Severely critical of China, Pompeo, cited killing of Indian Army personnel in the Galwan Valley in eastern Ladakh in a clash with the Chinese military, and asserted that both India and the US are taking steps to strengthen cooperation against all threats and not just those posed by the Chinese Communist Party.
'The Khalistanis get bulk of the money from abroad.' 'Where did Amritpal's Mercedes come from, which costs well over Rs 60 lakhs?' 'Where does his fleet of vehicles come from?' 'Local Punjabis can certainly not contribute this kind of money.'
Until last month more than two-thirds of the Indian Army was deployed against Pakistan. Of 14 army corps, just four-and-a-half faced China, while more than twice that number was ranged against Pakistan.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday undertook an aerial survey of affected areas in Gujarat and the adjoining Union territory of Diu to assess the devastation caused by Cyclone Tauktae.
A day after Cyclone Yaas tore through coastal Odisha and Bengal to cause havoc as far as Jharkhand, tornadoes, torrential rains, bridge collapses and swelling rivers continued to plague eastern India as people tried to pick up their lives amid the debris of swept away mud homes and swamped farmlands.
To progress from U-19 to first-class level, we need to put in double effort: India U19 captain Dhull
Speaking with reporters, Gandhi said, "This (school) is India's future. Hate and violence has destroyed it. Nobody has benefited from this. Violence and hate are enemies of development."
According to officials, the board will inform students about the schedule 10 days in advance.
'Traditionally, the US tried to tamp down tensions whenever a crisis situation arose and deputed officials from Washington to travel to Delhi to counsel restraint.' 'This time around, no US envoy flew down to Delhi -- not even when tensions spiked and a flashpoint was reached last week,' points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'The current budgetary practice of shifting expenditures off-balance sheet in order to be seen to be meeting fiscal targets should be discontinued; additional fiscal stimulus would be imprudent; individual income tax rates should not be cut; GST rates should not be raised now,' advise Arvind Subramanian and Josh Felman.
The enhancement of combat capability by the two armies in the region came even as both the countries continued their efforts to resolve the dispute through talks at military and diplomatic levels.
Even though the Health Ministry and Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) have been insisting that there is 'no solid evidence' of community transmission so far, the government has started scaling up health infrastructure to deal with any situation.
The BCCI is also mulling a couple of more windows in 2022 in case October-November is not feasible in India.
In a letter to Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Telangana, Karnataka and Maharashtra, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan highlighted that a few states were reporting a higher contribution to India's caseload, indicating the possibility of a localised spread of the infection.
Even as raw material prices start cooling off from their peaks, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies' margins are expected to remain under pressure at least in the next quarter. This is because commodity prices continue to remain high year-on-year (YoY). Consumer companies will also continue to increase rates as they have been taking price hikes in a staggered manner. They have not yet passed the entire price increase of raw materials to consumers.
'Shastri told General Chaudhuri, 'I want to reach Lahore before they enter Kashmir'.' 'Today, many regard this initiative of Shastri as the first surgical strike.' A revealing excerpt from Dr Sandeep Shastri's Lal Bahadur Shastri: Politics And Beyond.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Friday kept the benchmark interest rate unchanged at 4 per cent and decided to continue with its accommodative stance despite rising inflation. This is the 11th time in a row that the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) headed by RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das has maintained the status quo. RBI had last revised its policy repo rate or the short-term lending rate on May 22, 2020 in an off-policy cycle to perk up demand by cutting the interest rate to a historic low.
The Indian Navy said it was in a high state of readiness to "deter, prevent and defeat" any "misadventure" by Pakistan in the maritime domain.
'The Chinese navy is large and expanding both in numbers and capability by the day.' 'India too must take measures to safeguard its own interests, now and in the future.'
With the Russia-Ukraine war roiling financial markets globally, the government may defer the mega IPO of LIC and wait for an opportune time to get the maximum value of its holding in the state-owned insurance behemoth, sources said. "It's a full blown war now so we will have to assess the situation for going ahead with the LIC IPO," a government source said. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, too, had indicated review of the IPO in view of the evolving geopolitical situation.
Cautioning that there will be social and psychological consequences for the rest of the country too, Guha said the migrant tragedy could have been averted or at least minimised if Prime Minister Narendra Modi had given them a week's notice to return home before the lockdown kicked in.
Sources said India will not lower its guard and will maintain the current state of very high-level of combat readiness in eastern Ladakh till there are visible changes in the ground situation.
India is looking to tap its diplomatic missions abroad to enable grain exporters in the country to ship out wheat and corn as supplies from Russia and Ukraine are expected to remain disrupted for some time to come. Between the two items, pushing for wheat is easier because of a huge domestic surplus. "We are hand holding our exporters and support from various Indian missions abroad is also being channelised accordingly," a senior government official said. Global wheat prices have jumped since the Ukraine crisis started, with wheat futures in the US reaching their highest levels since 2008.
Fitch Ratings director Thomas Rookmaaker said India's debt-to-GDP ratio is likely to rise to 76 per cent from 70 per cent currently due to wider fiscal deficit and low economic growth.
The education ministry released guidelines last week for the reopening of schools, including for thorough cleaning and disinfection of the premises, flexibility in attendance, no assessment for up to three weeks and ensuring a smooth transition from home-based schooling during the coronavirus-induced lockdown to formal schooling.
As Western Australia, Queensland and Tasmania closed their borders to South Australia on Monday, the country's cricket board on Tuesday got down to figure a way to get Australian white-ball, Test match and Australia A squads into Sydney to ensure the upcoming fixtures of the 300 million dollars season remain unaffected.
PM to take a call on reopening places of worship on Saturday; state governments empowered to take a call on malls and wedding halls; domestic flights expected to resume on May 18, with Air India being first off the blocks.
'The worry among many international actors is whether there will be stability to provide assistance to the government because the political developments in the last few months are a real concern.'
'If the Bangladesh-China relationship strengthens further, it can only be to India's detriment,' notes Vice Admiral Premvir Das.
Developing more sources of supplies to guard against disruptions may emerge as the next big trend. But that may not necessarily mean flow of more investments into India, unless investors are assured, besides important economic factors and impartiality of institutions, that social disharmony will not cause unexpected disruptions.
Strongly rejecting Organisation of Islamic Cooperation's suggestion of allowing an OIC fact-finding mission to Jammu and Kashmir to assess rights situation there, India on Friday said the grouping has no 'locus standi' on such matters and termed suggestions to this effect by Pakistan foreign minister as 'propagandist'.
'Any 'de-escalation' that brings down tensions will deprive the BJP of a plank with seamless possibilities to project PM Modi as the 'Iron prime minister' and hype up jingoism in the upcoming election campaign,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'Look at the aggressive way in which a campaign against Friday namaz is going on in North Indian cities.' 'Even the Union home minister is part of this vicious campaign.'
'The events of 2020 have actually put our relationship under exceptional stress.' What External Affairs Minister Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told the All India Conference of China Studies on Thursday, January 28, 2021.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Wednesday hinted at financing for sorting out Eurozone crisis after a credible assessment of solvency problem is made.
While the likelihood of these states going the Lanka or Greece way may be an alarming assessment, the financial situation of some states such as Punjab and West Bengal is indeed quite weak.
India's COVID-19 fatality rate has dropped significantly to 2.43 per cent from 3.36 per cent on June 17 due to effective clinical management of coronavirus cases, the health ministry and asserted that the country has handled the pandemic 'relatively well'.
'But will there be matching action as far as tribals are concerned on the ground?'
BCCI president Sourav Ganguly on Saturday made it clear that the 13th edition of IPL will be a truncated one if the coronavirus pandemic subsides but could not commit on the number of matches under the current circumstances. The BCCI on Friday suspended the IPL from March 29 to April 15 due to government-imposed travel restrictions and refusal of three states to host any matches owing to the pandemic that has so far claimed more than 5000 lives and infected close to 1,50,000 people globally.
Mihir Bhatt, founder of the All India Disaster Mitigation Institute, a community-based, action research and advocacy organisation engaged in disaster risk management, tells Vicky Nanjappa that India needs to start learning from its flood experiences and innovating for future responses.
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