As a jaded and faded prime minister over-stretches himself, the BJP can see the election is far from being a done deal.

If Modi can stage a grand spectacle at Ayodhya, Naveen babu has done his own show in the service of Lord Jagnnath at Puri. If Modi’s cheer-leaders believe that the prime minister has cornered the affections of the women voters across the country, Naveen babu’s drum-beaters insist that the women voters are at the core of the Odisha chief minister’s political longevity.

In the next few weeks, voters will be called upon to choose between two macro-impulses. One impulse promises stability, decisiveness and ‘vikas’ undergirded by corporate loot, the other banks on sensitivity and empathy for the vast majority and its unfulfilled aspirations for a better hand in life.

BJP strategists and RSS commissars know that the voter is unimpressed with the “Modi Sarkar” – notwithstanding the crores of tax-payers’ money that has been spent on building a cult figure out of a very ordinary man. 

The nation’s best wishes for your son; but our grateful thanks for debunking some of the myths and pretensions of New India.

The formal re-arrangement in the party’s constitution can only be the proverbial tip of the authoritarian iceberg lurching just below the surface.

Only by acting in a joint and collective manner will the opposition parties be able to effectively demand that the Election Commission performs its job in a neutral and professional way. Far too much is at stake for anything else.

There is a stench of shabby calculations in L.K. Advani being awarded the Bharat Ratna.

Just when the country was being told that a new era of nobility and virtuousness had dawned, the Nitish Kumar caper has jolted us back to the reality that nothing has changed.

The Lok Sabha elections this year are about sab ka INDIA versus Narendra Modi’s coalition of vested interests and bigotry.

If Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi can jettison the old guard in key states, pick younger leaders, begin a conversation with Mayawati and hand over convenorship of the INDIA bloc to a senior non-Congress leader, the BJP can still be defeated.

The most cunning subscribers of Modi's “56-inch-ism” were the overlords of the security establishment. These shadowy men quickly sized up our new saviour and understood the great man’s need for 'enemies' to be tamed and vanquished.

In recent years, however, we have managed to crowd heroes and achievers out of a national imagination that has not allowed to look beyond the 'inspirational' and 'visionary' leadership of one man. 

'The crooked politician needs the businessman to provide the funds that allow him to supply patronage to the poor and fight elections. The corrupt businessman needs the crooked politician to get public resources and contracts cheaply.'

The RSS chief warning against “cultural Marxists” and “woke” elements suggests his speech was outsourced, perhaps to someone outside India. It also suggests that the RSS-BJP power equation has been resolved after nearly two decades of sparring.

The ruling elite, now armed with the technology of total surveillance, has come to believe that every challenge of statecraft can be met effectively by the use of a heavy hand.

In India, power at the Centre has hinged on a commitment to partnership, sharing honour, glory, patronage and political dividends. The arrangement worked as long all the partners abided by the rites of coalition dharma – which the BJP now seeks to dismantle.

The criminal case against the Editors Guild and its team for their report on Manipur is unprecedented.

The continued dominance of the Gandhis in the Congress scheme of things provides Narendra Modi with his most potent emotional appeal to the electorate.

One would expect that after nine years as the prime minister, Narendra Modi would have left behind his street brawler’s impulses and acquired a sliver of gravitas.