-The Hindu Forced dietary restriction has no place here. In the current battle for Bihar, caste has emerged as a more potent weapon than religion. There may be some churning among urban youth on caste-based quotas, their stated views depending not just on whether they have benefited from the present system but also on how they wish to be perceived — as pragmatic or forward-looking?. But cutting across the urban-rural divide, slicing through...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: India on Thursday made light of a US Congressional report on International Religious Freedom 2014 which said India witnessed "religiously motivated killings, arrests, riots and coerced religious conversions". "The report is internal to the US administration. It is widely acknowledged that the Constitution of India guarantees equal religious, social, political rights to all its citizens including minorities,'' said MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup. "Any abuses are handled by...

-Hindustan Times One of the closest electoral battles for Bihar, where PM Narendra Modi and CM Nitish Kumar are playing out their old rivalry, begins with the first phase of polling in 49 of a total 243 seats on Monday. Strategies by alliances to bite off each other’s caste pie and focus on issues such as beef, detached from ground realities, have arguably made Mandate 2015 the toughest ever with BJP desperate...

-The Hindu In returning their awards, Nayantara Sahgal and Ashok Vajpeyi have reminded Modi of two duties he has neglected — that of upholding a citizen's right to life and of protecting an artist’s right to creativity. Their angst is also directed at the silence of fellow writers and literary institutions.A writer not only seeks to reform a particular injustice in society. She is a tuning fork, a warning signal about...

-PTI CHANDIGARH: The raging controversy over cow slaughter has hit the Rs 2,500 crore business of breeding cows in Punjab with dairy farmers accusing the state's Gau Sewa Commission of "harassing" them by "inordinately" delaying the necessary permission for export of bovines to other states. Dairy farmers under the banner of Punjab Progressive Dairy Farmers' Association alleged that the "inordinate" delay in getting the necessary permission from district authorities for export of...