Several places in Arunachal Pradesh, including capital Itanagar, were cut off by floods and landslides.
A sub-inspector of the Andhra Pradesh's counter-Maoist force was posthumously awarded the Ashok Chakra, the highest peacetime gallantry award of the country, as India celebrated its 65th Republic Day on Sunday.
Those advocating a similar raid in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir, for instance, need to have a reality check on the applicability of the same template on other borders, says Nitin Gokhale.
Tubes gone, Irom Sharmila the brand is dead. As long as she was trying to kill herself, she had value to the cynics trying to build their careers over her fast, says Shekhar Gupta.
Some within the BJP see Amit Shah's entry into the Rajya Sabha as the party's succession plan for 2025 when Narendra Modi turns 75.
Modi invoked Lord Shiva on Mahashivratri and said people, with their third eye, can see what is good for them and what is bad.
Amit Shah's sustained campaigning against slaughterhouses has unnerved UP's leather and meat export industry.
Nearly 2.6 crore people in 73 constituencies of western Uttar Pradesh are voting on Saturday in the first of the seven phases of high-stake assembly elections
'The Chinese have a set pattern. They demonstrate, warn, threaten, attack and withdraw.' 'We were lulled into complacency, but I am certain things are being corrected now.'
A group of armed men in police uniform on Sunday attacked the Nabha Jail in Patiala and fled with five prisoners, including Khalistan Liberation Front chief Harminder Mintoo.
'You know, there's not much else happening other than the juicy murder story starring the TV mogul's trophy turned huntress wife,' says Mango Indian.
'Most Hindus believe in living in peace with their Muslim neighbours and vice versa.' 'It is this India we have to preserve.'
The bravado of NDA ministers may have undone the gains made in cross-border security cooperation over the past several years.
The terrorists were armed with AK-47s, grenades, pistols, knives, many rounds of ammunition. Sepoy Jagdish Chand's weapons were his bare hands and enormous courage. He died, but not before he felled one of them. Archana Masih/Rediff.com speaks to the family of Sepoy Jagdish Chand, one of the 7 soldiers martyred in the terrorist attack on the Pathankot Air Force Station.
This is Modi's first bilateral visit to Myanmar.
'Not a single soldier should be left behind in enemy territory.' Nitin A Gokhale's fascinating account on how the Indian Army conducted the daring and successful cross-border operation last September.
Much of the pre-2014 peace in our hotspots is diminished. Kashmir is on the boil and the Northeast is anarchic, observes Shekhar Gupta.
'We should hit Pakistan, continue to prepare for surgical strikes, continue to punish Pakistani posts in the proximity of the LoC and we should start adopting counter terrorist measures.' 'That should be India's action without escalating it to a full-fledged war.'
The political resolution passed at the party's national executive claimed that the Modi government has created a new "history" in the direction of the poor's welfare with its bold initiatives.
Bearing in mind how full India's pitcher is with ethnic and communal complexities, only the greatest circumspection can hold this country together in a willing union.
'The forces of good are on the run.' 'But dark times also challenge people to fight.' 'I believe Indians will rise against these dark times.'
'Where they lose, you never ask why they failed there, like in Bihar and Punjab.' 'You are stuck on the UP victory, thinking they have the mandate to rule for all times to come.' 'The BJP has 282 MPs, but can I honestly say that the BJP is the party for everyone?'
'The blood that runs in the veins of our family can never be anti-national.' 'They called Kanhaiya a traitor for questioning the Indian Army. Do they know that our cousin was killed by militants in Manipur while serving with the CRPF?' Archana Masih/Rediff.com travelled to the land of Lal Salam, Lal Sitara and comrades to find out what moulded India's most talked about student leader, Kanhaiya Kunar.
The assembly polls are seen as a test of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's popularity, especially in the wake of demonetisation.
We must repeal AFSPA to begin to heal Kashmir, and to enhance India's moral stature and that of the army, says Ajai Shukla
Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi attacked the Congress and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday for "failing" to ensure development of Northeast though he represented Assam for the last 23 years in the Rajya Sabha.
'In the short to medium term, the Myanmar raid will impose caution on Pakistan in planning another 26/11-like adventure. As a result of this caution, even if the proxy war ebbs, it will reduce the danger of escalation to a nuclear stand-off,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Lifting the AFSPA can certainly be attempted but the provisions of the AFSPA, as an emergency law that empowers the army -- the nation's instrument of last resort -- must continue to remain on the statute books given the increasingly violent and uncertain times that the subcontinent is likely to face in coming years, says Nitin A Gokhale.
'The Modi regime, after experimenting with its own versions of neighbourhood policy for 18 months, has now reached the exact stage where the Manmohan Singh government had left it in so far as our Pakistan policy is concerned,' says former senior RA&W officer Vappala Balachandran.
Indian intelligence agencies have often claimed that left-wing extremists are trying to make inroads in the militancy-hit regions of north-east to foment further unrest. But Jaideep Saikia, noted terrorism and conflict analyst, claims, "People who speak of Maoism taking roots in the north-east have not read history".
'The first thing they ask me and people like me is, are you a Pakistani spy? They don't call you an American or a Chinese spy; they only call you a Pakistani spy.' 'At first, a few inmates tried to attack me saying they would make me sing the national anthem, but another group rescued me from the assault. When I got out of jail, so many of them cried and asked me, "When will we see you again?"'
The roots of the problem lies in the alienation of the tribals. Extreme sensitivity is required to tackle the issues involved. Rough and ready methods of using force may prove counterproductive in the long run, says Colonel (retd) Anil Athale.
