India Narrative

Chris Blackburn is the Communications Director of the Swiss InterStrategy Group based in Zurich, Switzerland. He is the recipient of a “Friend of Bangladesh” award from the Government of Bangladesh for his work on counterterrorism and seeking justice for war crimes committed during the War of Liberation in 1971. Blackburn was also formally acknowledged by India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his work in international relations and security in January 2022. Blackburn is the head of European Outreach at Global Friends of Afghanistan (GFA), a US-based think tank that is working with Afghan figures from around the world. Blackburn speaks with India Narrative at length about India’s standing in the world and how the country is navigating itself through the global chaos in the region and the wider world. Excerpts from the interview: Q: What is your view on the dystopian state of the world - the Covid-19 crisis, Russia-Ukraine war, Taiwan under a constant threat, economies under stres

Amid concerns over global food shortage, India-- the world’s largest producer of millet—is looking at expanding its public distribution. The short nutritious grains may be distributed for mid-day meals and also at the Anganwadi centres. While it is imperative to reset focus on production of these short grains with their growing acceptance within the country and outside and rising threats of food insecurity, experts said it must be done in a well-planned manner ensuring that it does not lead to “lower cultivation of other staple crops such as rice and wheat.” Millet crops are essentially resilient to drought and floods and can be produced even at drylands. "Increased production of millets should enlarge the overall food plate, not lower it by reducing other crops yields," a food analyst with one of the industry bodies told India Narrative.  Compared to other cereals such as wheat, rice and maize, production of millets is still low in the country. “The increase in millet output

Climate change is a fact that can’t be wished away and now to understand its impact on both flora and fauna, scientists are conducting many studies. One such as per a report in sciencealert.com delves on how species are struggling to relocate to new habitats. Moving to places which are at a higher altitude raises two points. These are temperatures which are colder and also thinner, meaning they have less oxygen and make breathing harder. To comprehend these two issues, a group of Anna’s hummingbirds also known as Calypte anna were moved to a place 1,200 metres or 4,000 feet above their usual home. Researchers made a rather odd observation when they found that the metabolic rates of these birds lowered as they lingered around while there was lesser efficiency in flying shorter durations, most probably due to wanting more oxygen. Though in future the temperatures may become warmer, the study’s cool environs had a drastic consequence on their sleep patterns. Dozing off these creatures wen

Amreen Bhat (35), Kashmir’s first entertainment Vlogger and YouTuber, shot dead in terrorist violence at her home in Budgam’s Chadoora area on Wednesday, 25 May, has left behind big shadows of fear. In the last 24 hours, at least 6 female singers and artists made frantic phone calls to a senior television and theatre producer, whispering to him that they were all frightened after Amreen’s brutal assassination. They were advised to be ‘calm’. Married in 2012 and divorced in just two months, Amreen discovered a small livelihood in her petty performances in some songs and drama serials at Doordarshan Kendra (DDK) Srinagar. Soon she quit television and explored better opportunities in social media—Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok. As her followers and subscribers multiplied on all platforms, she became the sole bread-earner for her small family—an elderly father, Khizar Mohammad Bhat, and sister Razia who lives at the same parental house with her husband and 11-year-old son Farhan, at

India has once again stressed the urgent need to find constructive ways to ensure peace and stability in Afghanistan and combating risks from terrorism emanating from the region. In a meeting with the top security heads of the region in Tajikistan's capital Dushanbe today, National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval batted for enhancing capability of Afghanistan to counter terrorism and terrorist groups which pose a threat to regional peace and security. The NSA's of Tajikistan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Iran, Kyrgyzstan and China took part in the meeting which essentially carried forward the spirit encapsulated in the Delhi Declaration from the 3rd Regional Security Dialogue on Afghanistan held in New Delhi in November 2021.  While highlighting that India has historical and civilisational relations with Afghanistan and continues to stand by the people of Afghanistan, Doval said that the foremost priority should be right to life and a dignified living as well as protection

For archaeologists and historians artefacts and objects of the past reveal a lot about the period and people they belong to and so do teeth of ancient human beings and cultures. Take for instance the ancient Maya who gave a lot of importance to their teeth as per a report in sciencealert.com and had them filled with jade, gold, jet, turquoise or hematite gems. Irrespective of their gender or economic status, men and women from across the society paid a visit to the dentist to have their teeth drilled and filled with minerals, expensive stones and jewels. While the inlays which survived the individual’s lifetime had a spiritual significance there was more to it than just aesthetics as a new study suggests that the material used for cementing the gems to the teeth had therapeutic and hygienic attributes. The adhesive used held the gems in place for not just a lifetime but thousands of years and the ingredients used to make it had properties and potential to combat tooth decay and also ch

The first Eurasian Economic Forum kicks off in Kyrgyzstan capital Bishkek on Thursday as Russia battles unprecedented sanctions amid the ongoing conflict with Ukraine which is having much wider ramifications not just in the region but all over the world. The Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), which also includes Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, will be meeting in the backdrop of Moscow vowing to raise cooperation with post-Soviet states located in the region to a "qualitatively new level of allied relations" to counter a wide range of "modern challenges and threats". Russian President Vladimir Putin will speak at the plenary session virtually and share his views on 'Eurasian economic integration in an era of global change - New opportunities for investment activity'. Read more

Bacteria are found in most unexpected places – deserts which are arid, lakes which are toxic and acidic and now scientists have discovered them in one of the unexpected habitats -- the venom of spiders and snakes said a report in sciencealert.com. This finding is contrary to the previously held belief that since these venoms had antimicrobial compounds, they therefore were presumed to be sterile with no microbes thriving in them. This means that with the bacteria already in existence in the venom, a person who is bitten by a snake or spider may need to be treated for infection. Stressing the importance of this find, Sterghios Moschos a molecular biologist from Northumbria University in the United Kingdom said: "We found that all venomous snakes and spiders that we tested had bacterial DNA in their venom. Common diagnostic tools failed to identify these bacteria correctly – if you were infected with these, a doctor would end up giving you the wrong antibiotics, potentially making m

Availability of abundant prey is vital for the conservation of a huge number of large predators and that is precisely happening in the Northern Territory of Australia. A report in smithsonianmag.com mentioned that the population of saltwater crocodiles of this region are thriving as they are getting to eat more feral pigs than earlier. Suggesting this in a study published in the journal Biology Letters, scientists have compared the bones of crocodile specimens which are 40 to 55 years old and kept in museum with those of the present-day reptiles and noted the change and shift in their diet over a period of time. In a statement, the Director of Griffith’s Australian Rivers Institute, Stuart Bunn said: “We measured the naturally occurring carbon and nitrogen isotopes extracted from the crocodile’s bones and other tissue which are derived directly from the animal’s diet. This gives truth to the old adage ‘you are what you eat’.” This comparison of the bones highlighted that the modern rep

The Russian-controlled administration in southern Ukraine's Kherson region has once again reiterated its intention of joining Russia and also urged Moscow to establish its permanent military base to guarantee full security. Kirill Stremousov, Deputy Head of the military-civilian administration of the region, has said Kherson will not "rush to a referendum" since its results "will not be recognised by Western countries anyway". The integration into the Russian Federation, he told the Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti on Tuesday, would be gradual after establishing a peaceful life on the territory. The Russian language will also be given the status of a state language along with Ukrainian in the due course. "According to our plan for integration into the Russian Federation, we must complete the process of transition to all standards of Russian legislation by the end of the year, and only then we can decide on a referendum and our future status,"

On Tuesday, the four-member Quadrilateral Security Dialogue launched the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA). The new initiative will allow tracking of “dark shipping”—illegal fishing and unregulated fishing. In a statement, the White House said: "This initiative will transform the ability of partners in the Pacific Islands, Southeast Asia, and the Indian Ocean region to fully monitor the waters on their shores and, in turn, to uphold a free and open Indo-Pacific. Quad countries are committed to contributing to the region’s maritime domain awareness—a fundamental requirement for peace, stability, and prosperity—through an investment in IPMDA over five years". Under the initiative, three regions—the Pacific Islands, Southeast Asia, and the Indian Ocean region—of the Indo-Pacific will be integrated for an almost real-time and cost-effective maritime domain awareness. The India-based Information Fusion Center-Indian Ocean Region will coordinate with si

The recovery of a massive cache of small arms and ammunition from a terror hideout in Srinagar on Monday has exposed a plot of the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LET) and its local front TRF to disturb peace and spread fear with target killings across the Kashmir valley. The small arms haul was seized hours after TRF threatened to carry out attacks on the annual Amarnath pilgrimage which is scheduled to commence on June 28. Senior Police officials said that developing an operation on technical and human intelligence, the Special Operations Group (SOG) of Srinagar District Police swooped on a terrorist hideout at Chhanapora, on the outskirts of Srinagar late on Sunday night, and recovered a huge quantity of arms and ammunition. The house under the scanner belonged to Umar Mushtaq and Amir Mushtaq, sons of one Mushtaq Ahmad Khan. The seizure included 15 pistols and 30 pistol magazines with 300 rounds of ammunition and one silencer. Preliminary reports said that Mushtaq Khan had been working as an ag

Like any other mother, the female octopus is protective of her eggs. Guarding them day and night, she zealously shields them from predators while ensuring they remain oxygenated by blowing water over them. Yet, a report in smithsonianmag.com stated that a mother octopus is different as unlike other mums, she ceases to eat and worse self-destructs and inflicts injury to herself – tearing her skin, beating herself against rock and eating her arms. Finally, she dies before getting to see the eggs hatch! Till now what the octopus experts knew was that the optic glands of the creature were accountable for this peculiar conduct. This was confirmed since the removal of these glands saw the octopus start eating and living longer. Yet, what was fascinating was how did these glands trigger such amazing and strange actions? Read more

In an opinion piece in the Japanese newspaper--Yomiuri Shimbun, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that closer India-Japan cooperation is vital in the post-COVID world. He also said that the two nations constitute key pillars of a stable and secure Indo-Pacific region. Modi, who arrived in Japan for the four-member Quad summit tweeted: "Closer India-Japan cooperation is vital in the post-COVID world. Our nations are firmly committed to democratic values. Together, we are key pillars of a stable and secure Indo-Pacific region. I am equally glad that we are working closely in various multilateral forums as well." The Quad is a strategic security dialogue between India, Australia, Japan, and the US and aims at balancing China in the Indo-Pacific. Besides the Quad summit with US President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and the new Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Modi's two-day visit also includes interactions with top Japanese business leaders.  

Anil Kumar Baloch has spent almost half of his life in India. He spent the other half in Balochistan, Afghanistan, Russia and Kazakhstan. Now that he has settled in India, he is working in medical tourism—an interpreter and a medical tourist guide to people who come from half a dozen countries. "I know Russian, Hindi, Sindhi, Baloch and Pashto. I can also converse in Dari, which resembles Persian therefore I can interact with people from Iran as well", says Anil with a sense of justified pride. Struggle in New Delhi Life wasn't as easy in New Delhi. "My initial life in Delhi was a struggle. I tried my hand at many jobs—made credit cards, did odd jobs in shops and worked in a bank. None was easy”, says Baloch. One day, whiling away time with friends, an Afghan recommended him to utilise his multilingual skills to help people coming from Afghanistan as they faced problems in interacting with medical staff. "I began translation for Afghans coming to India for trea

The mighty ancient Egypt is not just about the great pharaohs, queens and wars. It is also about hundreds of officials who helped the monarch to run this powerful empire. Not much is known about these officials. Now archaeologists have found a 4,300-year-old tomb of a man called Mehtjetju -- an official who professes to have access to “secret” royal documents -- states a report in livescience.com. The location of this tomb is next to the Djoser’s Step Pyramid, which was built 4,700 years ago in Saqqara. The hieroglyphs in the tomb as per Kamil Kuraszkiewicz in a statement said: "The dignitary bore the name Mehtjetju and was, among other things, an official with access to royal sealed — that is secret — documents.” Kamil Kuraszkiewicz is a professor at the University of Warsaw's faculty of Oriental Studies. Finding the tomb of an official next to the Step Pyramid – the first one to be constructed by the ancient Egyptians -- is not strange. The reason is that Djoser "was an

  Continuing with humanitarian assistance, India sent another consignment of 2,000 metric tons of wheat to war-ravaged Afghanistan. The consignment, flagged off by Rahul Nangare, Commissioner of Customs, was sent via the Attari-Wagah border. It had a message reading 'Gift from the people of India to the people of Afghanistan'. "The Indian government has promised to provide 50,000 metric tons of wheat to Afghanistan, to which we have sent 10,000 metric tons of wheat already,” ANI quoted the commissioner as saying. “From the remaining 40,000 metric tons today we are sending the first consignment of 2,000 metric tons of wheat," he said. India has already said that it will provide 50,000 metric tonnes (MT) of wheat to Afghanistan overland through Pakistan. Thereafter, several consignments of wheat have reached Afghanistan. In November Pakistan agreed to allow Indian trucks carrying relief materials including wheat and life-saving medicines to pass through its land. Read m

When marine creatures like sea turtles travel great distances in the oceans to their breeding grounds without any aid for navigation, it has fascinated scientists. A report in sciencealert.com states that a new study has revealed that this ability in turtles is due to its built-in geomagnetic steering and also plenty of luck and tenacity. For this study 22 hawksbill turtles or Eretmochelys imbricata were fitted with GPS trackers to chart their routes they would adhere, to reach their foraging regions following mating and breeding. It was indeed surprising to know that the routes taken were circuitous. For instance, one creature swam 1,306 kilometres to reach an island which was merely 176 km from where it started. Basically, the travelling entailed plenty of swimming before they reached the dry land. In their paper, the scientists wrote: "Our results provide compelling evidence that hawksbill turtles only have a relatively crude map sense in the open ocean. The existence of widesp

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has arrived in Lumbini —the birthplace of Gautam Buddha in Nepal, to kick start festivities on the occasion of Buddha Purnima. The visit is of enormous geo-cultural importance in part of consolidation of India as a modern civilizational state. By visiting Lumbini, on a day when the entire Buddhist universe is focusing on the founts of a great faith revered by nearly seven percent of the world’s population, the Prime Minister is making a bold statement—India is the core of Buddhism, and seeks to revive its natural connectivity with the global Buddhist ecosystem.   PM Modi is consciously leveraging India and Nepal’s enormous soft power on account of the two countries’ shared Buddhist heritage which spread its branches into China, South Korea, and Japan, and simultaneously in South and Central Asia via the ancient Silk Road, as well as Sri Lanka. In reviving India’s standing in the international Buddhis network, Modi inaugurated in Kushinagar, the place where

While the erstwhile State’s own Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has completed investigation or filed charge sheets in a number of the matters lingering since long in the last three years, the Central investigation agencies have been remarkably proactive in Jammu and Kashmir after its reorganisation in August 2019. Unlike the Central agencies, most of the ACB’s cases pertain to the alleged corrupt practices of the junior public servants. Very few of the senior J&K Administrative Service (JKAS) and IAS or IPS officers have been proceeded against, primarily for the fact that they happen to be either batch mates or seniors of the top functionaries of the organisation. In recent times, this is believed to be the main reason for the transfer of some high profile investigations, under judicial or administrative orders, from the ACB to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). The ACB’s investigations into the encroachments and illegal constructions in the area of PatniTop Development Author

It was one of the rare chances which the scientists could not dream of letting go. It was a golden opportunity, described a report in sciencealert.com, to study monozygotic or identical twins in common parlance, who in their childhood got separated and were raised in completely dissimilar environments – different countries and families. The findings of this research -- published in Personality and Individual Differences – were both interesting and amazing. Twins generally have similar scores in cognitive tests thereby pointing that intelligent quotient is heritable to a tune of 80 per cent but in this particular case, there was a 16-point difference between the twins. While there were several similarities too, the divergences were sharp and stood out. The findings stress on the need to relook at the perception about how much of intelligence is due to our genes and how much comes about because of the environment one is brought up in. Read more

Russia has slammed the decision of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to hold a special session on Thursday to address the deteriorating human rights situation in Ukraine "stemming from the Russian aggression". The special session will be held at the Palais des Nations in Geneva and is being convened according to an official request submitted by Ukraine and supported so far by 53 States. Moscow said on Tuesday that the special session highlights another anti-Russian approach of the “collective West” on the situation in Ukraine. Late Tuesday, the UN General Assembly elected Czech Republic to the 47-member Human Rights Council following Russia's suspension from the body over the Ukraine conflict. "As a justification for the need to hold it, Westerners cite the argument about the 'degradation of the situation on earth', as well as the fakes they themselves disseminated about the events in Bucha and Mariupol. At the same time, the crimes committed b

Sri Lanka is facing the worst economic crisis since its independence in 1948. The South Asian Island nation is in the grips of acute shortages of food, fuel and medicines. The 13-hour power-cuts have become the norm and the country was forced to cancel school exams as it could not pay for the imports of paper. And now, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa has resigned, and fled to a naval base in Trincomalee. Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves have declined to an alarming $ 1.6 billion in March 2022. However, it has upwards of $ 7 billion debt obligations slated for this year. Amidst the deepening economic crisis, Sri Lanka has defaulted on the $ 51-billion foreign debts. The decision to default was expected and yet it will make it difficult for Sri Lanka to borrow.  To manage the crisis, the government has sought assistance from India, China, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). However, the regime led by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa is on a sticky wicket. He has brought in a new

The profound churning in Sri Lanka—an impending regime change now that the Rajapaksa family seems to be throwing in the towel—may chiefly benefit an untested organisation. With the former Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and most of the extended Rajapaksa family now holed up at a naval base in Trincomalee, a huge political vacuum has emerged in the island nation. It is here the Front Line Socialist Party (FLSP), a breakaway from the ultra-Left Anatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), which had itself mounted two armed revolts against the government in the past, comes in. Highly placed sources told India Narrative that FLSP has been a key player in giving political direction to what had started at Colombo’s Galle Face as spontaneous protests against a virtual economic meltdown. The once powerful Rajapaksa family led by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, which had monopolised power became natural targets of the people’s wrath, once shortages kicked in and prices sk

Science is continuously striving to make headway in the medical field and find out how dreaded diseases work and what can be their cure. Neurobiologists Tushar Kamath and Abdulraouf Abdulraouf from the Broad Institute led a team that studied cells of the brain taken from persons who have died due to Parkinson’s disease or dementia and juxtaposed them with those from unaffected persons as per a report in sciencealert.com. The team was able to spot out certain brain cells that died due to the disease and also what made them susceptible to death. The “highly susceptible” found made them the prime target for therapeutic intervention while the research also brought into limelight how genetic risk plays a role in the disease. A neurodegenerative disease which is ongoing in nature – Parkinson’s attributes include movements which are uncontrollable like tremors, difficulties in speech, and problems of balance that turn worse with passage of time. The reason for this is the harm caused to nerv

Calling it a tough decision for his country, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has said that phasing out or banning the import of Russian oil due to the ongoing Ukraine conflict will "take time" and that Tokyo has no plans as of now to back out from large oil and gas extraction projects with Moscow in the Russian Far East. Kishida made the comment in Tokyo on Monday morning, only a few hours after attending the Group of Seven (G7) Summit video conference which lasted for about 70 minutes from midnight (Japan time).   The meeting was held at the behest of Germany, which holds the G7 presidency this year, and was attended by the leaders of G7 countries and also the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In a joint statement released today, the G7 leaders committed to phase out dependency on Russian energy, including by phasing out or banning the import of Russian oil in "timely and orderly fashion", and in ways that provide time for the world to secure altern

Pakistan’s new government has decided to file a case against the ousted former premier Imran Khan following his heavy attack against the Pakistani army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa. In a statement released late Sunday night,  Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif announced that a treason case will be filed against Imran Khan for his speeches against Pakistan and its powerful military establishment. "Imran first conspired to destroy the economy of the country and now planning to trigger civil-war in Pakistan", said Shehbaz Sharif adding that Khan’s “nefarious designs” would be crushed at all costs. Sharif’s statement came after the Pakistani army came heavily on Imran Khan . The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the Pakistani military’s media wing, took exception to “intensified and deliberate attempts to drag Pakistan armed forces and their leadership in ongoing political discourse in the country.” "Pakistan armed forces take strong exception to such unlawful and unethi

Failing to trigger a cycle of violence on the pattern of the 2010 and 2016 street turbulence in Kashmir after abrogation of Article 370, the separatist operatives made an organised attempt at Srinagar’s Jamia Masjid in the holy month of fasting in April. It, however, failed as the mosque’s management volunteers forced the saboteurs out and helped the Police to identify, arrest and book them for the criminal offence.    During the investigation, Srinagar District Police seized smartphones of some saboteurs and retrieved their data that suggested not only their free access to the alleged killers of a Police officer but also their contact through smartphones with their handlers in Pakistan. “There was an organised plan of sabotage of peace and clear instructions to the local saboteurs to create a fresh season of violence from Jamia Masjid”, SSP Srinagar, Rakesh Balwal, disclosed to India Narrative. “We have booked the saboteurs and gathered technical evidence of their links to Pakistan th

Russian President Vladimir Putin told Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Thursday that Russia was still ready to provide a safe passage for civilians from the besieged Azovstal steel works in the Ukrainian port of Mariupol, according to a Kremlin statement. It said Putin in a telephonic conversation with Bennett also said that Kyiv should order Ukrainian troops holding out in the vast Azovstal plant to lay down their weapons. The commander of the Ukrainian forces has in social media posts stated that his troops are running out of ammunition and food but the top authorities in Kyiv have ordered him to stay put in his position. Some civilians have made it to safety through humanitarian corridors allowed by the Russian forces but there are more still inside. The Kremlin has denied that Russian forces were storming the plant, referring to an April 21 order from Putin that they should seal it off but not venture inside its huge network of underground tunnels. Russian President Vladim

Amid a rising trend of curbs on rights in China, the country is intensifying its censorship of Hollywood movies to make them 'conform' to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) ideals, a media report said. The practice, which is almost 25-years old, has expanded in recent times even as producers make movies with an eye toward pleasing Beijing yet without isolating the global audience, Voice of America reported citing industry insiders. "Now it's kind of escalated in the sense that they're much more direct in banning films outright rather than just tampering or asking for scenes to be removed," Stanley Rosen, a University of Southern California political science professor who follows China's film industry was quoted as saying. As per the report, industry observers say censors are also asking that versions of movies for audiences outside China follow Beijing's script. It is unlikely that censors will allow the 2022 Marvel Studios movie "Doctor Strange i

Two British soldiers killed on 26th September 1915 (during the Battle of Loos) were laid to rest with full military honours on Thursday, a century after their deaths. The service was organised by the UK Defence Ministry's Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre (MOD JCCC), also known as the 'MOD War Detectives', and was held at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission’s (CWGC) Loos British Cemetery, Loos-en-Gohelle in northern France. One set of remains was recovered in January 2018 during a World War 1 ordnance search near Lens. Also found was a pocket watch and a spoon with the number 13228 stamped on the back. MOD JCCC and the CWGC confirmed it to be the regimental number of Private (Pte) William Johnston (aged 39) of 7th battalion, Royal Scots Fusiliers, having cross referenced it with war records that also confirmed he was the only casualty with this number who did not have a known burial place. The MOD JCCC traced a great-great-niece who provided a DNA sample to compar

The necessity of preserving forest cover is not just essential from the environment point of view but also because they are pristine. Recently, fossils of leaf found in Borneo have been studied for the first time in detail and it came up with a startling revelation – these rainforests covering the island have been in place for at least 4 million years and nurturing life as per a report in sciencealert.com! The present look of the forests – dominated by dipterocarp trees – is what it was 2.6 and 5.3 million years ago, that is in the Pliocene Epoch, making it necessary to preserve this invaluable ecosystem for the future, said the scientists. Home to more than 50 per cent of the total species in the world, Borneo has 270 types of dipterocarp trees and considering that tropical biodiversity in Asia is under threat, it is essential to help in its preservation. Talking about this find, Peter Wilf a palaeobotanist from Pennsylvania State University said: "This is the first demonstration

Hugs, handshakes and a lot of smiles - there was so much more at play than just mundane diplomacy when Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Emmanuel Macron, President of France, in Paris on Wednesday evening.  As India and France celebrate 75 years of their diplomatic relations, PM Modi was the first foreign leader received by Macron after his triumph in the presidential elections last month.  The impeccable trust and camaraderie that exists between the two leaders was quite visible from the warm welcome given by Macron to the Indian Prime Minister at Elysée Palace and in the talks - in one-on-one and delegation level formats - that followed.  Over the last few years, both leaders have given a new impetus to the India-France friendship and as Macron takes a fresh stance to begin his second innings, they once again displayed the spirit of trust and frankness that characterizes their relations. Read more  

The State of Odisha has the singular distinction of being home of the world’s one and only white grayheaded swamphen. Found in Mangalajodi wetland located on Chilika lagoon’s northern edge, this bird has become the talk of the town. The discovery of this bird was published online in the well-known scientific publication Wilson Journal of Ornithology. The features of this bird include an almost all-white plumage because of genetic dilution but its eyes are coloured which is a common attribute of swamphen species. On the other hand, the gray-headed swamphen or purple swamphen is purplish-blue, has a large red bill, white overall covers and a red front shield. This bird is found across the country in large marshes and reed beds bordering lakes. This rare bird was identified by a research team of three members. They are Subhendu Mallik, honorary wildlife warden of Khordha Shakti Nanda, associate professor at Sri Sri University Shakti Nanda and Ashutosh Mallik, assistant conservator of fore

They have been one of Pakistan’s most enduring backers and Shahbaz Sharif’s very first foreign visit, after taking over as Prime Minister of Pakistan, to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and thereafter to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), set the compass for the future trajectory of the country’s foreign policy. A priority is to mend fences with these two energy powerhouses, as bilateral relations had been in a free fall under the now deposed Prime Minister Imran Khan. To be fair to Imran Khan, relations between the two sides had begun to deteriorate since the time of Nawaz Sharif and his government’s refusal to participate in the Saudi-Emirati war in Yemen in 2015. That spurred the Saudi led coalition to go it on their own and it still remains embroiled in the war with no end in sight while the Houthi rebels, backed by Iran, have become increasingly aggressive targeting oil installations inside Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Given the deep and strong security relations between Pakistan and the Gu

After Egypt, many more countries are now looking to purchase wheat from India. Egypt, the world’s largest importer of wheat, is already looking to source the cereal from India after the Russia-Ukraine war dented supplies. Most of Egypt’s wheat until now came from Ukraine. Several other countries from Europe and West Asia are also expected to soon start purchasing Indian wheat.  Besides Egypt, the other large wheat importing countries are China, Turkey, Nigeria and Indonesia.  After exporting a record 7.85 million tonnes of wheat in 2021-22, India’s worldwide supply of the grain could touch 20 million tonnes this financial year amid rising concerns over food security as the Russia-Ukraine crisis deepens. Russia and Ukraine accounted for about a third of the total global wheat exports estimated at around 180 million tonnes. “For India, new markets for wheat exports are opening up. Egypt has already placed orders..we are expecting many new markets to start buying the grain from us. Many c

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that "despite Kyiv's inconsistency and unpreparedness for serious work", Moscow is still open to dialogue to resolve the ongoing conflict with Ukraine.   In a telephone conversation with French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday evening, Putin also accused the European Union member states of ignoring the "war crimes" of the Ukrainian security forces. This was the first interaction between the two leaders after Macron was re-elected as head of state after his victory in the recent presidential elections. Both Presidents have exchanged views on the situation in Ukraine several times since February 24, the day Russia began its 'special military operation' in the neighbouring country. As Putin congratulated Macron on his election triumph, he detailed the course of the military operation, including the liberation of Mariupol and the evacuation of civilians "held by the nationalists" at the Azovstal plant i

Amidst raging fires, triggered by unusually prolonged dry spell and early rise of high temperature this year, there is a heart-warming story about rural  women trying to save the forest's wealth in their vicinity while authorities sleep over massive loss to the environment in Himachal Pradesh. The 23- old Raveena Chauhan at village Dodli has set an example, fighting the blaze for five hours and standing as a human wall not letting the fire engulf her house, apart from nearing the village. The video of Chauhan has already gone viral on social media showing her how she braved the raging fire at Chail forests risking her own life. “The fire has been going on for the past three days. I informed the forest department and even made calls at control room numbers. No one turned –up for 48 hours. One morning ,I noticed the fire approaching our village, my house too. I could not stop myself “ she told India Narrative. Noticing her struggle with the fire, the villagers also joined. The fire w

A recent study busted the long-held belief among dog-lovers and people in general that breed makes a notable difference in the behaviour of these animals. Bringing this to light, a report in smithsonianmag.com stated that irrespective of the breed, any of these animals can be a human being’s favourite and loyal companion and friend. Published in the journal Science, the genome study concluded that breed alone can’t be a deciding factor to zero on the dog’s personality. For this study, the scientists conducted a survey of 18,385 dog owners. They were asked about the demeanour of their pet. The questions asked included if the dogs continued to work till it was not completed, their conduct with the strangers – if it was friendly or otherwise, etc. The DNA of 2,155 pure as well as mixed dogs were sequenced and these compared with the results of the survey. Read more

Russia said on Monday that its armed forces continue to strike important military infrastructure of Ukraine with high-precision missiles, including the Iskander-M which destroys air and missile defence systems as well as other important objects at a distance of up to 500 km. Releasing a video on the operation today, the Russian Defence Ministry showed how the Iskander-M operational-tactical missile system destroys an entire battery of Smerch multiple launch rocket systems of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with a high-precision strike. "Intelligence calculated the positions of the rocket artillery of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. In the sky, an unmanned aerial vehicle controls the target. At a distance of hundreds of kilometers from the enemy, 'Iskander-M' hits the enemy in the heart. In place of the explosion, a sea of fire and a column of smoke. Dozens of destroyed strategic facilities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine have already been accounted for by such complexes," sai