Above the fold: Top stories of the day
1. Exit polls predict a close contest in the Bihar assembly polls, with no clear trends emerging.
2. Underworld don Chhota Rajan has been brought to India and is held at an undisclosed location.
3. Twenty four more filmmakers have returned their awards in protest against the crisis at the Film and Television Institute of India.
The Big Story: Calling on Kashmir
Kashmir is less than enthusiastic about Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit, scheduled for Saturday. Separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani had called for a "million march" to protest against the visit, ensuring the same routine arrest of separatist leaders ahead of any big event. Now the Valley bristles under a heavy blanket of security and everyday life is disrupted by protests, arrests and shutdowns. There is a sense of siege as the prime minister approaches, reportedly with the gift of a bumper economic package for Jammu and Kashmir.
Governments in Delhi have always been quick to pour money into the Valley, hoping special packages will quell the fires of political unrest. This has failed on two counts. First, the largesse showered on the state has not necessarily generated better economic opportunity and infrastructure. Second, the Centre keeps promising economic packages without addressing, or even recognising, the political aspirations of people in the state. By all accounts, people in the Valley are troubled by border tensions, which have soared over the last year, and this government's hardline stance on separatists – the Centre has repeatedly cancelled talks with Pakistan because the latter held meetings with Hurriyat leaders. The perception that this is an anti-minority government has also hardened resentments in the Valley.
As Modi flies into Srinagar, many will be recalling his Diwali visit to a flood-ravaged Kashmir last year. The prime minister had made a grand gesture of calling on flood victims and promised sumptuous amounts in relief. A year later, the Valley is still limping back to normalcy. People say they never saw any of the promised flood relief.
The Big Scroll: Scroll.in on the day's biggest story
Fahad Shah writes about the "million march" planned in protest against Modi's visit to Kashmir.
Sada Naqvi argues that Modi's visit to Kashmir is crucial if the government is to prove it is not anti-minority.
Politicking and policying
1. In Tamil Nadu, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam rejected the idea of a coalition government after the assembly polls in 2016.
2. The Bharatiya Janata Party claims the "intolerance" campaign is aimed at derailing development.
3. The Centre has hiked minimum support prices of pulses but experts say it is too little, too late.
Punditry
1. In the Hindu, Satish Deshpande explains how the Bihar elections show the return of caste to Indian politics.
2. In the Indian Express, Yameen Rasheed argues that by declaring emergency, the Maldives have abandoned even the pretence of democracy.
3. In the Telegraph, Swapan Dasgupta rails against those "enemies of liberty", the liberals.
Don't Miss...
Anumeha Yadav on the government's weird maths for a legally binding national minimum wage:
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1. Exit polls predict a close contest in the Bihar assembly polls, with no clear trends emerging.
2. Underworld don Chhota Rajan has been brought to India and is held at an undisclosed location.
3. Twenty four more filmmakers have returned their awards in protest against the crisis at the Film and Television Institute of India.
The Big Story: Calling on Kashmir
Kashmir is less than enthusiastic about Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit, scheduled for Saturday. Separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani had called for a "million march" to protest against the visit, ensuring the same routine arrest of separatist leaders ahead of any big event. Now the Valley bristles under a heavy blanket of security and everyday life is disrupted by protests, arrests and shutdowns. There is a sense of siege as the prime minister approaches, reportedly with the gift of a bumper economic package for Jammu and Kashmir.
Governments in Delhi have always been quick to pour money into the Valley, hoping special packages will quell the fires of political unrest. This has failed on two counts. First, the largesse showered on the state has not necessarily generated better economic opportunity and infrastructure. Second, the Centre keeps promising economic packages without addressing, or even recognising, the political aspirations of people in the state. By all accounts, people in the Valley are troubled by border tensions, which have soared over the last year, and this government's hardline stance on separatists – the Centre has repeatedly cancelled talks with Pakistan because the latter held meetings with Hurriyat leaders. The perception that this is an anti-minority government has also hardened resentments in the Valley.
As Modi flies into Srinagar, many will be recalling his Diwali visit to a flood-ravaged Kashmir last year. The prime minister had made a grand gesture of calling on flood victims and promised sumptuous amounts in relief. A year later, the Valley is still limping back to normalcy. People say they never saw any of the promised flood relief.
The Big Scroll: Scroll.in on the day's biggest story
Fahad Shah writes about the "million march" planned in protest against Modi's visit to Kashmir.
Sada Naqvi argues that Modi's visit to Kashmir is crucial if the government is to prove it is not anti-minority.
Politicking and policying
1. In Tamil Nadu, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam rejected the idea of a coalition government after the assembly polls in 2016.
2. The Bharatiya Janata Party claims the "intolerance" campaign is aimed at derailing development.
3. The Centre has hiked minimum support prices of pulses but experts say it is too little, too late.
Punditry
1. In the Hindu, Satish Deshpande explains how the Bihar elections show the return of caste to Indian politics.
2. In the Indian Express, Yameen Rasheed argues that by declaring emergency, the Maldives have abandoned even the pretence of democracy.
3. In the Telegraph, Swapan Dasgupta rails against those "enemies of liberty", the liberals.
Don't Miss...
Anumeha Yadav on the government's weird maths for a legally binding national minimum wage:
“Who has made this list?” asked Vinay Kant Mishra, who works as a machine operator. “Please tell me which vegetable costs Rs 16 per kilo and where can one can stay for Rs 390 per month?”
Mishra’s mirth is not shared by central trade unions. The unions are filled with misgivings as the National Democratic Alliance government prepares to restructure labour laws through eight legislative amendments in the winter session of the Parliament in November. Troubling them the most is a proposed amendment to the Minimum Wages Act, 1948, that will set a legally binding national minimum wage – below which no worker can be paid – across all Indian states and industries.
The problem, they say, is that the Indian government is not raising it enough.
In its draft calculations, the government has set the national minimum wage at Rs 273 a day or Rs 7,100 a month, say trade unions. This is less than half of what it ought to be if the Supreme Court guidelines, and the norms proposed in the Indian Labour Conference 1957, were applied to current prices. The unions demand that every worker be assured of at least Rs 15,000 a month in wages.
