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🎯 @Noon: China Can't Change India's Forward Policy
India and China recently disengaged from the Gogra-Hot Springs area of eastern Ladakh.
Another news is that Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping can meet at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Samarkand.
However, Venu Gopal Narayanan thinks that such optics have become largely redundant.
Why so: First, India has firmly adopted a new ‘Forward Policy’ vis-s-vis China since 2014 (albeit with a difference from 1962);
and second, India will not deviate from this policy until a radical political change takes place in either New Delhi or Beijing.
What changed: The ‘Forward Policy’ of 1961 was fatally flawed, Mao’s objectives were immutable and inimical to ours, we were lulled into a false sense of security, and our public didn’t know the true state of affairs until it was too late.
The situation in 2022 is quite the opposite. Today, it is China which has been forced to devise a fresh ‘Forward Policy’, and it is India’s position which is immutable.
This is apparent from China’s foreign minister visiting Delhi in March 2022 to try to break the ice.
Bilateral relations are at their lowest in half a century.
Our foreign office has made it unambiguously clear that China’s military nexus with Pakistan will not be tolerated.
Leaders of India and China have not spoken or met in three years.
Indian border infrastructure and high-altitude military formations are being rapidly commissioned on a large scale.
China facing crisis: Its flagship Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is in tatters.
The BRI’s lynchpin, the Karakoram Highway, is formally at risk since it passes through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
Surviving on the Tibetan plateau for the Chinese soldiers is difficult as their lines of supply stretch for thousands of miles over the roof of the world, which, for six months of the year, is an icy, inhospitable wasteland.
DMK MP Andimuthu Raja's above statement has gone viral.
He goes on to say that Shudra means "son of a prostitute".
He also adds that one remains an "untouchable" till one remains Hindu.
A Deeper Malaise: That malaise is the deep, negative stereotype of Hindu Dharma and civilisation and hence the Hindus — that Hindu Dharma divides and demeans people.
As per this line of thought, Hinduism has to be eradicated and destroyed if the ‘Shudras’ and ‘Panchamas’ who have been 'tyrannised' in the name of religion are to be liberated.
What to do: We need to change the narrative of history from colonial preconceptions and bygone racial, essentialist frameworks to holistic, hard-data driven indigenous Indic frameworks.
The thread connecting the Vedas-Upanishads to Bhakti Movement to the 14th-century inscriptions to Swami Vivekananda and Sri Aurobindo, Mahatma Gandhi and Dharampal is one approach Indian historiography can take.
The narrative of colonial stereotypes and the pseudo-rationalist, racist worldview of Dravidianism as demonstrated by Andimuthu Raja is another approach.
It is not hard to see what kind of historiography has to be nurtured and which should be allowed to reach its natural destination to the dustbin of history.
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Bharat Ratna Sir M Visvesvaraya's autobiography Memoirs of my Working-Life tells about his contributions to the construction of a flood protection system and a drainage system for Hyderabad, among other things.
He proposed the construction of storage reservoirs of adequate capacity above the city, which proved effective in controlling future floods.
In order to keep sewage from flowing into the river and prevent mosquito breeding, he built a sewage farm and laid pipes to carry the city’s sewage there.
The sequence of events: Nizam’s government sought Visvesvaraya’s services following a catastrophic flood in 1908.
The report on the flood protection was submitted on 1 October 1909 and that for reservoirs on the two branch rivers above Hyderabad on 20 October 1909.
A report in outline on the City Sewerage Scheme together with preliminary plans and estimates was submitted on 6 November 1909.
Supreme Court is hearing pleas challenging the Centre's decision to grant a 10 per cent quota for the EWS category in admissions and jobs.
It orally observed that economic criteria to ensure that the benefits of government policies reach the target group are not “proscribed” and a “recognised” basis of classification.
However, while the case is being heard, a wave of false propaganda can be seen on social media.
But the truth is that all castes coming under the general category can benefit from the EWS quota if their gross annual family income is less than Rs 8 lakh annually.
Moreover, the cartoon is doing rounds in Tamil Nadu, where the state government has refused to implement the quota.
Action till now: Total six accused involved in crime in different ways, have been arrested.
Accused are identified as Chotu, Junaid, Sohail, Hafizul, Karimuddin and Arif.
Accused Junaid has been nabbed in an encounter that ensued where he was shot in his leg.
What Lakhimpuri SP Kheri Sanjeev Suman said: Accused were friends with deceased girls. Girls were lured to farms and raped by Sohail and Junaid.
They then called Karimuddin and Arif and hanged girls to eliminate proof.
This is a preliminary probe, rest details will come out after post-mortem which is being conducted by a panel of three doctors.
Accused have been booked under IPC sections of 302, 376 and POCSO act.
'Canadian Khalistani extremists' defaced a prominent Hindu temple with anti-India graffiti in an apparent hate crime.
The time of the incident at the BAPS Swaminarayan Mandir, Toronto is not yet known.
Indian mission has urged the authorities to take swift action against the perpetrators.
The BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha is a spiritual, volunteer-driven faith dedicated to improving society through individual growth by fostering the Hindu ideals of faith, unity, and selfless service.
Dangerous precedent: The very use of the term ‘hijab’ in the ongoing agitation when the stated demand is that of a ‘headscarf’ could have dangerous repercussions for Muslim women.
If the Supreme Court indeed accepts the petitioners’ arguments and they win the case, it will send a signal to all fundamentalists to enforce their interpretation of hijab.
Swati Goel Sharma explains with examples from Afghanistan and Iran.
