The finance minister hiked the total defence expenditure from Rs 203,672 crore in FY 2013-2014 to Rs 229,000 crore for FY 2014-2015. Though the increase appears substantial, it is insufficient to undertake the military modernisation necessary to meet the emerging threats, feels Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
The kind of people Narendra Modi has chosen, the decisions he has taken and the rail and central budgets suggests that he is treading carefully in New Delhi. There is less of innovation and more of continuity, so far. He is not ready to rock the boat and start from scratch, says Sheela Bhatt.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held comprehensive discussions and took stock of full range of bilateral relations, including political and economic.
The party's most important electoral challenge lies in whether it can meet the aspirations of the youth who were drawn by the promise of gainful work.
Lack of decisiveness and courage to deal with PSBs may turn out be the biggest impediment to the Modi government's economic initiatives, says Debashis Basu.
It has been a difficult year for the world's second-largest economy.
'People do not want a 'maha milavat' (highly adulterated) government of those who assembled in Kolkata.'
Startups in India need low-cost debt for working capital, which is impossible to get.
Moving ahead with their new mantra -- Chalein Saath Saath: Forward Together We Go -- Prime Minister Narendra Modi and United States President Barack Obama on Tuesday vowed to deepen cooperation in every sector for the benefit of global stability and people's livelihoods over the next ten years.
India and Japan have a shared interest in countervailing China's hegemonic ambitions in Asia. Although neither has an interest in forming an overt anti-China alliance, Tokyo and New Delhi feel increasingly obligated to work together to find ways to guard against a muscular Beijing's power sliding into arrogance, says Brahma Chellaney.
'The past year has yielded extraordinary results in the strategic, commercial, and people-to-people components of the India-United States partnership, US Ambassador to India Richard Rahul Verma tells Aziz Haniffa/Rediff.com in an exclusive interview.
'The people of the state can be won over by love, and not by swords.'
'So you have a middle class, and an elite that have seceded into outer space and they look down and say, "What's our bauxite doing in their mountains?" and "What's our water doing in their rivers?" There's a sense of entitlement there.' Arundhati Roy captures minds with her thoughts on capitalism, Indian politics, war, and more in New York.
Unless the judges factor in the ungovernability of technologies and their beneficial owners, present and future Presidents, prime ministers, judges, legislators and officials handling sensitive assignments may become redundant with reference to their age-old roles for securing 'national resources and assets', warns Dr Gopal Krishna.
China's CSI300 stock index shed 1.1 per cent, hitting a five-week low, while shares of Hong Kong-listed Chinese companies sagged 0.9 per cent.
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