IPA Special
India’s Space Agency Emerges As Major Force In Global Launch Market
By T N Ashok A rocket lifted off at dawn from the coastal launch complex of Sriharikota, carrying a 6.1-ton American communications satellite into the December sky. Within minutes, the payload was safely deployed in orbit, another mission completed with the metronomic precision that has become India’s calling card...
Trade Unions Toughen Stance, Call For General Strike On Feb 12
By P. Sreekumaran THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The major trade unions in the country except the BMS have decided to toughen their stance against the implementation of the four new labour codes, enactment of a new law to replace the MGNREGA, amendments to the Insurance Act and changes in the nuclear energy...
2025, The Year That Was; 2026, The Year That Will Be
By Nilotpal Basu Reviewing the year gone by is important, as the past gives us the wherewithal to understand the present and step into the future with all our energy and purpose, particularly in an environment which is engulfed by a mainstream media which is increasingly hegemonised by corporate...
In Defence Of Our Anti-Colonial Socialist-Communist Heritage
By Krishna Jha The national freedom movement, both through its successes and failures, greatly deepened the national consciousness. This consciousness went through the stages of evolving new strategies and methods of struggles, creation of new traditions of resistance, of secularism, of democracy and egalitarianism. Among its great successes and...
Trump Focuses On Nigeria, The New Epicentre Of ISIS Terrorism
By Ashok Nilakantan Ayers On Christmas night, American warplanes struck northwestern Nigeria. The targets: suspected ISIS positions in Sokoto State. The location surprised seasoned observers. Nigeria is neither Syria or Iraq. Yet for Donald Trump, that was precisely the point. The operation signals a fundamental shift. America’s war on...
Murmurs Of ‘Rahul Hatao, Priyanka Laao’ Pinch Congress
By Rahil Nora Chopra After poll routs in Maharashtra, Haryana, Delhi and poor performance in the assembly elections of Bihar, the voices for Priyanka Gandhi Vadra have grown stronger. The rumbling heard within the party is “Rahul hatao, Priyanka laao”, publicly calling for a meaty central role for Priyanka....
Sreenivasan, The Keeper Of Malayali Conscience On Screen Passes Away
By Tirthankar Mitra The common factor between the Malayali films Sandesam (1991) and Nadodikkattu (1987) is no more. Sreenivasan, who was part and parcel of both the films, has passed away. It did not matter to the multifaceted man that the two films were on divergent topics. Sreenivasan enacted...
2026 Would Be A Year Of Lower Oil Prices And Crude Oversupply
By K Raveendran As 2026 approaches, the global oil market is heading into a year that could decisively reshape price dynamics, fiscal planning in producing states, and energy security calculations for importing economies. The defining feature of the coming year is not demand destruction or geopolitical shock, but the...
BlueBird Block-2 Launch: India’s Heavy-Lift Moment Is Beyond Space
By R. Suryamurthy By any technical measure, India’s successful launch of the BlueBird Block-2 satellite should have been routine. Rockets lift satellites into orbit every week now. SpaceX alone has normalised spaceflight to the point of near banality. And yet, the LVM3-M6 mission — which placed a 6,100-kg U.S.-built...
Bodo Movement Groups Restive, Mass Mobilisation Likely Soon
By Rabindra Nath Sinha KOLKATA: Whether the Bodo Movement Groups (BMGs) will press ahead with the in-principle decision to organize a mass gathering of two lakh people at Kokrajhar in the near future in support of their five-year-old demand for more powers and more elected representatives — will hinge...
Will FTA With New Zealand Hamper Indian Apple Growers’ Interests?
By Jag Mohan Thaken Amid a stuck period for Indo-American Trade finalization, India and New Zealand announced a bilateral agreement, on December 22, 2025, stating a win-win situation for both. However, the implementation may take a period of six months or so. A Government of India press release through...
Student Assassinations In Bangladesh Can Impact Regional Stability
By Aritra Banerjee It’s often observed that political violence in the Indian subcontinent, especially in the now volatile South Asian neighbours India and Bangladesh, has often announced itself first on university campuses. When students become targets rather than participants in political life, it signals that institutional mechanisms for managing...
December In Chennai: A Season Of Culture, Joy, And Artistic Reverence
By T N Ashok Every December, the southern Indian metropolis of Chennai undergoes a remarkable transformation — its air infused with jasmine, its streets animated with cultural fervour, and its people drawn into a rhythm of music, drama, dance and cinematic celebration. For decades, this coastal city has turned...
An Indian Supporter In Pakistan: Meet Maulana Fazlur Rehman
By Asad Mirza India recently got support in its fight against cross-border terrorism, from an unexpected quarter. Several Pakistani religious scholars and representatives of various religious sects stressed at a meeting that Afghan territory must not be used by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) against Pakistan. In a joint statement...
G Ram G Bill Marks The End Of India’s Rural Employment Revolution
By Nesar Ahmad Since the beginning, the National Democratic Alliance (‘NDA’) government has not shied from showing its dislike towards the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (‘MGNREGA’). In 2015, only a year after the government came to power, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, speaking the Parliament mockingly, noted...
Bangladesh’s Bluster On Northeast India: Empty Threats, Or More?
By Ashis Biswas How serious is the slogan for wresting the seven sister states in India’s northeast region, raised by Islamic extremists in Bangladesh, for New Delhi? For a proper assessment of the political challenge this poses for India, a brief study of background information is necessary. Bangladesh sought...
China’s Tech March Grappling Against Its Own Weakening Economy
By Ashok Nilakantan Ayers NEW YORK: China is steering its future in an uneven manner and with great speed. In gleaming industrial zones, robots guided by artificial intelligence assemble electric vehicles that rival the best in the world. Data centres hum with vast computing power. Laboratories race to design...
Tensions Escalate In West Bengal Over SIR Process And Deletion Of Names
By Dr. Gyan Pathak As the Election Commission of India started sending notices to unmapped voters to appear before the officials for hearing from December 27, 2025, tensions in West Bengal have considerably escalated. There are about 32 lakh voters in this category, who are facing a prospect of...
