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When hiding a bribe promise in India became a US crime — and now isn't

One and a half years ago, I wrote a blog wondering whether merely hiding the promise of a bribe in India — not actually paying it — is a crime in the US. Citing a CNN report on the Adani case in the US, I quoted it to say that the US justice department had sought to indict Gautam Adani, his nephew Sagar Adani and others for "promising" more than $250 million in bribes to Indian government officials to secure solar energy contracts.
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When this astrologer, who 'predicts' climate, was arrested for creating panic post-2001 Kutch quake

A recent piece of news , that Ambalal Patel , considered a prominent Gujarat-based astrologer, has decided to stop predicting daily weather based on his "calculations" of how he sees the stars behaving, took my memory back to 2001. It was January 26, and I was having my morning tea, hoping to enjoy a holiday.
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The unstudied crisis of Himalayan nallahs: Flooding under a scorching sun

  A new report by Parineeta Dandekar of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People (SANDRP) has brought to light a recurring and largely unstudied crisis in the Indian Himalayas : the phenomenon of glacial streams, or nallahs , experiencing devastating flash floods not from rainfall, but under a blazing sun.
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Inequality itself isn't inherently harmful: Corporate insider opens up on CSR

In the latest episode of the Unmute podcast , corporate strategist and institution-builder Dr Sunil Parekh made a case for a renewed dialogue between industry, government and civil society, arguing that India urgently needs new institutional spaces where the three can jointly address the tensions thrown up by decades of market-led growth. 
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New study flags dismantling of India’s rights-based welfare state

India’s rights-based welfare architecture, painstakingly built over two decades through legal guarantees to work, food, and education, has undergone a systemic legislative and budgetary rollback over the last decade. In its place, a discretionary model of "New Welfarism"—characterized by centralized cash transfers, digital gatekeeping, and diminished state accountability—has been institutionalized, driven primarily by electoral calculations rather than administrative reform.
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Babri to Gyanvapi: Courts undermine rule of law in mosque conversion cases, says study

A new legal research paper argues that Indian courts have become a central arena for what its author calls the "Hindu majoritarian project" to convert historic Muslim places of worship into temples, through a pattern of civil litigation that departs from established legal principles.
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Cities as heat engines: How urban design is making India's heatwaves deadlier for the poor

Nine out of India's ten hottest cities globally are located within the country's borders, with the majority concentrated in Uttar Pradesh and the surrounding plains, according to climate and energy expert Soumya Dutta, who has spent three decades studying climate change, environment, rivers and energy issues while working with communities across the world. In a recent detailed discussion, Dutta sought to explain why Indian and South Asian cities are becoming unbearably hot and who bears the brunt of this crisis.
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