China is engaged in hotly contested territorial disputes in the South and East China Seas. Beijing has also made substantial progress in militarising its man-made islands in the past few years, which it says it has the right to defend.
'When one has a lot of power, one can shut one's ears to the other side. This is what is common between the BJP of 2019 and the Congress of 1947,' says Aakar Patel.
Geopolitics resurfaced at the Cricket World Cup on Saturday when a plane towing a "Justice for Kashmir" message flew over Headingley during India's final group game against Sri Lanka.
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.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi began a three-day visit to China from this north west city on Thursday, the hometown of Chinese President Xi Jinping with whom he held "very substantive" discussions focussing on strengthening of mutual trust and the boundary issue.
Many anticipate that by the 2021 assembly elections in West Bengal, the BJP may come to power, says Mohammad Sajjad.
The TMC expects to emerge victorious by way of a majority of minority votes and a minority of majority votes, notes Arun Bhatnagar, a retired IAS officer.
Eight images that prove it's a wonderfully bizarre world.
'Muslims in India have been suffering in many ways. Yet, they are proud Indians and love India as much as any other Indian community.'
'Even though as Xi will seemingly continue to stay in power beyond his third term, competitions for the post-Xi leadership would be inevitably unfolded beneath the surface of water, and that will be a big headache for Xi the dictator.'
A Ganesh Nadar, who once met V Prabhakaran at the LTTE's press conference in Jaffna, feels Madras Cafe is not at all about the Tigers.
'I'm very proud of having worked with one of the finest minds of India and Indian cinema.'
Don't be surprised if Imran invites Modi and other South Asian leaders for his swearing-in ceremony, says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
The Sri Lankan innings was into its first hour when the plane moved over the stadium with the message.
Attlee said Great Britain had concluded that the Indian element of the army was no longer reliable and that Netaji's Indian National Army had demonstrated that. That had shaken the foundation on which Britain's Indian empire rested, argues Lieutenant General Ashok Joshi (retd).
India's largest airline has also told its crew members -- who are working on flights connecting India with East Asian countries like Thailand and Singapore -- to wear N95 masks at all times when they are on ground.
Once Mazar-i-Sharif falls, some isolate pockets of resistance may remain, which the Taliban would tackle through political work or coercion, asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
By presenting the battle in Bengal as one between Mamata on one side and Modi-Shah on the other, the saffron camp has projected the former as a larger-than-life figure, a portrayal which has the potential of turning her into Modi's main competitor in 2024, predicts Amulya Ganguli.
September 12 marked the 122th anniversary of one of the most incredible battles in Indian history.
'As America prepares its exit strategy, the fear in Iraq is of a genocidal conflict between the Sunni minority and the Shias in which an entire society implodes,' warns The Independent.
A Washington-based Pew Research Centre survey has revealed rising concern among Pakistanis about a threat to their country from India.
Driven from its self-styled caliphate in Iraq and Syria, Islamic State is down but not out. Where once they confronted armies, the extremist Islamist group's adherents have now staged hit-and-run raids and suicide attacks. In some cases, the group has claimed responsibility for atrocities, including the bombings of churches and hotels in Sri Lanka that killed at least 253 people. Its involvement is not always proven, but even if the link is ideological rather than operational, Islamic State still poses a security threat in many countries.
Major Somnath Sharma was awarded the Param Vir Chakra posthumously for his bravery in the Kashmir operations on November 3, 1947.
Unless the Taliban goofs up in a big way, which seems highly unlikely, we are looking at a regime that will be around for quite a long while and present a level of governance that the puppets of the richest and most advanced countries failed to provide, predicts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'The PLA has continued to do exercises and drills and recently carried out air exercises with fighter jets.'
New Union minister L Murugan's declaration of Kongu Nadu as his native place, instead of Tamil Nadu, may be part of a grand BJP strategy to create new states out of existing ones, particularly those that have anti-BJP governments, mulls N Sathiya Moorthy.
At least seven people were killed on Thursday in Pakistan in two separate blasts, including a suicide attack on the Pak-Afghan border apparently targeting soldiers.
The Indian Army has shown it can face down the PLA, but is too often held back by a political leadership that lacks boldness, asserts Ajai Shukla.
Prices are sustainable and not just driven by speculative gains
'Amit Shah and his fellow travellers need to realise that India was divided because of competitive communalism of forces like Hindu Mahasabha and the Muslim League, prodded, aided and abetted by the colonial power,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
Europeans believe that what is under attack is their way of life, their secular faith, the long-fought right to keep religion out of the public sphere, observes Virendra Kapoor.
'What would we feel if we found the world behaving the way it has?' 'Forced to fight our own prolonged battle; nobody from outside really demanding that the war end or actively working to make it end, and above all, a completely toothless United Nations reduced to pleading for a halt to the violence,' notes Shyam G Menon, exactly a month after Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine.
It is time the current leaders who swear by 'cultural nationalism', that is religion neutral, assert that Bharatiyata is at the core of our nationalism and India was never a 'Hindu Rashtra', argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
This week's collection of unbelievably unusual images from across the world.
Here's a collection of some of the best photos, taken last week, from around the globe.
We present some of the best photographs clicked across the globe in the month of May.
China has chosen to keep New Delhi guessing, while retaining for itself the option of constantly changing facts on the ground and shifting the LAC westwards -- the strategy called 'salami slicing', notes Ajai Shukla.
The emperor's appetite for enlarging his realm translated into a fetish for raising taxes, despite the simplicity of his personal lifestyle, points out Devangshu Datta.
'It's waging an offensive with no seeming precedent.' 'The fact that it's now entering cities, as opposed to remaining massed around their perimeters, is a game changer.'
According to Indian meteorological department, tremors were felt in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Rajasthan, Haryana and Punjab, lasting for a minute, triggering panic and forcing people to rush out of their homes and offices. There was no official word about casualties from any of the states but reports from West Bengal said cracks appeared in several multi-storeyed buildings in Siliguri in north Bengal. An incident of wall collapse was reported from Telipara in Jalpaiguri district.
