Is the current institutional conflict in Pakistan an indication that it is increasingly becoming a dysfunctional state, or is it a sign that the political system is now becoming more democratic? The Zardari government is at loggerheads with the judic....
The Government of India has announced that it had decided to provide 4.5 percent reservations for Muslims, to form part of the 27 percent reservation quota for other backward classes. Salman Kurshid, the Law Minister, has stated that this reservatio....
How Nine Governments Betrayed the Nation While every political party in India has offered lip service to the idea of having an independent institution to probe allegations of corruption against members of the political executive and the ....
The crassly cynical political developments in Pakistan, epitomized by the Memogate scandal, befit a banana republic. The Army is accusing the Head of State of acting against national security by seeking to conspire with the US to curb its power. In a....
China has been regularly coming out with white papers in many areas of its endeavour including defence and space activities. Promoting transparency is claimed to be one of the main goals of such an exercise. But largely such papers hide more and reve....
In India at least since the British came to rule us it is the State which took upon itself the responsibility for providing health care. In 1925 in the undivided province of the Punjab Sir Fazl-i-Husain scheme for health care was initiated. The broa....
The announcement that the Taliban will be opening an office in Qatar should be a cause for some reflection. The US and its allies are politically exhausted and economically drained by the war in Afghanistan. They no longer seek a clear victory; they ....
The Russian Constitution allows a president only two consecutive terms in power. Vladimir Putin was President from 2000 to 2008. Highly popular for having restored the political and economic authority of the state as well as national self-respect aft....
The basic structure of the Constitution of India divides the State into three equal but separate constituents which, nevertheless, have a degree of convergence and interaction because each is incomplete without the others. These three constituents a....
Book Review - That Used To Be US by Tom Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum. The book spells out succintly where the US is slipping up, says Kanwal Sibal As the title suggests, this book deals with the reality of the United States’ slow decli....