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Despite financial constraints due to slowdown of the Indian economy in the current financial year 2024-25, Union Budget 2025-26 has to give special attention to education, health, and women’s welfare for two reasons –first, because these are essential elements for India’s long-term growth aspirations, such as Vikasit Bharat by 2047, and secondly due to political considerations involving youth and women, who have been lately emerged as vote bank, as we have seen in all the elections held in the country in last one year.

Trajectory of the right wing growth across the globe could not be accomplished unless it turns India into a heaven for these forces in South East Asia. Right from the days of Hitler many attempts were made to push India into the dirty dungeon of rightist philosophy. But it could not succeed while most of the countries, including socialist countries succumbed to their allure.

There is an upsurge of interest in the life and times of Sir Winston Churchill who died sixty-five years ago on January 24, 1960. On this 76th commemoration of the Republic Day of India, fresh perspectives emerge on the roles of historical personages of those times when India was transiting from a colony to a sovereign state.

United States President Donald J. Trump is in that stage of his life where he must be asking himself, “If not me, who? If not now, when?” And Trump has a powerful platform to get things he wants done, make good the promises he made, which catapulted him to power, for a second time after a gap of four years and much maligning coming his way during those four years on a Florida golf course.

It seems as if finally, the three years old Russia-Ukraine might end after the US President Donald Trump’s pompous intervention. The Russian President Vladimir Putin has assumed a noticeably favourable tone, downplaying Trump’s economic threats, while Trump blames Ukrainian President Zelensky squarely as the one who started the war.

NEW YORK: “The reckless approval of an agreement with the Hamas terror organization . . . represents a disgraceful surrender. This deal forfeits the IDF’s (Israel Defense Forces) hard-won achievements in the war, involves withdrawing forces from Gaza, and halts the fighting in a manner that capitulates to Hamas,” read the statement by Itamar Ben-Gvir, the leader of the Jewish Power party, as he resigned from the post of minister of national security earlier this week.

US District Judge John C Coughenour has temporarily blocked President Donald Trump's executive order ending the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship regardless of the parents' immigration status. The case was moved before the court by the states of Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon, which argued that the 14th Amendment and Supreme Court case law have guaranteed birthright citizenship. The case is one of five lawsuits being brought by 22 states and a number of migrants rights groups across the country.

Just six days have passed since the inauguration of Donald Trump as the second term President of the United States of America and his policy announcements on the first day in office. The impact varies from country to country but nowhere it is more panicky than in the European Union countries, especially Germany and France. The process further intensified on Thursday when Trump elaborated on his policies through his interaction with the World Economic Forum at Davos.

The Trump administration's exploration of creating a national Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) may usher in a new era of global financial strategy, one defined by digital assets rather than traditional monetary instruments. This concept marks a potential seismic shift in how nations perceive and secure wealth, akin to the historical role of gold reserves in fortifying national economies. By anchoring such a reserve in Bitcoin, the United States is not only signalling its readiness to embrace the decentralized financial revolution but also positioning itself at the forefront of a burgeoning ‘crypto arms race’.

On January 13, 2025, the rupee recorded its sharpest single-day decline in nearly two years, finishing the session 58 paise lower at a historic low of Rs 86.62 against the US dollar. Numerous commentaries are now emerging in popular media, expressing concern that a weakened Rupee could pose challenges for the Indian economy, particularly for Indian industries, as larger companies tend to borrow in dollars. A weaker Rupee also implies higher import costs, which could lead to a widening current account deficit (CAD). Basic macroeconomic theory suggests that a widening CAD will fuel domestic inflation by raising the price of imported crude oil. This could have secondary effects, including a decline in foreign exchange reserves and foreign institutional investors pulling out of the Indian stock market.