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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.

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.”

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.

Alternatively, for India, BRICS remains a non-West platform as reiterated by PM Modi at the Russia summit that the organisation must not foster a notion that it seeks to replace international institutions.

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.

New Delhi has ambitious plans to bolster its armed forces with French procurements, but it is unclear how these deals are to be delivered

The Modi government should have put in place systems, structures and strategies that would make it politically very difficult for any future government to slide back to the pusillanimous policy on Pakistan.

The diversity of engagements planned during PM’s visit suggests that after a long hiatus, relations between two of the world’s oldest civilizations are on an upswing

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.

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.

The visit of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani in New Delhi this week offers an opportunity to PM Modi to recalibrate India's Afghan policy towards greater realism and more modest goals. Modi must reassure Ghani that Delhi is in a "standby" mode, ready to extend, whatever support Kabul wants and feels comfortable with.

The report prepared by National Investigating Agency (NIA) on David Coleman Headley, after interrogating him for 34 hours (June 3-9, 2010), show that he was not recruited by Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT) but by ISI to help in planning the Mumbai attack.

read5 January 2005

Pakistan is grappling with multiple challenges currently and perhaps the only silver lining on the horizon is the possibility of a deeper economic relationship with India. There were more questions than answers about the situation inside Pakistan.

The occupier observed from the sidelines. The occupied were summoned to be handed yet another promissory note, and a sustenance allowance ¿ on condition of good behaviour. The ritual was enacted, appropriately enough, in London (on March 1) where it all began nine decades earlier; it was consecrated by the august presence of United States Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice,

The Fourth Finance Commission recommended devolution comes at a critical juncture of Centre-State fiscal relations that was looking increasingly unsustainable. Yet, with it, lies a different set of challenges and the Centre is expected to play an even greater role to aid States to spend money effectively while managing newer forms of inequality that are bound to emerge out of the new direction.

PM Modi's 'Make in India' is a grand idea to reboot the ailing manufacturing sector. But the success of this programme will largely depend on creating an enabling ecosystem for manufacturing. This would require serious reforms in taxation.

The biggest challenge in dealing with terrorism is the 'double-standard' approach that many nations, including the US, at the policy-level internationally, according to Dr K V S Gopalakrishnan, former Special Director of the Intelligence Bureau (IB).

The relative calm in the major Russian cities was broken last November when a bombing attack derailed the Nevsky Express -- a high-speed train plying between Moscow and St Petersburg

For Mongolia, Russian investments & cooperation between the two nations create a more competitive market in Mongolia & reduce its dependence on Chinese exports

Our 20 most–read commentaries this year.

Announcing the deaths in Parliament nullified the goodwill the Centre had earned by engaging with the families of the missing Indians.

The recent Indian government's decision to equip 800 police stations in 80 cities with radiation monitors is a clear indication of how serious the threats posed by chemical, biological and radioactive (CBR) weapons is being taken.

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.

India is among the countries in the world that are most vulnerable to the consequences of global warming. While there are notable efforts for both mitigation and adaptation, these have failed to consider issues of gender equity even as evidence shows that women and girls bear the disproportionate burden of climate change. This is a gap that needs to be bridged, given the complex interlinkages between climate and gender that encompass livelihoods,

The India-Japan partnership has matured into an important component of the new security and economic architecture of the Indo-Pacific region. For a long time, the partnership was centered on economic matters. But it has diversified to cover a wide spectrum of interests including security, counter terrorism, sea-lanes, UN reforms, energy security and climate change.

The share of women’s cooperatives in India is just about 2.5 percent and more than half of those are dormant. Can 2025, the International Year of Cooperatives, provide the impetus for transformation?

A study undertaken by ORF on the Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS) found that there is a need to work on the loopholes of the scheme and take corrective measures for its better implementation.

The Indian parliamentary delegation's visit to Sri Lanka was not expected to fast-track a solution to the ethnic issue. Yet, it has facilitated continued Indian engagement on the subject with various stake-holders, the Government, the TNA and the UNP Opposition.

निम्न और मध्यम आय वाले देशों (LMIC) में रोज़गार सृजन और गरीबी में कमी लाने के लिए औद्योगिक विकास बेहद अहम होता है. औद्योगिक विकास से पर्यावरणीय स्थिरता में भी सुधार हो सकता है. ले

US President Donald Trump is desperate to pull American troops out of the war-torn country, even if it means clearing the way for the Taliban's ascent to power in Kabul

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is popularly known as Bangabandhu or Friend of Bengal. He became the Prime Minister of Bangladesh in 1972. He was a close friend of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

President Pranab Mukherjee's visit to Jordan, Palestine and Israel in October was different for its content and long-term implications. A careful analysis of his statements and speeches in Amman, Ramallah and Jerusalem indicates a new Indian template for its engagement with the Middle East. While some of his observations were a reiteration of the traditional Indian positions since the early 20th century, they also signal a more nuanced approach t

Mullah Omar's latest statement shows that despite his amicability to the reconciliation process, the prospects for the new Afghan president to achieve a breakthrough with the Taliban are quite remote.

Instead of dealing with the Mullaperiyar dam controversy as a geo-political conflict, it should be tackled as an institutional, legal and administrative failure in the region. Equitable distribution of the benefits of the shared resource is not an impossible task to achieve.

New security challenges confront India today. Newer areas of conflict and contestation are emerging on the horizon. These challenges call for dynamic and autonomous response mechanisms.

As the Pakistani People's Party (PPP) Government struggles to get the Reformed General Sales Tax (RGST) passed into legislation, an international team of IMF experts are scheduled to meet with political parties this week to be the mediators for a much-needed consensus.

The future of the internet is by no means simple, and that the deeper the analysis became, the more complicated it would be, according to Vint Cerf, Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist at Google.

For long we have been fed lies. Mumbai has no scarcity of houses and the key to the truth lies in using digital technology to unlock the city's housing potential.

The coordinated serial bombings in Mumbai on July 13, 2011, have raised serious questions about India's counter-terrorism (CT) policies which rely more on technology enablers and not as much on robust intelligence gathering and analysis at the local as well as national level.

The Mumbai serial train blasts that killed over 200 persons on July 11, 2006 is the most serious attack on the Indian state and its people since the attack on Parliament in December 2001. To assure the people that they will be protected, the government should immediately formulate a National Counter-Terrorism Strategy, create a separate Ministry of Internal Security affairs.