December 3, 2021 marks 50 years since the beginning of the 1971 War which ended in a decisive military victory for India and the liberation of Bangladesh. Most analysts of the 1971 War agree that the IV Corps dash across the mighty Meghna river led by the brilliant General Sagat Singh was the turning point in the war, recalls military historian Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Minimum temperatures have plummeted below the freezing point across the Kashmir Valley, but pilgrims from all over India can be seen taking a dip at Shadipora located at the confluence of the Jhelum river and Sindh stream in the Ganderbal district of central Kashmir these days.
'The government is plucking leaves and not destroying the plant.'
While there was unrest in the rest of the Kashmir valley, the Dal Lake was serene and peaceful.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Friday held Jharkhand and DVC responsible for the current "man made" flood in the southern part of the state and contended that it was caused due to the unplanned and enhanced discharge of water from dams and barrages in the neighbouring state without information.
To visit the village of Malana deep in the Himalayas, a COVID-19 vaccination team scrambled over a landslide that blocked the road the day before, scaled a retaining wall and then began a three-hour trek down and up a river valley.
'It is high time that we act instead of just talking about how and why the climate is changing.'
Pakistan has raised objections to the design of India's Kiru hydroelectric plant, a mega 624 MW project over the Chenab river in Jammu and Kashmir, but New Delhi asserts that the project is fully compliant with the Indus Water Treaty, according to officials.
The Indian Army has shown it can face down the PLA, but is too often held back by a political leadership that lacks boldness, asserts Ajai Shukla.
"I can tell you that I understand you, my family must have drank water from the river Jhelum. Kashmiriyat, the culture and thought process must be in me too. When I come here, I feel like I am coming home," he said, while referring to his family ties to Kashmir and added that he had come with a message of love and respect.
The Indian Army started bringing the T-90 Bhishma and T-72 Ajay tanks along with the BMP series Infantry Combat Vehicles from the deserts and plains in a big way to these high altitude locations from last year with the beginning of the Operation Snow Leopard to counter the Chinese aggression in eastern Ladakh last summer.
Faced with criticism that water released from its dams in an 'unprecedented' manner led to the flooding of West Bengal, the Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) on Wednesday said that it discharges water after taking consent of the state government and blaming it for the deluge is not justified.
The transformative improvement promised in Jammu-Kashmir remains largely a mirage, observes David Devadas on the second anniversary of the Constitutional changes in the former state.
New Delhi should resist any temptation to act as spoiler and instead should cooperate with its SCO partners in reaching a regional consensus behind the formation of an interim government in Kabul, argues Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'This is for the first time that a strong, solid evidence-based investigation has happened.' 'It can meet international standards and put the onus on the Pakistanis.'
China remains in firm control of an estimated 600-800 square kilometres of Indian territory.
The study suggests that climate change is contributing to such events happening more frequently, and highlights risks of increasing development projects in fragile environments.
A total of 430 BRO workers were at the road-construction site when the avalanche occurred on Friday, Uttarakhand Director General of Police Ashok Kumar said.
The 1.3-kilometre-long bridge aims to boost connectivity to the Kashmir Valley and it is being constructed at a cost of Rs 1,486 crore as part of the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Railway Link project
India's water future remains very bleak. The monsoon season, which once extended to 4 months, is now down to less than 30 days of heavy rain.
Four Chinese soldiers were killed in the fierce clash with the Indian Army in the Galwan Valley in eastern Ladakh in June last year, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) acknowledged for the first time on Friday.
On the situation in the Kashmir Valley, the army officials highlighted Wednesday evening's incident when a son of a prominent eatery owner was shot and critically wounded by terrorists at his shop in a high-security area of the city.
'Above 2,000 metres the gradient of the Himalayas is very steep and if you build any infrastructure (roads, dams, hydro power projects) in these regions, it will not be able to sustain these events (the onslaught of debris that comes down with great speeds).'
'Geological processes occur at time scales that are beyond human imagination, but we need to understand these events.'
At the devastated Tapovan power project site rescuers worked nonstop even as the odds of finding the trapped workers alive seemed slim.
'Events like the one we saw on Sunday are complex geological processes which can be impacted by weather and climatic conditions.' 'It is difficult to attribute something like this to just one factor or to a particular time period, especially when we have still not understood the exact cause.'
While rescue efforts are on in full swing, the narrow tunnel and the massive slush that was brought down by the glacial flood are hampering rescue operations, confirm Swati Bhadauria, the district collector of Chamoli, and Yashwant Singh Chauhan, the superintendent of police.
The teams carried out a helicopter survey of the area on Tuesday to find clues as to what led to the massive flash floods that swept everything on the way.
'We need an early warning system in India.'
'The 100-metre stretch from the opening of this tunnel is completely flooded with debris; the oxygen supply (through the pipes) too had gotten over and the chances of any survivors inside this tunnel are very bleak. Nobody has been able to talk to the people trapped inside'
Tapovan Hydro-Electric Power Dam, also known as Rishi Ganga Project was completely washed off following a glacier burst in the Chamoli district, said the Indian Air Force's initial report as Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH) deployed at Joshimath has undertaken recce of affected areas.
A 13.2 MW small hydro project on the Rishiganga river was swept away in the glacier burst in Uttarakhand on Sunday, but there is no danger of floods in the downstream areas as the water level has been contained.
It has been 24 days since Victoria reported a locally acquired COVID-19 infection, while Australia as a whole posted a 13th straight day without a community case on Saturday.
Here's the full text of President Ram Nath Kovind's customary address to the joining sitting of Parliament on the first day of the budget session.
'China wants to change the status quo of India's Northern Border and proves that it can do whatever it wants in what it perceives as its own territory,' states Claude Arpi.
'There was a wrong policy of government during the Congress regime. They didn't construct roads up to the border which left a buffer zone of 3-4 km which China occupied. Construction of new villages isn't a new thing, it's all inherited from Congress'
Until last month more than two-thirds of the Indian Army was deployed against Pakistan. Of 14 army corps, just four-and-a-half faced China, while more than twice that number was ranged against Pakistan.
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