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What next in Jammu and Kashmir? The question arises due to the history-making turn state politics has taken with the PDP and the BJP forming coalition government headed by the PDP’s patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed. Though unthinkable in Indian politics prevailing polarizing environment, the coming together of Mufti’s Muslim majority Kashmir-centric PDP and the Hindu majority Jammu-centric BJP to form the government cannot be described as a negative development. Mufti has described it as coming together of the North and the South poles.

The roots of the Aam Admi Party’s (AAP) travails lie in the circumstances of its formation. Having emerged from Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption movement, it imbibed all the pretentious self-righteousness and unreal utopianism of the campaign along with the Ralegan Siddhi crusader’s disdain for the existing system.

The world is eagerly watching the unfoldment of the assurances of the Modi government to its neighbourhood and to the developing world. And also the new emphasis in the country’s foreign policy of maintaining friendly relations with countries for attracting investments and boosting trade so as to make India a new centre of the growth engine for the world. India is slated to emerge as a security provider in the region.

Against high hope, the budget for 2015-16 failed to entice the foreign investors to invest in India. The only hope which can trigger foreign investment is high growth of GDP of 8 – 8.5 percent in 2015-16. Finance Minister ensured that this growth will paint a progressive Make in India approach.

There is no denying the fact that without involving separatist and Hurriyat leaders, a solution to Kashmir problem is not possible. Pakistan too has to be brought on board, sooner or later, for a fruitful discussion. The second-term J&K Chief Minister, Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, may have this mind when he made the ill-timed statement, crediting Pakistan, Kashmir separatists and militants for smooth conduct of the recent assembly elections. By ignoring the determination of the people of Kashmir to hold peaceful election and, vigil of the security forces, Muft has made a big mistake and insulted the people of Kashmir who overwhelmingly voted for him. Whichever constituency he might be addressing, the Pak-trained militants did attempt to disrupt the peaceful poll; in one incident a Lt. Colonel and few soldiers lost their lives. The fact remains that these militants were pushed back by the Indian army and they did not dare to disrupt the poll.

LUCKNOW: Whatever chief minister Akhilesh Yadav may say about AAP victory in Delhi but its impact is quite visible in the Samajwadi Party budget for 2015-2016 to face 2017 assembly polls.

Jammu and Kashmir has seen several coalition governments in the past few decades but the present BJP- PDP government led by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed is indeed historic. This was the first time that aspirations of both Jammu and the valley have got representation in the state government. All along it had been the valley, which had dominated the state. It is an alliance of unnatural partners who had fought against each other in the elections and the two share nothing in common except their hunger for power. In spite of all these if the coalition could survive the next six years it will be an achievement of strange bedfellows.

New Delhi: Consumer Electronics and Appliances Manufacturers Association (CEAMA), the apex Industry Chamber for the Consumer Electronics and Home Appliances Industry in India, submitted a white paper on “E- Waste in India” to Mr. Ashok Lavasa, IAS, Secretary Environment and Forests, which highlights the background of India’s E-waste management. The paper provides an analysis of the regulatory framework (E-waste Management and Handling Rules 2011; and Implementation Guidelines), current E-waste management practices in India, global scenario, comparison with best international practices and recommendations to the government in response to the draft amendments to the rules proposed by MoEF.

Since I am a Bengali, the People's Republic of Bangladesh has a special place in my heart. The People’s Republic of Bangladesh was born partly out of a struggle to protect the dignity of Bangla, the mother tongue of many of its people, against assaults from Urdu, Pakistan’s state-sponsored language that served the purpose of fostering ‘national unity’. Any multi-lingual nation-state that has policies favouring some languages over others as part of its ‘unifying’ agenda is a state that is fundamentally insecure about diversity and views that as an existential threat, irrespective of politically correct official stances. ‘National unity’ is the slogan aimed to silence those who point out this basic fact and want to maintain their own dignity.

In pre-emptively moving to bring down the repo rate to 7.5 per cent with immediate effect, no doubt data-based, Governor Dr Raghuram Rajan has also characteristically responded to issues emerging from the Union Budget 2015-16 and the historic accord between Government and RBI on monetary policy framework, in his statement of March 4, 2015.