IDR Blog
Importance of South Asia in Global Politics with India Leading the Pack
Countries of South Asia South Asia is the southern sub-region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethnic-cultural terms. As commonly conceptualized South Asia consists of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Most recent figures in US $ the per capita income of South Asian countries...
Winds of Change or Status Quo in Pakistan
It was the promise of creating a ‘Naya [new] Pakistan’ on the lines of ‘Riyasat-e-Madina’ [a model Islamic welfare state] plus a discreet ‘push’ from Pakistan’s powerful army that saw Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf [PTI] chief Imran Khan becoming the ‘selected’ prime minister of Pakistan in August 2018. Unfortunately, despite...
Revisiting 1962
A recent visit in the forward areas of the Tawang sector opened my eyes wider. Though I have been studying different aspects of the 1962 border war with China for years, it is only by seeing the terrain of the tragic confrontation which turned into a debacle for the 7th Brigade of Brigadier John P. Dalvi, that one can realize the utter...
The Long March to Siachen
The Crucial Meeting After preliminary discussions with Gen. A S Vaidya, the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) around 9th of February 1984, a crucial meeting was called by the Northern Army Commander, Lt. Gen. M L Chibber in his Office at the Northern Command, Udhampur on 14th of February. The objective of this meeting was to finalize the blueprint for...
On Farooq Abdullah’s ‘Prescription’ for Resolving the Kashmir Issue
Indo-Pak Dialogue While there can be no two views that dialogue is the best way of resolving disputes amicably, there are certain cases that preclude this option, and unfortunately, the issue of Jammu and Kashmir [J&K] happens to be one such example. For the unversed to suggest that India and Pakistan should resolve the Kashmir logjam...