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‘Yuvatis’ Kanaka Durga and Bindu sneaked into Sabarimala Ayyappa Temple in the wee hours of January 2, 2019. Victory! Temple Chief Tantri Kandraru Rajeevaru closed shut the temple doors and “purified” the temple precincts. Humiliation! Only then was the temple reopened for male Ayyappa devotees. A team of 70 cops in mufti assisted Kanaka and Bindu gain “backdoor” entry. They did not climb the “18 sacred steps”. Kerala society stands divided, polarized.

On the New Year’s Day the Reserve Bank of India put in place a mechanism for restructuring the stressed assets of the medium and small scale sector. Individual banks have been advised to take up stressed loans of these units and work out schemes which will enable them to continue getting funds for their operations.

Delegates of Cuba’s National Assembly of People’s Power on December 22, 2018 unanimously approved extensive revisions proposed for Cuba’s Constitution of 1976. The Assembly authorized a national referendum on acceptance or not of what is in effect a new constitution. That vote takes place on February 24, the day in 1895 when Cubans launched their second War of Independence from Spain.

BHOPAL: The Congress government in Madhya Pradesh has averted a political crisis by agreeing to withdraw all "politically motivated" cases filed by the previous BJP government as demanded by BSP leader Mayawati.

It is a spring back moment for the global Left. It might not have reached a point of renascence yet. But the Left revival, though inconspicuous and asymmetrical across countries, is unmistakable. It is a bouncy aftereffect of the all too common right wing surge all over the globe. Writing off the Left or berating it for inaction is passé. The call of the hour is to seize the moment and grasp the less-noticed left effervescence.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has broken his mounabrata by giving an extensive interview on New Year’s Day to ANI which elaborates in a big way his strategy to fight the Lok Sabha polls in April/May 2019. Three things are clear. First, the Prime Minister will keep the pot boiling for the BJP and its allies on the Ram Mandir issue till the elections. Expectations will be roused to rally the Sangh Parivar activists, but the PM may not take the final plunge before the Poll as is being demanded by the VHP and the RSS as also Shiv Sena. He will try to keep his appeal to the moderates who think that India needs a strong political leader and Modi has those elements.

Mr. Incidental Prime Minister your record in fulfilling 2014 general election promises stinks to high heaven. The Rs 15 lakh in every man’s bank account is a pipe-dream Pied Piper sold. All the people got was Jan Dhan bank slips showing little or no money. You made all the promises and then when you got what you wanted – BJP rule and the PM chair – you went off on tangents, doing Tughlak-things – demonetization and the midnight tryst-with-GST.

Nitin Gadkari has been training his guns against the leadership of the Modi-Amit Shah duo. It began with the revelation that the election promise of Rs15 lakh being deposited into the account of every Indian out of the proceeds of black money seizures was made on the basis of the feeling that the BJP had no chance of being voted to power. More recently he attacked the leadership of Amit Shah for the poor performance of the party legislators.

It has been 13 years since Sohrabuddin Anwarhussain Sheikh died. He was killed in an “encounter” with the Gujarat police, which is widely believed to be a case of “fake encounter”. He died on November 26, 2005 and since then his brother Rubabuddin has fought for justice. Rubabuddin filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court which led to the probe into the alleged encounter

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in a recent statement has blamed to a great extent the officers of the public sector banks for delinquency in dealing with NPA accounts. He has mentioned that 6049 officers have been held responsible on account of staff delinquency in NPA accounts and in all cases, depending upon the amount involved, CBI and police complaints have been lodged.The manner in which the Finance Minister has approached the issue of tackling of NPAs does not give credit to him as a senior cabinet minister who is expected to take a holistic view of the continuing crisis in the country’s banking system It is a prejudiced view and rightly, the ALL India Bank Officers Confederation, the body of the officers of the public sector banking industry, has protested against these observations of the Finance Minister.