Website articles  (73) Courtesy: AFR
2 April 2026

India’s options after the Persian Gulf war

The Persian Gulf conflict has already impacted India’s oil imports and financial security. However, India has not created meaningful options to protect itself from oil shocks over the last decade – and such shocks will continue. Now is the time for India to make equity investments in oil and gas companies in stable economies like the U.S., Canada and Australia, to protect itself from future energy crises.

Website articles  (68) Courtesy: AFP
2 April 2026

Modi’s Israel visit brings defence and tech

It is important to take an objective review of PM Modi’s visit to Jerusalem and its implications for India’s security. New Delhi will have to demonstrate its strategic autonomy by managing heterogeneous and often contrapuntal relationships and strike a balance in its ties with the U.S. and Israel on the one hand and Iran and the Arab world on the other hand.

Anjuman Atash Bahram, Mumbai, with the winged Farohar symbol at the top. Courtesy: Heritage Institute
2 April 2026

The Persian-Parsi identity

Persia and India’s impact on each other go back to antiquity, but the extent of the Persian influence on the Parsi identity is more difficult to quantify. Despite their deep cultural connection, Parsis do not identify with Iran as the mother country. Reza Shah Pahlavi, impressed with their achievements in India, wanted them to return to Iran, but they could not be enticed to leave India.

Website articles  (62) Courtesy: Gateway House
26 March 2026

Arctic politics: between competition and cooperation

The Arctic region is at the crossroads of the dramatic environmental shifts and heightened conflict that are shaping global politics today. In the region, major geopolitical events and enduring rivalries necessitate a logic of competition, yet coordination on transboundary issues remains important. This echoes the challenges facing oceans, ecosystems and planetary problems in global governance more broadly, in which political efforts yield frustratingly incremental, yet indispensable, results.

Website articles  (60) Courtesy: MSN
19 March 2026

Gulf War pinches South Asia

The war in the Persian Gulf has already caused significant disruption in India’s South Asian neighbours. A prolonged conflict is likely to push the region back into economic and political crises from which it had been hopeful of emerging this year.

Website articles  (58) Courtesy: Finland in India
19 March 2026

A significant Finnish visit

Amid the fast-changing geopolitical landscape, European Union (EU) member states seem to have rediscovered the value of close cooperation with India, an Asian power with greater ambitions. India, too, finds that growth in partnership with the EU and the UK is a source of strategic comfort. Both sides are propelled to deeper mutual policy proximity by the pressures generated by the Trump 2.0 presidency in the U.S.

Website articles  (61) Courtesy: Ruby Myers / Alchetron
19 March 2026

European Jews in Bombay’s film industry

The high point of Jewish glamour in Hindi films were led by Indian Baghdadi Jewish women – but also by German-speaking European Jewish male refugees in Bombay. Music composer-conductor-musician Walter Kaufmann, and his friend, scriptwriter Willy Haas, both German-speaking  Czech Jews, introduced a new sensibility and modern techniques into the early talkie era of Hindi cinema

Website articles  (55) Courtesy: Andreea Campeanu/Getty Images
12 March 2026

Europe’s strategic absence in West Asian conflict

The war in West Asia is crowded with armaments and players, but there is one presence that is LOB, or Left Out of the Battle: that of Europe. The Continent is peripheral in the current crisis. Structural constraints, strategic dependence on the U.S., internal political divisions, and a shift in Europe’s geopolitical priorities since the war in Ukraine, has reduced its strategic weight.

Website articles  (53) Courtesy: Gateway House
11 March 2026

Africa’s Marginalisation: How India Must Respond

Once central to global strategic discourse, the Indo-Pacific and Africa have been sidelined amid the “Age of Polycrisis,” as attention shifts to crises in Europe and West Asia. While India has long expressed goodwill toward Africa, recent regional tensions have pushed the continent off its strategic radar. Renewed India–Africa cooperation is essential to advancing the agenda of the Global South and strengthening South–South partnerships.

Website articles  (52) Courtesy: AFP
9 March 2026

Iran regime change unlikely

The U.S.–Israel war against Iran will alter the geopolitical landscape of West Asia and adversely impact the global economy, including India. Vali Nasr, Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, analyses the conflict and its implications in an exclusive conversation with Nayanima Basu.