'We spent Rs 59,000 crore on acquiring 36 Rafales and we do not know if we will ever use them. The chances are that we never will,' argues Aakar Patel.
As the United States and China joust for supremacy, India might remain on the sidelines with its limited resources.
'Manmohan Singh's fond hope of avoiding conflict over territory by 'making borders irrelevant' is increasingly difficult to realise in a world where institutional restraints on aggression are weakening and the new game in town is unalloyed power play,' notes T N Ninan.
'The location was the central part of the southern pacific and most part of the Tiangong-1 was burnt up on the re-entry.'
'Transformation of Ukraine into some kind of permanent strategic challenger, which Russia would have to contain and deter, spend a significant part of political and strategic resources on it.'
Thirty-four years after he traveled to space, Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma tells Rediff.com's Archana Masih that he looks forward to Gaganyan, India's first manned space mission in 2022.
'I cannot be confined to just one or two kinds of music.'
China's troubled moon rover Yutu or Jade Rabbit has come back to life from a troubled dormancy although experts are still trying to figure out the cause of its abnormality, officials said on Thursday.
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.
'Every Indian knows why the BJP is targeting Hamid Ansari.'
'There is no evidence of newspapers and television channels ganging up to wage a coordinated war to expose the BSP, destroy the AIADMK, malign Kejriwal, discredit Lalu or defame Mamata.' 'But it's of interest that none of these exposes threatens the 12 states the BJP controls,' says Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
'The goal is achievable. What is stopping us from getting there?' asks Aakar Patel.
While we have to hiss loudly and do the lunging bit to keep our foes on their toes, that's only a tactical matter. What is the strategic goal? What is the end game? In my opinion, there is only one possible end game: the unwinding of Pakistan into several pieces: Balochistan, Sind, Balawaristan (Gilgit, Baltistan, the rest of PoK), the Pashtun area Khyber Pakhtunwa which will merge with Afghanistan, and the rump Punjab, says Rajeev Srinivasan.
'Kashmir is the main issue between the two countries.' 'We have not been able to resolve it bilaterally.' 'As the two major countries in South Asia, we have to go back to the drawing board and start engaging.'
List of French Open women's singles champions:
'It's a moot point if Kailaasa will ever evolve beyond being a haven for a fugitive from justice,' notes Devangshu Datta.
United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon has appealed to India, China and the US along with five other nations to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, saying the international community should complete the "unfinished business" of achieving a world free of atomic weapons.
Why do Innovation Revolutions happen outside India, asks Ajit Balakrishnan.
The United States is expected to run away with the athletics competition in Rio, taking podium spots often the preserve of Russians such as double pole vault gold medalist Yelena Isinbayeva and 110m hurdles world champion Sergei Shubenkov.
The Russian Athletics Federation (ARAF) said on Monday four athletes had tested positive at the Russian Winter Indoor Athletics Championships in February.
'Once positions are hardened and troops start building defences, it is difficult for soldiers to step back.'
Several of WhatsApp's early features were designed keeping Indian conditions in mind, given the choppy connectivity and existence of devices of different makes. In fact, India was the first country where WhatsApp rolled out in-app video calling services in 2016, ahead of its global launch, underlining the importance of the market for the company.
'It is not a matter of fixing the military problem up there in the Himalayas and the retreat of the two militaries.' 'India has to find a way to correct the racist and very patronising views of India in the Chinese mind.'
The hit to economic activity will be mostly confined to the first quarter. And a third wave, if it materialises, is unlikely to be hugely disruptive for the economy, predicts T T Ram Mohan.
Rup Narayan Das reveals the towering Odisha leader's role in improving national security after the 1962 War with China.
'The Vladivostok visit marks a subtle reversal of trend discernible in the revival of India-Russia relations pioneered by Modi during the past couple of years,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The Euro 2020 soccer Championship, trumpeted as a continent-wide feast of football from Dublin to Baku to mark UEFA's 60th anniversary, was postponed for a year on Tuesday as the coronavirus pandemic claimed its biggest sporting casualty yet. Europe's flagship tournament, staged every four years and second only to FIFA's World Cup in terms of prestige in soccer, will now be staged from June 11 to July 12, 2021.
KPS Menon (Jr) had a quiet humility and playfulness, and was not motivated by money or power, recalls Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The Russian government and security services will overcome security threats and can guarantee safety at the 2014 Winter Olympics in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said.
The BJP chief and former chief minister of UP, who is on a five-day visit to the United States, reiterated his resolve on Tuesday at a major Afghan policy speech at Capitol Hill, jointly organised by the Foundation for India and Indian Diaspora Studies; US India Political Action Committee and American Foreign Policy Council
The Great Showman's five children remember him on his 93rd birth anniversary.
Chusovitina may not want to look old for her Hollywood hero but in a sport over-populated with teenagers, she is almost pre-historic as her gymnastics lifespan of competing in seven successive Olympics defies logic.
Remember the US withdrawal agreement was signed in February 2020. In the intervening period, a proper evacuation plan ought to have been in place. It was not. Consequently, tens of thousands of Afghans who had worked as interpreters, drivers, suppliers of goods and services, etc, face brutal retribution from the Taliban, Virendra Kapoor points out.
Nothing spawns the creation and perpetration of conspiracy theories more effectively than an official obsession with secrecy.
'Some have speculated that it has to do with Doklam and the 2019 elections.' 'That Modi asked Xi not to embarrass him by sending the Chinese army into Bhutan again, this time rolling over our resistance,' says Aakar Patel.
'2020 will show whether India's troubled domestic economic and political house reveals a mismatch in their strategic association or whether closer strategic ties are yet possible,' says Anita Inder Singh.
With the launch of the first indigenous aircraft today, India will join a club of nations like the United States, Russia, China, the United Kingdom and France that possess nuclear-powered submarines
'Frankly, India has no role to play.' 'This is a showdown between the US and NATO on one hand and Russia on the other.' 'That said, the outcome of this titanic struggle in Central Europe will remould the world order and affect India profoundly,' argues Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
India is apprehensive about the Taliban's return as it would mean loss of access to Baluch rebels and help to the restive tribals of Waziristan. This would be a setback to the Indian strategy of returning the compliments of death by a thousand cuts to Pakistan, notes Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
December 2022 could be the last Christmas for Santha Bakery, a business drawing its lineage from the first Christmas cake baked in Kerala.
