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Wednesday, March 18, 2026
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Opinion

Why India has friends everywhere, but leverage nowhere

India is too close to Israel for Iran’s trust, yet still blindsided. It risks losing assets like Chabahar port and export markets, while key partners don’t factor in its concerns.

Supreme Court’s NCERT textbook order punishes the messenger, doesn’t answer the message

The portion of the NCERT Class 8 textbook that the Supreme Court deemed objectionable included remarks made by the outgoing CJI BR Gavai in June 2025.

Zohran Mamdani’s shaky politics has come home to bite

The Israel-Palestine question appeared to be the one area where he apparently refused to soften his views. And that refusal is now colliding with the realities of governing.

Now is India’s chance to reform its electricity system—utilise the energy crisis

India’s states have vastly different electricity needs. Tamil Nadu has high wind penetration and Rajasthan has abundant solar irradiance. A one-size-fits-all procurement template cannot work.

India-Europe ties can stabilise the chaotic international order

Working together, they could help create the diplomatic space necessary to prevent current tensions from sliding into wider conflict.

Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala lead the way in ending the orderly system. Will North follow?

Madras High Court has ordered strict compliance with Tamil Nadu's abolition of the 'orderly system'. In ending this colonial-era practice, southern states are torchbearers of social reform.

Badshah’s men say India doesn’t get the hip-hop game. Truth is, misogyny is their normal

That Badshah is misogynistic is not a particularly illuminating observation. The misogyny is a creative condition of his music, as fundamental to it as the buzzy beat drop.

De-dollarisation is just fashionable debate. Every global crisis sends world back to dollar

Replacing the dollar necessitates not only a rival currency but also an equally robust financial market, trusted institutions, and an ecosystem of banks, investors & payment infrastructure.

Amit Shah won’t lose sleep over Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Assam. Bengal is different

The scenarios in Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Puducherry should explain why the BJP is so focused on West Bengal.

SC decision on menstrual leave is feminist. Rani of Jhansi didn’t use period as an excuse

Women officers in the forces routinely manage the physiological realities of menstruation. Making menstrual leave mandatory would be two steps backwards for them.

On Camera

War in West Asia shows India must rethink tech sovereignty

Iran’s strikes on data centres in the UAE and Bahrain brings tech policy into focus. The war threatens the web of global connectivity that flows through these hubs.

Covid, sanctions, war. Life’s rough for Surat’s small diamond units, salaries ‘not guaranteed anymore’

West Asia war threatens to push already fragile industry deeper into crisis. Latest disruption is playing out differently for bigger and small-scale players in Surat’s diamond industry.

Supreme Leader Mojtaba, the man Iran must keep alive & the secret force ‘tasked with it’—all about NOPO

The Nirouyeh Vijeh Pasdaran Velayat, or NOPO, was the only force Ali Khamenei trusted.It was founded in 1991 and is more feared than the Revolutionary Guards.

Peaceful power transfers followed uprisings in India’s neighbourhood. It’s a sign of mature democracies

Rating democracies is a tricky business. I am only using the simple metric of who in the Indian subcontinent has had the most peaceful, stable, normal political transitions and continuity.