Daily Hindu Editorials

         💥Competitive politics is putting the TDP on a collision course with the BJP Sometimes, the opponent is less important than the rival. The decision of the Telugu Desam Party to leave the National Democratic Alliance is more about its competition with the YSR Congress Party and less about its conflict with the Bharatiya Janata Party. The desertion of the NDA happened alongside the announcement of a no-confidence motion against the NDA government. But importantly, the TDP moved it separately, independent of the one served by the YSRCP. Clearly, the effort was not to join hands with other parties against the BJP, but to isolate the YSRCP politically. The TDP wants to demonstrate that it is prepared to do more than the YSRCP in taking on the BJP, and winning concessions for Andhra Pradesh from the Centre. In all this, there is no danger to the NDA government. The BJP has the numbers to survive a no-confidence vote even without any help from the other di...

    💥The suspicion of a Russian hand in targeting a spy in the U.K. will test British diplomacy The attack on Sergei Skripal, a former Russian spy who had defected to the U.K., and his daughter Yulia in the cathedral city of Salisbury on March 4 was an outrageous act flouting all international norms. The military grade nerve agent used in the attack, the first of its kind in Europe since World War II, has been identified as being from the Novichok class of chemical agents developed by Russia during the Cold War. The modus operandi of the attack was similar to the polonium poisoning of another former Russian spy, Alexander Litvinenko, in London in 2006, an attack that is likely to have been approved by Russian President Vladimir Putin according to a U.K. inquiry. It is therefore entirely reasonable that Britain asked Russia to clarify if it was behind the attack or had somehow lost control over the nerve agent, two possible explanations for the Salisbury incident. Having...

  💥The ‘Russia collusion’ narrative in the U.S. has rendered any diplomacy between the two countries impossible Many have been quick to conclude that it was his strong anti-Russia position that led to Rex Tillerson’s dismissal as U.S. Secretary of State by President Donald Trump on March 13. The nerve agent used to poison a former Russian spy and his daughter in Britain on March 4 clearly came from Russia, Mr. Tillerson had said, while the White House was more guarded initially. It “sets a profoundly disturbing precedent in which standing up for our allies against Russian aggression is grounds for a humiliating dismissal,” said House of Representatives Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. 👉The Trump singularity History, that had been declared ended, appears to have started all over again for the U.S. on November 8, 2016 when Mr. Trump won the presidency. The mainstream punditry in America that missed the revolt around them initially blamed Mr. Trump’s victory on the lack o...

   💥To outsmart the disease, India must intercept infection, progression and transmission Science borrows words from common parlance and assigns quantifiable meanings. For example, “significance” in biostatistics, measured by ‘p’ value, clarifies if a study result is reliable or mere chance finding. “Incidence” in epidemiology is a rate: new cases per unit population, per unit time. The incidence rate of tuberculosis (TB) in India is estimated at 200-300 cases per 100,000 population per year. As a comparison, in western Europe it is five per 100,000 per year. “Control” in public health is “deliberate reduction of incidence to a desired and defined level by specific interventions”. Without monitoring incidence and defining the desired target, the Revised National TB Control Programme (RNTCP) is not a valid control programme, but a great humanitarian programme of free diagnosis and treatment. India’s estimated annual TB burden is 28 lakh, 27% of the global total...

💥The RBI’s omnibus ban on a legitimate financing instrument is not the solution A month after the ₹12,800-crore letters of undertaking (LoUs) fraud at Punjab National Bank came to light, the Reserve Bank of India has decided to ban such instruments as well as letters of comfort issued by bankers to businesses for international transactions. While the government has been in firefighting mode, unleashing all investigative agencies to probe the fraud, this is the first major step by the central bank on the issue, apart from asking banks to ensure there are no slip-ups between their core banking systems and the SWIFT mechanism used for international money transfers. LoUs are among the most popular instruments to secure overseas credit by importers — known as buyers’ credit in banking parlance — because of their attractive pricing. It is estimated that overall, bank finance for imports into India is around $140 billion, of which over 60% is funded through such buyers’ credit. Natural...

💥More proof that propriety, protocol, punditry no longer hold sway in the U.S. administration Even by his standards for unexpected diktats, U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to fire his Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, and replace him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo, came out of the blue. Mr. Tillerson, who was the CEO of ExxonMobil Corporation before taking up the role, did not agree with Mr. Trump on fundamental policy matters, the President said. This is widely seen as an allusion to Mr. Tillerson’s preference, contra-Trump, for diplomacy as a means of defusing the North Korean crisis. Also implied was a widening chasm between the two men on the merits of the Iran nuclear deal. With Mr. Tillerson’s departure, the number of senior officials exiting the Trump administration after a little more than a year has reached at least 24. Less than a week before the long-rumoured “Rexit”, White House Chief Economic Adviser Gary Cohn, formerly a Wall Street banker, quit his post ove...

💥India must work towards some understanding with Pakistan before the situation on the border spins out of control A little over two months into 2018, the violence on the Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) stretch of the India-Pakistan border has reached a new high: more than 633 ceasefire violations (CFVs) by Pakistan have been reported by New Delhi which have claimed the lives of 12 civilians and 10 soldiers. Many more have been injured and several civilian habitats along the border destroyed. Till the first week of March, Pakistan reported 415 CFVs by India which have claimed 20 civilian lives (there is no data on Pakistani military casualties). The calibre of weapons used on the border have also graduated from short-range personal weapons to 105 mm mortars, 130 and 155 mm artillery guns and anti-tank guided missiles. With the rising violence, casualties and upcoming elections in both countries, we may have a perfect recipe for escalation on our hands. The question we must ...

💢Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announces at a press conference on Thursday, March 1 that the Cabinet had approved the Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill, 2017. 👉Taking on fugitive economic offenders The Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill, 2018, which was introduced in the Lok Sabha this week, aims to provide for measures to deter fugitive economic offenders from evading the process of law in India. It is a deterrent for those offenders who continue to stay outside the jurisdiction of Indian courts. The larger objective of the proposed legislation is to “preserve the sanctity of the rule of law”. In its statement of objectives and reasons, the government refers to the “several instances of economic offenders fleeing the jurisdiction of Indian courts anticipating the commencement of criminal proceedings or sometimes during the pendency of such proceedings”. Fugitive businesspersons Vijay Mallya and Nirav Modi have resisted the jurisdiction of Indian courts. The absence of...