A military modernisation manifesto. A case for genuine defence reforms A decade after the Kargil Review Committee (KRC) submitted its recommendations not much has changed. The report had argued that India’s defence structures are woefully outdated and need to be modernised in a purposeful, determined manner. Yet, in the second decade of the twenty-first century, the way India organises, equips, manages, employs and rewards its armed forces has remains largely the same as Lord Mountbatten’s staff officer had recommended in the 1940s.
Big-ticket arms purchases, development of indigenous weapon systems, new procurement policies and a token change in the form of a integrated defence headquarters might provide political, bureaucratic and military leaders with talking points on military modernisation, but they fall short even by the standards of the 2002 KRC report. The emerging strategic environment In the meantime, India’s strategic environment has undergone radical change. Photo: Deepak Gupta What must change? New capacity. Look east on Stilwell Road. Never before has a road meant so much to external relations: there’s a move to re-open Stilwell Road, which connects India, Myanmar and China, and which passes through Thailand and Cambodia.
Hence the feeling of keen anticipation, bordering on euphoria, as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh embarks on a three-day official visit to Myanmar from May 28. The reluctance of the Myanmar government to open the road with India had to do with the fact that it passes through the country’s Kachin region, home to an age-old insurgency. Dr Singh’s visit comes at a time when Indo-Myanmar relations are on a rising trajectory after the recent withdrawal of sanctions by nearly all the advanced economies against Myanmar. This vindicates India’s quiet diplomacy, by which it had maintained working relations with the ruling regime in Myanmar and at the same time encouraged them to move towards adopting a democratic system in the country. Wind Monitoring Stations in India. India is counted as the 4th nation world wide amidst all the nations producing wind energy.
India's potential to produce wind power is estimated to be 45000 MW. The wind resource estimation has been done at the wind-monitoring stations in India, which spreads to more than twenty states. Almost 221 Wind Monitoring stations in India show that the density of wind power is over 200 W/m2 at a ground level of 50 m. Several agencies have come forward in helping the country with its wind power generation capacity. India's wind monitoring stations help the country immensely in calculating, estimating and generating wind power efficiently. The Ministry of New & Renewable Energy (MNRE) under the Government of India in association with other agencies encourages the development of the wind energy-producing sector in India.
The government has facilitated the growth of the wind sector through financial aids and several policies. China eyes Myanmar power sector. OTHERS / STATES : Israeli water major in talks with W Bengal for infra projects. New Delhi, May 22: Israel's largest national water company, Mekorot, is in talks with the West Bengal Government for setting up water infrastructure projects. A top-level team of the State-owned Israeli company met senior officials in the West Bengal Government in Kolkata on Monday. “The talks were positive. To begin with, we are looking at offering solutions, including technology, in the Darjeeling area,” Dr Mahesh Gandhi, Managing Director, AFII Corporate Advisors Pte Ltd , advisors to Mekorot, at a media briefing here on Tuesday. Mr Lior Frumkes, Vice President — Business Development, Mekorot, said the company had technology and expertise in the fields of water supply, quality, waste water management for agricultural use, and desalination among others.
Commenting on high water wastage in India, estimated at 40-50 per cent, Mr Frumkes said through research, experimentation and field innovation, Mekorot had reduced water wastage in Israel to 3.5 per cent. aditi.n@thehindu.co.in. Integrated hydrological data book (non-classified river basins) by Central Water Commission, Ministry of Water Resources | India Water Portal. This book is a compendium of hydrogeological data related to major river basins in India This data book published by Central Water Commission (CWC) is a compendium of important hydrological information on major basins in India. It provides updated site wise data for 12 non-classified basins that covers aspects such as location, drainage area, population, temperature, average runoff, seasonal water flow, historical water levels, average sediment load, water quality parameters and land use statistics. The statistics of year 2006-07 to 2009-10 are used as the base for the data mentioned in the book.
The book is divided into six chapters followed by an exhaustive appendix consisting table on hydrology and land use statistics in river basins. The introduction of the book briefly discusses about the need for a “comprehensive and reliable” data on hydrological aspects for the purpose of designing and executing any water resource project. Chapter 5 is on water quality statistics. Facing water shortages, Indian farmers dig in. Kai Ryssdal: There are, plus or minus, 7 billion people now living on this planet. By the middle of the century, the United Nations tells us it's gonna to be 9 billion. Among the many, many questions that raises is how we're gonna feed them all. The answer is complicated -- a mix of politics, culture, science, and traditions all affecting the global food supply. Here's part of the science. The average person drinks a couple of quarts of water every day, but it takes more than a thousand times that to produce a day's worth of food.
That's a problem everywhere, but especially in India, where scientists say nearly a third of that country's underground aquifers are already in critical condition and worry that the country is headed for a full-blown water crisis. Today on our series "Food for 9 Billion," Jon Miller went to India to meet a man who's trying to do something about it. Jon Miller: Rajendra Singh lives in a patch of forest hours from anywhere in the dry hills of eastern Rajasthan. Solve water problems or forget growth, India told. India's China-Centric Military Capability. By B. Raman We don’t need Agni-V, the intermediate range ballistic missile that we successfully tested on April 19,2012, to give ourselves a deterrent capability against Pakistan. We need it only for a deterrent capability against China.
Agni-V is a Chinese-centric missile. China’s plans to protect itself against a possible Indian missile strike have to cover the whole of China, instead of only Western China as it is till now. While we are now in a strategically better position to protect ourselves against China by discouraging Chinese temptations to intimidate us with its missile capability, this does not mean that our capability to protect ourselves tactically against China will improve with the induction of Agni V into our arsenal.
During the last 10 years, the entire Chinese military planning vis-à-vis India has been focussed on giving itself such a surprise strike capability. The tactical situation that we face today is less favourable than what the Chinese face. B. Fitch’s Pant Says India Rate Cut Will Raise Corporate Spending. (Corrects designation in first paragraph.) Devendra Pant, a director at Fitch Ratings in New Delhi, comments after India’s central bank reduced interest rates for the first time since 2009.
Pant spoke today in a telephone interview. Governor Duvvuri Subbarao lowered the repurchase rate to 8 percent from 8.5 percent, the Reserve Bank of India said in a statement in Mumbai today. The outcome was predicted by three of 25 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. On growth prospects: “At present, any kind of fiscal prudence can only come from high tax revenue, which will happen if growth is supported. On inflation: “While current core inflation has moderated, it is still a concern.
To contact the reporter on this story: Abhishek Shanker in Mumbai at ashanker1@bloomberg.net; To contact the editors responsible for this story: Rebecca Keenan at rkeenan5@bloomberg.net. India and the World: Scenarios to 2025 | World Economic Forum - India and the World: Scenarios to 2025. Into the future, boldly.