Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the United States this month will set new benchmarks for bilateral ties and some 'really big, historic and exciting' announcements are likely to be made on defence cooperation and boosting India's indigenous military industrial base, the Pentagon has said.
'Notwithstanding the realisation among the Indian leadership to build up its navy for the force's expanding role, the Indian Navy was allocated only 15% of the interim defence budget presented in Parliament in February 2019.' 'The outlay for the navy's capital acquisition is not even adequate to meet its committed liabilities,' points out Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
The Centre had issued the warnings across the Indian Ocean after a massive earthquake, measuring 8.2 on the Richter scale, off the Indonesian coast.
China on Tuesday said the activities of its high-tech research vessel will not affect the security of any country and should not be 'obstructed' by any 'third party', as the ship berthed at Sri Lanka's strategic southern port of Hambantota amid Indian and United States concerns.
Esper also highlighted the 'increased' military cooperation with India and called it as 'one of the most important defence relationships of the 21th century'.
The PM held bilateral meetings with three ASEAN leaders, including his Vietnamese counterpart Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Myanmar's State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, and discussed key bilateral and regional issues.
The United States will continue to support India with equipment and other things it needs along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China, a top American admiral has told lawmakers, asserting that Washington and New Delhi share a 'tremendous partnership'.
Modi held a "productive meeting" with his Ethiopian counterpart Abiy Ahmed Ali on a day when BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) leaders officially endorsed Ethiopia's entry into the bloc.
The high-voltage Malabar exercise featuring the navies of all four Quad countries -- India, the US, Australia and Japan -- began on Thursday off the coast of Guam against the backdrop of a resolve by the four nations to solidify cooperation for a free and open Indo-Pacific in view of China's rouge behaviour in the region.
The next edition of the high-voltage Malabar naval exercise begins from August 26 to 29 off the coast of Guam amid mounting global concerns over China's growing military muscle-flexing in the Indo-Pacific region.
The new year will witness two unmanned missions under the "Gaganyaan" project, deep ocean exploration project, "Samudrayaan" and many more.
India must break out of this strategic triangulation between China and Pakistan. We need to settle our issues with one of the two, notes Shekhar Gupta.
'Investment is the only way India can counter the Chinese influence in the region.' 'With more and more investments, you will have more and more stake; the strategic importance of Sri Lanka can be fulfilled with investments.' 'Investments should come because the void which is created by investments is always going to be filled by Chinese companies.'
'Besides Ayodhya, the BJP lost in nine other constituencies with a Ramayana imprint; it tasted success only in Thrissur.' 'In Rameswaram, K Navaskani of the Indian Union Muslim League won with a 44% voteshare in a 84% Hindu constituency.' 'In the 21 seats in the Ayodhya and Varanasi regions, both crucial to the Hindutva project, the BJP won just 7.' 'It won just 3 out of 12 seats around Modi's constituency,' points out Krishna Prasad.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi spoke over phone on Monday during which they took stock of India-UK trade and defence talks, opening up of international travel between the two countries and climate action targets in the lead up to the COP26 summit, Downing Street said.
In his opening remarks at the virtual summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), Modi also said that some countries use cross-border terrorism as an instrument of their policy and the grouping must not hesitate to criticise them.
"We often thought of terrorism as a peripheral problem for this region. The barbaric terrorist strikes in Paris, Ankara, Beirut, Mali and on the Russian aircraft is a stark reminder that its shadow stretches across our societies and our world, both in recruitment and choice of targets," Modi said in his remarks at the East Asia Summit.
Although the Malabar is a routine exercise which has been carried out for several years now, security experts attach a lot of traction to it in view of China's assertive behaviour in the South China Sea, observes Rup Narayan Das.
'An authoritative source in the government tells me that India has emerged as the net security provider of the Maldives,' says Rajeev Sharma.
'The world is watching carefully. The choices India makes today have consequences beyond its borders.'
China's desire to have India as part of its ambitious Maritime Silk Route makes strategic sense for both nations. However, it would involve substantive assurances from Beijing, says Dr Rahul Mishra
The US remained "watchful" over developments along India's frontier with China as it cannot take its eyes off the regional security issues, a senior American official said on Wednesday against the backdrop of the over 29-month border standoff in eastern Ladakh that has significantly frayed ties between the two neighbours.
"Welcome to India, President @EmmanuelMacron! Your visit will add great strength to the strategic partnership between India and France. I look forward to our talks tomorrow," Modi tweeted after receiving Macron at the airport.
The NRSC satellite imagery revealed that the lake covered approximately 162.7 hectares. Its area increased to 167.4 hectares on September 28 but drastically reduced to 60.3 hectares.
Exercise Tiger Triumph -- a full-scale, tri-service beach landing operation -- is a capability India is seeking to build.
The Indian Space Research Organisation said it successfully carried out an "extremely challenging" controlled re-entry experiment of the decommissioned orbiting Megha-Tropiques-1 (MT-1) satellite.
China is scouring its territory in Tibet and Xinjiang for the Malaysian jetliner missing for 11 days, a senior diplomat said as international efforts to locate the plane failed to achieve any breakthrough.
The aircraft carrier is China first domestically-built ship. Shandong is bigger than China's first aircraft carrier Liaoning and could house 36 fighter jets.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi enjoys a close relationship with Shinzo Abe. For Abe, "a strong India is in the best interest of Japan, and a strong Japan is in the best interest of India."
It will be for the first time since Independence that India and Pakistan will both be part of a military exercise.
Scientists said they have new evidence of increasing strain where two tectonic plates underlie the world's largest river delta.
PM Modi addressed the Sri Lanka Parliament on Friday.
'The potential of one such LAC engagement going out of control and leading to heavy casualties cannot be ruled out,' warns Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd).
An earthquake measuring 5.9 on the Richter scale hit the Andaman Sea on Thursday but the Met department ruled out tsunami.
Aircraft carriers of India, the United States, Japan and Australia are set to take part in the second phase of Exercise Malabar that is scheduled to take place from November 17 to 20 in the Indian Ocean region, the Navy said on Monday.
Gen Rawat said the world looks at India as a country that can balance the rise of China in the region as it was showing its 'assertiveness'.
More than India's alignment with the Quad, India's defence cooperation and partnership with the USA is of critical importance, notes Rup Narayan Das.
The meeting is taking place under the shadow of a fierce border row between India and China, both members of the influential bloc.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi commissioned India's first indigenously designed and built aircraft carrier INS Vikrant in Kochi on Friday, that put India into a select league of countries with domestic capability to build such large war ships.
The GSAT-31 is a 'high power' communication satellite going to serve and replace some of the satellites that are going to expire soon.
