Opinion

By Bruhaspati Samal A government's priorities are often revealed by the contrast in its treatment of different sections of society. Two recent Parliamentary replies by the Minister of State for Finance present precisely such a contrast. Nearly 10 lakh crore in corporate loans have been...

Bhabani Shankar Nayak   WilliamShakespeare’spastoral comedy As You Like It—specifically Jaques’ melancholic monologue in Act II, Scene VII, which con ceptualises the seven stages of human life—defines the realities of world with the following famous lines: “All the world’s a stage, And all the men...

Ashish Kumar Meher India’s 176th rank among 177 countries in the recently published 2026 Environmental Performance Index (EPI) is not merely an unfavourable international comparison. It is a warning that environmental governance is lagging behind the country’s economic ambitions. India scored 22.46 out of 100,...

Jan-Werner Mueller Here in the Albanian capital, the hotel receptionists go out of their way to stress that the ongoing protests outside are entirely peaceful. Apparently, there have been quite a few room cancellations since mass demonstrations began in the spring. But ask them directly,...

Melvin Durai It has become clear to me, partly through an incident involving two goats, that we are depriving many animals of something they would surely enjoy: public transportation. Like humans, animals love travelling. They love looking around at the wonders of the world, and...

Marina Zucker-Marques Almost every major global health emergency has exposed the same flaw in the international financial system. When disaster strikes, the institutions built to support af fected countries must scramble to raise money for relief funds. Twelve years ago, when the Ebola virus was...

By Santosh Kumar Mohapatra In his Independence Day speech from the Red Fort, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has presented an ambitious vision of Viksit Bharat@2047, built around what he describes as “Shakti Ki Saptadhara”—manufacturing, agriculture and food processing, technology and innovation, Gati Shakti and logistics,...

By Ajit Ranade In his Independence Day address from the Red Fort, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made an important announcement. He acknowledged that coaching classes have become a major financial burden on families, with parents fearing that a child who does not attend coaching will...

The sanctified cockroaches, an epithet given by a tall member of the judiciary, are rocking the country’s systems as a deep unemployment or disguised job situation engulfs. While the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2023-24 puts overall unemployment at around 3%, it reveals a much...

International criminal tribunals once focused on bringing defeated leaders, such as Serbia’s Slobodan Milošević and Liberia’s Charles Taylor, to justice. But the International Criminal Court has gone further, issuing arrest warrants for incumbent leaders—notably, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. While...