The five-state assembly elections are seen as a now-or-never, no-holds battle for the Congress, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
An independent Muslim candidate has secured a surprise victory in a ward in the Hindutva nerve centre of Ayodhya in the civic election results declared on Saturday.
'But he was very quick and did a very stylish adab.' 'Of course, I didn't expect him to hug.'
'The government should immediately enact an Act to make caste discrimination a criminal offence and lay down a procedure similar to that of the Anti-Ragging Act.' 'Ragging has nearly been eliminated because it is treated as a criminal offence.' 'Similar procedure should be used in case of caste discrimination.'
The governor's move has been welcomed by a large segment of the Indian-American community who were opposing the bill.
Cricket has taken many steps forward towards excellence and fairness. Electoral politics has a lot of catching up to do, points out Rajeev Bhargava in his fascinating new book Between Hope and Despair.
Observing that the final NRC list, which validates bona fide Indian citizens of Assam, has excluded 19 lakh residents, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom on Friday said that a number of domestic and international organisations have expressed concern that the NRC is a "targeted mechanism to disenfranchise Assam's Bengali Muslim community, implicitly establishing a religious requirement for citizenship and potentially rendering large numbers of Muslims stateless."
'Most students find it difficult to cope with the way they are expected to learn at the IITs.' 'So, all the students face the same stress.' 'But those students who are mentally weak are more affected.'
Religious minorities in India have been subjected to "violent attacks, forced conversions" and 'Ghar Wapsi' campaigns by groups like the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh after the Modi government assumed power in 2014, a US Congress-established panel has said.
Banerjee also alleged that the BJP is manipulating electronic voting machines to increase its vote share.
Responding to USCIRF's statement on the bill, the MEA said it was guided by 'prejudices and biases'.
With the role of the venerable elder thrust on him in UP, Mr Singh has had to attune himself to the politics at the Centre, observes Aditi Phadnis.
The Gujarat Assembly on Friday passed a resolution requesting the Centre to take strict action against BBC for tarnishing the image and popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi with its documentary on the 2002 riots in the state.
Nine seats have been proposed for STs and seven for SCs in Jammu and Kashmir, sources said. This is the first time that seats have been proposed for STs in Jammu and Kashmir, they said.
'Rahul Gandhi has shown courage to heal the heart of democracy.'
In a three-page letter to Facebook Chief Executive Zuckerberg, Prasad alleged "bias and inaction" by individuals in Facebook India team on complaints by people supportive of right-of-centre ideology.
'You will see more laws that treat Hindus and non-Hindus, especially Muslims, quite unequally.' 'Once you see this kind of erosion of secularism, it will be very hard to get it back.'
The wrong of victimising, targeting and persecuting homosexuals on the basis of archaic and prejudiced ideas has gone for long. Time we set it right, says Mohd Asim.
"Somewhat surprisingly, Indian-Americans born in the United States are much more likely to report being victims of discrimination than their foreign-born counterparts," said the report.
'Aurangzeb supported construction of the Kumarswamy math and the reconstruction of the Kedar temple and supported the Jangambadi math in Banaras.'
Under the Maharashtra Hindu Place of Worship (Entry Authorisation) Act, if any temple or person prohibits any person from entering a temple then he or she faces a six-month imprisonment.
'If I was communal, I could have adjusted the practice timings according to our prayer timings but that's not the way I am.'
The case involving an inter-faith couple was filed in Vadodara under the amended Gujarat Religious Freedom Act and the interim relief granted by the court to the four, including the main accused, will be pending the disposal of a petition filed by them seeking quashing of the FIR against them.
'As soon as the violence broke out, they should have stepped in and sent a message that the state is there to stop this violence.' 'Had they done it right there, the situation would not have gone out of control.'
Outside Rampur, Azam Khan's name may be an alias for controversy. But Rampur's voters believe that all the improvements in their constituency has been accomplished only by the man they have elected 8 times to the state assembly.
'It is a frightening situation as the most threatening aspect is the development and growth of society.' 'Once our society comes into perpetual violent mode, then investments will drop.'
India and Indians can ignore Pakistan, but that cannot be said of other nations in the neighbourhood, where New Delhi's 'Neighbourhood First' policy constantly reverberates. Four of the eight SAARC member-nations are Muslim -- Afghanistan and Pakistan, Bangladesh and the Maldives. The rulers decide the nation's India or anti-India policy in the first two, and street-opinion contributes to the same in the latter two, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Events in America have strengthened the hand of those leaders there who wish India well, but think of India as being a collection of Indians.
If Indians are mistreated, they will object, asserts Aakar Patel.
Spin legend Anil Kumble on Thursday extended support to his former India teammate Wasim Jaffer after the Cricket Association of Uttarakhand (CAU) alleged that he had tried to force religion-based selections as the state team's coach.
A 41-year old Sikh-American IT specialist was brutally attacked by some men, who knocked off his turban and allegedly cut his religiously-mandated unshorn hair with a knife, prompting a civil rights organisation to demand a hate crime investigation into the incident.
'We take allegations of bias incredibly seriously, and want to make it clear that we denounce hate and bigotry in any form'
The fact that the responses from the community to Mohan Bhagwat's remarks have ranged from guarded optimism to outright disbelief tells its own story, points out Kanika Dutta.
In a sign of the growing political prominence of Hindus in America, the Trump and Biden campaigns are wooing this religious minority community like never before. Hinduism is the fourth largest faith in the US, representing approximately one per cent of the US population in 2016.
At the time of religious intolerance in Pakistan, shlokas from Bhagavad Gita reverberated at a school in Karachi during a quiz competition to test the knowledge of Hindu boys and girls about their religion, leaving the minority community having something to cheer about.
A beautiful documentary from Delhi. A shocking satire that spares no one. A thriller about a serial killer in Iran. A Pakistan film about family secrets... Aseem Chhabra lists the best films he saw in Cannes.
It is a difficult problem and will require the Union, state governments and civil society, meaning NGOs, to work together, points out Aakar Patel.
Human memory about policy issues is short. That alone can explain why many are deliriously happy with his latest slogans and ignore seven years of poor 'doing business' climate, taxtortion, extortionate oil prices, and high dependence on babus and the big State that has kept the enterprise system stifled, observes Debashis Basu.
Several Sikh, Hindu and South Asian rights groups have asked the United States justice department to probe the "discriminatory" surveillance of Muslims by the New York police department, saying such religious profiling unfairly "stigmatises" the community members and "breeds distrust".
Stalin's personal intervention in the Adheenam row may have contained the avoidable political damage and social tensions at least for now, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The party is better at winning elections than at governance and it remains intent on pushing ahead with its trademark social and political agenda observes T N Ninan.
