Pre-election campaigns -- this one particularly -- are always about personalities, never about issues. Bashing one another is the best political parties can do. Or pandering to their constituencies -- religious, caste, economic or whatever. Best to just enjoy the show without expecting any electrifying performances, feels Sherna Gandhy.
'The reason I call Dadri a landmark turning point in our politics is the relatively muted response of the self-styled secular forces.' 'Top leaders of the Congress haven't even taken a padyatra to the village, just a 40 minute drive from Delhi. Lalu, Nitish, Mamata, all claimants to the secular vote, are afraid of messing with an issue involving the cow.' 'Holiness of the cow has now become as multi-partisan an issue as hostility to Pakistan,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'We still look at films with A-listers.' 'There is change, but it's minor.' 'We still haven't learnt how to invest in stories.'
'As the film progresses, you tire of the been-there seen-that spectacle.' 'You want a story. You want good dialogue, not the corny words you are hearing.' 'You want an emotional connect. You want a tighter film.' 'Sadly, with Padmaavat, that's not what you get,' says Savera R Someshwar.
If Manto, the film, falls short of being a masterpiece it's because Nandita Das could not quite crack the Manto code: She couldn't quite see the wholeness of her subject with the same eyes that Manto saw his people. This imperfection in the film, in a way, becomes the greatest tribute to Manto, feels Sreehari Nair.
'Did Islam kill those five people in London?' 'Or did one wacko individual do them in?' asks Vaihayasi Pande Daniel.
Identifying Islamic State terrorists as uniquely brutal, United States President Barack Obama has announced that the country will lead a broad coalition to roll back the threat posed by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and his militia.
J Jagannath on how he expects to see the Trump effect at the Academy Awards.
'Worryingly, intelligence assessments indicate that growing disaffection amongst the youth is ceding ground to fundamentalist Islamist groups like Islamic State,' reports Ajai Shukla.
We celebrate Independence Day with this special feature, published on Rediff.com in January 2013.
Let Bihar be damned under its contradictions of having gone 'dry' and then having been submerged under flood, which is a recurrent phenomena? After all it is a godforsaken land, having lost its promises of overcoming its problems, says Mohammad Sajjad.
Saudi Arabia's Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz died on Friday and his half-brother Salman took over reigns of the world's top oil exporting nation in a smooth transition of power, calling for "unity and solidarity" among Muslims.
'Communal killings take place routinely in our country and yet we don't ever convict the offenders.' 'The riots of 1993 and 2002 would not have happened if justice was given to the 1984 Delhi riot victims.'
Sofia Ashraf's video 'Kodaikanal Won't,' slamming Hindustan Unilever for alleged 'mercury poisoning,' has gone viral with over 25,000 online petitioners demanding that the multinational clean up the mess as well as compensate those who worked at its thermometer factory in Kodaikanal.
A summary of sports events and sports persons, who made news on Thursday
'We are going to see relatively soon an executive order that deals with H-1B and other temporary visas.' 'We are also going to see an executive order on undocumented people.' 'Undocumented Indians comprise the largest population growth of all undocumented people in this country.' 'Just because India is not named in this executive order doesn't mean it won't be in the future.'
Though the list of superstitious beliefs is long, often dissolving distinctions of class, caste, religion and education, Karnataka's anti-superstition bill is seen as a big step ahead.
'Earlier India as part of the Third World fought for the rights of the Palestinians. But oddly the defeat of the Congress and the decline of the Nehruvian imagination has altered such perceptions. The new middle class expresses an open sympathy for Israel, contending that Jews like many Hindus has been misunderstood,' says Shiv Visvanathan.
Photojournalist Chandu Mhatre, one of the first to reach Bhopal after India's worst industrial disaster ravaged the city, remembers his worst seven days, in a conversation with Vaihayasi Pande Daniel/Rediff.com.
Assembly elections in Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat are over. Another set of state elections is due in 2018. Here's an assessment of the next round of the electoral challenge and how it could change India's political equations.
He had even proposed marriage to Madhubala. When she had giggled it off, he was said to have gone home and cried in front of his mother.
'Do we not all exhibit a sense of entitlement every day,' asks Savera R Someshwar.
'The only positive I see are the youth of India who were earlier just after money. The young now want to do something for society.'
'I got to know the men accused of the blasts regularly meeting them in court and jail. Some of them, like Dutt, are back in jail. Others, like Mohammed Jindran, a quiet and well spoken middle class man, were killed. And now of course Yakub is ready to be hanged. The first in the case to do so,' says Aakar Patel.
With 32 people being killed in Assam, the Centre on Sunday said it is determined to curb attacks on minorities as the violence there was aimed at starting a "full-fledged communal conflagration".
A bench headed by CJI Dipak Misra agreed to hear on Tuesday the interim applications of both the states.
A lot of the terrorism that is affecting Pakistan is really a blowback of the Pakistani state's policy of using jihadist groups as instruments of state policy. And unlike some other countries with similar policies, Pakistan doesn't have the benefit of the political and social space for pulling back from the disastrous course, says Sushant Sareen.
Hopeful of getting a resident permit in India, controversial Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen has said that even if Bangladesh allows her to enter, she wants to spend the rest of her life in her second home -- India.
'I am very sure that Rajnikanth, a patriot and a spiritual person, will not do this movie which is about a tyrant, killer and murderer,' BJP leader H Raja tells Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com
Following is the full text of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's address from the ramparts of the Red Fort on the 73rd Independence Day.
The Payment of Gratuity (Amendment) Bill and The Specific Relief (Amendment) Bill passed amid din.
Eyewitnesses reported hearing a loud "bang" from inside the venue.
A 17-hour-long hostage drama in which a lone heavily-armed man of Iranian-origin held 17 people hostage at a cafe in central Sydney ended late Monday night (Indian Standard Time) with the police storming it, resulting in three deaths.
One shocking finding of the investigation was the extent to which sexual violence was committed against detainees, often extremely brutally, by the Sri Lankan security forces, with men as likely to be victims as women.
Former Pakistani dictator Pervez Musharraf has sought "forgiveness" for any wrongs he may have committed during his nine-year regime, saying he will face all cases against him and not flee the country like a coward.
Members of all parties condemned the killings in the name of cow.
Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt unearths some never-told-before details of Narendra Modi's early life. Read on!
Peoples Democratic Party president also demanded that "fringe elements" acting in the name of Hinduism should be checked, drawing comparison with elements of Islamic State who misuse Islam.
Of the two brothers in Kapoor & Sons, Fawad Khan's is the more successful, the better-earning, the more polite, the apple of his parents's eyes. Beside this perfection sits his homosexuality and the film forces us to question if we can look at Rahul as perfect, inspite of that fact.
