A strategic shock for the subcontinent Shri Krishna hare murari Hey nath narayana vasudeva

The sudden, surreal, collapse of the Afghan State in the face of a Taliban onslaught is a strategic shock to the subcontinent..

Triggered by an expected but ill-executed departure of the United States (US) — typified by a 17-year-old football enthusiast, Zaki Anwari, falling to his death from a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III — this moment was long in the making. Undecided between the narrower counterterrorism and broader nation-building objectives, the US failed at both. But more than the failure of the US and the corrupt Afghan elite who fled when their country needed them most, it is the “victory” of the Taliban and its sponsor, Pakistan, which makes this moment significant..

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Both these aspects ie, the Taliban’s largely unchallenged, almost preordained rise, and the concomitant success of Pakistan’s military establishment, which has long desired influence in Kabul, require unpacking. For these entities, Kabul has not fallen, it has risen. Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan’s much-criticised statement that the Taliban are “breaking the chains of slavery”, offers important clues about South Asia’s geopolitical contours.

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Shri Krishna Govind hare Murari.

It marks the (geo)political mainstreaming of fringe Islamists. Unlike the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), that made the cardinal mistake of simultaneously altering territorial boundaries and propagating global jihad, the Taliban focused its efforts on a territorially recognised nation-State and, in rhetoric, steers clear of global jihadists. That the United Kingdom (UK)’s chief of defence staff, Nick Carter, active in behind-the-scenes negotiations between Rawalpindi and pre-Taliban Kabul, thinks that the Taliban are “country boys with honour at the heart” demonstrates how far the Taliban has come, with Pakistan’s support, in reshaping the world’s views about it.

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The Taliban’s genius lies in their ability to navigate along, and manipulate, differences between ethnic nationalism and Islamist radicalism. Ever since its resurgence, the group kept international opinion divided on where the Taliban figured on this Islamist-versus-nationalist spectrum. Even now, big powers such as China, who are eager to engage with the Taliban, are demanding them to cut ties with “terrorists” ie, the Turkistan Islamic Party, that China views as antithetical to its security. Islamabad too wants the Taliban to cut ties with the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). The irony is that such demands afford the Taliban leverage vis-à-vis both Islamabad and Beijing — not the other way round.

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For a group that has come to power after humiliating the US, and that knows Beijing is unlikely to use military force in Afghanistan given the risks, the Taliban has little incentive to cut the cord with foreign Islamists to whom it owes battlefield gratitude. This doesn’t mean that the Taliban will suddenly take a global Islamist turn. It will not. But it will extract a heavy price, including aid and diplomatic recognition, for every foreign Islamist it targets on behalf of an external power. In that sense, the Taliban, an internationally connected Islamist group, doesn’t need to send fighters to Kashmir or Xinjiang. It just needs to be and let them be.

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Scientifically Speaking | Radiation is a deadly threat to human space Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe

On July 20, American billionaire Jeff Bezos flew on a Blue Origin rocket past the Kármán line, which, at an altitude of 62 miles, is the widely accepted boundary of space. The spacecraft topped out at 66.5 miles above the Earth, and its crew experienced a few minutes of weightlessness. Billionaire Richard Branson had reached the NASA-designated space boundary of 50 miles only nine days earlier. The other billionaire interested in space travel, Elon Musk, heads SpaceX, a company which has taken astronauts up to the International Space Station (ISS). Though Musk has not been in space yet, he has made no secret of his desire to take humanity to Mars and back.

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On July 20, American billionaire Jeff Bezos flew on a Blue Origin rocket past the Kármán line, which, at an altitude of 62 miles, is the widely accepted boundary of space. The spacecraft topped out at 66.5 miles above the Earth, and its crew experienced a few minutes of weightlessness. Billionaire Richard Branson had reached the NASA-designated space boundary of 50 miles only nine days earlier. The other billionaire interested in space travel, Elon Musk, heads SpaceX, a company which has taken astronauts up to the International Space Station (ISS). Though Musk has not been in space yet, he has made no secret of his desire to take humanity to Mars and back.

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Some futurists think a permanent colony on Mars will be possible. I don’t expect to see one in my lifetime. The challenges of travel to Mars and survival on the planet are exceptional. Mars has thin air, frigid weather, and trace oxygen. And after 10 years on Mars at lower gravity, a spacefarer’s legs and bones would be so brittle that re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere would render them useless.

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Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.

But one of the greatest risks in space is from radiation. Ionising radiation causes damage to cells and to DNA inside them. In deep space, ionising radiation is of two main types — galactic cosmic rays that originate outside the solar system from exploding stars, and solar energetic particles from the Sun.

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Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.

Radiation poses an existential threat to humans and to all other forms of life. Unsurprisingly, NASA considers radiation one of the major unresolved problems of sustained human spaceflight. Returning astronauts might face a greater risk of various cancers, eye ailments, and cardiac events.

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The risks are not unique to humans either. Any organisms that accompany humans into space and to Mars would need to be able to withstand ionising radiation. As Christopher Mason writes in his eminently readable new book, The Next 500 Years: Engineering Life to Reach New Worlds, “Sending an Earth-evolved organism to another planet would result in almost-certain death.

Earth is an incomparable planet. The magnetic field of Earth is created by currents of electricity that flow in the molten core. The Earth’s internal magnetism creates a region around the planet known as the magnetosphere, which protects us from the harmful effects of most of the radiation of space.

Several planets in our solar system have magnetospheres. Earth’s is the strongest of all the ones possessed by rocky planets. Our magnetosphere is a large, comet-shaped bubble, which has played an essential role in our planet’s habitability. Life would not exist on the planet without it.

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India, Russia to assess Taliban actions before any recognition move Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe..

Russia and India have decided to consult each other over Taliban’s actions in Afghanistan and assess where there is any marked change in the Sunni Pashtun Islamist force since they first came to power in 1996 before deciding to recognise the new Emirates of Afghanistan.

.Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri...The two countries have also decided to set up combined teams comprising of foreign ministry and national security officials of each country to conduct a detailed assessment of the Afghan situation so that future course of action with the Taliban Islamic government is decided by both India and Russia.

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These crucial decisions were taken after Russian President Vladimir Putin called up Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday and held detailed conversation over telephone on Afghanistan situation and its impact on both South and Central Asia ahead of the G-7 summit. This was the first call of President Putin to any global leader after he discussed the Afghan situation with leaders of Central Asian Republics, who are extremely worried about the impact of rise of an Islamist terrorist force in Kabul. The conversation was warm and both leaders appeared to be on the same page on Afghanistan.

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The call by German Chancellor Angela Merkel to both PM Modi and Russian President Putin was a farewell call from the German leader and was set up before the Taliban seized Kabul with the US forces virtually running out of Afghanistan.

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While Russian National Security Advisor Gen Nikolai Patrushev was in touch with his US counterpart Jake Sullivan this week, the discussion was tactical in nature with Moscow offering a helping hand to US forces trying to evacuate civilians from Kabul. A similar conversation took place between Russian Defence Minister and his UK counterpart.

.While Russian National Security Advisor Gen Nikolai Patrushev was in touch with his US counterpart Jake Sullivan this week, the discussion was tactical in nature with Moscow offering a helping hand to US forces trying to evacuate civilians from Kabul. A similar conversation took place between Russian Defence Minister and his UK counterpart.

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President Putin made it evident that Russia is still to assess whether there is any change in the methodology of Taliban from the past before taking steps to recognize the Islamist regime. He said that Russia would consult India before any such decision is taken and hence the combined national security and intelligence teams of the two countries were asked to carry out this assessment. During 1996-2001, the Taliban carried out a reign of terror against minorities and women. The Taliban then went after their political opponents by castrating and publicly hanging former Afghan president Mohammed Najibullah, an Ahmedzai Pashtun, from a traffic light pole on September 26, 1996.

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While India is in discussion with the US, EU leadership and at the UN on Afghanistan development, one must remember the role both Russia and India played in bolstering the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance in the 1990s along with Iran. All three countries have a legitimate stake in Afghanistan as neighbors and understand the perfidious role of Pakistan in Taliban 2.0.

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India’s health sector presents an opportunity to transition to clean energy.

A recent report by India’s NITI Aayog discusses various operating models of India’s not-for-profit hospitals to highlight the crucial services they provide and the challenges they face. As the country recovers from another wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, India’s overstretched and inadequate health infrastructure, which largely remained in the margins of conversations on development, has taken centre stage in the past year. And the stark differences in the quality and cost of care between private healthcare facilities and the government and not-for-profit hospitals are very evident.

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Data from the annual national Rural Health Statistics (RHS) have long informed us of the challenges that the government faces in filling rural vacancies at Primary Health Centres (PHCs) or ensuring trained medical professionals remain in their jobs in remote parts of the country. What is often missed is how the not-for-profit health sector had stepped in to fill this gap. The NITI Aayog report acknowledges these services by this sector and highlights prominent challenges it faces.

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These challenges mirror those faced by the government hospitals — the severe lack of infrastructure and the constraints in expanding it, often exacerbated by insufficient funding. There is also the challenge of getting trained medical professionals to take up rural postings, leaving many jobs unfilled. This is an extremely important and timely report. We add one more challenge– the lack of reliable and affordable electricity required to power existing and future rural healthcare facilities...

These gaps present a challenge, but they also provide an opportunity to attempt a paradigm shift in building health infrastructure and provisioning power supply. Both would directly impact the quality of care, its reach, and the livelihoods this would create.

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According to the RHS 2019-20, nearly a quarter of the 35,980 sanctioned positions for doctors in rural Primary Health Centres (PHCs) nationwide are unfilled. The statistics for Community Health Centres (CHCs) that provide specialised medical care are even starker. The data reveals that 63.3% of the sanctioned posts of specialists at CHCs are vacant. They comprise surgeons, obstetricians & gynaecologists, physicians and paediatricians.

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More importantly, of the existing about 155,000 sub-centres, nearly one-third (44,000) and 1,000 PHCs out of about 25,000 in rural areas still operate without electricity supply.

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Healthcare professionals point to multiple hardships, from low salaries to working in remote locations that lack basic facilities such as reliable electricity and water supply, motorable roads, and network connectivity. Often, rural healthcare facilities lack sophisticated diagnostic and surgical tools and medical equipment.

Also, a common refrain is the limited infrastructure for their accommodation, the lack of options for good schools and daycare support for their children. Cumulatively, these issues deter medical staff from moving to these remote locations...

Reliable electricity is crucial for every aspect of a health facility. It is required to run equipment for diagnostics, sterilisation, medical procedures, water supply, and store vaccines and other medications. Beyond the hospital building, reliable electricity is required to power staff quarters — not just lights and fans, but also household and kitchen appliances, charging mobile phones and internet connectivity. The efficient functioning of a health facility is underpinned by the quality of infrastructure provided to its staff, which is only possible when there is affordable and reliable power supply for all their needs..

Reliable access to energy, therefore, plays a critical role in creating a virtuous cycle. 24x7 power supply in hospitals enables upgradation of facilities to provide advanced healthcare services and for longer operating hours. This results in more patients being able to access much needed healthcare facilities, reinforcing the need for more doctors and nurses. In turn, this could possibly attract more financing for the health facility to improve its infrastructure.

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Reliable access to energy, therefore, plays a critical role in creating a virtuous cycle. 24x7 power supply in hospitals enables upgradation of facilities to provide advanced healthcare services and for longer operating hours. This results in more patients being able to access much needed healthcare facilities, reinforcing the need for more doctors and nurses. In turn, this could possibly attract more financing for the health facility to improve its infrastructure.

Reliable access to energy, therefore, plays a critical role in creating a virtuous cycle. 24x7 power supply in hospitals enables upgradation of facilities to provide advanced healthcare services and for longer operating hours. This results in more patients being able to access much needed healthcare facilities, reinforcing the need for more doctors and nurses. In turn, this could possibly attract more financing for the health facility to improve its infrastructure.

Additionally, increased budgetary allocations towards enhancing access and quality of all health services are needed. This requires a holistic view of creating a climate-resilient and energy-efficient healthcare infrastructure. This could be achieved by assessing healthcare facility energy requirements, retrofitting energy-efficient medical equipment and ensuring the provisioning of power through cost-effective renewable energy resources.

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Transitioning to renewable energy comes with multiple benefits. They can be deployed quickly, and will immediately enhance the reliability of the power supply. It will also bring savings on power bills and cut down on diesel expenses required for standby generators. These accrued savings could be ploughed back into enhancing healthcare service delivery.

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The NITI Aayog report has spotlighted a sector that has thousands of unsung warriors who have striven to put the care of others first, particularly in the least visible and remote regions of India. It is time to ensure lessons from this sector on resource management inspire the private and government healthcare facilities to attempt a sustainable transition to clean energy.

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To ensure justice, a caste census is essential. Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.

An Indian women’s hockey team player, who happened to be Dalit, had to face caste slurs, and her family had to confront upper-caste harassment after the team’s loss in the Tokyo Olympics. This reminded me of novelist Farahat Zama’s apt comment, “You can take an Indian out of the caste system, but you cannot take the caste system out of an Indian.”.

The caste system is India’s nemesis and has severely restricted the country’s ability to realise its immense potential and become a great nation in science, technology, knowledge, art, sport and economic prosperity. Many public intellectuals would like to believe that they have been “de-casted” — meaning they have got rid of all of the markers of caste identity. But whether we acknowledge it or not, caste has been at the forefront of our social existence and regulates our lives — from birth to death, customs, rituals, housing, professions, development planning, and even voting preferences..

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Studies suggest that 94% of marriages are endogamous; 90% of menial jobs are performed by the deprived castes, whereas this figure is reversed in white-collar jobs. This abysmal lack of caste diversity, especially at the decision-making levels in various sectors — the media, the judiciary, higher education, bureaucracy or the corporate sector — is weakening these institutions and their performance.

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A tale of four presidents, Afghanistan, and India. Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.

“It was never expected that we will have victory in Afghanistan,” Taliban leader Mullah Baradar said after his return to Kabul. He was certainly not alone in expressing surprise at the sudden collapse of the Afghan government and the Taliban’s complete takeover..

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In the aftermath, there is plenty of blame to go around. Officials in several regional capitals played an active role in facilitating the Taliban’s return to power. Many Afghans feel betrayed by their own country’s erstwhile leadership, with good reason. Others in the international community arguably did not do enough. But there is no escaping the fact that significant failures lay with successive United States (US) leaders for the execution of the Afghanistan war, the doomed reconciliation process, and the chaotic withdrawal.

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The US intervention in Afghanistan followed the devastating 9/11 attacks by al-Qaeda, which struck the nerve centres of the US military and financial markets. Under George W Bush, the US easily ousted the Taliban government in Afghanistan, which had sheltered al-Qaeda’s leadership. But the Bush administration was also worried about a large-scale military commitment and maintained only a small military footprint in Afghanistan at the outset. The US intervention, therefore, involved aerial bombardment, the extensive use of special operations forces, and local alliances on the ground..

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Taliban’s rhetoric indicates the limits of Islamist project and jihadism Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe

The Taliban’s conquest of Afghanistan has reignited many fears. Will the group cast off its past of flagrant barbarity? As their fighters breached Kabul and their top leaders homed in on the presidential palace amid a tearful recitation of the Quran’s 110th chapter, I was transported back to a world I had visited earlier.

I had had a professional opportunity to embed with Pakistani forces in the Taliban holdouts in the Khyber Pakhtunkwa province in 2012. My interests didn’t boil down to geopolitical questions about how spectacularly Pakistan’s forces cleared many of these hideouts that they and the Americans had helped to prop up in the first place. I instead pivoted towards understanding my own faith in all its dimensions..

The Taliban have sought to convey a less dogmatic position on governance this time, vowing to avoid reprisal attacks and respect people’s basic rights. It’s early days still to tell whether this is a ruse for global acceptance or proof of reform.

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But irrespective of how it pans out, the Taliban’s apparent turning a new leaf highlights the limits of Islamism, and in particular, its most potent tool — jihadism. Many ordinary people are still confused about what Islam is, and isn’t. A simple acceptance of monotheism is the sine qua non of Islam, the faith. On the other hand, Islamism seeks to build more structures drawn from the normative aspects of the faith. Islamism and, by extension, jihadism are primarily a response to colonialism, imperialism and modernity itself. To that extent, Islam is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for violent modern-day jihad..

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The effects of violent jihad have been egregiously felt across the modern world. This is not to suggest that non-Islamic sources of war have been any less lethal. The Fat Man and Little Boy obliterated at least 220,000 lives in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in singular strikes, nearly the same number of people killed in all of modern jihad’s history.

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Jihad under Prophet Mohammed had ground rules. Combatants could take on only combatants, unless there was an explicit “command” from God. Mutilation and killing of women, children, old and the infirm were prohibited. Suicide is prohibited in Islam. Regardless of what is the right jihad, one finds compelling reasons why all Islamist organisations must shun jihad. The nature of problems faced by Muslims today are different from those 1,400 years ago, when Prophet Mohammed blazed through the sands of Badr or Al Khandiq following “direct divine sanction” to battle his enemies..

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Islam is not compatible with modernity, defined by the ever-enlarging scope of universal freedoms, rights and equality. No religion is. But modernity’s underlying values are not repugnant to classical Islam. Concepts such as equality and democracy are not alien to Islamic aspirations (“White men are not superior to Black men and Black men are not superior to White men”, the Prophet said in his last sermon). Zakat is one of the earliest forms of economic redistribution known to humankind..

The Taliban has rejected the possibility of a democratic State. This rejection is un-Islamic. Islamic societies have been governed by institutions called shoora, an inflection of the word “mashwara” (discussion) from the Prophet’s time, and well before English philosopher John Stuart Mill famously described democracy as “government by discussion”.

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By 2030, 60% of the world’s Muslims will continue to live in developing or least-developed economies and encounter problems wrought by unbridled capitalism, discrimination and neo-liberalism, rather than political subjugation. Fixing these problems will require mastery over modern economics and sciences, understanding of complex modern institutions such as the World Trade Organization and the United Nations.

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The Taliban has no idea about how to claim the $9 billion of foreign reserves held by Afghanistan, for instance, mostly in assets abroad. But they will need that money soon. They can’t blow up human beings to access those cash piles. Muslims make up about 22% of the world’s population. But over a third of the world’s two-billion poor people live in Muslim countries. The Quran enjoins Muslims to proactively work to change their fortunes. This, today, means assertion of claims through a language of rights, rather than violent extremism.

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