Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI – Campaigners for a nuclear-free South Asia are aghast at the potential nightmare that lies ahead following the nuclear technology and fuel deal announced here this week by visiting United States President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. "This deal may have further complicated an already difficult situation in South … Continue reading “India Deal Makes US a Nuclear Proliferator”

NEW DELHI – While India denies that its security agencies helped arrange meetings between a top Nepali Maoist leader and its political establishment, analysts welcome dialogue with the rebels as a key to ending a seemingly intractable crisis in the neighboring Himalayan kingdom. According to S.D. Muni, a widely acknowledged expert on Himalayan affairs, engaging … Continue reading “Maoist Overture to Enter Nepal’s Mainstream Politics?”

NEW DELHI – India’s plan to resume military assistance to Nepal, suspended after the Feb. 1 "royal coup" has nothing to do with China’s offer of support to the regime of King Gyanendra, beleaguered by a nine-year Maoist insurgency, say security experts. “India and China are no longer competing in Nepal or elsewhere,” C.V. Ranganathan, … Continue reading “Analysts: India’s Resumption of Arms to Nepal Not Due to China”

NEW DELHI – By offering nuclear-capable F-16 Falcon fighters to Pakistan and the even more advanced F-18 Hornets to India, Washington has shown a cynical readiness to profit from the long-standing rivalry between the nuclear-armed South Asian neighbors, say analysts. "This is a bit like the Aesop’s fable in which two cats fighting over a … Continue reading “US Arms Industry Fishing in Troubled South Asian Waters”

NEW DELHI – It’s a rarity for the United States to lend its ear to Indian human rights campaigners, let alone take any action on their petitions. But Washington’s cancellation Friday of a U.S. visa given to right-wing politician Narendra Modi, blamed by human rights groups for the deaths of more than 2,000 Muslims in … Continue reading “Gujarat Pogrom Costs Chief Minister Modi US Visa”

NEW DELHI – The fact that Russian President Vladimir Putin equally divided his three-day visit to India, that ended Sunday, between political and business leaders speaks much for the changing nature of what was once regarded as a definitively strategic alliance of the cold war era. That the military part of the alliance is largely … Continue reading “India-Russia Alliance Turns Commercial”

NEW DELHI – When it comes to Kashmir there can be no pleasing of anyone, as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must surely have discovered during a two-day visit, this week, to the state troubled by 15 years of separatist insurgency and half-a-century-old territorial claims by neighboring Pakistan. During his whirlwind tour on Wednesday and … Continue reading “Road to Peace Is Still Long in Kashmir”

NEW DELHI – Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ruled out Wednesday any change in the status of Kashmir and indicated that he would not agree to a redrawing of India’s borders with Pakistan as a solution to the long-disputed territory. Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf suggested last month that parts of Kashmir, now divided between … Continue reading “India Firm on Status Quo in Kashmir”

NEW DELHI – The top leadership of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) could stand trial for the December 1992 demolition of the medieval Babri Masjid mosque, which propelled the right-wing, pro-Hindu party to national power but deeply polarized the country’s two main religious communities – the Hindus and Muslims. A bench of the Allahabad … Continue reading “Top Hindu Hawks May Face Trial for Demolition of Mosque”

BANGKOK – Of the many initiatives undertaken to forge lasting peace between South Asia‘s squabbling neighbors, none can challenge the promise of Iran’s proposed natural gas pipeline to India traversing through Pakistan. New Delhi and Tehran first signed a memorandum of understanding for the pipeline in 1993, but the intervening decade saw India’s relations with … Continue reading “Iran’s Gas Pipeline May Turn South Asia’s Peace Pipe”