With just under a year to go to the Lok Sabha polls, I shudder to think at the mish-mash India is faced with if neither the Congress nor the BJP were to get a majority – or at least emerge as the single largest party in the Lok Sabha. Read more

In a week full of scams and scandals and exposes all over the country, just some random thoughts about my overview of the state of the nation – or rather its leaders. Read more

Last week I heard with interest Rahul Gandhi, as the newly appointed vice president of his party, call for the identification of 40 to 50 people in the Congress in each state who could be leaders -potential chief ministers and prime ministers. Read more

Back in those days when I was at college and Subramanian Swamy was a Havard-returned guest lecturer at our university, I remember one of our professors of political science watch the man grimly as he spoke more on economics than on politics. Read more

In a recent interview to an English TV channel, I was both startled and delighted to see Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi tongue-tied – though that’s a mild word for his reaction – to a question on whether he thinks he should apologise for 2002 to be able to clear his path to New Delhi. Read more

In 1995, when the Congress was pushed below the majority mark in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly and the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance was struggling to cop up one of their own, Sharad Pawar, the sitting chief minister, well, just sat back and did nothing. Read more

The Shiv Sena and the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena like to believe that the Mangeshkar sisters belong to them. In fact, not just belong to them – the Thackerays believe that they own these national assets. Read more

During his first term as chief minister of Maharashtra, I had once quizzed Vilasrao Deshmukh about the general feeling of critics that his was a lack-lustre government that was really incapable of doing anything significant for the people. Read more

Now that Team Anna is contemplating forming a political party, I wonder why Anna Hazare had to go as far as New Delhi to look for a clean government. Read more

When Sharad Pawar split the Congress in 1999, he had hoped that the whole of the party will rally behind him and that Sonia Gandhi will be just left with herself and a handful of her close supporters. Read more