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International students on US campuses are at present a terrified lot: they can be abducted, sent to some detention centre hundreds of miles from where they live, kept there for any length of time, and then deported abroad. And all this can happen to them not because they have violated any known law, but entirely at the whim of the administration. Exact estimates are difficult to come by, but about 1500 students are reported to have had their student visas revoked and are facing deportation.

In 2024, as in previous years, communal violence has persisted in the form of structural violence, embedded within the legal and institutional framework of the state. Structural violence, as conceptualized by Johan Galtung, refers to systematic inequalities and injustices that are institutionalized within legal, political, and social structures, thereby disproportionately affecting marginalized communities. In this context, discriminatory legislation, selective implementation of existing laws, and state directives have played a crucial role in perpetuating structural violence.

BHOPAL: How democracy can be subverted is the finding of a survey conducted by a leading news paper of the state. The survey revealed that vested interest, who described as "Dabang" are controlled many panchayat without contesting election. This Dabang pays a fixed sum to the sarpanch and panch and obtain all powers to run the panchayats. This is widespread position in the reserved panchayats. They include such "Dabang" who finance election of sarpanch and after election they obtain total control of the panchayat.

Vietnam has shown how a well calibrated trade diplomacy can be conducted in the year 2025 amidst the ongoing tariff war between the two biggest economic and military powers of the world USA and China. Both countries are having best trade relations with this South East Asian nation which is a sort of leader amongst the emerging economies.

BJP leaders and the Vice President of India, Jagdeep Dhankhar, have launched vicious attacks on the Supreme Court. These attacks have come in the wake of the Supreme Court judgment on the Tamil Nadu Governor’s unconstitutional role in withholding bills passed by the state legislature and subsequently the CJI-headed bench giving an interim order on the Waqf Amendment Act.

From asserting “all is well” on the floor of Lok Sabha only on March 7, the Modi government has had to order “keeping in abeyance the Indus Water Treaty of 1960”, declare the defence advisers in the Pakistani High Commission in New Delhi as persona non grata and close integrated check post at Wagah-Attari border on April 23, after Pahalgam, often dubbed the Switzerland of Kashmir, witnessed the gruesome massacre of 28 innocent tourists on April 22.

One of the greatest tragedies of South Asia has been the emergence of ‘Two Nation Theory’, which opposed the Anti Colonial Indian National movement. It was a great help to British colonialists to rule over this vast land. It led to the formation of Pakistan on the basis of Muslim majority (Islam) and the remaining part, India as a secular state with a large Muslim population. These Muslims, who by force of circumstances or by choice chose to stay here in India. It also led to large migrations of Hindus from Pakistan to India and many Muslims to Pakistan, the suffering was horrific.

The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 (‘the Act’) is currently under a rigorous constitutional scrutiny before a Division Bench led by Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna in the Supreme Court. One question we have not explored enough is what this Act means for Muslim women of this country.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has won the first round in the protracted battle against Donald Trump over his declaration of tariff war against China. After waiting for long three weeks for a personal call from XI Jinping offering talks to discuss the proposed tariff hikes, Trump partially retreated on Tuesday when he told newsmen in White House that high tariffs on goods from China’ will come down substantially but it won’t be zero”.

Pakistan on Wednesday, a day after Pak Army Chief Gen Asim Munir-inspired ‘Muslim terrorists’ shot dead Hindu Indian males ‘touristing’ in Kashmir’s scenic ‘Pahalgam’, a spot eulogized as “Kashmir’s Switzerland”, woke up to the tragedy in India and in a gesture of commiseration expressed “concern at the loss of tourist lives”, reported a Pakistani newspaper.