Opinion – Page 15 – The Singapore Post

Article 370: Can Jammu and Kashmir regain statehood?

9Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Article 370: Can Jammu and Kashmir regain statehood?

Soon after the Indian government announced abrogating the special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 in 2019, converting the state into two Union Territories, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said it was a "temporary" situation.PM Modi said statehood of Jammu and Kashmir would be restored at "some point of time".In March this year, PM Modi told a visiting delegation of politicians from Kashmir that "the government will work with all sections of the population to realize the hopes of statehood for Jammu and Kashmir at an early opportunity".Union Home Minister Amit Shah also told the Jammu and Kashmir leaders that "visible changes will be seen on the ground in the next few months".However, around 10 days after the meeting, the coronavirus lockdown had to be imposed across the coun...

8Aug

By Nectar GanNo Comments

Opinion, Politics

Indo-Bangla bonds rise to new heights

By resolving longstanding disputed issues and increasing trade, the bilateral relations between Bangladesh and India have reached new heights.According to diplomatic sources, the bilateral relations, under the dynamic leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have risen to their historical best though some pending issues, including the much-talked-about Teesta water sharing, are yet to be resolved.In order to end the 41-year-drought of statelessness to the residents of enclaves, the then prime ministers of Bangladesh and India signed the historic Land Boundary Agreement in 1974. But, the deal was finally inked under the leadership of Sheikh Hasina and Narendra Modi, who also came to power in 2014 and visited Bangladesh in June 2015.Another longstanding di...

8Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Opinion

Xi’s attempted coup against Pakistan

In order to expand his direct influence over the political and economic processes of Pakistan, Chinese President Xi Jinping is all set to sideline the democratically elected representatives and civil servants of the people of the country.Since 2016, Xi has been forcing the Pakistani establishment to put pressure on the government (it was Nawaz Sharif’s government back then) to sideline the Planning Ministry’s role in the implementation and monitoring of the multibillion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).He pushed for the creation of a supra-constitutional CPEC Authority that would freelance the management of the predatory infrastructure and power-generation projects under his direct command.The proposal was rejected then, but in 2019, it was again presented before the current

Jammu and Kashmir: A year without Article 370

8Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Opinion

Jammu and Kashmir: A year without Article 370

It has been a year since the government of India scrapped Article 370 (and Article 35A), taking away the special status of Jammu & Kashmir and bifurcating it into two Union Terrirtories – Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh. Undoubtedly, August 5, 2019, was a watershed moment, popularly dubbed as “historical blunder being corrected in one stroke”. Of course, the cynics cried foul – ranging from the killing of a democratic polity, recommitting a historical blunder, a betrayal, to a sinister ploy to alter Kashmir’s demography, so on and so forth.Nonetheless, it was a monumental step taken by the Narendra Modi government to seal Kashmir’s fate. In one stroke it removed all the ills of Kashmir misfortune, which boosted national domestic confidence, struck a deadly blow to Pakistan’s ostentatious

From aggressor to appeaser, China caught out in consulate reprisal game

6Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Opinion

From aggressor to appeaser, China caught out in consulate reprisal game

The Trump administration’s order to shutdown China's consulate in Houston caught Beijing by surprise.The United States claimed the Chinese mission had illegally transferred medical research, turned over information to Chinese institutions and coerced fugitive Chinese citizens to return home.Barrels of documents were burned in the courtyard of the consulate before four Chinese researchers were charged by the Department of Justice for allegedly lying about their links to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).China had 72 hours to decide how it would react. It used up nearly 48 in the hope of a diplomatic reversal. Beijing had to appear strong to placate nationalists at home but avoid provoking America into a deeper economic, diplomatic or even military confrontation that neither side is prepare

Abrogation of Article 370: Dawn of a new era for Jammu and Kashmir

4Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Opinion

Abrogation of Article 370: Dawn of a new era for Jammu and Kashmir

It is almost a year since the abrogation of Article 370 of the Indian Constitution. It was this ‘special status’ that barred the Indian mainland as well as any foreigner from investing in the former state. Not only that, a cluster of privileged families freely ran the roost and created hereditary political lineage that was no different than the pre-Partition hereditary monarchy practiced in the state since the signing of the Amritsar Treaty between Maharaja of Jammu Gulab Singh and the East India Company at the end of the First Anglo-Sikh war in March 1846.The Amritsar Treaty signed on March 16, 1846, was the basis on which the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir was established and which existed as an independent state for 101 years before Pakistan launched an unprovoked attack on the fa

Demand of some Kashmiri Pandits to restore Art 370 illogical, lacks historical support

4Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Opinion

Demand of some Kashmiri Pandits to restore Art 370 illogical, lacks historical support

In a vibrant democracy like India’s, every decision can be challenged and the same happened last year on August 5, with the Central government announcing to abrogate Articles 370 and 35A, creating two Union Territories out of the erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). While the local political parties, which had warned of serious consequences, have been immobilized and national parties have turned cautious in voicing their objections, an organization named ‘Reconciliation, Relief and Rehabilitation’ headed by Satish Mahaldar demanded the restoration of Article 370 in J&K.The organization comprises Kashmiri ‘Pandits’, which itself is a highly ambiguous expression since the term used to indicate Shaivite Pancha Gouda Saraswat Brahmins of Kashmir and there is nothing wrong in identifying

TikTok really is the central front in the US-China Tech war

2Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Opinion

TikTok really is the central front in the US-China Tech war

If the future of the internet will be determined by a technology war between the United States and China, India is the key emerging-market battleground.Until recently, TikTok, the popular vertical video app had as many as 1 billion users but after the India ban on TikTok and 58 other Chinese apps, including the messaging giant WeChat, the Clash of Kings mobile video game, and Baidu maps, the number of users plummeted rapidly.The devastating effect can be analyzed by the fact that TikTok was downloaded in India 611 million times in this year's first quarter, equating to 30.3% of its total downloads worldwide in the quarter and nearly double the total number of India downloads for all of 2019.The digital rupture between China and India virtually ensures that the latter will land firmly in Am...

The coming India–China conflict and a higher calling for India

2Aug

By Stuart WhiteNo Comments

Conflict, Opinion

The coming India–China conflict and a higher calling for India

On July 3, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the border region of Ladakh for the first time since Chinese troops killed 20 Indian soldiers in the Galvan Valley on June 15. And judging by China’s official reaction, the Communist Party didn’t see Modi’s response coming.Modi showed support for his troops, and also tapped into the growing anti-China sentiment that has been provoked by Beijing’s coronavirus-era brazenness. His visit placed the fighting in Ladakh in the broader context of China’s global expansionism. Speaking in Leh, Modi directly admonished Beijing for its expansionist policies.“The age of expansionism is over, this is the age of development,” he said. “History knows that expansionist forces have either lost or were forced to turn back.”Instead of calling out China’s

Questions about COVID-19 that keep Sick Kids’ infectious diseases expert up at night

2Aug

By desk teamNo Comments

Opinion, World

Questions about COVID-19 that keep Sick Kids’ infectious diseases expert up at night

Dr. Upton Allen, head of infectious diseases at the Hospital for Sick Children, remembers the winter day he started to worry about the novel coronavirus that first began circulating in Wuhan, China. It was in mid-January, after scientists confirmed human-to-human transmission, and it became clear the virus could be easily — and quickly — transported around the world by infected passengers on airplanes. Fast forward six months and Allen hasn’t stopped worrying about COVID-19, even as he and other physicians and scientists work to understand how the virus that causes it, SARS-CoV-2, impacts children. Here, Allen, who has studied infectious diseases for 25 years, tells us what COVID-19 research questions keep him up at night (How do kids develop immunity to the virus?), whether parents sho

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