This controversial project of the mid-1980s, inspired by Israeli models, ultimately failed to achieve its intended outcomes. Nevertheless, Israeli involvement left a lasting imprint on the Mahaweli Development Project and agricultural settlements in Sri Lanka. The continuing association between the military and the Mahaweli Development Project may, in part, be attributed to practices introduced by Israeli advisers during the 1980s.
India’s economic self-reliance is not about shutting the doors to the world. It is about standing firm during crises, reducing vulnerabilities, and becoming globally competitive. The philosophy of Atmanirbhar Bharat represents a pragmatic approach: be self-reliant in areas where dependence is dangerous, and globally integrated in sectors where India can lead.
The Indian software and IT services giants have for long been accused of running body shops, a business fashioned out of what essentially is labour arbitrage turned into a fine art. The sector has consistently denied this, arguing that they have moved up the value chain and that they compete on quality, not price.
When I think back to Wagah, what stays with me is not the barbed wire, but the wind -- the same wind moving across the border without asking permission. I think of rivers that carry stories of children whose laughter sounds the same in Lahore, Delhi, Dhaka, and Kathmandu.
Interestingly, strategies employed during the Covid pandemic are being replicated. Much like the Cowin app was used to track and monitor Covid vaccinations, the Indian government plans an app to monitor every eligible child to ensure that they are up to date with their vaccination schedules
The port can grow to be one of the key hubs of trade and business in South Asia as a result of its geographic advantages and deep-sea port capabilities.
If India focuses on improving bilateral economic and connectivity initiatives with Bangladesh, the economic development of this region is inevitable.
The manner in which bulldozers as tools of retaliatory State violence and punishment are being normalised now is akin to illegal 'encounter' (extra-judicial) killings which have now been normalised by police forces across the country.
I learned, too, that on average, the Gulf countries send half a dozen coffins a week to Nepal with the remains of somebody’s beloved family member. This didn’t just apply to Nepal — workers from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and African countries faced a similar fate.
The root causes behind the food insecurity status of Sri Lanka are two-fold. Short-sighted policies such as the chemical fertilizer ban imposed by the Rajapaksa government generated a domino effect on agricultural production. Additionally, foreign exchange constraints severely limited food imports.
As Mahatma Gandhi said we should be the change that we want to see or in other words we should practice what we preach. That is never the case. So we heard pontification on how we should reduce the carbon footprint to make this world sustainable by people who never practice sustainable living in their personal life.
If trade and cultural relations between Bangladesh and Northeast India improve, the picture of the entire region will change.
Writers of the three winning entries, one from Pakistan and two from India, read their works out online at the Spelt conference to a full auditorium. The meritorious list included four stories from Pakistan, three from India, two from Nepal and one from the Philippines.
The ranking process is a vicious circle wherein higher-ranking institutions can mobilize more resources and vice versa. Unfortunately, those institutions which are not part of this frenzy competition will eventually be excluded from the higher education space dominated by the current neoliberal discourse.
The space industry is keenly looking forward to the Indian government's new space policy and hoping for ease of doing business to take a practical shape.
What applies to India can also work for other nations. So one hopes that world leaders participating in COP27 will reach actionable decisions and obtain the funding already promised by the developed countries to make a serious start to creating a sustainable global environment and avoid further climate change within the next few decades.
There can be no doubt that the direction of the Ukraine conflict may cast a long shadow on India’s presidency.
Taking a cue from Africa, can South Asian countries conduct strategic and collective consultations to build a nest?
Following the crash of a Cheetah helicopter on 5 October 2022, the second such helicopter to crash this year (the earlier one was in March 2022), the Indian Army Wives Agitation Group (AWAG) wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressing anguish over the continued use of the outdated Cheetah and Chetak Light Utility Helicopters (LUH), which have claimed many lives of experienced and young officers.
