Indholdsfortegnelse for July 16, 2018 i India Today

Chinese and Pakistani officials often like to boast that their relations are “higher than the Himalayas, deeper than the oceans and sweeter than honey”. Deeper than the oceans could soon capture the extent of Pakistan’s growing financial debt to its ‘all-weather’ ally. In June, China lent Pakistan $1 billion to arrest its plunging foreign exchange reserves, which have fallen under $10 billion, down from $16.4 billion a year ago. Pakistan had earlier borrowed $6 billion from China, under the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a key part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The $6 billion under CPEC has been lent at 2 per cent interest and Pakistan “will end up returning $7.4 billion over 20 years”, China’s deputy chief of mission in Islamabad, Zhao Lijian, said on June…

Ending the yearlong freeze in defence exchanges after Doklam, Xi Jinping sent a fast-rising PLA general, Lt Gen. Liu Xiaowu, as head of a 10-member delegation to New Delhi last week. Liu is among the top-ranked ‘gen next’ PLA generals (born in the 1960s) and is currently the deputy commander of the Western Theatre Command that borders India. Earlier, he led the ground forces of the southern command bordering Myanmar and Vietnam. He is also to visit Pakistan, keeping in mind the sensitivities of its ‘all-weather’ ally.…

Some future Shakespeare may well be tempted to refer to the ‘Ides of June’ while reflecting on the dramatic events last month. Soon after the US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, we had two deeply contrasting images on our television screens. One was the deliberate US disruption of the G-7 summit in Toronto (June 7-9, 2018), with Donald Trump insulting his Canadian hosts, repeating his dire threats of penal tariffs against his western allies and, even more provocatively, recommending that Russia, drummed out in 2014 after its occupation of Crimea, be invited back to the grouping. Having left the western alliance in tatters, Trump then proceeded to a Made-for-TV summit with North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, in Singapore on June 12, displaying warmth and friendly feeling in sharp contrast…

Q. You’ve faced many challenges in your life, whether in your early childhood, or later in politics. What has been the biggest struggle of your life so far? A. Struggle has been a part and parcel of my life. After my father died, we faced hardship but never asked anybody for help. We were self-sufficient. Student life taught me a lesson—never bow down your head, be straightforward and bold in whatever you do. Then I faced 34 years of Left misrule, their torture. If you see my health reports, I’ve been operated on five to six times, from my brain to my belly to my hands to my eyes. I was about to die so many times. It was only my spirit [that kept me alive]. I was never scared,…

OVERALL Best Performing KORBA Most Improved RAJNANDGAON INFRASTRUCTURE Best Performing DURG Most Improved KABIRDHAM AGRICULTURE Best Performing RAJNANDGAON Most Improved KANKER SERVICES Best Performing BIJAPUR Most Improved BIJAPUR SAFETY Best Performing DANTEWADA Most Improved DANTEWADA HEALTH Best Performing DHAMTARI Most Improved BILASPUR WATER AND SANITATION Best Performing DURG Most Improved KANKER INDUSTRY Best Performing KORBA Most Improved BIJAPUR PROSPERITY Best Performing KORBA Most Improved JANJGIR-CHAMPA EDUCATION Best Performing KANKER Most Improved BASTAR…

Madboy/Mink—with a new album slated for release next month—is Saba Azad and Imaad Shah: lovers, musicians, urban bards. In five years, they have established themselves as a force to reckon with on the indie scene. Not just that, Madboy/ Mink has defined cool for, and become the voice of, a generation under 30. Imaad starred in the cult college film Dil Dosti Etc, Saba in the YRF web series Ladies Room that blew the lid off Indian conservatism. Last year, Imaad directed and Saba acted in the musical Threepenny Opera, which opened to rave reviews. Right from the beginning, M/M chose to work with a pop aesthetic that combines swing, disco, soul and funk, with the occasional pounding cobra-head guitar riff. Each sensuous song is carefully constructed, danceable yet concealing…

The new S.H. Raza retrospective at Mumbai’s Piramal Museum of Art goes further than most exhibitions to contextualise the painter’s work with archival material relating to his life in India and France and his dialogues with other artists. As a result, says exhibition curator and museum director Ashvin Rajagopalan, the show captures Raza’s evolution as an artist, and helps viewers connect the stylistic shifts seen in his paintings. Born in 1922, Raza was a contemporary of M.F. Husain and F.N. Souza, among other notable artists. Together, they founded the ‘Progressive Artists’ Group’ (PAG) in 1947, a short-lived association of artists now acknowledged for their path-breaking work. Their aim was to understand art from an independent perspective. When Raza moved to Paris for a scholarship with the Ecole des Beaux Arts,…

HALF THE NIGHT IS GONE Acclaimed novelist Amitabha Bagchi’s latest tells the story of a vernacular author and the book he’s writing about a wealthy merchant—a double effort at translating (as it were) the Hindi literary world into English. KITTY’S WAR Brits “doing” Indians, especially period Indians, is old hat. But in this one Daman Singh (Manmohan Singh’s daughter) tries her hand at portraying the inner lives of India’s colonisers in the last days of the Raj. POLITE SOCIETY Mahesh Rao’s latest—the story of a matchmaker by the name of Ania Khurana—is billed as Jane Austen’s Emma set in the world of Delhi’s super rich. But the similarities go beyond marketing, giving it the whiff of pastiche.…

EVERY YEAR WHEN IT’S TIME TO ROLL OUT the watch special one can’t help but hark back to a time when watches were just that—watches. Keeping time and keeping it well is an art and the watch making industry, which has undergone a great deal of churn over the last few years has recognised the wisdom in becoming more nuanced, giving watch lovers and collectors room to be surprised by their innovations. While there is a sense that smart watches have dented the business, the mechanical watch still remains a coveted acquisition. This year, the two key watch fairs, Baselworld and Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie SIHH, Geneva, shone the light on key trends. As the millennial spender took centrestage, the challenge was to create smart, savvy, complicated watches…

MARINE 5517 BREGUET Breguet gave a new face to its Marine line through a revamped aesthetic style, combining a sense of modernity. The titanium case was chosen for its remarkable properties as well as its resistance to both salty air and corrosion. It is also a light and particularly robust material. The titanium version features a sunburst slate grey dial. The movement, visible through the sapphire crystal case-back, is engine-turned and reminiscent of boat decks. The 40mm case is water-resistant to 10 bar (100m). Even though this remains one of the base models of the Marine collection, the sunburst slate grey dial in gold is individually numbered and signed Breguet. Hours chapter with Roman numerals and luminescent dots give it a retro-sport look. Facetted Breguet hands in gold with luminescent…

Describe Longines in three words Consistency, continuation and success. I usually say consistency, continuation, focus and stay in your league and when I say stay in your league I mean don’t play with the price segment. When I say focus, the idea is to ensure you don’t do anything and everything, and to ensure continuation and consistency, don’t change your mind every day. You said continuation and that reminded me that none of your brand ambassadors have changed in a long time. It’s a good example of loyalty. We had a shop opening in Sydney, and Aish (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan) came for it. Everyone there was very excited to see her so we are very happy with her. She brings people to the brand and is doing a fantastic job…

Apart from traditional, hand-finished decoration, what makes Greubel Forsey special? As a brand, we are focussing more on tradition, culture, and other aspects that define who we are, which is rare, special and exclusive. Customers are looking for credibility, legitimacy and for things that are special. When you have a certain budget available to invest, you want the experience to be more authentic. With improved knowledge, you want to be able to feel that you are participating in an adventure. Greubel Forsey responds well to that. But what’s interesting is that from the day we started almost 20 years ago, our philosophy has been the same from the beginning. We do not have an objective to be very well known worldwide, but to remain focussed on what we do best.…

Money affects the ability of political actors to act independently, as it chains them to a system of obligations without oversight The role of money in politics is an issue everyone has an opinion about despite having none of the facts. The reason quite simply is that political funding in India is opaque and thus unobservable, despite the enhanced scrutiny of candidates’ expenditures exerted by the Election Commission. Political funding in India does not lack transparency. It has none. Costs of Democracy, edited by political scientists Devesh Kapur and Milan Vaishnav, makes a refreshing start towards addressing the opaqueness of political funding in India. The editors put together a collection of seven papers, which combine novel data with methodological rigour (both quantitative and qualitative) to seek answers to some fundamental…

PM Rallies the Troops? Of course, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj can look after herself in a Twitter scrap. Her BJP colleagues certainly think so as they left her to face incessant abuse because her ministry had the temerity to grant an ‘inter-faith’ couple passports after they complained of an unusually intense, possibly bigoted interrogation by an official at the Lucknow passport office. Swaraj learned, in a snap poll on her own account, that as many as 43 per cent of respondents approved of tweets describing Swaraj as having an “Islamic kidney” or asking her husband to give her a beating. Belatedly, home minister Rajnath Singh joined the likes of Mamata Banerjee and various opposition leaders in condemning the vitriol. As for the prime minister, he took time out on…

On June 28, at a function to mark the 10th death anniversary of Prem Bhai, a revered local Christian missionary, Pema Khandu announced that his government would repeal the Arunachal Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act, passed in 1978 to check proselytisation. The chief minister said that the law restrains freedom of religion and has no place in a secular India. “In today’s context, this act doesn’t have any meaning for Christians, indigenous faiths or any other religion. The act is neither harmful nor helpful to any religious group,” the chief minister told INDIA TODAY. The announcement evoked strong reactions across the state. The BJP’s ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, has asked the chief minister not to act on his announcement. “Khandu may be hoping to win Christian votes in…

50 LAKH HECTARES Area under sugarcane cultivation in India 9 PER CENT Increase in sugarcane cultivation in India in 2017 compared to 2016 530 NUMBER OF sugar mills in India But this sugar season (starting Oct. 2017 to Sept. 2018) saw excess production... 48 PER CENT Increase in sugar production this season from the previous season 32 MILLION TONNES production in India this season 25 MILLION TONNES Total demand for sugar in India this season 7 MILLION TONNES Surplus sugar produced in India this season ...leading to sugar prices crashing 37 AVERAGE price of sugar in 2017 26 AVERAGE price of sugar in 2018 ...which led to sugar mills defaulting on farmer payments 22,000 CR ARREARS SUGAR MILLS have to pay sugarcane farmers, as on May 2018…

The State of the State study of Chhattisgarh has two segments: best performing district at a particular time and the most improved district over the past decade. The data was collected by the Institute for Human Development from sources such as the Census, National Sample Survey, Central Statistics Office, National Family Health Survey (NFHS), District Information System for Education (DISE), National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Land Use Statistics Information System for Ministry of Agriculture and Directorate of Economics and Statistics of the Chhattisgarh government and standardised for the sake of comparability. Ten parameters were selected, each a composite index of variables for which uniform, continuous data was available. All the constituent indicators were arranged unidirectionally, i.e. either all indicators were positive or all were negative. The parameters are: education, health,…

Its 19th century Victorian Gothic architecture and 20th century Art Deco were inscribed as World Heritage Site last week—a landmark for architectural conservation in the city. Teejokaya Park at Matunga (above) has a clock tower at the entrance of the housing complex. And Seksaria Building at Marine Drive has exquisite plasterwork on the ceiling of the lobby. These buildings are part of an ensemble of more than 90 such structures across the city.…

Exploring the evolution of Rajasthan’s royal culture, this handsome coffee-table book features works collected over four centuries from Marwar—now part of an exhibition currently at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. With writings from an international team of contributors, it sheds new light on the role of women in the royal court and other marginalised perspectives.…

C.B. STRIKE The “other novels” of J.K. Rowling come to the screen in this limited series, starring Tom Burke as detective Cormoran Strike. Like the Harry Potter franchise, it’s derivative stuff, but likable pap all the same. Hotstar UNSOLVED Joining the thicket of true crime dramatisations streaming to your box is the (hopelessly) complicated tale of the murders of Tupac and the Notorious B.I.G. Sadly, spirited performances can’t save it from three separate and simultaneous timelines. Netflix BABYLON BERLIN A little gem of a period drama set in the between-the-wars Berlin of Christopher Isherwood. With a noir vibe and nods to Cabaret and (anachronistically) David Bowie, it hits all the right notes. Tata Sky World Screen…

SHOES Green with Envy Play with colour with these Louis Leeman Green calf leather and suede studded slippers that are both comfortable and fierce. The soft suede cushion your feet while the studs up your fashion quotient. Price $1,335 Availability www.louisleeman.com Fresh Feet A boat shoe in a bright hue will solve all your footwear needs on that weekend by the lake. These CERRUTI 1881 ridged soled shoes are pefect to wear on a boat, yatch or simply to lounge around the lakeside in. Price $921 Availability www.cerruti.com Its Shoe Time Sneakers are still ruling the runway. Let these multi-hued Balenciaga trainers take over your wardrobe, with their high tops, thick soles and splashes of bright teal and yellow. Price On request Availability www.farfetch.com…

What do you think about the value proposition factors that have been factored in the luxury brand business, making price points more accessible, over the last two years? It is necessary for the prices to go up but this is not because the brand wants to make more money. In fact, companies work hard to save costs and money in order to match the selling price. We have placed our watches at around 6000 euros which is a pretty good price. But the challenge is when people wish to reduce the cost but maintain the same quality. The other side to this is the need to innovate and think creatively when faced with a crisis. The Due collection is very accessible apart from the Base and Marina editions. Was this…

Irony Skin SWATCH The first metallic version of its slimmest watch line, the Swatch Skin Irony collection sits pretty at just 5.8 mm high. The Skin Irony features meticulously brushed and polished stainless steel wrapped in vintage-feeling metals, rough and classic leather as well as soft silicone. Signature classic lines sway graceful contemporary contrasts; everlasting materials merge with elegant profiles and lustrous reflections. Eternal SWAROVSKI Modern, feminine, and versatile, Eternal is a timepiece that will brighten every day, outfit, and occasion. It features two pavé lines on the bezel and asymmetric cutouts, while the lugs extend into a chic, contemporary bangle and elevate this watch to a different level. It offers a fresh take on the classic sparkle available in silver, rose gold, champagne gold and gun metal tone coating…

NEW EATRIES Ethnic On Your Platter ANGEETHI BY DROPOUTS Angeethi by Dropouts is a the dream venture of entrepreneurs and partners, Prachi Singh and Deepansh Malik. While Singh left a lucrative job as an HR manager to put her passion for cooking to good use, her business partner Deepansh, an engineer by profession, quit his job to do something of his own. And so they got together to launch their restaurant, Angeethi by Dropouts at Zirakpur. Talking about the restaurant, Singh says, “Our specialty includes traditional dishes such as litti chokha and vegetarian dum biryani. I personally prepare both these dishes. On the menu you can also find vegetarian kebab lakhnavi parantha, a Lucknow dish prepared by our chefs. " The restaurant offers both indoor and outdoor seating with comfortable…

“Bullet trains will cater only to the elite community. It is highly expensive and beyond the reach of ordinary people. What India needs is a modern, clean, safe and fast rail system” E. SREEDHARAN, practically a national icon because of his successful leadership of such projects as the Delhi Metro, poured scorn in a newspaper interview on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet bullet train project. Modi’s political opponents have mocked the project as vainglorious and the cost as prohibitive, but Sreedharan’s status and neutrality mean his criticisms will carry more sting. He also dismissed claims that Indian Railways had improved and said it was “20 years behind” the services provided in developed countries.…

National Security Advisor Ajit Doval’s vice-like grip on the three central intelligence agencies is widely acknowledged. What is less well known is the influence the former Intelligence Bureau chief seems to wield in the choice of the Mumbai police commissioner. On June 30, Subodh Jaiswal became the third consecutive police commissioner, after Ahmed Javed and Dattatray Padsalgikar, to have a Doval endorsement. The common thread, of course, is the intelligence services. Both Padsalgikar and Jaiswal have had long stints in the IB and R&AW and, in fact, opted out of the race to head these spy agencies.…

Will former chief minister Ajit Jogi’s Janta Congress Chhattisgarh (JCC) lend the Raman Singh-led BJP the edge it needs to win a fourth successive term in office in Chhattisgarh? There is already widespread speculation that Jogi and his party could dampen the Congress’s prospects in the assembly polls scheduled later this year. Since 2003, every assembly election in Chhattisgarh has seen a close finish, with the gap between the BJP and Congress vote share steadily reducing. It came down from 2.5 per cent in 2003 to 1.7 per cent in 2008. In the last assembly elections (2013), the difference narrowed further to 0.75 per cent. Analysts say that being a former Congress politician, Jogi would cause attrition in the Congress’s support base, benefit-ting the BJP. At the INDIA TODAY State…

Shortly after Hardik Patel addressed a ‘Patel Awareness Conference’ in Patna on June 29, appealing for the unity of the Extremely Backward Castes (EBC)—Kurmi, Dhanuk and Kushwaha—the Patidar leader from Gujarat drove straight to the residence of Tejashwi Yadav, the Rashtriya Janata Dal leader who has been trying hard for a foothold among the ati-pichada voters. The EBC, comprising over one hundred castes, make up nearly 33 per cent of Bihar’s voters and, among them, the Kushwahas, the second largest caste block after the Yadavs and a focal point of Tejashwi’s game plan for the Lok Sabha polls next year, constitute five per cent of Bihar’s population. Played up as the coming together of two youth leaders, Tejashwi’s meeting with Hardik is a clear signal that the RJD is looking…

CONGRESS 48 National vote share 19.52% Areas of influence Pan-India Predictability quotient To keep BJP out of power, Rahul Gandhi may agree to play second fiddle to Mamata TRS 11 Vote share 14.03%* Areas of influence Telangana (17) Predictability quotient Telangana CM KCR has expressed his support in public, but may switch sides depending on poll results SHIV SENA 18 Vote share 20.82% Areas of influence Maharashtra (48) Predictability quotient Sena chief Uddhav Thackaray is in talks with Mamata SP 7 Vote share 22.35% Areas of influence Uttar Pradesh (80) Predictability quotient Akhilesh Yadav has a good equation with Mamata but father Mulayam has earlier ditched her twice TDP 16 Vote share 29.36%* Areas of influence Andhra Pradesh (25) and Telangana (17) Predictability quotient Andhra CM Chandrababu Naidu is a…

Aim To accelerate the start-up movement and give a push to entrepreneurship in India Big Draws Start-ups can self-certify compliance under labour laws Benefits such as getting intellectual property rights faster and three-year exemptions from income tax/ labour audits and from angel tax Status Of the 6,096 companies recognised as start-ups by DIPP, only 74 have got approval to avail of tax benefits About 75 per cent of funded technology start-ups are redomiciling outside the country citing regulatory hindrances…

Janta Congress Chhattisgarh leader Amit Jogi had the house in splits when he said Raman Singh has three avatars—Bhraman Singh, Daman Singh and Rakam Singh. In the first avatar, the CM travelled around the world. “But nobody knows if he went around seeking investment or investing his own black money,” Jogi said. In the second avatar, Jogi said, Singh sat over the largest number of killings in Maoist violence and farmers’ suicides in the state. In the third avatar, he took commission for every project sanctioned in the state, claimed Jogi.…

Counterfeit Kunkoo (Marathi/ Hindi) A short film about the struggle of a woman escaping an abusive marriage to find a home in Mumbai. Ee. Ma. Yau. (Malayalam) A funeral becomes a microcosm for everything that ails a community. Scattered (Kashmiri) It navigates the complicated emotional territory of a Kashmiri Pandit who seeks to return to his roots. Sxxx Durga (Malayalam) A winner at Rotterdam, Sanal Kumar Sasidharan’s controversial film offers a grim look at the violence against women. Paddayi (Tulu) A modern Macbeth, set in a South Indian fishing village.…

If there’s one category where Amazon Prime Video has upstaged Netflix in India it is with its volume of homegrown stand-up comedy. This year, Prime will air 20 stand-up specials, including a few by women comics. And it’s still looking for more funny people. So emerges Comicstaan, a talent hunt for stand-up comics hosted by comedians Sumukhi Suresh and Abish Mathew and judged by seven of India’s funniest performers—Tanmay Bhat, Biswa Kalyan Rath, Kanan Gill, Kaneez Surka, Kenny Sebastian, Naveen Richard and Sapan Verma. The first four episodes will be available from July 13. Comedy is serious business on the show. The judges also serve as mentors to the contestants—seven men and three women who were shortlisted from up-and-comers participating in open mic nights around the country from the variety…

Q. You offered the help of your legal team to South African athlete Caster Semenya. I had met her at 2016 Rio Olympics. I sent her an e-mail offering the aid of my legal team to help her challenge the International Association of Athletics Federations’s new regulations. I do not understand English too well, but I know she was touched by the gesture. Q. The Olympic channel’s Foul Play series implicitly compares you with Jewish high jumper Margaret Lambert who was barred from competing at the 1936 Olympics…. I feel honoured and humbled. I am also compared to P.T. Usha and that is a big motivation. Q. What kept you going during your hyperandrogenism case against IAAF in 2014? Winning medals for India. That has always been my biggest dream,…

What are the three words that best describe Breguet? Technology, history and design, but history and design are linked closely so they may occupy the same space. Innovation on the other hand, has had a strong position in the brand since the beginning. The Marine focus is very strong this time around. What inspired it? This is the third edition of the Marine collection and the first timepiece of this new generation is the Marine Équation Marchante we launched in 2017. This year, we added three new references, the Marine 5517, the Marine Chronographe 5527 and the Marine Alarme Musicale 5547. We could have waited for three to four years before introducing those novelties but it made no sense; the time was just right to introduce it to the consumer.…

How would you describe your transition from economics to telecommunications to watches? I came from the telecommunication business before they had started getting into watches, and Swatch had already started on a project to add messages and other such features in their watches. But, at that time, the consumer electronic industry had nothing to do with the watch industry. And this was the case for the software industry too, which was a danger to the watch brands. Motorola, Nokia and Apple have all had a similar trajectory but Apple has done something valuable for the industry, where people are now willing to pay for the hardware. But there is a problem with this as products become obsolete after a few years, you either need to upgrade or change. But this…

Harry Winston Emerald HARRY WINSTON The Art Deco lines of the delicate 18-carat white gold case echoes the silhouette of Harry Winston’s preferred emerald-cut. The graceful eight-sided silhouette of the case and lugs are enhanced by 53 brilliant-cut diamonds. The emerald-cut motif is celebrated once again on the dial with 44 brilliant-cut diamonds accented by three pink sapphires at 3, 6 and 9 o’clock. Crowning the feminine dial is an exceptional emerald-cut pink sapphire at 12 o’clock, a first for Harry Winston. Sophisticated and stylish, the pink satin strap wraps twice around the wrist while the ardillon buckle sparkles with a setting of 11 brilliant-cut diamonds. Cape Da Vinci Automatic Moon Phase 36 Edition “150 Years” IWC A bold move by IWC, predominantly known for its oversized Pilot and men’s…