Someone Else Owns India's Off Switch: Around 70 per cent of our cloud runs on three American hyperscalers, every byte reachable under the US CLOUD Act.
We do not operate a single DNS root server, so every query from Indian soil is resolved on infrastructure we neither own nor can audit.
And since a breach in 2014, we have had no trusted sovereign Root Certificate Authority, which means foreign corporations decide what the Indian internet is allowed to trust.
Nayara Energy, July 2025. Microsoft suspended services to an Indian refinery that handles 8 per cent of the country's refining capacity, to comply with European Union sanctions over its Russian shareholding. It was a kill switch, and we had no override.
The cloud, the certificates, the DNS, the navigation, the silicon. We rent all of it.
Dear Indian Corporates, dump Microsoft 365, embrace Zoho One to support and preserve tech Sovereignity.
MBA era is over: India has historically placed greater value on academic credentials while overlooking vocational professions and skilled trades. Countries such as Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Korea and China have traditionally shown greater respect for occupations involving practical skills.
"The globalising world gave a certain advantage to software, computer science and MBA education, but that era is over". Young people should focus on developing skills that remain valuable even as technology transforms industries.
CBSE has made vocational education mandatory for Class IX and Class X. It was one of the most sensible reform recommendations under NEP.
The rollout may still need work (report below), but the idea is unquestionably the right one. pic.twitter.com/ubsdiw9C2w
— Prasanna Viswanathan (@prasannavishy) June 26, 2026
India's Biggest Economic Challenge is not inflation, oil, or war - It is an unskilled population addicted to distraction.
It is a generation that spends more time consuming content than creating value.
The biggest theft today is not of money. It is of attention. Every notification fragments concentration. Every endless scroll delays mastery.
Modern economies reward deep work, specialized knowledge, creativity, and disciplined execution. Algorithms reward emotional reactions. Unfortunately, millions choose the algorithm.
Own goal - Rupee's Pain Is Self-Inflicted: Indian firms investing abroad contributed roughly $30 billion to the capital outflow. Why would a country that requires close to $90B in net foreign capital annually to sustain rapid growth permit $30B of capital to flow abroad, thereby contributing to pressure on the rupee?
End to Rafale mess? Only 40-50 Rafales will be bought, if at all; rest MRFA Su-57E. This is because two other offers are on the table — Russia’s complete with tech-transfer, including source codes, for its 5th generation fighter — Su-57E, and Sweden’s for its Saab 4.5 gen Gripen E.
‘The future isn’t manned vs unmanned’: If Pakistan does induct the J-35, it would change the regional air power equation. The Su-57 is one platform that comes into the conversation, given its operational status and India’s familiarity with Russian-origin systems.
It is worth remembering that fifth-generation capability goes well beyond the airframe. Sensors, mission systems, weapons integration and networking define it as much as stealth does. An aircraft without that ecosystem solves only half the problem. Importantly, AMCA is and must remain India’s long-term answer.
Ashtavakra Gita: One small shift in understanding can dissolve a lifetime of inner struggle.
Mohammed's Own Country: Deaths outpace births among Kerala’s Hindus and Christians as population growth turns negative
BikAss: Over 2.8 million trees on forest land were approved for felling or recorded as felled in less than three years. . . .India's worst air pollution crisis isn't in its megacities.
Over 2.8 million trees on forest land were approved for felling or recorded as felled in less than three years, a Down To Earth analysis of official records has found.
Between July 2023 and May 2026, the environment ministry’s Advisory Committee considered 288 unique forest… pic.twitter.com/37jHJqaJt7
Iran deal - back to square one:
“Over the three-month trajectory, what Iran showed is that, yes, they were the underdog, attacked by two nuclear powers with military supremacy. But they also had their own cards to play.
The defining point in this war is the strategic geographic advantage that Iran has over the Strait of Hormuz. And it seems like President Trump and the US just couldn't get them to reopen the strait with force. This brought [the US] to the negotiating table and, essentially, back to square one, because the Strait of Hormuz wasn't even a problem before the war.”
"We're back to the original sin of Trump: out of obsession or jealousy of Barack Obama, tearing down an agreement that was much better negotiated.”
Advantage China: CEO of Chinese Anthropic rival tells Elon Musk that China will have a Fable 5-class AI model before next year
Cheaper AI: Microsoft abandoning costly OpenAI, Anthropic models for China-based DeepSeek’s V4 Model for enterprise workloads. Soaring token costs are driving enterprise customers away from OpenAI and Anthropic and right into the lap of China's DeepSeek
Nation run by engineers: China drafts $295 billion plan to build national AI data center grid running on 80% homemade silicon.
NEET 2026 is a case study in institutional failure. Almost farcical
NEET 2026 is no longer an examination. It’s such a case study in institutional failure. Almost farcical
First the paper leak. Then cancellation. Then a nationwide re-exam for 22+ lakh students. Then portal. glitches. Now reports of portal itself is being exploited, admit cards… pic.twitter.com/qs1KwMhlBV
— Prasanna Viswanathan (@prasannavishy) June 16, 2026
Put the screens away: The U.S. spent $30 Billion to replace textbooks with screens. The Result: A first generation mentally weaker than its parents.. For the first time in modern history, a generation scores lower than the one that raised it. The reason sits on every school desk in America. Nearly two-thirds of laptop time goes off task
Biogas could be LPG hedge in India's dairy belt: If all the 40 million cattle-rearing households were to shift to biogas, the displacement potential is up to ~4 million tonnes of LPG every year. Even if 10 million of them make this transition, it could save up to Rs 2,000 crore annually
Burden of BikAss: India’s legendary hill towns are sinking. Overdevelopment threatens many Himalayan states
India has 100/100 hottest cities in the world: "Too bad the mangroves on the west coast, trees on the Aravali hills on the western front of India, the sparse protections it has from the warm winds from the direction of Africa, are going away in the name of "progress" and "infrastructure". Capitalism will absolutely be the death of the human race". . . Cutting trees, filling lakes, and building heat traps in the name of BikAss.
"The central government is selling all the geological important forest land to corporate. Then they are planting irrelevant trees in irrelevant areas to keep the statistics levelled. Not only that but the factories here run completely without regulations".
Who runs India?: China is run by engineers.. US run by lawyers.. Who runs India?
Highly recommended book. Along similar lines is my analysis: China is run by engineers US run by lawyers Europe by ideologue Pak run by terrorists Who runs India?
What could possibly go wrong: The Pentagon announces AI deals with OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Nvidia, and more — LLMs to be deployed on classified Department of War networks ‘for lawful operational use’
India’s pollution is becoming an economic roadblock: The government’s inaction runs counter to its goals. The latest budget cut funding for pollution control. It is all getting embarrassing. In December a cricket match between India and South Africa was called off because smog made it impossible to see the ball. In January one the world’s top badminton players pulled out of the India Open in Delhi citing the bad air (and getting a $5,000 fine). Those who did play sent an official complaint to International Olympic Committee.
The Price of Intelligence is Collapsing
One developer with Claude Code can now do what took a team a month. The cost of Claude Pro or ChatGPT is $20 dollars a month, while a Max subscription is $200 dollars. The median US knowledge worker costs ~350-500 dollars a day fully loaded. An agent that handles even a fraction of their workflow a day at ~6-7 dollars is a 10-30x RoI not including improvement in intelligence.
Microsoft’s Conundrum The cost collapse is destroying the seat-based software model. There has been no bigger share shift than Microsoft’s seat-based Office 365. Most of the cash today still comes from Office. The core way of how a human interacts with a computer is about to change, and Microsoft sits at the center of the old paradigm.
Why does a company need to standardize Salesforce if an agent is just going to query data on leads on your behalf? Salesforce is a form and workflow wrapper, and the form and workflow can likely be scaffolded by AI into a database and then queried as needed.
AI fears wipe out $50 billion from Indian IT stocks. . . Software ate the world. AI is eating software.
Dr Vishal Sikka: At a time when there was no ChatGPT, Gemini, or self-driving cars, Vishal Sikka gave a presentation on AI before NITI Aayog at the PM’s request, where officials of 20 Union Ministries were gathered. . . India's risk-averse capitalism has no place people like him
"India Has a Great Opportunity in AI, Period" – Dr. Vishal Sikka (Ex-Infosys)
1. TCS has partnered with him to fight its existential crisis
2. PM & officials have met him multiple times
3. Oracle, GSK, BMW, Stanford have him on their Boards for AI
Existential threat: The European Union should consider either an unprecedented 30% across-the-board tariff on Chinese goods or a 30% depreciation of the euro against the renminbi to counter a flood of cheap imports, according to a French government strategy report.
China is depleting the world's oceans of fish. Estimates are between 200,000 - 800,000 fishing vessels, going as far as Argentina.
They account for ~half of the world's fishing catch and do not respect stewardship protocols to preserve ecosystems. This is not industrial… pic.twitter.com/BfbJoGTveM
Madhav Gadgil, Kerala’s reluctant prophet: Gadgil was part of the scientific scrutiny that questioned the ecological wisdom of damming Silent Valley. That intervention helped reinforce an idea Kerala would never quite abandon, that development was not automatically virtuous and that expert knowledge could legitimately challenge state power.
US Companies Face Anti-Indian Backlash: Indian American entrepreneurs who obtained loans from the government-backed Small Business Administration have been singled out for coordinated harassment.
Why India-US Trade Deal Is Delayed: India has shown willingness to eliminate tariffs on nearly 95 per cent of US industrial exports and lower duties on products such as almonds, apples and avocados. Yet Washington continues to push for unrestricted access for dairy and genetically-modified crops, including corn and soybeans -- an issue deeply sensitive in India due to environmental, political and social concerns.
'China Wants India On A Tight Leash': If the Chinese and Pakistanis join hands, they have the resources to come down to Ladakh and into Leh.
However, the presence of Indian troops in Siachen is a deterrent to China and Pakistan from joining hands in the Karakoram.
Therefore, if that road is constructed to Aghil Pass and is connected to Khunjerab Pass, it will provide them access.
China will connect as much of the Karakoram Pass as they can.
They have also constructed a 170-kilometre artery from Gilgit to Siachen.
Artificial nation: Pakistan Should Actually Be 4 Different Countries.
Transforming India Post into a Rural E-Commerce Powerhouse: Can India Post, a state-run entity with a massive presence and logistical network across India, reposition itself as a leading e-commerce player, not just a logistical support provider?
The answer could lie in harnessing the power of its well-established network, employees, and extensive rural reach to create a transformative e-commerce platform catering specifically to rural markets.
It will also enable India Post to have a good share of the emerging e-commerce era pie, in terms of volume of sales, turnover, and profitability, making it a brand like Amul.
India's State-Sponsored Sugar Addiction
: Thanks to our policies, India produces way more sugar than it needs, using up precious water and financial resources; and as a result, Indians end up eating more sugar than is healthy.
When Dry January becomes permanent: ‘Even though I was fit and energetic the weekends were gone’. “You’d have few drinks on Friday night because you’ve worked hard all week long, and then Saturday was sluggish. You might have a few drinks on Saturday night, and Sunday was sluggish. All of a sudden it’s Monday.”
Ugly, smog filled 'bikAss' comes with a price: India is seeing dip in foreign tourists. In contrast, Vietnam became the fastest growing market for foreign tourist arrivals in south east Asia
What urban India needs: Walkaluru walkathon highlights Bengaluru’s pedestrian infrastructure, encourages walking culture
Indore tragedy: Indore, in spotlight over 20 deaths, allocated Rs 2,450 Crore for 'Clean' Water. What makes the tragedy even more disturbing is the scale of public money that has been spent on Indore's water and sanitation infrastructure over the past five years.
60% of top 1,000 stocks delivered negative returns in 2025: Even after the recent correction, the Nifty Smallcap 100 trades at a price-to-earnings multiple of 24.6 based on one-year forward earnings, well above its 10-year average of 18.3.
Why The Americans Were Opposed To Agni: 'The heat shield technology for re-entry vehicles was first mastered in DRDO for the Agni missile.' 'This is why the Americans were so opposed to Agni in the 1980s, unlike other missiles -- it was a re-entry vehicle.'
The Chinese way: Videos and photographs show how the Chinese authorities have tried to dismantle Zion Church, a Christian network with branches across the country.
The year of Chinese robotics domination: The real AI story of 2026 will be found in the boring, the mundane—and in China. Washington's fatal miscalculation was assuming its sanctions would hammer Chinese innovation. Instead, it only hampered the viability of the West's own tech.
MAGA doesn't like your skin: Sikh truckers found refuge in trucking until the Trump administration’s crackdown
IMEC is alive: India–Turkey tensions shape IMEC route via Oman
Jordan, Israel and Greece.
Three new political-economic axes have been converging in recent weeks — none of which include Turkey:
A renewed Qatar–Saudi axis, including the announcement of the Doha–Riyadh high-speed rail line and economic agreements between Saudi Arabia and Syria.
The Oman–India–Jordan axis, forming the eastern and western anchors of IMEC trade routes.
The Israel–Cyprus–Greece axis, connecting IMEC from the Middle East to Europe via the Mediterranean.
Micro-plastics in your Zomato order: People who have five to 10 takeaways per month might be consuming excessive microplastic from the containers their meals come in.
"Miicro- and nano- plastics, have been detected in virtually every organ in our bodies, including arteries, brain, blood, placenta and testicles".
Leftists abandoning Muslim women? Who knew! "So many big names in progressive and feminist circles, would personally agree with us, but when it came to taking a public stand, they'd go back on their promise. Only Asghar Ali Engineer stuck publicly to the stand he took privately. And he bore the brunt for doing so".
Putin-Bush talks: 'A Junta with nukes'-revelations on Putin-Bush talks disclose Putin's 'Pakistan' warning
"We learnt a lot from the very first prototype in India": Placing solar panels over the 4,000 miles of California’s open canals could save up to 63 billion gallons of water annually — enough to meet the needs of 2 million people.
This is also how ISRO succeeded -- you can't import a satellite launch vehicle.
In such segments, DRDO and ISRO come out looking very good.
Take for instance, the ring laser gyroscope developed by DRDO under the Integrated Guided Missile Programme.
Older missiles used mechanical gyroscopes; the new laser gyroscope is far more accurate.
Nobody would give that to us, so DRDO developed it indigenously.
However, in areas where an import option exists -- like fighter jets, main battle tanks, or towed artillery guns -- the moment DRDO gets close to a solution, someone shows up offering to sell it.
The sellers also have an interest in undermining DRDO.
There are also numerous critical subsystems developed that aren't as visible.
For example, the heat shield technology for re-entry vehicles was first mastered in DRDO for the Agni missile.
This is why the Americans were so opposed to Agni in the 1980s, unlike other missiles -- it was a re-entry vehicle.
We also had to master the technology of mounting printed circuit boards in these missiles that can withstand extreme shock, vibration, and temperature.
The US had a far better ecosystem for spinning off military technology for civilian use --Teflon came from the space programme.
DRDO could have done this, but it was stifled by financial and ideological hurdles.
For example, armour-penetrating explosives could have had mining and other civilian applications. Similarly the laser gyro, heat shield etc.
The commercialisation never took off because our finance people were scared to make decisions.
I don't necessarily blame them; they fear audit objections. The whole system is messed up.
This is also why government startup funds often go unspent -- no one wants to take the risk inherent in venture capitalism, where you expect many failures for one big success.
This culture of audit objections stifles innovation, and no government, including the present one, has shown the willingness to truly understand and fix this problem.
Our biggest success was the control law for the LCA.
It started around 1992. Girish Deodhare, who just retired as DG of ADA, was my PhD student at Waterloo and joined CAIR.
Dr Kota Harinarayana was the programme director of ADA.
Initially, Martin Marietta was supposed to design the control software. They would talk big but belittle Indian capabilities and refused to share design documents, only giving final numbers.
Dr Kalam, who took over as DG in July '92, called a meeting -- on a Sunday -- and appointed Prof Roddam Narasimha FRS, to head a committee to decide if we could build the control law indigenously. We all said we could.
These foreign companies weren't impressive technically and weren't offering a knowledge transfer.
We decided to go for a state-of-the-art digital fly-by-wire control with a 32-bit floating-point processor, which was advanced for the time.
Prof Narasimha recommended we do it ourselves, and Dr Kalam agreed. He appointed Professor I G Sharma of IISc as an independent assessor to report to the ADA governing council every three months.
We designed the first cut of the control law in about two years.
A major hurdle was computing power. Due to international restrictions, we couldn't get powerful computers in India.
We rented time on a British Aerospace flight simulator in the UK.
Our team would go there with the software on tapes, and our test pilots would fly the LCA control law on that simulator.
Interestingly, the BAE guys, who were also working on the Eurofighter, invited our pilots to try their simulator.
Our pilots later reported that they found the LCA's handling qualities to be better!
Professor M Vidyasagar, FRS, is a Distinguished Professor at IIT Hyderabad. He earned his BS, MS, and PhD in electrical engineering from the University of Wisconsin.
Blue skies are a luxury in India: It’s the same endless blue dome that stretches over America, Europe, and India alike. But it’s not blue anymore in most Indian cities. The saddest part? We got used to it.
Ram mandir needs trees and water bodies to be the model temple of the maryada purushothaman
I feel a tad bit sad every time I go outside the country. In Vietnam now. Lots of parks, used by the elderly for exercise and socializing. Lots of bicycles on the roads. We could have all this and more if only we could root out corruption and develop civic sense in India. https://t.co/Lb0rNBVSzfpic.twitter.com/ggQVOWAxYT
— Vishnu Sreekumar (@vishnusreekumar@masto.ai) (@vishnusreekr) October 24, 2025
Bye-Bye Blue Skies: India is getting dimmer. Sunshine hours have been steadily declining across most regions for the past three decades. Aerosols from sources like vehicles and industries block sunlight — a phenomenon scientists call “solar dimming”. The consequences include reduced solar power output and reduced agriculture yields apart from health impact.
"India is the dumbest IPO market" "The millions and billions of small investors coming in. Someone has to extract money from them, so these IPOs come and take money from you".
Incentive wars: Why walking away can be wiser. Karnataka’s refusal to outbid Andhra Pradesh for Google’s $15 billion AI data centre may seem like a loss, but in game theory – and governance – wisdom often lies in knowing when not to play. Around the world, multinational firms have mastered the art of triggering incentive wars between governments, extracting concessions that can erode public value. . . . The Hidden Cost of Google’s $15 Billion AI Data Center in Vizag.
China gets Swadeshi: China bans foreign AI chips from state-funded data centers.
"India is just screwing the parts together": Are we truly manufacturing, or just assembling parts? We destroyed our electronics industry and turned to a 100% importing nation. The real state of ‘Make in India’.
Showing spine: Vietnam Is Building Islands to Challenge China’s Hold on a Vital Waterway
Top researchers consider leaving U.S. amid funding cuts: A poll from the journal Nature found that 75% of researchers in the U.S. are considering leaving the country. That includes a man who’s been dubbed the "Mozart of Math".
Good oped in @EconomicTimes that points to the surge in Indian students in the US (most in STEM and management) but at huge economic and talent costs to India. The authors call for building world-class universities at home, reabsorbing PhD talent, and turning brain drain into… pic.twitter.com/7zSDTCuyTJ
Following Chinese model: A generation ago conventional wisdom held that as China liberalized, its economy would come to resemble America’s. Instead, capitalism in America is starting to look like China - 'State capitalism with American characteristics' - a sea change from the free market ethos the U.S. once embodied. . . . Trump reviving crony capitalism.
India pauses plans to buy U.S. arms after Trump's tariffs: Discussions on India's purchases of Stryker combat vehicles made by General Dynamics Land Systems and Javelin anti-tank missiles developed by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin have been paused due to the tariffs.
Fistful Of Dollars: Rice for Vietnam farmers displaced for Trump Golf Club.
AI pervert: Meta AI chatbots gave false medical advice and flirted with minors — now the company is restructuring its AI division again - fourth restructuring in six months.
China catching up in AI: Huawei is making its Ascend AI GPU software toolkit open-source to better compete against CUDA. . . Chinese censorship bias in LLMs
Power hungry toy: AI's soaring energy consumption is causing skyrocketing power bills for households across the US — States reporting spikes in energy costs of up to 36%
Milk may not help the elderly: People who live in countries with the lowest rates of hip fractures also tend to drink the least milk. Drinking more milk was not associated with lower fracture risk
Inspired by Waqf board, KKKaangress to reclaim 'its' properties: “There are a large number of properties, including in Delhi, that belong to the pre-1969 Indian National Congress that were subject to legislation. There is now a Supreme Court judgment, which says that all the pre-1969 properties in which the Congress had operated from belong to the INC”.
Chinese EVs in India?: BYD keen on India manufacturing despite Visa issues.... Xi wants EV dominance, NaMo wants shanti, sadbhavana. Match made in heaven! /s
India's battery hope: Hindustan Zinc to revolutionise batteries, challenge Lithium dominance. "We are working with IITs on how to innovate with zinc for EVs".
Semiconductors: First 'Made-in-India' chip to now roll out in 2025.
War prep: Chinese university applies for undersea cable cutter patent — device developed by coastal university located across the sea from Taiwan
Chinese illegal immigrants in US: “Sixty thousand Chinese males, mostly military age, do not leave China without the coordination and approval of the Chinese government. This is a coordinated national security vulnerability that the Chinese government is involved in.”
Dalai Lama: “Despite all the suffering and destruction, we still hold fast to the hope for a peaceful resolution of our struggle for freedom and dignity. Drawing on the lessons learned from my decades of engagement with Beijing, the book also aims to offer some thoughts on what might be the way forward.”
Freebie Raj: "All over the world, subsidy and welfare is given to those who can't afford. Here, we have women from two rich cities like Bengaluru and Mysuru, traveling free just because it is available".
I took an early morning bus to Mysuru, from Bengaluru. ₹210 fare. Comfortable KSRTC bus and a world class highway for fast travel.
But I got a few thoughts.
1) Nearly 30 of the 50 passengers were women. Just show Aadhar and travel free. Is this fair? Is it equality? 2) 20… pic.twitter.com/2TfkzF88IA
World's dumping ground: Between June and August 2019, 58 ships containing plastic waste appeared in Indonesian ports. Indonesia didn't accept this waste and the ships were supposedly sent back to their home country: the US. But instead, 38 of these ships came to India.
“Tech dumping” is the practice of old, outdated or malfunctioning electronic devices and technologies being exported by developed countries to developing countries at low prices.
Solar Sheep: China's Unexpected Solar Power Success Story！
Google CEO: AI development is finally slowing down—'the low-hanging fruit is gone’
India's crisis in Engineering and management studies: Manufacturing sector has struggled to grow due to increased dependence on imports from China. On the other hand, the service-sector firms are either solving last-mile delivery problems or offering basic services -- sectors that don’t really need higher-order engineering and management capability.
BikAss ain't working: Why 7 crore newfarmers in the last 7 years is bad news: The increase of people taking up farming in the last seven years is the highest in some of India’s poorest states, with usual suspect Uttar Pradesh leading from the front, along with compatriots Madhya Pradesh and Bihar.
Why most Indians choking on smog aren’t in Delhi: According to Swiss firm IQAir, eight of the 10 most polluted cities in the world last year were located in the Indo-Gangetic plains. Delhi receives significant attention due to its position as the capital of India
Green Great Wall: China completes 3,000-km green belt around its biggest desert - 46-year campaign to encircle its largest desert with trees, part of national efforts to end desertification and curb the sandstorms that plague parts of the country during the spring
Salmon back in Klamath river: After 100 years, salmon have returned to the Klamath River – following a historic dam removal project in California. "Seeing the videos of the salmon returning home brought me to tears of happiness and relief".
Reality check: India's bid to match China's factory heft gets a reality check. Goods imports have surged 56% since the 2020 border clash while India's trade deficit with China has nearly doubled to $85 billion. China continues to be India's biggest source of goods and was the largest supplier of industrial products last year.
Lagging: India’s share in global FDI falls to 2.1% in 2023 from 6.5% in 2020: Limited success in attracting FDI in manufacturing sector.
Decline: India losing out to countries like Bangladesh and Vietnam in manufacturing. India's share in global exports of apparel, leather, textiles, and footwear has declined from 4.5 percent in 2013 to 3.5 percent in 2022. Direct employment related to exports fell from a peak of 9.5 percent of total domestic employment in 2012 to 6.5 percent in 2020.
Speculator's haven: $5.5 trillion and ticking: Beware! The pressure is building in India's stock markets
"Exploitation is rampant: I worked as a food delivery boy in Bengaluru. Guess how much I earned in a week
Nikah mut’ah: Sex tourism in Indonesia sells itself as Islamic temporary marriage. . . Taliban’s 'reforms' lead to 21,000 musical instruments destroyed in Afghanistan
India leads the world in generating plastic waste: Producing 10.2 million tons a year (9.3 million metric tons), far more than double the next big-polluting nations, Nigeria and Indonesia. China, often villainized for pollution, ranks fourth but is making tremendous strides in reducing waste.
Man-made catastrophe: Man-made Church-made disaster. 62 per cent of the green cover in Wayanad district disappeared between 1950 and 2018 while plantation cover rose by around 1,800 per cent. Around 85 per cent of the total area of Wayanad was under forest cover until the 1950s.
Cardinal sin: Church organized agitations against restricting commercial activities in ecologically sensitive areas.
The truth is - The only voice that came out in support of Western Ghats was the RSS The Kerala govt (be it Left or Congress) + Church vehemently opposed any recommendations to protect Western Ghats https://t.co/oTP0FzDnCs
Over-Tourism: Wayanad received more than 1 million domestic and foreign tourists last year, nearly triple the number in 2011 when a federal govt report warned against over-development. Kerala has witnessed nearly 60% of the landslides in India between 2015 and 2022 . . . . Experts panel locates 70,582 buildings in buffer zones; most number of structures in Wayanad
Scientists May Have Discovered the Cause of Autism: researchers from the University of Fukui investigated the link between polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) in umbilical cord blood samples and autism scores in 200 children. The study identified one particular compound in the umbilical cord blood acid, called diHETrE, that may have "strong implications" for ASD severity.
"Muscular Nationalism": India-China military tensions persist even as their trade surges. India’s exports to China stood at $16 billion last year while imports were more than $100 billion.
Generative AI patents: China beat the U.S. in generative AI patents by 6-to-1 for the past ten years — almost 10,000 Chinese patents filed last year alone
AI superpower: Chinese AI built off open-source code matches American tech in chatbot benchmark tests.
The AI Industry Is Steaming Toward A Legal Iceberg: Legal scholars, lawmakers and at least one Supreme Court justice agree that companies will be liable for the things their AIs say and do—and that the lawsuits are just beginning. Several legal experts say Section 230 will not protect firms from lawsuits over the outputs of generative AI, echoing SCOTUS Justice Gorsuch's 2023 statement.
Value of an Indian engineering degree: IIT-Bombay is yet to place almost 36% of its students in the ongoing placement season. Other IIT campuses in Delhi and Kanpur have reported similar problems in the last few years. This has raised questions about the condition of India's job market and the value of an engineering degree in these changing times. United Nations data suggests that India's graduate unemployment has reached almost 30%. Is it time for you to rethink your degree?
Enemy within: Building spree in the Himalayas is increasing the risk of disaster on the tense China border
'People for Himalaya' Issues 5-pt charter of demand for political parties: A complete ban on all mega infrastructure projects, such as those related to the railways, dams, hydro projects and four-lane highways in the Himalayas, and have urged for referendums and public consultations to be made compulsory for all development projects.
India: No country for a Green Party? Mainline political parties have maintained a deafening silence on environmental issues even as the 2024 Lok Sabha election campaign gains momentum and fury.
Politicians feasting off Hindu devotees' offerings: Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams has expedited the distribution of house site pattas and registration process for employees and workers. The TTD had sanctioned funds and allocated more than 1,000 acres of land for houses to as many as 14,500 employees.
Billionaire Raj: India's richest 1% earn 22.6% of total income — the highest share since data going back to the 1920s — and hold more than 40% of the wealth.
The inequality gap widened after the economy’s opening up in the early 1990s, but “between 2014-15 and 2022-23, the rise of top-end inequality has been particularly pronounced in terms of wealth concentration”. “The ‘Billionaire Raj’ headed by India’s modern bourgeoisie is now more unequal than the British Raj headed by the colonialist forces”.
The China-built BYD Seagull, a small all-electric hatchback, starts at less than $10,000, and reportedly banks a profit for the Chinese automaker. That latter point — EV profits where U.S. automakers have mostly failed to turn any — combined with the expansion of Chinese automakers into Europe, Latin America and elsewhere has automotive executives and politicians, from Detroit and Texas to Germany and Japan, on edge.
The rise of BYD and other Chinese automakers led Tesla CEO Elon Musk to warn that Chinese automakers will “demolish” global rivals without trade barriers.
In One Key A.I. Metric, China Pulls Ahead of the U.S.: Talent: When it comes to the artificial intelligence that powers chatbots like ChatGPT, China lags behind the United States. But when it comes to producing the scientists behind a new generation of humanoid technologies, China is pulling ahead.
New research shows that China has by some metrics eclipsed the United States as the biggest producer of A.I. talent, with the country generating almost half the world’s top A.I. researchers.
Domestic chis and operating systems: China to pivot from AMD & Intel CPUs to domestic chips in government PCs. The transition to domestic processors will advance more swiftly for server processors than for client PCs, due to the less complex software ecosystem needing replacement. China will need to invest approximately $91 billion from 2023 to 2027 to overhaul the IT infrastructure in government and adjascent industries.
Solar cooking - From sun to plate: Despite its advantages, solar cooking has some limitations, such as longer cooking time and the need to cook outdoors in the sun.
To overcome these challenges, Saswat Sourav Panda, a resident of Puri, Odisha, integrated three solar-based cooking systems at his house for different cooking processes. A solar box cooking system is used for slow cooking, a parabolic concentrator for heavy cooking and a solar glass tube-based system for cooking even without sunlight.
With a total investment of Rs. 31,000, Panda reduced his annual consumption of gas cylinders from twelve to four. “Once I started to appreciate the enhanced natural taste due to slow cooking in solar, we switched entirely”.
