2019_5_img23_May_2019_PTI5_23_ Courtesy: India Today
21 May 2019

Elections 2019: Making India Middle Class

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The Bharatiya Janata Party, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has been returned to power for another five years, till 2024. In the run-up to the national elections, the author travelled to Bengal and Uttar Pradesh, two of India’s most important states, to gauge the mood of the electorate, and to assess the economic and political conditions on the ground since the last election in 2014. She found a new generation with big dreams, and a population whose basic needs were being met. Economic citizenry has trumped identity politics. Modi is the leitmotif for this India, and they look to him to lead them into a middle class future.

nehru Courtesy: Free Press Journal
2 May 2019

Tracing Indian merchants in Japan

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Japanese Emperor Naruhito’s coronation on May 1, marking the dawn of the Reiwa Era, is a milestone also for the Indian merchant diaspora, which began arriving during the reign of the Meiji Emperor in the 1870s. The strength of the India-Japan bilateral relationship lies in the 150-year-old narratives of these family-run firms and the success of many Indo-Japanese  collaborations

Maldives-618x412 Courtesy: Dying Regime / Flickr
25 April 2019

A power change in Maldives

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Maldives’ new president, Ibrahim Solih, has had two election wins in a span of six months – his own in September 2018 and his Maldivian Democratic Party’s landslide victory in the Majlis elections about three weeks ago. An analysis of what this win says about democratic politics in Maldives, improved relations with India and the complex equation it shares with China

Jorhat :Polling officer checking electronic voting machine (EVM) and documents after collecting from the respective center on the eve of the 1st phase of Assam State Assembly election 2016 at Jorhat in Assam on Sunday. PTI Photo(PTI4_3_2016_000067A) Courtesy: PTI
18 April 2019

The cyber security imperative for India’s elections

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The growing use of technology in the election process has made cyber security a crucial issue. Instances of the spread of fake news, manipulation of voter behaviour and hacking show how digital technology can be misused. These issues need to be addressed in the long term

IMG_20190411_090307__01__01_Norita SAN (1) Courtesy: Gateway House
11 April 2019

Japan’s Buddhist trail in Bombay

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At the turn of the 20th century, British India was home to about 3,000 Japanese expatriates, and Bombay and its presidency had well-established trade ties with Imperial Japan – until the Second World War brought it all to an end. The city never regained its substantial Japanese resident population, but the few monuments that remain point to rich political and religious linkages

e comm Courtesy: Medium
4 April 2019

A critique of India’s Draft National e-Commerce Policy

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The Draft Policy, issued by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade in February, is a welcome step for India and globally, but its all-inclusive definition of a fast, click-and-buy world requires some refining: is it intended to be an internet policy or a specific e-Commerce policy?

thediplomat-asean-flags-553x360 Courtesy: The Diplomat
28 March 2019

An ASEAN trio in transition

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Philippines, Cambodia and Lao PDR face a range of development challenges at home even as they respond dynamically to shifting priorities in external relations. With U.S.-China competition increasingly shaping this part of the world, will India provide some balance? An insider’s account of how three less noticed ASEAN countries are coping with geopolitical changes

591ba7996bbfe0287b0c8a5c01dc4a1defb31b68 Courtesy: AFP Photo/AREF KARIMI
28 March 2019

Afghanistan: Development against the odds

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The people of Afghanistan, torn by war, ethnic strife and geoeconomic contestation for their country’s rich natural resources, have paid by forsaking the assurances of daily life. But President Ashraf Ghani has shown them that normalcy can return and it is possible to hold regular elections. The author, a guest of the President and First Lady, travelled through the country in October 2018 to record her impressions of a resilient people who have reason to hope for a different future