The Indian budget every year has always been an eagerly awaited event. For many decades, the best minds in economics, finance, tax, business and industry throng the media house to analyze the provisions shared by the Financial Minister.
Sometimes major events completely disconnected may be data points for the plans of the different powers around the world. The challenge is to discern what purpose they serve? More critically, what are we moving towards?
When the US Ambassador threatened India's "Strategic Autonomy" policy over India's friendship with Russia - much more than meets the eye was at stake. Let us unpack how the Ukraine war has fundamentally changed the US and the world. And why are we here anyway?
How to prevent small boats from being hijacked and used like in the 26/11 terror attacks? How to deal with beaching or sinking of vessels off the Mumbai coast as has happened before. How to deal with pirates attacking ships registered in one country, loaded in a second, bound for a third, with its Master from a fourth and with a crew from several other countries? How to warn small boats of a cyclone or conduct rescue and relief operations? The Indian Navy has taken another major step in handling such incidents with the Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman inaugurating the Information Fusion Centre-Indian Ocean Region (IFC-IOR) in Gurugram in the presence of Navy Chief Admiral Sunil Lanba, the US and Australian envoys and diplomatic and defence attaches. This has been done at the Navy’s Information Management and Analysis Centre(IMAC), which is the single point centre linking all coastal radar chains to give a seamless, real-time picture of India’s 7,500 kilometre-long coastline.
The IOR sees 66 percent of the world’s oil, 75 percent of the world’s maritime trade, 33 percent of bulk cargo and 50 percent of container shipments (over 1,00,000) ships transit through the IOR every year. The Navy’s eyes and ears have now got sharper to fight maritime terrorism, piracy, human and contraband trafficking, illegal and unregulated fishing, arms running and poaching. IMAC and IFC-IOR are tracking between 75,000-1,00,000 ships in real time and round the clock 24 hours. The aim is to collaborate with countries and organisations to share data and information on vessels in the sea.
The systems are only for tracking commercial ships not warships or sensitive vessels. For now, information is shared in the virtual world. Already over 10 countries including the USA, Japan, Australia and France have requested for Liaison Officers to be physically present at the IFC and more are expected to be given the green signal. SNI’s Associate Editor Amitabh P Revi spoke to Commodore K M Ramakrishnan for more on this partnership aimed at keeping the global commons open and accessible to all. #india #navy #defence
Attack by Hamas took a lot to accomplish. The sudden Chinese bonhomie with Syria and the bringing together of Arab - Sunni and Shia countries and actors by Xi Jinping's regime raises some questions .
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