Arun Venugopal

For years, men like Arish Kumar Sahani have spoken out about the abuses suffered by Hindus in Muslim-majority countries, as well as how Islamic extremism affects Hindus in India. Their concerns didn't often travel outside the Indian-American community, which has fiercely debated the rights of Muslims in a Hindu-majority India.

But the furor over Park 51 and more recent controversy over Congressman Peter King's hearings on Muslim radicalization have provided a mainstream platform for Hindu-American activists, while simultaneously diversifying the ranks of anti-Islamic protesters.

Hundreds of demonstrators stood in the rain in Times Square on Sunday to protest Congressman Peter King's hearings on the radicalization of American Muslims.

An organization linked to Park 51, the controversial Islamic cultural center and mosque near Ground Zero, suddenly cancelled a Wednesday night performance of a play featuring September 11 family members.

More than 600,000 people were stopped and questioned as part of the NYPD's stop-and-frisk policy in 2010. Police officials have long argued that the stops are critical to maintaini...

About 130 protestors demonstrated in front of Rep. Peter King's office in Massapequa Park on Tuesday, some in support and others against the Long Island politician's proposed Congressional hearings meant to examine the threat of radical Islam in the U.S.

A fire that raged through a Brooklyn building Saturday and claimed the life of a 64-year-old woman has fueled the union's claims that staffing cuts put the public at risk -- even though the FDNY said manpower wasn't a factor in the fatal blaze.

For a number of Yemeni-Americans, the grievances about life in Yemen revolve around a clear set of problems: the poverty, the endless bureaucracy, the seemingly endless rule of President Ali Abdullah Salleh, who is facing the greatest challenge in his 33-year reign. But more than anything else, it is the collective memory of corruption that seems to fuel resentment and makes Yemenis abroad convinced that Salleh must go.

New Yorkers proud of their water supply, filtered only by upstate forests and meadows, can now look forward to another 15 years of quality H2O. Under an agreement between the city, state and federal EPA, a land acquisition program targeting private properties in the watershed area will continue.

A word of advice to visitors planning to visit the World Trade Center Memorial: make a reservation.

Multiply the volubility of this guy by 20, maybe 50 on a crowded day, when the subways are completely wired and everyone's got his or her phones out. Now imagine your normally placid commute being disrupted, daily, by the sound of TMI.

The city has started notifying holdouts in the Willets Point, Queens, development area of eminent domain proceedings. According to the Economic Development Corporation, there are nine businesses in the 20-acre Phase 1 area that haven't agreed to relocate.

There is no New York City public official better suited to the spectacle of food -- whom the citizenry wants to see eating -- than Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz.

This is not simply an issue of body type, although that certainly factors in. The fact is, Marty exudes a certain jocularity, a game-ness that's very old-school. Have a baby that needs to be held? Give it to Marty! Have a catchphrase that bears repeating, such as "Fuhgeddaboutit!"? Marty'll say it!

Street art isn't what it used to be. And for a lot of New Yorkers, that's probably a good thing. Gone are the days when entire subway trains were coated in spray paint.

That isn't to say that street art is irrelevant.

Check out "Exit Through the Gift Shop," the documentary that at once celebrates and hilariously sends up the significance (and the very definition) of street art. The movie, directed by the ever-mysterious artist Banksy, is up for an Oscar this year.

So, who are the newest street artists making their mark in (and on) the city?

One of them has been penning "moustache" on the upper lips of various actresses, at least their two-dimensional selves (Reese's moustache here). The penmanship isn't anything to write home about, but still, there's a certain Gallic charm to the enterprise, and an impishness. These days, it's striking just how innocent and inoffensive so much subway graffiti is. Sure, you get the predictable assortment of four-letter words and body parts and all-around disfigurement. But not all that often. To a much greater extent subway posters seem to have been defaced by really happy, well-adjusted people. Whatever became of urban rage?

 

The number of black-owned businesses in the New York metropolitan area rose by 61 percent between 2002 and 2007, according to census data released Tuesday. Nationally, it grew by ab...

Opponents of congestion pricing are worried it's about to stage a comeback. Although confident that it would be dead on arrival in Albany, Queens Assemblyman David Weprin voiced concern about a possible resurrection.

In an attempt to shift the political climate on gun control, post-Tucson, the Bloomberg administration released a series of undercover videos Monday pointing to lax enforcement of laws at a gun show in Arizona.

Many Muslim New Yorkers said they felt moved by the events in Egypt, as protests in the Egyptian capital of Cairo calling for the resignation of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak conti...

The number of students suspended at city schools has skyrocketed in the last decade, with black and disabled students comprising most of those disciplined, according to findings compiled by the New York Civil Liberties Union.

Hotel Carter, ranked the No. 4 dirtiest hotel in the U.S., has made the annual survey of the nation's top 10 filthiest hotels for the fifth time in six years, according to TripAdvisor's Dirtiest Hotels 2011.

Mayor Bloomberg, at a rally championing gun control, called on President Obama to lead the charge on reforming the nation's gun laws in the wake of the Tucson tragedy during his State of the Union speech Tuesday night.