US: Imposing visa curbs on Indian travel agencies behind illegal immigration

The us said Monday that it is imposing visa restrictions on owners, executives and senior officials of travel agencies in India for facilitating "illegal im-migration" to the country.

"Mission India's Consular Affairs and Diplomatic Security Service work every day across our Embassy and Consulates to actively identify and target those engaged in facilitating illegal immigration and human smuggling and trafficking operations," the US State Department said in a statement. 

'Unsafe' for National Museum antiquities, Red Fort barrack to house ASI collection

Declared "Unsafe" by the National Museum for its "high-value objects" in 2023, a Red Fort barrack in Old Delhi is expected to house a new Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) museum in-stead, according to a recent decision by the Union Culture Ministry.

The ASI Archives and Archival Museum of Archaeology, expected to be located at the bar-rack, CMP-A3, will house antiquities from the Central Antiquity Collection (CAC), on display at Purana Qila, nearly 8 km from the 17th-century Red Fort, since 1974. With over 3.5 lakh items, the CAC is the single-largest collection of antiquities in India.

In response to an application filed by The Indian Express under the Right To Information (RTI) Act, documents shared by the Culture Ministry had revealed that the decision on the new museum was taken in August 2023 and that the same was recently conveyed to the ASI, which has uploaded a new office order on its website.

RESTORE GUARDRAILS

Environment clearances are guardrails that ensure developmental projects do not injure ecosystems, wildlife and natural resources and harm people's health. One of the defining elements of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Rules of 2006, these screenings were meant to enable policymakers to strike the right balance between the imperatives of development and sustainability. The precautionary principle behind this provision has, however, been substantially undermined in the past eight years. In 2017, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change issued a notification that allowed developers to obtain an environmental clearance after be-ginning work on a project. The notification provided a one-time window to defaulters to com-ply with due procedure. However, in the process, it inaugurated a regime of post-facto clearances, which was consolidated in 2021 when the Centre issued an Office Memorandum (OM) to "identify" and "handle" violation cases. Now, the Supreme Court has called out the government for "going out of its way... to protect those who harm the environment". On May 16, a two-judge-bench struck down the 2017 notification and the 2021 OM.

A tale of two Gulf Visits 

Us President Donald Trump's sojourn in West Asia this month could not have been more different from his visit in May 2017. As now, the kingdom had been his first foreign destination eight years ago (besides the quick visit to Rome for the Pope's funeral), but then the President's approach to the region had been deeply influenced by his political allies, the evangelical Christians and the Israel lobby. 

He had viewed the domains of his Arab hosts as sources of extremism and violence and had later showered limitless gifts upon Israel and its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu: He moved the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, backed the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, and promoted the "deal of the century" on the Palestine issue, which was heavily skewed in Israel's favour

A BANK OF INNOVATORS

The Latest Data on MTech enrolment in engineering paints a concerning picture: The numbers have hit a seven-year low. From an approved intake of 1.81 lakh in 2018-19, only about 1.3 lakh seats were offered in 2023-24, and less than 45,000 students enrolled. This means close to two-thirds of postgraduate (PG) engineering seats are lying vacant across the country. The trend is not merely statistical-it reflects a deeper malaise in the higher technical education ecosystem that policy-makers, educators, and institutions must collectively address.

The future is bilingual

For some time now, I've had a sense that India is stuck, while large parts of the world, Africa, South and Central America, East and Southeast Asia, are waking up to a new sense of turn. Not so long ago, we looked forward to a major role in the world, but that dream has dwindled. How do we regain that place? Unlike China and other modern countries, we are not firing on all cylinders. Our demographic dividend feels frustrated, excluded in a way that people in a modern nation should never be. But that may be about to change.

Anatomy of a panic

Operation Sindoor was launched by India on May 7 in response to the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack. Nine terror-related targets in Pakistan were identified and precision strikes were carried out by the Indian military. Pakistan responded with strikes on Indian military assets and an escalation dynamic was at play between the two nuclear-weapon capable neighbours.

'India not dharamshala': SC junks Lanka man's plea seeking refuge

Refusing to grant any relief to a Sri Lankan national facing possible deportation, the Supreme Court said Monday that India, which is "struggling with a 140 crore population... is not a dharamshala (rest house)".

Top 5 cities account for over 52% of MF assets, women investor base rises

India's Mutual fund assets are heavily concentrated in the top five cities, with Mumbai, New Delhi, Bengaluru, Pune, and Kolkata collectively accounting for a staggering 52.52 per cent of the country's total mutual fund assets under management (AUM) as of March 2025. This means as much as Rs 34.52 lakh crore of total AUM corpus of Rs 65.74 lakh crore came from these five cities.

Power demand in May drops as rains bring relief to grid managers

US farmers can offer non-GM soybean products to India, says USSEC chief

A US-India trade deal could re-solve several trade issues between the two countries, helping the Indian poultry industry gain access to 'sustainably verified' US soybean feed products, while allowing the US to partially offset potential losses arising from trade tensions with China, CEO of the US Soybean Export Council (USSEC), Jim Sutter, told The Indian Express.

RBI revises rules for investment in AIFs

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has revised draft guidelines for investments by regulated entities (REs) in Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs), aiming to enhance oversight and prevent potential misuse.

Wetter & not that hot: Why is summer of 2025 atypical so far?

The Summer of 2025 has been unusual so far. High day temperatures, typically reaching between 40 degrees and 45 degrees Celsius, and heatwave days have been largely absent, and May, in particular, has been exceptionally wet in many parts of the country - with thunderstorms accompanied by heavy rain and, in some cases, hail.

WHAT A PROSTATE CANCER DIAGNOSIS LIKE BIDEN'S MEANS FOR PATIENTS

Former Us President Joe Biden was diagnosed on Friday with an aggressive form of prostate cancer that has spread to his bones, his office said in a statement on Sunday. The cancer is Stage 4, which means it has spread and cannot be cured.

However, recent advances in diagnosing and treating prostate cancer-based in large part on research sponsored by the National Institutes of Health and the Defense Department - have changed what was once an exceedingly grim picture for men with advanced disease, according to prostate cancer specialists. "Life is measured in years now, not months," said Dr Daniel Lin, a prostate cancer specialist at the University of Washington (US).

Dr Judd Moul, a prostate cancer expert at Duke University (US), said that men whose prostate cancer has spread to their bones, "can live five, seven, 10 or more years" with current treatments. A man like Biden, in his 80s, "could hopefully pass away from natural causes and not from prostate cancer," he said.

'Core' inflation & RBI's rate cuts

Between February 8, 2023 and February 6, 2025, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) kept its key short-term 'repo' lending rate unchanged at 6.5%.

This roughly two-year period saw inflation based on the official consumer price index (CPI) average 5.2% year-on-year. It was even higher, at 7.6%, for the consumer food price index (CFPI).

At the same time, the so-called 'core' inflation rate - which excludes food and fuel items from the CPI to compute the annual price increase - was only 4.1%. The relatively low core inflation was cited by many, then, as reason enough for the RBI's monetary policy committee to cut interest rates.

Food and fuel inflation are largely driven by supply-side factors - such as rainfall, temperature and other weather-related phenomena affecting crop output or geopolitical developments and production policies of major petroleum exporting nations.

Given the inherently volatile nature of food and fuel inflation - which monetary policy cannot effectively address, as interest rates primarily work by influencing borrowing costs and aggregate demand in the economy the RBI, it was argued, should focus on 'core' than the headline 'general' CPI inflation.

Why SC struck down Centre's orders on retrospective green clearances

The Supreme Court on Friday struck down and held illegal a 2017 notification of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC), which introduced a regime of granting ex-post facto clearances to projects - after work had al-ready begun. A clutch of petitions had challenged the notification.