Syed Firdaus Ashraf covers national politics, and sometimes movies too -- a truly wide arc! You can e-mail the author at firdausa@rediff.co.in
Tral, the former hotbed of terrorism, rocks to the music of democracy.
'The wave of terrorism is over in Kashmir. Local people do not support it.'
'Who are Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti to issue certificates?'
In 2022 Nanaji Dembi pulled down the Hurriyat office board in Srinagar, an act of defiance that grabbed headlines. Despite such nationalistic bravado, the BJP has denied him a ticket for the assembly election.
If Rashid cannot be the king, he could be the kingmaker after October 8 when the results to the J&K assembly are declared.
'We called him Sher-e-Kashmir but we realised he was no lion but a pussycat who surrendered.'
At Srinagar's famed Lal Chowk, Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf meets a computer engineer who drives an auto for a living and discovers that Kashmiris are more interested in finding jobs than discussing the assembly election.
'The intellectual A G Noorani and A G Noorani the family man sound like a contradiction in terms, but both aspects were integral parts of the individual.'
'...but subjecting our heritage to rigorous evidence-based understanding.'
'Rahul Gandhi is raising the issue of a caste census though his party has been doing injustice on this front from the 1950s.'
'Not disclosing information to the public indicates that there is something wrong with Project Cheetah.'
'I want to die with my finger on the click button of the camera,' veteran photographer Pradeep Bandekar, who passed into ages early on Sunday morning, told Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
'Under this amendment, in any dispute over Waqf properties, the Waqf Board cannot approach the court.' 'This is very surprising because the government instead of protecting Waqf properties they are snatching it away and not allowing them to go to court.' 'The third biggest landowner in India is the Waqf Board after the Indian Army and Indian Railways.'
'All of these guys who are opposing the Supreme Court judgment are from dominant scheduled caste communities and none of them come from the scavenging community.' 'Not a single scavenging leader will oppose this Supreme Court judgment.'
'At this moment you cannot give her asylum because if you do, then you are directing public anger against India.'
'Heavy rains are not the primary reason for landslides in Wayanad.' 'There are all sorts of (human) intervention going on in that area.'
'No one is propagating RSS ideology as a government officer.'
'For me, if I want to buy a house to stay, I don't care about indexation because I don't want to sell that house.' 'The only thing that matters to me as a buyer is that the home price should be within my reach.' 'Any market, when speculators and investors go out, it will benefit the middle class.'
'The 2024 general elections proved that UP is not Gujarat.'
'People want to do business in the name of the Kedarnath temple.'
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