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In response to increasing criticism of the existing international investment regime, various countries, including India, have been revising their model investment treaties. is paper analyses India's recently approved Model Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT). It makes an assessment of the text's practical implications from the perspective of ongoing negotiations of investment agreements with several countries, as well as India's transition towards
The Andhra Pradesh Smartcard Project was India’s first large scale attempt to implement a biometrics payment system.
With the Election Commission formally notifying the presidential polls for September 7, Maldives is gearing up to prove to itself and the rest of the world that democracy is very much at work in the Indian Ocean archipelago.
There seems to be a need for conferring permanency of sorts for the All-Party Roadmap Talks that is now headed by Ali Mujthaba Mujthaba, aimed not only at national reconciliation but even more at national consensus and consequent national reconstruction.
The People's Majlis, or Parliament's confirmation of the nomination of Vice-President Mohammed Waheed Deen have taken the punch out of the MDP's argument against the need for a constitutional amendment for facilitating early elections.
With Maldives' Election Commission setting in motion the process for holding the first round of Supreme Court-ordered re-poll for the nation's presidency, political parties and voters alike are gearing up for a repeat performance of sorts, twice in as many months.
Governments are architects designing our range of choices and social environment. Using formal behavioural science towards design, they can craft smar
There has been two political developments in Nepal of high significance in the last few days. On August 28, vice-chairman of UCPN (Maoist) Dr Baburam Bhattarai became the 35th prime minister of Nepal by a majority vote of the legislature-parliament.
At this juncture of weak economic performance, India has done well not to sign the treaty. It can still join if its main complaint about rapid tariff reduction by 80 to 90 per cent on imports from China is resolved. Also, its concerns about services have to be dealt with, especially regarding the movement of service workers within the region. India could not at this point have opened its huge market to ASEAN and China unconditionally.
IA needs a real transformation and not incremental improvement if it is to effectively take on the PRC forces
Task Force 6: Accelerating SDGs: Exploring New Pathways to the 2030 Agenda
While the recent push for MDB transformation is welcome and reform urgently needed, the IEG report’s recommendations should be evaluated more critic
Goals 4 and 5 of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) focused a great deal on maternal and child health, which has now been carried forward to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). While India made significant strides in reducing maternal and child mortality, the country did not succeed in achieving its health goals. This paper makes an assessment of the current state of Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn and Child health (RMNC
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev added some flair to the normally staid Indo-Russian diplomatic engagements by visiting the Taj Mahal and "rekindling Russia's Bollywood love affair" with a trip to a film studio in Mumbai.
When Germany headed to the polls on 24 September, there was little doubt that Merkel was poised for a comeback. As the election results began to pour
The ministers in Baburam Bhattarai cabinet resigned en masse just before midnight on May 3 to pave the way for the formation of a new national consensus government.
From initiating schemes to aid migrant workers to deciding on budget allocations, information is integral to the development of effective state respon
There is merit in collaborating with Indo-Pacific partners in the islands, but it will entail information-sharing too
Only a military approach is not enough to solve the problem of Islamic State. A crucial part of the overall strategy to deal with the IS should include creation of an inclusive state apparatus inside Iraq and Syria, felt speakers at a conference on "Transformations in West Asia: Regional Perspectives" organised at ORF.
On November 26, 2008, 10 terrorists who attacked Mumbai undid in less than 60 hours what governments of two sovereign nations had been struggling for over four years to achieve-peace and stability in the region. These terrorists were from Pakistan, recruited, trained and armed by Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT), a terrorist group with visible presence across the country.
Mission LiFE has the potential to empower women in the informal e-waste management sector as it aims to adopt sustainable waste reduction measures
Is the country’s communication system heading from free flow of information to restricted, regulated and controlled regime?
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to France, Germany and Canada beginning Thursday should help New Delhi consolidate three of India's very special relationships -with France, Germany and Canada. Modi's visit to Europe and Canada should help restore some balance to India's international engagement.
New Delhi is going through the motions of pretending everything is normal.
The best news in years is that India’s government finally seems to recognize the scale of the problems it faces.
Narendra Modi came to power with an unexceptional agenda: push economic growth; transform the infrastructure; bring about a social transformation. But this agenda appears to be in danger of being drowned out by a cacophony of voices from Hindutva organisations.
Some nuances can be captured from the opening remarks made in Sochi. Modi thanked Putin for helping India get a permanent membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. In turn, Putin noted: “Our defence ministries maintain very close contacts and cooperation. It speaks about a very high strategic level of our partnership.”
The informal nature of the summit — namely the absence of pressure involved in putting out a joint statement, among other aspects — helps create an environment for better understanding of each other’s concerns.
Despite India’s stance on the Ukraine crisis, Europe is eager to cooperate with India in different sectors.
India had several reasons to seek a quick stabilization and reaffirmation of its relationship with the UAE.
Development partnerships between countries are crucial in addressing policy challenges in the developing world. Cooperation between countries in the Global South, in particular—such as those that India engages in, under its Development Partnership Administration (DPA)—is heightening conversations around the demands of sustainability. Yet, India continues to lack an appropriate framework by which to assess its development partnerships
As usual there is speculation about the normalcy of the monsoons. A deficient monsoon this year will certainly aggravate the stress of farmers who suffered losses due to the unseasonal rains in the last winter season. It will also dent the high growth profile that India is currently enjoying. Such a situation will test Modi's ability to manage crisis.
While India was part of the Moscow Format talks, it’s also a member of the new Middle East Quad.
In agreeing to explore with Pakistan a final settlement of the Kashmir question as part of a normalisation of bilateral relations, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has pushed the India-Pakistan dialogue into what could be an exciting, if not decisive, phase.
The internal security situation in southern Thailand, which has seen a recrudescence of long dormant Muslim anger against the Government since the beginning of this year, has again taken a turn for the worse with the death of six Muslims allegedly due to firing by the security forces outside a police station in the Narathiwat province on October 25,2004,
The last surviving member of Myanmar's '30 Comrades', Ye Htut, passed away on 27 November 27, in a Yangon nursing home at the age of 92. Ye Htut was the youngest member of the '30 Comrades' and Burma Independence Army (BIA), which was led by Gen Aung San.
At the start of the republic, India found a normative voice on the global stage through its moral stand against colonialism. Now a rising India needs
It is abundantly plain that the salubrity of cities will increasingly determine ‘India’s global profile’
Under the Interim Budget, the Financial Minister has outlined a few schemes for urban development, but a more comprehensive budget would be required f
When comparing the current geopolitical landscape of Europe to the circumstances in the years following NATO’s establishment, it becomes apparent that very little has changed.
In the light of the economic climate and the government's spending capabilities, the Indian Navy needs to comprehensively review the performance of the systems it wants to acquire and its potential trade-offs, rather than accessing each technical requirement or performance need in isolation.
Biological weapons can come from naturally occurring microbes and viruses; but innovations in genomic editing are opening up new, potentially more threatening avenues for their development. These innovations can cause or spread disease or resist known therapeutic approaches. Addressing such threats of biowarfare requires obtaining reliable and informative taxonomies for the pathogens and timely and effective responses. This, in turn, calls for co
The opposition is right to demand information on the pricing. Providing information on the cost of an aircraft, its engine, missiles, radar warning receivers, radars, does not undermine the country’s security.
Once the general elections are over in India, it may be time to look inward at the existing processes and revise certain provisions to make them more meaningful and sustainable. If timely cure is not injected, it could damage the firmament of our democratic scheme.
Globally, there is an upsurge of sectarian movements and informal community-based organisations that affect the daily lives of the urban poor in the way they provide for their need of tangible goods and services.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had taken a bold step in 2006 when he constituted five working groups on Jammu and Kashmir to grab the initiative for ushering in a phase of development by creating conditions of permanent peace in the troubled state.
Noting that BRICS have a significant future, Duma Chairman Sergey Naryshkin has highlighted the need to democratise BRICS as much as possible and to promote the parliamentary dimension of the structure.
Arunachal Pradesh Governor Lt Gen. (Retd) Nirbhay Sharma says there is an urgent need for utilising the skills of trained ex-servicemen who leave the services in their prime age.
