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At last, the Indian Parliament may ratify the long awaited Land Boundary Agreement between India and Bangladesh in the current session. It is an issue, which has remained a sour point between the two countries for the past four decades. The delay was mainly because India’s foreign policy has been held hostage to domestic politics.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: We have managed to win over the Janata Dal(U) with a promise to redress their grievances at the earliest. And all is hunky dory with the United Democratic Front (UDF). That is what Chief Minister Oommen Chandy would have us believe.

The Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi is all set to undertake yet another but by now familiar string of three-nation tour starting with China on May 14 that takes him to Mongolia and South Korea before he heads home to be in time for the celebration of his first year in office. Though Mr. Modi seldom likes to be compared with India’s first and most popular Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru who etched his name in the global arena by fostering India’s sui generis foreign policy of non-alignment, the indisputable fact is that Mr. Modi takes the task of swaying external powers seriously by his own brand of diplomacy.

If the National Crime Records Bureau of India (NCRB) data is to be taken seriously, on an average over 15,000 farmers commit suicide in India every year and a good number of them for crop failure and many under pressure of high debt burden. The crime records list several other reasons for farmers’ suicide. They include ill health, personal and family problems. The NCRB records since 1995 number 2,96,438 cases of suicides by farmers in the country till 2013. The number represents a little over 11 per cent of total suicide deaths in the country per annum during the period.

As India completes 20 years of Mobile telephony it has many reasons to celebrate. Firstly, 900 million mobile subscriptions owned by about 700 million Indians (discounting for inactive subscriptions and multi-SIM users) are connected like never before. Secondly, by offering the most affordable call rates in the world, it offers immense opportunities in e-governance that goes well beyond connecting families, businesses, friends and customers.

It is humanly impossible not to be moved by the magnitude and quality of the humanitarian disaster that has visited Nepal and the adjoining regions of India and Bangladesh as a result of the April 25 earthquake of magnitude 7.9. The death toll has already crossed 5,000. The entire world, and India in particular, must do all it can to help the earthquake’s victims with rescue and relief.

Paradoxically, it is not the small traders based BJP’s apathy towards FDI in multi-brand retail, but the changing scenario in the global retail business. There is a paradigm shift from traditional retailing (cash on delivery) to E-retailing with the growth of E-commerce. It is envisaged that the future of global retailing will depend upon E-retailing. At present, even though the share of E-retailing is miniscule in the total global retailing, the sparking growth of E-retailing is sure to hit the operations of traditional retailing.

The race for power in Tamil Nadu assembly elections 2016 has now gripped opposition parties, rivalling one another, amid dramatic expectations of the Karnataka High Court verdict on the appeal of convicted AIADMK leader Ms. Jayalalithaa, within days.

In his recent visit to India, Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani has given enough indications that New Delhi need not be unnecessarily worried over his reaching out to Pakistan or China. What he intends is to make Afghanistan “a hub” of economic activity that connects South Asia with Central Asia and beyond so that in all practical sense it becomes the real “Heart of Asia”. This can happen when peace ultimately prevails in the country.

What next in Jammu and Kashmir? The answer will largely depend on the form the controversies arising after the formation of the PDP-BJP coalition government will take. These controversies have arisen due to the ruling parties clashing interests and moderate Hurriyat Conference’s demand for Islamicisation of education in the state. Another controversy relates to the separatist-terrorist Masarat Alam arrest under the Public Safety Act for waving Pakistan flag and inciting crowds raise anti-India slogans.