How Zohran Mamdani’s Win In The New York City Mayoral Primary Could Ripple Across The Country

New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, center, greets voters with New York Comptroller Brad Lander, right, on the Upper West Side on June 24, 2025. Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

BY LINCOLN MITCHELL

LECTURER, SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL

AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS, COLUMBIA

UNIVERSITY

Top Republicans and Democrats alike are talking about the sudden rise of 33-year-old Zohran Mamdani, a state representative who won the Democratic mayoral primary in New York on June 24, 2025, in a surprising victory over more established politicians.

While President Donald Trump quickly came out swinging with personal attacks against Mamdani, some establishment Democratic politicians say they are concerned about how the democratic socialist’s progressive politics could harm the broader Democratic Party and cause it to lose more centrist voters.

New York is a unique American city, with a diverse population and historically liberal politics. So, does a primary mayoral election in New York serve as any kind of harbinger of what could come in the rest of the country?

Amy Lieberman, a politics and society editor at The Conversation U.S., spoke with Lincoln Mitchell, a political strategy and campaign specialist who lectures at Columbia University, to understand what Mamdani’s primary win might indicate about the direction of national politics.

Does Mamdani’s primary win offer any indication of how the Democratic Party might be transforming on a national level?

Mamdani’s win is clearly a rebuke of the more corporate wing of the Democratic Party. I know there are people who say that New York is different from the rest of the country. But from a political perspective, Democrats in New York are less different from Democrats in the rest of country than they used to be.

That’s because the rest of America is so much more diverse than it used to be. But if you look at progressive politicians now in the House of Representatives and state legislatures, they are being elected from all over – not just in big cities like New York anymore.

Andrew Cuomo, the former governor of New York, ran an absolutely terrible mayoral campaign. He tried to build a political coalition that is no longer a winning one, which was made up of majorities of African Americans, outer-borough white New Yorkers and orthodox and conservative Jews. Thirty or 40 years ago, that was a powerful coalition. Today, it could not make up a majority.

Mamdani visualized and created what a 2025 progressive coalition looks like in New York and recognized that it is going to look different than the past. Mamdani’s coalition was based around young, white people – many of them with college degrees who are worried about affordability – ideological lefties and immigrants from parts of the Global South, including the Caribbean and parts of Africa, South Asia and South America.

When you say a new kind of political coalition, what policy priorities bring Mamdani’s supporters together?

Mamdani reframed what I would call redistributive economic policies that have long been central to the progressive agenda. A pillar of his campaign is affordability – a brilliant piece of political marketing because who is against affordability? He came up with some affordability-related policies that got enough buzz, like promising free buses. Free buses are great, but it won’t help most working and poor New Yorkers get to work – they take the subway.

He has been very critical of Israel and has weathered charges of antisemitism.

In the older New York, progressive politicians such as the late Congressman Charlie Rangel were very hawkish on Israel.

What Mamdani understood is that in today’s America, the progressive wing of the Democratic Party does not care if somebody is, sounds like or comes close to being antisemitic. For those people, calling someone antisemitic sounds Trumpy, and they understand it as a right-wing hit, rather than the legitimate expression of concerns from Jewish people. Some liberals think that claims of antisemitism are simply something done just by those on the right to damage or discredit progressive politicians, but antisemitism is real.

Therefore, Mamdani’s record on the Jewish issue did not hurt him in the campaign, but he needs to build bridges to Jewish voters, or he will not be able to govern New York City.

How else did Mamdani appeal to a base of supporters?

He got the support of “limousine liberals” – including rich, high-profile, progressive people. His supporters include Ella Emhoff, a model and the stepdaughter of Kamala Harris, and the actress Cynthia Nixon, but there were many others. Supporting Mamdani became stylish – almost de rigueur – among certain segments of affluent New York.

Mamdani is also a true New Yorker and the voice of a new kind of immigrant. His parents are from Uganda and India. But he is also the child of extreme privilege – his mother, Mira Nair, is a well-known filmmaker, and his father is an accomplished professor. Mamdani went to top schools in New York and knows how to play in elite circles, and with white people. He is a Muslim man whose roots are in the Global South, not threatening because he knows how to speak their language.

But to people of color and immigrants, Mamdani is also one of them. Because of Mamdani’s interesting background, he brought the limousine liberals together with the aunties from Bangladesh.

Finally, on the charisma scale, Mamdani was so far ahead of other Democratic candidates. Who is going to make better TikTok videos – the good-looking, young man whose mother is a world-famous movie producer, or the older guy who is a loving father and husband but gives off dependable dad, rather than hip young guy, vibes?

Is New York City so distinct that you cannot compare politics there to what happens nationwide?

I think that nationwide or at the state level there is a potential for something similar to a Mamdani coalition, but not a Mamdani coalition exactly. But in a place like Oklahoma, there are people who are in bad economic shape and who will also respond positively to an affordability-focused, Democratic political campaign. Mamdani remade a progressive New York coalition for this moment. Other progressives politicians should copy the spirit of that and reimagine a winning coalition in their city, state or district.

When Trump was campaigning, he focused at least on making groceries cheaper. Mamdani is one of the few Democrats who took the affordability issue back from Trump and addressed it head on and in a much more honest and relevant way. Trump has the phrase, “Make America Great Again!” That’s a popular slogan on baseball caps for Trump supporters.

If Mamdani wanted to make a baseball cap, he could just print “Affordability” on it. Boom.

Other Democratic politicians can take that approach of affordability and reframe it in a way that works in Kansas City or elsewhere.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

Kamala, A Common Name In India, Is Associated With Several Deities And Is A Symbol Of Wisdom

BY ARCHANA VANHATESAN

PROFESSOR OF RELIGIOUS STUDIES

AND COMPARATIVE LITERATURE

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS

Ever since Vice President Kamala Harris became a presence on the national scene, her name – a common one for women in India – has attracted a lot of attention, most specifically for its pronunciation.

The three-syllable word should be pronounced “Come-a-laa” (Kamalā), with the final long “a” signaling a feminine noun in Sanskrit. In the United States, it is often enunciated with stresses placed on the first or second syllable.

However, the pronunciation of “Kamala” is the least interesting thing about this lovely name, which is only one of many words in Sanskrit for the radiant, fragrant, large-petaled pink lotus, or Nelumbo nucifera , that is ubiquitous in the Indian subcontinent. As a scholar of South Indian religions, I’d like to explain the deep symbolism and the many meanings of the kamala, or lotus, which are shared by different faith traditions in the subcontinent.

The ‘kamala’ in Indian literature

In many Indian love poems, the wide, shapely eyes of beautiful women are compared to the lotus, while in devotional poetry it is the God’s eyes that invite the comparison.

The simile is not confined just to the eyes but can be used to praise the beauty, softness and radiance of a lover’s or the divine’s face, feet or hands. The ninth-century Tamil poet, Nammalvar, in his magnum opus, the “Tiruvaymoli,” uses the simile to describe the beauty of the god Vishnu:

You are faultless light

You are unsullied wisdom

that neither blooms nor withers.

You are everything. You rule it all.

If the king of the beautiful gods

worships you, won’t it dim

the radiance of your lotus feet?

In some cases, love, whether mystical or human, is described as a lotus that blooms in the day, responding to the warmth and brightness of the sun. At night, the lotus closes its petals, much as one might withdraw in the absence of the beloved. Equally, the lotus can be evocative of desire and intimacy, drawing a bee to drink from its nectar.

The lotus, both as whole flower or even a single curved petal, is a pervasive motif in Indian art. A famous 18th-century Indian miniature painting depicts the divine couple, Radha and Krishna, facing each other, clothed entirely in lotuses.

The lotus’s divine symbolism


Most significantly, the kamala, or lotus, is closely associated with Sri-Lakshmi: the goddess of sovereignty, auspiciousness, fecundity, wealth and good fortune, who is worshiped by Hindus, Buddhists and Jains. In fact, Kamala is simply another name for Sri-Lakshmi. This goddess either sits or stands on a fully bloomed lotus and holds them in her hands as well.

In Hindu temples in Southern India, she will often be adorned in a garland of lotuses, so complete is her association with this flower. Lakshmi’s divine husband, Vishnu, is also closely connected to this flower. A lotus emerges from his navel to birth the god Brahma, who in turn births the whole universe.

Although Sri-Lakshmi’s association with the lotus is most obvious, the religious traditions of Jainism and Buddhism also integrate the bloom. Buddhist and Jain divine figures may hold the lotus in their hand, like the Buddhist goddess Tara or the male Buddhist deity Avalokiteshvara. The sixth great teacher of the Jain tradition, Padmaprabhu, is named after a lotus, with “padma” being another name for the flower. Sometimes the lotus serves as a pedestal for the divine being in the Jain, Buddhist and Hindu traditions.

In all cases, the lotus is rarely a bud and almost always a lush, open bloom. This gestures to its deep meaning as a symbol of wisdom, of one’s awakening into knowledge from the torpor of ignorance. The kamala’s symbolic meaning is rooted in the fact that the lotus blooms in swampy waters but remains untouched by the dirt around it. Similarly, enlightenment and wisdom arise and blossom from the murk of desire and attachment. But when one attains wisdom, like the lotus, one remains above and untouched by the dirt of deluding ignorance.

That is why the kamala is always pictured and described not as a bud, suggesting only potential for wisdom, but as a large, open, unfurled flower.

Kamala Harris’ name is a reminder of its significance in these religious traditions. One could argue that a lotus by another name is still a lotus, but as these traditions show, it is also so much more.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

BOOK REVIEW: Camouflaged: Forgotten Stories From Battlefields

Probal Dasgupta (Wikipedia)

BY MAJOR GEN. JAGATBIR SINGH

Probal DasGupta’s first book, ‘Watershed 1967: India’s Forgotten Victory Over China,’ gave rare granularity to the clashes that were central to India regaining control of strategically significant border areas in Sikkim. His latest offering, ‘Camouflaged’, is another masterpiece in which he has now brought to the fore ten forgotten stories from the battlefield.

The expanse of the book is vast, as the stories span over a century, from World War I to the 26/11 terrorist strike in Mumbai. From the ground to the air, battlefields far and near, from dense jungles to desolate mountains and densely populated urban areas, the settings of each tale vary, but what stands out is the character of these ordinary men who delivered extraordinary results when confronted with extreme challenges.

The book also gives a rare insight into the unique camaraderie and ethos of units, the family traditions of military service, and, more importantly, covers an aspect that is not written about often—the trauma faced by their families.

Arthur Conan Doyle bowling off spin in Eastbourne to a stylish turbaned Indian batsman is an unusual way to start a story about war and glory. From the grassy fields of England to the skies above France and air combat, ‘Sultans of the Skies’, is an incredible story in many ways.

Hardit Malik, studying in Oxford when the First World War broke out, was rejected by the British Air Force. He went on to be an ambulance driver in France and applied for the French Air Force who accepted him. His tutor in Oxford then shot off a letter to General Henderson the head of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and soon he joined the RFC and was even given a ‘special helmet to fit over his turban’.

He went on to join 28 Squadron and ‘determined to stamp his country’s presence in the war despite officially representing Britain’ had India painted on the side of his aircraft. He became an ace pilot but ended the war with a bullet lodged in his thigh while engaging in an air duel with Paul Strahle, a legendary German pilot. He later went on to become India’s Ambassador to Canada and France.

Laddie Roy the other pilot covered in this story also came from a privileged background and did his schooling in England, lying about his age he joined the RFC, he was told he had to ‘survive and fight and then survive again’. He did survive his first crash and after he recuperated he ‘persuaded the medics to pass him fit for flying duties’.

He became a ‘war veteran and teen sensation’ and took down nine German planes between 09 and 19 July 1918, unfortunately on 22 July 1918 the prodigy was shot down in a skirmish but this was after taking down two German aircraft. He was a trailblazer in combat flying in India and in 1998 a stamp was released in his honour.

‘Message In A Battle’ is the story of Gobind Singh of 2nd Lancers, a renowned Cavalry Regiment, who was awarded the Victoria Cross in the Battle of Cambrai in 1917. Belonging to Damoi in Nagaur District of Rajasthan, he was fearless.

This was the battle where tanks were introduced on the battlefield for the first time but after they had achieved the breakthrough, additional troops in the form of Infantry and Cavalry were required to follow on and capture the ground.

Indian soldiers of the Regiment with lances had charged ferociously at German Machine Guns; ‘raw courage against steel’. Though they had been successful they were soon surrounded by Germans and an urgent message needed to be sent to the Brigade Headquarters.

Sowar Jot Ram and Lance Daffadar Gobind Singh volunteered. Losing his horse, dodging bullets and feigning death he displayed unshakeable composure and resilience, he repeated this feat thrice and this act of ‘conspicuous bravery’ thwarted a major enemy breakthrough and was awarded the Victoria Cross. His son and grandson went on to serve in Second Lancers.

The story of Chanan Singh Dhillon; ‘Three Lives in War’; can be summed up in the words; ‘believe it or not’. A farmer’s son from Punjab, who was keen to join the Army, fell short of English proficiency to join as an officer. Nevertheless, he joined as a soldier and set off to fight World War II with his Engineer Regiment initially in Basra, Iraq and later in North Africa where he became a Prisoner of War (PoW).

This was in June 1942 a week before he was to return to India as he had been selected as an officer. Facing an Italian execution squad for complaining against the inhuman work conditions, he was saved by the Germans. While being transported to a PoW Camp in Italy their ship was hit by a British submarine ironically killing many British prisoners, he survived the boiling waters as SS Loretto went down in the Tyrrhenian Sea by clinging to a plank of wood.

Later, while in, Stlag 12 A, a PoW Camp in Limburg Germany he was nearly killed by an Allied air attack. He returned and became an officer and his children then helped put together the story of his remarkable ordeal based on his diary and letters which were written in Punjabi. Ironically, it all started the day he received the letter offering him the opportunity of his dreams.

The legendary tale of Colonel Chhewang Rinchen has been recounted in great detail bringing the enormity of his valour, the strength of his character and the adversity of the terrain and weather conditions where he fought.

He has participated in all of India’s Wars and been recognised for his extraordinary bravery and leadership having been awarded the Maha Vir Chakra twice. In 1971 he was instrumental in capturing a portion of Baltistan which resulted in the shifting of the line of Control. The villagers in this area, though Muslims, ‘ had reminisced about life before Pakistani occupation in 1948 and felt a greater kinship with their Ladakhi brethren’. ‘Today the legend of Stak lives on undefeated.’

‘The Rise and Fall of 1962’ is the story of Haripal Kaushik who fought the Chinese in Tongpen La leading his subunit of 1 SIKH in resolute defence applying his tactical acumen on the battlefield in October 1962.

He was fortunate to breakthrough the Chinese onslaught and returned weeks later absolutely bedraggled. He was shattered both physically and psychologically but fought back due to the faith of his Commanding Officer Lieutenant Colonel Karnail Singh Sidhu and amazingly went on to play in the Olympics again winning his second Gold Medal in Hockey. A Vir Chakra for his ‘remarkable bravery’ and Arjuna Awardee Colonel Haripal Kaushik, known for his speed and stickwork, was indeed an extraordinary human being.

‘Top Guns of Boyra’ is an extraordinary narration which brings out the character of young men, the spirit of a unit and a sense of achievement as well as ethical soldiers’ conduct on the battlefield. Flying Officers Don Lazurus, Ganapathy, Soares and Massey of 22 Squadron flying Gnats were successful in destroying two Pakistani Sabres over Garibpur in November 1971. They displayed extraordinary flying skills and became legends ‘before they touched down’.

One of the Pakistani pilots was Parvaiz Mehdi Qureshi who was captured by 4 SIKH and saved from being beaten up by their Adjutant Captain (later Lieutenant General) HS Panag. Qureshi, a contemporary of General Musharraf went on to become the Pakistani Air Chief, had advised Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif against using air power during the Kargil war as it would have led to retaliatory escalatory measures. Many years later Don Lazurus, then settled in Coonoor, received a reply to his congratulatory letter to Qureshi in which he complimented him for the fight in Boyra.

Part III of the book covers the ‘Modern Era’- the Kargil War, insurgency and terrorism. Complex modern-day issues. Some stories are still classified in the sense that the names of the people can’t be revealed but their actions and reactions are fact and not fiction. How do you deal with a militant who admits he has been led astray, wants to make amends and is willing to help you? How do families support each other in times of crisis knowing fully well that their husbands could be the next victims?

‘The Warriors Code of Courage’ brings out the spirit, training and ethos of 21 Special forces (SF) and the manner in which they operate. There are two actions of one of their Teams which have been covered, one in Assam and the other in J&K. The manner in which an encounter takes place and the interpersonal relations within the Team, which is one of the closest relationships with a buddy willingly sacrificing his life for his colleague, brings out the character of these men, where in spite of being seriously wounded their thoughts lie only on successfully completing their mission.

The undaunted courage of Major Deepinder Singh Sengar who suffered serious bullet injuries in both operations and his colleague Saurabh Singh Shekawat who evacuated him both times and is one of the most highly decorated officers reflects rare bonding and loyalty and fills one with pride.

The dilemmas men face in battling these insurgencies, the effect of intense operations on soldiers, society and people living in insurgency prone areas as well as on the families of those combating it are vividly covered. There is no doubt that we need to preserve the perspectives of the protagonists so that they don’t get obliterated by the passage of time.

Books like this need to be read as they not only serve as an inspiration for the future generations but also build a sense of patriotism and pride in our Armed Forces.

Tales of soldiers, their courage and commitment are inspiring to say the least. Military heroism displayed in the face of extreme adversity wherein individuals take life threatening actions to uphold the honour of their units and the nation totally disregarding their own safety are rare acts of bravery, dedication and commitment whose tale needs to be told to a wider audience.

While the legacy of these brave men is well recorded in their units and by their families, the candid and intuitive manner in which Probal has weaved these tales by infusing life into them needs to be admired. It’s truly a book that is difficult to put down. Probal’s gripping narrative brilliantly matched by his eloquent prose while revealing what was hidden under ‘camouflage’ needs to be admired.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

An Indian Scholar’s Take On Xi Jinping’s Relationship With The Cultural Revolution

BY P. K. BALACHANDRAN

Xi Jinping, the unquestioned leader of the People’s Republic of China, has further transformed the once inward-looking China into an outward-looking and highly organized country that is now resolutely challenging American global leadership in a drive to become a world power.

In his chapter on Xi and the Cultural Revolution in the newly published book Studies of China and Chineseness since the Cultural Revolution (World Scientific, Singapore, May 2023) Indian scholar Professor Swaran Singh of Jawaharlal University, meticulously analyses the Cultural Revolution’s role in the shaping of Xi’s mind and political style.

It showcases how that traumatic era in modern Chinese history taught Xi how to weather storms and creatively use opportunities thrown up by the vicissitudes of politics.

What emerges from Singh’s account is that Xi is an innovator with firm roots in certain vital aspects of the past. This has vested him with a firm ideological commitment, an iron will, an ability to put up with adversity with patience, an ability to seize opportunities to further his goals and consolidate power through a combination of imaginative and ruthless actions.

Xi has taken leaves out of Mao Zedong’s book even as he has built on Mao to shape China’s destiny in a rapidly changing world.

Xi’s father, mother, and Xi himself, had gone through the tumultuous phases of the Chinese revolution. He has been toughened by its privations and humiliations and also inspired by its uncompromising ideals. The techniques Xi has used to acquire and consolidate power may be different in form from those used by his immediate forebears, but they have been equally effective.

Xi’s father, Xi Zhongxun, an early member of the communist party, was purged twice and also publicly beaten up during the Cultural Revolution. But neither father nor son nor the mother, vacillated from their commitment to Chairman Mao. When young Xi was put in the doghouse for criticizing the Cultural Revolution, and he slipped out of detention and headed home, his mother refused to give him food and reported his presence to the authorities.

These episodes inspired him to commit himself to the cause, though later the negatives of the Cultural Revolution also dawned on him.

In 2001, as party secretary of Fujian province, remembering his father on his 88th birthday, Xi recalled that Xi Zhongxun, led “a frugal life, almost to the point of being harsh.” Xi acknowledged that he inherited “self-cultivation, devotion to work, belief and commitment, patriotism, and simple living” from his father. He owed to his mother his grit and commitment to the cause setting aside personal considerations.

Xi told state-run CCTV in 2003: “I think the youth of my generation will be remembered for the fervor of the Red Guard era. But it was emotional. It was a mood. And when the ideals of the Cultural Revolution could not be realized, it proved an illusion.” Xi has been able to sift the grain from the chaff.

He unreservedly adopted the Maoist ways of the Cultural Revolution when confronted with the humongous problem of corruption in the party and the State. Swaran Singh quotes the president of the US–China Policy Foundation, Dr. Chi Wang, as saying in 2020: “In recent weeks, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been cracking down on law enforcement officials in a campaign echoing actions taken by Mao in the 1940s to ensure loyalty.”

Reinforcing “loyalty to the party” among China’s military, media, and masses has been a constant refrain in Xi’s speeches, making him sound like Mao.

Given the constitutional amendment of 2018 that removed the two-term limit on the Presidency, experts speculate that Xi may even change the party constitution to revive the title of “Chairman” that is used only for Mao.

Xi’s bringing under his wing an array of key structures such as the Central Military Commission, the newly created National Security Committee, the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms and several other leading groups on sectoral decision-making, indicate a Maoist agenda.

Xi’s “China Dream of national rejuvenation” could become the second Cultural Revolution, albeit with a distinctly Xi stamp, Swaran Singh says.

The Indian scholar draws attention to the fact that Xi has successfully shifted China’s national narrative from a “century of humiliation” to the “rejuvenation of a nation” setting up clearly defined benchmarks for China.

These goals are: becoming a “moderately prosperous” nation by 2021, completing modernization of the People’s Liberation Army to make it the “world class armed forces” by 2035, and making China “a developed nation” by 2049.

Xi is on the path to becoming a cult figure like Mao. Adoption of the title “Chairman” would enable him to assume that status. As Ling Li, lecturer in Chinese studies in the University of Vienna, put it: “The title (Chairman) would provide a mechanism to extend Xi’s tenure because there is no term limit for party chairmanship in the past”. This would easily legitimize Xi Jinping’s continuation in power.

Xi’s apotheosis as a cult figure was hinted at in the November 2021 Sixth Plenum of the CPC Central Committee. It concluded that the establishment of “Comrade Xi Jinping’s position as the core of the central committee as well as the whole party, was of decisive significance in advancing towards the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.”

Western media commentaries attribute Xi’s “authoritarian streak” to the way he put up with the excesses of the Cultural Revolution and did not turn against Mao and was indeed “redder than red” as a US embassy leak put it.

Xi once told to an interviewer: “Nothing could be as hard as that…. With that kind of experience, whatever difficulties I would encounter in the future, I am fully charged with the courage to take on any challenge, to believe in the impossible, and to conquer obstacles without panic.”

Swaran Singh notes that during the Cultural Revolution, Xi also developed “cautiousness”, which included political prudence, self-discipline, and careful avoidance of any demonstration of “dangerous” ambitions.

However, after lying low and patiently biding his time, Xi came out of his shell when the time was ripe and circumstances were propitious. Speaking at the game-changing 19th Party Congress in October 2019 Xi said: “History looks kindly on those with resolve, with drive and ambition, and with plenty of guts; it won’t wait for the hesitant, the apathetic, or those shy of a challenge.”

Deng Xiaoping’s opening up of China and the internal reforms he effected created new opportunities for Xi. He assiduously worked on his assignments to climb the party ladder and wisely kept disagreements to himself.

His early career began in the province of Hebei, close to Beijing and yet a relatively poor region. Experience in working in a poor region was useful for his future massive poverty alleviation program.

When he was transferred to the rapidly growing and wealthier regions like Fujian and Zhejiang provinces, he got a different kind of experience. “These regions were integral to Deng’s experiments with China’s opening up and reforms that saw China rapidly integrating with the global economy. Especially Xi Jinping’s longest tenure in the rapidly growing Fujian province would provide him with several opportunities to showcase his caliber, commitment, and concerted dedication to the party line. It was here that Xi would learn about globalization and the market economy,” Swaran Singh points out.

But prosperity brought corruption in its train. Xi held this bull by the horns. “He dealt with the matter so effectively, that within months, he was propelled to the central leadership in Beijing and became Vice President in March 2008,” Swaran Singh notes.

But true to style, even as Vice President, Xi continued to be quintessentially low profile. So much so that he was not seen as part of China’s fifth-generation leadership to take over the reins from the Hu Jintao–Wen Jiabao collective leadership. Leaders like Bo Xilai and Li Keqiang and several others who were in the running, not Xi.

Indeed, when Xi took over as Party General Secretary in November 2012, not much was known about him and little was expected from his leadership. Western media portrayed him as a “compromise candidate”, easy-going and amiable.

But the US had seen Xi in his true colors, that he was no lamb. Swaran Singh refers to a cable leaked by the CIA which said that Xi, then a member of the Politburo Standing Committee and Vice President, was ‘exceptionally ambitious’, ‘confident’ and ‘focused’, and had had his ‘eye on the prize’ from early adulthood.

From the very beginning, an anti-graft campaign was to be his main instrument to consolidate the party’s absolute power as well his path to the party’s central leadership. Xi’s first term in office saw large-scale reshuffles and reorganizations in the intelligence, army, and other security and disciplinary organizations.

Swaran Singh points out that by 2015, the Central Military Committee’s Vice-Chairmen Xu Caihou and Guo Boxiong were arrested. The director and his deputy at the Central Guard Bureau, Chao Qing and Wang Qing, and also Vice Minister of State Security, Ma Jian, were dismissed, to name just a few.

It was a Cultural Revolution packaged differently and bearing a different name, but effective nonetheless.

But in contrast to Mao, Xi’s domestic consolidation of power was accompanied by global image-building in tune with his global plans for China.

“At the beginning of Xi Jinping’s second term in office, Xi had been listed six times in TIME 100 (annual list of 100 most influential world leaders), hailed as “the most transformative Chinese leaders since Deng Xiaoping”, “the leader of rising China”, and “China’s first truly global leader.”

Xi showed his capabilities in domestic affairs also by the resolute way he handled the Hong Kong crisis, Sino-US trade and technology wars, Western admonition of China’s treatment of the Uyghur Muslims, and of course the coronavirus pandemic.

Significantly, in true Maoist style, Xi tackled these problems not through decentralization or collective leadership but through further centralization of authority in his hands as indeed Mao did when challenged.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

India Looks Beyond Australia, Africa, To Source Critical Minerals Used In Electric Cars

BY MAHUA VENKATESH

INDIA (INDIA NARRATIVE)--India is going beyond Africa and Australia to set up a steady supply chain of minerals, including the 17 -metal rare earth elements. It is now eyeing the large mineral resources in the South American countries including Argentina, Bolivia and Chile. Many of the mineral rich countries such as Bolivia remain untapped and offer “huge opportunities.” Besides, Russia is also sitting on a rich pile of rare earth mineral reserves.

The Khanij Bidesh India Ltd, a joint venture between National Aluminium Company Ltd.(NALCO), Hindustan Copper Ltd.(HCL) and Mineral Exploration Company Ltd. (MECL), set up in 2019 on the lines of ONGC Videsh Limited, has started looking at untapped markets in Latin America.

Starting from identification and acquisition, KABIL is expected to carry out exploration and development activities as well.

At present China leads the world’s production in rare earth minerals.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) revealed that Latin America has not yet attracted sufficient investment in line with its potential. A mere 7 per cent of the global exploration budget for nickel and rare earth elements is allocated to the region, it said.

The IEA also pointed out that mining, which has historically accounted for between 13 per cent and 19 per cent of Latin America’s incoming foreign direct investment (FDI) offers “great development potential,” though it is also fraught with “high risk of environmental degradation and adverse impacts on local communities.”

Meanwhile with sanctions underway, Russia, a rather slow-starter in rare earth mining, is also now aggressively developing its supply chain for these critical elements. New Delhi may look at deepening trade opportunity in minerals with Russia. “India and Russia can look at this area for boosting trade partnership,” an industry body member said.

For India, which is aiming to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2070, mineral security has come to the fore. “Mineral security in today’s world is as critical as energy and food,” he said. Several experts have even opined that wars will not be limited to energy and food but in the future, but will extend to minerals.

According to a Takhshashila research “India must not only secure its national interests in the rare earth sector but also take advantage of the current geopolitical and trade situation to become a major player globally.” However, this will require liberalising the mining of rare earth, increasing extraction, production, and processing capacity, and building a high-value supply chain including in the renewables and electronics sector, it added.

Why is mineral security critical for India?

Several minerals and rare earth components are key for acquiring clean energy. That apart, these components, which are otherwise not very rare even as their mining is a tedious and risky exercise, are the basic raw materials required for electric vehicles, defence equipment, smartphones, batteries, television sets and computers among others.

India has the fifth largest rare earth mineral reserves but its output is low. While it is exploring ways to mine rare earth minerals within the country to achieve mineral security, it is also looking at markets outside its borders.

Brazil’s US Capitol-Like Siege Ominous For All Democracies, India Included

THE FEDERAL

FILE - Protesters, supporters of Brazil's former President Jair Bolsonaro, storm the Planalto Palace in Brasilia, Brazil, Jan. 8, 2023. Planalto is the official workplace of the president of Brazil. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres, File)

BY KS DAKSHINA MURTHY

For those who support freedom and governments elected by popular vote, the storming of Brazil’s top democratic institutions is a worrisome development. In a copycat attack in the capital Brasilia, similar to the one on the US Capitol on January 6, 2020, rampaging mobs on Sunday backed by right-wing, conservative forces clearly undermined democratic choices and a peaceful change of power.

Though the vanquished former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has not directly supported the attack on the state’s institutions, he has neither condemned it. The mob, on January 8, made up of Bolsonaro supporters, resorted to violence to express frustration at their leader’s loss to leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the recent election.

Yet, the fact that they thought it necessary to mount the anarchist attack shows that a defining line has been crossed in the practice of democracy, in which elections play the key role.

Inspiration from US Capitol attack

On January 6, 2020, the world was stunned at defeated presidential re-run candidate Donald Trump’s audacious attempt to egg his supporters to “retrieve the stolen vote”, a claim made to convey to his supporters that he had lost by subterfuge rather than in a fair and free election. Though this accusation proved to be false and did not have supporters even within his administration and the Republican Party, a section of Trump’s rag-tag loyalists, some armed, tried to stage a coup of sorts to overturn the results.

The coup did not work, thanks among others to the then Vice-President Mike Pence who fended off pressure to neutralise Joe Biden’s victory and ratify Trump. But the attack breached an unwritten convention – that of respecting the popular mandate. The copycat Brazil storming has also confirmed the worst fears of democrats, that the US incident could “inspire” losers elsewhere in other democracies to try out similar stunts.

Backdoor entry to power in India

The US first and now Brazil have shown that democracy is creaking under strain. Vested interests are no longer keen on playing a fair game, one that provides a level playing field and allows people to take a call on who should govern them.

The two instances are crucial learning curves for India, which has thrived as an elected liberal parliamentary democracy for seven decades (except for 21 months during the Emergency). Until now, there has never been a situation in India where a vanquished leader of a political party or their supporters have violently challenged their defeat. On the contrary, losers have been gracious and acknowledged the will of the people respectfully. All challenges have been either in the courts or in the Election Commission, as mandated by law.

This is not to imply that everything is hunky-dory in India as far as elections are concerned. Without having to storm any state institution, the ruling BJP, even if in a losing position, appears to have mastered the art of coming to power by “attracting” rival party legislators into its fold. The electorate, in state Assembly elections, may have voted against the BJP, or not given a majority to any single party.

Obviously the verdict, by inference, is for a coalition government. When it turns out to be a non-BJP coalition, in a matter of months the arrangement comes apart and the BJP occupies power – through the back door. In other words, the electorate’s verdict stands subverted. The examples are innumerable – among them, Karnataka earlier and the latest, Maharashtra.

Opinion | Modi and Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro are cast in the same mould

The process, which initially evoked considerable indignation, drew condemnation and expressions of dismay, is so completely normalised now it hardly triggers a squeak even among the affected opposition parties. As some cynical voters say, it does not matter who you vote for in India today. The BJP will eventually make it to the gaddi.

In the footsteps of Africa

Supporters of Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro would probably be surprised to know that there are other “discreet” ways to hijack elections, India style.

If the storming of the US Capitol and Brazil’s institutions housing the National Congress, Presidential Palace and Supreme Court had only been the beginning of such attacks, it could have been dismissed as aberrations. But the fact is that these two prominent powers are only following in the footsteps of several African nations which routinely have seen widespread violence in presidential elections.

Kenya has been the worst affected with all-pervasive election-related violence for the last couple of decades at least. The 2007 general elections were among the worst when at least 1000 people were killed in violence that erupted after elections. In the latest August 2022 elections too, despite efforts to curb post-election violence, the defeat of Raila Odinga brought out his supporters onto the streets, protesting his loss.

Fortunately, violence was only sporadic and not to the extent of previous ones. The court finally ruled in favour of the winner William Ruto.

Nigeria is another country in Africa that has seen widespread election-related violence after the loss of candidates. Violence spiked after 2015, with Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) being the target. After the 2019 polls, more than 50 attacks were registered across Nigeria against the INEC. With general elections due this year in Nigeria, there is widespread apprehension of violence.

Watch | Why Brazil’s Bolsonaro stirs a storm ahead of Republic Day

With conservative, right-wing leaders and political parties in contention for power worldwide, not coincidentally, the instances of post-electoral violence too appears to be increasing. Rising xenophobia, religious fundamentalism and a growing global economic crisis are not only aiding a sharp turn to the right politically, these are being accompanied by intolerance against dissent, pluralism and the democratic space.

All these years, democracy wherever it was practised, was considered above board, people’s choices were viewed as sacrosanct and political players accommodated the opposition, even if reluctantly. But no more. And that is what makes election-related violence in Brazil, or the US, and countries in Africa ominous for other democracies. India included.

India Signals It Will Continue To Buy Oil From Russia

In this photo provided by Indian Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar's Twitter handle, Jaishankar and German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, pose for a photograph during their meeting in New Delhi, India, Monday, Dec.5, 2022. (Indian Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar's Twitter handle via AP)

BY SHEIKH SAALIQ

NEW DELHI (AP) — India will prioritize its own energy needs and continue to buy oil from Russia, its foreign minister signaled Monday, as Western governments press Moscow with a price cap to squeeze its earnings from oil exports.

Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar made the comments after holding talks with his visiting German counterpart, Annalena Baerbock, in which they discussed bilateral relations and Russia’s war in Ukraine. Jaishankar said it isn’t right for European countries to prioritize their energy needs but “ask India to do something else.”

“Europe will make the choices it will make. It is their right,” he told reporters.

India has so far not committed to the $60-per-barrel price cap on Russian oil set by the Group of Seven major industrialized countries and European Union that is expected to come into effect Monday. The move is an attempt by Western governments to limit fossil fuel earnings that support Moscow’s budget, its military and its invasion of Ukraine, while also avoiding a possible sharp price spike if Russia’s oil is suddenly taken off the global market.

Jaishankar did not make any direct reference to the price cap but said the European Union was importing more fossil fuel from Russia than India. Indian officials have defended buying oil from Russia, saying the lower price benefits India.

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, India has steadily increased its purchases of discounted Russian oil. Indian imports of Russian oil hit a record high in October, with Russia becoming India’s top oil supplier in terms of barrels per day, the Press Trust of India news agency said, quoting data from energy tracker Vortexa.

India and Russia have close relations and New Delhi has not supported Western sanctions on Moscow, even though it has repeatedly urged an “immediate cessation of violence” in Ukraine. India, also a major market for Russian-made weapons, has so far abstained from U.N. resolutions critical of Moscow’s war.

Jaishankar and Baerbock, who is in India on a two-day visit, also discussed a diversification of trade between the two countries, global consequences of the Russian war on Ukraine and cooperation in the energy transition away from fossil fuels.

The two countries also signed a migration and mobility partnership which will make it easier for people to study, do research and work in each other’s country.

Germany is India’s largest trading partner in Europe and more than 1,700 German companies are operating in India. German investments in India are mainly in transportation, electrical equipment, construction, trading and automobiles.

How Tramadol, Touted As Safer Opioid, Became 3rd World Peril

In this Oct. 31, 2019, photo, an Indian drug user lies unconscious by the side of a road in Kapurthala, in the northern Indian state of Punjab. Mass abuse of the opioid tramadol spans continents, from India to Africa to the Middle East, creating international havoc some experts blame on a loophole in narcotics regulation and a miscalculation of the drug’s danger. Punjab, the center of India's opioid epidemic, was among the latest to crack down on the tramadol trade. Researchers estimate about 4 million Indians use heroin or other opioids, and a quarter of them live in the Punjab, India's agricultural heartland bordering Pakistan. (AP Photo/Channi Anand)

BY EMILY SCHMALL, CLAIRE GALOFARO

KAPURTHALA, INDIA (AP) — Reports rolled in with escalating urgency — pills seized by the truckload, pills swallowed by schoolchildren, pills in the pockets of dead terrorists.

These pills, the world has been told, are safer than the OxyContins, the Vicodins, the fentanyls that have wreaked so much devastation. But now they are the root of what the United Nations named “the other opioid crisis” — an epidemic featured in fewer headlines than the American one, as it rages through the planet’s most vulnerable countries.

Mass abuse of the opioid tramadol spans continents, from India to Africa to the Middle East, creating international havoc some experts blame on a loophole in narcotics regulation and a miscalculation of the drug’s danger. The man-made opioid was touted as a way to relieve pain with little risk of abuse. Unlike other opioids, tramadol flowed freely around the world, unburdened by international controls that track most dangerous drugs.

But abuse is now so rampant that some countries are asking international authorities to intervene.

This story was produced with support from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.

Grunenthal, the German company that originally made the drug, is campaigning for the status quo, arguing that it’s largely illicit counterfeit pills causing problems. International regulations make narcotics difficult to get in countries with disorganized health systems, the company says, and adding tramadol to the list would deprive suffering patients access to any opioid at all.

“This is a huge public health dilemma,” said Dr. Gilles Forte, the secretary of the World Health Organization’s committee that recommends how drugs should be regulated. Tramadol is available in war zones and impoverished nations because it is unregulated. But it is widely abused for the same exact reason. “It’s a really very complicated balance to strike.”

Tramadol has not been as deadly as other opioids, and the crisis isn’t killing with the ferocity of America’s struggle with the drugs. Still, individual governments from the U.S. to Egypt to Ukraine have realized the drug’s dangers are greater than was believed and have worked to rein in the tramadol trade. The north Indian state of Punjab, the center of India’s opioid epidemic, was the latest to crack down. The pills were everywhere, as legitimate medication sold in pharmacies, but also illicit counterfeits hawked by street vendors.

This year, authorities seized hundreds of thousands of tablets, banned most pharmacy sales and shut down pill factories, pushing the price from 35 cents for a 10-pack to $14. The government opened a network of treatment centers, fearing those who had become opioid addicted would resort to heroin out of desperation. Hordes of people rushed in, seeking help in managing excruciating withdrawal.

For some, tramadol had become as essential as food.

“Like if you don’t eat, you start to feel hungry. Similar is the case with not taking it,” said auto shop welder Deepak Arora, a gaunt 30-year-old who took 15 tablets day, so much he had to steal from his family to pay for pills. “You are like a dead person.”

Jeffery Bawa, an officer with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, realized what was happening in 2016, when he traveled to Mali in western Africa, one of the world’s poorest countries, gripped by civil war and terrorism. They asked people for their most pressing concerns. Most did not say hunger or violence. They said tramadol.

One woman said children stumble down the streets, high on the opioid; parents add it to tea to dull the ache of hunger. Nigerian officials said at a United Nations meeting on tramadol trafficking that the number of people there living with addiction is now far higher than the number with AIDS or HIV.

Tramadol is so pervasive in Cameroon scientists a few years ago believed they’d discovered a natural version in tree roots. But it was not natural at all: Farmers bought pills and fed them to their cattle to ward off the effects of debilitating heat. Their waste contaminated the soil, and the chemical seeped into the trees.

Police began finding pills on terrorists, who traffic it to fund their networks and take it to bolster their capacity for violence, Bawa said.

Most of it was coming from India. The country’s sprawling pharmaceutical industry is fueled by cheap generics. Pill factories produce knock-offs and ship them in bulk around the world, in doses far exceeding medical limits.

In 2017, law enforcement reported that $75 million worth of tramadol from India was confiscated en route to the Islamic State terror group. Authorities intercepted 600,000 tablets headed for Boko Haram. Another 3 million were found in a pickup truck in Niger, in boxes disguised with U.N. logos. The agency warned that tramadol was playing “a direct role in the destabilization of the region.”

“We cannot let the situation get any further out of control,” that alert read.

Grunenthal maintains that tramadol has a low risk of abuse; most of the pills causing trouble are knock-offs, not legitimate pharmaceuticals, and American surveys have shown lower levels of abuse than other prescription painkillers. The company submitted a report to the WHO in 2014, saying that the abuse evident in “a limited number of countries,” should be viewed “in the context of the political and social instabilities in the region.”

But some wealthy countries worried about increasing abuse also have acted to contain the drug.

The United Kingdom and United States both regulated it in 2014. Tramadol was uncontrolled in Denmark until 2017, when journalists asked doctors to review studies submitted to regulators to support the claim that it has a low risk for addiction, said Dr. Karsten Juhl Jorgensen, acting director of the Nordic Cochrane Centre and one of the physicians who analyzed the materials. They all agreed that the documents did not prove it’s safer.

“We know that opioids are some of the most addictive drugs on the face of the planet, so the claim that you’ve developed one that’s not addictive, that’s an extraordinary claim, and extraordinary claims require evidence. And it just wasn’t there,” said Jorgensen. “We’ve all been cheated, and people are angry about that.”

Jorgensen compares claims that tramadol is low risk to those made by American companies now facing thousands of lawsuits alleging misleading campaigns touting the safety of opioids unleashed the U.S. addiction epidemic.

Stefano Berterame, a chief at the International Narcotics Control Board, said there is a critical difference: The crisis is not as deadly as the American one, which began with prescription opioids and transitioned to heroin and fentanyl. Tramadol does not as routinely cause the respiratory depression that leads to overdose death.

But it is mostly afflicting poor nations, where overdose statistics are erratic, he said, so the true toll of tramadol is unknown.

The United Nations established the International Narcotics Control Board in 1961 to spare the world the “serious evil” of addiction. It has since tracked most opioids.

Tramadol’s exemption means authorization isn’t required as the drug moves across borders. Its easy availability also leads to confusion about what tramadol even is, experts say. In many countries, it is thought to be a mood enhancer or treatment for depression and post-traumatic stress. Some take it to improve sexual stamina or endure grueling labor.

Grunenthal synthesized tramadol in the 1960s, as the company was embroiled in scandal over its marketing of the sedative thalidomide, which caused extreme birth defects in thousands of babies whose mothers took it. Tramadol was initially believed to have a low risk of abuse because initial trials studied injected tramadol, the most potent route for most opioids. But researchers later found that tramadol releases a far more powerful dose taken orally because of how it is metabolized by the liver.

Tramadol’s worldwide market quickly expanded in the 1990s. In 2000, the WHO, which assesses medications and recommends scheduling, noted reports of dependence. A committee has reviewed the drug numerous times since, recommended it remain under surveillance but declined to add international regulation.

There is no alternative to tramadol, said Forte, the committee’s secretary. It is the only opioid available in some of the world’s most desperate places; relief organizations rely on it in war zones and natural disasters. It is used extensively not because it is a particularly good medication, he said. The most effective opioid is morphine, but morphine is strictly controlled and countries in crisis fear abuse. Tramadol became the default precisely because it’s uncontrolled.

The WHO is analyzing whether any other drug could take its place but have so far found none. Meanwhile, Forte said, the agency is working with battered nations to ferret out counterfeits.

Legitimate tramadol remains a lucrative business: market research estimates the global market amounts to around $1.4 billion, according to Grunenthal. The medication long ago lost its patent protection. It is now manufactured by many companies and sold under some 500 brand names. Grunenthal markets it as Tramal as well as Zaldiar, tramadol combined with paracetamol. In 2018, those products brought in 174 million euros ($191 million), according to the company’s annual report.

“Our purpose at Grunenthal is to develop and deliver medicines and solutions which address the unmet needs of patients with the goal of improving their quality of life,” the company wrote in a statement that said it acknowledges opioids pose a risk of abuse and addiction. “”We do so with the highest ethical standards.”

Grunenthal also sells other opioids and is expanding around the world. The Associated Press this year revealed executives were swept up in an Italian corruption case alleging they illegally paid a doctor to promote the use of opioids.

The company has campaigned to keep tramadol unregulated. It funded surveys that found regulation would impede pain treatment and paid consultants to travel to the WHO to make their case that it’s safer that other opioids.

Spokesman Stepan Kracala said regulation would not necessarily curtail illicit trade and could backfire: Some desperate pain patients turn to the black market if no legal options exist. Egypt’s long struggle with tramadol abuse is an example, he said. The country enacted strict regulation in 2012 and a later survey found some suffering from cancer using counterfeit tramadol for relief.

Kracala also pointed to regulatory decisions as proof of tramadol’s comparable safety: The U.S. in 2014 added tramadol to its list of controlled substances but included it in a lesser category than opioids like oxycodone or morphine, signaling it is less risky.

There are growing calls to change that.

The Mayo Clinic hospital in Minnesota worked to reduce opioids prescribed post-surgery as the American epidemic escalated, said surgeon Cornelius Thiels. Doctors there started shifting patients to tramadol because it was billed as safer. But Thiels and his colleagues analyzed prescription data and were surprised to find patients prescribed tramadol were just as likely to move on to long-term use.

They published their findings this year to alert authorities, he said: “There is no safe opioid. Tramadol is not a safe alternative. It’s a mistake that we didn’t figure it out sooner. It’s unfortunate that it took us this long. There’s a lot more that we need to learn about it, but I think we know enough that we also can’t wait around to act on this.”

Indian regulators knew the massive quantities manufactured in the country were spilling over domestically and countless Indians were addicted. But S.K. Jha, responsible for the northern region of India’s Narcotics Control Bureau, said he was shocked to learn in 2018 that tramadol from India was ravaging African nations. They realized then they needed to act, he said.

India regulated tramadol in April 2018. Regulators say exports overseas and abuse at home came down. But they acknowledge that the vastness of the pharmaceutical industry and the ingenuity of traffickers makes curtailing abuse and illegal exports all but impossible. Tramadol is still easy to find.

Jyoti Rani stood on her front steps and pointed to house after house where she said tramadol is still sold in her neighborhood of narrow roads and open drains, where school-aged boys sit hunched over the street in the middle of a weekday.

Rani’s addiction began with heroin. When her 14-year-old son died, she fell into depression.

“I wanted to kill myself, but I ended up becoming an addict,” she cried. A doctor prescribed tramadol to help kick the habit — instead, she formed a new one. She locked herself in her room, not eating or taking care of her two children. Rani used tramadol until she ran out of money and entered treatment. Now her family tells her she’s her old self again.

The crackdown on tramadol coincided with the opening of dozens of addiction clinics that administer medicine and counseling to more than 30,000 each day.

“We are trying our level best,” Jha said, “but it’s a challenge for all of us.”

Countries’ efforts to control tramadol on their own often fail, particularly in places where addiction has taken hold, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

India has twice the global average of illicit opiate consumption. Researchers estimate 4 million Indians use heroin or other opioids, and a quarter of them live in the Punjab, India’s agricultural heartland bordering Pakistan, where some of the most vulnerable are driven to drugs out of desperation.

Amandeep Kaur was pregnant when her husband died of a heart attack. She turned to the sex trade to make ends meet. She wanted not to feel, and a fellow sex worker suggested tramadol. She had no idea she’d get addicted, but eventually needed three pills to get through the day.

“If I didn’t have it I felt lifeless, my body ached as if I was going to die,” she said, and joined the line stretching from the addiction clinic’s doors.

The Global Opioids project can be seen here. https://www.apnews.com/GlobalOpioids

Associated Press journalist Rishi Lekhi contributed to this report.

India Expels 86-Year-Old Spanish Nun Who Helped The Poor

Sister Enedina of the Daughters of Charity congregation walks with villagers after they gave her a send-off. The Spanish nun left India on Aug. 20 after the government refused to renew her visa. (Photo supplied)

BY UCA NEWS REPORTER

NEW DELHI (UCA NEWS) -- Govt gives no reason for rejecting the visa renewal of Sister Enedina, who dedicated her life to the poor for five decades

The Indian government has refused to renew the visa of an elderly Spanish nun who had worked for the country’s poor for five decades.

Sister Enedina, 86, from the Daughters of Charity congregation, had her visa renewal refused on Aug. 11 and was then told she had 10 days to leave the country.

The nun, who trained as a medical doctor, had helped poor people in the country’s east since the mid-1960s. She flew out from New Delhi on Aug. 20 on a flight to Spain.

Sister Martha Pradhan, head of her congregation’s North India Province, said Sister Enedina had been renewing her visa periodically ever since she came to Berhampur in 1965, but the government rejected it this time around.

“She applied online to renew her visa in the first week of August, paid the fees and completed all the formalities … we then received the notice that she had to leave the country within 10 days,” Sister Pradhan told ucanews.com. “We were not told why the visa was not renewed.”

The Federal Ministry of External Affairs deals with visa issues but maintains a policy that it denies visas without stating any reasons.

The development comes amid criticism that the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which came to power for a second time in May riding on a landslide for the pro-Hindu BJP party, has been supportive of hard-line Hindu groups pushing to make India a Hindu-only nation.

Hindu groups have been demanding the expulsion of all foreign missioners from India, accusing them of using social work as a façade for converting Dalit and tribal people to Christianity.

A ministry official told ucanews.com that it cannot speak about specific cases.

“A visa, as a rule, is often denied if it is incompatible with the purpose of the visit as mentioned in the visa application of the applicant,” the official said. “The government, like any other government, believes that the right to grant visas remains the sole prerogative of the host country concerned.”

Considered a mother

Sister Enedina earned bachelor's degrees in medicine and surgery from Madrid Capital Medical College in 1959.

After arriving in Berhampur several years later, she opened a dispensary to cater to the healthcare needs of local people — mostly tribal and socially poor Dalit people.

Five years later, she moved to Mohana village in nearby Gajapati district and began working for the education of Dalit and tribal people.

Sister Enedina’s 54-year missionary career as a doctor, nurse and teacher forced “many in the area to consider her their mother,” Sister Pradhan said.

The provincial nun said Sister Enedina will "live in one of our houses” in Spain.

Bishop Sarat Chandra Nayak of Berhampur said he was saddened by what has happened to Sister Enedina.

“It is unfortunate that such a qualified and trained nun had to leave the country,” Bishop Nayak told ucanews.com. “It indeed is a loss. We don’t have many sisters qualified as doctors who will work in remote areas among the tribals and Dalits.”

Father Madan Sual Singh, director of Jana Vikas (people’s development), a social service wing of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar Archdiocese, said he knew the nun when he was a schoolboy.

“Her hard work for and dedication to the poor were very moving,” Father Singh said. “She would not hesitate to drive and go to the even most remote villages, risking her life where the resources were limited. She learned the local language and people naturally developed a friendship with her.”

The Daughters of Charity was founded in France in 1633 and is based on the spirituality of St. Vincent De Paul. It serves through hospitals, orphanages, old age homes and educational institutions. They are also involved in the pastoral activities of the Church.

The congregation has 60 provinces around the world with 16,179 members working in 90 countries. They arrived in India in 1940. In 10 northern Indian states the congregation has 232 members living in 42 houses and working in 14 dioceses.

Key Events In Kashmir Since British Rule Ended In 1947

BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

In this Aug. 26, 1947, file photo, a cart loaded with children and household goods belonging to a Muslim family fleeing from Hindu India moves along a road near Lahore, India. In 1947 Britain left the Indian subcontinent divided as predominantly Hindu India and mainly Muslim Pakistan. Massive migrations of Hindus and Muslims to their country of choice trigged violence, leaving more than million people dead. (AP Photo/Max Desfor, File)

Some Key Events In Kashmir:

— August 1947: With the end of British colonial rule, the Indian subcontinent is divided into predominantly Hindu India and mainly Muslim Pakistan. A mass migration follows, with Hindus and Muslims moving to their country of choice, and more than a million people are killed in communal violence.

— October 1947: India and Pakistan fight their first war over control of Muslim-majority Kashmir, a kingdom ruled by Hindu Maharaja Hari Singh. The war ends in 1948 with a U.N.-brokered cease-fire, leaving Kashmir divided between the nations, with the promise of a U.N.-sponsored referendum.

— August 1965: A second war erupts over Kashmir, and India and Pakistan agree to a U.N.-mandated cease-fire in September.

— December 1971: The third war between India and Pakistan is fought in East Pakistan, ending with the creation of an independent country, Bangladesh.

— May 1974: India detonates a nuclear device in the first confirmed nuclear test by a non-permanent member of the U.N. Security Council.

— December 1988: India and Pakistan sign an agreement that neither will attack each other’s nuclear installations or facilities; it takes effect in 1991.

— 1989: Armed resistance to Indian rule in Kashmir begins. India says Pakistan supports local fighters with weapons and training, which Pakistan denies, saying it only gives local Kashmiris “moral and diplomatic” support.

— May 1998: India detonates five nuclear devices and Pakistan responds by detonating six of its own. International sanctions are imposed against both.

— December 2001: India masses troops along its western frontier with Pakistan and the Kashmir boundary after blaming Pakistani insurgents for a deadly attack at the Indian Parliament. The standoff ends in October 2002 after international mediation.

— November 2008: Gunmen mount an audacious attack in India’s financial capital of Mumbai, killing 166 people. India blames a Pakistan-based militant group.

— September 2016: Suspected rebels sneak into an army base in Indian-controlled Kashmir and kill at least 18 soldiers. Indian forces later attack militant bases in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir.

— Feb. 14, 2019: A car bombing of a paramilitary convoy in Indian-controlled Kashmir kills 40 Indian soldiers. Militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed, headquartered in Pakistan, claims responsibility. India blames Pakistan and promises a “crushing response.”

— Aug. 5, 2019: India’s central government changes part of the Indian Constitution and downgrades Jammu and Kashmir from one state to two territories. The changes eliminate Kashmir’s right to its own constitution, limit its decision-making power, and allow non-Kashmiri Indians to settle there.

Cyclone Fani Hits India's East Coast; 1.2 Million Evacuated

People run away from high tide at a beach in Puri district of eastern Odisha state, India, Thursday, May 2, 2019. Hundreds of thousands of people were evacuated along India's eastern coast on Thursday as authorities braced for a cyclone moving through the Bay of Bengal that was forecast to bring extremely severe wind and rain. (AP Photo)

BY EMILY SCHMALL

NEW DELHI (AP) — Cyclone Fani tore through India’s eastern coast on Friday as a grade 5 storm, lashing beaches with rain and wind gusting up to 205 kilometers (127 miles) per hour and affecting weather as far away as Mount Everest.

The India Meteorological Department said the “extremely severe” cyclone in the Bay of Bengal hit the coastal state of Odisha around 8 a.m., and was forecast to weaken to a “very severe” storm as it moved north-northeast toward the Indian state of West Bengal.

In Bhubaneswar, a city in Odisha famous for an 11th-century Hindu temple, palm trees whipped back and forth like mops against skies made opaque by gusts of rain.

The national highway to Puri, a popular tourist beach city with other significant Hindu antiquities, was littered with fallen trees and electricity poles, making it impassable. A special train ran Thursday to evacuate tourists from the city.

The airport in Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, closed from 3 p.m. Friday to Saturday morning. At least 200 trains were canceled across India.

The National Disaster Response Force dispatched 54 rescue and relief teams of doctors, engineers and deep-sea divers to flood-prone areas along the coast and as far afield as Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a group of islands that comprise a state located about 1,300 kilometers (840 miles) east of mainland India in the Bay of Bengal.

On Mount Everest, some mountaineers and Sherpa guides were descending to lower camps as weather worsened at higher elevations. The government issued a warning saying that heavy snowfall was expected in the higher mountain areas with rain and storms lower down the mountain, and asked trekking agencies to take tourists to safety.

Hundreds of climbers, their guides, cooks and porters huddled at the Everest base camp, according to Pemba Sherpa of the Xtreme Climbers Trek, who said weather and visibility was poor. May is the best month to climb the 8,850-foot (29,035-foot) Everest when Nepal experiences a few windows of good weather to scale the peak.

“It is still the beginning of the month, so there is no reason for climbers to worry” that weather from the cyclone will cost them their chance to reach the summit, Sherpa said.

On India’s cyclone scale, Fani is the second-most severe, equivalent to a Category 3 hurricane.

Its timing is unusual, according to data from the Meteorological Department. Most extremely severe cyclones hit India’s east coast in the post-monsoon season. Over roughly half a century, 23, or nearly 60% of the cyclones, to hit India were observed between October and December.

Because Fani spent 10 days gathering strength over the sea, it delivered a huge blow when it made landfall.

Some of the deadliest tropical cyclones on record have occurred in the Bay of Bengal. A 1999 “super” cyclone killed around 10,000 people and devastated large parts of Odisha. Due to improved forecasts and better coordinated disaster management, the death toll from Cyclone Phailin — an equally intense storm that hit in 2013 — were less than 50, according to the World Meteorological Organization.

The 1999 super cyclone reached wind speeds of 260-280 kph (161-173 mph)r, said India Meteorological Department scientist Dr. M. Mohapatra.

“This is not as bad,” he said.

Around 1.2 million people were evacuated from low-lying areas of Odisha and moved to nearly 4,000 shelters, according to India’s National Disaster Response Force. Indian officials put the navy, air force, army and coast guard on high alert.

Odisha Special Relief Commissioner Bishnupada Sethi, who said the evacuation effort was unprecedented in India, said communications were disrupted in some areas, but no deaths or injuries had been reported.

In the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh just south of Odisha, Fani topped electricity poles and uprooted others, leaving them in sharp angles. In the Srikakulam district, where around 20,000 people had been evacuated, thatched-roof houses collapsed and fishing boats left unmoored on beaches had been sliced into shards.

The district experienced wind speeds of 140 kph (87 mph) and received heavy rains but no loss of life or major damage was reported, district collector J. Niwas said.

The Bangladesh Meteorological Department said the storm would reach the southwestern part of Bangladesh by Friday.

Aid agencies warned that the more than 1 million Rohingya from Myanmar living at refugee camps near the coastal district of Cox’s Bazar were at threat. Hillol Sobhan, local communications director for the aid group Care, said it had emergency supplies for the refugees in Cox’s Bazar.

The Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority said it suspended operations of all vessels. Authorities also halted activities at Chittagong Seaport, which handles 80% of the country’s overseas trade.

___

Associated Press writers Omer Farooq in Hyderabad, India, Julhas Alam in Dhaka, Bangladesh, and Binaj Gurubacharya in Kathmandu, Nepal, contributed to this report.

Indian Bishop Charged With Repeatedly Raping Nun

In this Sept. 19, 2018 file photo, bishop of the Indian city of Jalandhar, Franco Mulakkal, center, leaves after being questioned by police in Kochi, India. Indian authorities charged the Roman Catholic bishop on Tuesday with repeatedly raping a nun in her rural convent, a case that helped make the sexual abuse of nuns a major issue in the church. (AP Photo/Prakash Elamakkara, File)

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW DELHI (AP) — Indian authorities charged a Roman Catholic bishop on Tuesday with repeatedly raping a nun in her rural convent, a case that helped make the sexual abuse of nuns a major issue in the church.

Bishop Franco Mulakkal was charged with rape, illegal confinement and intimidation, said Hari Sankar, a district police chief in the southern state of Kerala, India’s Catholic heartland.

The nun who made the accusations, who has not been publicly identified, said she went to police last year only after complaining repeatedly to church authorities. Eventually, a group of fellow nuns launched unprecedented public protests to demand Mulakkal’s arrest. He was arrested but released after a few weeks.

Mulakkal was the official patron of the nun’s community, the Missionaries of Jesus, and wielded immense influence over its budgets and job assignments. The nun said the rapes occurred between 2014 and 2016.

Mulakkal has denied the accusations, calling them “baseless and concocted” and saying the accusing nun was trying to pressure him to get a better job.

In February, Pope Francis for the first time publicly acknowledged the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and bishops.

Speaking to reporters aboard the papal plane, Francis vowed to confront the problem. “Should we do something more? Yes. Is there the will? Yes. But it’s a path that we have already begun,” he said.

The Mulakkal case has split India’s Catholic community, with many people defending the bishop.

In March, the founder of the Vatican’s women’s magazine, along with the magazine’s all-female editorial board, quit their positions, saying a Vatican campaign to discredit them had increased since they denounced the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and bishops.

In this Nov. 4, 2018, photo, Sister Josephine Villoonnickal, left, sister Alphy Pallasseril, center, and Sister Anupama Kelamangalathu, who have supported the accusation of rape against Bishop Franco Mulakkal talk at St. Francis Mission Home, in Kuravilangad in southern Indian state of Kerala. Indian authorities charged Franco Mulakkal, a Roman Catholic bishop on Tuesday with repeatedly raping a nun in her rural convent, a case that helped make the sexual abuse of nuns a major issue in the church.(AP Photo/Manish Swarup, File)

First Lull In Kashmir Since Latest India-Pakistan Escalation

In this handout photo released by the Indian Ministry of Defence, Indian Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, left, meets with Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman at a hospital in New Delhi, India, Saturday, March 2, 2019. The captured Indian pilot was handed over Friday in a "gesture of peace" promised by Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan amid a dramatic escalation with the country's archrival over the disputed region of Kashmir. (Indian Ministry of Defence Photo via AP)

BY ROSHAN MUGHAN

MUZAFFARABAD, PAKISTAN (AP) — Residents near the disputed boundary in divided Kashmir region said Sunday it was quiet overnight, their first lull since a dangerous escalation between Pakistan and India erupted last week bringing the two nuclear-armed rivals close to full-out war.

Many villagers used the calm in Pakistani-held Kashmir to leave their homes in Chakoti area along the so-called Line of Control, the demarcation line that divides the troubled Himalayan region on an Indian and a Pakistani sector, and move to safety.

Nazakat Hussain said his and many other families have no underground shelters or bunkers on their land to protect them and have no other option but to leave. The rough cold weather and snow, along with the cross-border shooting, prevented them from leaving earlier.

Pakistani government official Moazzam Zafar said some 200 families have already taken shelter in three large government buildings in the territory. Zafar said the authorities were providing warm clothing, bedding, food and medicines, and would establish more such camps.

At least eight civilians and two soldiers have been killed in Pakistani-controlled Kashmir since tensions soared following India’s airstrike last Tuesday inside Pakistan that New Delhi said targeted militants behind a Feb. 14 suicide bombing in Indian-controlled Kashmir that killed 40 Indian troops.

Pakistan retaliated, shooting down a fighter jet on Wednesday and detaining its pilot, who was returned to India on Friday. India, in turn, on Saturday handed over the body of a Pakistani civilian prisoner beaten to death by inmates in a jail in India last week. The man, Skahir Ullah, was buried later Sunday in his home village of Sialkot in Punjab province.

Kashmir has been divided between India and Pakistan practically since their independence from British rule in 1947. The two countries each claim Kashmir in its entirety and have fought two of the three wars between them over it.

The rivals struck a cease-fire deal in 2003 but regularly violate it and trade cross-border fire.

Associated Press writer Zarar Khan in Islamabad contributed to this report.

India-Africa Ties To Redefine International Order On Egalitarian Lines: Swaraj

File photo of Sushma Swaraj via Tribune India

GANDHINAGAR,  (THE TRIBUNE, INDIA)--Highlighting the Narendra Modi government’s focus on Africa as a top priority in its foreign and economic policy, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Saturday said that strong India-Africa relations would redefine the contours of the international order on more egalitarian lines.

Speaking at the inauguration of “Africa Day” during the Vibrant Gujarat Summit here, Sushma Swaraj said India’s long-standing ties with Africa had acquired vibrancy and dynamism during the last four years and the government had thus decided to open 18 new embassies and high commissions in the continent over the next few years, taking the total number to 47.

She said the first of these missions was already opened in Rwanda last year.

The Minister said that Africa had emerged as an important trade and investment partner for the country with India-Africa bilateral trade at $62.66 billion for 2017-18, an increase of nearly 22 per cent over the previous year.

“In recent years, there has been a surge in Indian investment in Africa. India is the fifth largest investor in Africa with cumulative investments of $54 billion,” she said.

“We view the recent signing of the African Continental Free Trade Area as yet another opportunity to boost trade and economic ties with Africa.

“Strong India-Africa relations will go a long way in redefining the contours of the international order on more egalitarian lines. We should not expect anything less from this shining example of South-South cooperation,” Sushma Swaraj added.

The Minister said India had always shared a special bond with the people of Africa and had supported their liberation from colonialism and from apartheid.

“We view our substantive engagement with the African countries through the prism of our own experience. When we became independent, we found that external assistance came with conditionality, both overt and covert, with prescriptions that would have constricted our sovereignty and independence,” she said.

“As Africa pursues Africa-owned and Africa-led development, we are determined to anchor our partnership on the principles of equality, mutual respect and mutual benefit.” Sushma Swaraj said that Prime Minister Modi had declared Africa as top priority in India’s foreign and economic policy, which would be guided by African priorities.

“It will be on terms that will liberate African potential and not constrain African future.” She said that in the last four years, India’s long-standing ties with Africa had acquired vibrancy and dynamism through an “unprecedented intensification of political engagement” with 29 visits to African countries at the level of President, Vice President and Prime Minister, apart from several other ministerial visits.

She said the visits had taken place from both sides.

“In addition to the visit of 41 Heads of State or Heads of Government who attended the third India-Africa Forum Summit, we have hosted over 35 leaders from Africa for various events in the last four years,” the Minister said.

Sushma Swaraj said a total of 189 projects in 42 African countries for nearly $11.4 billion were being implemented under Indian lines of credit which have had a positive impact in many African countries and were changing the lives of its people.

“In a new initiative, we have offered construction of Mahatma Gandhi Convention Centres in Africa as grant assistance, in the context of the 150thbirth anniversary of Gandhiji.” Emphasising that both India and Africa faced the serious of terrorism, the Minister said preserving peace and security, countering terrorism and extremism was an important element of India’s engagement with Africa.

“We are one of the largest contributors to UN Peace Keeping Missions and have participated in all the peacekeeping missions in Africa, playing an important role in the African continent.” — IANS