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The U.S. and India see a surge in coronavirus cases. Per day cases surged to 40,000 on June 25 in U.S. and 17,000 in India. Alabama, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, California, Florida are seeing a surge in new cases. Texas, California and Florida all recorded more than 5000 cases each. In California cases for hospitalization surged 32% with more than 4200 in hospitals.

India now has 490,000 cases with death toll of 15,301. Indian Railways cancelled all bookings. In the U.S. Texas is paused reopening plans.

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Havana a ghost town with little activity, garbage piling up, and population struggling to make a living- pictures as France's Le Monde sees it in Jan 2026. Was it all worth it?  A revolution happened in 1956 against Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista that lost its way over 4 decades to 2000, on life support for another 2 decades to 2026. The Cuban experiment caused Venezuela to enter the same realm of disillusionment and many insurgencies in the rest of Latin America that failed with too much rhetoric and little to back it up with in investment and growth through patient effort and inputs of capital, labor and technology, and cooperation with US and EU, the very stuff that changed lives in China and India for 2.5 billion people.

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India China Border and rail connection $40 billion project Chengdu to Lhasa 2025. The infrastructure brings China greater access to the western region of China some of it from the occupation of Tibet in the 1950's that now makes up territory the size of 80% of the contiguous US. India is rapidly modernizing it's side of the border with tunnels and bridges.  This situation is new. For most of history from 1000 to 1950's China had only a remote connection with the Tibetan and Indian border regions where nomadic tribes and Tibetans lived. Very few Chinese numbering by the hundreds or a few thousands may have visited the region as even under the British contacts were very limited with Tibet and border regions in the Himalayas. For China it is far from its major population centers in Beijing and Shanghai and Hong Kong, Shenzen. And it provides few advantages in spreading over a vast region that is remote and in high over 15,000 feet in the Tibetan and border regions. It is only the invasion of Korea and China by Japan in the close of the nineteenth and early part of the 20th century that has created the idea of having buffer regions that protect it from foreign powers. And this is what may happen over the next 50 years as the region goes back to what it was before the 1950's, but with modernization, as India does not seek to reach out beyond Himalayan borders into regions closer to China. ...

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India's ruling BJP party wins 103 seats and is leading in one more seat in the 2018 Karnataka state assembly elections. This compares with 40 seats in the last election in 2013. The Congress party won 78 seats down from 122 seats in the 2013 election. A regional party Janata Dal won 37 seats. 113 seats are needed to have a majority and form the next government. The elections here could influence the national elections in 2019. India's tech city of Bangalore is the capital of Karnataka state. For the BJP Party is was critical to win the state as it prepares for the national elections in 2019 to advance its rapid infrastructure development program in India, and increase foreign investment in India's economy.

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In an effort to normalize trade relations Pakistan's government plans to move forward with a step by step approach that will end the restrictions on Indian imports by Jan 1, 2013. The first step is ending a system that allows a list of 2000 import items from India and replacing it with a list of 600 items from India that are banned, allowing the flow of all other goods. This negative list will be eliminated by the end of 2012 leaving in place restrictions on sensitive defense items and some staple goods. Ashfaque Khan, dean of Pakistan's National University of Sciences and Technology Business School advises the government on trade issues. The trade between India and Pakistan stands at $2.7 billion for the year ending March 2011. This is much smaller than the $60 billion in trade between India and China which is growing. The trade between India and Pakistan is likely to grow significantly in the next ten years as trade barriers are removed and normal trade is established.

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India's Supreme Court ruled that Vodafone PLC does not owe $2.2 billion in taxes on the acquisition of a majority stake in Hutchison Essar Ltd. The Indian tax authorites were directed to return 25 billion rupees ($500 million) which Vodafone had deposited. With declining foreign investment in India and a lower growth rate of about 7%, this tax case had assumed larger significance. The Supreme Court decision emphasized that taxing Vodafone "would amount to imposing capital punishment for capital investment." Vodafone had difficulties in its Indian operations- a $3.4 billion impairment charge in May 2010 because of strong competition. Vodafone is estimated to have invested $26 billion in India since 2007, and in the fiscal year ending March 2011 showed only $115 million in profit on sales of $3.86 billion.

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India's Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal sets out the new Foreign Trade Policy. It moves away from giving incentives to exporters to remission of taxes and lower costs for smaller medium sized enterprises. The new export target is for goods and services exports to reach 2 trillion dollars by 2030 from $760 billion in 2023. The new policy will go into effect in April 2023. India's exports have grown 75% from $435 billion in 2015 to $760  billion in 2023. Under the new policy Indian exporters can source goods in one country and send them to a third country without touching Indian shores. Wider engagement will take place with States and Districts to promote exports at grassroots level. DGFT, Director General of Foreign Trade offices of DGFT will interact with district collectors to push exports. India's Commerce Ministry will also conduct a massive global outreach sectorally and country wise in tandem with the External Affiars Ministry  over the next 4-5 months. E commerce hubs will be established to generate $200-$400 billion in e-commerce exports. India's share of world trade is very low and needs to be pushed up to 7-10% says Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal. ...

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Indian finance minister Sitharaman announces a new stimulus package "Atman Nirbhar Bharat." This includes an effort to incentivize creation of employment opportunities for people making less than Rs. 15,000 a month ($215 a month), called "Atman Nirbhar Rozghar Yojana, for a period of 2 years. Sitharaman cited stock market rebound and foreign reserves reaching $560 billion to show that along with the government efforts and planned infrastructure the economy would make a robust recovery. Because of India's large informal economy help to street vendors and other small retail is critical in the Indian economy. The finance minister cited the "One Nation, One Ration Card" which allows street vendors and other retail merchants to access foodgrains from FPS of choice in 28 states and union territories in India. This is part of the effort to build demand and upward mobility in the economy. The names given for these efforts or yojanas are unique- PM SVANidhi stands for PM's Street Vendors Atmannirbhar Nidhi. Atmannirbhar is the overall plan for self reliance in the economy and the prime minister Modi has pushed for buying Made in India, to promote jobs and technology + capital accumulation in Indian manufacturing. India took a blow from the coronavirus with close to 9 million infected by the virus and lockdown in March. By September 20 the daily cases reached 100,000, and by November 10 the daily cases have dropped to 44,000. Social distancing and mask wearing are widely accepted in India. India has other advantages in the large pharmaceutical industry and access to drugs at government regulated and low prices as part of the planned effort after independence in 1947. Other aspects of Indian life are cultural preference for vegetables and fruits in the diet, and spices, herbs in cooking, yoga practice, which are anti-inflammatory and promote healthy living.  With the largest population in the world the region in the Indian ocean comprising the countries of India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Burma and Indonesia, former parts of the British and Dutch empires, is a region where the coronavirus posed a great threat to human life. An early carefully orchestrated lockdown by prime minister Modi  helped with the message in March that India faced a singular choice - between going back 21 years in development or controlling the coronavirus in 21 crucial days. The setting up of the direct transfer of money to bank accounts  of farmers, urban street vendors and lower income people in rural areas by giving everyone a bank account under a government plan early in the first term of the current administration enabled it to send aid directly when coronavirus hit the country. Other schemes included cooking gas for women in rural areas who depended on firewood for cooking. These schemes and sanitation infrastructure setup under the Clean India campaign, helped India build an element of resilience when coronavirus hit.  The government plan to remove interstate barriers to commerce and integrate tax system collection at the federal level, bringing parts of the informal economy into the formal economy, have increased revenues that now finance an infrastructure plan that hopes to match the one in China over the next decade.   ...

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Action the Indian government has taken so far to control cryptocurrency in India and prevent the kind of losses that have taken place in other countries. This includes a 1% tax on digital transactions above a certain amount and a 30% tax on cryptocurrency.

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Andhra Pradesh on India's southeast coastline with 25 parliament seats and Bihar in India's north and east with 40 parliament seats and long history of being part of the BJP led National Democratic Alliance are now key to a five year term for prime minister Modi in India. Modi's BJP party won 240 seats out of 543 in parliament.  Chandrababu Naidu of Telegu Desam Party won 135 seats in the state Assembly election in Andhra Pradesh (NDA), all but 18 seats. It wins 22 of 25 seats in India's parliament (NDA). It also shows the wide swings in Indian elections that no party is safe. Telgu Desam Party (NDA)  won on the platform of a double engine government at state and federal levels to create jobs and modernize its rural agricultural economy. In the last 2019 election the Opposition YSRCP party won almost all the seats in the state assembly and in 2024 lost almost all the seats. In 1995 Telegu Desam Party joined Atal Bihari Vajpayee's BJP to form a government and during elections that followed for Vajpayee's 5 year term (1999-2004) he was part of the NDA. He has served three terms as chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, two terms before Telengana was formed and one term after Telengana split off from Andhra Pradesh. Andhra Pradesh is centered around the Vizag region on India's south eastern coastline and the cities of Vijayawada and Guntur with a 1000 kilometer coastline on Bay of Bengal. ...

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After increasing the price of subsidized diesel, the Indian government lays out a plan to cut the deficit over five years. The plan sets a goal for the deficit of 5.3% for fiscal year ending March 2013 to come down to 3% by 2017. Earlier India's central bank, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), had said the government needed to take action on the deficit before it reduced interest rates. The RBI faces a difficult task in reducing rates to stimulate the slowing economy because inflation was 7.8% in Sept. 2012. At the same time the sharp decline in growth is a cause for serious concern- the most recent RBI forecast for GDP growth made in July for the current fiscal year through March 2013 is 6.5%. This may not be achieved as other economists have lowered the estimate to as low as 5% because of slow government action in economic reforms, high interest rates, and the uncertain global economc outlook. The last action by the RBI to lower interest rates was a drop of half a percentage point in April 2012. Much of the momentum for the Indian economy was lost in the first half of 2012 with the governments vacillating steps for opening the retail and other sectors to foreign investment. Only in October 2012 has prime minister Manmohan Singh set a clear direction by dropping coalition partners opposed to reforms and announcing new policies for foreign investment....

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During the first days of vaccination drive in India the uptake is lower than expected, below 48% in many states of India. Healthcare workers are coming forward in smaller numbers. The glitches in the app that was used to transmit information is one reason, the other being that not enough information was disclosed about the two vaccines.  On the first day Jan. 16 India vaccinated 200,000 healthcare workers. The target was 300,000. The uptake is lowest in states such as Tamilnadu and Punjab.  One of the reasons for the low uptake is also that India has a lower number of cases, and cases are in decline in India for coronavirus. The first wave peaked on September 13 at over 90,000 and has declined ever since to 13,000 on January 19, 2021. The Indian diet includes vegetables and a large part of the country is vegetarian. Indian diet also includes herbs such as turmeric, ginger and cinnamon, and many others that help build immunity. The lack of cars for large numbers of the population means a lot more exercize walking long distances is essential in daily living. Another factor is that the mandate for masks is strictly followed everywhere. Also helpful is that after independence in 1947 the pharmaceutical industry was built up to serve the large population with prices regulated carefully by the government, enabling steady supply of medicine during the pandemic. ...

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This interview with Indian Health Minister, Harsh Vardhan, by Amitabh Bachchan and Anant Goenka of the Indian Express covers a range of questions including India's low fatality rate for coronavirus of 1: 46, its vaccination programs for polio, malaria and other diseases long before the pandemic for a population of 1.3 billion people, respect for healthcare workers, and the distribution of the new vaccines under development in India. Vardhan says there are of the 100 vaccines being developed 30 are in India,and of the ones nearing approval 5 are in India.  India makes 60% of the world's vaccines and its distribution capacity for such a large population has been proven many times. During this coronavirus months of preparation are going into reaching the whole population including remote parts in the mountainous areas. Vardhan says the plan is to vaccinate about 30 crores or 300 million people by June-July 2021 out of a total population of 135 crores or 1.35 billion. The vaccination will start with health care workers, moving on to essential service personnel in the military, police and other occupations, and to vulnerable parts of the population based on age and health conditions. Vardhan who is also the chair of the executive board of the WHO as India's representative, says the prime minister is personally holding two 3 hour long meetings to monitor the preparations for the vaccine and its distribution. Vardhan lists the achievements of the Modi administration and the quality of leadership provided by the prime minister- 2100 testing labs, 97% of the country having a testing facility within 3 kms, testing 1-1.5 million people each day, 1 million testing kits produced daily, 2 million beds in India with oxygen support or in ICU, 13,000 quarantine centers. By personally visiting the vaccine development facilities in Ahmedabad, Pune and Hyderabad, the prime minister also directly supported and encouraged scientists and their efforts. ...

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India's new vaccine policy and how it will vaccinate fully with 2 doses India's entire population by December 2021 is  outlined in the federal government's affidavit to the Supreme Court. The vaccine supplies of about 1880 million doses will be supplied by 5 Indian pharmaceutical vaccine manufacturers. 1350 million doses will be supplied by the manufacturers between August and December with 500 million doses made available by July 31 to the government. This is a monumental task for the vaccine manufacturers and the federal government which is being courageously tackled at every level. The new variants have shown how critical this task is and the challenge is being taken up vigorously.

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The story of Milkha Singh, India's fastest runner, is told wonderfully here in the Indian Express.

Milkha Singh came through a period of life growing up in a poor part of the Punjab, then partition, and finding a place in post independence India on track and field. He joined the army on his third attempt. Finished fourth in the Rome Olympics, just 0.1 seconds behind Pence and with it missing a Bronze medal.

He said after this - that he was taken for an interview, and he could only say in whatever English he knew, "your son has fulfilled his duty, and I demand this from every youngster in the country." This could be the message to all the youngsters in the country that are volunteering for the PM's effort for 100,000 trained healthcare youngsters to help with Covid work in villages and towns throughout India.

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The India Pakistan issues have already evolved into India China issues. And the competition between the US and China has consequences for India, the European Union and the rest of the world. As the US seeks to regain its industrial base and reduce overconcentration of manufacturing in China, India is at the stage of a manufacturing effort that is similar to Japan's in the 1920's and 1970's and China's in the 1990's. It will take place over the next two decades. This is the crucial event for Asia that will see the emergence of not two but three nations in Asia- Japan, China and India as modern manufacturing nations.  The talk about military action popular in the media misrepresents the real issues which are economic and ignore the turning point in 2025 with the Ukraine war putting the European Union and Germany's position of concentration of production in China as untenable. For the US DJT represents a second effort to bring serious manufacturing back to the US and allies such as India. This will be the deciding change in Asia and the world by 2030, 2035 and 2040, as India will make the decisive change to a modern nation similar to the US and Europe. This will open up opportunities for 1.4 billion people in India and a related 300 million people in Indonesia. ...

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Saudi Arabia signed a series of agreements with India at the G20 Summit with $100 billion in investments planned including digital, rail, energy  and other connectivity for the IMEC corridor for India through Middle East to Europe. Saudi prince MBS announces the IMEC Corridor and talks about its significance at the G20 Summit.

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The leader of the company Jio that pioneered 4G development in India, says India will grow at an unprecedented  acceleration to become a $5 trillion economy, one of the targets of the government. He says under the "atmannirbhar" vision of self-reliant economy, his company will lead the development of 5G in India in the second half of 2021 using home made technologies. Mukesh Ambani was speaking at the Indian Mobile Congress 2020.

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Tata has a couple of things going for it to make a car at a price under $2500- a different vision behind it and a longer term idea of the market and its opportunities for Tata Motors. This is a personal vision of Ratan Tata, the last in the series of Tata family members who have run a company that was at the leading edge of industrialization in India since British times in the closing years of the 19th century. He sees this as a way to bring a car that is affordable to millions of Indians, the average Indian, just as his father and great grand father were pioneers in India's early steps towards industrialization. This also will serve another purpose. It will provide momentum to India's manufacturing base by putting India's auto industry on its way to sell cars by the millions in the next ten years. The cost was a challenge to Indian engineers ingenuity. It would help them develop something from scratch from a clean slate, and as he hoped reinvent the car if possible. The cost also was doable in India because of the wages paid to Indian engineers and workers are different. The entire cost structure with suppliers like Bosch providing the engine also and internet purchases of parts coming under a completely different way of doing business, again a reinvent of things. And the skimping on a lot of basics like a radio is possible in the Indian context where the inital target market is the scooter family of which in India there are millions. People who would simply be waiting for such a bare bones car, not see it as such because it is a great advance over a scooter even in terms of safety. What most people who have never been to India would not be able to grasp is that a whole family of four can be seen riding on a scooter or motorbike in India on weekends in Indian urban areas. Tata's idea of the market potential is the way it can ride the next stages of increasing incomes in India. Once it has come up with this car it can come up with enhanced versions with an airconditioning and radio and so on, and still price it way below competitors with Tata's quality and brand name and innovative design. As long as Tata can sell all the cars it makes it can expand production rapidly. Tata's costs for engineering a top selling model may be only 20% of the $350 million it costs western companies, according to Alix Partners, with savings of $300 to $1000 per car right there. Labor costs are about $1.20 per hour in India, less than what auto workers make in China, this provides more cost savings. Tata plans to supply kits to dealers who will do the final assembly in small workshops. This distribution strategy will save Tata another chunk of costs, as about 20% of the car's cost is in distribution in the USA. ...

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Iraq is Iran's most promising market for gas exports. Iraq needs the gas for its power stations now that Islamic State has been decisively cleared from Iraq. Yet Iraq is having difficulty making payments to Iran for gas supplies because banks are not ready to handle the payments with the reimposed tighter U.S. sanctions and restrictions. The deputy head of media at the Electricity ministry in Iraq, Sadoun Shehan, told WSJ that transfer of money by Iraqi banks is prevented because of U.S. sanctions. U.S. sanctions were reimposed by the Trump administration after they were lifted in January 2016. The new sanctions prohibit gas exports from Iran. Iran had hoped to make the sales and also export to the European Union when sanctions were lifted. Iranian exports of gas that started in 2017 were itself delayed for 4 years by the war from Islamic State.  Iran has the second largest reserves of natural gas in the world. The Trump administration's sanctions have led to a drop of Iranian crude shipments by 29% in 3 months and added to upward pressure on oil prices to take prices to $80 a barrel. This issue has implications for India and China, particularly India as it faces both higher prices for oil and the tight restrictions in purchase of Iranian oil. ...

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Much of the reward for Labour goes to Health, Nutrition (food choices), and Education (schooling choices for children). This is the backbone for any Nation that is going to be strong and have a good future. Yet economic structures in 2026 and for decades has swung too far in one direction away from Labour and more and more for Capital, creating grave risks for the Nation, and setting the US as the wrong role model. Labour and Capital in 1980 vs 2026- increasing reward for Capital from 7% to 12% of GDI decreasing for Labour 58% to 52% in same period. In some areas this is not so because other regions have set their own priorities and this is a good thing Europe has a strong and fair access healthcare system, India has a strong and fair access pharmaceuticals healthcare system, which act as role models for the US. In 2026 RFK Jr, Dr. Oz at HHS and DJT are focused on getting US pharmaceuticals prices down to levels in the European Union. The real dangers of the skewing in the direction of Capital of rewards is creating a class that is not sensitive to the lives of ordinary people resulting in fracturing of society. Something like that happened in 1600-1800 in India and China leading to the disintegration of society and becoming overcome by foreign European powers which had more dynamic societies from the bottom up that led to discoveries in science leading to the industrial revolution. One detects something like this happening by accident by poor governance and bad decisions for wars (Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama), and the same administrations pushed by bad advice from economists to ship the productive manufacturing resources of the Nation to China. If not reversed it would lead to the kind of decline Asia witnessed after 1600- hitting all classes of society and destroying the economic structures as foreign powers get the upper hand. The surrendering of research labs and higher education in advanced science fields to foreigners at US and European universities poses similar risks as fractured society with Capital dominant and unaware of the risks. Such societies have less perception of such risk than a bottom up built social, economic and political framework with large numbers of aspiring local citizens seeking these positions in science and technology in the Nation. ...