Opinion

With less than a week to go for election results, it is to be seen whether Naidu or KCR who will emerge kingmaker. Or they may well be beaten to it by Sonia Gandhi who has also reached out to opposition leaders.

In a democracy, people reserve their rights to evaluate, praise, question and criticise the functioning of the governments and former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi cannot be an exception.

The recommendations of JS Verma committee, constituted after the Nirbhaya gang rape in 2013, recommended criminalisation of marital rape.

The party’s strategy is to concentrate on a few seats it thinks are winnable, seats like Unnao, Kanpur, Fatehpur Sikri, Barabanki, Baharaich, Kushinagar ,Dharhaura, Rai Bareli and Amethi.

There seems to be a lack of intent and efficacy in the rescuers who have taken it upon themselves to rescue Jet Airways.

Without institutions and conventions, the constitution becomes a shell sans kernel, government an oligarchy and political morality merely a weapon to thrash rivals with. Unfortunately, we are almost there.

By seeking to make changes to AFSPA, the Congress has played into the hands of forces for whom the Indian security establishment is an enemy and the insurgents of all hues are friends.

Shatrughan Sinha has been an astute weathercock, mostly siding with the winning side. He was among the first few to back Modi and the first actor to enter politics by formally joining the Opposition party over two decades.

In effect, the ambitious revival plan to rescue Jet, stitched together with active involvement of the Indian government, lies in tatters.

By referring the Ayodhya case to a mediation panel, the Supreme Court can absolve itself of such unwarranted public opinions in the times to come.

As such war is a means of achieving an end, a weapon which can be used for good or for bad purposes. Putting it in Orwell’s famous dictum: “Peace is War”.

No man in any civilised country can be punished for the crimes his grandfather committed. Similarly, no country should be asked to atone the sins it committed a century ago.

The terrorists attacking India have so far only faced proportionate response. They attack. Then they are hunted down and killed. Next day, new attackers replace them. This cycle has not been broken for 30 years now. At some point, a new strategy will have...

Priyanka Gandhi and Congress are planning a category much broader that encompasses caste and echoes the meaning of class. However, categories like women, youth and marginal seem too abstract.

There is no clear answer as the BJP’s predicament has been complicated by its recent defeat in the Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh Assembly polls.

In recent years, there has been intense criticism of the non-transparency and lack of public participation in deciding recipients of national awards, which made a mockery of the principle 'it is not titles that honour men, but men that honour titles'.