General

Cut your coat according to your cloth. That’s the loud and clear message Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar has sent out to the three armed forces. In less than six months after taking over, Parrikar has studied various complex issues dogging the Defence Ministry and has come to his own conclusions on…

India is likely to buy between 60 and 63 Rafale combat jets from the French aviation major Dassault in a government to government deal that may be finalised during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s talks with French President Francois Hollande, in Paris later today, top government sources have indicated.​ The decision…

On Friday I waded into a raging debate currently on in the Indian Army over its promotion policy quashed by the AFT, by writing this:  (http://nitinagokhale.blogspot.in/2015/04/of-promotions-and-equivalence-in-army.html). As expected, it generated huge debate with people calling me names (Comments ranged from “You have done it to please your contacts in the…

The new age tendency to find equivalence and parity in the name of justice and equality seems to have percolated down to quasi judicial bodies like the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) too. The judgement by the Delhi bench of the AFT in early March striking down the Army’s 2009 policy…

By all accounts Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Indian Ocean sojourn–which took him to Seychelles, Mauritius and Sri Lanka last week—has served to reclaim some of New Delhi’s lost footing in the area. In the first two legs of his three-nation tour Modi secured agreements to develop islands in Mauritius and…