THE agreement to bring peace to Afghanistan signed by the United States and the Taliban at Doha represents nothing but a unilateral retreat by the United States from Afghanistan.  After invading Afghanistan and toppling the Taliban regime in October 2001, for 19 years, the United States and its NATO allies were engaged in the fruitless pursuit of subjugating the Taliban.Under President Obama, American troops were reduced to 8,400 and efforts made to equip the Afghan army to counter the Taliban forces. The civil war, which has been going on for the past few years, led to no success.

TWO judgments delivered by two High Courts have forthrightly upheld the fundamental right of citizens to protest.  The Aurangabad Bench of the Bombay High Court set aside an order by the additional district magistrate against allowing protests in Beed against the CAA.  The Karnataka High Court, two days earlier, held that the prohibitory orders under section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) imposed by the Bengaluru police to prevent protests against the CAA were illegal.These are two significant judgments at a time when sections of the higher judiciary and even the Supreme Court ar

KERALA is facing a harsh discriminatory approach from the BJP-led government at the centre. Because of this prejudiced attitude of the centre, Kerala is experiencing a serious financial crisis. The Modi government seems determined to thwart the LDF government’s development agenda by strangulating its finances.Centre-state relations are structured in an asymmetrical fashion. The centre has all the major powers to raise resources while the states are required to undertake development and social welfare expenditure that far exceed their revenue generating capacities.

JAIR Bolsonaro, President of Brazil, is on a State visit to India and will be the chief guest at the Republic Day parade at the invitation of the Modi government.  This is a disgrace for the Indian people who are celebrating the 70th anniversary of the Indian Constitution. Bolsonaro is the anti-thesis of all the values enshrined in our constitution.Bolsonaro is a racist, who repeatedly mouths abuse at the indigenous people of Brazil and takes pride in the supremacy of the ‘white race’.

THE Indian economy is in dire straits. The government has projected a growth rate of GDP of 5 per cent for 2019-20, a full 2 percentage points less than what was assumed in the budget presented in July 2019. The actual outcome may be worse, with the State Bank of India projecting a growth rate of 4.6 per cent.