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Vice-president Jagdeep Dhankar and law minister Kiren Rijiju are decidedly waging a proxy war on behalf of the Narendra Modi government. The Collegium happens to be just a prop and the real target is the Constitution, which the ruling party considers as a hindrance to the pursuit of its isolationist agendas. While it began as potshots on the judiciary, the fight has transformed into a full-fledged war, with the vice-president lately taking direct aim at the Constitution. And it is the most vicious attack on the statute since Indira Gandhi’s dubious Emergency.

Rourkela: Three-time winners the Netherlands opened their campaign with a dominating 4-0 win over tentative Malaysia in the Pool C fixture of the Hockey World Cup at the Birsa Munda Stadium here on Saturday.

Mumbai: Defending champion Derara Hurisa has exuded confidence of retaining the Tata Mumbai Marathon title in the 18th edition on Sunday, January 15.

Bhubaneswar: It turned out to be a poor day for Asian teams in Hockey World Cup, as defending champion Belgium thrashed Korea 5-0 while former winner Germany overpowered Japan 3-0 in the Pool B matches at the Kalinga Stadium here on Saturday.

King Dollar that saw a 20% rise in the world's reserve currency (our currency, your problem) died in late September 2022 and the greenback is now 8% below its high on US dollar index (DXY). All G10 currencies have risen at least 7% against the USD. So its weakness is just not limited to the Euro, yen or the post Liz Truss sterling. Econometric models, various PPP indices and even the Big Mac index suggested that King Dollar was grossly overvalued at DXY 114. Yet a sequence of world events precipitated its dethronement.

"If they answer not your call, walk alone, walk alone" one of Rabindranath Tagore’s great poems, set to music used to be one of the favourite songs of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the most famous Congressman to don khadi. If the charismatic prophet of non-violence sang it in many a trying times, another Congressman in salt and pepper beard trudging across the country these days who shares nothing except the sur name with the Mahatma " The Great Soul" cannot afford to walk alone; Rahul Gandhi and the Congress can ill afford to pick and choose fellow political travellers if a tangible challenge to BJP is to be put up at 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Sharad Yadav was a module of the triumvirate which brought about basic vicissitudes in the Indian politics and transformed it for ever. He designed the thesis of social justice, a key component of the Mandal philosophy. But unfortunately he could not attain the status of an icon for social justice. This has been the biggest tragedy for him.

Governor is neither a decorative emblem nor a glorified cipher. His powers are limited but he has an important constitutional role to play in the governance of the state and strengthening federalism. He is head of the state and all chief ministers, including the Tamil Nadu chief minister, must remember it. All governors too must remain true to their oath of “preserving, protecting and defining the constitution”. What happened in Chennai recently was shocking and demonstrate the trust deficit between governor and the Chief Minister. But what governor R N Ravi, an appointee of the BJP government at the Centre, did was neither new nor surprising: Governors appointed by Congress governments in the past had behaved similarly.

The Bharatiya Janata Party losing the central government is not impossible, says Shashi Tharoor, the Congress party’s Thiruvananthapuram MP. Of late, ever since Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra hit the blacktop running, such statements are common. But Tharoor’s prediction could be double-edged. The suave Congress leader might be deflecting after facing flak for being overly ambitious and talk attributed to him that he wouldn’t mind being Kerala Chief Minister.

After months of struggling to bring the economy back in shape, Pakistan is finally close to the moment when its forex reserves will be completely drained and it would start defaulting on payments to its creditors. Its forex reserves currently stand at $5.5 billion which is enough for meeting imports barely for three weeks. The country with 230 million people has been facing a shortage of essential goods for several months and the situation has become worse in the past few days.