NEWS BRIEFINGS: LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN INDIA

A bill tabled earlier this year in Nepal’s National Assembly to regulate social media platforms remains pending—thankfully so, as it follows a growing trend across South Asia where governments use legislation to enable surveillance, criminalise criticism and consolidate power. What’s needed is for Nepal’s lawmakers to either annul the bill or amend it substantially. In its current form, its vague language and punitive clauses pose a direct threat to democratic freedoms.

Israel and Iran are engaged in direct military confrontation, following an Israeli air and drone assault on June 13 targeting critical nuclear and military installations deep inside Iran. Let’s look at the roots of this confrontation and examine why public opinion on this conflict around the world, including in India, remains deeply divided.

The official inflation rate is released every month and is used by policymakers and the media as an indicator of whether life is becoming more expensive for citizens. But a paper by the World Inequality Lab shows that this average number hides big gaps in how rising prices affect people at different income levels, especially the poor.

India–Pakistan tensions remain in the news more than a month after a ceasefire or agreement was reached. Despite the end of direct hostilities, Operation Sindoor continues, and the ruling party has sent a delegation abroad to lobby foreign governments to pressure Pakistan. Interestingly, this delegation includes members of the opposition. It might seem intuitive that the government deserves full support from all sides in matters of national security—but political science suggests otherwise.

A recent independent study reveals a disconnect between official poverty estimates and the everyday reality of food access for much of the population. The researchers used government data and constructed what they call a “Thali Index,” which suggests that more than half of India’s population cannot afford to eat even one vegetarian and one non-vegetarian meal a day.

The discovery of a new mass grave in Sri Lanka has once again exposed a truth many have long chosen to ignore—when a government uses violence in the name of peace, it does not stop with those initially targeted. It normalises a dangerous value. That value shapes the system, and in time, becomes the state’s default method of control. Eventually, it turns against everyone.

In Bhutan’s high Himalayan pastures, villagers say the alpine plants they’ve used for incense, medicine and fuel for generations are disappearing. But new ecological research shows that many of these plants are still growing, and some are now found in greater numbers. The study raises questions relevant not only in Bhutan but also in the mountains of India, Nepal and Tibet, where people depend on nature’s cycles, as well as across South Asia, where similar shifts are already underway.

Seven Maoist leaders were killed over three consecutive days in armed encounters in Chhattisgarh’s Bijapur district, according to police. Civil rights organisations have alleged that at least some of them were picked up from a village, held in custody, tortured and then executed.

The central government has launched the Bharatiya Bhasha Anubhag (Indian Languages Section) to free the administration from the influence of foreign languages and promote decision-making in Indian mother tongues. At first glance, it may look like a step toward inclusivity. But it raises several fundamental concerns—both practical and political—that cannot be brushed aside under the guise of cultural revival.

At a public function on 5 June, Madhya Pradesh Cabinet Minister Kailash Vijayvargiya said he disapproves of the trend of women wearing “skimpy clothes,” calling it a foreign concept of beauty that clashes with Indian tradition. The remark reflects a flawed notion, as it targets women’s clothing instead of confronting the real issue in India, which is that many men have not been taught to look at or behave around women with respect, regardless of what women choose to wear.

India’s unicorns are celebrated, and its startup scene is often seen as the future. But behind the fast-paced success stories, there’s a worrying pattern that can’t be overlooked. A private investigation shows that much of this shiny success has been built on unstable ground.

Flooding in northeast India has long been treated as an unavoidable natural disaster – a view convenient for those in power, as it conceals the fact that the annual devastation is not inevitable. On June 3, the death toll from rain-related disasters across the eight northeastern States rose to 47 – a loss that could have been prevented.

Why don’t we often feel moved, angry or responsible when we read about tragedies in the news? The recent death of a 10-year-old Dalit girl from Bihar, raped and left in critical condition in an ambulance, may have saddened us for a moment, but not enough to make us act—not even to express outrage online. But this wasn’t the case after the 2012 Nirbhaya Delhi gang rape. Let’s turn to psychology to understand what makes us pick and choose whose suffering we mourn.

The Indian public, and even members of Parliament, first learned about the Indian Air Force’s losses during the early phase of Operation Sindoor through foreign media reports quoting Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan on May 31. This confirms that the information about the initial setbacks is not classified on grounds of national security. Why, then, has the central government not provided a clear explanation of what transpired during those four days of armed conflict?

A 22-year-old law student in Pune has been charged with allegedly offending religious sentiments after making derogatory remarks about Islam and the Prophet Muhammad. Whatever the merits of the case, the incident raises an important question: should the right to free speech include the right to criticise religion—one’s own or someone else’s?

The Assam government’s decision to issue arms licences to “indigenous” residents in remote areas, under the pretext of protection from “illegal immigrants,” marks a retreat from the state’s core responsibility to ensure public security. It also legitimises exclusion and replaces public trust and institutional justice with a politics rooted in fear.

China is operating a vast network of “colonial” boarding schools across Tibet that forcibly removes children—including those as young as four—from their families, a new report released Wednesday claims. The report, published by the U.S.-based Tibet Action Institute, says the system is designed not for education access but for political assimilation, cutting children off from their language, culture and religion.

Ten legislators from the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) have reportedly demanded the restoration of a “popular government” in Manipur, citing the support of 44 MLAs and calling for an end to President’s Rule. Their demand comes even as the ground realities in the state—gripped by prolonged ethnic violence since May 3, 2023—remain unchanged. The central constitutional question is whether an elected government can be restored when one section of legislators remains physically and functionally excluded from the legislative process.

The central government now requires NGOs that receive foreign funding and engage in any form of publication to declare that they do not circulate “news content” — and to obtain a certificate from the Registrar of Newspapers for India (RNI) confirming this. This could amount to the use of financial regulation to curb the speech and advocacy roles of civil society groups.

A court in Delhi has cleared Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, former president of India’s wrestling federation, in a case filed under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. The case was lodged by a minor female wrestler in 2023. The development comes at a time when the conviction rate under the child protection law stands at just 3%, according to official data.

A global study has tried to answer this question by looking closely at how people across four countries—India, France, the U.K. and the U.S.—react to news, especially in the age of social media, looking at people’s emotional reactions, thinking patterns and how their background affects the way they process information. What the study found about India is worrying—but it’s reassuring that it also points to clear solutions.

A new COVID-19 variant, JN.1, has been detected in several parts of India and abroad, with rising cases and at least one death reported in Maharashtra. Here's what is known so far about the strain, its symptoms and how to stay protected.

As citizens debate freedom of speech—amid serious charges over social media posts and alleged selective blocking of news websites—it’s worth examining censorship through the lens of political science rather than ideology, which often reduces complex issues to partisan battles and obscures deeper understanding.

Many people today feel pessimistic about life and the world around them, largely because the news tends to focus on conflict, crisis and division. But a new research suggests this gloomy outlook may be misleading. The world appears to be far kinder—and more interconnected—than we often assume. Generosity, empathy and trust are widespread across societies, including in India.

As security forces wage an all-out war against Maoist rebels in Chhattisgarh, citizens remain divided over how governments should handle insurgencies—whether to respond decisively with military force or first sit down for talks. The answer isn’t as straightforward as we’d like, because rebellions and insurgencies are almost always messy, complex affairs. But let’s unpack this clearly.

A new study has found that many personal care products used daily by women—like body lotions, shampoos, soaps and cosmetics—contain chemicals that release formaldehyde, a substance known to cause cancer. These chemicals are especially common in products used by African-American and Latina women in the United States, but some of these brands are sold widely, including in India.

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has reportedly issued a new directive to states and Union Territories, setting a 30-day deadline to verify the citizenship status of “suspected” undocumented immigrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar. This move is likely to create bureaucratic bottlenecks and trigger long-term humanitarian and geopolitical complications with no resolution mechanism in sight.

The arrest of Ashoka University professor Ali Khan Mahmudabad points to a troubling truth about how law enforcement operates in an increasingly polarised public sphere: in a politically charged atmosphere, the threshold for prosecuting an ordinary citizen—academic or not—can be alarmingly low. All it takes is one complaint, one misreading, or one wilful distortion of a public remark. The system, instead of examining the context or the merit of what is said, responds as if the outrage itself is evidence of wrongdoing.

The recent detention of Bahubali Shah, co-owner of Gujarat Samachar, by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has led to accusations of political vendetta. Opposition leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, have condemned the move as part of a pattern of intimidation against media critical of the government.

Two years after their homes were torched and their lives uprooted, residents of 45 Kuki-Zo villages from Manipur’s Chandel district are still waiting for government recognition, let alone compensation or relief. Not one official relief camp has been set up for them, no state support has reached them in their name, and the government continues to deny that their villages were even affected in the May 2023 violence.