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Parliament erupted February 3, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's 'Budget 2025' forgotten in the ruckus. The session went from ‘derailed’ to ‘stampede.’ Opposition MPs to a man (and 'woman') raised slogans against the ‘Modi and Yogi’ governments, holding the so-called ‘double-engine ki Sarkar’ in Uttar Pradesh responsible for the Mahakumbh stampede that left untold dead, scores injured and ‘tens’ missing, their relatives stranded at the ‘Mahakumbh’, anxiously to hear word from the ‘Koya-Paya’ department, which seemed to be lost for comforting words.

Union Minister of Finance Nirmala Sitharaman has emphasized on 100 per cent skilled labour with meaningful employment; 100 per cent quality, good school education; and access to quality, affordable and comprehensive healthcare as part of Vikasit Bharat initiative in her speech while presenting Union Budget 2025-26 on February 1. However, the initiatives and funding level provided therein are too little to fulfil the dream of such ambitious programme.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's budget announcement to establish five national Centres of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Education, with an allocation of Rs 500 crore, marks a significant step in India's AI ambitions. These centres, developed through global partnerships and integrated into premier institutions like the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), aim to foster innovation and technological advancement. However, the question arises: Is this effort sufficient for India to realize its full potential in AI?

The only big idea about the eighth budget of finance minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, is an announcement of an income tax exemption of upto Rs 12 lakhs. It is a big jump no doubt, from the exemption level of Rs 7 lakh earlier. There is a political catch in that though.

All those with a salary upto Rs 12 lakh per annum can tell Income Tax sharks to get the hell out to sea and not return. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman read out her eighth straight budget speech and beat Morarji Desai’s six-in-a-row record. More importantly, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's prayer to 'Maa Lakshmi' didn't fall on deaf ears!

Foreboding that the Hindutva fanatics and saffron ecosystem would convert India into a theocratic state and christen it as the Hindu Rashtra in 2025 appears to be taking a realistic shape and character with the Hindu saints and rightist forces unveiling the “Constitution of Akhand Hindu Rashtra” on February 2, the Basant Panchami, at the Mahakumbh and forwarding the same to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for consideration by the BJP as also his government.

One state may call it business summit and another investor meet. But the commonalities in the publicity campaign preceding such conclaves – some states do it annually and some others like West Bengal have opted for once in two years – are striking. States big and small will not spare any efforts with money made available liberally by the concerned exchequers to tell the world in rosiest detail of the advantages of building industries and services centres there. At the end of two or three-day jamborees, state governments are found to be going wild in announcing the number of memoranda of understanding and investment intent received. But as is the experience so far, for most states, only a portion of the investment promised is realized and as a consequence a good number of promised projects remain good on paper.

In a rare and powerful display of naval strength, India's two major naval forces—the Western and Eastern Fleets—came together during the ongoing TROPEX-25 exercise. This marks a major shift in India's approach to maritime security, showing that the country is prepared to respond to threats in the Indian Ocean with a unified force.

What is happening to the proposed official visit of the Russian President Vladimir Putin to India early this year? Is the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s invitation to the Russian President to visit India given at the BRICS summit at Kazan on October 22 still valid? Doubts are being raised about the visit as more than three months have passed since Indian Prime Minister’s invitation to the Russian President, but no confirmation is available from the Indian external affairs ministry on the dates of the visit, though hectic preparations are on in South Block for organising Narendra Modi’s visit to Washington for bilateral meeting with the President Donald Trump in the third or last week of February.

The key narrative of the Economic Survey 2024-25 is that India’s real GDP growth in the financial year 2025-26 is expected to be between 6.3 to 6.8 per cent, suggesting a sluggish economic condition for the country in the next financial year. Since India’s GDP growth rate has already likely to slip down from 8.2 per cent in 2023-24 to four years low in the current financial year 2024-25 to 6.4 per cent, the country has very hard times ahead.