On June 22, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order suspending the entry of a number of non-immigrant work visa holders into the US till the end of the year. The visa categories affected include, most notably, H-1B, which has been used by more than a million Indian information technology professionals since the 1990s and L1 visa used by US companies to bring in workers from their Indian offices. During his campaign for President four years ago, candidate Trump … [Read more...]

  Since the brutal death of 46-year-old African American George Floyd at the hands of a white Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin on May 25, the United States has witnessed civil strife of the kind not seen in more than five decades. In a video that has been streamed around the world millions of times, Chauvin is shown kneeling on Floyd''s neck for nearly nine minutes, even as the black man is heard crying, "I can''t breathe." For several years running up to Floyd''s death, … [Read more...]

  Dealing with China in post-Covid times (Comment) There is no doubt that China is where the coronavirus originated. There should be doubt and concerns, however, about China''s actions at that time and since. Much can be learned by analyzing what China did at the onset of the virus; what it did as the coronavirus spread and became a pandemic; and how China has interacted with the US as this evolved. Finally, it is worth considering what this could mean for future relations between … [Read more...]

  The US presidential elections and future of India-US relations (Comment) As the coronavirus pandemic dominates global news in the United States, progress toward the next presidential election scheduled to be held on November 3 moves slowly forward. President Donald Trump had no real opposition in the Republican party and is running for re-election. And it has now become apparent that former Vice President Joe Biden will be his opponent as the Democratic candidate for … [Read more...]

  In her marathon 2 hours and 46 minutes speech introducing India''s 2020 budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman painted an optimistic picture of the Indian economy. She stated at the outset that her budget''s goal is to boost "incomes and enhanceÂ… purchasing power" of the people of India. "Only through higher growth can we achieve that and have our youth gainfully and meaningfully employed," Sitharaman added. The Finance Minister''s assessment that higher growth and employment … [Read more...]

  There has been much written and an outpouring of protests throughout 2019 against the Chinese internment of more than one million Uighur Muslims in the western Xinjiang region of China. In response, China has continuously rationalized its horrific treatment of the Uighur Muslims as an effort to contain and stop Islamic terrorism. It has also claimed that the internment camps are vocational skill retraining centres. The evidence clearly shows these are falsehoods. In a stunning November … [Read more...]

  Before returning to New Delhi recently after attending the annual IMF-World fall meeting, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman provided an upbeat perspective on the Indian economy. She asserted that its fundamentals are strong and attributed the majority of the problems ailing the Indian economy to a global slowdown. In the same time period, the World Bank announced that India had jumped 14 spots from 77th to 63rd on its Ease of Doing Business ranking. Together, these indicators might … [Read more...]

  Modi''s US visit: But is it Mission Accomplished? Prime Minister Narendra Modi has returned home to India from his six-day visit to the US to reach out to the Indian American community, buttress US-India trade relations, speak in a number of forums, hold meetings with country and business leaders to reassure to encourage and promote investment in India. And do all of this while avoiding or minimizing speaking about Kashmir. Based upon the results, it must be concluded that the … [Read more...]

Washington, Sep 12 Free press has been a cornerstone of American democracy and also an essential contributor to the US belief in government confined by a system of checks and balances, an eminent Indian-American philanthropist has said. "The overriding responsibility of the media is to separate facts from fiction and is to hold governments and leaders, including the President, to the same standards," Frank Islam told a Washington audience this past week during the Alfred Friendly Press … [Read more...]