Witnesses in the cases that controversial Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Shahabuddin has been facing have been "bumped off", the Supreme Court said on Monday, rejecting his claim of facing "media trial" in a murder case and his vehement plea for more time to prepare for his defence.
The former Union minister joined the UPA after holding talks with the Congress leadership.
Brigadier Gagneja (retd) was attacked by bike-borne assailants on August 6 in Jalandhar.
A promising young actor suffering from depression has had his life laid bare for the grubby public to paw through. An ordinary family has been pitched into the middle of a nightmare of an investigation and arrested for no reason discernible at present. And a young actress has had her reputation, and probably career, destroyed so that TRP ratings can soar, notes Sherna Gandhy.
'Putting Yogi Adityanath in the CM's seat two years before the 2019 Lok Sabha polls is something to be read carefully.' 'Opposition parties would be dishonest themselves and unfair to secular people if they failed to unite and work as a single force to defeat the BJP.'
The reputation of Bihar's schools has taken a knock. Satyavrat Mishra explains how a student-teacher nexus has gamed the system to produce toppers by the dozen.
In another dig at Kumar for joining hands with the Rashtriya Janata Dal of Lalu Prasad, Modi reeled out Bihar police crime figure to claim "Jungle raj has begun to knock Bihar."
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.
The agency said it searched a Mumbai-based operator who was running 700 shell companies with 20 dummy directors and had "converted Rs 46.7 crore for Chaggan Bhujbal", the jailed ex-Maharashtra deputy chief minister.
'The current BJP leadership believes the party's expansion across India, and thus their own survival at the top, depends on injecting communal tension into areas where it has so far been largely controlled,' argues Mihir S Sharma.
Bihar's ruling Janata Dal-United on Tuesday asked an embattled Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav, an accused in the land-for-hotels scandal, to "come out with facts in public against the accusations" but stopped short of demanding his resignation.
'Babur has been facing gross historical injustice for the last two centuries, when he had no role either in the demolition of any temple or in the construction of the so-called Babri mosque at Ayodhya.'
Raising the 'Jungle Raj' pitch, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday warned that Lalu Prasad will "remote control" the affairs in Bihar and "kidnapping" will be only industry that will flourish if the opposition grand alliance comes to power.
Jaitley's endorsement of Upadhyaya doesn't come as a surprise, for the latter has been the source of ideological guidance and moral inspiration for the BJP since its inception.
Factors such as industrial backwardness, crime, poor infrastructure, erratic power supply and poor educational infrastructure will take a backseat to identity
'It is the RJD, otherwise known for misgovernance, which has offered a candidate of clean and performing credentials, rather than the NDA,' points out Mohammad Sajjad.
'The BJP should be really wary of Nitish Kumar, or he will also take the BJP down with him.'
On the road rage incident in Gaya, Kumar said, "... when I saw in the media the (journalist's) family's demand for a CBI probe, I personally asked the DGP (director general of police) to send a police team to acquaint the family with probe (being conducted by the state police).
'No short cuts, no sensationalism, but sheer talent is responsible for Nawaz's position as one of the finest actors of his generation.'
Driving a Tata Nano covered with banners about his son's killing by the Mumbai Police, Kundan Prasad Singh is fighting his first election to get justice for a dead son.
Prasad will face charges including criminal conspiracy and fraud in the fresh trial.
'Today, Dalits can become IAS officers, doctors, IPS, MLAs, MPs and even the President due to the Constitution of India.' 'And if you destroy India's Constitution, then poverty will never disappear.' 'If the BJP is pro-Dalit, they must implement policies which are pro-Dalit.' 'It cannot work if they only talk.'
The year threw up quite a few shockers, some rather rude one. Below are Rediff.com's 12 picks that made us sit back and think, 'Did that really happen?'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday announced a 'special package' of Rs 1,25,000 crore for poll-bound Bihar during his address at Ara district, in the state.
When Rani Hong was just seven, she was taken from her family and sold into slavery. At an age when she should have been enjoying her childhood, she was subjected to treatment that left her close to death.
The widow of Rajdeo Ranjan, the journalist who was gunned down, has said the killers had a connection with someone in jail.
'The effect of demonetisation has been largely to drive black money above ground. But there are several interesting side-effects. One is the uncomfortable realisation that this can happen again, which is a deterrent to future sinners,' says Rajeev Srinivasan.
'A fierce crusader against communalism, George joined hands with majoritarian forces, never to revisit or re-assess his saffron association.' 'He was a Union minister in 1998-2004, a time when people like Graham Staines were lynched in Orissa.' 'On the Gujarat pogrom of 2002, George went on to kind of justify the slashing of pregnant women, by saying in the Lok Sabha that this was nothing new for India.' 'Thus, he was in sharp contrast to what he had himself stood for in the heyday of his political career in the 1970s and 1980s, says Mohammad Sajjad.
Four men, convicted for killing the then Railway Minister Lalit Narayan Mishra and two others in a blast in Bihar's Samastipur railway station nearly 40 years ago, were on Thursday awarded life imprisonment by a Delhi court.
Just days after Kailash Satyarthi won the Nobel Peace Prize for his campaigns against child labour, photographs captured barefoot children clearing waste from the Yamuna. We take a look at the progress or lack of it on the issue of child rights.
India's Muslims need to assert their educational and economic upliftment and political empowerment rather than be provoked by communal remarks, says Mohammad Sajjad, reflecting on the Malda riot.
'We live in a time when hideous anger easily flares up, particularly on identity-related issues.' 'Often advocates of harmony and compassion fall victim to the same anger and end up hating the 'haters'!' 'This changes the moment we are able to turn the slanging match into a conversation.' 'More often than not you may find that there is agreement on a fundamental truth -- respect for the life and dignity of all.'
More noticeable than the hue of his shirt was his mast style in the witness box. He seemed to be reinventing the truth every few minutes. He yarned on and on, navigating his testimony further and further away from the facts, but he never lost his aplomb.
Joining hands with his arch rival, Lalu Prasad Yadav, paid off for the Bihar chief minister
The calculated playing up of confidence by Amit Shah and his team obviously means that the BJP has a strong counter-strategy in place to turn the tables on the Congress before the monsoon session is over, reports Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com.
Speaking at a rally in poll-bound Bihar, Modi said that the Congress has no right to talk about tolerance after the 1984 anti-Sikh riots.
'By resorting to divisive issues, the BJP is giving the impression that even if it is voted to power it won't do anything new to give Bihar a facelift. It will repel voters with the belief that the BJP can't do anything without communal polarisation as its core ideology. This is sad and unfortunate,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
Incidents of arson, firing and vandalism were reported from Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Punjab as protesters agitated against the dilution of the SC/ST Act.
The National Democratic Alliance on Monday finalised its seat sharing for Bihar polls with the Bharatiya Janata Party contesting 160 out of the 243 assembly constituencies while allies Lok Janshkati Party and Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha being allotted 40 and 20 seats respectively.
Glimpses of I-Day celebrations across India.
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