2165 results found
With both the goods FTA and services FTA in place, India is well set on the path of a comprehensive economic partnership with ASEAN. India, whose services sector contributes about 55% to the country's GDP, has been keen to sign the services FTA with ASEAN as it will help the Indian companies tap the ASEAN markets easily.
CyFy in many ways is a platform that mimics the internet in its pristine prime. It is designed to be owned and curated by multiple stakeholders and pa
Free flow in data can unlock huge social and economic value in user data that is usually locked in silos. With this motivation, Data Empowerment and Protection Architecture (DEPA), a public-private endeavour, is being developed in India as a template for users to access and share their data on their terms. Not only does this form of data sharing promote competition, but it fosters innovation as well. This brief dissects the conceptual layers of D
Any new framework for non-personal data must consider that data is not just an economic resource to be commodified, neither is it an instrument of sov
Pooling data rights to negotiate better with platform companies can help rebalance power in the data economy and address the growing gaps in individua
The Fourth Industrial Revolution has created complexity in the international power model of state sovereignty.
With the death of Ayman al-Zawahiri, the primary question that looms over Al Qaeda is who will replace him as the next chief.
Recent grey-zone activity in maritime-Asia suggests an increase in hybrid warfare, even as the lines between military, economic, diplomatic, intelligence and criminal means of aggression become increasingly blurred. By replacing overt military aggression with soft provocations – kept well below the threshold of open warfare – aggressors attempt to leverage asymmetry, ambiguity and incrementalism for strategic effects. These tactics are highly
The Chinese conduct their tests from their test site in Korla, Xinjiang. Since the hit-to-kill vehicles can be used for BMD and ASAT, the site probab
As an emerging power in the current multipolar global order, India can use the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) to protect, promote, and project its geostrategic and geoeconomic interests. The SCO is also a platform for India to reaffirm its commitment to revive and deepen its centuries-old civilisational, spiritual, and cultural ties with other member countries. This paper explores India's priorities at the SCO, chiefly connectivity, coun
The new land acquisition bill has brought transparency in land acquisition. But by incorporating too many instruments and agencies to ensure the same, it instead risks making the process bureaucratic. Thus, the bill ends up replacing a coercive colonial law with a cumbersome one.
The continuation of oppressive colonial ideology through the preservation of heritage sites is stifling social change.
The Ministry of Defence released the Defence Acquisition Procedure 2020 (DAP 2020) in September last year, in a move to further streamline the procurement process and provide a boost to indigenous arms manufacturing. This brief argues that measures articulated in the DAP—highly anticipated as it was—need to be complemented by additional reforms to create a robust procurement machinery that supports faster and cheaper acquisition as well as hi
Keeping in line with the security needs of India, the defence budget saw a significant increase. Will this be enough to boost defence research and dev
Defence needs to be viewed as an integral part of national planning so as to comprehensively quantify the overall requirement to meet our legitimate security needs and strategic aspirations.
At a time when advances in technology are revolutionising warfare, India is still debating the need to move towards leaner force structures. India needs to cut the flab on an urgent basis.
Resources are constraining the modernisation drives of India's three services. The government has not been able to check the growth of manpower in the Army and paramilitary forces. This has a direct repercussion on the modernisation plans of the military.
The defence component of the national budget accounts for 14% of central government expenditure, but gets less than 5% of media space. Virtually no discussion on the issue takes place in Parliament either. A call for increased resources for national defence usually goes out only when defence spending by Pakistan and China makes headlines.
All three countries have unique strengths which they can leverage by working trilaterally and together they can play a major role in shaping the futur
Modern street planning does not stop at technical designing.
As India reels from the economic fallout of Covid-19 despite the announcement of a relief package, calls for a more refined and demand-inducing stimulus have emerged. However, the bleak state of the government’s coffers has left limited fiscal space to act. This brief explains the plausibility of financing a demand-inducing stimulus using debt monetisation as a one-time policy measure. Outlining the criticisms against such proposals and how the
It is important to harness informed technology so that we protect against and mitigate the very risks that are likely to play spoilsport in our attemp
Jal Jeevan Mission needs to take into cognizance the localised diversity and remain flexible in its planning and implementation processes.
Access to, and development of indigenous digital platforms and cutting-edge technologies is imperative for robust socio-economic development and national security. In turn, such process needs to be democratised, and undertaken in a sustainable manner. India is a first mover in this novel idea of democratising technology and developing Digital Public Goods. Operationalised in the digital infrastructure called India Stack, India’s strategy aims t
Various Indian states have attempted to implement their respective deradicalisation programmes to counter radicalised thought amongst those identified as being at-risk, as well as those contemplating on joining, or are returning after having joined terror groups. Maharashtra and Kerala, for example, claim that their programmes are a success. Yet little is known regarding the structure of these deradicalisation programmes, their implementation, th
Though the Planning Commission went by the Tendulkar formula, Rs 32 and Rs 24 look extremely low at today's prices and high inflation, and especially if we take into account that these amounts include other items of daily life like education and health.
Development of a proper and efficient transport network is a science in itself, but the least understood.
Beijing and New Delhi may be disengaging in the Pangong Tso lake region, but their divisions are more fraught than ever.
Despite public display of affection, all is not well in the India-Russia relationship.
New Delhi declared unequivocal support for “all peoples striving for decolonisation”, only to keep conspicuously quiet.
As technology is growing by leaps and bounds, and its interplay with democracy has magnified, is it time to place regulations on digital democracy?
India, like much of the rest of the world, is faced with the twin but opposing conditions of economic potential and social concerns that need to be negotiated to realise the digital dividends from artificial intelligence (AI) and achieve sustainable and balanced growth. AI systems involve layers of technological dependencies that necessitate and enable social and institutional interdependency between stakeholders, enabling conditions, and resourc
With plans of launching the digital euro project, the Eurozone aims at producing “a riskless, accessible and efficient form of central bank money”
An analysis of how the DHIS2 open-source platform was used in Sri Lanka, Norway, and Uganda during the COVID-19 pandemic
The Kashmir floods have exposed our communication faultlines. Why is there no disaster management plan in the case of a communication blackout? This is perhaps even more pertinent given that the remote corners of India, be they coastal, mountainous or otherwise, are not well connected to modern telecom networks.
The use of digital twin technologies in renewable energy ecosystems will benefit producers, consumers, and governments alike
When Lang Lang, a resident of New York, was invited by the White House for a piano recital at the banquet for Chinese President Hu Jintao in Washington DC on January 19, no one really bothered to check the music he would play.
China’s belligerence across the Taiwan Strait raises tensions in the Indo-Pacific.
The international community must ensure that measures are in place to deal with the food and health crises unfolding in the Horn region
The COVID19 pandemic is a wake-up call to the world to realise that the sustainability quotient, in terms of the scale that city population densities
Nepal is witnessing a clear disillusionment with the federal political system as protests demanding the restoration of monarchy are on the rise
With the idea to dispel doubts about the India story abroad, Observer Research Foundation brought together the spokespersons of the two rival parties, the ruling Congress Party and the Opposition BJP, at a platform arranged by the US India Business Council (USIBC) in Washington on 18 September.
Apart from emotive issues and caste loyalties, the narrative of governance played a major role in this election.
Intentionally or otherwise, the ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu seems to be conferring on the 'Sri Lankan Tamil issue' the place that the State's voters did not attach during the critical weeks of the parliamentary polls in May 2009.
The “India factor” has normally played a big role in the course of Nepali politics, discourse, and elections
On the eve of the February 18 elections, no two people in Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi were agreed on the certainty of elections taking place. Elections cannot take place, it was argued then, because the establishment will not risk an open-ended process which might produce inconvenient results. In the Pakistani context, the establishment has always meant the Army, the bureaucracy, big landlords and the United States.
