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Danger signals: Maoists seek linkages with Muslim extremists
By P.V. Ramana : Naxalites of the Communist Party of India Maoist (CPI-Maoist) have condemned the extension of the proscription on the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), which has been involved in a series of bomb blasts in India. According to media reports, Azad, spokesperson of the Central Committee of the CPI-Maoist, said 'it was a reiteration of the (government's) policy to continue its brutal war on Muslims'. (29)

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Saffron brigade dividing Hindus, Muslims in Jammu and Kashmir
By Amulya Ganguli : The Amarnath land transfer row has come as a godsend to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which was looking for an emotive issue after the Ayodhya temple movement fizzled out. The party now hopes to recapture the mood of the 'awakening' of Hindus, which was associated with Ayodhya, to consolidate its position in the run-up to the next round of assembly elections. (124)

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IPhone: The super brand of the decade
By Prasanto K. Roy : It's the coolest design on the planet. It's the super brand of the decade. And it has come to India - at midnight. The iPhone, like so many things Mac, defies logic. (49)

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A nation not interested in sports piggybacks the victors
By Chitra Padmanabhan : Abhinav Bindra, the well-heeled shooter who became the first sportsperson from independent India to win an individual gold medal at the Beijing Olympics, remained sober - no doubt helped by a natural reserve. But the delirious orgy of official and officious cash award celebrations went on for long. (37)

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Kashmir's independence cannot be an option
By Rajiv Sikri : After many years of relative peace, stability and economic progress, the situation in Jammu and Kashmir has been allowed to reach a dangerous point over the last two months. There have been mistakes, even serious ones, in the way the Amarnath land transfer issue has been handled. Despite these lapses, the answer to the problem cannot be to suggest that the Kashmir Valley be allowed to secede from India. (40)

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Musharraf's exit: another blow to Bush foreign policy
By Mayank Chhaya : Had George Bush's presidency not already entered its lame duck months, the less than flattering departure of Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf so close to the time when Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin took off his gloves would have dealt a staggering personal blow to the US president. (95)

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Why are Muslim zealots the media favourites?
By Firoz Bakht Ahmed : It has been seen over the years that all political parties cash in on the Muslim mandate but later they ignore the issues that affect the community, using it like tissue paper. (52)

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The 'harm' the land row did to Kashmir peace process
By Sarwar Kashani, Srinagar, Aug 16 : A frenzied mob of not more than a thousand marched through the narrow roads of old Srinagar - some carrying green flags and shouting slogans. (92)

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Micro-financing: A tool for grassroot development
By Animesh Banerjee: As a majority of the Indian population lives in its 650,000-odd villages, there has been a consistent attempt by successive governments since Independence to develop rural India. (57)

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Elvis Presley remembered on death anniversary (Tribute)
By Sevanand Gaddala: Elvis Presley might have died an inglorious death on Aug 16 thirty-one years ago, but there is no doubt that he is one of the most important singers ever. (4319)

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Plus points trump the minuses on Independence Day
By Amulya GangulI: It is not beyond the realms of possibility that this year's Independence Day will prove to be, in retrospect, more memorable than any in the recent past. (64)

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Olympics may make China more obdurate over Tibet
By Mayank Chhaya: The Dalai Lama's reported acceptance of Communist Party rule in Tibet as a gesture of sincerity to bring the resolution of the Tibetan issue within grasp is bit of a non sequitur. (81)

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Nuclear deal and India's place in a multipolar world
By K. Subrahmanyam: US President George W. Bush reportedly intends to write individually to heads of governments of 44 other member nations of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), urging that India be given a clean waiver from the present NSG guidelines which do not permit nuclear commerce with any non-signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which has not placed all its nuclear facilities under the full scope safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). (131)

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Why India does not produce more Abhinav Bindras

By Pupul Dutta, New Delhi, Aug 11 : India may rejoice over Abhinav Bindra's golden feat at the Beijing Olympics but shooters - and ex-shooters like me - know it is not easy to achieve wonders in an expensive sport where individuals are mostly left to fend for themselves. (84)

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Amarnath row: a test for Kashmir's syncretic culture
By Amulya Ganguli : Governments in India seem to believe in acting in haste, or without much forethought, and then pay the price later. The upsurge in Jammu and Kashmir could have been avoided if the fateful step of expanding the operations of the Amarnath shrine board and then rescinding the order had been preceded by the kind of wider consultations now being held by the centre. (86)

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For peace in Nagaland, dialogue among Nagas must succeed
By Sanjoy Hazarika : For months, the fragile peace in the Naga Hills has been shattered by internecine conflict. This is ironical because the ceasefires between the government of India and its armed forces, including the paramilitary, and the two factions of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (or Nagaland) -- the group led by Isak Chisi Swu and Thuingaleng Muivah and that headed by S.S. Khaplang -- remain in place. (113)

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Doha trade talks fail, but developing South wins
By Sushma Ramachandran : Headlines can be misleading! The media stories on the recent trade negotiations at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in Geneva had banners saying 'Talks fail' or 'Doha Round Collapses'. These gave the impression that calamity had struck the prolonged negotiations among its 153 members. But the ground reality was quite different. The talks did fail, but it also had a great outcome, at least for India and all the other developing countries, given the state of play. (104)

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Poaching in India may increase as China opens ivory market
By Sanjeeb Baruah, New Delhi, Aug 8 : Elephant poaching in India may increase as China plans to open its domestic market for limited sale of ivory products after a UN committee gave its consent, experts have said. (78)

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Pervez Musharraf: From kingmaker to supplicant
Islamabad, Aug 7 : In a mere 254 days since he shed his army chief's uniform, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has plummeted from being an all-powerful kingmaker who single-handedly called the shots to a toothless tiger who faces impeachment - unless he quits office before that happens. (94)

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India a thriving global e-waste dump yard
By Shweta Srinivasan, New Delhi, Aug 7 : If you thought your old outdated PC or television was safely in a junkyard rotting away or being dismantled, think again. A study by a leading environmental group says it is poisoning our soil and water, causing serious health problems. (83)

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Congress has its nose ahead in the political race
By Amulya Ganguli : Having won the trust vote in parliament, even if by dubious means, the Manmohan Singh government and the ruling Congress can be said to be in a more comfortable position at present than their opponents. (116)

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Making NRIs feel guilty with 'emotional blackmail'
By Kul Bhushan : A mountain of mail at the doorstep confronts most NRIs in the US on returning from their summer holidays in July-August. 'Sorting out the mail and throwing away junk mails is a massive job that I hate,' said Manohar 'Manny' Sharma in New York. 'The highest number of letters is for 'special offers' for all those things that we don't need,' he added, 'Then there are the appeals for charity as if we have billions of dollars to spare!' (90)

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Lhasa uprising eyewitness recounts nightmare
New Delhi, July 30 : 'The police fired at the protesters, killing scores of innocent people. Trucks followed the army and the police, carrying away the bodies to destroy any evidence of Tibetans killed. I myself saw many people killed,' recounted Kunsang, 30, who was in Lhasa when protests erupted in March this year. (101)

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Media needs to be more circumspect in literate Kerala
By B.R.P. Bhaskar : 'Kerala trembled', screamed the nine-centimetre deep headline in the state's largest circulated newspaper Monday. Those words summed up the totally literate state's response to some sensational media reports that it was the terrorists' next target. (102)

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Muslim voices of sanity must get louder
By Firoz Bakht Ahmed : Ahmedabad and Bangalore, like many others, are global cities and the terror that struck these on consecutive days too is a global phenomenon. As a human being and an Indian Muslim, I literally wept over the needless deaths of those who died or were maimed. (103)

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Why India should get exceptional treatment from IAEA
By K. Subrahmanyam : The India-specific safeguards agreement comes under the scrutiny of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in the next few days. Thereafter the safeguards agreement and the draft 123-agreement will go before the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) to obtain a waiver from its guidelines. At this stage attention is focused on what will be the impact of this exceptional treatment for India on the international non-proliferation order. (109)

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Naxalites graduating from guerrilla to mobile warfare
By Nihar Ranjan Nayak: Less than three weeks after the Chitrakonda attack, armed cadres of the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-M) attacked the Special Operation Group (SOG), Orissa's anti-Maoist force, on July 16. Seventeen personnel were killed in the landmine explosion triggered by the Maoists in Malkangiri district of southern Orissa. (120)

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ULFA to use HUJI cadres for subversive activities in Assam
By Ashok Dixit,New Delhi, July 26: The banned United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) has arrived at an agreement with the Bangladesh-based Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami (HUJI) to operate jointly in Assam. (118)

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Everybody loves a trust vote
By Chitra Padmanabhan: I have a confession to make. As the recent debate on the trust vote sought by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the Indo-US nuclear deal neared its climax and news channels dizzyingly zoomed in on the display board that would announce the results, I caught myself wondering how many runs the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government would score against the opposition. (102)

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Manmohan Singh: short-term politician with a long-term vision
By Mayank Chhaya: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has emerged triumphant from the firestorm of nuclear politics and in the process discovered a true politician in himself. (112)

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Trust! Manmohan Singh will now bat for reforms
By Sushma Ramachandran: By using the term 'bonded slave' in his speech at the conclusion of the trust vote, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh eloquently expressed his feelings during the four years of ties between the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and the Left parties. (113)

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Mayawati returns to Lucknow with renewed hope
Lucknow, July 24 : The loss in the parliament trust vote may have dashed Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati's immediate dream of power in New Delhi, but she is returning to Lucknow with a larger national profile, including new allies who are more than ready to accept her as prime ministerial candidate. (128)