An astrologer told Ramesh Menon that he was increasingly having worried parents asking him about the future of their children who were showing serious behavioural changes like lack of tolerance towards others, shunning social interaction, and even violent behaviour. They were worried because they had never ever seen such traits in their children before the pandemic.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah asserted that with pro-people measures and infrastructure development, Modi has not only prepared a blueprint for making a strong 'new India' but also a self-reliant one for the country's 'golden future', while party president J P Nadda declared that the period will be known for taking tough and big decisions and turning challenges into opportunities.
The most experienced administrator in the country seems to have sat back and allowed bureaucrats and policemen to manage the lockdown, observes Jyoti Punwani.
Women and children have been given short shrift with these crucial sectors facing substantive budgetary cuts, discovers Rashme Sehgal.
As with the Spanish flu, the world must be ready for a second and third wave as this start-stop-start-stop response plays out, recommends Rahul Jacob.
May 2021 will end with double-digit unemployment rate, falling employment rate and substantial loss of employment, points out Mahesh Vyas.
The family of nine, Mukesh, his parents, wife and five children, the youngest less than a year old, set out from their 'home' under a flyover in Palam in southwest Delhi on the long walk to their village. While he pushed the cycle, the others walked alongside, some holding bags, others unwieldy bundles on their heads, some barefeet as they walked on the hot tarred road under a scorching sun and others wearing flimsy footwear.
The Congress has never given India a PM who was a prisoner of his or her own image, said Rahul Gandhi at the party's MPs' meet.
Here's a glimpse of all that happened around the world last week, in 9 images.
An average nine unidentified bodies, largely of drug addicts and beggars, are recovered from the streets of the national capital every day.
With the first salary date after demonetisation around the corner, will India's labourers be able to take their hard-earned wages home?
Modi said his government has taken 'historic' decisions and the nation progressed rapidly in the last one year, even as he acknowledged that there is a lot that needs to be done and many challenges and problems face the country.
MGNREGA scheme: A significant Rs 17,370.58 crore has been carried forward over to the next financial year as unpaid dues as demand for work continued unabated for the scheme in rural areas.
Here's the full text of President Ram Nath Kovind's customary address to the joining sitting of Parliament on the first day of the budget session.
India has declined assistance offered by the United Nations of its integrated supply chain for COVID19-related material, saying the country has a "robust system" to deal with the required logistics, a spokesperson for UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said.
A worker has died in a "work-related fatality" at the site of a 2022 World Cup stadium in Qatar, the country's World Cup organizing body said late on Saturday.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi suggesting five measures to conserve money for the fight against COVID-19, including a complete ban on media advertisements by government and PSUs for two years and suspending the Central Vista beautification project.
The panel also stated that without the lockdown the country would have witnessed a peak of over 140 lakh cases.
If the precautions are not taken and guidelines are not followed properly, there can be chances of spike in cases, the government said.
If pandemic (mis)management threatened to dominate Goa's electoral discourse, the BJP is up against a deeper structural issue in its organisation, created by the fact that a majority of the legislature party and the ministerial council is made up of Congress defectors, disparagingly referred to by the Opposition as "imports". Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
She had faced criticism over the existence of UK Home Office deportation targets and her knowledge of them.
'That way, it will be helpful for India because by April, temperatures will be in the late 30s and early 40s.' 'So, if we are able to sustain these 21 days, and go to that temperature zone, it will be a way of nature protecting us.'
In a nearly 25-minute televised address to the nation, Modi said implementation of the lockdown will be strictly ensured in its second phase and detailed guidelines will be brought out on Wednesday to ensure that outbreak does not spread to new areas.
'The jobs that are being created now are the delivery boy jobs which are of extremely poor quality, or contractual jobs where you hire a person on a per piece basis.'
'The handling of the pandemic, under this totally constitutional and legal three-level dictatorship, has begun to show its downside,' observes Shekhar Gupta.
If Team Rajini expected Kaala to carry the superstar's political message off-screen, it may have proved counter-productive. If the not-so-infrequent presence of Muslim residents of Dharavi, including that of Kaala's ex-love Zarina, in many scenes is expected to convey a political message, it is a no-brainer, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Give cash assistance of Rs 75 per person per day and an android phone and you will see the economy reviving.'
'I am sceptical of the Indian economy returning to a sustained high-growth trajectory any time soon'
A total of 77 deaths were reported since Thursday evening of which 27 fatalities were reported from Maharashtra, 17 from Gujarat, 11 from West Bengal, seven each from Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, three from Delhi, two from Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh and one from Karnataka.
'You can't make the poor rich overnight.' 'Nor can you fly millions in planes.' 'But remember that word: Empathy.' 'Who in the BJP is speaking in that language to these millions?' 'Someone putting an arm of understanding, warmth, comfort around them?', asks Shekhar Gupta.
'Evacuation' has been key to disaster management in Odisha. The aim is to achieve zero casualty.
India has asked its nationals living in Saudi Arabia, who have received their Emergency Certificates, to get their final exit visa immediately from the Saudi authorities.
Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has started preparing the ground to rescue Indians who are expected to be deported from Saudi Arabia as it goes ahead with its new job law, Nitaqat. Sheela Bhatt reports
'When the virus, in a way, tires itself out, because it is not finding any more people to attack or keep itself viable, that is when the peak actually has been reached and you are on the downward limb (of the curve).'
'How many people have been skilled up and thus able to escape from needing to be in NREGA? The true success of NREGA would lie in its irrelevance -- that is, people no longer need it as a crutch.' 'NREGA should enable them to climb out of poverty and stand on their feet.' 'But this is expressly forbidden by NREGA rules. Skill development, which is what India needs more than anything else, appears to be outside the purview of NREGA,' points out Rajeev Srinivasan.
The new government has to make conscious efforts to rebuild social equality and bring the people together.
Any NGO critical of the government is unlikely to receive a green signal. The new amendment will leave NGOs vulnerable to harassment. It was the NGO sector that helped provide compassion and food to millions of people during the lockdown. The new Bill will render such cooperation and camaraderie impossible in future, observes Rashme Sehgal.
'We have not been able to use the potential of our location in the region and the world and our strength as a nation and an economy to establish an EU-like structure in South Asia,' points out Aakar Patel.
'The fight against COVID-19 is not a hospital fight.' 'It's a community level fight. 'If your community level measures are good, you can decrease the number of people coming to hospitals, or flatten it.'
Speaking at industry association CII's annual session, PM Modi said the government has taken tough steps to fight the coronavirus pandemic and has also taken care of the economy. "On the one hand we have to safe the lives of our people and on the other hand we have to stabilise the economy and speed up the economy," he said. "Yes, we will definitely get our growth back," he asserted.
