Russia's unprecedented rapprochement with North Korea has raised concerns about the re-emergence of a Russia-China-North Korea alliance which could increase the probability of conflict on the Korean Peninsula, explains Dr Rajaram Panda.
'This updated NPR database along with Aadhaar Number would become the mother database and can be used by various government departments...' the home ministry declared in July 2015. 'UID/Aadhaar has been used as a fish bait to ensnare and entrap present and future generations of citizens,' warns Gopal Krishna.
The NITI Aayog is likely to continue to both formulate plans and engage with the states.
The experts said adequate care must be taken before implementing what is being touted as a "game-changer".
This time Modi has no emotive message to take to the stump. Muscular nationalism doesn't work against the backdrop of China's successive inroads into Indian territory. Rising prices is a sore point that cuts across class and caste barriers; unprecedented levels of unemployment has the youth in a ferment. This has reduced the BJP campaign to a laundry list of recycled grievances and thinly veiled communal appeals, neither of which are working as well as they have in the past, argues Prem Panicker.
In the five years in politics Priyanka Gandhi has undeniably emerged as a thorn in the BJP flesh, notes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay. It is time that this thorn is twisted a wee bit more when the elections have become far more uncertain than what it was when the Election Commission announced the poll schedule.
Subject to visa, the team will now leave for Hyderabad from Lahore in the wee hours of September 27 and reach Hyderabad via Dubai in the night.
Holding their first comprehensive Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED) in Beijing on Monday, India and China have reached an understanding to deepen bilateral investment cooperation, further open up markets to each other and improve the investment environment.
Modi said today "we all have reached an important and historic partnership".
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday urged Lieutenant Governor V K Saxena to take strict action over the murder of a minor girl in Shahbad Dairy in Delhi and said it was his responsibility to maintain law and order in the city.
The main Opposition BNP of former premier Khaleda Zia, 78, who is under house arrest, is boycotting the elections amidst violence.
A senior Indian government official posted in Sri Lanka sustained grievous injuries in an unprovoked assault, the Indian high commission in Colombo said on Tuesday as it urged its nationals to remain aware of the latest developments in the island nation and plan their movements and activities accordingly.
The two part-time members of the new body would be from leading universities and research organisations.
After securing an approval for a plan size of Rs 59,000 crore (Rs 590 billion) for this fiscal, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on sparred with the Centre over social sector development in the state as he countered Planning Commission's assessment that lot more needs to be done.
The poverty ratio was highest in Chhattisgarh at 39.93 per cent.
Ajit Doval is now India's all-powerful security boss. This concentration of power disrupts our layered security system. Will it not weaken whatever remains of the power and authority of the home, defence and finance ministers? asks Shekhar Gupta.
India's first-ever Olympic medallist in women's boxing Mary Kom has been honoured with the Global Indian Icon of the Year award at the annual UK-India Awards in Windsor.
The Kerala assembly on Tuesday unanimously adopted a resolution urging the Bharatiya Janata Party-led central government to refrain from implementing the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in the country.
The nation's highest policymaking body, the National Development Council, will focus on five key areas, including the Naxal menace, power reforms and water crisis, at its meeting on Saturday.
Kerala had the highest number of average sitting days at 48 days a year, followed by Odisha (41) and Karnataka (35).
A number of exhibitions at the Bharat Mandapam, the convention centre which will host key G20 summit meetings, will showcase India's technological prowess and innovation, and offer a multitude of unique experiences to the visitors.
The National Committee on Direct Cash Transfers will have 11 cabinet ministers, two ministers of state with independent charge, the Deputy Chairman Planning Commission, the Chairman UIDAI and the Cabinet Secretary as its members.
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 Y V Reddy-headed commission said the states should use extra fiscal space for productive assets
'The UPA was never soft on Pakistan, terrorists and even China, but Sonia Gandhi's Congress rightly earned a "soft" image on issues of hard national interest, leaving the field open for Modi to take it and wrap it around with his implicit Hindutva,' says Shekhar Gupta.
The BJP game-plan: Take the top slot, or a close second, either for the 'Lotus' or the larger NDA, if it can and push the AIADMK to the third place, explains N Sathiya Moorthy.
Economist Arvind Panagariya is the vice-chairman of NITI Aayog, while economist Bibek Debroy and scientist V K Saraswat are the two full-time members of the Aayog.
In an apparent reference to political differences between Bharatiya Janata Party and Trinamool Congress, Jaitley said there are national causes to stand together, notwithstanding political differences.
As China's ruling CPC appointed 'fifth generation' leaders headed by Xi Jinping, high-level Sino-India contacts are set to resume this month starting with the Strategic Economic Dialogue, which would be followed by a likely visit of National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon in Beijing.
Farm activists say low MSP is fine, if salaries revised under the Sixth Pay Commission are lowered.
Nijjar was a close associate of Gurdeep Singh alias Deepa Heranwala, who was involved in the killing of around 200 people in Punjab during the late 1980s and early 1990s.
The government has asked Twitter and other social media platforms to take down a video of two Manipur women paraded naked, since the matter is being probed.
The UK's health authorities have confirmed that a new and "most significant" variant of COVID-19 is officially under investigation in the country as the government on Friday added six countries to its travel ban red list from southern Africa, where B.1.1.529 strain was first identified.
'I'm talking about that predator in your house, and how one should protect one's children from him.'
An improvement in the wind speed November 21 onwards might bring air pollution levels down.
The Planning Commission's latest poverty estimates, based on the 2011-12 consumption expenditure survey, shows that across India, the number of people living below the poverty line declined by more than 15 percentage points -- from 2004-05 to 2011-12 and from 37 per cent to 21.9 per cent.
The ministry of education is yet to take call on the recommendations by the empowered expert committee and the University Grants Commission.
If Saudi Arabia, with just two Muslim holy sites of Mecca and Medina, can create a huge tourism-based ecosystem beyond oil, Ayodhya is sure to become the world's hottest religious tourism site in less than a decade, predicts R Jagannathan.
