrupt in its construct and aimed at divesting deserving Hindus of basic human rights by raising the bogey of Muslim discrimination, and must be called out for what it is,' says Vivek Gumaste.
"Those who hoist the Pakistani flag, they should be punished," Katiyar said.
'Muslims should not justify demolition of temples by foreign invaders.'
'The Modi government thinks that once the CAA protests are over, they will bring in the NPR that will help to get the NRC.'
Aijaz Ilmi is chairman of the Executive Board of Siyasat Jadid, a popular Urdu newspaper brought out from Kanpur and Lucknow. He is a senior political analyst with the television channel News X, and writes on Muslim, national and international issues in various newspapers. In this interview with Yoginder Sikand, he reflects on the present Indian Muslim leadership.
Naqvi expressed confidence that Muslims will abide by lockdown guidelines during the holy month of Ramzan.
'Muslims must show patience and endurance.' 'The perception that has been created against them needs to be changed by them.'
Observing that the final NRC list, which validates bona fide Indian citizens of Assam, has excluded 19 lakh residents, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom on Friday said that a number of domestic and international organisations have expressed concern that the NRC is a "targeted mechanism to disenfranchise Assam's Bengali Muslim community, implicitly establishing a religious requirement for citizenship and potentially rendering large numbers of Muslims stateless."
National Conference general secretary and former minister Ali Mohammed Sagar, who wields a support base in downtown city, was served with a PSA notice public order by the authorities.
In an interview with rediff.com's Arun Lakshman, scholar, writer, teacher and social activist Professor Hameed Chendamangalur says that the people of the state have given a befitting reply to such organisations in the recently held local body polls.
India's 71st Republic day celebrations in the United States on Sunday were marred by protests and marches, albeit peaceful ones, against recent changes in the citizenship law by large number of Indian Americans in various cities of the country.
'The majority community needs to accept that the Indian Muslim is peace loving, not communal and treat them accordingly.'
'Till the time we do not remove fear in the minds of Muslims of India, how will we achieve peace?' asks the Bharatiya Janata Party MLA from Gorakhpur, Radha Mohan Das Agarwal, who says he will resign as a member of the Uttar Pradesh assembly if any Indian Muslim of his constituency is evicted from the country during the Citizenship (Amendment) Act exercise.
Prasad said only Parliament has exclusive powers to pass any law with regard to subjects under the seventh schedule and not any assembly. He said the CAA was 'perfectly legal' and 'constitutional'.
It looks like Hindi, which faces political opposition at the front door, is entering Tamil Nadu through the kitchen, says Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
Adding fuel to fire in the recent conversion-row, working president of right-wing organisation Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Pravin Togadia said ancestors of Indian Muslims and Christians were Hindus.
Faesal, who recently returned from a foreign training and was awaiting posting, said he had decided to resign from Indian Administrative Service, "to protest against the unabated killings in Kashmir, and lack of any sincere reach out from the Union government".
The manner in which a large proportion of common people have mortgaged their rationality and questioning spirit to let hatred, prejudice, and bigotry take over their minds is a cause of worry, observes Mohammad Sajjad.
The BJP's panicky return to basic-instinct majoritarianism in Bihar has pushed Muslims back into the 'secular' basement, says Shekhar Gupta.
With several suspected terrorist being nabbed in the state for alleged links with ISIS, the Shiv Sena on Monday urged the Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis-led Government to make proactive efforts to curb the expansion of the deadly terror outfit.
Some party leaders have conceded that the extent of protests against the CAA has taken them by surprise and pointed out that apprehensions in a section of society, especially among Muslims, over NRC have played a key role in whipping up emotions.
The MNS chief unveiled his party's new flag which is completely saffron and bears King Shivaji's royal seal. He also questioned how many of the Muslims taking part in the protests were Indian.
The danger to India's democracy is coming from recourse to mobocracy encouraged by the anti-Modi gang, argues Vivek Gumaste.
Experts tell Rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa about the impact of the 'Islamic state' on the terror world.
As Bal Keshav Thackeray, one of India's most polarising politicians and Shiv Sena chief died on November 17, people in Pakistan expressed hope that his anti-Muslim and anti-Pakistan legacy would perish. Thackeray often referred to Indian Muslims as 'anti-nationals' and called for Hindu suicide squads to counter what he saw as a rise in Islamic terrorism.
North West India is what the ISIS is aiming at in its map of the caliphate. However, many Indian Muslims feel that the jihadists are making a mockery out of Islam. Vicky Nanjappa reports.
Many political experts believe that the extent of protests has put the government on the defensive and highlighted its unpreparedness.
A fundraiser for the Aligarh Muslim University hosted in California saw keynote speakers talk about the plight of Indian Muslims and a way out.
