India | Pakistan

Indian investigators are examining evidence linked to an Air India flight that plunged sharply mid-air last week, authorities said on Tuesday, as local media reported the pilot had tested positive for marijuana. The Airbus A320 carrying 137 passengers and eight crew members lost about 300 feet (91 metres) of altitude shortly after departing from Thailand’s Phuket for New Delhi on August 4, before landing safely in the Indian capital. India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) said 24 people were injured in the incident, a higher figure than the 17 previously reported by the airline. The AAIB said it was “presently engaged in the systematic collection, preservation and examination of all relevant technical, operational, medical and human-factor evidences”. The agency was “committed to an independent, transparent and professional investigation”, it said in a statement. Indian media reports, meanwhile, said the chief pilot had failed a second drug screening test. Broadcaster NDTV, citing unnamed sourc...

Bangladesh is scrambling to save a six-match cricket tour by neighbour India next month, with the foreign ministers of both nations roped in to try to salvage the series. Comprising three one-day internationals and three T20 matches, the white-ball series was originally planned for August last year but postponed after political relations soured between Dhaka and New Delhi. “It is being worked on at the ministerial level,” Bangladesh Sports Minister Aminul Haque said late Monday, adding talks were ongoing between the foreign ministers of both nations. Dhaka and New Delhi have been at odds since Bangladesh’s 2024 mass uprising toppled then-prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who fled to India, her long-time ally, where she remains in hiding. In February, Bangladesh refused to send a team to India for the T20 World Cup, citing security concerns. The International Cricket Council (ICC) refused Bangladesh’s request to play their matches in Sri Lanka, and Scotland was drafted in to replace them. “We want to quickly resol...

An Indian parliamentary panel called on Wednesday for Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg to apologise for the temporary removal of a video of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. India, the world’s most populous country, is Meta’s largest market by users, with hundreds of millions of people using Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. Modi’s video, addressing students during youth-led protests on July 23, was briefly removed from Meta-owned Facebook and Instagram, but was later restored. Meta has said it was caused by technical error. Nishikant Dubey, who heads the parliamentary committee on communications and information technology, said the panel blamed Meta. “Deleting the prime minister’s video was not the work of an intermediary, but that of a publisher,” Dubey said, a lawmaker in Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). “Zuckerberg will have to apologise within three days.” Joel Kaplan, chief global affairs officer at Meta, said he met with India’s Information and Broadcasting Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Wednesday and a...

Bangladesh has asked India to clarify its stance on exiled former prime minister Sheikh Hasina’s planned virtual address from New Delhi, warning that allowing political activities by a fugitive could hurt improving bilateral relations. The remarks were Bangladesh’s first official response to Hasina’s planned appearance at an August 5 event hosted by the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of South Asia in New Delhi, marking the second anniversary of the student-led uprising that toppled her government. The issue comes as Dhaka continues to seek Hasina’s extradition from India, where she has lived since fleeing Bangladesh in August 2024. Despite multiple cases against her, Hasina told Reuters in an interview that she plans to return to Bangladesh in December. “We are moving forward with India with a forward-looking approach. We don’t want that progress to be affected,” Bangladesh’s State Minister for Foreign Affairs Shama Obaed Islam told reporters late on Monday. “India has to be clear about its stance.” The FCCSA s...

A court in New Delhi acquitted the former head of the Indian wrestling federation on Monday of charges of sexual harassment and stalking brought by medal-winning athletes, his lawyer said. Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, 69, a former lawmaker from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), had been accused by some women wrestlers of groping and demanding sexual favours, allegations that he denied. The case triggered weeks of demonstrations in 2023 led by top wrestlers, including world championship winner Vinesh Phogat and Olympic bronze medallist Sakshi Malik, who demanded Singh’s removal as the head of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI). Singh’s lawyer, Rajiv Mohan, said on Monday he had been “honourably acquitted”. The court reached its verdict after finding “inconsistencies” in witness statements and “contradiction on major issues”, he told reporters. Singh’s supporters set off firecrackers and showered him with flower petals while chanting slogans after the ruling. “I had said tha...

Pakistan has issued a flood alert after India released water from the Salal Dam for the 11th consecutive time, prompting concerns over rising water levels.

The Narendra Modi-led government has often declared proudly that its ministers do not resign under public pressure, unlike those from previous governments. However, that hubris was shattered on July 25 when Dharmendra Pradhan, India’s education minister, was forced to resign following widespread youth anger and resistance galvanised by the successful protest in New Delhi led by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP). The first such capitulation by a cabinet minister since Modi came into power in 2014 has prompted questions on the wider political impact of this youth-led movement on the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ahead of key state elections, including in India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, in 2027. While CJP maintains it has no immediate plans to transform itself into a political party, its unprecedented success and continuing pressure on the government has not only dented Modi’s invincibility but also revitalised the opposition, both on the streets and in Parliament. Modi biography author and pol...

When cricket returns to the Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028, it will bring far more than bats, balls and wickets. Its inclusion reflects a strategic calculation by Olympic leaders that the surest route to billions of new viewers runs through India, cricket’s commercial heartland and a country they believe is increasingly central to the Games future. Cricket, absent from the Olympics since 1900, offers the International Olympic Committee (IOC) something no recent addition has: direct access to a fan base of more than two billion people and, crucially, the commercial power of the Indian market. As the Games seek a younger and broader audience, it may prove the most valuable sport added to the Olympic programme in decades. Cricket has been one of the major global sports not to feature in the Olympics, IOC Sports Director Pierre Ducrey told Reuters in an interview. “It is very strong in markets where maybe you could say the Olympic Games today may not have penetrated as much as they have in other markets,” he sai...

A CHILD holds a placard during a gathering in solidarity with the Cockroach Janta Party in Mumbai.—AFP • Indian PM posts video promising remedial steps amid growing youth anger • Experts say social media-driven activism signals changing political trends NEW DELHI: Nearly five weeks after the leaders of India’s youth Cockr­oach Janta Party (CJP) began their protest dema­n­ding the resignation of the education minister over exam paper leaks, Pri­me Minister Narendra Modi, 75, posted a rare selfie video: he said he was pained by their suffering and promised remedial steps The video, posted late on Thursday on Instagram, where CJP amassed 22 million mainly Gen Z followers in a matter of days in May, was not enough to satisfy the thousands of protesters who had gathered in central Delhi, braved a massive police crackdown days earlier, and then inspired protests across the country. On Saturday, the education minister stepped down, meeting the protesters’ main demand, in a rare such setback for Modi. The resignation...

In South Asia, the state has often existed in tension with society, asserting control not only over governance but also over history, memory, and legitimacy, while society is forced to negotiate or submit to official narratives. Rather than reinforcing one another, the political and social spheres frequently become antagonistic, with the imperatives of postcolonial state-building overriding justice, dissent, and collective memory. It is against this backdrop that Satluj, inspired by the life of human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra, assumes significance beyond cinema as an effort to reclaim a contested history. Its removal from ZEE5 only two days after its July 2026 release in India highlights the persistent struggle over who has the authority to narrate the past and whether censorship can erase, or merely delay, historical memory. Originally produced as Punjab 95, Honey Trehan’s film traces Khalra’s investigation into enforced disappearances and illegal cremations during Punjab’s insurgency, a pursuit t...

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Friday accused India of sponsoring terrorism in Pakistan, alleging that New Delhi was providing support and resources to militant groups to destabilise the country.

India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka secured direct entry into the men’s cricket knockout stage at the 2026 Asian Games after the draw was announced on Thursday. The 10-team men’s competition, starting from September 24 in Nagoya, will begin with a preliminary round featuring Afghanistan, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Nepal and Oman competing for the remaining quarter-final berths. Afghanistan, Japan and Nepal were drawn in Group A, while Hong Kong, Malaysia and Oman were placed in Group B. The top two teams from each group will advance to the knockout stage to join the four seeded sides. The women’s tournament, scheduled from September 17-22, features eight teams and will begin at the quarter-final stage. Defending champions India will face hosts Japan, Bangladesh will take on China, Sri Lanka will meet Malaysia, and Pakistan will play Thailand. All matches in both competitions will be played in the Twenty20 format. India swept the cricket gold medals at the 2022 Asian Games, held in 2023 in Hangzhou, cla...

Thousands of supporters of India’s youth-led “cockroach” movement have been protesting since June, demanding the education minister resign over exam paper leaks, in the biggest challenge to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his third term. Activists say the leaks showed widespread corruption, a complaint which has brought crowds onto the streets for years. Following are details of major rallies, triggered by graft and other crimes and causes, over the past two decades. April 2011 Anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare started the first of two hunger strikes in a bid to push the government to bring in anti-graft legislation. Hundreds of thousands rallied to his support across the country and he was briefly jailed by the then-Congress alliance government. India’s parliament eventually passed an anti-graft law, though Hazare said it watered down his demands. Some of his supporters went on to form the Aam Aadmi Party in 2012, now one of Modi’s opponents in parliament. December 2012 Public fury over the gang-rape of a...

A steady stream of food delivery riders carrying meals, snacks and bottled water is helping sustain a youth-led protest movement that has sprung up in the heart of India’s capital. Motorcycles weave through traffic before pulling up beside clusters of volunteers, ferrying donations from supporters across India and abroad unable to join a rare display of public dissent against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government. “From Kerala to the USA, orders are coming from everywhere,” said rider Suraj Kumar, 25, sitting atop his motorcycle with a bag of kachoris, a popular deep-fried snack, as some volunteers climbed over police barricades to take delivery of the packages. A volunteer took the packet and passed it hand-to-hand towards the centre of the protest site a few hundred metres away around Delhi’s Jantar Mantar observatory, where hundreds of people gathered around a raised platform. There, leaders of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), a movement that began as online satire in May, demanded the resignation of E...

WASHINGTON: A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced legislation aimed at criminalising efforts by foreign governments to intimidate political opponents and activists living in the United States, amid growing concern in Washington over alleged cases of transnational repression involving India. The Stop Transnational Repression Act of 2026, sponsored by Democratic Senator Adam Schiff and Republican Senator John Curtis, would make transnational repression a specific federal crime for the first time. It would expand the Justice Department and FBI’s authority to investigate and prosecute foreign efforts to suppress dissent on American soil. Under the proposed legislation, individuals convicted of transnational repression could face an additional prison sentence of up to 10 years and fines of up to $100,000, alongside penalties for any underlying offences. The bill would also strengthen the role of the US Justice Department’s National Security Division and the Assistant Attorney General for National Securi...

When pent-up youth anger propelled India’s Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) to online fame in May, its founder said his supporters were disillusioned with both Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party and the opposition for failing to address their concerns. Yet CJP leaders turned to opposition lawmakers and appealed directly for their support on Monday after police used batons and tear gas to disperse protesters marching on parliament to demonstrate against damaging exam leaks and corruption. Opposition lawmakers were quick to oblige on Tuesday, after many young demonstrators were injured. Police personnel stand guard as India’s opposition party Indian National Congress stages a sit-in protest calling for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s resignation outside the latter’s residence in New Delhi on July 21, 2026. — AFP The show of solidarity with protesters could help opposition parties win valuable young voters and broaden the appeal of the CJP, which has so far focused on demanding the education minister’s resignation o...

On a Saturday evening this month, an 11-year-old girl left her home for a friend’s birthday party in a small town in eastern India. She never returned. She was kidnapped, raped, bundled into a sack and thrown into a pond by a gang of men while still alive, according to a local investigating police officer. A health and physical education textbook of an 11-year-old girl who was raped and killed last week, is kept inside her parents’ house in a town near Kolkata, West Bengal, India on July 11, 2026. —Reuters/File The assault was the latest example of the brutal sexual violence that is endemic across India, with over 80 rapes reported to police every day, according to data from the National Crime Records Bureau. Many more assaults go unreported because of victim blaming and shaming, activists say. Deep-seated patriarchy and misogyny, understaffed police forces and severe judicial delays contribute to many perpetrators believing they can escape punishment for assaulting women. That sense of impunity feeds into th...

Ransomware group World Leaks has posted on the dark web a huge cache of files related to India’s largest nuclear plant, including purported blueprints of parts of its facilities and supplier details — information it ​labelled as coming from Reliance Group. The Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant, located in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, is the largest of India’s seven nuclear plants and central to Prime Minister ‌Narendra Modi’s ambitious plans to expand the country’s atomic energy capacity. Indian businessman Anil Ambani’s Reliance Group, one of the plant’s contractors, told Reuters in a statement that there had been a “partial breach” of its data on a server hosted by third-party Indian data centre service provider Yotta, and that the government had been informed about the incident. Reliance did not disclose what data had been breached. The data breach could pose a “serious” risk to the safety of the plant, says Nickolas Roth, a senior director at the Nuclear Threat Initiative, which ​advises governments and...

They suffered a six-wicket defeat against India in the first ODI

India has prohibited the import of goods produced using forced labour, the trade ministry said on Tuesday, in a move that could help avert new tariffs from a probe by the United States. The Asian nation is one of the several countries facing proposed new US trade tariffs of up to 12.5 per cent over allegations they failed to prohibit import of goods produced with forced labour. The ministry’s notification, dated Monday, said it empowers “the central government to prohibit, by notification, the import of goods produced or manufactured, wholly or in part, through the use of forced labour”. India’s foreign trade body will investigate whether imported goods were made using forced labour and, if evidence is found, recommend that the government ban imports of those products after consultations, according to the notification. The notification will come into force after 30 days. Like most countries, the bulk of goods from India currently face a 10pc US tariff. But Washington is expected to introduce steeper tariffs t...