On Shankara Jayanti, Friday, May 2, 2025, Mahamandaleshwar Swami Sri Sri Vishwatamanand Saraswati and other sadhus conducted a special puja at the Shankaracharya temple in Srinagar for victims of the Pahalgam terror attack. They also prayed for peace and the long life of India's soldiers.
Shyam Benegal passed into the ages on December 23, leaving behind a rich legacy. We look back at some interesting moments from his life.
'Action for the sake of action never really works, then it's an item number.' 'Action works when the emotional drama and arc of the story moves forward with the action.'
'Murlikant sir saw the film for the first time alongside the army chief and many other army officers.' 'The way he got a standing ovation there, I got teary-eyed. It was a very emotional moment for all of us.'
Plabita shoots in Assam... Urmila relaxes in Goa... Shehnaaz explores the mountains...
Malavika Sangghvi gives us fascinating glimpses from Dilip Kumar's life.
'Why did your generals try to grab a few square kilometres of Indian territory in Ladakh?' 'And what happened to the hard work that you and Prime Minister Modi put into the Wuhan and Mamallapuram meets?' Claude Arpi writes a letter to Xi Jinping, China's self-styled supreme leader, who turns 68 today, June 15.
'I came to hear you sing Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon. I am glad I have heard you sing.'
He spoke about how fitness has become an integral part of his life and how it helped him recover quickly.
The film, which traces Sachin Tendulkar's evolution as one of the greatest cricketers of all times, will release on May 26.
Gujarat Chief Minister Anandiben Patel and Governor O P Kohli were also present at the meeting.
More than merely being an economic balancing act, this was also about walking the political tightrope.
This moment would be remembered as the lowest to which the collective intelligence of a people can descend to, says Apoorvanand
A look at the top tweets from your favourite Bollywood celebrities.
In the early 80s, when Indira Gandhi was the prime minister, her son Rajiv was once so engrossed in explaining to his parents-in-law the features of a new navy ship that he gave some nervous moments to a bureaucrat in the defence ministry who feared he might be late for an official event that night.
Natesan Kathiresan, a village painter, who loves the colour of sandalwood, but does not want his boys to pick up the paintbrush like him.
In a special series, Rediff.com looks at India through the lives of her people. Today: Abdul Nabi, who has been cleaning people's ears for 40 years in Mumbai.
Nanak Chand Sharma did not lose his nerve when terrorists attacked his bus and drove 76 passengers to safety.
Reema Kaur is one of the students on strike for nearly three months at the FTII. The Delhi resident feels the campus that had been a cocoon for her in the last three years has turned into a revolution ground demanding change -- and she is happy to be a part of it.
Mohammed Taufiq has been a waiter at Kolkata's famous Coffee House for 36 years. After encountering at least 50, 100 new faces every day -- including Satyajit Ray once -- all he wants now is to return to his village after retirement.
Dr Ganesh Rakh has delivered 436 baby girls free of charge. The son of a coolie and housemaid, the good doctor wants to change the mindset of a 'boy- obsessed' society.
As a child, Sufal Das used to dream of becoming a dhaki. But a life full of adversities, and dwindling popularity of the dhak, has made him regret his dream.
'For over a decade, the United States has been shaping the contours of Hinduism. It has been doing this from the perspective of upper caste and conservative interests,' Professor Shefali Chandra tells Rediff.com's Arthur J Pais.
The Congress on Tuesday accused Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party of trying to appropriate Sardar Patel's legacy, which "belongs to Congress", and reminded that Patel had said that it was the "communal poison of RSS" which killed Mahatma Gandhi.
Tapeshwar Ram, has hand-pulled a rickshaw on the streets of Kolkata for 30 years. He works 7 days a week and plans to call it a day soon - and that's when he plans to take his wife for her first-ever holiday.
'Patel was more in tune with the popular mood than Jawaharlal Nehru. While the principle that Hindus and Muslims should be able to live together remained central to Nehru's vision for India, the Sardar was less sentimental.' 'Nehru would angrily face down mobs himself, rushing from trouble spot to trouble spot. A veritable tent city, filled with Muslim refugees, sprouted on the lawns of his bungalow... Mountbatten feared Nehru's impulsiveness would get him killed, and assigned soldiers to watch over him.' Nisid Hajari's Midnight's Furies: The Deadly Legacy of India's Partition casts fresh light on the events and personalities behind the horrific division of the subcontinent which haunts the India and Pakistan to this day.
'Nehru had multiple chances to make compromises, that would have preserved a united India, and he chose not to,' Nisid Hajari tells Vaihayasi Pande Daniel/Rediff.com
Brijesh Kumar Saroj, the son of a poor weaver, overcame every hardship, to make it to IIT-Bombay. When he cleared the IIT entrance exam, villagers threw stones at his home because he is Dalit. This has only hardened his resolve to 'make it in life'.
The journey of Abhijit Avasthi, the former national creative director of Ogilvy & Mather, is as amazing as it is unbelievable. Read on!
Only reforms that accelerate economic growth can generate the revenues to finance expenditure on social infrastructure for the poor, not the other way round, insists Jagdish Bhagwati.
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