Asian Lite News Archive

Category: Opinion

  • A face of modern Islam in the Arab world

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    By Tarun Basu  The Arab world is in a bloody ferment. The Yemen conflict is just the latest in the upsurge in regional unrest, compounded by the spread of extremist forces with their violent ideologies that threaten to take the region and beyond into a vortex of uncertainty. This may have unpredictable – and possibly…

  • Baltimore: A problem of lawless law enforcement?

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    By Arun Kumar  US President Barack Obama has called for some “soul-searching” and Hillary Clinton described it as “a tragedy that demands answers”, but what happened in Baltimore in the aftermath of a black man’s death points to a much larger problem. Monday’s eruption in Baltimore, less than an hour’s drive from the American capital,…

  • 38 Indian cities in high risk earthquakes zones

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     At least 38 Indian cities lie in high-risk seismic zones and nearly 60 percent of the subcontinental landmass is vulnerable to earthquakes. Barring rare exceptions, such as the Delhi Metro, India’s hastily-built cities are open to great damage from earthquakes. The earthquake that devastated Nepal  and jolted northern India, damaging buildings as far apart as…

  • Why target only India for rapes:Danish designer-writer

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      By Ranjana Narayan   Why target only India for rapes, they happen all over the world, says Danish designer-turned writer Inger Solberg, who has come out with her first book “Pushpa”, a vibrant account of her life in India, which she has made her home for the past 15 years. Solberg, who loves India and…

  • Is moving from farms to factories the answer?

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    By Amulya Ganguli  The stir against land acquisition took a tragic and macabre turn when a farmer hanged himself during an Aam Admi Party (AAP) rally in the heart of the national capital. The mortifying episode only showed how the political exploitation of a complex problem was diverting attention from what really needed to be…

  • Indian media’s lack of intrest in world affairs

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    By Saeed Naqvi Werner Adam, the late foreign Editor of Frankfurter Allgemeine, used to tell me a story about his meeting in Moscow with India’s ambassador, T.N. Kaul. Kaul had barely started his conversation with Adam when his secretary tip toed in and handed Kaul a slip of paper. “Dobrynin on the line,” Kaul whispered…

  • US seeks ‘rebalance’ in Asia

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    By Arun Kumar  Citing President Barack Obama’s historic “good trip” to India in January, US officials have said that different partnerships it’s forging across Asia can contribute to the stability and prosperity of the broader region. In a conference call on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s state visit next week, Deputy National Security Advisor Ben…

  • Warnings over bringing back 66A

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    By Aparna Kalra  Jadavpur University professor Ambikesh Mahapatra is still anxious a month after the Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional a controversial law that led to his arrest for e-mailing a cartoon mocking West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. On April 27, his lawyer will rise in a court in Kolkata and ask that…

  • India’s inevitable rise to the top

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    Bhim D. Asdhir writes on India’s rise top in world affairs in UK’s leading newspaper Asian Lite. India’s meteoric rise to global prominence is inevitable. Perhaps, US President Barack Obama, writing in Time Magazine on April 16, puts India’s and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rise to prominence best: “Today, he’s the leader of the world’s…

  • Modi’s stewardship in confronting climate change

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    Rajendra Shende,an IIT-alumni, is chairman of the TERRE Policy Centre and former director UNEP writes about Modi’s stewardship on confronting climate change in UK’s leading Asian paper the Asian Lite. US President Barack Obama, in his 166-word eulogy in Time magazine that named Prime Minister Narendra Modi among the 100 most influential people in the…

  • “The Shortcut To Deradicalization Is The Long Road”

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      By Alon Ben-Meir Every Arab state, regardless of the extent to which it is involved in combating violent extremism, must recognize that there is no shortcut to defeating this scourge, and those who are looking for quick fixes are in for a rude awakening. Whereas military force is selectively necessary to destroy irredeemably ruthless…

  • Govt must not be a tax bully

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    By Venkatachari Jagannathan  Even as the central government has decided to review the new norms to file income tax returns barely three days after it was notified, due to widespread angst, experts termed the original proposal nothing but “tax terrorism” unleashed on honest tax payers. “This is real tax terrorism. This does not target corrupt…

  • Net neutrality in India is still a myth

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    By Aparajita Gupta  Amid the raging debate globally over net neutrality, which has evoked a strong reaction from stakeholders in India, domain experts feel that an unshackled access to the Internet world isn’t feasible in India yet but attempts must continue for egalitarianism. “Building a net neutral network is technologically not possible to implement. It’s…

  • India & Social Progress Index

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    India ranks 101th in the Social Progress Index among 133 countries, lower than even Nepal. Saeed Naqvi analyses the plight of the new world power  The embarrassing news that India ranks 101th in the Social Progress Index among 133 countries, lower than even Nepal, may well be the right occasion to narrow the focus on states which…

  • Has Rahul shot himself in the foot?

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    By Amulya Ganguli Unlike the Biblical tale of a prodigal son, the return of a foot-loose family member may not be a cause of great joy to his relatives. In Rahul Gandhi’s case, it can be a source of embarrassment and misgivings. The embarrassment is likely to be caused by speculation about where the not-so-young…

  • Masrat Alam a rock stuck in Mufti’s throat?

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    By Sheikh Qayoom   Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Muhammad Sayeed’s decision to “provide democratic space to separatist politics” by releasing Masrat Alam has badly backfired. Instead, the decision had made hardline positions on two sides even harder. Alam’s arrest in 2010 was “a hard earned success” for the security forces as the intelligence agencies…

  • The humanitarian crisis at Yarmouk

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    By Dr Omar Gabbar writes about life in Yarmouk, the Palestinian refugee camp on the outskirts of Damascus in Syria. In recent months and years, the name ‘Yarmouk’ has come to be a byword for suffering. A Palestinian refugee camp on the outskirts of Syria’s capital Damascus, its population has variously been ignored, starved, bombed…

  • Modi Projecting a self-confident India

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    By Ranjana Narayan    Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s three-nation tour was marked by several high points – the surprise announcement on purchase of 36 Rafale fighter jets in France, clinching a five-year uranium supply deal with Canada, pushing the Make in India initiative in Germany, assuring all of the ease of doing business in India, not…

  • Out with the truth on Netaji’s death

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    Angry and shocked over the alleged snooping on Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’ family by successive Congress governments, concerned citizens here termed it a “national shame” and demanded to know the truth that is purportedly buried in secret government files. United in rage, a large section of eminent personalities and commoners alike have called for the…

  • Gandhi bastions in UP fall on bad times

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    By Mohit Dubey  Having basked in envious glory for the past few decades, the Gandhi bastions of Rae Bareli and Amethi in Uttar Pradesh seem to have fallen on bad times after the ascendancy of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government at the centre. With the union government red-flagging an ambitious mega food park project…

  • ‘Tory vision good for BAMEs’

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      By Amandeep Singh Bhogal, Conservative Candidate for Upper Bann, in Northern IrelandOn May 7, this country will face the most important general election of a generation. The choice is clear: between a competent Conservative Party that is working through a plan to build a brighter future for you, your family and Britain – regardless…

  • Hillary Vs the rest

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    By Arun Kumar   The US presidential race took off with Hillary Clinton finally jumping into the fray with an aura of inevitability, but that analysts suggested may turn out to be the former secretary of state’s biggest handicap. In her second bid to break the glass ceiling and return to the White House, the former…

  • Gujarat, Delhi or Tripura?

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    By Saeed Naqvi The embarrassing news that India ranks 101th in the Social Progress Index among 133 countries, lower than even Nepal, may well be the right occasion to narrow the focus on states which might be examined as milestones. This examination will have to be done by serious social scientists. An itinerant journalist can…

  • CPI-M work out plan to strengthen party

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    By Mohammed Shafeeq   The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) will chalk out a strategy to rebuild and strengthen the party besides electing a new general secretary at its 21st Congress, beginning here. Sitaram Yechuri, member of the party’s outgoing central committee, is tipped to take over from Prakash Karat, who has been at the helm…

  • Rahul’s absence puts question marks?

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    By Prashant Sood   Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s long “leave of absence” appears to have accentuated the debate in the Congress on his possible elevation with clear differences among party leaders on the issue. While a section wants him to assume the mantle at the earliest, there are leaders who want party president Sonia Gandhi to…

  • Rise and fall of Ramalinga Raju

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    By Mohammed Shafeeq He was once considered the IT czar and the Bill Gates of Andhra Pradesh, who founded and built Satyam into one of the top IT companies in India. B. Ramalinga Raju even shared the dais with Bill Clinton when the then US president visited Hyderabad in 2000. A special CBI court on…

  • The actions of ISIS are an indignity to Muslims around the world

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      Imam Qari Asim MBE – Imam at an award-winning mosque, Leeds’ Makkah Masjid and Senior Editor at Imamsonline.com If anyone had doubts as to the level of depravity ISIS will resort to, then daily examples of murder, rape, slavery, torture and now destruction of religious and cultural heritage will give a glimpse of what…

  • NRI Preet Bharara: World’s sheriff or ambitious manipulator?

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    BY Arun Kumar The enviable record of Wall Street’s Indian-American prosecutor Preet Bharara, known in India for his dogged prosecution of an Indian diplomat, has put him in the limelight, but some have also questioned his methods. Time magazine put him on the cover and Vanity Fair described him as “Wall Street’s most fearsome foe”.…

  • Kejriwal chose victory over party

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    By M.R. Narayan Swamy  From the happenings of recent weeks, it will be tempting to deduce that Arvind Kejriwal is a Stalinist who, like all autocrats, hates democracy and dissension and loves yes-men. That’s what Prashant Bhushan will want us to believe. But the stormy story of the Aam Aadmi Party’s internal crisis is far…

  • Likud’s Victory Is Israel’s Defeat

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    The Europeans, Americans, and Palestinians, who have had extensive experience with Netanyahu throughout the peace process, fully recognize his duplicity. He has lost every grain of credibility and no one will trust that he will negotiate in good faith in the future …writes Dr. Alon Ben-Meir Those of us who regularly observe and try to…

  • India must be wary of Tamil extremism in Lanka

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    By M.R. Narayan Swamy  As Prime Minister Narendra Modi begins to build a relationship with Sri Lanka’s new leadership, the one thing he needs to be wary of is the extremist Tamil position in the island nation. Modi made history by becoming the first Indian prime minister to visit Sri Lanka after 1987 when Rajiv…

  • A lot at stake in region and beyond

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    By Hardeep S.Puri and Omar El Okdah  In contemporary politics, the flow of historical forces cannot be understood by glimpsing a mere snapshot. The unprecedented fourth-term election of Benjamin Netanyahu is indeed a significant event in itself. He will now go down in Israeli history as the longest serving head of government. It is the…

  • Modi’s modernity vs saffron orthodoxy

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    By Amulya Ganguli  Historian Ayesha Jalal has writen in her latest book, “The Struggle for Pakistan”, that “at the root of Pakistan’s national identity crisis has been the unresolved debate on how to square the state’s self-proclaimed Islamic identity with the obligations of a modern nation-state”. The same problem has begun to affect the reputation…

  • ‘Bibi Reveals His Duplicity’

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    By Alon Ben-Meir In a follow-up question to the statement that Prime Minister Netanyahu made during an interview with the Israeli website NRG–in which he stated that “I think that anyone who moves to establish a Palestinian state and evacuate territory, gives territory away to radical Islamist attacks against Israel”–he was asked if that meant…

  • Diversification of army helped Indian democracy

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      India’s well-timed decision post independence to control and diversify its army helped preserve its democracy, or it could have ended up like Pakistan which has seen three army coups post independence. Yale university professor Steven I. Wilkinson, in his book “Army and Nation: How India’s Founders Made its Army Safe for Democracy” – writes…

  • ‘Shameful attacks send the wrong message’

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      What stops a prime minister like Narendra Modi, who has a strong mandate, to put a full stop on attacks on Christians in India, ask community leaders in the country, adding that it sends a wrong message to the world about India. “It seems that nobody is interested in stopping attacks on Christians in…

  • Modi endorses a Blue Revolution

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    By C. Uday Bhaskar  The three island-nation trip that took Prime Minister Modi to Seychelles, Mauritius and Sri Lanka in mid-March may well mark the beginning of India’s long-overdue maritime awakening. For a nation so richly endowed with a distinctive maritime geography, the paradox has been the tenacious indifference, often veering towards inexcusable sea-blindness, that…

  • Spectrum demystified

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    By Aparajita Gupta   The issue of spectrum has been in news in India with unfailing frequency in recent times, for reasons both right and wrong. What does this term mean? How does it affect lives, yours and mine? A primer: Radio frequency spectrum is a band of electromagnetic airwaves, used to transmit signals. It can…

  • Modern Feminism Is ‘Ageist’: Germaine Greer

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    Germaine Greer has criticised modern feminism as “ageist” and says that society has “no respect” for older women. The 76-year-old academic and feminist was speaking as part of a panel discussion at Sydney Opera House to mark International Women’s Day reported Huffington Post. Greer said that feminism focusses too much on the issues facing younger…

  • India’s Daughter: A Note of Dissent

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      By Rajeev Poduval The government of India recently banned the documentary film Storyville: India’s Daughter by British filmmaker Leslee Udwin breathing life into an international discussion on the supposedly growing connoisseurship of rape and violence against women in the country. Undoubtedly, the brutality the film depicts is gruesome and raw. As the film takes…

  • What influenced Rajan’s rate cuts?

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    By Biswajit Choudhury  The second unscheduled cut  – within two months – in the repo rate at which the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) lends to commercial banks was not as unexpected as the first in January. Indeed, it could even be called expected after the weekend’s historic announcement by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in…

  • Invite the world to fight ISIS

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    By Saeed Naqvi West Asia becomes more mysterious by the minute. Who is fighting whom on whose behalf? The lines were always blurred. Now they are more so. Iraq’s army has just shot down two British planes as they were carrying weapons to the ISIS in Al Anbar province. How do we know this to…

  • Changing American views on Israel

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    By Saeed Naqvi  To win the March 17 Israeli elections or to postpone them , Benjamin Netanyahu is turning heaven and earth. Last month’s Israeli air strikes killed six Hezbollah commanders and an Iranian general in the Syrian town of Quneitra. The purpose was to invite retaliation. Warlike atmosphere would block Secretary of State John…

  • Rahul the fugitive prince

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    By Amulya Ganguli  There may be a deeper and more unsettling reason for Rahul Gandhi’s present farewell to active politics than the explanation that he has gone away to mull over the factors which led to the Congress’s recent electoral reverses. Even the reticent and reclusive heir apparent cannot be unaware that a spell far…

  • It all started from 1967 war

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    By Vikas Datta Wracked by insurrection and terrorism, the Middle East is going through a traumatic time but most of its problems can be traced to one short war between Arabs and Israelis nearly half a century ago, says a Pulitzer Prize-winning American historian who spent his formative years in the region. “The Middle East…

  • India overpower South Africa at the MCG

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    By Veturi Srivatsa   It is natural to go ga-ga over India’s victory over South Africa at the MCG  — because this is the first time they have beaten the Proteas in a World Cup match after losing at all their three previous meetings. Yet, to disprove the critics, India have done everything they looked incapable…

  • BJP feels the pinch in Maharashtra

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    By Quaid Najmi As the second alliance government of the BJP-Shiv Sena combine, formed in Maharashtra after a brief period of bickering between the partners of 25 years, completes 75 days in power, it is clear that the Shiv Sena has sharpened its attack on the BJP. The short journey since Dec 5 has already…

  • AAP now dream Uttar Pradesh

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    By Mohit Dubey   After winning the assembly elections in Delhi hands down, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has set its eyes on Uttar Pradesh — the country’s politically most crucial state. The state had slipped out of the party’s radar following the initial euphoria after Arvind Kejriwal took power in Delhi the first time in…

  • He lost because of himself

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    By Saeed Naqvi  Politicians and pundits across the country have been served notice by the Delhi electorate: please take a bow and make way. Mingled with the voter’s ecstasy is a primeval cry: we are tired of old politics. Meanwhile Kejriwal’s cup runneth over. “Dene waley mujhe dena hain to itna de de Phir mujhe…

  • Is it time for a leadership change in Congress?

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    By Trina Joshi  The Congress needs to go for a leadership revamp following its humiliating rout in the Delhi election, experts say, but the country’s oldest party does not feel that is necessary. Political pundits say the massive defeat in Delhi has again put the focus on leadership deficit in the party and its need…