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Natural disasters such as floods and cyclones are routine in Odisha. There has been hardly a year when we have not seen a natural calamity, big or small. The frequency of such disasters has gone up with time due to fast-paced climatic changes. Since the...

My mother, who is remembered by friends and family alike as the world’s most buoyant and caring person, spent the last few months of her life ill in bed with cancer. But no matter how sick she was, the first thing she did every morning...

Another great exhortation from Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi is that the Indian media should go “global” at a time when the nation enjoys a “very strong presence” at different international fora. True, the Indian media has failed to spread out beyond the nation’s boundaries,...

Attention-diversion seems to have become a familiar tactic used by many current politicians for different purposes. Magicians are believed to use such techniques with perfection to mesmerize the spectators. At a different level, criminals use it for theft, pick-pocketing in buses and trains, and chain-snatching...

Durwood Zaelke & Mario Molina The ironies of climate change are often cruel. In our warming world, for example, the demand for air conditioning (AC) and refrigeration is exploding, especially in developing countries. But more AC units lead to more warming, both from the refrigerant...

India does not have a national security policy. To the extent that it can be understood from the BJP’s manifesto, the policy is “India First” (a line used in 2014) and “Nation First,” used in the manifesto of 2019. But what these words mean is...

Transparency or weeding out corruption is a ‘theme’ with the Modi sarkar, and it has been sort of pursuing this goal despite a pushback from the babus. Last year, the government endorsed lists of “dozens” of officers of the IRS and IT services accused of...

The Goods Services Tax (GST), introduced with much fanfare in July 2017, is unraveling itself. The new tax regime, touted to be the biggest ever tax reform in independent India, has failed to meet the purposes it had promised to serve. Both the Centre, which...

Compassion is not a hobby, or something you do in a good mood, or when you are well fed, or with your friends. It is a mental state, or an orientation towards suffering that includes four things -- recognising that there is suffering, being emotionally...

The Government of India (GoI) has recently announced it will take steps to weed out inefficient and corrupt officials from its ranks. Ministries have been directed to prepare the list of such officials, within the age group of 50-55 years, and recommend action. Obviously the...