Cementing its strategic partnership with Seychelles, India on Wednesday signed four agreements with the Indian Ocean island nation to boost security and maritime partnership.
India, Japan and the US are set to focus on "anti-submarine warfare" by deploying "different machines" during the next round of their marine wargames named the Malabar Exercise, amidst increasing presence of Chinese underwater vessels in the strategic Indian Ocean region.
Monsoon is likely to be 96 per cent of the long period average
East India, along with a major portion of central India, is likely to be at a higher risk of being rain deficient, especially during the first half of the season.
Polls opened at 7 am local time and would close at 5 pm with some 12,845 polling stations being set up throughout the country for 15.9 million voters, who will choose a successor to President Maithripala Sirisina.
'India enjoys the maneuverability of a coming big power.' 'It is this possibility that has persuaded Moscow to humour India and stayed Washington from getting punitive about India's neutrality on the Ukraine issue.'
Anyone within range of China's expanding navy will have to build capabilities faster and/or work more closely with the US, as Australia has just announced, asserts T N Ninan.
'The last time we had such a late withdrawal of monsoon was in 1960 or so.'
The search for flight MH370 is yet to target a "hotspot" most likely to be the crash site in the Indian Ocean as priority was given to investigate "pings" that has led to a dead end, a United Kingdom satellite firm claimed on Tuesday.
According to Skymet Weather, the initial surge in the Monsoon rains can be attributed to the transition of El Nino into the neutral phase.
The multinational search for the Malaysian jet's debris was today suspended due to bad weather in southern Indian Ocean, a day after it was announced that the missing plane had crashed in the remote area.
Vagir is part of the six Kalvari-class submarines being built in India.
Over 300 angry relatives of Chinese passengers aboard the Malaysian airliner on Tuesday clashed with security personnel outside Malaysia's embassy in Beijing as China demanded the truth about the jet's mysterious crash.
Whether it is Sri Lanka, Maldives, or Nepal, quietly but steadily, India has been reclaiming some of the ground it had lost to China, observes Aditi Phadnis.
Boeing also won a $4.5-billion contract for 10 C-17 Globemaster III transport aircraft, and will soon start delivery of $3 billion contracts to supply 22 AH-64E Apache attack helicopters and 15 CH-47F Chinook heavy lift helicopters., reports Ajai Shukla.
Esper also highlighted the 'increased' military cooperation with India and called it as 'one of the most important defence relationships of the 21th century'.
...with extravagant claims in both the eastern and western sectors, observes Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad, as India is fixated on asserting its border claims based on the McMahon Line.
The United States has made it clear to India that it is "discouraging" it from proceeding with its acquisition of S-400 missile defence systems from Russia but Washington will have to weigh "important geostrategic considerations" while taking a decision on growing calls for a presidential CAATSA waiver to New Delhi, President Joe Biden's nominee for Coordinator for Sanctions Policy has told lawmakers.
India has sent a letter of request to the United States seeking to purchase patrol drones for protection and vigilance of its maritime assets in the Indian Ocean, sources said.
India is playing its South China Sea card by restarting oil exploration off Vietnam coast despite China's objections as a calculated geopolitical move to force Beijing to make "compromises" on border issue and its close ties with Pakistan, a state-run Chinese think-tank has said.
With China increasing its military power and influence in the strategically crucial Indian Ocean, a noted American expert has urged the Obama administration to partner India to balance and counter Beijing's increasing influence in the region.
Rajapaksa's five-day visit to India assumes significance as his tenure as Sri Lanka's president from 2005 to 2016 saw expansion of China's footprints in the Indian Ocean island nation, triggering concerns in India.
'I am also concerned over Chinese ambitions in the Maldives and wider Indian Ocean,' former Maldives president Mohamed Nasheed tells Rediff.com contributor Rajeev Sharma in an exclusive interview.
The search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has come to an end with passengers' families being informed that the effort to find the plane has been suspended.
Kalvari underwent around 120 days of extensive sea trials and tests for various equipment and is expected to bolster India's maritime prowess.
It is the first such case of a sizeable number of military personnel being treated for COVID-19. The Indian Army has reported eight cases of the deadly virus so far.
At war, the Jalashwa can carry and launch a full infantry battalion in a single wave. At peace, the Jalashwa can evacuate 1,000 people in a single trip. Ajai Shukla explains why the Indian Navy's new tender for more ships like the Jalashwa must be treated with special urgency.
The probe into the mysterious disappearance of the Malaysian jet is now looking at the possibility that the plane may have landed somewhere as no debris has been found so far, a media report has said.
Describing the boundary talks with China as "positive", National Security Adviser Ajit Doval on Friday said India has inalienable positions and the government will protect vital national interests.
In the second of the three part series, C Raja Mohan, Strategic Affairs Editor with the Indian Express, says that as India moved from the expansive internationalist vision of Jawaharlal Nehru to the narrower worldview of the Indira years, the pursuit of 'strategic autonomy' became an important theme in the Indian foreign policy discourse.
The grieving families of the 239 passengers and crew of Flight MH370 will receive financial assistance from Malaysia Airlines to ease their burdens, a top official said today, 44 days after the plane vanished mysteriously from radar screens.
Aircraft carriers of India, the United States, Japan and Australia are set to take part in the second phase of Exercise Malabar that is scheduled to take place from November 17 to 20 in the Indian Ocean region, the Navy said on Monday.
The Australia-led search operation for the crashed Malaysian airliner has now shifted 1,100 km further north-east in the southern Indian Ocean following a "new credible lead", officials said on Friday.
MH-60 Romeo Seahawks would add lethal capabilities of the Indian Navy, which experts say is the need of the hour given the aggressive behavior of China in the Indian Ocean region.
In the last of a three-part series, startegic expert C Raja Mohan says that India needs a new maritime strategy and diplomacy that are at odds with many of its past normative and ideological preferences
The search for the crashed Malaysian jet on Friday dramatically shifted to a new area 1,100 km further northeast in the Indian Ocean after authorities received "the most credible lead" of radar data suggesting the plane flew faster and ran out of fuel more quickly than estimated.
The United States is moving forward to develop a long-term strategic military partnership with India, a top American military commander said, noting that in the long run, India's role in security in a peaceful Indian Ocean is critical.
The aircraft carrier is China first domestically-built ship. Shandong is bigger than China's first aircraft carrier Liaoning and could house 36 fighter jets.
Even as Chinese troops continue squatting on territory that we claim as our own -- this was the lowest allocation for defence in percentage terms since the 1950s, reveals Ajai Shukla.
Yameen declared the state of emergency on February 5 after the country's top court ordered him to free high-profile dissidents from jail.
