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The key purpose of learning a language is to communicate with people in other parts of the country, says Venkaiah Naidu, vice president of India 2017-2022. He himself from Nellore in Andhra Pradesh speaks both Telugu his mother tongue, and over the years learned Hindi so that he could talk to people all over India. Even in Europe there are countries with several languages. Switzerland is a land composed of cantons with areas that speak German around Zurich, French Geneva, and Italian around Lugano. Children learn a second language and in German speaking areas children also learn German in both High German and standard German because dialects of German are common.  English is often the chosen language in German speaking areas as the second language after the mother tongue which happens in India. It is a good idea to learn as many languages even if one is not as proficient in all so that one can communciate and travel freely. In India the north has extensive use of Hindi- in the states of Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh Hindi is the language used, and even in Gujarat, and north east one can communicate in Hindi, so that a southerner can do well just by learning Hindi to communicate and travel freely in all parts of the country. For a Northerner the challenge remains on which language to learn between Tamil for the Madras region, Telegu for the Hyderabad and Vizag region, Karnataki for the Bangalore region, and Malayalam for the Thiruvanathapuram region. At some point in India's future a common script should be adopted for all Indian languages so that only the language pronunciation and vocabulary not the script itself has to be studied . This would make reading and writing easier once one knows the meaning of words. This is the situation in European Union where the languages can be learned without having to learn a different script and is written in the same script as English is using Latin alphabet. Turkey introduced the Latin alphabet to modernize the country and increase literacy in 1928. In India this would make it possible for northerners to learn a southern language and southerners to be able to learn Hindi without difficulty with the script in reading and writing, and in travel across the country. Venkaiah Naidu says about learning more than 2 languages mother tongue and English- learning another tongue such as Hindi makes it possible to do a lot more. "If you want to grow, if you want to communicate your ideas to a larger section of the people, you must know their language." One does not always get it right the first time, but the effort over the years can lead to so much wider exposure to different ideas in a multilingual world. ...

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Micheal Martin, prime minister of the Irish Republic, says the 2011 visit by Queen Elizabeth to Ireland helped in "lightening the load of history." A history which has seen the British rule over the island of Ireland since 1603. The use of Irish language was banned the period of The Plantations with British settlements began in the Northeast and south east, and of British law, leading to great resentment by the Irish. The Queen spoke words of Irish during her visit to Dublin Castle for state dinner and laid a wreath at the Dublin Garden of Rememberance, a park that is dedicated to the Irish men and Irish women who fought against British rule.  One of these Irish women is remembered in India as Sister Nivedita, who helped organize the early efforts of Swami Vivekanada's mission to revive the effort for practice of yoga and for Swaraj or self rule in British India.

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In all the coverage on the Indian election the impossible having been accomplished that of going beyond the 244 million voters in the US, beyond the 373 million voters in the European Union. The eligible voters in India 2024 are 640 million and all the counting done on one day was accomplished by the Electoral Commission and tackled under leadership of the team by Rajiv Kumar, a civil servant who earlier served as the Finance Secretary of India. The results show that the elections were free and fair as the results speak for themselves that the opposition parties did better than they expected. What was not told in media coverage in the US and EU/UK was that the Opposition and the current government are at odds on one fundamental issue that a continental country suffering from centuries of colonialism can only create a modern nation with the infrastructure enjoyed by the US, EU, China, if it creates a large enough pool of investment in the trillions of dollars, has a master plan of proven execution, with no leakages from this pool of investment. Leakages from the pool of investment only stopped after 2014, and actions of direct deposits to 400 million bank accounts or rural households was essential. For modernization to succeed another condition that had to be fulfilled was to create even through a pandemic a core of about 500 million of 1.4 billion people of the middle and lower classes who would approach the conditions o the US, EU, China consumer base for industry. This the Modi government has done with all its projects and hard work by adding the 250 million people to the consumer base pulled out of poverty. The task ahead is doing what the US, EU, China as continental nations have done to modernize and industrialize 2024-2035 to build the third largest economy ahead of the EU by 2035 and every state and city in India aspires to this transformation, from the south and northeast to the north and the west.   ...

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A study published in the British journal Lancet shows that the number of people suffering from diabetes went from 153 million in 1980 to 353 million in 2008. The study shows the U.S. having 24.7 millon diabetics in 2008, which is three times the number from 1980. About 70% of this is from population growth and aging, and the rest from obesity, lack of exercize, changing diet. The American Diabetes Association estimated the cost of treating diabetes in the U.S. at $174 billion for 2007. About 138 million diabetics live in China and India. In India there is an additional cause- malnutrition in early childhood years for the poorer segment of the population. European countries have done better than the U.S., Mexico, India and China. S. Korea and Thailand have done better than other Asian countries. And this is attributed to healthier lifestyles, diet and less obesity in these countries.

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Timothy Roemer, U.S. ambassador to India, interviewed by the Wall Street Journal in May 2011. He is completing two years as ambassador to India and returning to the U.S. He describes the challenges facing the Indian government in the areas of growth, inflation and corruption.

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By March 2012 India's Aadhar project- for unique identification numbers to be given to every citizen of India- will have given out 200 million 12 digit unique ID numbers. Nandan Nilekhani, former head of Infosys, leads the project. The Indian govenment has committed $650 million for the first phase of the project, which has the personal backing of prime minister Manmohan Singh.

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The Indian government has received bids of Rs. 1.49 lakh crores for 5G spectrum auction from companies led by Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Adani. The 700 megahertz band important for coverage for distant and remote locations also received strong bids which is seen as a positive development. Previous auction in 2015 raised 1.09 lakh crore rupees making the 1.49 lakh crore rupees auction in 2022 a significant advance.

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Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah sign a powersharing agreement brokered by the U.S Secretary of State Kerry and president Karzai after Afghanistan elections in 2014. The question is whether the two can set aside their differences and make it work, and can they negotiate some form of peace agreement with the Taliban to give Afghanistan and the region years of peace after so much conflict. Pakistan and India's elites and military need to step up to the plate to set aside differences by looking to the long term future of the region and the aspirations of the people for better infrastructure, services, education and healthcare, so long denied to the region. The Kashmir floods, and the floods in Pakistan before that, recent elections in India and Pakistan showing the clear aspirations for development of the people, are a reminder of so much that remains to be done and so much that was never done.

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The number of countries visa free entry is the wrong way to give passport rankings as learning from other countries and cultures, learning about their scientific advances and manner of thinking is key to the huge changes that happened in Asia- in first Japan by 1900, South Korea and Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, by 1960's, China by 1990's and India by 2010- as the people of these countries interacted with Europe and the US. Interaction with Europe and the US is key for Asian nations.  This happened even earlier as Americans by 1880's interacted with Europe through ship voyages across the Atlantic in 7 days. This brought knowledge of scientific advances and ways of thinking from Europe to the US accelerating pace of industrialization in the agricultural economy in the US in the 19th century.  In 2025 the visa free access for US and EU to some of the advanced Asian nations, Japan and China is key to bringing back knowledge of scientific and other advances to the US and EU.  India and China should be compared. At Munich and other German EU airports China has the kind of visa free and fast track entry that does not exist either for the US or India. The writer experienced this on a recent visit in 2025 with a US passport denied entry to the fast track lane reserved for Chinese, Japanese, Korean and other travelers. India's bureaucracy, and US's lethargy, and the sheer lack of serious effort comparable to China and Japan in getting fast easy access to EU is to blame , particularly for the travelers who are most likely to gain from such interactions, the educated middle class and business people of India and the US. One could go so far as to say that one of the keys to China's advances is its ties to Germany and Hamburg and entry ports in Netherlands to the EU. EU is the source of technologies and of scientific knowledge freely available to China 1990-2025. For this to happen advanced logistics and ship- port building had to take place. India must do the same and much faster than anything that happened before 2025 at a pace as fast as China's if it is to reach it's potential in the world economy alongside the US and EU. ...

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Vodafone is well positioned to cope with the eurozone crisis. Operations in Greece and Spain are only 6% of total enterprise value, according to JP Morgan estimates. Vodafone expects free cash flows of 5.3-5.8 billion pounds in 2012 compared to 6.1 billion pounds in the prior year. Vodafone continues to show growth in Turkey and India. And the 45% stake it has in Verizon Wireless in the U.S. also contributes to earnings, as growth in Verizon Wireless revenues was 7.3% in 2011.

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The work of key Ministries in India is tracked by the Hindusthan Times in March 2018 showing the progress of the Modi government. At the Defense Ministry  a major effort is underway to promote the defense sector to reduce the defense imports of $100 billion over the last decade, and to make this a major jobs generating sector. The Foreign Ministry is pursuing the China-India dialogue, and efforts to tackle the trade deficit with China of $51 billion. The Ministry of Education is working on giving universities autonomy from the Universities Grant Commission so that first tier universities can plan their own development, hire faculty and plan for the future without UGC approval. Jawaharlal Nehru University and the University of Hyderabad, first tier institutions have autonomy from UGC under this effort. 

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Declan Walsh's article published on May 19, 2013 in the NYT, was written and reported before his expulsion by the Interior Ministry of Pakistan. It surely must rank as an exceptional piece of journalism and possibly the best that has been done on Pakistan in the U.S. media for decades. Walsh focusses on the Pakistan Railways once part of the British Indian Railways which pulled together all of South Asia from Burma and the Afghan border to Ceylon, an engineering feat accomplished by the British which integrated India (and Pakistan) into nation states. He takes a cue from the India patriot Gokhale's advice to the the young Mohandas Gandhi to travel by rail to see India, its agricultural interior and small towns. Walsh rides the Awami Express from Peshawar near the Afghan border to Karachi, in Sindh province. Along the way the train passes Sukkur, crosses the Indus river, reaches Lahore in the Punjab province, and makes its way to Hyderabad in Sindh province near the Thar desert and India. Walsh stops at each point to talk with railway personnel, describes passengers, and the changing terrain. The strains on the society from extremist violence, the lack of investment in the railways, corruption, and railway ministry officials who diverted resources away from the railways, are described in detail, showing how conditions have deteriorated in the railways to this point. It also focusses attention on the need to modernize and rebuild Pakistan's railways. In China and in India railways play a huge role in the life of the common man, providing the major means of transportation and freight links for these large developing countries. By pulling freight business away from the railways and shifting it to businesses outside railways, a critical source of revenue was take away by a rail minister in the Musharraf government, which needs to be reversed. In the U.S., China and India rail freight business is a key part of the railway companies. There is a sense of despair in the railway people Walsh talks to, but his account also spells hope by bringing this to the attention of the outside world, to the public in the U.S. and Europe, even Japan, that what Pakistan needs is new investment, help with infrastructure. It sends a message to the new government to gird itself for the difficult tasks ahead to win the confidence of the people of Pakistan in a way that has not been done in the past. Falling behind is then both problem and opportunity in a modernizing world with new technologies that can transform the landscape....

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Jaguar Land Rover has strong sales in 2013 of 425,006 vehicles. JLR is investing 1 billion pounds to build a factory in China, in a joint venture with Cherry Automobile Company. The factory will make 130,000 automobiles a year when it starts in late 2014. In Brazil JLR is investing 240 million pounds for a factory that will make 95,000 vehicles a year. JLR currently has assembly facilities in India for the Freelander 2 sport-utility vehicle and Jaguar XF sedan, and assembly facilities in Pakistan, Kenya, Malaysia, Turkey. JLR plans to spend 3.5-3.75 billion pounds in the fiscal year beginning April 1, an increase from the 2.75 billion pounds capital spending budget for 2013. 2013 capital spending was 17% of total revenue of 15.78 billion pounds. Dealers are expected to spend an additional 1 billion pounds on improving the sales network.

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Solar energy is now the better option versus coal as costs are going down at rapid pace. In 2010 cost was about $100 per megawatt hour, This is down to about $35 per megawatt hour in many countries including India by 2020 as cost for the lifetime of new plants. New solar farm plans cost less for renewable energy than coal fired plants. The Modi administration hopes to double then triple production of solar energy to meet India's growing needs. This makes it possible for the European Union to set targets of 32% for renewable energy in the total energy production by 2030. 

The cost of coal has not changed much costing about $55 to $150 per megawatt hour for new plants.

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Parussini describes the different style of new RBI Governor Urjit Patel, who is no rock star economist like his predecessor Raghuram Rajan. Rajan is quoted as once saying; "My name is Raghuram Rajan and I do what I do." Rajan engaged widely with the media. At his first press conference Patel made a short statement thanking RBI staff, and turned it over to staff at RBI who talked about financial supervision, banking regulation and other issues. Patel's answers were short without follow-up questions, the whole event over in 20 minutes. Patel was chosen by the new government of prime minister Modi to run RBI in 2016.

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Labour's Keir Starmer wants to make Britain the first nation to have a zero emissions power system. His plan put forward in September 2022 would double onshore wind, triple solar energy, and quadruple offshore energy production by 2030. It would create half a million jobs, reindustrialize Britain and cut electricity bills by hundreds of pounds, says this report in The Guardian.This is Labour's answer to the Tories faltering energy plans. The Breakthrough report on achieving COP26 goals of the IEA and IRENA, international renewable energy agencies, shows the opportunity to create 85 million additional jobs by 2030, compared to 2019. Many world leaders including president Biden and Starmer, Germany's Habeck, and India's Modi are setting aggressive goals for renewable energy.

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Germany's growth rate for GDP in 2016 was 1.9% compared to 2015. This is the highest growth rate in half a decade, and better than 2015 when the growth in GDP was 1.7%. Fiscal surplus was 0.6% of GDP in 2016. Germany's Economics and Technology Ministry says the economy is improving because of the positive labor situation, rising incomes and consumer spending. Real estate boom is also helping growth, and also the state spending including on refugees accomodation. Exports have surged and the economy has recovered from the Brexit effect. Exports surged to 1.1 trillion euros in 11 months of 2016.

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Brazil's economy is forecast to contract by 2% in 2015, the currency has lost about one third its value and the stock market is down 22% in the last year. This follows the decline in demand for Brazil's commodities exports as China growth slows down. Experts say Brazil is now seeing another boom bust cycle similiar to boom-bust cycles in the past, such as the 1966-73 boom followed by years of hyperinflation and stagnation. Brazil's exports to China declined 17% in the first 7 months of 2015. The crisis is in many ways similiar to crises in other emerging markets dependent on commodities exports. The resources boom leads to overvaluation of the currency, and decline in development of manufacturing away from dependence on commodities exports. Other errors rise from complacency and politics prevalent in such periods. These errors include mismanagement of resources with poor resource allocation decisions such as spending on soccer stadiums in cities in the northeast while basic bus services remained underfinanced in large urban areas, large overspending by the government using state owned bank BNDES to offer rates at below market rates, a credit fueled boom and credit card binge for households, and a reversal of capital flows from the U.S. and Europe with the sharp decline in investment climate. There is a severe loss of confidence in the government of Dilma Rousseff with her approval rating as low as 8%. Corruption scandals at Petrobras show close links between the Workers Party of Rousseff and executives, with about $2 billion in misused funds. Brazil, like other emerging markets such as Russia and India, have taken some lessons from the 1997 financial crisis by setting aside large foreign exchange reserves for a crisis. Brazil's reserves of $397 billion help it cushion the effects with funding of the safety net and support to industries to avoid large layoffs. Other problems not tackled as in Mexico, India, and other emerging markets, are the weak educational system, and poor infrastructure, that create bottlenecks for growth. Brazil could face a lost decade after the debt overhang, decline in foreign investment and commodity export generated revenues. ...

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Baden-Powell was founder of the Boy Scouts which has given millions of boy scouts throughout Asia, Australia, Africa, Latin America and North America a sense of purpose when they were attending elementary and secondary school throughout the twentieth century. For girl scouts it added confidence to girls and enabled them to grow in many ways.  So it comes as a surprise that Baden-Powell is seen in this way. Gandhi never questioned British rule directly during the period when he fought for human rights in South Africa during the period 1893-1915. During the Boer War in 1900 Gandhi volunteered to form the Natal Ambulance Corps that as stretcher bearers helped treat British soldiers in the Boer War. He was given the Queens South Africa medal. In the Zulu war he repeated this by being part of the ambulance corps supporting British troops, but also treated Zulu wounded. Gandhi acted as a loyal part of the British Empire and throughout most of the period into the 1920's acted with loyalty to the British Empire. Few questioned British rule at the time, and Gandhi followed Gokhale's advice in 1915 as he returned to India at the age of 45. Gokhale was a moderate who accepted the British rule in India and sought provincial assemblies and self-rule under the British Empire. Gandhi's whole thinking was shaped by British traditions, British laws, British democracy, having attended a British school in Rajkot, Saurashtra province of Gujarat state. The letter helping him make his move for education as a barrister in England came through the British political agent in Rajkot, who was a friend of his father, the Diwan of the princely state of Porbander, Gujarat. Even Swami Vivekananda was helped by leaders of princely states in Saurashtra who pledged loyalty to the British Empire in India, one of whom was a close friend who helped Vivekananda come to America. It may be too easy to look back and make everything look good, when in reality it is complex, but yet ordinary human beings are in search for the right path. As Vivekananda's guru said you will still get there but "it is good to travel by a clean path." I visited the Gandhi home and museum in Porbander in September 2019. Driving in along the Saurashtra, Gujarat coastline we hit a rainstorm and when we reached the home it was in heavy rain. After visiting the home I went to a small bookshop in the museum and came across a copy of a small book Gandhi wrote in 1910 on a steamship back to South Africa from London, with the title- "Hind Swaraj or Home Rule." That little book written in the form of a dialogue between the reader and the editor by Gandhi amazes me as it was the basis of the movement after 1915 all the way into the 1930's. His clarity of thinking and his sincerity and steadfast purpose was such that it stood the test of time. Gandhi even goes as far as to say the English did not take India, India was given to them, given to English traders as Indian princes vied with each other for the favor of Company Bahadur, British forces designed to protect the East India Company's warehouses. That they remained in India for the purpose of trade and Indians helped them to do so. To blame them was for Gandhi to perpetuate their power. For him British arms and ammuniton were perfectly useless.  Gandhi writes this dialogue about Gokhale in the book which is worth reading at this time, as it was in 1910. Reader: Gokhale has constituted himself a great friend of the English, he says we have to learn a great deal from them, that we have to learn their political wisdom before we can talk of Home Rule. I am tired of reading his speeches. Editor: If you are tired it only betrays your impatience. We believe that those who are discontented with the slowness of their parents and are angry because the parents would not run with their children, are considered disrespectful to their parents. Professor Gokhale occupies the place of a parent. What does it matter if he cannot run with us? A nation that is desirous of home rule cannot afford to despise its ancestors. We shall become useless if we lack respect for our elders. only men with mature thoughts are capable of ruling themselves and not the hasty-tempered. Moreover how many Indian were there like Professor Gokhale, when he gave himself to Indian education? I verily believe that whatever Professor Gokhale does, he does with pure motives, and with a view of serving India... our chief purpose is not to decry his work , but to believe that he is infinitely greater than we are, and to feel assured that with his work for India, ours is infinitesmial."   ...

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This Guardian report provides a timeline for lunar exploration. The last Apollo Moon missions date back to 1972 with Apollo 17. It lasted 12 days with the first crewed space flight to the moon taking Schmitt and Cernan to moon's surface while Evans orbited above. Since then it has been quiet for lunar exploration till Chang'e 3 lander and rover from China in 2011 put China on the moon, followed by Chang'e 5 in 2020. Today August 23, 2023 India puts its own moon lander and rover on the South Pole of the moon which is expected to have water.

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Apple makes most of its products in China. This exposes Apple to high risk with the Chinese tariff set at 46% on April 2, 2025. If it passes on the tariff to customers it faces a loss in sales, if it does not pass onto customers the higher tariff price and cuts margins it will affect Apple profits. Apple's high margin strategy by making in China is now at risk. Apple had been given a warning to shift from over concentrating manufacturing in China. It did not heed the warning since 2016 and only made small shifts of manufacturing to India and Vietnam.

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Reducing risk buffers to 5.5%-6.5% for India's central bank as recommended by former governor Bimal Jain helps to transfer $21 billion to the government as it copes with a bad loan crisis at banks and drop in credit and lending. This has hurt the economy reducing growth in early 2019. The RBI transfer will help stimulus and recapitalizing of banks as the Modi government copes with the economic deceleration to 5% growth in the last quarter.

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The BBC looks at some of the claims made by president Trump about India's rapid progress in delivering services to the people in electricity, sanitation, roads infrastructure, cooking gas, internet connections. BBC confirms that the economy size is now 6 times that in 2000, as Mr. Trump stated on his visit to Ahmedabad. It was in terms of the total value of all goods and services in the economy or GDP at $477 billion (IMF figures) in 2000. In 2019  it is $2,940 billion.  270 million fewer people were living in poverty in 2016, this is confirmed in a UN report. Here is the list for services as checked by The BBC. 1. Providing electricity to every one of the 600,000 villages in India. By 2014 most of the villages were electrified- at 96%. It is defined as having schools, health centres and 10% of households having electricity in each village. 2. About 600 million people having access to toilets under the Clean India mission launched in 2014. 100 million new toilets were built. 3. 70 million women were given access to cooking gas. 80 million new connections were built. 4.  320 million new internet subscribers. The figure is low about 600 million total internet subscribers. 5. It is true that infrastructure building is moving quickly says the BBC. About 10,000 kms were built in 2018-19 double that in 2013-2014 under a previous administration. The Mumbai Metro is mentioned in the WSJ as a project that has made remarkable progress. A bullet train project is moving ahead with Japanese financing and technological help from Mumbai to Ahmedabad.  Access to banking accounts and direct deposit of government transfer payments to all Indians is another project. Healthcare access through health care payments directly for health care costs incurred for low income families is another more recent project to reduce the uncertainty and improve finances of poorer citizens. ...