My career as a journalist has run parallel to the communication revolution in India. My first full blown election reportage was in 1984 – and I remember the long wait at the Central Telegraph Office to send out a telegram with just the salient points of a particular address by a particular leader after an election rally in the rural districts. Read more

When the nation asks Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde, if he could not find one good and reliable ophthalmologist in India, I could say that among the best in the country sits right under his nose at the JJ Hospital in Bombay. Read more

I had been to London a couple of years ago on invitation from the British Foreign office to study the situation with regard to their minorities and how they deal with the growing problem of Islamic terrorism. Read more

I have written about this some years ago but it bears repeating.

Nearly 15 years ago when the Hansie Cronje scandal had hit the headlines round the cricketing world, a top ranking police officer had told me there were only two honest men in the Indian cricketing team — Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly. 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

Among the earliest stories of my career was to report the rape of a five year old girl in a Bombay slum in the 1980s. She had been raped by her 15 year old neighbour while their parents – sweepers – were all out to work. Read more

The first time I met Sonia Gandhi was soon after she became Congress president – at a dinner at Nasik hosted by Sharad Pawar who was then sill part of the Congress. The party had swept more than 40 of the 48 seats to the Lok Sabha from Maharashtra and Pawar had just been made leader of the opposition. Read more

Contrary to what some politicians say, I do not believe the Sangh Parivar’s latest stress on Hindutva is a nine-day wonder that will disappear with the Kumbh Mela. I have reason to be convinced that it is a clever, well thought out strategy and that those who are propagating it know even as they call for the Ram temple in Ayodhya that the temple issue is a self-defeating goal. Read more

Mahatma Gandhi was an apostle of peace. Narendra Modi, clearly, is not. But he is nobody’s fool. So when Anil Ambani compares the Gujarat chief minister to Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, I do not think even Modi believes a single word of what he says. Read more

Some years ago then RSS chief the late K Sudershan had come up with a unique plan to combat the presumed mushrooming population of Muslims in India. Contrary to all anthropological data in the country he thought all Muslims had four wives when the fact was that it was more Hindu and Jain businessmen, rather than the comparatively poor Muslims, who had the means to afford second and third establishments had married more than once. Read more