'It is time we Indians stop our internal bickering and present a united front to Chinese machinations,' advises Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'Pakistan is paying the price for ignoring secularism. In seeking to be ever more Muslim to define its nationhood, it has become a terrorist haven.'
'Whatever the legal position, it is my understanding that in practice, the Indian authorities have always treated Hindu refugees from Pakistan and Bangladesh far more sympathetically than Muslims,' notes Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
Decommissioned aircraft carrier INS Vikrant's voyage came to an end on Friday as workers at the Darukhana ship-breaking yard in Mazgaon docks in Mumbai began scrapping down the warship.
The Left parties attacked the government's policies and said the country was heading towards an economic emergency.
'Notwithstanding the realisation among the Indian leadership to build up its navy for the force's expanding role, the Indian Navy was allocated only 15% of the interim defence budget presented in Parliament in February 2019.' 'The outlay for the navy's capital acquisition is not even adequate to meet its committed liabilities,' points out Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
10 takeaways from the prime minister's UN speech.
'Washington senses that the anchor sheet of India's strategic autonomy lies in its longstanding partnership with Russia, which remains firm and immutable despite the changes in world politics in the post-Cold War era,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.<
'With technology advancing rapidly, the need for branches is declining.'
Historically, tensions in West Asian regions have provided support to gold prices.
There is a vocal constituency of educated, well-to-do, articulate Indian elites who would rather go with the idea that too much democracy is a liability. That India needs a spell of benevolent dictatorship. Of course, they have never lived under one, points out Shekhar Gupta.
One has to wonder what is so wrong with the European Union.
Opposition parties on Monday staged a walkout in the Rajya Sabha after their demand for a resolution on Gaza was not accepted.
'The war against ISIS is what earned the Kurds global recognition of being some of the best fighters that overshadowed regular armies,' points out Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
With a massive final push, which began mid-November, Syrian forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad took over the last remaining rebel strongholds in the historic city of Aleppo on the night of December 12. They only won a ruined city and ruined lives.
New Delhi remains a priggish suitor to Washington's overtures, but it has begun appreciating potential tech benefits to ties with the US.
Xi Jinping is winning the war without firing a shot in Sri Lanka, observes Colonel R Hariharan (retd).
Prime Minister Narendra Modi asserted that the BJP has emerged as the "third force" in Kerala that will replace the two fronts in the next year's assembly elections.
I tried to reason in my mind that wouldn't beating Pakistan again and again -- in the league matches and in the knockouts if they made it -- be a better tribute to our martyred soldiers? A revealing excerpt from Vinod Rai's Not Just A Nightwatchman: My Innings In The BCCI.
The Indian economy can grow if it is delinked from the slow growth in the West and the deceleration in China, says Ashok K Lahiri.
'India is a strange place.' 'On the one hand we have the most advanced science working on our origins and our ancestry.' 'On the other we are at war with ourselves over a temple to a god whom our first ancestors knew nothing of,' says Aakar Patel.
It is easy to foretell that negotiating a comprehensive and final agreement on the Iran nuclear issue is by no means an easy task. It involves hard negotiations, but the hardest step has been taken, says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar, who was among the first group of foreigners to visit the the top-secret Arak plant hidden behind barren mountains south of Tehran.
'It was the Mughals who first established standard units of measurement and maintained offices of meticulous record keepers and auditors, departing from the more haphazard methods of earlier regimes.' 'By the end of the 16th century, their revenue and judicial administrations exhibited an obsessive preoccupation with order, the efficient management of time, and a spirit of rational self-control -- all of them characteristics of early modernity,' point out Sheldon Pollock and Benjamin Ellman.
The US election campaign has provided plenty of ammunition for the CCP to make its case that its political system is superior.
Mere shuffling of resources or cosmetic changes to prove a point would be counterproductive in the long run, observes Commodore Venugoptal Menon (retd).
With Beijing having had a profound rethink on India's admission as a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the tectonic plates of the geopolitics of a massive swathe of the planet stretching from the Asia-Pacific to West Asia are dramatically shifting. That grating noise in the Central Asian steppes will be heard far and wide -- as far as North America, says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Protectionism and a rollback of regulation. Defusion of tensions with Russia and a lowering of geo-political risks. Looser fiscal policy and tighter monetary policy. At least Donald Trump can't be faulted for not trying something different where existing policies have disappointed, says T T Ram Mohan.
'Offensive operations to capture objectives across the LoC to eliminate terrorist launch pads and deny the use of the most dangerous routes of infiltration, are likely to be limited to brigade-level attacks.' 'These limited operations are unlikely to escalate to war across the international boundary,' says Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
'I do not agree that the intent was to send a political message to China that the US treats friends and foes alike.' 'In any case, such acts do not ruffle a feather in China,' observes Commodore Venugopal Menon (retd).
'It was India's good fortune to have a Vajpayee lead the government at this crucial moment in history.' 'By taking the N-decision he saved future generations of Indians from being 'Kosovoed' or 'Iraqed',' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'There is much symbolism in President Pranab Mukherjee's participation in the Victory Day celebrations in Moscow.'
The module was in touch with foreign handlers, whose identity is yet to be established, NIA Inspector General Alok Mittal told reporters.
