Howdy, Modi! event, Houston, Texas, Sept. 22, 2019 The rift between India and Canada over the killing of Khalistani activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar has deepened into a first-rate diplomatic crisis with the ‘tit-for-tat’ expulsion of senior diplomats, including the heads of missions. That this happened on a day when an Indian team of officials was …
Continue reading “The India-Canada-US triangle merits an honest political dialogue”
President Vladimir Putin (R) and Prime Minister Narendra Modi (L) took a walk in the woods at the presidential estate in Novo-Ogaryovo, Moscow Region, July 8, 2024 The lodestar of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on July 8-9, it must be the disclosure by the Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration …
Continue reading “India-Russia ties take a quantum leap in the fog of Ukraine war”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi (R) and Iran’s president late Ibrahim Raisi at the BRICS Summit, Johannesburg, August 18, 2023 TEHRAN — There is enormous appreciation among Iranian intellectuals, diplomats and politicians regarding Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s stellar support for their country’s membership of the BRICS grouping. Modi played a key role to navigate Iran’s …
Continue reading “India-Iran makeover dovetails into Iran’s ties with Russia”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi displays a letter from President Draupadi Murmu inviting him to form the next government, June 7, 2024 The US president Joe Biden has deputed his trouble shooter National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan to travel to New Delhi no sooner than Prime Minister Narendra Modi forms his new government. The White House …
QUAD foreign ministers from US, Australia, India and Japan (from left to right) met in New York, September 22, 2023 The raging controversy over alleged involvement of the Indian government in the killing of Sikh plumber-cum-religious activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in faraway Canada is snowballing. Sensing that our elites are ultra-sensitive about western criticism, Canada, …
Continue reading “Nijjar affair poses an existential dilemma”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi (5th from left) and leaders of Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Jakarta, sept 7, 2023 Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s daylong visit to Jakarta for the ASEAN-India Summit on Thursday despite the countdown having begun for the G20 summit he’s hosting in New Delhi, stands out as a sign of Indian diplomacy …
Continue reading “Modi’s trip to Jakarta is a geopolitical event”
Reuters carried a speculative report last week that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi might not attend the BRICS summit in Johannesburg in person and, furthermore, that India disfavoured an expansion of the grouping. Reuters’ long history of cold war skulduggery notwithstanding, the gullible Indian media fell for the rumour mongering. And it created some confusion, …
Adani Group formally takes over Israel’s strategic port in Haifa City The American short-selling firm Hindenburg Research’s shocking allegations of stock manipulation and money laundering against the Adani Group of companies rocked India for close to a fortnight. The media hype is, fortunately, waning and serious opposition politicians with mass base are returning to consequential …
Continue reading “Reports of Adani’s eclipse are greatly exaggerated”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s short visit to Germany pegged on the Indian-German Intergovernmental Commission meeting in Berlin on Monday inevitably came to focus on the Ukraine crisis. The western media would have loved to grill Modi on India’s reluctance to criticise Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine. But German hosts thoughtfully skipped the customary Q&A …
Pegasus Project: Activists, journalists, politicians have been spied on allegedly using mobile phone malware developed by Israel. The so-called Pegasus Project, which hit media headlines, has highlighted India in a clutch of countries where snooping of the telephones of citizens is widely practised as state policy. The Washington Post, which spearheaded the Pegasus Project, proposes …
Continue reading “Pegasus Project: Why I am hesitant to defend the government but must”
