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On a proposal by Vietnam recently, ONGC Videsh Limited (OVL), the overseas investment arm of ONGC, has decided to stay invested in Block 128. The decision was taken after Hanoi offered to provide additional data to make future exploration economically feasible and discovering hydrocarbons commercially viable.

The Straits of Malacca is rife with several security threats, such as piracy, maritime terrorism, drug smuggling, gun running and illegal immigration. These challenges have the potential to disrupt, if not destroy, the maritime shipping in the Straits. Although regional countries have made considerable efforts to address these problems with some encouraging results, the challenges and threats are too formidable and complex for the combat capabili

While President Barack Obama is pursuing his two-pronged approach in Afghanistan that involves talking to the Taliban and handling over the security to the Afghan National Army (ANA).

Independent India’s copyright law has mostly centred around facilitating “access”. This is because India is a large country with a predominantly poor population, limited research facilities and budgets, and constrained access to knowledge-driven products and services. The politics of standard-setting in international copyright frameworks, however, has prevented government from realising a completely accessbased copyright regime. It has had

China has sometimes been cordial to sanction imposers depending on the issue-salience of the sanction, yet its posture towards international sanctions regimes remains cold, especially when they conflict with its national interests.

The pending Companies Bill provides for in an increase in the corporate funding to political parties from 5% to 7.5% of the average net profits. This increase is despite the fact that the presence of strong corporate funding laws has not hindered companies to squeeze out crores in bribes.

This Issue Brief seeks to outline the history of corporate funding in India, legislation governing corporate funding, institutional innovations in corporate funding like electoral trusts, and international experiences and their relevance in the Indian context. Given the increasing clamour for transparent and accountable corporate funding of political parties, the Brief also explores the perils of over-reliance on corporate funding.

There had always been a nexus between the Congress party and big business. After all, Mahatma Gandhi?s Ashram at Sevagram was financed by Jamnalal Bajaj; Gandhiji was assassinated in Birla House, New Delhi.

There is nothing more anti poetic than the image of Suresh Kalmadi and his alleged shananegans. Yet the mind, that strange instrument, moved mysteriously to Josh Malihabadi one of the greatest poets of the 20th century.

Though Myanmar's reforms are mostly'cosmetic' now, the changes can have unintended consequences, as witnessed in the case of Mikhail Gorbachev's Glasnost & Perestroika in the erstwhile Soviet Union, says Bertil Lintner, author of many books on Myanmar.

If Richard Nixon sought a breakthrough in China after failure in Vietnam, George Bush had a breakthrough with India after failure in Iraq, Barack Obama could work on a legacy that is a breakthrough with Iran after failure in Afghanistan.

Young Suryanarayana is a life that has been cut in its prime. He was the vic- tim of a bigoted doctrine taught in Pakistan for nearly three decades; for the Taliban are only another manifestation of the Islamist drive of General Zia-ul-Haq. The Indian died in a terrorist act after his abduc- tors demanded that all 2,500 Indians in Afghanistan vacate immediately. It was an absurd demand and no government would ever have agreed to it.

The Council of Councils Seventh Regional Conference brought together experts from 20 leading institutions from around the world to discuss and debate critical regional and global issues.

With the foreign forces drawing down in Afghanistan, there is an inevitable loss offocus on the threat of terrorism in the highly vulnerable region of South Asia. But almost everycountry in the region, barring Bhutan, continues to confront the challenges of terrorism andinsurgency. Yet there appears little sense of the danger posed by terrorism, and its 'new' formsthat ride the wave of technology and the collapse of traditional state structures.

The Indian Ocean is important to China because Chinese trade and energy resources transit this route.

Social media platforms facilitate the sharing of information and enhance connectivity and civic engagement. At the same time, however, they are vulnerable to abuse by malicious actors who use the channels to spread misinformation and hateful and divisive content. Regulatory reforms must seek to align the utility of social media platforms with the welfare of citizens, while safeguarding the right to free speech. This paper explores the regulatory

Drone or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) technology has become more accessible and affordable in recent years, and their increasing long-range capability, endurance, and applications, have made them integral for both civilian and military uses. At the same time, malicious elements such as criminal networks, drug smuggling syndicates and terrorist organisations, have exploited the technology to aid their activities. For India, the increase

Countering the militancy in Kashmir has become a highly challenging task due to the exploitation of new information and communication technology by insurgent groups. The battlefield is now a multidimensional one, encompassing both physical territory and cyberspace. The overall capabilities of insurgents have been enhanced by tools in cyberspace that are inexpensive, ever more sophisticated, rapidly proliferating, and easy to use. Militants are sy

There is a need for governments to engage the private sector in counter-terrorism and counter-propaganda initiatives. Counter-terrorism doctrines and strategies have been framed in the last decade with a focus on religious extremism and have failed to encompass other ideas, feel cyber expers.

Given India’s position in the region and its history of supporting democratic traditions, Delhi is likely to exert pressure for the restoration of democracy.

Prolonged periods of military rule in Pakistan have enabled the military to penetrate all structures of the Pakistani state. Political parties, the judiciary, bureaucracy, and the media — today all have their share of pro-khaki elements. Therefore, a military coup d’etat is no longer the only way to unseat a democratically elected political leader who may have differences with the Army. Indeed, if former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had compl

Across the globe, the COVID-19 pandemic has had a massive impact on food and nutrition security. Efforts to meet Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 on Zero Hunger have been stalled, and it is estimated that an additional 137 million people faced acute food insecurity as 2020 ended. The reasons are many: interrupted food supply chains, high levels of unemployment, loss of incomes, and rising food cost. Climate change and the resultant extreme we

The human toll of the COVID-19 pandemic has been devastating. At the same time, measures to tackle the crisis have affected national economies and grounded global trade to a halt. Small Island Developing States (SIDS) such as the Seychelles are amongst the countries that have suffered some of the worst economic impacts of the outbreak. The current situation illustrates the global state of unpreparedness for a pandemic and points to similar inadeq

The gig economy is part of a crucial transformation occurring in India’s work landscape, and ride-hailing companies are examples of platforms on which “gigs” can be found. The Indian ride-hailing market was projected to grow by 15.5 percent until 2023; the COVID-19 pandemic, however, has disrupted the trajectory. The drivers of these companies—numbering approximately four million—are considered as “independent contractors” and thus

Pakistan has been one of the countries worst affected by COVID-19, with the economic disruption caused by the pandemic exacerbating an already existing crisis. This paper discusses how the public health crisis has affected some of the most critical sectors of the Pakistani economy. While the government has implemented some mitigation measures, they are inadequate to counter the impact of the pandemic. The paper analyses the likely fallout of a ne

This brief explores the post-COVID-19 geopolitical order and the challenges facing BIMSTEC in meeting the most pressing needs of its member countries. It argues that strengthening regional organisations such as BIMSTEC will add weight to the counterbalancing of China that is underway. The brief calls on BIMSTEC to shift its priority to sectors like Connectivity, Counterterrorism and Transnational Crimes, as well as upgrading Human Resource, for b

Despite being irresponsible and concealing information, Beijing is reaping the dividends of the global disorder

The race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine is gaining ground in many parts of the world. This brief examines the challenges that India must hurdle to successfully manufacture and distribute a vaccine. It argues for a fair and equitable distribution of vaccine with an aim to save the maximum number of lives. It suggests a multi-parameter model based on age, co-morbidity, income and profession to justify one’s claim for vaccine. The imperative is to

The outcome of the Third Plenary meeting of the 18th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China which ended on Wednesday in Beijing is like a typical iceberg -- you see some of it above the water, but most of it is below. The leadership knows well that if reforms of the financial sector and of creating a legal governance regime are delayed, the economic miracle could well turn into a nightmare.

Not only would CPEC run roughshod over the sacred Panchsheel principle of "mutual respect", it would also destroy any chance of a peaceful settlement of the Kashmir dispute.

If India wants strategic dividends from arms acquisitions, it must craft its acquisition policy in a prudent manner with the aim of bringing in knowledge that necessitates a higher degree of trust with the US. It should go beyond economics to factor in larger strategic considerations.

Modi must preserve the dignity of the ordinary Kashmiri. This is what he will be judged by.

The former Governor of Chhattisgarh, Lt Gen (Retd) K M Seth, called for a national strategy and national level coordinated action plan to successfully deal with Naxalites of the CPI (Maoist). He was making a presentation on Naxalism in India, at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi, on April 13, 2007.

If one looks at China's actions in the South China Sea over the past five years, the picture that emerges is of a rising China attempting to change the ground realities and destabilise the status quo. If the international community wait to see the end game of the Chinese strategy, it may be too late to de-escalate a military confrontation.

In January 2015, African states, at the 24th session of the African Union (AU) Summit, adopted Agenda 2063—a development plan for ‘The Africa We Want’ that aims to turn the continent into a powerhouse. For Africa to achieve the vision, it needs access to massive financial resources, as well as reforms that enhance its role in global economic governance systems. However, the institutions comprising the global financial architecture continue

The Special Envoy for the Fourth Cyberspace Conference in Netherlands, Dr. Uri Rosenthal, says global efforts are required to help create "an open and secure internet that is an engine for growth and innovation and for the benefit of the people."

Like Chinese do now, India needs to create 'constituencies' in the neighbourhood that are not only sound but are also continuing. This is not to influence their decisions but to create institutional mechanisms that will be able to constantly update its knowledge and understanding of the existing and emerging situations.

As South Asia faces an increasingly complex and expanding disaster risk landscape, the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated the systemic gaps in risk management. There is a need for a paradigm shift in disaster risk reduction—from a single-hazard, single-sector perspective to a multi-hazard, multi-sectoral, and systemic risk perspective supported by parallel risk financing measures. This brief examines the current gaps in the efficient operatio

Considering that films and books, creator's freedom and that of the Press are not existential questions for which ready answers could still be found, whether enforceable or not, the answers too have to be in the realm of pragmatism.

The fault lies not with the game or its practitioners. It is a delightful sport, capable of arousing emotions even in the most die-hard cynic of the game. It has spawned legends, created folk tales out of ordinary mortals. And unlike football, it has never been a cause of war between two nations. This time it could.

Dr. Manmohan Singh's invitation to Pakistani President and the Prime Minister has a special relevance for a number of reasons. And Dr. Singh definitely deserves kudos for pushing the envelope for Indo-Pak peace, in spite of not being on the strongest political wicket himself.

There was space in Pakistan for open discourse upto the Zia period. It is from Zia's Pakistan that poets like Faiz Ahmad Faiz and Ahmad Faraz began to leave for other countries. From London, Farigh Bukhari wailed: "God, forgive me: these days it seems that Islam was only for tyrants and murderers like Yazid"

Immersive technology is a key part of the emerging Web 3.0. A prominent aspect of this evolution of the World Wide Web is the Metaverse, which aims to build a fully immersive and self-sustaining virtual shared space for humans to use as they would the physical world in all aspects of life. Existing concerns and debates on privacy, user protection, and the ethics of monetising platforms also extend to the Metaverse. This brief discusses the three

Obama's warning to Putin that there would be costs for the invasion of Crimea was not only empty, but the real cost in all this was to American credibility, once again. One can, therefore, expect both the US and Russia to assert their rights regardless of international law.

The Observer Research Foundation, in partnership with the Center for Contemporary Conflict (CCC), Naval Post-graduate School, California, USA, and the Islamabad Policy Research Institute (IPRI), Pakistan undertook a project, Crisis and Escalation in South Asia: The 2002 India-Pakistan Military Standoff....