A New Oil Rush Endangers the Gulf of Mexico and the PlanetYes, the oil spewing up from the floor of the Gulf of Mexico in staggering quantities could prove one of the great ecological disasters of human history. Think of it, though, as just the prelude to the Age of Tough Oil, a time of ever increasing reliance on problematic, hard-t
When the future of humanity is at the edge of an abyss, when 40% of the world is living below poverty lines with worsening disparity between the rich and the poor, worsening environmental damage and rapid depletion of resources, it is time to reflect. Independence from Britain heralded by the rousing speech from Prime Minister Nehru gave south Asia
After months of expected violence, the confrontation between supporters of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, ousted by a ‘coup” in 2006 organised by those who belong to what is known as the Privy Council, and the backers of the King’s keepers, erupted into a major conflict on May 19. Hundreds of Thai Army tr
Bhagur is an obscure village around 6 or 7 miles from Nashik in Western Maharashtra. It would have remained a mere speck on the map had it not been for the fact that it is the birthplace of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (b 28 May 1883). Originally from Savarwadi, a small hamlet in Guhagar tehsil in Konkan (coastal Maharashtra), Savarkar’s ancestor
Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime-minister of India, visualised his socio-political and economic insights for a future India by imbibing lessons from history. He was not a professional historian in the strict sense of the term, but he had a good sense of history and was reflective in the bulk of his literary creations and letters, including his mem
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Hari Om
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26 May 2010
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The London-based Amnesty International (AI), which has set up branches all over the world to “monitor” human rights, particularly in conflict zones, had been trying to persuade the Government of India to allow its members to visit Jammu & Kashmir to examine complaints of “human rights abuses” there since 1990, when Pakis
It is now evident that Microsoft founder Bill Gates visited India to push the odious agenda of genetic engineering in agriculture. At a famous talk show, Gates mouthed platitudes about the world being unable to feed its growing population with existing technologies. The only solution, he argued, is agricultural biotechnology, and its only masters a
On April 15, the Haitian Parliament ratified a law extending by 18 months the state of emergency that President René Préval declared after the earthquake of January 12. The Parliament also formally ceded its powers over finances and reconstruction, during the state of emergency, to a foreign-led Interim Commission for the Reconstruction o
On Tuesday [May 11], the US senate began hearings into the Deepwater Horizon disaster, which took the lives of 11 workers in an April 20 explosion and has since poured millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, threatening the region with an environmental and economic catastrophe. Appearing before the Energy and Natural Resources Comm
The concept of the “long war” has characterised military doctrine since the end of World War II. The broader objective of global military dominance in support of an imperial project was first formulated under the Truman administration in the late 1940s at the outset of the Cold War. The 2000 Project for the New American Century (PNAC),
Dana – The Prime Dharma Dana & Dharma [2] go together and we normally say “Dana Dharma” whenever we talk about seva. Dana refers only “Annadana” as denoted by the term Dharmashala. Hindu Dharma says one should even sacrifice one’s life to save another life. While helping a person, we should not look into his/
The dark ages of Islamic domination seem to be slowly seeping back into independent India. First was the Kashmiri Muslim hegemony of not allowing land and infrastructure for Hindu yatris; and now Jazia has been levied on the pilgrims and langars for the revered Amarnath Yatra. In their appeasement of Muslims, the Omar Abdullah Government and G
Dharma, Seva and the Vedic CivilisationThe Vedic civilization evolved on the banks of Sindhu and Saraswati with Dharma as the basis of evolution. Though it got the name “Hinduism” in later times, it is still denoted as Sanatana Dharma. The Itihasas and Puranas have vividly described the crushing of Adharma by different Avatars of almigh
It was amusing to see US President Barack Obama undergoing a complete flip, praising the Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who concluded his four-day trip to Washington on May 13, and seeking long-term cooperation. Last time he met President Karzai in Kabul on March 28, when he visited the Afghan capital “under the cover of darkness, it was all
On stage, it would be farce. In Afghanistan and Pakistan, it’s bound to play out as tragedy. Less than two months ago, Barack Obama flew into Afghanistan for six hours - essentially to read the riot act to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, whom his ambassador had only months before termed ”not an adequate strategi
As soon as the Second World War ended in 1945, Canada and the United States began shipping food to the hundreds of millions of people who were facing starvation as a result of the war. Unprecedented in world history, this massive program fulfilled the highest ideals for which the Western Allies had fought. Their generosity seemed to have no limit.
An investigation into the mass deaths of German prisoners at the hands of the French and Americans after World War II The closing months of World War II, well after German military personnel knew that they had lost the war, witnessed some of the most bitter resistance put up by the Wehrmacht. The soldiers of the Reich fought desperately against the
Less than three months ago, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, Commander, International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and Commander, US Forces Afghanistan (USFOR-A), unleashed amidst loud drumbeats the Operation Moshtarak. It was identified as the biggest battle of the eight-year war in the town of Marja situated in the Nad Ali district of Helmand provinc
The Report of the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities (NCRLM), also known as Ranganath Misra Commission Report, has triggered off bitter controversy in general and fear among the Hindu Scheduled Castes. The Ranganath Misra Commission has recommended reservation for Muslims and Christians on the basis of religion and deletion
The Sri Lankan connectionLate last month, Theivanayagam proclaimed in an interview to Tamil biweekly Nakkeeran that and his supporters would storm into the Kapaleeswarar Temple and capture it, as it was constructed on the ruins of a Church, which allegedly stood at the site centuries ago! As a first step, he has organized a ‘hunger strikeR
Exit John Ganesh; Enter TheivanayagamAs Dr. Arulappa’s attempt to establish the Thomas story was marred in legal tangles, the Catholic Diocese took the services of a low profile evangelist named Theivanayagam and encouraged him to spread the Thomas canard. While the court battle was going on between Arulappa and Acharya Paul (John Ganesh), Th
Wrong report and right action It was shocking to see a report (with an accompanying photograph) in The New Indian Express (3 May 2010) titled, “Stir seeking right to worship”. The report said, “Members of the ‘Federation of All Self-Respecting Tamils’ observed a fast inside the Kapaleeswarar Temple demanding right
How a Computer Program Designed to Save the Free Market Turned Into a MonsterWhile the SEC is busy investigating Goldman Sachs, it might want to look into another Goldman-dominated fraud: computerized front running using high-frequency trading programs. Market commentators are fond of talking about “free market capitalism,” but acc
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) knows that High-Frequency Trading (HFT) manipulates the market and bilks investors out of tens of billions of dollars every year. But SEC chairman Mary Schapiro refuses to step in and take action. Instead, she’s concocted an elaborate "information gathering" scheme, that does nothing to addres
The Indian media has again missed the woods for the trees. When it includes the mainstream financial newspapers, the miss appears deliberate. The moral crux of the dispute between Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Ltd and Anil Ambani’s Reliance Natural Resources Ltd - and the only issue that impacts on the public - is the cost fixed b
Judge M.L. Tahaliyani’s decision to acquit the alleged Indian collaborators of Ajmal Amir Kasab for lack of evidence reveals serious lacunas in the investigations into the terrorist attacks on Mumbai in 2008. Faheem Ansari and Sabauddin Ahmed allegedly gave logistical support for the November 26 attack by preparing maps of the terror targets
From the Renaissance to RisorgimentoConti’s vivid and enchanting description of the wealth and refinement of the Vijayanagar court and of the prosperity and beauty of the India he explored (which he reported to Pope Eugenius IV on his return to Italy) did much to motivate the West to find a new way to that Eldorado, bypassing the Islamic stat
Within the greater epic of the still largely mysterious “Indo-European” migrations, the story of the millenary bonds between the two peninsulas, one in the ocean that bears its name and the other in its Mare Nostrum, fills a particularly intriguing chapter. As is often the case, geography provides a telling heraldic shield for the legen
[On May 4, BJP spokesperson Tarun Vijay astonished Kashmiri Hindus by arriving in Srinagar and stating that the anger of the Kashmiri [read Muslim] youth needs to be channelised into employment avenues, and that the time had come for a ‘New Kashmir’ led by the youth to lead the state into an era of peace, prosperity and progress. Bringi
Just when there seemed to be a glimmer of real change in US-Russian relations - Russia giving in to the US on START and assuring the continuation of the Kyrgyz US airbase - the logic of US empire reasserts itself with a slap in the Russian face. Even Poland, Russia’s age-old nemesis, is trying to bury the hatchet, after the shocking air crash
EU Countries sinking into DepressionGovernment debt in Greece is just the first in a series of European debt bombs that are set to explode. The mortgage debts in post-Soviet economies and Iceland are more explosive. Although these countries are not in the Eurozone, most of their debts are denominated in euros. Some 87% of Latvia’s debts
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Hari Om
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04 May 2010
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Pakistan’s stand on J&K is unambiguous and Islamabad is consistent in its approach towards India. The approach is aggressive. There is no confusion at all. Pakistan considers India the root cause of all troubles in South Asia. It consistently tells the international community that J&K is a disputed territory and that it is for India t
The determined and patriotic people of Jammu observed a complete shutdown on Saturday, May 1, to press their demand for a ‘local’ as Vice Chancellor of the newly established Central University of Jammu. The bandh was voluntary and there was no coercion from the organizers, Jammu Central University Morcha to enforce the bandh. The
Today China is the world's fastest growing country in the world. 25 percent of the total world production comes from China, and its share in world trade is 6 percent. From consumer goods to power plants, China today is producing all in large quantities, and world markets are dominated by Chinese products. India has a huge trade deficit with Ch
The status of Iraq has always framed the strategic challenge of Iran. Until 2003, regional stability — such as it was — was based on the Iran-Iraq balance of power. The United States invaded Iraq on the assumption that it could quickly defeat and dismantle the Iraqi government and armed forces and replace them with a cohesive and effect
On April 9, a woman armed with a pistol and with explosives strapped to her body approached a group of police officers in the northern Caucasus village of Ekazhevo, in the southern Russian republic of Ingushetia. The police officers were preparing to launch an operation to kill or capture militants in the area. The woman shot and wounded one of the
After the Foreign Secretary level talks between India and Pakistan, the meeting between the Prime Ministers of the two countries in Bhutan, has exposed the inconsistencies in the politics followed by India in dealing with what the Indian Government has called ‘cross-border terrorism’. For quite some time, the Indian Government rep
There is an old saying that for making momentary lapses sometimes we have to suffer for centuries: Yeh jabr bhi dekha hai tareekh ki nazron neLamhon ne khata ki thi sadiyon ne sazaa payee Every time I speak about my home State of Jammu and Kashmir I wonder how long the people in New Delhi will go on making mistakes, pushing us to the brink of