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Tuesday, December 16, 2025
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National Interest

Gaza to Pakistan, political Islam is at its strongest and weakest. Depends how you look at it

This is not an argument about Islam, the faith. This is about political Islam, where the faith is the state religion, defines a nation and/or maintains its mostly unelected leaders in power.

Congress just blew a Ram-given opportunity. It chose chronic confusion over national mood

Congress refusal to attend Ram temple inauguration triggers questions, including one on its post-1996 ideology in face of today's electoral politics. Could it have joined celebrations with Hindu majority while also criticising Modi, BJP, RSS?

Why 5 political upsets in India, from 1967 to 2014, hold lessons for struggling INDIA alliance

Smarter opposition leaders could pick an issue with emotional potential & conjure up a campaign pitch, a line, to convince a large enough body of voters that it mattered to them.

DDA turned into Delhi Destruction Authority & why we applaud the market taking revenge

A DDA flat was a privilege in a city where almost nobody could build anything. Its inventory of unsold flats now exceeds 40,000 at a value of Rs 18,000 crore, and it's still building more.

2024 isn’t about north vs south. See BJP’s limitations & do the maths

India’s political geographies display BJP’s strengths & vulnerabilities. Nobody understands this better than BJP and it is because of this hard-headed realism that it keeps winning.

There’s a straight line from Modi govt misreading Punjab farmers’ protests to the Pannun saga

Situation calls for bringing focus back on Punjab. Working with credible political forces, even adversaries, would serve national interest better than fighting in New York courtrooms.

In no-big-ideas campaign, BJP just followed Congress cues on doles & caste. Karnataka still hurting

It was probably the setback in Karnataka that shook Modi & the BJP. As is a pattern in our politics, the loser searches for external factors to blame rather than look within.

India is seeing a Blue Revolution like never before. Fast bowlers, fitness & ‘the system’

At the point you are reading this, Indian team holds #1 spot in ICC rankings in all 3 formats of the game. The biggest reason behind this success is the rise of a true meritocracy.

Nation bigger than 200-cr Ummah. Muslims don’t get it and that makes them powerless

By reigniting Middle East just when we had begun to believe it had gone into deep sleep, Hamas has also underlined the many contradictions within, and questions about, Islamic world.

Cricket, club & country. The challenge of nationalism, politics, emotion

Over the last decades, club sport and professionalism have softened hard nationalism. It began with football and much of that is playing out in cricket now. The ongoing World Cup is proof.

On Camera

Indo-Pacific security demands a strong India-Japan relationship

Japan’s technological sophistication align with India’s growing blue-water reach and central geographic position. Together, they can act as a counterweight to the Chinese navy.

India’s merchandise exports to US rising month-on-month despite Trump tariffs, govt data shows

November exports to the US saw 10% growth from the previous month. Overall, in the first 8 months this fiscal, the merchandise exports to the US touched has touched $59bn.

US clears $686-mn package to breathe fresh life into Pakistani F-16s

Of the total package, $649 million will be utilised for additional hardware, software, and support services, and the remaining for Major Defence Equipment (MDE).

India’s top airline just handed sarkar the keys. That’s IndiGo’s real ‘crime’

Don’t blame misfortune. This is colossal incompetence and insensitivity. So bad, heads would have rolled even in the old PSU-era Indian Airlines and Air India.