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PM Modi must shed the self-acquired role of the sole, vote gatherer. He needed this image to overcome inner-party contestation and become the Prime Minister. Today, this image is a handicap. On this score, ironically, Modi could usefully emulate the laidback, apolitical Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi.

EGoMs were a useful device that helped decide many contentious issues in India in the past. It was pioneered by the Vajpayee government. It may be useful for the Modi Govt to note that 18 "leading small groups", four presided by President Xi Jinping, exist in the Chinese system as well.

Even though India's defence, security and economic relations with Israel have been on the upswing since the 1990s, Modi has been credited with elevating the strategic dimension of India-Israel partnership by bringing relations "out of the closet".

India must improve relations with both Washington and Beijing and not limit ties with one because of the other. India, as Modi says, has the bandwidth to engage both China and the US. The objective must be to build India's comprehensive national power through whatever cooperation is possible with both America and China.

Experience has shown us that governmental systems run by bureaucrats cannot be reformed by them. Reform and restructuring is something only the political class can bring. But the Modi government has sought to rely on the bureaucracy. The result is a seriously underperforming government.

As Prime Minister Narendra Modi winds down an intensive phase of foreign policy activism, one surprising feature of his diplomacy has been the frequent evocation of Buddhism. The PM has put Buddhism at the heart of India's vigorous new diplomacy.

Prime Minister Modi's visit to Australia, taking place nearly 30 years after the last Indian Prime Ministerial visit (Rajiv Gandhi in 1986), comes at a critical time for both countries - when strategic equations are being redrawn, creating new Asian security dynamics.

As one of the world's largest economies and as a rising power, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is suggesting that India needs "multi-alignment", or more intensive partnerships with all great powers, including America and China.

Cricket has always come in handy for India and Pakistan leaders to break political ice at difficult moments. And this World Cup has provided Modi with an opportunity to end the current diplomatic impasse. Modi called up Sharif to wish Pakistan well in the Cup and offered to send the new foreign secretary to Islamabad.

Under Modi, India must find the right balance between a strong national leadership, popular expectations for change and an optimistic vision of progress. Change can certainly be achieved, but Indians need more than just the will of a strong leader.

Is it realistic to expect the new Prime Minister and his team to bring about a turnaround when some of the key economic indicators have been stagnating for so long? He struck the right note at his inaugural speech by asking people to build a developed and inclusive India.

India has signalled that it will embed its regional policy within the framework of SAARC. This should reduce the disquiet among our neighbours arising from the sheer size of India and its economy. This has a history since India's Pakistan policy of today is rooted in Vajpayee's visit to Islamabad to attend the 12th SAARC summit.

India's new Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces a tough challenge in balancing cost-optimisation for ordinary people while mitigating environmental risks, meeting the needs of stakeholders and interest groups from energy companies to activists to regular folk who rest their hopes on his electoral promises of cheaper, cleaner and safer power.

The IOR tour was not just about declarations and MOUs, proof of this is that New Delhi has put down money through Lines of Credit for infrastructure development in various island states. The challenge now is to ensure that it is effectively utilised.

India is on the path to becoming a cashless society. The Prime Minister's Jan-Dhan Yojana is one more step towards a more developed India. And possibly a big step, if successful.

Indian industry stalwarts have welcomed the arrival of Narendra Modi. The first priority of Prime Minister Narendra Modi should be to ensure the revival of economic growth, which has gone below 5 per cent in the past two years and also tackle food inflation and price rise.

Continuity, rather than change, is the true hallmark of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's foreign policy. True, he has been far more vigorous and muscular than his predecessor Manmohan Singh, but the difference is in tone and emphases, rather than substance.

For the next government, tough rhetoric on the boundary question is no substitute for coping with the multiple challenges arising from China's new status as a first-rate power. With China emerging as the second-largest economy in the world, comprehensive commercial cooperation with Beijing is an imperative that no Indian government can ignore.

Delhi's foreign policy discourse continues to be dominated by the metaphor of "non-alignment" and the mindset of a weak state. Are there other ways of thinking about India's grand strategy? Delhi could turn to classical geopolitics in understanding the global power shift.

The decision to invite US President Barack Obama to be the chief guest at the 66th Republic Day is the clearest indicator of the directions of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's strategic outlook.

Enabling a stable Asian strategic framework to the mutual benefit of both New Delhi and Tokyo should be a compelling factor for both prime ministers, Mr Narendra Modi and Mr Shinzo Abe.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's fluent Hindi, through which he engages foreign interlocutors and the rhetorical instinct for catchy phrases, is helping expand India's diplomatic lexicon.

Modi's forays into the global investment hot spots will pay dividend only if we reform ourselves, if we decide once and for all that this is the economic agenda which we need to chart out for future proofing India, one that improves our structural inadequacies bogged down by an iron willed bureaucracy.

The Chinese and Russians have replaced the US and the West as the lead singers in the international orchestra for Indo-Pak amity. Instead of telling them to mind their own business, Modi appears to have recognised that he can use the weight of Beijing and Moscow to facilitate India's engagement with Pakistan.

No matter how you nuance the outcome of the recent Sharif-Modi meeting, the fact is that continuity, rather than change, marks the Indian PM's new Pakistan initiative. And, Time has shown the success of this strategy because India has, if anything, become more resilient, while Pakistan has come to the brink of collapse.

The prime minister has shown a refreshing approach towards Indian agriculture, but for the real challenges to be surmounted he needs a massive dose of digital technology in all part of the value chain.

Other than neighbouring countries, any future Indian government's principal focus will be on the vast swathe that begins in Sri Lanka and ends in Sydney, and can be described under a variety of rubrics: Look East, Indian Ocean Region, the Indo-Pacific. Countries such as Japan, Indonesia and Singapore present India big windows as it strives to become an economic and maritime power.

To improve South Asian regional cooperation, Modi has three options. The first is to focus on a two-speed Saarc. The second is to build on transregional institutions like the BIMSTEC. However, it is the third way -- unilateral action -- that offers Modi the greatest opportunity. For example, Modi has already proposed to build a Saarc satellite for use by its neighbours.

As he swings across the Indian Ocean this week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's biggest challenge is not about countering China. His real problem is in Delhi, afflicted by a condition called continentalism, which has proved rather difficult to overcome.

For a bilateral visit at the highest-level after an undesirable and inexplicable gap of 28 long years, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's three-day tour of Sri Lanka was noted as much for what it achieved as for the optics.

New Delhi can't really expect that the Americans can or will solve India's problems with Pakistan. India can better leverage support from the US and other international partners only when it has a strong and sustainable engagement of its own with Pakistan.

The question remains as to how the Modi government will choose to address nuclear liability issue, balancing both the supplier and the domestic concerns. Dilution of the Liability Act is not an option, which is an important lesson learnt globally.

Former Ambassador to Nepal Jayant Prasad says that the relationship between India and Nepal should not depend on the number of projects or the amount of credit sanctioned. It should be a more sensitive political relationship.

Modi's visit to Dhaka is likely to focus on greater economic cooperation and engagement. Some of the major highlights of the visit will be on rail, road and water connectivity as well as coastal shipping services.

Modi's foreign visits resemble roadshows with their attendant hype, even though they also have a larger strategic purpose. But like all roadshows there is a time for publicity, and a time to get down to work on the MoUs, agreements, promises and commitments.

If elected to power, Narendra Modi's success on the diplomatic front will depend on an emulation of the last BJP prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who successfully carved out foreign policy autonomy from his party's antediluvian world view.

Britain's strong endorsement of India's regional interests marks an important shift in the way two countries relate to each other in the Subcontinent and the Indian Ocean.

India's Prime Minister-elect Narendra Modi, has set a healthy precedent for all of South Asia to follow by inviting all Neighbourhood leaders for his inauguration, including Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

New Indian Prime Minister and Sri Lankan President should attempt to take forward the fishers' talks, promised to be continued/revived by their respective Heads of Government at their Delhi meeting, and then have their officials create the structures and super-structures aimed at implementing those decisions.

To characterise the Modi-Sharif meeting and joint statement in Ufa as a "breakthrough" would be a gross exaggeration. It is another move - a positive move, but only one small move in the larger reckoning - in the elaborate chess game of India-Pakistan relations.

We need to restructure government and administration in each of India's 568 districts. The District Collector/Deputy Commissioner, like his ICS predecessor, must become the executive head of the district with all branches of government subject to his/her authority and power. This must particularly include the police.

Having played multiple roles - part comic, part tragic - in the Western mind, perhaps it's time for Iran to make its own Bollywood debut. And get to play a solid, character role.