If Davos had a clear centre of gravity this year, it was technology—not geopolitics. The tech industry arrived in force, underscored by high-profile appearances from Elon Musk and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. The message was unmistakable: this is where attention, ambition, and capital are converging. With extraordinary sums being poured into…
India’s challenge, and opportunity, lies in mastering torque rather than seeking a mythical centre of gravity. In a world defined by flux, leverage matters more than alignment, and agility matters more than allegiance. Strategic autonomy will not be preserved through rigid doctrines, but through continuous recalibration anchored in national…
Contrary to popular belief, migration is not primarily a one-way movement from poor countries to rich ones. Nearly half of all migration from the Global South occurs between developing countries themselves, rather than towards the affluent Global North. Indeed, South-South migration, often taking place across contiguous borders with porous…
Has India faltered in “handling” these two neighbours? In theory, perhaps. As the dominant regional power, expectations are inevitably high. In practice, however, India’s very dominance generates suspicion in both Pakistan and Bangladesh, sharply limiting its influence. Meanwhile, the United States, with its strategic weight, and China with its…
In such a world, the greatest danger is not that AI becomes alien. The danger is that humans start behaving less humanly by outsourcing thinking, surrendering responsibility, and hiding behind the machine while letting it make decisions we should be making ourselves. Leaders may find it convenient to blame the algorithm. Companies may find it…
The Mahabharata’s deepest warning is stark and sobering: nations rarely fall because of external enemies alone. They fall because of internal decay. Hastinapur did not collapse under foreign assault. Its destruction was the inevitable outcome of accumulated resentment, festering grievances, unchecked ambition, wounded egos, and a collective…
The real taste of the pudding, the real measure of progress, will be revealed only when the average Indian experiences opportunity, fairness and security as everyday realities. When a dispute is resolved in weeks instead of years, when a farmer receives fair price directly, when a start-up gets clearance swiftly, when a citizen is treated with…
Walk into a gathering of South Asians abroad, in the U.S., the Gulf, Europe, and you will see Akhand Bharat in its simplest form. People do not ask, “Are you Indian or Pakistani?” They connect over language, food, festivals, music, accents, humour, and the familiar comfort of shared culture. A Tamilian and a Sindhi, a Bengali and a Pashtun, a…
While low-level clashes may continue, the possibility of a large-scale conflict, as projected by recent U.S. intelligence reports, remains far-fetched. Both countries are acutely aware that they stand to lose far more than they can gain. Despite uneasy relations, several factors actively discourage conflict
It is time for India, along with like-minded nations across Asia, Africa, and Latin America, to articulate a shared agenda of non-alignment 2.0, not as a posture of neutrality but as a strategy of autonomy. The original Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) emerged from the Cold War’s bipolar tension; its modern counterpart must respond to multipolar…
