Protests on the street are continuing, even as the government continues to forcefully suppress them. What happens next is evolving and remains to be seen. However, it is certain that we live in “interesting times” where the word from the streets will perhaps echo louder and louder in the corridors of power.
The spirit of democracy cannot be sustained merely because elections are held regularly. Restoring public faith in the institutions and systems that sustain elections is of paramount importance. The true measure of democracy is not whether power can be exercised, but whether it can be challenged peacefully
Southern Europe shows that mobilisation can reshape political agendas while leaving difficult economic questions unresolved. South Asia shows that a narrow grievance can become a challenge to the legitimacy of a governing system when trust has already been eroded. The real test of governance is whether institutions learn between storms—before the next generation concludes that the street is the only place where its voice can be heard.
At independence, Pakistan's economy was competitive with India's. Today India's is more than ten times larger, and Pakistan is on roughly its 25th IMF program. Investors rarely abandon a country simply because it is poor. They leave when they cannot tell who actually decides.
In a country known for its traditional inter-faith tolerance and harmony, one of the headline news for the last few months has been how groups of right-wing Hindus, supported by local leaders of India's ruling BJP of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have been obstructing and protesting against the offering of namaz in public places by Muslim citizens in Gurugram, a satellite city of capital New Delhi
On 15 August 2021, the day the Taliban seized power militarily in Kabul, the world watched with trepidation the scenes of an ignominious end to the twenty-year-long efforts of the US to prop up a democratic government there
Within the new Middle East/West Asia Quad, there is space for trilateral economic cooperation between India, the UAE and Israel
India should assist Nepal and Bangladesh to obtain GI certification for their teas
Will this demonstrable assertion of sportsmanship lead to a revival of bilateral sporting ties, particularly cricket, in the near future?
The recent widespread anti-Hindu violence will not make any difference to the bilateral ties between India and Bangladesh, said Dinesh K Patnaik, Director General, Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), calling the recent events “small incidents”
‘Bangladesh Finalizes Agreement to Build Buddhist Monastery in Lumbini, Nepal’ was the headline of the Hong Kong-based Global Buddhist Door’s news headline on October 11
Since the last decade, the US drone strike has caused numerous casualties worldwide, including Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia
Senior Indian Army sources asserted that the Pakistani youth's plea for surrender, as soon as his mate was killed, was a definite indication that he was not so convinced about the 'jihad' narrative but had taken on the cross-border 'task' out of financial compulsion
The SAU aims to bring together peacebuilders and particularly women from the region to work towards a political and economic South Asian Union, along the lines of the European Union, by 2030
Trump also gave the Indian media backhanded compliments when he met with Modi in 2019
The Taliban, the new rulers of Afghanistan, earlier this week announced a ban on the broadcast of the Indian Premium League (IPL), the hugely popular and monetarily lucrative Indian cricket league, which is widely watched in Afghanistan as their star player, Rashid Khan, is part of it
They “violate” the otherwise volatile Line of Control (LoC) at their own sweet will, but far from being challenged for their “infiltration”, they are treated as guests of honor on both sides of a disputed frontier – India and Pakistan
Prisons in South Asian countries are overcrowded-- with some countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka having almost double their official capacities-- as most people spend years there as pre-trial detainees in the absence of speedy justice, according to data presented at a conference titled "The Rights of The Incarcerated in South Asia", organized by the South Asia Peace Action Network (SAPAN)
Concerned by reliable reports of harassment of academics in India, the South Asia Institute (SAI), Heidelberg University, Germany hosted the webinar "Academic Freedom in South Asia" on 2 August, 2021 in which the following, internationally renowned scholars took part
