On available evidence, it is still not clear if India was the target or if the occupants on destroyed boat were assigned to carry out any terrorist attack. What is clear however is the boat was no ordinary fishing vessel, says Nitin Gokhale.
India and China have mostly set aside their bilateral differences in order to champion the cause of developing countries at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). That seems to be changing. During the latest round of China's trade policy review, India questioned its northern neighbour's claim that it was a developing country, since, going by the World Bank's definition, its per capita income belongs to that of an upper middle income country. "As per the per capita income level, the Chinese economy belongs to 'upper-middle income'. "How can China still claim to be a developing country? "What are the indicators which China is using to claim such a status?" India asked.
Responding to another question, Choubey said that the phase-I of clinical trials have revealed excellent safety of the two candidate vaccines indigenously developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with Indian Council of Medical Research and Cadila Healthcare Ltd, and now their immunogenicity testing is in progress. Their phase II clinical trials are ongoing.
The CDS has the option to focus on key areas of capability development to fight new generation wars or get bogged down in trying to bring cosmetic changes to humour the political leadership, asserts Brigadier Narender Kumar (retd).
'We have the technical expertise, and international collaborations. We also have robust real-time data. We are a university of pandemic management. If the ministry neglects the role of NCDC, it is the loss of the country'
The National Technical Research Organisation, the ambitious project to protect India's cyber space, is all set to roll out in May. However, experts are sceptical on how the government will maintain a balance between cyber security and civil liberties, reports Vicky Nanjappa.
The industrialised world must work fast.
Following her spat, 'Aunty National' Irani took to Facebook to speak out against her detractors. Here's the Facebook post in response to her critics which Rediff.com represents verbatim:
It is the biggest issue we have ever faced in the securities market, where a sensitive and systemically important institution and first-line regulator was not only exploited by unscrupulous elements but functioned like a private fief, points out Debashis Basu.
Vardhan's elevation to the chairmanship of the 34-member World Health Organisation (WHO) Executive Board comes amid growing calls, including by United States President Donald Trump, to investigate how coronavirus originated in China's Wuhan city and subsequent action by Beijing.
The scheme is aimed at slashing the salary and pension bills of the three services, which have been increasing rapidly.
Companies today are taking a very fashionable way to reduce their workforce. Instead of the outright firing of employees, an alternative approach that some companies are using is the passive-aggressive method which is both deliberate and accidental, points out corporate lawyer Ishanee Sharma.
'Fearlessness, courtesy, humour, wide interests and wisdom, deep commitment to science and technology, passion for the environment, objectivity and the ability to see many things through not only a national but also an international prism.'
The Centre Thursday issued guidelines for vaccination near home, making it easier for the elderly and the differently-abled to get inoculated against coronavirus close to the places of their residence.
'The more emphatic denial of any proposal for an OIC foreign ministers meet in Islamabad appears aimed at keeping Pakistan on a leash,' notes Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd).
'As long as we have such partners, Russia cannot be isolated.'
As it has done in the past, Beijing put a technical hold on the proposal just as the deadline was about to end.
Like ants declining to question the rules of the anthill, they feel innately justified in their approach, notes Shyam G Menon.
There has been criticism of the official statistics ever since MoSPI came out with new methodology to estimate the GDP on the base year of 2011-12 compared to earlier 2004-05.
India was the most targeted country in Asia and second in the world.
"The need is to strengthen the judiciary as a consequence of which the justice delivery system becomes fast, qualitatively responsive and serve the purpose of justice," he said.
Few people know Ratan Tata as well as R K Krishna Kumar does. Widely perceived to be among the managers closest to Tata, Krishna Kumar assesses Ratan Tata, the man and business leader, in this exclusive interview to Rediff.com's Vaihayasi Pande Daniel.
'It is sad that Kerala had so many Covid patients which is primarily due to the mismanagement of the Left government.' 'The technical committee was full of CPI-M leaders who happen to have medical degrees with no experience in public health.' 'They were advising the CM and we are paying for those mistakes.'
The US State Department, in its Congressional mandated annual Country Reports on Terrorism for the year 2018, on Friday said even though the Pakistani government voiced support for political reconciliation between the Afghan government and the Taliban, it did not restrict the terror group and the Haqqani Network from operating in Pakistan-based safe havens and threatening the US and Afghan forces in Afghanistan.
President Pranab Mukherjee on Wednesday gave away Gandhi Peace Prize 2014 to ISRO in recognition of its services in transforming India through the use of space technology.
PM has been regularly seeking people's inputs through mygov.in and his app, to assess the mood of the nation.
Foreign banks set the template in consumer banking in its infancy, but have almost vacated this booming space.
'The Reserve Bank's independence has remained a work in progress, an enduring challenge that the nation has been grappling with on an ongoing basis,' says RBI Deputy Governor Dr Viral Acharya.
'The opposition party was disappointed that the UN listing does not mention the Pulwama terror attack, in which 40 CRPF personnel lost their lives, and has no reference to Jammu and Kashmir'
'The fact that this happened and the fact that we were not able to bring it down, we were not even able to trace from where it came from and where it went, certainly raises questions on our level of preparedness.'
It's not every day that an undergraduate from India wins a scholarship to study at one of the prestigious universities in the world.
The 'terrible' surge of the coronavirus cases in India has severely impacted COVAX's vaccine supply in the second quarter of this year to the extent that there will be a shortfall of 190 million doses by the end of June, according to a joint statement by the WHO, UNICEF, GAVI and CEPI.
Many senior officers believe the chief should have taken a stronger stand against using army resources to help what one officer calls "a government-friendly godman".
One should appreciate the sagacity and audacity of JRD and Nani Palkhivala in founding TCS on April 1, 1968. At that time there was no Microsoft or Intel, SAP or Accenture, much less Google.
They needed a person who could build and execute their vision: A frontiersman; a problem solver and an institution builder. It was their and India's good fortune that Faqir Chand Kohli more than measured up to their requirements and indeed laid the foundation to take TCS to unimaginable heights and to the giant success that it is today. Shivanand Kanavi salutes the incomparable F C Kohli, who passed into the ages last week.
Once ISRO masters the technology to send humans into space, the next step will be experimenting with technologies allowing humans to live in space.
President Pranab Mukherjee on Saturday called for constant defence technology upgrades for India to maintain an edge in military capability over its adversaries.
According to the World Health Organisation, 10 candidate vaccines for COVID-19 are in the clinical evaluation and 126 are in the pre-clinical stage.
Last year, the US assistance to Pakistan was $534 million.
'We cannot be naughty and expect the government to do good!' 'We have to behave ourselves and then we can expect the government to support us.' 'If we are able to protect ourselves well, then we should not be having deaths.' 'Unfortunately, people have gotten into this super scary event participation (mode) -- birthday parties, large gatherings.' 'Among the people who have attended those, 80 to 90 per cent of them have come down with COVID-19.'
The UN decision came after India provided detailed evidence about Saeed's activities.
