Left, Right & Centre

The Supreme Court's order on using green firecrackers on Diwali, and that too only between 8 and 10 pm, went up in smoke last night. From Delhi to Mumbai, people openly defied the top court, bursting crackers way beyond the 10 pm deadline and bursting the same, polluting high emission ones. The problem is, that while the court ordered only the use of low emission crackers, those don't exist yet in the market. So those people who did use crackers last night, would have used the old high emission ones, flouting the court order. This morning, Delhi's air quality was at 'hazardous' or the highest 'severe plus emergency' in several places - the worst air quality recorded in the national capital this year. This means that prolonged exposure could lead to respiratory illnesses. The US embassy tweeted that the air quality levels in Delhi had soared to 526 at 6 a.m. That would put the pollution above hazardous levels and pose a serious health risk to residents. A level of 50 or less is considered healthy. The deadliest, most poisonous particulate matter out there, PM 2.5, spiked to 3200 micrograms/cubic m in Delhi's Jahangirpuri - a staggering 128 times the WHO's safe or healthy limit of 25. What happened last night shows that implementing the court order on the ground was a disaster.

As the air we breathe continues to poison us, the political bickering gets worse. Why isn't the prime minister intervening? Is it time for an emergency cabinet meeting on this?

Yogi Adityanath's Diwali gift for Ayodhya - he makes major announcements, including another name change - Faizabad district will now be known as Ayodhya. Is this the game changer the BJP is hoping for in 2019?

As controversy grows over the killing of the tigress Avni, we ask, was the shooting justified? We get into the big debate on conservation, which has now also turned into a political row.

Why has the pitch for a ram temple suddenly got so extreme? From one BJP Minister to the next, the talk of a temple in Ayodhya has gained ground in recent days leading us to ask whether polarisation will be the hallmark of the 2019 campaign.

Manoj Tiwari-AAP Face-Off Over Violence At Delhi Bridge Opening

Is India An Easy Target For Cyber-Attacks?

Five Bengalis are killed in cold blooded murder in Assam, sparking off a wave of protests and political controversy as West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee links it to the National Citizens Register issue. Is there a link to the NRC as Mamata Banerjee claims, or is this cynical politics?

As pollution peaks in north India and emergency measures kick in, how is all of this working on the ground? Will a proposal to take private cars off the roads really work?

On the road to 2019, the TDP's Chandrababu Naidu tries to get the opposition together to take on the BJP, even ready to let go of his party's traditional anti-Congress stand. Standing side-by-side with Rahul Gandhi - both leaders said this was a critical time for the opposition to unite. But can they?