blog
Welcome back to another edition of My Take 5, your weekly round-up of top international news. For this edition we again focus on the war in Ukraine, China’s stand on that conflict as revealed by its foreign minister Wang Yi, Beijing’s help to Pakistan during India’s Operation Sindoor, Chinese agents’ shocking plan to attack Taiwan’s…
The media (print & visual) is full of stories of increased consumption driving economic activity. It conveniently omits to mention that much of the increased consumption is thru taking on higher Debt and not thru higher earnings. This difference between spendings from higher income and spendings by taking on higher Debt must be understood. As…
A jazzed up, illuminated version of our humble auto rickshaws are plying their trade at Wimbledon. As the nearest tube stations are a good 20-30 minutes’ walk away from the grounds, and in slightly uneven terrain, a handful of autos are willing to save you the uphill/downhill climb. Of course, at a steep price. Pound 20 for…
In a shocking case from Pakistan’s Punjab province, a man allegedly shot and killed his daughter after an argument over her TikTok activity, police said on Wednesday.The incident took place in the Dhok Choudrian Takht Pari area of Rawalpindi district. The father had repeatedly told his daughter to delete her TikTok social media account, according…
Why women are still denied their fair share We live in a world of wealth, yet millions of women remain poor.Women grow the food, care for the young, hold families and communities together, but, when it comes to land ownership, wages, or climate funding, they’re left fighting for scraps. This isn’t just inequality. It’s a…
In an era when students are seeking more than just degrees, India’s top academic institutions are being called to rethink their purpose. At the heart of this shift is a quiet but urgent transformation – one that places innovation, entrepreneurship, and real-world impact at the centre of higher education. VRamgopal Rao ,group vice chancellor of…
Hello and welcome to the fiftieth edition of the Weekly Vine. To paraphrase the President of the United States: “Thank you for your continued attention.” I have now spent more time writing this newsletter than I ever did studying in college. To be fair, I spent more time on one edition than I did studying…
Trump has called Musk’s effort to launch a party in competition to Republicans & Democrats ridiculous. But the reason third parties fail in US is that rules & legislators are stacked against them Over the weekend, the richest man in the world, Elon Musk, announced that he would start a new political party, the “America…
When tech-based welfare delivery fails, who helps India’s digitally unlettered poor? For ten months members of an all-women household in a tribal village in MP – 80-year-old Gaura Bai, her widowed daughter-in-law and her three small grandkids – have lived under a tree, after razing their own kuccha house in village Lohari, Dhar district. They…
In the digital space of any gated community’s WhatsApp group, the 80:20 rule – or is it 95:5 rule? – doesn’t just apply; it reigns sovereign. A mere 20% or 5% of the population – those enthusiastic, sometimes overly passionate, spend their days tapping away on their smartphones, hogging much of the messaging space. Meanwhile,…
