The Cynics of Delhi

NEW DELHI â€" I was talking last week to a senior official from the Congress Party in one of the capital’s colonial bungalows that are a much-envied perk of power when news arrived that the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (D.M.K.), a party from the southern state of Tamil Nadu and an important partner in Congress’s ruling alliance, had withdrawn support from the government. The functionary was gleeful. That reaction surprised me, but less so than the explanation for it: “There goes Chidambaram’s chance of becoming prime minister.”

The reference was to the finance minister, whose parliamentary seat from Tamil Nadu depends on continued support from D.M.K. Even assuming that, against current odds, Congress does well in the 2014 general election and then Rahul Gandhi chooses not to become prime minister, P. Chidambaram could hardly claim India’s top post without winning his own election. That this Congress politician would delight at an ally’s setback sums up the atmosphere of cynicism that permeates Indian politics today.

Then again, D.M.K.’s withdrawal was cynical to being with. For years the party, which has its roots in a Tamil separatist movement, had done little to take up the cause of the Tamils in Sri Lanka. But faced with plummeting support in its home state over allegations of corruption, it has recently tried to rebrand itself. Sensing an opportunity after a recent U.N. resolution on Sri Lanka calling for “an independent and credible investigation into alleged war crimes” committed agains Tamils during the civil war that ended in 2009, the chief of the D.M.K. reportedly said that “India’s failure to understand the gravity of the situation and its indifference” were “antidemocratic.” Hence the party’s withdrawal from the government.

Now that the D.M.K. is out, India’s ruling alliance can be held hostage by any one of its remaining partners. With barely a majority in Parliament, Congress is desperate for the continued support of the Samajwadi Party (which rules India’s largest state, Uttar Pradesh), the Bahujan Samaj Party (which represents the dalits), and the Trinamool Congress (a breakaway faction of Congress that rules the state of West Bengal). And they know it.

In 2011, for example, the Indian government had to give up on a water-sharing agreement with Bangladesh because the Trinamool Congress opposed it, alleging it would take too much fresh water away from West Bengal. And six months ago the party withdrew from the government over proposed cuts to India’s burgeoning subsidies. But then just this month, reacting to the Sri Lankan Tamil issue, the Trinamool Congress’s leader said that when it comes to India’s external affairs “our party never interferes” with the central government’s policies. She seemed to have been positioning the Trinamool Congress for some of the spoils left by D.M.K.’s eparture.

Congress’s response to feeling hamstrung has been no less cynical. Among other things, it has used the Central Bureau of Investigation, the agency responsible for monitoring major corruption cases, as a political tool.

A few years ago, it appointed Ashwani Kumar â€" who once oversaw security for Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi (of Congress) and his wife Sonia Gandhi (now the head of Congress) â€" as chief of the investigation bureau. And after President Pranab Mukherjee (Congress again) appointed Kumar to be governor of the state of Nagaland, Congress replaced Kumar with another hand-picked candidate.

No wonder, then, that within days of D.M.K.’s withdrawal from the government the Central Bureau of Investigation raided the house of M.K. Stalin, the son of the D.M.K.’s leader and its heir apparent. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s attempt to distance himself from the raid only heightened suspicions about its motivations: Congress appears to be warning not only the D.M.K., but all its other nominal allies, to stay put.

In the cynical political atmosphere that dominates India today, perhaps these parties deserve one another. The question is whether the country deserves them.

Hartosh Singh Bal is political editor of Open Magazine and co-author of “A Certain Ambiguity.’’

The Cynics of Delhi

NEW DELHI â€" I was talking last week to a senior official from the Congress Party in one of the capital’s colonial bungalows that are a much-envied perk of power when news arrived that the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (D.M.K.), a party from the southern state of Tamil Nadu and an important partner in Congress’s ruling alliance, had withdrawn support from the government. The functionary was gleeful. That reaction surprised me, but less so than the explanation for it: “There goes Chidambaram’s chance of becoming prime minister.”

The reference was to the finance minister, whose parliamentary seat from Tamil Nadu depends on continued support from D.M.K. Even assuming that, against current odds, Congress does well in the 2014 general election and then Rahul Gandhi chooses not to become prime minister, P. Chidambaram could hardly claim India’s top post without winning his own election. That this Congress politician would delight at an ally’s setback sums up the atmosphere of cynicism that permeates Indian politics today.

Then again, D.M.K.’s withdrawal was cynical to being with. For years the party, which has its roots in a Tamil separatist movement, had done little to take up the cause of the Tamils in Sri Lanka. But faced with plummeting support in its home state over allegations of corruption, it has recently tried to rebrand itself. Sensing an opportunity after a recent U.N. resolution on Sri Lanka calling for “an independent and credible investigation into alleged war crimes” committed agains Tamils during the civil war that ended in 2009, the chief of the D.M.K. reportedly said that “India’s failure to understand the gravity of the situation and its indifference” were “antidemocratic.” Hence the party’s withdrawal from the government.

Now that the D.M.K. is out, India’s ruling alliance can be held hostage by any one of its remaining partners. With barely a majority in Parliament, Congress is desperate for the continued support of the Samajwadi Party (which rules India’s largest state, Uttar Pradesh), the Bahujan Samaj Party (which represents the dalits), and the Trinamool Congress (a breakaway faction of Congress that rules the state of West Bengal). And they know it.

In 2011, for example, the Indian government had to give up on a water-sharing agreement with Bangladesh because the Trinamool Congress opposed it, alleging it would take too much fresh water away from West Bengal. And six months ago the party withdrew from the government over proposed cuts to India’s burgeoning subsidies. But then just this month, reacting to the Sri Lankan Tamil issue, the Trinamool Congress’s leader said that when it comes to India’s external affairs “our party never interferes” with the central government’s policies. She seemed to have been positioning the Trinamool Congress for some of the spoils left by D.M.K.’s eparture.

Congress’s response to feeling hamstrung has been no less cynical. Among other things, it has used the Central Bureau of Investigation, the agency responsible for monitoring major corruption cases, as a political tool.

A few years ago, it appointed Ashwani Kumar â€" who once oversaw security for Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi (of Congress) and his wife Sonia Gandhi (now the head of Congress) â€" as chief of the investigation bureau. And after President Pranab Mukherjee (Congress again) appointed Kumar to be governor of the state of Nagaland, Congress replaced Kumar with another hand-picked candidate.

No wonder, then, that within days of D.M.K.’s withdrawal from the government the Central Bureau of Investigation raided the house of M.K. Stalin, the son of the D.M.K.’s leader and its heir apparent. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s attempt to distance himself from the raid only heightened suspicions about its motivations: Congress appears to be warning not only the D.M.K., but all its other nominal allies, to stay put.

In the cynical political atmosphere that dominates India today, perhaps these parties deserve one another. The question is whether the country deserves them.

Hartosh Singh Bal is political editor of Open Magazine and co-author of “A Certain Ambiguity.’’

A Conversation With: Singer Kailash Kher

Courtesy of Joy Dutta Kailash Kher.

The acclaimed Indian singer Kailash Kher has carved a special niche for himself in the music world by specializing in the classical Sufi tradition. With his soulful, high-pitched voice, he has captured the imagination of music lovers across India and Pakistan, as well as other parts of the world where Indians and Pakistanis have settled down.

Mr. Kher and his band, Kailasa, are always in much demand, and his more than 300 concerts in the United States alone are a testimony to Mr. Kher’s increasing global popularity.

India Ink spoke with him in Rajkot, in the westernmost Indian state of Gujarat, where he performed with his band on the eve of the Republic Day of India. He discussed the state of Indian classical music and his thoughts on the young singers of today.

Q.

Like many artists, you had to struggle a lot to establish yourself and get recognized in the highly competitive world of Hindi music. Did you ever lose heart Did you really imagine that you would be such a huge star and enjoy immense popularity

A.

No, I never lost heart or felt frustrated simply because I had full confidence in my talent. God has always been very kind to me. I had a passion for music since childhood. And it’s the passion that eventually helps you realize your ambition, your dream, whatever your chosen field. I knew I would get the opportunity at the right time. And when it came, I grabbed it with both hands.

I’ve sung more than 500 songs in 21 different languages and held 800-odd concerts across the globe, including more than 300 in the U.S. alone. I represent India’s culture abroad. Seven American states have offered me honorary citizenship.

Q.

Where does your inspiration come from Who have been major influences on your singing

A.

Music itself is an inspiration for me. As I said, I’ve a passion for music. I always sing from the heart and try to be as natural as possible. I’ve been greatly influenced by my father, who was an amateur traditional folk singer, and Pandit Kumar Gandharva, a great classical singer. Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan has also influenced me.

Q.

What do you think of the current state of Hindustani classical music in India

A.

Hindustani classical music has a special, even sacred, place in the psyche of Indians. It enjoys an honorable status, not just in India but in the world. Unfortunately, today’s television-crazy youngsters are more interested in “seeing” the music than in listening. They need to be told that music should be enjoyed and learned by listening, not by “seeing.” All I want to tell the aspiring singers is start listening to music. I think radio can play an important role in this regard.

Q.

And how do you rate the new, young singers who keep sprouting thanks to satellite television channels

A.

I think they are good. Some of them are talented, too. But many of them seem to become stars, not true artists. If you watch them on television, you’ll notice that they’re more concerned about their looks, clothes, dance and style than how they sing or how good they sing. This is also one of the reasons why they aren’t interested in pursuing classical music, which calls for a lot of hard work and dedication.

But I don’t blame them. They are only following the trend. After all, you tend to like and learn what you see and get.

Q.

Are you against an element of a bit of glamour in music

A.

No, I’m not. I accept that people’s lifestyle has changed. And so has their taste in music. An element of glamour has been added to the Sufi and other traditions of music. Fair enough. It’s the demand of the times we live in.

Many people find me, too, different from other singers because I tend to experiment and add variety to my singing. I think glamour is required if you want to create a mass appeal. Simplicity doesn’t work or appeal. Hence our classical music doesn’t reach far.

Let’s live with the present time. After all, we’ve to connect to the present generation, too. But I must say that Hindustani classical music is the foundation of even pop and rock music.

Q.

If invited, would you go to perform in Pakistan again, especially after the of beheading of the two Indian soldiers, which has created a tense situation between the two neighboring nations

A.

Whatever has happened is very unfortunate. But I must say music bridges the gap, not widens it. I had a most memorable experience of my life when I was in Pakistan last year. I was welcomed with so much warmth wherever I went. I was simply overwhelmed by the Pakistanis’ love and enthusiasm. It was quite a sight, and sheer joy, to see them cheer and dance with excitement when I was singing my hit number “Bum Lahiri” about Lord Shiva.

(The interview has been condensed and lightly edited.)

New Ideological Battle in Pakistan: Traffic Circle’s Name

Diego Ibarra Sanchez for The New York Times

There is opposition to renaming a busy traffic circle in Lahore, Pakistan, in honor of Bhagat Singh because he was not Muslim.

LAHORE, Pakistan â€" If ever a squabble over a street name could sum up a nation’s identity crisis, it is happening in Lahore, Pakistan’s cultural capital.

A portrait of Mr. Singh, a Sikh revolutionary who was hanged by the British in 1931 in the spot where the traffic circle is today.

Late last year, a group of Lahoris made progress in getting local officials to rename a busy traffic circle for Bhagat Singh, a Sikh revolutionary who was hanged at the site by the British in 1931 after a brief but eventful insurrection against colonial rule. They see it as a chance to honor a local hero who they feel transcends the ethnic and sectarian tensions gripping the country today â€" and also as an important test of the boundaries of inclusiveness here.

But in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, questions of religious identity also become issues of patriotism, and the effort has raised alarm bells among conservatives and Islamists. The circle was named in 2010 for Chaudhry Rehmat Ali, a Muslim student who coined the name Pakistan in the 1930s, and there was an outcry at the news that it might be renamed for a non-Muslim.

“If a few people decide one day that the name has to be changed, why should the voice of the majority be ignored” asked Zahid Butt, the head of a neighborhood business association here and a leader of the effort to block the renaming.

The fight over the traffic circle â€" which, when they are pressed, locals usually just call Shadman Circle, after the surrounding neighborhood â€" has become a showcase battle in a wider ideological war over nomenclature and identity here and in other Pakistani cities.

Although many of Lahore’s prominent buildings are named for non-Muslims, there has been a growing effort to “Islamize” the city’s architecture and landmarks, critics of the trend say. In that light, the effort to rename the circle for Mr. Singh becomes a cultural counteroffensive.

“Since the ’80s, the days of the dictator Gen. Zia ul-Haq, there has been an effort that everything should be Islamized â€" like the Mall should be called M. A. Jinnah Road,” said Taimur Rahman, a musician and academic from Lahore, referring to one of the city’s central roads and to the country’s founder. “They do not want to acknowledge that other people, from different religions, also lived here in the past.”

A recent nationwide surge in deadly attacks against religious minorities, particularly against Ahmadi and Hazara Shiites, has again put a debate over tolerance on the national agenda. Though most Sikhs fled Pakistan soon after the partition from India in 1947, the fight over whether to honor a member of that minority publicly bears closely on the headlines for many.

A push to honor Mr. Singh has been going on here for years. But it was not until the annual remembrance of his birth in September that things came to a head. A candlelight demonstration to support renaming the traffic circle had an effect, and a senior district official agreed to start the process. As part of it, he asked the public to come forward with any objections. The complaints started pouring in.

Traders of Shadman Market, the local trade group led by Mr. Butt, threatened a strike. Chillingly, warnings against the move were issued by leaders of the Islamic aid group Jamaat-ud-Dawa, largely believed to be a front for the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba. Clerics voiced their opposition during Friday Prayer.

The issue quickly became a case for the city’s High Court, which said it would deliberate on a petition, initiated by Mr. Butt and a coalition of religious conservatives, to block the name change. That was in November, and the case still awaits a hearing date. The provincial government has remained in tiptoe mode ever since. “It is a very delicate matter,” said Ajaz Anwar, an art historian and painter who is the vice chairman of a civic committee that is managing the renaming process.

Mr. Anwar said some committee members had proposed a compromise: renaming the circle after Habib Jalib, a widely popular postindependence poet. That move has been rejected out of hand by pro-Singh campaigners.

Mr. Rahman and other advocates for renaming the circle paint it as a test of resistance to intolerance and extremism, and they consider the government and much of Lahore society to have failed it.

“The government’s defense in the court has been very halfhearted,” said Yasser Latif Hamdani, a lawyer representing the activists. “The government lawyer did not even present his case during earlier court proceedings.”

The controversy threatens to become violent. On March 23, the anniversary of Mr. Singh’s death, police officers had to break up a heated exchange between opposing groups at the circle.

Mr. Rahman and the other supporters have vowed to continue fighting, saying it has become a war over who gets to own Pakistan’s history.

“There is a complete historical amnesia and black hole regarding the independence struggle from the British,” Mr. Rahman said, adding of the Islamists, “They want all memories to evaporate.”

A version of this article appeared in print on March 31, 2013, on page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: New Ideological Battle in Pakistan: Traffic Circle’s Name.

Newswallah: Bharat Edition

Jammu and Kashmir: The state government Thursday tabled a bill that seeks to regulate the functioning of private security agencies in the state, the Business Standard reported. Under the new proposal all such agencies will have to seek a mandatory license before they are allowed to operate in the state.

Assam: The man believed to be one of the oldest persons in Assam died Wednesday at the age of 135 at his native Baribandha village in Morigaon district, according to a Press Trust of India report on the Zee News Web site. Puna Konwar was the oldest registered voter in the district during the state assembly elections in April 2011, the report said.

West Bengal: An estimated 25 percent increase in the rhinoceros population has been registered at Jaldapara National Park in West Bengal since 2011, The Hindu reported. After Assam’s Kaziranga National Park, Jaldapara park has the India’s second largest population of one-horned rhinoceros, an animal listed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Madhya Pradesh: Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has promised to set up a special security force for the protection of foreign tourists visiting the state, Hindustan Times reported. His statement comes after the recent gang rape of a Swiss tourist in Madhya Pradesh.

Gujarat: While Gujarat’s chief minister, Narendra Modi, claims that the Narmada Project waters have reached every part of the state, 17 districts in Gujarat are currently affected by acute water crises, The Hindu reported. The regions affected include Saurashtra, Kutch and north Gujarat.

 Andhra Pradesh: The chief minister, Kiran Kumar Reddy, met his cabinet colleagues on Wednesday to chalk out a strategy to counter criticism from opposition parties about electricity cuts in the state. Mr. Reddy asked his colleagues to launch a campaign to publicize the government’s efforts to ease the power crisis, the New Indian Express reported.

The Internet Loves Kim Jong-un Gags, but What Does North Korea’s Propaganda Mean

As my colleague Choe Sang-Hun reports, North Korea’s state news agency released the latest in a series of saber-rattling images on Friday, this time showing the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un, studying what the agency called “plans to strike the mainland U.S.”

#DPRK Kim Jong Un photo shows map of “Strategic Force Plan for Striking US Mainland.” http://t.co/Wo1mRKZpWx

â€" Steve Herman (@W7VOA) 29 Mar 13

Since mocking North Korean propaganda featuring Mr. Kim has become something of a reflex for his peers in the West, the Internet’s attention was quickly focused on the comic possibilities of a military chart behind the young leader in the photograph, tracing what appeared to be trajectories of North Korean missiles aimed at major cities in the United States.

Are you on Kim Jong Un’s new America bombing map http://t.co/HDUkjnO2bp http://t.co/AyRSNNAG4S

â€" BuzzFeed (@BuzzFeed) 29 Mar 13

After one blogger’s detailed analysis of the image suggested that the unlikely target of Austin, Texas was in the firing line, Twitter lit up with a spate of “Why Austin” jokes, as Max Fisher of The Washington Post explained.

CONFIRMED: The reason North Korea wants to bomb #Austin, TX. #whyaustin http://t.co/IPg3bFBbrx

â€" Paul Szoldra (@PaulSzoldra) 29 Mar 13

When pondering what all this means, it is easy, perhaps too easy, to focus on the accidental comedy in these photographs of North Korea’s unimposing young leader, and in the series often-bizarre propaganda videos and poorly Photoshopped images of war games that preceded them.

A recent North Korean propaganda video, posted online by The Telegraph.

To find out what an expert on North Korean propaganda made of the current campaign, The Lede contacted B.R. Myers, a North Korea analyst at Dongseo University in the South Korean port city of Busan. Mr. Myers, who spent eight years studying the nation’s propaganda for his book, “The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves and Why It Matters,” answered questions from The Lede on Friday via Gchat. Below is a transcript of the complete conversation, edited for clarity (with links to related articles added to some of Mr. Myers’s answers).

Q.

We are wondering, essentially, what you make of these recent videos flowing from North Korea. Is this really some sort of escalation in rhetoric for them or has the Internet just woken up a bit more to the phenomenon

A.

The rhetoric itself has not escalated significantly over last year. And it’s been almost 20 years since North Korea first talked of turning Seoul into a sea of fire. I get the feeling that North Korea’s long-range missile launch and the nuclear test have both lent a new force to the old rhetoric.

Video from North Korean state television of a military parade this week, posted online by The Telegraph.

Q.

Is the impression we get via these Web videos similar to what they broadcast on television, and what you see in other forms, or are we in the news business guilty of hyping the most inflammatory material do you think

A.

That’s a good question. We need to keep in mind that North and South Korea are not so much trading outright threats as trading blustering vows of how they would retaliate if attacked. The North says “If the U.S. or South Korea dare infringe on our territory we will reduce their territory to ashes,” and Seoul responds by saying it will retaliate by bombing Kim Il-sung statues. And so it goes. I think the international press is distorting the reality somewhat by simply publishing the second half of all these conditional sentences. And I have to say from watching North Korea’s evening news broadcasts for the past week or so, the North Korean media are not quite as wrapped up in this war mood as one might think. The announcers spend the first ten minutes or so reporting on peaceful matters before they start ranting about the enemy.

The regime is exploiting the tension to motivate the masses to work harder on various big first-economy projects, especially the land-reclamation drive now underway on the east coast. Workers are shown with clenched fists, spluttering at the U.S. and South Korea, and vowing to work extra hard as a way of venting their rage.

It is all very similar to last year’s sustained vilification of South Korea’s then-president Lee Myung-bak, when you had miners saying that they imagined Lee’s face on the rocks they were breaking, and so on. The regime can no longer fire up people with any coherent or credible vision of a socialist future, so it tries to cast the entire workforce â€" much as other countries do in times of actual war â€" as an adjunct to the military. Work places are “battlegrounds,” and all labor strengthens the country for the final victory of unification, etc.

A recent North Korean news report posted online by a supporter of the government.

Q.

That’s very interesting â€" I have to say we don’t even see the South Korean threats…. Are regular TV transmissions from the North blocked in the South, over the airwaves

A.

Yes, they are blocked as a rule. After a relaxation of the rules governing access to North Korean materials during the “Sunshine Policy” years, the government here has again become quite strict about such things.

Q.

A few final questions. First, does it seem to you that there has been any observable change in the propaganda since the change at the top Second, what did you make of that strange episode with the U.S. TV crew bringing Dennis Rodman to Pyongyang Was that a sign of a potential opening or just the sort of event that has gone on for years with visitors less well-known to Americans And finally, are you at all concerned that our coverage of the propaganda in the western media as something wacky and sort of comic is inappropriate, in that it shifts focus away from the hard realities of life in North Korea

A.

To answer the first question, I think that the international press exaggerated the extent to which Kim Jong-un departed from the leadership style of his father. He has a Kim Il-sung haircut, and the propaganda apparatus is happy to play up the resemblance, but from the start of the hype in 2008-2009, he was presented to the masses as a taejang or four-star general. That was years before he was officially promoted to that rank, by the way. And the first documentary about his life played up his military-first credentials, portraying him as an even more exclusively military figure than his father had been. Kim Jong-il, after all, spent his first decade or so of public life posing as an expert on film and ideology.

When Kim Jong-un took his wife around with him, the West was quick to see this as a sign of Gorbachev-like tendencies, when in fact Kim Jong-il had taken his second wife (the current leader’s mother) around with him on public visits; even though her presence wasn’t broadcast, it’s clear from the video footage of those visits that has since become public that the North Korean people knew who she was and accepted her as a kind of first lady. In any case, one of the main slogans of the propaganda is “Kim Jong-un is Kim Jong-il.” He’s compared to his father much more often than to his grandfather. And he is certainly continuing on the same military-first path.

Q.

Fascinating â€" we’ve previously quoted your explanation of the state’s military-first nature.

A.

Second, the Dennis Rodman affair was very similar to the New York Philharmonic affair of 2008. In both cases the North Koreans were able to convey the impression of openness to the wishfully thinking West while at the same time showing to their own people the international appeal of their leader. All visitors to the country are treated in the media as pilgrims or as penitents.

As for your third question, I think the media underestimates the extent to which North Korea reads its own press. This is why you have Americans pleading in op-ed pages for “subversive engagement” with Pyongyang, as if the North Koreans would not think of actually reading one of our newspapers. And all the ridicule naturally poses a problem to a regime that derives almost all its legitimacy and popular support from the perception of its strength and worldwide renown. That doesn’t mean we need to censor ourselves the way the South Korean press did during the “Sunshine Policy” years, but we do need to realize how serious the situation is.

In a North Korean “historical” novel published last year, “Oseongsan,” a general looks at a twenty-year old Kim Jong-un and says, “That’s the man who’s going to lead the holy war of unification.” I have a hard time just chuckling about things like that.

Can I mention one more thing

Q.

Absolutely, yes.

A.

One of the few things that has restrained the North Koreans over the decades has been Pyongyang’s reluctance to alienate the South Korean left. I wonder now if, after two successive elections of the more hardline presidential candidate (the current president having been elected with an absolute majority of votes), the North may have given up on South Korean public opinion altogether.

The rapid aging of the South Korean electorate certainly does not bode well for the prospect of another “Sunshine Policy” in the near future. This may be one reason why the propaganda apparatus’ denigrated President Park as a “skirt” â€" a clear indication, by the way, that we are not dealing with a far-left regime up there but a far-right one. And I notice from the TV broadcasts that many of the people in the man-on-the-street interviews talk of how they would love to give the “sea of fire” treatment to Seoul and Washington almost as if they were the same enemy territory. If the regime has given up on winning over the South Korean electorate, things could get much more dangerous than they already are.

Ex-Soldier Accused of Joining Terrorist Group in Syria Left Trail of Videos

YouTube Video posted online shows former U.S. soldier Eric Harroun with Syrian rebel fighters.

As my colleague Scott Shane reports, a former American soldier was charged on Thursday with fighting alongside a rebel group linked to Al Qaeda on the battlefields of the Syrian civil war.

Eric Harroun, 30, was arrested on Wednesday after arriving at Dulles International Airport outside of Washington, D.C., and charged in Alexandria, Va., on Thursday with “conspiring to use a destructive device outside the United States.”

He is accused of entering Syria in January and fighting alongside the Nusra Front, which was designated a terrorist organization in December 2012 and is accused of ties to Al Qaeda in Iraq. It is one of hundreds of rebel militias that have emerged over the last two years to battle the government of President Bashar al-Assad, whose family has ruled Syria for four decades. The conflict has so far claimed more than 70,000 lives.

Mr. Harroun, a Phoenix native who served in the United States armed forces from 2000 until 2003, has been far from discrete about his activities in Syria, posting at least two videos of himself with Nusra fighters to YouTube and speaking with two journalists based in Israel for Foreign Policy magazine.

The authors of the Foreign Policy article, Ilan Ben Zion and Greg Tepper, wrote that in online communications with Mr. Harroun, “he seemed paranoid about being tracked by U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies” and referred to the men with anti-Semitic slurs. He also frequently changed his story.

During conversations on March 4 and March 16, Harroun said that Jabhat al-Nusra “picked [him] up” after the rebel group he had been traveling with was largely wiped out in a firefight with Assad forces. On March 16, however, he denied that he was a member of the organization, insisting that he was only a member of a rebel group that was part of the mainstream [Free Syrian Army].

Nevertheless, that retraction didn’t stop Harroun from bragging, unprompted, that he had met Jabhat al-Nusra’s elusive leader, known by the nom de guerre Abu Muhammed al-Julani. He said that the two had met twice in January at an unspecified location near the Syrian-Iraqi border, and described the terrorist leader merely as a “humble man of few words.” He refused to describe Julani’s reaction to meeting an American fighter in the FSA.

In a video posted to YouTube on Jan. 15, Mr. Harroun appears to be reclining into the arms of a Syrian rebel as several more crowd around him, smiling and stroking their beards as he delivers a brief threatening statement to Mr. Assad and pro-government paramilitaries known as the shabiha.

The title of the video refers to Mr. Harroun as a “U.S. mujahid,” or holy warrior. If the accusation that Mr. Harroun entered Syria in January is true, that means the video was recorded very soon after he arrived in the country.

Video posted online shows Mr. Harroun surrounded by rebel fighters threatening Syrian President Bashar al-Assad

“Bashar al-Assad, your days are numbered,” said Mr. Harroun in the video, as rebel fighters around him looked on. Some appear amused by him, others confused or unsure of what to make of the American fighter in their midst. “You’re going down in flames. You should just quit now while you can and leave. You’re gonna die no matter what. Where you go, we will find you and kill you. Do you understand And your shabiha is going to die also with you.”

In another video posted online in February, Mr. Harroun can be seen driving in a jeep down a narrow dirt road through fields toward a crashed military helicopter. Several rebel fighters ride with him in the car, whose windshield bears the emblem of the Free Syrian Army, a rebel coalition that receives aid from the United States and which pointedly does not include the Nusra Front.

Video posted online shows Mr. Harroun driving towards a downed military helicopter in a jeep with rebel fighters.

Mr. Harroun spoke with his companions in a mix of broken Arabic and English, and also occasionally addressed the camera. “Let’s blast these fools,” he said. “We’re gonna smoke ‘em. Every day, all day.” He then lead the rebels in a call-and-response religious victory chant, screaming “takbeer!” The fighters responded, “God is great!”

“Bashar al-Assad this is what’s left of your airforce,” said Mr. Harroun as they approached the crashed aircraft. He then switched back into Arabic to curse Mr. Assad’s mother and the mothers of his supporters. Due to his broken Arabic, he also accidentally cursed God’s mother.

When they arrived at the crashed aircraft, it’s cockpit was splattered with blood but it’s pilot and crew were nowhere to be seen.

A third video posted online shows Mr. Harroun and the same driver, with whom he appeared to be friends, in a jeep in the desert near another downed aircraft. The video contains several expletives in both Arabic and English.

A video posted online shows Mr. Harroun celebrating near a downed Syrian military helicopter.

“We smoked” them “didn’t we” Mr. Harroun asked the driver of the jeep. “Hell yeah. We smoked ‘em out. I don’t know, ten Twenty”

The driver simply flashes a broad, happy grin and gives Mr. Harroun two thumbs up.

Shoe Tossed at Musharraf Misses Mark, Video Shows

Pakistan’s former military ruler, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, narrowly escaped being struck in the head by a shoe hurled at him outside a courtroom in Karachi on Friday, video of the incident showed.

The footage, broadcast in a loop on Pakistani television, showed the shoe passing just in front of General Musharraf’s face as he made his way through the court building, surrounded by a scrum of security officers, journalists and protesters.

A video report from Pakistan’s Geo TV showed a protester hurling a shoe at the country’s former military ruler, Pervez Musharraf, on Friday outside a courtroom in Karachi.

An analysis of the footage from Geo News, which slowed the video down and traced the path of the shoe in forensic detail, suggested that the attacker, standing behind photographers jostling for a shot of the former ruler, was forced to make an awkward throw, raising the projectile high overhead before flinging it down at the general.

Quoting witnesses, the Pakistani newspaper Dawn reported that the shoe had come from a group of about 20 lawyers who “had gathered to protest against the former military ruler at the Sindh High Court building, shouting, ‘He’s a dictator and he should be hanged.’”

General Musharraf was in court to obtain an extension of pre-trial bail in several legal cases filed against him for his actions after he took power in a coup in 1999. He returned to the country from exile this week, hoping to make a political comeback in the nation’s upcoming elections.

A Euronews video report on the incident showed protesting lawyers inside the court building, and explained the charges against General Musharraf.

A Eurnoews report on the failed shoe attack on Pakistan’s former military ruler, Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

Protesters outside the court building also waved their shoes in the air during the general’s bail hearing. As Omar Waraich, a journalist who covers Pakistan for Time magazine noted on Twitter, being shown or struck with the sole of a shoe is a form of insult pioneered in the Muslim world.

I keep reading that it’s an insult in the Muslim world to hurl a shoe at someone. Is there somewhere they regard it as a compliment

â€" Omar Waraich (@OmarWaraich) 29 Mar 13

However, the meme has spread rapidly across the globe in recent years, since an Iraqi journalist hurled two shoes at President George W. Bush in 2008. Last month in Cairo, an attacker hurled a shoe at Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, during the Iranian president’s visit.

The attack was condemned by several Pakistani journalists and commentators not know for their sympathy for the general.

Shoe hurled at Musharraf http://t.co/c3hJ1tgcaJ Strongly condemn this cheap act.

â€" Umar Cheema (@UmarCheema1) 29 Mar 13

Much as I want Musharraf to be tried, this is misconduct->”Angry lawyer throws shoe at Pakistan’s Musharraf” http://t.co/i4ej4MfSbu

â€" Raza Rumi (@Razarumi) 29 Mar 13

Man throws shoe at Mush. Well, we’re good at throwing shoes at ex-dictators, but equally good at showering rose petals on twisted murderers.

â€" Nadeem F. Paracha (@NadeemfParacha) 29 Mar 13

The general made no mention of the near miss on his Twitter feed, where he thanked the court for extending his bail and mentioned “posing for pictures with excited fans.”

I appreciate Sind High Court extending my protective bail for 21 days on my appearance in court today. PM

â€" Pervez Musharraf (@P_Musharraf) 29 Mar 13

Earlier in the week, General Musharraf took some flak on the social network for posting a photograph of himself working out in a gym after his return to Pakistan. Some saw the image as an effort to show that the 69-year-old was still vital, as he heads into an election in competition with, among others, Imran Khan, the trim former captain of Pakistan’s cricket team, who is a decade younger.

Starting my day with a workout. Feel very energized. PM http://t.co/gpYyKkw3v3

â€" Pervez Musharraf (@P_Musharraf) 28 Mar 13

When John F. Kennedy Jr. Came to India

Courtesy of Diya Akbar John F. Kennedy Jr. with Diya Akbar, daughter of journalist M.J. Akbar, in Kolkata (then Calcutta), West Bengal in 1983.

India in 1983 was still in its infant stages of economic development; however, like today, it was a popular destination among Westerners with its marketable poverty, a lingering sense of spirituality, mysticism and a rich history.

Around 20 years after United States President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, his son, John F. Kennedy Jr., was ready to take on the world as a fresh 23-year-old history graduate from Brown University.  After finishing his education, he took a working year off in which he traveled to India to spend some time at Delhi University, where he researched topics of his personal interests like food production, health and education.

Having the fortunes, or misfortunes, of being attached to that famous American family name, Mr. Kennedy’s India trip was well designed to protect his identity through a collaborative effort by both Indian and American governments. In Delhi, instead of the American Embassy, Mr. Kennedy stayed at various places, from the dingy hotels of Pahar Ganj in the center of the city to the embassies of America’s allies.

At the same time, during Delhi’s winter season, Narendra Taneja, a journalist (who is also the father of this reporter), was a regular attendee of the city’s expat “wine-and-cheese” scene. At one such do at the Irish Embassy, he met a young man who was staying at the residence of the embassy’s second secretary, on the floor, in a sleeping bag.

“We just got talking, and I asked him where he was staying for his trip to Delhi, and he, with a smirk, pointed towards a corner of the room’s floor,” Mr. Taneja recalled.

“At that time, I had just shifted to Delhi and was staying in a professor’s house in .I.I.T,” the Indian Institute of Technology, he said. “The professor was traveling abroad for a few months and had lent me his big four-room house. I had a lot of space so I offered this guy a room, seeing that he was sleeping on the floor. He took up the offer, and after some time we took a tuk-tuk and left for my place.”

Mr. Taneja continued, “As we talked sitting in the living room and having instant noodles for dinner later that night, he brought out his diary and started to flip pages, showing his written musings about travels, family and so on. As he flipped through the pages, there were photos of him and his family. After quick glances, I started to realize that most of his pictures were with John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jackie Kennedy.

“I inquired about the photographs, and he replied, ‘Well, they are my parents,’ and that is when I realized I had John F. Kennedy Jr. living in my house. We had a very interesting chat for the rest of the evening about his life in America.”

The very next morning, an American Embassy official visited Mr. Taneja. He asked about Mr. Kennedy’s residence there and asked Mr. Taneja to make sure Mr. Kennedy’s presence was not leaked to the press or any other such institution.

But somehow a professor at I.I.T. discovered Mr. Kennedy’s identity and that he was living on campus. He called Mr. Taneja and asked whether Mr. Kennedy would like to come over for tea.

“I hesitated but agreed, telling him no one else should know about him staying here,” Mr. Taneja said.

When they reached his place, they found that the professor had also ended up inviting 20 other people in an attempt to show off his clout, that he knew John F. Kennedy’s son.

“We decided to stay even though I had asked him specifically not to let anyone know,” Mr. Taneja said. “After a while, the professor decided to ask John a question, and he asked, ‘So do you remember when your father was assassinated’ John, aghast, looked at me, and I stared at the professor in disbelief that this question was actually tabled to him.

“We left his house within minutes, and I apologized to him. ‘It’s O.K., it’s just that no one ever asks me that,’ he said.”

The next day, Mr. Taneja was preparing to go to a small town near Agra called Tundla, and Mr. Kennedy expressed his wish to join him as well. Upon being told that the travel included crowded trains in third-class compartments, he insisted that travel conditions did not bother him.

“He not once complained throughout his stay about anything. In fact, he even took up some typical Indian traits, such as haggling with the tuk-tuk driver over the price of the journey,” Mr. Taneja said.

They reached Tundla, a town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, where life was based around the Indian Railways, which operated a big train junction. After moving around for a while and meeting a host of locals, Mr. Kennedy was introduced to an Indian jyotishee, or a palm reader. He obliged when the palm reader offered to read his hand, and sat down with him.

After a few minutes, the palm reader looked at him, then at his hosts, and announced, “This man is the son of a king,” Mr. Taneja recalled.

This sudden statement took Mr. Kennedy back by surprise, Mr. Taneja said. As his identity was not to be divulged, no one said anything, but the palmist continued and asked him, “You have to be the son of a king. Who are you”

Later that day, struck by the palmist’s comments, Mr. Kennedy insisted on going back to him, but this time alone. He ended up spending two hours with the jyotishee, and what was discussed between the two remains between them.

“John spent a week with me before making his way to Varanasi and then on to Kolkata,” then called Calcutta, Mr. Taneja said. “Even until Varanasi he went in a third-class, non-air-conditioned train without a confirmed reservation, sharing the everyday experience of the common folk of India.”

Little is known about Mr. Kennedy’s trip to the spiritual city of Varanasi on the banks of the Ganges, but in Kolkata he was hosted by another journalist at the request of the Indian government. Upon arriving in the City of Joy, he stayed with M.J. Akbar and his family at their residence in the Chitralekha building.

“He stayed with us for a week,” said Mr. Akbar. “It was great fun having him. I remember that women used to line up around the staircase of the building as he ran up and down, bare bodied, for eight floors whenever there was no electricity and the lift would not work.

“He was well informed about U.S. politics, and we had some good debates on topics such as the era of imperialism in America and India,” he recalled.

While in Kolkata, Mr. Kennedy also visited Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity headquarters as part of his study, along with other institutions in the city.

“Even after he left, we stayed in touch,” said Mr. Taneja. “He sent me copies of his magazine, George, which he started in 1995.”

Mr. Kennedy died in a plane crash on July 16, 1999, along with his wife, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette. Prayers were offered in Kolkata by Mother Teresa’s order of nuns, remembering him not as a Kennedy, but as that down-to-earth, idealistic student.

Kabir Taneja is a freelance journalist, you can contact him on Twitter @KabirTaneja.

When John F. Kennedy Jr. Came to India

Courtesy of Diya Akbar John F. Kennedy Jr. with Diya Akbar, daughter of journalist M.J. Akbar, in Kolkata (then Calcutta), West Bengal in 1983.

India in 1983 was still in its infant stages of economic development; however, like today, it was a popular destination among Westerners with its marketable poverty, a lingering sense of spirituality, mysticism and a rich history.

Around 20 years after United States President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, his son, John F. Kennedy Jr., was ready to take on the world as a fresh 23-year-old history graduate from Brown University.  After finishing his education, he took a working year off in which he traveled to India to spend some time at Delhi University, where he researched topics of his personal interests like food production, health and education.

Having the fortunes, or misfortunes, of being attached to that famous American family name, Mr. Kennedy’s India trip was well designed to protect his identity through a collaborative effort by both Indian and American governments. In Delhi, instead of the American Embassy, Mr. Kennedy stayed at various places, from the dingy hotels of Pahar Ganj in the center of the city to the embassies of America’s allies.

At the same time, during Delhi’s winter season, Narendra Taneja, a journalist (who is also the father of this reporter), was a regular attendee of the city’s expat “wine-and-cheese” scene. At one such do at the Irish Embassy, he met a young man who was staying at the residence of the embassy’s second secretary, on the floor, in a sleeping bag.

“We just got talking, and I asked him where he was staying for his trip to Delhi, and he, with a smirk, pointed towards a corner of the room’s floor,” Mr. Taneja recalled.

“At that time, I had just shifted to Delhi and was staying in a professor’s house in .I.I.T,” the Indian Institute of Technology, he said. “The professor was traveling abroad for a few months and had lent me his big four-room house. I had a lot of space so I offered this guy a room, seeing that he was sleeping on the floor. He took up the offer, and after some time we took a tuk-tuk and left for my place.”

Mr. Taneja continued, “As we talked sitting in the living room and having instant noodles for dinner later that night, he brought out his diary and started to flip pages, showing his written musings about travels, family and so on. As he flipped through the pages, there were photos of him and his family. After quick glances, I started to realize that most of his pictures were with John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jackie Kennedy.

“I inquired about the photographs, and he replied, ‘Well, they are my parents,’ and that is when I realized I had John F. Kennedy Jr. living in my house. We had a very interesting chat for the rest of the evening about his life in America.”

The very next morning, an American Embassy official visited Mr. Taneja. He asked about Mr. Kennedy’s residence there and asked Mr. Taneja to make sure Mr. Kennedy’s presence was not leaked to the press or any other such institution.

But somehow a professor at I.I.T. discovered Mr. Kennedy’s identity and that he was living on campus. He called Mr. Taneja and asked whether Mr. Kennedy would like to come over for tea.

“I hesitated but agreed, telling him no one else should know about him staying here,” Mr. Taneja said.

When they reached his place, they found that the professor had also ended up inviting 20 other people in an attempt to show off his clout, that he knew John F. Kennedy’s son.

“We decided to stay even though I had asked him specifically not to let anyone know,” Mr. Taneja said. “After a while, the professor decided to ask John a question, and he asked, ‘So do you remember when your father was assassinated’ John, aghast, looked at me, and I stared at the professor in disbelief that this question was actually tabled to him.

“We left his house within minutes, and I apologized to him. ‘It’s O.K., it’s just that no one ever asks me that,’ he said.”

The next day, Mr. Taneja was preparing to go to a small town near Agra called Tundla, and Mr. Kennedy expressed his wish to join him as well. Upon being told that the travel included crowded trains in third-class compartments, he insisted that travel conditions did not bother him.

“He not once complained throughout his stay about anything. In fact, he even took up some typical Indian traits, such as haggling with the tuk-tuk driver over the price of the journey,” Mr. Taneja said.

They reached Tundla, a town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, where life was based around the Indian Railways, which operated a big train junction. After moving around for a while and meeting a host of locals, Mr. Kennedy was introduced to an Indian jyotishee, or a palm reader. He obliged when the palm reader offered to read his hand, and sat down with him.

After a few minutes, the palm reader looked at him, then at his hosts, and announced, “This man is the son of a king,” Mr. Taneja recalled.

This sudden statement took Mr. Kennedy back by surprise, Mr. Taneja said. As his identity was not to be divulged, no one said anything, but the palmist continued and asked him, “You have to be the son of a king. Who are you”

Later that day, struck by the palmist’s comments, Mr. Kennedy insisted on going back to him, but this time alone. He ended up spending two hours with the jyotishee, and what was discussed between the two remains between them.

“John spent a week with me before making his way to Varanasi and then on to Kolkata,” then called Calcutta, Mr. Taneja said. “Even until Varanasi he went in a third-class, non-air-conditioned train without a confirmed reservation, sharing the everyday experience of the common folk of India.”

Little is known about Mr. Kennedy’s trip to the spiritual city of Varanasi on the banks of the Ganges, but in Kolkata he was hosted by another journalist at the request of the Indian government. Upon arriving in the City of Joy, he stayed with M.J. Akbar and his family at their residence in the Chitralekha building.

“He stayed with us for a week,” said Mr. Akbar. “It was great fun having him. I remember that women used to line up around the staircase of the building as he ran up and down, bare bodied, for eight floors whenever there was no electricity and the lift would not work.

“He was well informed about U.S. politics, and we had some good debates on topics such as the era of imperialism in America and India,” he recalled.

While in Kolkata, Mr. Kennedy also visited Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity headquarters as part of his study, along with other institutions in the city.

“Even after he left, we stayed in touch,” said Mr. Taneja. “He sent me copies of his magazine, George, which he started in 1995.”

Mr. Kennedy died in a plane crash on July 16, 1999, along with his wife, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette. Prayers were offered in Kolkata by Mother Teresa’s order of nuns, remembering him not as a Kennedy, but as that down-to-earth, idealistic student.

Kabir Taneja is a freelance journalist, you can contact him on Twitter @KabirTaneja.

India Observes Good Friday

Piyal Adhikary/European Pressphoto Agency A group of nuns organized a silent peace rally to commemorate Good Friday in Kolkata, West Bengal. Some parts of the country observe a holiday to mark the occasion.

India Observes Good Friday

Piyal Adhikary/European Pressphoto Agency A group of nuns organized a silent peace rally to commemorate Good Friday in Kolkata, West Bengal. Some parts of the country observe a holiday to mark the occasion.

Palestinians Fight Prison Sentences for Mocking Their President on Facebook

A Palestinian court on Thursday upheld a one-year jail sentence for a journalist convicted of insulting President Mahmoud Abbas with a pastiche image posted on Facebook. Another Palestinian was given the same sentence last month for posting a humorous caption beneath an image of Mr. Abbas kicking a soccer ball on the social network.

The journalist, Mamdouh Hamamreh, said that he did not create or publish the composite image that compared Mr. Abbas to a character from a Syrian historical drama who collaborated with French colonialists. The court, applying part of the old Jordanian legal code that criminalizes insulting the king to an Internet jibe against the Palestinian president, was not swayed by the journalist’s argument that he had played no part in the decision by the person who did upload the image to Facebook to draw it to his attention by adding his name as a tag to the text that accompanied it.

Hussein Ibish, a fellow at the American Task Force on Palestine in Washington, pointed on Twitter to what appeared to be a copy of the offending composite image.

A composite image posted on Facebook compared the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, right, to a character from a Syrian historical drama who collaborated with the French colonial administration. The caption says the two men are “similar in every way.”

The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms explained in a statement decrying the sentence:

Hamamrah’s case started in September 2009, when he was arrested and transferred to the public prosecutor. He was arrested due to a claim by the Palestinian intelligence service, that they found an offensive image of President Abbas posted on his own social networking page Facebook next to a character in a Syrian drama TV show “Ma’amoun Beik,” as a comparison to the character, who is known in the drama show for hiding his true evil face from a community in Syria and working as a spy for the French. In fact Hamamrah was not the person who posted this picture, or made any comments, and did not share it.

“We don’t have a king, we have a president,” Riham Abu Aita of the The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms told Reuters. “When images online are criminalized, it’s a very serious violation of basic rights of expression.”

Late Thursday, the Palestinian Maan News Agency reported that the president’s office had decided to pardon the journalist.

As the Maan News Agency reported last month, a court in Nablus sentenced Anas Saad Awwad, 26, to a year in prison for adding a jokey caption to a digitally altered photograph of Mr. Abbas taken during a visit to the Real Madrid’s stadium in 2011.

A 2011 video report from Real Madrid TV on a visit to the club’s stadium by Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president.

Thaer Ganaim/PPO, via Getty Images A not-in-any-way sarcastic or insulting caption for a photograph of President Mahmoud Abbas in Madrid in 2011.

According to his lawyer, Mr. Awwad was accused of Photoshopping a Real Madrid shirt over the president’s suit and adding the caption: “the new striker for Real Madrid.”

“My son only commented on Facebook,” Mr. Awad’s father told the Electronic Intifada after he was sentenced last month. “You know how young people comment. He didn’t mean to insult the president. I ask the president to intervene personally to cancel the court’s decision.”

Issam Abdeen of the Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq told The Associated Press that Mr. Awwad’s sentence was overturned on appeal earlier this month, but several other Palestinians face similar charges.

7 of 8 Ivy League Schools Report Lower Acceptance Rates

It was a little more difficult this year to get admitted to an Ivy League school, as tens of thousands of college applicants learned Thursday evening.

Seven of the eight colleges and universities that make up the Ivy League have lowered their acceptance rates since last year. (Dartmouth, as of 6:40 p.m. Thursday, had yet to release its admission statistics. Check back for updates.) The trend to tiptoe toward increased selectivity seems to hold true whether the institution received more or fewer applications than last year.

A word of caution before we crunch the numbers: Although these admission statistics may seem startling, even prohibitive, prospective students and parents would be wise to remember that a quality college education is still within reach. The admission rates at Ivy League and other highly selective institutions are exceptions to the norm; there are more than 2,000 four-year colleges and universities in this country, and many accept a sizable percentage of students who apply.

With that, here are some of the initial acceptance rates we have gathered so far:

Getting into Cornell proved more competitive this year for its record-high applicant pool of 40,006. The university admitted 15.15 percent of those applicants this year, delivering good news to 6,062 students Thursday evening and inviting another 3,146 to join its wait list. Last year, Cornell accepted 6,119, or 16.2 percent, of its applicants.

The overall acceptance rate fell below 7 percent at Columbia this year. The university reviewed 33,531 applicants and rejected or deferred all but 2,311 of them. Only 6.89 percent of the students who hoped to enroll in Columbia’s freshman class this fall were scheduled to receive acceptance notices online Thursday night. Last year, the university accepted 7.4 percent of its applicants.

The acceptance rate at Yale, which fell below 7 percent last year, decreased again this year. Yale received a record 29,610 applications this year. It accepted 6.72 percent of those students, which made Yale more selective than it was last year, when it offered admission to 6.82 percent of its 28,974 applicants. Yale invited 1,001 students to join its wait list this year.

Princeton, which received slightly fewer applications this year, was also more selective. It accepted 7.29 percent of the 26,498 applicants who applied for fall 2013. Last year, the university offered acceptance notices to 7.86 percent of the 26,664 students who applied.

The University of Pennsylvania was also a little more selective with its applicant pool this year. The university received 31,280 applications this year, an uptick from last year’s 31,217. The university decided to admit 12.1 percent of this year’s applicants, compared with 12.32 percent of the applicants last year.

While a vast majority of applicants will be denied admission, thousands of applicants are in limbo on the wait list.

Regular readers of The Choice know that selective colleges are redefining the adjective every year. As we mentioned earlier, there are many more colleges and universities to cover. We have been surveying a range of them about their admission statistics. Stay tuned; we’ll be posting that data soon.

For now, we turn our attention back to the colleges and universities that are announcing their highly anticipated admission decisions. If you are a college applicant, we are very interested to hear your reactions and reflections in our communal kitchen table. Please join the discussion about this year’s admission decisions.

Failed Robbery Immortalized on Video

When police officers in the California town of Redding arrived at the scene of an attempted robbery one night earlier this month, they had little to go on, save for a blaring alarm and a broken window. Then they looked at the security-camera video. The tape revealed, as Anthony DeRosa of Reuters observed, an 18-second masterclass in “How Not to Rob a Convenience Store.”

Surveillance-camera video, posted on YouTube by the Redding Record Searchlight, shows a failed attempt to rob a market in Redding, Calif.

The Redding Police Department has asked the public for help in identifying the suspect, who made life easier for the authorities by wearing a distinctive outfit and showing his face on camera before pulling down a stocking to conceal it.

The video, posted on YouTube by the Redding Record Searchlight, also shows that moments after he hurled a rock at the sliding-glass front door of Kent’s Meats & Groceries, triggering the alarm, the would-be robber apparently thought better of his crime and immediately turned to run away. Perhaps unable to see through his stocking, the man then fell twice as he made his getaway.

Failed Robbery Immortalized on Video

When police officers in the California town of Redding arrived at the scene of an attempted robbery one night earlier this month, they had little to go on, save for a blaring alarm and a broken window. Then they looked at the security-camera video. The tape revealed, as Anthony DeRosa of Reuters observed, an 18-second masterclass in “How Not to Rob a Convenience Store.”

Surveillance-camera video, posted on YouTube by the Redding Record Searchlight, shows a failed attempt to rob a market in Redding, Calif.

The Redding Police Department has asked the public for help in identifying the suspect, who made life easier for the authorities by wearing a distinctive outfit and showing his face on camera before pulling down a stocking to conceal it.

The video, posted on YouTube by the Redding Record Searchlight, also shows that moments after he hurled a rock at the sliding-glass front door of Kent’s Meats & Groceries, triggering the alarm, the would-be robber apparently thought better of his crime and immediately turned to run away. Perhaps unable to see through his stocking, the man then fell twice as he made his getaway.

Image of the Day: March 28

Channi Anand/Associated Press Children with a hearing impairment communicating with each other at a demonstration against the state government, in Jammu city, Jammu and Kashmir. They were demanding better educational and employment opportunities for disabled people.

Image of the Day: March 28

Channi Anand/Associated Press Children with a hearing impairment communicating with each other at a demonstration against the state government, in Jammu city, Jammu and Kashmir. They were demanding better educational and employment opportunities for disabled people.

American Republicans Visit Modi in Gujarat

Courtesy of Bharatiya Janata Party Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, center, meeting with a U.S. Congressional and business delegation in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, on Thursday.

Gandhinagar, GUJARAT â€"A group of Republican representatives from the United States Congress traveled to Gujarat Thursday to meet the state’s controversial chief minister, Narendra Modi.

Representatives Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, Aaron Schock of Illinois and Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington all said they were eager to work with Gujarat, according to a statement on Mr. Modi’s Web site.

Despite strong support for Mr. Modi from the Gujarati-American community, the United States has not issued Mr. Modi a visa, and a planned video address at a Wharton business school conference was canceled this month, a reflection of lingering questions over the role he may have played in the 2002 riots that left hundreds dead, mostly Muslims.

Last year, a bipartisan group of United States Congress members urged then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a letter to continue to deny Mr. Modi a visa on “numerous reports of his involvement in horrific human rights violations in India.”

The delegation’s visit on Thursday was part of a several-day India tour, in conjunction with the Overseas Friends of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the statement said.

“The members were impressed by the great development Gujarat has made under Modi’s visionary leadership,” Vijay Rupani, the state Bharatiya Janata Party’s general secretary, said in an interview.

During the meeting, Mr. Modi invoked Mohandas K. Gandhi, who was born and raised in Gujarat, and called for the strengthening of democratic processes in both India and the United States.

“Mahatma Gandhi has been and is the biggest lighthouse in this journey,” he said. “Gujarat, being the land of Gandhi, believes in these principles and has been at the forefront of nurturing such ideals and leading its people on the path of growth.”

Mr. Rupani hailed the lawmakers’ visit as a sign of burgeoning American support for Mr. Modi.

“The delegation’s Gujarat visit is a lesson to, and a slap on the face of, those elements busy exercising denying the U.S. visa to Modi,” Mr. Rupani said. “A majority of the Americans are pleased with the work Modi has done for the development of Gujarat over the years.”

Photos From Holi Celebrations Across India

@nytindia NAME- ABHAY NAWANI

LOCATION - NANDGAON ( U.P) #HoliNYT http://t.co/3hhZulM2qX

â€" abhay nawani (@abhaynawani) 26 Mar 13

Holi fest India 2013 http://t.co/zJXwikXmEH

â€" Rob Willingham (@Robbo445) 27 Mar 13;

Happy holi people… http://t.co/SoFwOHT4ui

â€" Sachin (@RedDezire) 27 Mar 13

Holi Cow #HoliHai http://t.co/gDl2MWSgvn

â€" Aman Wadud (@AmanWadud) 27 Mar 13

Saving water this Holi !! http://t.co/zivgraePCh

â€" Ashwini Gawad (@ash_diet) 27 Mar 13

ye daala rang bacho @anil_mahadev: @subodh1945 lets play holi http://t.co/iYeYCOIDzZ

â€" subodh khanna (@subodh1945) 27 Mar 13

ye daala rang bacho @anil_mahadev: @subodh1945 lets play holi http://t.co/iYeYCOIDzZ

â€" Navrang (@Navrang) 26 Mar 13

Wish you a happy MAD Holi! #HappyHoli http://t.co/kI2ZInzyO7

â€" Make A Difference (@makeadiff) 27 Mar 13

Do you have a Holi photo that you would like to share with us Send it to us on Twitter @NYTIndia.

In Mumbai, Creating Airy Charm

Fram Petit

The living room and dining area in Venna and Nari Dalamal's apartment on Marine Drive in Mumbai. Apartments along the drive command some of the city's highest prices.

MUMBAI â€" Even as Mumbai’s skyline rises, the Art Deco homes that dot stately Marine Drive continue to be among the city’s most prized residences.

Marine Drive, which overlooks the Arabian Sea, is a main artery connecting the southern tip to the rest of the island city. Developed by the British on reclaimed land along the bay, most of the buildings were constructed in the 1920s and 1930s and now are subdivided into apartments, a few offices and social or sports clubs. Officially, the road is called Netaji Subhash Chandra Marg, but the old colonial name has hung on.

The drive’s greatest attraction is its water views. “Aesthetically and view-wise, Marine Drive is the place to be,” said Himanshu Parekh, head of real estate at S. Harish & Co., a 35-year-old local real estate agency. “These flats have old-world charm, with good ceiling height, more usable space and interesting architectural details.”

However, he added: “Its disadvantage is lack of parking, that the buildings are in poor condition and they are now located far from newer business districts.” Some landlords have allowed properties to deteriorate, blaming a lack of maintenance on Mumbai’s rent control laws, which favor long-term tenants.

Still, apartments with sea views are selling at 60,000 rupees to 80,000 rupees, or $1,104 to $1,472, per square foot. Average apartments are 2,000 to 2,200 square feet, or 186 to 204 square meters, so the cost of a high-end apartment along the drive can run from 120 million to 176 million rupees.

Such prices, which have fluctuated little in recent years, have prompted some owners â€" like Veena and Nari Dalamal, Roohi and Chetan Jaikishan and Cecilia and Rohan Parikh â€" to invest in their homes. The Dalamals and the Jaikishans restored apartments in their family-owned buildings, while the Parikhs bought their home three years ago, shortly after they were married.

Four years ago, the Dalamals moved from London to Mumbai and decided to combine two fifth-floor apartments into a 9,000-square-foot residence in their family’s building, called Sunder Mahal. Mr. Dalamal runs a family-owned real estate business.

“I wanted it to be light and airy and bring out the view,” Mrs. Dalamal said. She chose Ashiesh Shah, now 33, as their architect. Later, he also worked on the Parikh residence.

Mr. Shah said the couple wanted the apartment to look as if it had been lived in for a long time, although the project, he added, “was a full gut job.” It took two years to complete. To give the view prominence, Mr. Shah dropped the windows in the main living area, which measures about 2,000 square feet. The study, in a recess behind the dining area, was created with sliding glass doors, setting off the space but not impeding the sea views.

The apartment now has four bedrooms, including a 1,200-square-foot master suite with a 200-square-foot walk-in closet, a bathroom with Lladro fixtures and mother-of-pearl sink inlays, and a small balcony. The three guest rooms, for the couple’s three adult daughters, measure 900 square feet each.

In addition to creating a kitchen, a 300-square-foot pantry, a family room, a staff room and a utility area, the architect enclosed in glass the central light shaft typical in Marine Drive buildings and filled it with plants to create a garden effect that also lets in more light. The original marble flooring was retained wherever possible, but wood flooring was installed in some areas.

The Dalamals would not disclose the renovations’ cost, but such work typically runs more than 5,500 rupees per square foot.

The 4,500-square-foot Jaikishan residence is on the first floor of a yellow-stone building called Noor Mansion, which dates to 1914 and is owned by the Begmohammeds, Mrs. Jaikishan’s mother’s family. It is considered one of the drive’s most attractive structures.

The Jaikishans, who run food-production businesses in Mumbai, hired Nozer Wadia, one of the city’s most celebrated architects, to modernize the apartment, a project that took two years.

At Mrs. Jaikishan’s request, Mr. Wadia retained original elements, including stained-glass windows, decorative ceiling moldings and Burma teak rafters, as well as the 13-foot ceilings and 12-foot doors. He also installed contemporary features like walk-in closets and glass sliding doors. Mrs. Jaikishan said she attempted to “preserve the essence and sanctity of the building by bringing the apartment back to its original form.”

The Parikhs sought to do much the same in their 2,400-square-foot apartment in the Zaver Mahel building. Mr. Parikh is in real estate, while Mrs. Parikh runs Le Mill, a concept store in Mumbai.

The couple worked with Mr. Shah to retain Art Deco touches like the bullseye-shaped ventilators in the exterior walls, circular bathroom windows and original glass, brass bolts and locks, while installing 21st-century features like air-conditioning and lighting features. Work began in 2010 and took about a year and a half to finish.

“Where else in the world do you do you have heritage buildings on the sea” Mrs. Parikh said. “The quality of life you have, given the view and the architectural details, make it appealing.”

A version of this article appeared in print on March 29, 2013, in The International Herald Tribune.