By creating groups of secretaries, the Modi government has precluded the need for groups of ministers, which were so ubiquitous in the first decade of this century in New Delhi. Each group will have a leader who will be expected to steer the schemes for implementation, cutting through the ministerial turf battles.
'It is the government's most important duty to ensure that when war breaks out, the armed forces are absolutely ready to face the adversary -- well equipped, well trained and in high spirits,' says Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
The video clips showed some terrorists being killed, besides destruction of bunkers and other military constructions.
Is the RBI unable to accept with grace that beyond 55, one can have the ability to head the compliance functions in a bank, asks Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Big ticket defence deals including purchase of missile systems, frigates and joint production of helicopters were sealed on Saturday.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday hiked tax on petrol and diesel, raised import duty on gold, levied additional surcharge on super rich and brought a tax on high value cash withdrawals as she sought to spur growth with reduction in corporate tax and sops to housing sector, startups and electric vehicles.
Here's the full text of President Ram Nath Kovind's customary address to the joining sitting of Parliament on the first day of the budget session.
The Rafale will surely be flying in Indian skies next year. But the way the BJP government has botched this will cast a shadow on defence acquisitions in the years to come.
The ministry of defence has bought two regiments of the indigenous Pinaka multi-barrelled rocket launcher for Rs 3,230 crore.
'Under the present Defence Procurement Procedure, it would have been a nightmare, and a long, long one at that, to build 108 Rafales in India. Modi realised this and took the wise decision, though it is a definitive setback for his Make in India scheme.'
Did Vinod Sehgal die in Tsangdgar or was he taken PoW to Tibet or China? Why has the IAF kept so quiet for all these years, asks Claude Arpi.
Do India's laws governing the Internet need revolutionary change, asks Ajit Balakrishnan.
Three militants were killed when troops foiled an infiltration bid in the Gurez sector of the Line of Control (LoC) early Saturday morning.
Four Hinduja brothers -- Srichand, Gopichand, Prakash and Ashok -- had in 2014 signed on a document saying the assets held by one brother belong to all, and that each of them will appoint the others as their executors. But now family patriarch Srichand Hinduja, 84, and his daughter Vinoo want the letter to be declared of "no legal effect" and the family's assets be separated as per his wish of 2016.
'We should not minimise the seriousness of Chinese encroachments because their perception is different.' 'Nor should we fall into the trap of accepting so-called 'buffer zones' in areas of overlapping claims. We cannot have buffer zones in our own territory,' asserts Ambassador Shyam Saran, a former foreign secretary.
With the Indian Army having blocked the PLA several kilometres inside India, hundreds of soldiers from both sides remain in a tense face-off.
According to industry figures, the pre-Covid demand for liquid medical oxygen (LMO) before the pandemic was 700 tonnes per day across the country. Now, with the second wave, the demand has gone up more than seven times, reports Jyoti Mukul.
Prime Minister Modi was hosted by Russian President Putin for a private tete-a-tete at Kremlin during which the two leaders touched upon issues of mutual national interests.
It is learnt that the Indian delegation insisted on a time-bound implementation of the agreement finalised during the extensive talks between External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Moscow on September 10 on the sidelines of a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation(SCO) meet.
Modi's visit to Spain will be first visit by an Indian prime minister since 1988.
Since 2016, when India was officially recognised in US law as a 'major defence partner', Washington has purposefully upgraded the defence relationship.
He said the Fourth Industrial Revolution will have more importance than the capital.
Here is an explainer and a timeline relating to India's purchase of 36 combat jets.
Mukherjee conferred with the Jordanian monarch on a wide variety of subjects, including terrorism, UN Security Council reforms, enhancement of bilateral trade.
The Delhi high court had directed the Centre on Tuesday to show cause as to why contempt should not be initiated against it for failing to comply with its order.
Modi is keen to get more investments into Gujarat.
'I chose the army over glamour,' says Major Sheena, who feels no other profession elicits the kind of respect like the army does.
'Despite frequent high-level interactions there has been little traction on substantive issues between India and France,' says Mohan Guruswamy.
Global sentiment has turned very positive for India
The aircraft flew out from the airbase in the French port city of Bordeaux and will cover a distance of nearly 7,000 km with air-to-air refuelling and a single stop in the United Arab Emirates before arriving at Ambala airbase on Wednesday, officials said.
India will need an annual investment of Rs 15 trillion in infrastructure over the next five years, says Chandrajit Banerjee, DG, CII.
Rajnath also attacked the Congress for the burning of a tractor by protesters from their youth wing.
During his two day visit, Modi is expected to seal a raft of major deals in defence, nuclear energy and hydrocarbons sectors to further cement their 'special and privileged strategic ties'.
Indians want change and progress. They should be willing to accept tough decisions, says Sanjeev Nayyar.
FinMin had, recently, notified changes in FDI rules that made prior approval of the government mandatory for foreign investments from countries that share a land border with India. Hong Kong was ranked 14th on the list of countries with FDI flows to India, contributing $4.2 billion between April 2000 and December 2019, the data from DPIIT shows. India received FDI worth $2.34 billion from China in the same period.
He said the country now possesses the capability to strike satellites in outer space with centimetre-level accuracy and precision.
The Centre on Monday earmarked a separate Rs 2,217 crore for 42 urban centres to tackle air pollution and announced the much-awaited voluntary vehicle scrapping policy to phase out old and polluting vehicles, even as it shrunk the budgetary allocation for the environment ministry from the last fiscal by nearly eight percent. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her budget speech for 2021-22, announced a total of Rs 2869.93 crore for the ministry, Rs 230 crore less than the last fiscal. Officials said the outlay has been lesser this time as the economy is recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Economic Survey seems convinced that 2019-2020 saw the bottom of the economic cycle, points out Abheek Barua, chief economist, HDFC Bank.
The decision was taken just a day before the Army squad was set to travel to Pune, where the drill will commence on Monday, the Kathmandu Post reported.
Did Xi deliver a message to Modi at Mamallapuram, which though couched in a velvet glove was time-bound? What was that message? It is clear Indian/Israeli/US spy satellites would not have missed detecting Chinese troop movements towards the Ladakh-Tibet frontier. Then why did some important functionaries in the Government of India choose to only ask the Russians about this in April 2020? Was Russian reassurance of Chinese troop movements being part of a routine exercise the reason that the Leh-based XIV Corps did not mobilise itself for its annual summer exercises near the LAC? A fascinating excerpt from Iqbal Chand Malhotra's new book Red Fear: The China Threat.
