Opening Pandora’s Box of CAA in northeast : Chakmas and Hajongs Protest in Jantar Mantar, Delhi, on January 8, 2023, against cancellation of Residential Proof Certificate (RPC) by the state government of Arunachal Pradesh. (Image Courtesy: Twitter) Home Minister Amit Shah recently claimed peace was restored, and insurgencies were resolved, in the Northeast by the Modi regime. He was[Read More…]
The whole length of the Himalayan border, not just Uttarakhand, now in news because of Joshimath disaster, faces the risk. “Multi-hazard risk is expected to increase in the Hindu Kush Himalaya( HKH),”, says a study of January 2022, by Jack Rusk et al. “Half the Himalayan population is at risk of multiple – more than one type of – natural[Read More…]
Courtesy: timesofindia.com. “Historically, people in the north-east haven’t worshipped Ram as a deity…Hundreds of saffron activists quietly hit the streets to bring the people of the north-east on the Ram page, with the BJP’s battle-cry of ‘Jai Shri Ram…’ Almost 13,000 kayrakartas RSS and its sister outfits in the north-east tried to reach as many households as possible and[Read More…]
India’s Prime Minister Modi with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Welcoming Dinner during G20 Leaders’ Summit, 15th November 2022, in Badung, Bali. (Photo | PTI) It was the first time that the two leaders publicly exchanged words since a military standoff in Galwan Valley in April 2020. “Their exchange may not indicate a return to normalcy between the two[Read More…]
The Ministry of External Affairs has done the right thing by explaining its taciturn press release on September 8 Thursday in a single sentence regarding the disengagement of troops in the area of Gogra-Hotsprings along the LAC in the Western Sector of India-China border areas. The Official Spokesman Arindam Bagchi shared on Friday more details. Broadly, a consensus reached at the 16th round of[Read More…]
This is Part-1 of a two-part article. This part shows how peace and tranquility at LAC is sought to be restored, in spite of a rare clash at Galwan last year. LAC was a rare border where not a single shot was fired, and none killed, in over four decades despite it being a disputed border. It further shows how[Read More…]
China’s alleged cyber-attacks on Indian power facilities is the latest sensational story featured in the Indian media, print and electronic, not to speak of the wild social media. For those who do not read the small print, it is taken for granted that the “wily Dragon” was, as usual, out to undermine India. “Misinformation refers to false or out-of-context information[Read More…]
The reduction of military tensions in Pangong Tso has become a matter of heartburn for sections of the media and the fraternity of India’s ‘China hands’ — and possibly, hawkish elements within the establishment — who scoff at the very notion of peaceful resolution of territorial differences with China now or ever. What we see is a calibrated attempt to[Read More…]
India also has a powerful pro-American lobby clamouring for “forever wars”. Sinophobia feeds into it seamlessly. This lobby will only gain ascendancy, as India develops a defence industry and the corporate interests and their eventual nexus with the defence establishment come into full play, inevitably, in the domain of foreign and security policies. *** The Washington-based Quincy Institute, arguably the[Read More…]
After reading Bharat Dogra’s article “ For De-Escalation on India-China Border, Government Needs Wider Support of the Opposition”- February 14, 2021 in counter currents, I would like to share my views on this issue. The 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and India in 2020 has proven to be a challenging time for the bilateral relationship. Signs[Read More…]
In difficult times one good news that has emerged recently relates to some progress on de-escalation on India-China borders. As several knowledgeable observers have pointed out, we should not hasten to celebrate peace too soon as there are several uncertainties. Nevertheless any turn for the better in de-escalation is certainly welcome , and both the involved governments, their advisers and[Read More…]
In September 11, both India and China optimistically agreed to reduce tensions, caused by China’s occupation of Indian lands, with a joint statement in Moscow made by the foreign ministers of respective parties on the need to achieve results through negotiations and military de-escalation. In actual fact, the recent Sino-India border clashes, which started between the two Asian nuclear armed[Read More…]
There have been several rounds of talks between India and China but peace on the border continues to be more elusive. It is because we are trying to deal with the consequence of the conflict without trying to address its cause. It is intriguing why China suddenly turned so hostile despite Modi-Jinping unprecedented bonhomie. The cause of 1962 war was[Read More…]
For the much of human history on planet earth – till the 18th century – India and China were the two largest economies in the world, who periodically interchanged the top position amongst themselves. This was mainly possible because of the ‘blessing from the heights’: first, the Tibetan Plateau – the largest water tank in the world from which[Read More…]
The US efforts to ruffle-feathers with China does not seem to cease as US has sent its senior Keith Krach to Taipei, the capital of Taiwan on September 17, 2020, as the reports published in The NewYorkTimes 1 informs. This visit was destined to become controversial as it is a well known fact that any US meddling inside Taiwan irks[Read More…]
The two world largest armies and unarguably the Asian largest economy and the third largest economy China and India seem determined to undermine each other in this seemingly uneasy scenario which tends to build around these two countries. There is an uneasy chill in the mountains as both the nations are into building their ‘military-build-ups’ to outdo each other, and[Read More…]
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has announced to make Gilgit-Baltistan, a part of the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir, as the fifth province of Pakistan on September 17, 2020, making it the new hot spot in the region. India retorted by saying that ‘Government of Pakistan or its judiciary has no locus-standi on territories illegally and forcibly occupied by it. India[Read More…]
The situation between China-India and with India-Pakistan is now into an extremely sensitive zone as there is a report for the first time from the Indian army, though through a retired Brigadier, that ‘Indian army fully geared to fight full-fledged war in eastern Ladakh even in winters’, in Times of India on September 16, 20201 , (Retd) Brig Hemant Mahajan[Read More…]
When Indian defense minister Rajnath Singh declared on record, in parliament, that China is illegally occupying 38,000 sq. kms of land in Ladakh 1 and eyeing further 90,000 sq. kms in Arunachal Pradesh, which China calls as South Tibet, India had made it clear to the world, about the expansionist designs of China and to which India is ready to[Read More…]
When India’s external affairs minister S Jaishankar and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, met in Moscow on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation on September 10, 2020, and issued a joint-statement, the peace-lovers had a sigh of relief as it signalled towards a significant de-escalation between the two countries, but on the contrary the situation is by all standards[Read More…]
The Line of Actual Control (LAC) at Pangong Tso remains poised on a razor’s edge. India- China animosity is high, mutual trust is nonexistent, and all past agreements and mechanisms that provided the basis for managing the border dispute have gone for a toss. The situation is slipping fast towards a point of no return, but a war that looks[Read More…]
Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (R) meets with Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar on the sidelines of a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Council of Foreign Ministers in Moscow, Russia, on September 10, 2020. (Photo: Xinhua) India and China have agreed to ratchet down tensions that have been building along the disputed Chinese-Indian border, leading[Read More…]
India’s war with China is getting more and more imminent, as what has finally come out, after the talks between India’s defence minister Rajnath Singh and his Chinese counterpart Wei Fenghe in Moscow, it has become clear that situation is clearly heading for a deadlock 1. India in a true case of running with a hare and hunting with a[Read More…]
India which is already bogged down by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic as its economy is into a ‘meltdown’, right now is in quite a piquant position as the likelihood of a conflict now only on Line of Actual Control (China) but a conflict on Line of Control (Pakistan) is almost waiting to happen. Going by the details, it[Read More…]
Co-Written by Tenzin Tsundue and Sandeep Pandey India has a cancerous wound around its Himalayan neck and this has been literally a pain in the neck ever since India’s humiliating defeat during the Chinese invasion of India in 1962. The recent Galwan Valley massacre only added salt to the wound. It has come to this because when China invaded the[Read More…]
Photo Courtesy: India Today All the news of de-escalation between China and India, has turned out to be farce, as the heat which began in May 2020, and which reached its height on June 15, 2020, in which India lost 20 soldiers in Galwan valley, in Ladakh, has refused to cease, despite India having sat with China over ‘rounds-of-talks’. All[Read More…]
The developments in world polity took to a storm when on August 14, 2020, United Arab Emirates(UAE) and Israel decided to normalise their relations 1 , with Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) forcing Pakistan to repay its 1 billion USD loan and stopping oil supplies on deferred loan to it, which Pakistan repaid after China provided with 1 billion USD[Read More…]
The China-Pakistan ‘hand in hand’ against India has now come all out in the open after the USNews.com 1 on August 6, 2020, published an elaborate report as to how China and Pakistan have started an unprecedented intelligence sharing in an attempt to secure Beijing influence in Afghanistan at the expense of US government which is now to withdraw from[Read More…]
The Galwan valley violent clash on June 15th in the eastern Ladakh borders of India and China, has triggered an emotionally charged situation in the country. With the hike in military activity and occasional clashes occurring between two militaries in Pangong Tso (lake) area from May 5th this year, the peace and tranquillity at borders of India and China was[Read More…]
The heat around the Himalayas is getting hard and talks between India-China have as yet only failed and it is now for India to finally take-on China on its own, as hours before Rafale jets were to arrive at the Land of Jaguars, Ambala, India banned 47 more Chinese applications on July 28, 2020 in continuation to the already banned[Read More…]
The events unfolding in terms of military deployment and military exercises by US in South China sea are a clear sign that any small spark is to lead to triggering a war between US and China as US is slated for its elections where Trump wants to hone a point to US citizens that in order to contain China all[Read More…]
At the end of the Cold War in 1990, we all heaved a big sigh of relief, as the two superpowers didn’t destroy themselves and the world! What was seemingly “inevitable” – the Third World War – didn’t take place. Despite having some major military conflicts and proxy wars between the Western and Communist blocs – the Korean, Vietnam, Cambodian,[Read More…]
There is a new body-posturing everyday by China over the parts of India, some already under its control in Ladakh, and China is now putting claim over Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim, and in the middle of this unfolding conflict India has lost 20 of its soldiers on June 15, 2020 1 who were unarmed 2 and succumbed to the[Read More…]
(This is Part- 4 of the series on India-China Relations. Part-3 was published on July 17, 2020 : Oppose US Moves To Drag India-China Conflict Into Its Indo-Pacific Strategy.) “The CIA goal was never independence for Tibet. In fact, I do not think that the Americans ever really even wanted to help.They just wanted to stir up trouble, using Tibetans[Read More…]
As if the Chabahar debacle was not enough, as Iran scrapped its deal with India and instead entered into a 400 billion USD deal with China, that Iran has also now decided to keep India ‘out’ from Gas Field Right Exploration by saying that India would be involved ‘appropriately’ at some later stage 1. Bad news for India. One thing[Read More…]
Human Rights violation in Tibet is a bogey. It is an alibi for interference by US. PM Modi had said, less than one year ago, that the Mahabalipuram (Chennai) summit (Oct 11-12, 2019) had begun “a New Era of Cooperation between the two countries”. He had famously said, about his[Read More…]
The recent standoff between Chinese and Indian forces at Line of Actual Control in Ladakh has again brought the focus to the disputed region of Jammu and Kashmir. Ladakh is part of the larger Kashmir region which has been a matter of dispute between three nuclear armed nations. The region has again been the theater for disturbances but this time[Read More…]
What has triggered the on-going Indo-China face-off , if not its roots are to be found in August 5, 2019 when BJP led NDA-2 abrogated J&K Article 370 and made Ladakh a UT, inviting snarls from China. It may be pertinent to recall China’s sensitivity towards Ladakh, when only a month before Chinese forces had intruded 6 kms inside Ladakh[Read More…]
The Kashmiri word galwan is quite riveting. In common idiom, it has an unsavoury connotation laced with an overwhelming pejorative sentiment. Anyone described as a galwan would be uncouth both in visual representation and in deed, provoking an insalubrious characterisation in mind. Another meaning is to describe somebody who possesses a clamorous voice. But that is not what galwan is[Read More…]
In BJP led NDA-1 Narendra Modi was quite much on a whirlwind tour of the world. It is estimated that by July 2020 he had visited 60 countries with many countries a couple of times 1 , US being the exception where he visited 6 times, the place where once he was banned to enter and he visited China 5[Read More…]
War between India and China is on the cards. Though there is a retreat on both sides for the time being there is every possibility that war would break out any time in future. Unlike a war between India and Pakistan or with any other neighbouring country war with China will have to be fought on two fronts. One, the[Read More…]
To: The President of India The Prime Minister of India The Raksha Mantri Chief of the Defence Staff Chief of the Army Staff Chief of the Naval Staff Chief of the Air Staff We, the signatories, are all Veterans of the Indian Armed Forces, who have served in the defence of our nation in various ranks and appointments in peacetime[Read More…]
Hindustan wrote editorially on July 7 that there are indications of improvement in Indo-China tension. It further says that even if China has retreated from Galwan, we should not be in hurry to reciprocate. Its claim on Bhutanese territory is also in news. Many defence experts are also talking in the same vein. And many liberals go to the extent[Read More…]
After five decades of status quo in their unresolved border issue, India and China have locked horns again, this time at Galwan Valley. With the first casualties in nearly 53 years, this face off is essentially becoming a cause for concern among people. While the BJP-led government is out to squeeze the last drop of publicity through their toxic ultra-nationalism,[Read More…]
As news reports are coming that China is disengaging its forces from the Line of Actual Control (LAC), the words of former National Security Advisor Shivsankar Menon comes as a handy quote. The former Ambassador to China says; China moves two steps forward and then takes one step backward, having a net gain of one step, each time it withdraws[Read More…]
LiedAbout Wars “Advertising campaigns, marketing schemes. The target is public opinion. Wars are sold the same way cars are, by lying.In August 1964, President Lyndon Johnson accused the Vietnamese of attacking two U.S. warships in the Tonkin Gulf.Then the president invaded Vietnam, sending planes and troops. He was acclaimed by journalists and by politicians, and his popularity sky-rocketed. The Democrats[Read More…]
As India and China squabble over a tiny but strategic strip of land along their long border, some may be tempted to classify this as a clash between a democracy and a communist dictatorship. And yet, a closer look reveals that India is not much of a democracy anymore – with rampant state repression, subversion of institutions, mass surveillance and[Read More…]
Amid India-China border standoff, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday made a “surprise” visit to Leh and indirectly referred to China by saying that “the era of expansionism is over”. Making a mountain out of a molehill, the mainstream media used the occasion to indulge in an act of hero-worship. It turned blind to critical questions and concerns raised by the[Read More…]
As a retaliatory measure consequent to ‘Galwan Valley’ aggression, the Government of India invoked Sec.69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and banned 59 smart phone applications which include the most popular ‘ TikTok’, ‘Cam Scanner’ etc. The reasons cited was that these apps pose threat to sovereignty and integrity of India as per credible inputs received by the government.[Read More…]
“It was a time when the unthinkable became the thinkable and the impossible really happened” ― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things India’s Galwan Debacle Recently, in a gun-less fistfight (sort of) between India and China in the Galwan Valley, a stretch of land that divides China’s autonomous region of Tibet from India, 20 Indian soldiers were killed by[Read More…]
This is Part-3 of an article on India China after Faceoff of June 15. Read Part1, published on June 27,2020 with this title: Blaming PM Modi Now for “Surrender to China” is Nothing but Competing in Jingoism. And part-2published on June 28,2020: Is it PM’s surrender to China ? Or is it subservience to US Strategy of Congress and others? [Read More…]
We understand war through the sound of bullets and the sight of dead bodies of soldiers. If someone asks the people of the border areas, many facets of the war will be revealed, beyond media coverage, official reports, and hyped-up patriotism. War can sometimes take the form of a flash flood or that of a drought. These are not wars[Read More…]
This is part-2 of an article on India-China face-off, after the violent clash of June 15 night. Read Part1, published on June 27,2020 with this title: Blaming PM Modi Now for “Surrender to China” is Nothing but Competing in Jingoism. Now it’s BJP Vs Congress War of words on China that tops headlines, exposed Part-1. That focused on the hypocritical,[Read More…]
This is part-1 of an article on India-China face-off, after the violent clash of June 15 night. This focuses on the hypocritical,mutual blame game to deceive people and incite jingoism, presently targeting China. Now it’s BJP Vs Congress War of words on China that tops headlines. But both maintain relations, fairly long and deep, not only with China, but China[Read More…]
During the Chinese revolution, progressive forces of the world lent every possible support to it. At that time, it was widely believed that most of the Chinese people consumed opium and were always in a stupor. Additionally the country’s economy lay totally shattered. It was said that the people in China went to the market with a bag full of[Read More…]
If questioning Narendra Modi Government by the opposition parties about the “sensitive” border dispute with China amounts to “demoralizing” the nation and its soldiers, is the ruling BJP ready to apply the same yardstick to its ideologue Deendayal Upadhyaya who slammed the Jawaharlal Nehru regime during the Sino-India conflict? In the late 1950s when India-China relations were fast deteriorating,[Read More…]
Mao Zedong, first president of the People’s Republic of China, had designs on “reclaiming” territories to the west of China, by placing the “Chinese hand” over the region. Tibet was likened to the palm of the hand, and the fingers were Ladakh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim and NEFA (now Arunachal Pradesh), spanning across the whole Himalayan range. Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim and[Read More…]
Sadly, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the gander In dealing with the issues of national or international implications, it makes sense for the governments to calibrate official responses with an eye on the strengths and weaknesses of the adversary. However, it’s important to distinguish that sort of an approach from the one where responses[Read More…]
An unprovoked attack by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China led to the death of twenty Indian soldiers in the Galwan valley in Eastern Ladakh on June 15. This led to a nationwide furore and the opposition leaders accused the government for remaining silent on the ongoing border crisis with China for over a month. It all started with[Read More…]
On the evening of 15th June news began coming in of a commanding officer and two Indian soldiers having died in some remote area of Ladakh, in what appeared the most barbaric way. But, there was more to come. By midnight the ferocious, cave age encounter with stones, batons filled with nails and rods began emerging and the news of[Read More…]
India was constructing some activities along its side of line of actual control in the Galvan valley and this Galvan Valley there was no real dispute on this. It was for long considered to be part of Indian territory. There was no such real dispute on the Galvan valley. But for the first time in more than four and[Read More…]
The death of 20 soldiers on the Indo Chinese border at the LAC during the ‘de-escalation’ of the forces is shocking to say the least. The incident is reported to be of 15-16th June night and as per reports not a single bullet was fired. The government did not say anything except that during the day the army made a[Read More…]
Things along the Indian-Chinese border in the Himalayas have rarely lacked interest, notably along the secretive, heavily patrolled 3,488 km Line of Actual Control. Neither China nor India have ever quite sorted out their differences on that front, plagued by territorial claims over unclearly demarcated boundaries. The administration of Narendra Modi might well have wooed global governments, but China’s Xi[Read More…]
Three Indian soldiers were killed during a “violent face-off” with Chinese troops along the Line of Actual Control in eastern Ladakh. The incident occurred during a “deescalation process” underway in the Galwan Valley in the disputed Aksai Chin-Ladakh area, where a large troop build up has reportedly been taking place for weeks now on both sides of the border, before[Read More…]
Bill to recognize TAR (Tibet) as an ‘independent country’ introduced in US House of Representatives on May 19, 2020. “There has been pressure on India by USA …to come down heavily on China… US pressure regarding Taiwan, Tibet…ThePrint, 13 May, 2020. World should give recognition to Taiwan and Tibet -Comment in wionews.com, May 20, 2020. “Join anti-China global platform… Revise[Read More…]
Co-Written by Abhay Jain and Sandeep Pandey Unable to resolve its border disputes with Pakistan and China, India has now managed to create a dispute with Nepal in the process of building a road to Kailash Mansarovar in Tibet through areas which are claimed by Nepal. History has taught us that such disputes will require disproportionate attention and resources and[Read More…]
With the return of troops from front lines and end of confrontation at LAC, with statement from China that ‘Positive Consensus’ with India over border dispute, it is evident that diplomatic relations, though primarily were appeared weak, but seem to be on track again, however this episode also has given an insight to both sides that hope exists in strengthening[Read More…]
This is part-3 of a Report on the subject. Now that military delegations of a higher level held talks on June 6 and, as reported in Part-2, published on June 8, “agreed to peacefully resolve the situation in the border areas”, the issues involved may be understood in an objective and cool manner.This part also deals with a “strategic policy[Read More…]
This is part-2 of a Report on the subject, briefly covering talks held and touching on some significant issues involved. Part-1 was published on June 5 : Flood of Misinformation on the eve of India China Talks.Indian media in all languages is carrying on a jingoistic propaganda on China’s intrusions into Indian borders, almost all along the LAC, it was[Read More…]
“My enemy’s enemy is my friend, come to Jammu and Kashmir and realise its intensity among the ordinary people living near the border with China. The land beneath you will feel like it has slipped away”. This is the observation of many analysts in South Asia who have reported the strong indignation of locals against Indian establishment in the context[Read More…]
India’s Lt General Harinder Singh is slated to meet his Chinese counterpart on June 6 as part of efforts to sort out the weeks-long row along the LAC, said Lt Gen (Retired) SL Narasimhan, a China expert, and now a Member of NSA Advisory Board. It will be the highest level of talks between the two in recent past.[Read More…]
(Slowly increasing border problem may be a fore runner of a limited border engagement similar to 1962 clash which had a basis other than the disputed demarcation line!) There is a media hype on the Chinese side regarding possibility of a border clash in the Doklam plateau. Some reports have even suggested the possibility of a clash within two weeks![Read More…]
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Our beloved K.P.Sasi is no more. Filmmaker, cartoonist, writer, mentor, friend and above all tireless activist championing the cause of every underdog, Sasi breathed his last, mid-afternoon this Christmas day – after battling a medical condition for months. I remember the last time I met him, almost exactly a month before he passed away, at the ayurvedic healing center in[Read More…]
