Nothing will do coz its 142

We have unfettered powers under Article 142 to render substantive justice: Supreme Court

Many a times, there comes a situation over which earlier to that no one has paid heed into. No one has thought that anything of such nature can also come into picture and we should have done something about the same in advance.

For e.g. the recent flood of Chennai. No one had ever thought that a metropolitan city like Chennai can also face situation like this. This happened because earlier to this, none paid attention to subject matters like development of properly planned infrastructure.

To avoid the situations like above, the framers of the Indian Constitution inserted article 141 and 142. They were of the view that for once and all there comes a situation when issues can’t be dealt with any existing law and would be of such nature that ignoring the same will amount to great injustice. In those circumstances, the man shall not be left with his scars feeling pity on him. Rather, there should be a mechanism which shall immediately come up to rescue him and shall provide a shelter of justice.

There have been various instances where the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India has stood up to this thought process. Be it the case of Vishakha v State of Rajasthan where the Hon’ble Supreme Court laid down the guidelines to protect a woman from sexual harassment at its workplace or be it Bandhua Mukti Morcha Case where the Hon’ble Court gave its landmark judgment on bonded labour system of India or be it the Olga Tellis Case where the Hon’ble Court declared that Right to livelihood is part and parcel of the right to life. The Hon’ble Court standing up with these principles have gone leaps and bounds protecting the rights of human civilization as well as of the animals and nature (MC Mehta Cases). These all were done and guaranteed to us by the Hon’ble Court when either the interpretation of laws was required or there were no laws to deal such situations.

Right to Education is one of the most widely known outcomes of this situation.

That is why Article 141 and 142 exists in the Constitution of India and that is why so much of power have been given to the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India vide these Articles mandating all to comply with the same.

This is the reason that these articles have been included in the basic structure doctrine along with Article 32 and Article 136.

141. The law declared by the Supreme Court shall be binding on all courts within the territory of India.

142. (1) The Supreme Court in the exercise of its jurisdiction may pass such decree or make such order as is necessary for doing complete justice in any cause or matter pending before it, and any decree so passed or order so made shall be enforceable throughout the territory of India in such manner as may be prescribed by or under any law made by Parliament and, until provision in that behalf is so made, in such manner as the President may by order prescribe.

(2) Subject to the provisions of any law made in this behalf by Parliament, the Supreme Court shall, as respects the whole of the territory of India, have all and every power to make any order for the purpose of securing the attendance of any person, the discovery or production of any documents, or the investigation or punishment of any contempt of itself.

Recently, Supreme Court of India appointed the new Lokayukta of Uttar Pradesh, by exercising powers granted by Article 142of the Constitution.
The state government had amended the state act with a provision that: Lokayukta shall, notwithstanding the expiration of his term, continue to hold office until his successor enters upon his office. With this act, Lokayukta N K Mehrotra of UP continued in office more than prescribed term. This amendment was challenged in the court, and as result of which the Supreme Court directed the state government to appoint new Lokayukta within six months from the date of verdict. But with the state government failing to comply with the orders, the Supreme Court exercised the powers granted to it via Article 142 of Indian Constitution to appoint Virendra Singh as the new Lokayukta of UP.

Invoking Article 142 of the Constitution of India to do ‘complete justice’ to a couple who had decided to part with each other after living separately for last five years, the Supreme Court has waived statutory cool-off period of six months and granted them divorce.

The order in the Jagdambika Pal case can only trace its power to Article 142 of the Constitution which authorises the Supreme Court to “pass such decree or make such order as is necessary for doing complete justice in any cause or matter pending before it”. Orders passed under this article have no precedential value. Students of law and practitioners of serious constitutional law were unenthusiastic about the constitutional underpinnings of the order. Some wags in the corridor of the Supreme Court called the rough and ready measure “Punchhaiti Raj” in an apparent pun on the Chief Justice’s name. In an issue of the Supreme Court Bar Association

Voltaire

"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong" - Voltaire

oh no ..we need ur capital not you!!

The founders of India's top two consumer Internet companies Sachin Bansal and Bhavish Aggarwal have called for enforcing protectionist measures against their global rivals Amazon and Uber, accusing these firms of dumping capital to buy customers to become monopolies in the country.

India is the world's last large open market where Amazon and Uber are pitted against local rivals Flipkart and Ola respectively. Both firms have committed billions of dollars to capture India, giving tough competition to the local leaders, who have mirrored the business models of these two US internet companies.

E-commerce and ride-hailing, similar to all business that uses the internet to connect consumers with suppliers, tend to be monopolistic in nature. The company that gets the most users and vendors tends to dominate the business playing on the network effect, with the rival being a distant second. Amazon and Uber dominate the US market and many other markets globally and the gap with their rivals is growing.

Both Bansal and Aggarwal cite this reason to curb the expansion of Uber and Amazon, calling the government to bring rules that only get foreign capital in India, but restrict foreign consumer internet companies from setting up shops.

In the past, India had policies for pharma, automobiles, IT and banking that encouraged local entrepreneurs to build a strong base before opening up for competition. Likewise, the country's Make in India policy for defence manufacturing looks at local development over foreign imports.

"But in the technology sector, this is not the case because it is naturally monopolistic. The cost of acquisition is zero, once you have something it happens to be accessible to everyone at the same time and that is the unique thing for which China's answer was to close down the market," Bansal said at a panel discussion moderated by T V Mohandas Pai at the Carnegie India technology summit on Wednesday. "I think what we need to do is what China did. They told the world we need your capital but we don't need your companies."

Uber, which burnt over $2 billion in China was humiliated by local rival Didi Chuxing forcing it to exit the Middle Kingdom for a minority stake in Didi. The resources, which Uber had set aside for China is being diverted to India, besides the capital that was already allocated from the $ 3.5 billion it raised from Saudi Arabia's public fund.

Likewise, Amazon has committed over $5 billion since mid-2014 to capture the Indian e-commerce market, which has been dragging down its international margins.

Bansal and Aggarwal say both these rivals are burning money to capture market share but not adding any value to the Indian ecosystem, while local firms such as theirs are generating high-value jobs in the country.

"When a ride goes to Uber for example in India, the higher-end jobs are being created in the US and not in India. The capabilities in the ecosystem are getting created in the US and not in India, while when it comes to Ola the capabilities are being created in India," said Bansal.

Increased competition from Uber and Amazon have not only hurt the Indian companies in expanding their business but also dragged down their valuations that have made it harder to raise fresh funds from global investors.

"When you see the capital story that's where the Indian ecosystem is at a disadvantage. Number one is that there's no local capital, we have to go abroad for capital and it's much easier for non-Indian companies to raise capital because they're profitable elsewhere," said Aggarwal. "You might call it capital dumping but it's a very unfair playing field for the Indian startups and something needs to be done about it. The consumer Internet industry because it largely carries a monopolistic stake, a lot of irrational capital is thrown into the land grab."

Not all buy the arguments made by Bansal and Aggarwal. Anand Rangarajan, who is the engineering director at Google's Bengaluru research centre, says local companies can give competition to multinationals such as Google if they are able to build trust with the consumers.

"This has happened in markets such as Russia and South Korea and other markets where local players are very dominant. I don't think they're doing well just because they got protection, they're doing well because they've won the consumer trust and we couldn't do as good a job," said Rangarajan. 

kaushik basu

World Bank too has changed its goal to fighting no longer for just eradication of poverty but also for shared prosperity”

There is now a consensus the world over that the free market economic model does not work, said World Bank chief economist and former Chief Economic Adviser to the government of India Kaushik Basu on Sunday.

Dr. Basu was speaking at a function organised here by the ‘Ideas for India’.

Just as complete state control fails, leaving all decisions to markets results in grave inequalities and so it doesn’t work even politically, argued Dr. Basu. “The things that were ideologically rooted on the extreme right and extreme left, those fringes have now fallen off.”

Now, “sharing of the pie” with the bottom 40 per cent of people is gaining traction even with the International Monetary Fund and economists such as Thomas Piketty, Dr. Basu said.

Reflecting the new consensus, Dr. Basu said the World Bank formally changed its goal to fighting no longer for just eradication of poverty but also for shared prosperity.

Dr. Basu’s statement assumes significance as the Economic Survey states that the Narendra Modi government plans to bring in a “pure market economy” through legislations and new processes where the role of the state would be limited to intervening in case market forces fail.

The need for policy intervention is getting recognised globally, said Dr. Basu, since a large part of the inequality in the world is being inherited at birth and getting dynastically transmitted from generation to generation. “Since there can be no distinction on the lines of hard-working babies and lazy babies, the issue of inequality at birth has come to the policy makers’ table.”

Education paradox

As a case in point, he cited the problem of India’s education paradox: “India’s small elite are able to receive world-class education but the masses get very poor quality education… Literacy levels were till 10 years ago below some sub-Saharan countries.”

Dr. Basu also said that the World Bank was planning to create an ‘Ease of Living Life’ rating of countries that would be on the lines of the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ in which India ranks poorly. The rating being planned will rank countries on the costs incurred by ordinary people in interface with the bureaucracy.

Neo liberalism seen not just in globalisation but other aspects too

So this creation of political elites aka the industrialist/ corporate bureaucrat politician linkage... aka the subservience of the state to the market is again a doing of capitalism paradim

Then as the market paradigm spreads its tantacles across the world binding each nation with its stifling and coercive pattern of development the state and its policy lever os captured to suit the interest of these corporate global elites. This is at the cost of the rest majority.
Thus this battle between globalisation and market vs state and sovereignty also takes the colors of the duel between elitism vs democratic citizenship.

The surrender of state objective to serve its people can be directly seen in the mega regional trade blocks. The tpp rcep and the tatip. Why are people the environmentalist the labour unionists the sovereign gvts so against it. Precisely becoz these market led tantacles are seeking to stifle them.

Another tangential but significant point to be noted here is that the globalisation and capitalism can be verified or their existence perceived if the nation goes through environmental and labour reforms. So far here in india the labour reforms in the industrial dispute act such as the one carried out by rajasthan and madhya pradesh gvt that no sanctions from the gvt are needed for closing business etc.  last year the economic survey highlighted the chakrvyu challenges to the firms and the need for them to do away with the government contol by allowing them to exit and shutdown when they are not profitable.  this would lead to a more productive utilisation of capital labour and entrepreneurship. 

but these are just few of the highlights that show the onslaught of global capitalism in india. Much has been said and done about the need of labour reforms as a corresponding reform to the 1991 lpg reforms. So much water has flown under the low manufacturing bridge that poor industrial performance and the absence of manufacturing sector the losses incurred due to chinese goods flooding are all attributed to stagnancy in labour reform. 

Clearly the indian government is already under great dueress to produce results in favour of indian and global corporates. But it shouldnt be forgotten that india is a nation of people 1.3 crore people and no development paradigm can be successful without taking them into consideration. Aristotle while recounting the merits of democracy stated that it is a better form of gvt to oligarchy or say philosopher king because in case of oligarchy they have a vested interest in making themselves rich while keeping the majority poorer. but in a democracy if a government continues to only the select  few the majority would shut them of the power and then a new government which would serve the majority would continue. dont get it ...the focus on irrigation the pm gareeb kalyan yojana , mahila schemes , increased progressive taxations are all manifestations of aristotelian argument.

So labour reforms are somewhat hard, unless people are themselves sufficiently financially and socially to let go some of the benefits that they accrue while being in a union. Therefore a neoliberalism is somewhat checked due to democracy.

But there are caveats such as formation of coalition government and vote bank politics. in both cases aristotle fails. but anyways. 

A new brand of leaders who are more pro people like christina lagard (IMF) kaushik Basu ( world bank) are showing the needs for empowerment of people first before empowering the markets. Kaushik basu at the world bank in order to capture the concept of inequality came out with the concept of shared prosperity which actuallty takes into account the growth rate of poorest 40 percent. 

India too

Anti-globalization movement
Worldwide political movement against multinational corporations

Thousands of people gathered for a demonstration in Warsaw, the capital of Poland, as the country prepared to enter the European Union in 2004.

The anti-globalization movement, or counter-globalisation movement,[1] is a social movement critical of economic globalization. The movement is also commonly referred to as the global justice movement,[2] alter-globalization movement, anti-globalist movement, anti-corporate globalization movement,[3] or movement against neoliberal globalization.

Participants base their criticisms on a number of related ideas.[4] What is shared is that participants oppose large, multinational corporations having unregulated political power, exercised through trade agreements and deregulated financial markets. Specifically, corporations are accused of seeking to maximize profit at the expense of work safety conditions and standards, labor hiring and compensation standards, environmental conservation principles, and the integrity of national legislative authority, independence and sovereignty. As of January 2012, some commentators have characterized changes in the global economy as "turbo-capitalism" (Edward Luttwak), "market fundamentalism" (George Soros), "casino capitalism" (Susan Strange),[5] and as "McWorld" (Benjamin Barber).

Many anti-globalization activists do not oppose globalization in general and call for forms of global integration that better provide democratic representation, advancement of human rights, fair trade and sustainable development and therefore feel the term "anti-globalization" is misleading.[6][7][8]

the curious case of purvi patel

We can go back to Locke but that would be unnecessary to the lay readers. So lets start from the year 1973, the year when India had one of the most historic, probably the most historic- however lets not reduce such complex socio cultural issues to mere superlatives and unqualified simplicity. So the year was 1973 when the S.C. in the Keshvananda Bharti Vs state of Kerala judgment in 7;6 slim majority came out with the doctrine of basic feature. However the tussle between the court and the executive was far from over and one can see the same quest for supremacy between the two bodies in the NJAC judgment and countless others. But coming back to the year 1973, and moving continents away to America, another historic judgment was being met out by the apex court of the nation. A judgment that would greatly impact the people this nation directly on their lifestyles, their morals and value and the spirit of freedom that they so cherish. The judgment being ROE vs Wade and the case involving the right of a woman to undergo abortion and take away the life of her fetus to suit her choices.

To call America an ultra conservative country, maybe one like the Ireland today, would be a travesty of the truth. The fact of the matter is that Abortion is legalised in USA whereas it is not so in the Catholicism inspired nation of Ireland. However America of the 20th century was not the same as America is today. One has to look at the progressive movement, the prohibition movement that followed it and organisation like the women christian temperance organisation that cropped up along with issues of women suffrage and bringing in a purer electoral base. Further it was this ever pervading spirit of Individualism (could be a derivative of protestantism ) and liberty also added to the anti abortion sentiments, clearly the liberty of the unborn baby is being referred to and not the carrier mother. So all in all USA was a fairly conservative society and did not permit abortion. Not till this texan woman who wanted to abort her third child took up the cudgel to fight against the repressive institution and the state law. The matter reached apex court by the time Miss Mccourvey had already delivered the baby and put him or her for adoption. But the case continued, so the Court legalised abortion, thus a major battle was won by women and the pro choice contendors.

Interestingly the court did not dwelve in matters of life and death etc rather took up the argument of Right to Privacy to further the cause of women's choice. The court articulated that not allowing the woman to undergo abortion was a direct violation of her right to privacy and therefore anti abortion laws have to be done away with. The judgment was given by 7;2 majority, with 2 dissenting voices.
Again, another interesting point that needs to be mentioned here is that for the right to privacy argument the case of Gradison vs Connecticut was referred to. Here the judges stated that anti contraceptive laws of Connecticut were violative of right to privacy and the right to privacy emanated from some liberty something from the constitution.


So the question arises that why was pallavi patel jailed for 20 years for her act of self abortion.

Miss patel for some reasons did not go to an authorised doctor and conducted self abortion by eating pills brought via some online website. Abortion happened but post this she started having bleeding and other issues for which she had to go to the doctor. Now the doctor realised that the baby was not in the womb and therefore reported it to the Indiana police. Now the police found out the body of 25 weeks old (just 1 week older than what would indian laws allow for abortion) and found the lady guilty of foeticide.

However later she was aquitted

Usa withdrawl started in 2014

Withdrawal completed in December 2016 and larger U.S. presence[4]

U.S. keeps 8,400 troops in 4 garrisons (Kabul, Kandahar, Bagram and Jalalabad) indefinitely due to Taliban resurgence attempt in Kunduz

case for presidents rule

this article argues that a fertile ground has been created due to the rift between stelvarts of AIDMK party namely OPS and Sashikala for imposition of presidents rule. Tamil Nadu is a rich and prosperous state of course we are talking in relative terms within the boundaries of India. However the body politic over there has not been able to mature similarly as can be seen in the populist measures adopted by each party to come to power. Amma canteens , Amma milk , Amma gold and what not, it was seen that even during the chennai flood relief operation the relief packages had ammas photos on it. What blessing the goddess herself showers relief items to the needy.

Being an Industrialised state, Tamil Nadu needs to do much more, however it is mired in the bhakti cult of a corrupt CM whose disporportionate assets case brought her in sharp contrast to one of our another leaders enjoying single hood. None other than NAMO, namo has set the ideals for all the rulers and chair aspirants. In Platos replublic the philosopher king would have no family and therefore no motive to amass wealth. However this logic doesnt apply to JAYA. Anyways the thing is that BJP is the trail blazer for such acts of honesty and public welfare.

The post truth world that we have entered speaks of the same. Foucault argued that power distorts truth and true narrative to maintain its hegemony. In the same way Jayas rise to power has been spear headed by such manipulative and truth distorting events. The trend has been there so much and so that now it has become an inextricable part of the political party itself. What is one supposed to do then. The BJP, the harbinger of truth shouldnt hesitate to capitalise on this situation and let the Governor cat among the ruffian AIDMK pigeons.

A mechanism has to be devised by the shrewd machiavellian and kautilyan Amit shah and venkiah Naidu ji to make the rift between the two contenders to exacerbate the issue and the governance of the state and in no time shall the governor write to the President for applying his majesties rule.  Now before we get back to the exorcising the ghost of AIDMK by the sainthood of BJP, the million dollar question that arises is how do we do it in the first place, considering the apex courts hinder-some judgment in both SR Bommai and the more germane to this issue Buta singh Case of Bihar 2006. Simply put the judgment states that presidents rule is not a function of governors whims and fancies rather should only be applied when a hard and substantial case exists.

And my answer is plain and simple. Rope in the women issue and in no time will the Feminazi brigade exacerbate the situation beyond repair. The hazi ali and shani singur protestors and others of such fundamentalist nature.

The narrative that  a woman is not being made the CM because she is a woman and in the meanwhile BJP start backing OPS. As selvan gets stronger with politcal muscle so does Sashikala with the military might of feminazi regiment. very soon we can have the clash of these puppet titans resulting in what we can call a law and order problem leading to breakdown of constitutional machinery.


Now the presidents rule is very very justified, the BJP did no haste as it was criticised of in Uttarakhand, and the courts cannot intervene as the situation is actually quite bad. And from theron we can have issues of ram mandir in tamil nadu as well..

Namaskar

middle east chaos 2

in December 2015 but which gained attention last week, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh Abdulaziz Al Sheikh, declared that chess was forbidden for Muslims. This was only one among many ignorant, bigotry-laced and extremist statements that constantly flow from the kingdom.

In December the same mufti claimed that Islamic State (IS) was actually run by Israel. On January 17 Sheikh Saud al-Shuraim, imam of the Grand Mosque in Mecca, claimed that Jews and Iranians were conspiring against “Muslims,” by which he meant Sunni Muslims of his flavor. “There is no surprise in the alliance of the Safavids with the Jews and Christians against the Muslims, history witnessed this. But there is surprise at minds delaying their understanding of this truth until this moment,” he wrote. Given statements like these, it may be surprising that Israel has increasingly been moving into the Saudi orbit in recent years.

On January 21 Sudanese foreign minister Ibrahim Ghandour said at a conference that “the matter of normalized relations with Israel is something that can be looked into.” His comments come in the wake of Sudan breaking off relations with Iran after the Saudi embassy in Iran was attacked and Saudi Arabia encouraged Sunni regimes to oppose Iran.

The embassy had been attacked by angry Shi’ite protesters after Saudi Arabia had executed a Saudi Shi’ite preacher named Nimr al-Nimr. The Sudanese “opening” to Israel is part of a larger quiet revolution in the Arab world. Foreign Ministry director-general Dore Gold told the Institute of National Securities Studies (INSS) conference on January 18 that Israel has contacts with “almost every Arab state.” Rather than being isolated, Israel is being incorporated into the Saudi Sunni-Arab orbit. Part of this includes the opening of a mission in Abu Dhabi and increasing contacts in the Gulf States. The Wall Street Journal termed this Israel “quietly courting Sunni states,” but in fact it is the other way around: the Sunni states of the Arab League want Israel defending their goal as their world crumbles under an Iranian octopus that has seen Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen fall to Iranian proxies.

Part of this reversal of fortune can be seen in the numerous statements coming out of Turkey about rekindling ties with Israel. Turkey’s President Reccep Tayyip Erdogan made criticism of Israel a key to his policy in the region since his AKP came to power 15 years ago. But after years of supporting Hamas in the Gaza Strip and making outrageous anti-Israel and even anti-Jewish statements, including a famous tirade against Shimon Peres in 2009 at Davos, he changed course on January 2. “Israel needs a country like Turkey, we have to admit we need Israel,” the Turkish leader said, on a flight home from, guess where? Saudi Arabia. Israel plays into this new charm offensive like a poor kid in the sandbox who begs to be picked second-to-last when sides are chosen for kick-ball.

The Saudi-led initiative has its pedigree. During the second intifada Saudi Arabia led a peace plan to grant Israel recognition in the region if Israel withdrew from the West Bank and Gaza. In June 2015 the Saudis also told Israelis at the Council on Foreign Relations in the US that Iran was a common enemy.

The courting of Israel comes against the backdrop of the rise and fall of IS in the region and the frustration of Sunni regimes with their inability to topple Bashar Assad in Syria. At the base of the Saudi worldview is an interest in using other actors to achieve the kingdom’s goals in the region. In the 1980s that meant bankrolling Iraq’s Saddam Hussein to fight Iran. In 1990 it meant asking the Americans to “save” it from Saddam when he got too big for his britches and invaded Kuwait. Every time the Saudis find themselves in trouble they sell their role in the region as guaranteeing stability. Bret Stephens bought into this in a column on January 19, noting that the US must “stand by” its historic Saudi ally “lest they be tempted to continue freelancing their foreign policy in ways we might not like.” This is the Saudi blackmail tactic; support us or the “real” extremists might emerge, not “us moderate Wahhabis” that only ban chess and such.

The Sunni Arab states that want Israel to help them confront Iran have proved incapable of doing so themselves. In Yemen the “grand alliance” of Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states and others, has relied on Columbian mercenaries, and King Salman of Saudi Arabia even asked Pakistan to send troops.

The same weird idea that outsiders could topple Syria’s Assad led Turkey to allow thousands of IS volunteers to transit its borders. Initially Turkey thought that the Syrian rebels would defeat Assad, but for unknown reasons the country also didn’t notice the cancerous growth of IS. The Saudi-Turkey- Qatar alliance against Assad could have toppled him in 2013 and 2014 if they had not allowed IS to grow but instead backed the moderate rebel factions.

Instead they played “wait and see.” Not until 2015 did Turkey begin to detain large numbers of IS volunteers, by which time it was too late and IS had conquered parts of Iraq and Syria and emboldened Iran, eventually leading Russia to intervene.

Assad, whom everyone hated in 2013, was suddenly the “bulwark against extremism.” In 2015 Turkey detained 913 volunteers for IS from 57 countries.

These included Trinidadians, 324 Muslims from China (Uighurs), 99 Russians (Chechans), 83 Palestinians and dozens from Indonesia, Afghanistan, Germany and the UK.

Now you can understand why in 2016 Saudi Arabia fully awoke to the ruin that its failed policies of managing conflict and soft-power diplomacy had wrought. Who will stand against Iran now that Iraq and Syria have fallen? With the apparent election of Michel Aoun in Lebanon with the support of his old adversary Samir Geagae, Hezbollah’s stranglehold on that country is complete. Aoun runs a small Christian party allied with the Shi’ite movement and Lebanon’s president is by law a Christian.

IT IS perhaps understandable that Saudi clerics hate chess so much – they’re bad at it. In the regional conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran, the Saudis have been badly outplayed. The Persians, on the other hand, invented the game. Without taking the stereotype too far, chess is a game whose complexity and history have more in common with the ancient intricacies of Iran than with the monochrome ignorance of Saudi’s Wahhabi imams.

Chess is also a game that Jews have excelled at.

It’s sophistication appeals to Jewish cultural and religious heritage. In one list of the 64 greatest chess minds of all time, 31 are Jewish. Here we find Garry Kasparov, Bobby Fischer, Mikhail Tal and László Szabó.

So why are Israel’s allies in the region anchored by Saudi Arabia? Because Iran’s regime loathes Israel.

That’s the simple answer. When Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon was speaking at INSS he made an offhand comment that he “prefers IS to Iran.”

What he meant was that Israel views Iran as a more serious threat, because of its strategic depth. Unlike IS, which has only one extremist policy which has brought it into conflict with the whole world, Iran is on the march in international diplomacy and its proxy Hezbollah threatens Israel. Over the weekend, for instance, Iran held high level meetings with China and John Kerry was in Riyadh admitting that Hezbollah’s 80,000 rockets aimed at Israel had come from Iran. Another report revealed Iran had recruited 20,000 Afghan Shia to fight it’s proxy war in Syria, and that sanctions relief would bring millions of dollars to the coffers of the Revolutionary Guards, which help run the wars in Syria and Iraq.

This isn’t the situation Israel would have historically preferred. Israel has far more in common with Iran than with Saudi Arabia. Iran builds on the legacy of an ancient Middle Eastern civilization, much as the Jewish people do in Israel. It is part of the fabric of diversity of the region. The Wahhabi Islam of Saudi Arabia is a net destroyer of the region’s diversity and beauty. It abhors music, culture, dancing, pre-Islamic temples and architecture and of course chess. Wherever it is, diversity is destroyed in the name of a simplistic extremism. Localized Islamic diversity, sheikhs’ tombs, Sufi shrines or Islamic sects like the Ahmadis are all hated. Despite the extremist nature of the Iranian regime, levels of anti-Semitism in Iran are among the lowest in the region. The extremist nature of Iran’s current regime is in contrast to its history.

In the period after 1948 Israel and Iran had diplomatic relations and Iran was the second country after Turkey to recognize the Jewish state. It was a relationship based on common interests. During 1964-1975 the warm relations with Iran enabled the opening of contacts with the Kurds, who were fighting against the Iraqi regime.

In an interesting irony, the Kurds in Iraq now find themselves in the same perplexing situation as Israel. Saudi Arabia and Turkey have cultivated closer ties with the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq, at the same time that the Kurdish leadership there is seeking independence. The Arab states used to call Kurdistan a “dagger” that would be a “new Israel” in the region. There is no doubt that part of that newfound support for Kurdistan in the Gulf is due to perceptions that the Kurds can be a bulwark against Iranian power in Iraq and Syria. Some Saudi strategists seek to use Israel and the Kurds as pawns against the Iranian position.

Israel and pro-Israel commentators should therefore not take the Saudi opening as example of some genuine move toward friendship. There is also nothing to celebrate in having relations with Sudan, a pariah state. It is worthwhile to keep in mind that Iran, despite all the negative aspects of its regime, has a cultural heritage more in common with Israel’s in terms of preserving diversity in the region.

Israel may have wanted an Iranian ally, but due to the extremism of the 1979 Revolution, the Jewish state has ended up with the Saudis. For now that relationship may work. But the long-term strategy should be to build relations with groups like the Kurds, and others.

middle east chaos 1

Saudi Iran

A charter member of the Arab League, Saudi Arabia has supported Palestinian rights to sovereignty, and called for withdrawal from the West Bank and other territory occupied by Israel since 1967.^{[citation needed]} However Saudi Arabia never participated in the Arab-Israeli wars and has not taken part in conflict with Israel in battle^{[citation needed]}. The 1981 Israel operation Operation Opera, a preemptive strike on nuclear reactor purchased by Iraq from France in 1976, allegedly^{[by whom?]} took place with the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, as the flightpath was over Saudi territory.^{[citation needed]}. In recent years^[when?] Saudi Arabia has changed its viewpoint concerning the validity of negotiating with Israel^{[citation needed]}, which it previously refused^{[citation needed]}. It calls for Israel's withdrawal from territory occupied in June 1967. In 2002 then-Crown Prince Abdullah extended a multilateral peace proposal based on withdrawal that would follow the borders of two state solution. At that time, Israel did not respond to the offer. In 2007 Saudi Arabia again officially supported a peaceful resolution of the Arab–Israeli conflict in which Israel was to concede to withdraw to the borders set in the two state solutions, which generated more official negative reactions from Israeli authorities, citing the Oslo Accords and the Saudis' deviation from those accords. At this time, no demands were made of any other party other than of Israel.

Saudi Arabia rejected the Camp David Accords, claiming that they would be unable to achieve a comprehensive political solution that would ensure Palestinian Arabs can all move to Israel and the division of Jerusalem. In response to Egypt "betraying" the Arab States and signing peace with Israel, Saudi Arabia, along with all the Arab States, broke diplomatic relations with and suspended aid to Egypt; the two countries renewed formal ties in 1987. Simultaneously Saudi Arabia and Israel initiated their early steps towards a secret dialogue.^[5]

Saudi Arabia does not have official diplomatic relations with Israel. In 2005, Saudi Arabia announced the end of its ban on Israeli goods and services, due to its application to the World Trade Organization, where one member country cannot have a total ban on another. However, as of August 2006, the Saudi boycott was not cancelled.^[6][7][8] However, Saudi Arabia recognizes that its ally, the United States, has a strong and supportive relationship of Israel.^{[citation needed]}

In spite of not having official diplomatic relations, they cooperate with each other by intelligence exchange, especially about Iran^{[citation needed]}. In a meeting at the Washington office of the Council on Foreign Relations, Anwar Eshki, a retired major general in the Saudi armed forces and Dore Gold, a former Israeli ambassador close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, discussed "their common interests in opposing Iran".^[9]

Saudi Arabia played an active role in attempting to bring the Palestinians towards a self-governing condition which would permit negotiations with Israel. It has done so primarily by trying to mend the schism between Fatah and Hamas, most notably when King Abdullah invited the two factions to negotiations in Mecca resulting in the Mecca Agreement of February 7, 2007. The agreement soon failed, but Saudi Arabia has continued to support a national unity government for the Palestinians, and strongly opposed the war in Gaza in early 2009.

The Times has reported that Saudi Arabia has tested the ability to stand down their air defenses to allow an Israeli strike on Iran to pass through their airspace.^[10] Both nations have denied this.^[11][12]

After the Arab Spring, Israel views the Saudi government as "guarantor of stability", according to the New York Times. In 2011, Israel approved a German sale of 200 Leopard tanks to Saudi Arabia.^[13] The approval came from Uzi Arad, the national security advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu.^[14]

During the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Middle East Eye editor David Hearst wrote an article claiming that Saudi Arabia was supportive of Israel's actions in the conflict, and that officials from Mossad and the Saudi intelligence agencies met regularly.^[15] The Saudi ambassador to the United Kingdom, Mohammed bin Nawwaf bin Abdulaziz, denied that the Saudi government was allied with Israel, describing Israel's actions against civilians in Gaza as "crimes against humanity" - however he did not deny that the two countries had contact, saying that "any dealings by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with Israel have been limited to attempts to bring about a plan for peace".^[16]

According to a May 23 article by The Times of Israel, the London-based Arab paper Rai al-Youm reported that Israel had offered to provide Saudi Arabia with Iron Dome technology against rockets from bordering Yemen. The proposal was reportedly sent via American diplomats during a meeting in Amman, Jordan, and subsequently refused. Official sources have not confirmed the report.^[17]

A political analyst by the name of "Mujtahid" who has been leaking information against Saudi Arabia on Twitter since early 2000s alleged that an upcoming drone-assembly plant in Saudi Arabia that is being developed with cooperation from South Africa is actually a guise for a clandenstine Israeli-Saudi Arabian deal for buying Israeli drones via South Africa. The Israeli drones are first sent to South Africa where they are disassembled and shipped to Saudi Arabia where they are assembled again.^[18]

After Egypt agreed to the transferring the Red Sea islands of Tiran and Sanafir to Saudi Arabia in April 2016, the Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia said that his country would honor the terms of the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty regarding the islands however they will have no direct contact with Israel over the matter.^[19] The Israeli government did not signal any opposition to the deal.

Iran–Israel relations

Iranian–Israeli relations can be divided into four major phases: the period from 1947–53, the friendly period during the era of the Pahlavi dynasty, the worsening period from the 1979 Iranian Revolution to 1990, and finally the hostility since the end of the First Gulf War. In 1947, Iran was among 13 countries that voted against the UN Partition Plan for Palestine. Two years later, Iran also voted against Israel's admission to the United Nations. Nevertheless, Iran was the second Muslim-majority country to recognize Israel as a sovereign state after Turkey. After the 1953 coup d'état, which brought pro-Western Mohammad Reza Pahlavi to power, relations between the two countries significantly improved. After the 1979 Revolution, Iran severed all diplomatic and commercial ties with Israel, and its Islamic government does not recognize the legitimacy of Israel as a state.

Former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in office from August 2005 to August 2013, at the October 2005 "World Without Zionism" conference in Tehran^[109][110] adopted a sharp anti-Zionist stance. On 8 December 2005, during a summit of Muslim nations in Islam's holy city of Mecca, Ahmadinejad told Iran's Arabic channel Al-Alam a complicated story on the Holocaust and the establishment of Israel. Since then, the Iranian president has made statements pertaining to these topics.^{[citation needed]}

Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami[edit]

In August 2012, a senior cleric and Tehran's provisional Friday Prayers Leader Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, speaking about Qods Day, called for the annihilation of the "Zionist regime," emphasizing that the spread of the "Islamic Awakening" in the Middle East "heralds annihilation of the Zionist regime.

To see further how the anti-Israeli sentiments in Iran are deep rooted and are not limited to the Islamic Republic's hardliners, watch the following interview with Iran's last king (before the Islamic revolution) known as the Shah, who is often mentioned as a friend of Israel (which he was in many ways, by the way). In this short video the Shah complains about the Jews wielding too much influence in the American government and advancing Israel's interests.

 Democracy: I believe the most important reason why most Arab countries are not as anti-Israel as Iran is that they are not democratic. In fact the people of these countries have stronger anti-Israeli sentiments compared with the Iranian people, but they don't have a say in what their government does. Notice that this is about those Arab countries being non-democratic, rather than being about Iran being democratic. The point is that if Arab nations had democratic governments, they would be way more anti-Israel than they are now. If this sounds odd to you, remember how Egypt's Mubarak and the Jordanian kingdom became friends of Israel in the face of their peoples' feelings, and notice how an anti-Israeli Morsi was elected as president in Egypt as soon as Mubarak was ousted.

pravasi overseas citizen of india and rahat and sankat mochan

Indian Air Force[edit]

In June 2009, the Indian Air Force (IAF) selected the C-17 for its Very Heavy Lift Transport Aircraft requirement to replace several types of transport aircraft.^[128][129] In January 2010, India requested 10 C-17s through the U.S.'s Foreign Military Sales program,^[130] the sale was approved by Congress in June 2010.^[131] On 23 June 2010, the Indian Air Force successfully test-landed a USAF C-17 at the Gaggal Airport, India to complete the IAF's C-17 trials.^[132] In February 2011, the IAF and Boeing agreed terms for the order of 10 C-17s^[133] with an option for six more; the US$4.1 billion order was approved by the Indian Cabinet Committee on Security on 6 June 2011.^[134][135] Deliveries began in June 2013 and are to continue until 2014.^[136][137] In 2012, the IAF reportedly finalized plans to buy six more C-17s in its five-year plan for 2017–22.^{[129][138][139]} However, this option is no longer available since C-17 production ended in 2015.^[140]

The IAF's first C-17, 2013

The aircraft provides strategic airlift and the ability to deploy special forces, such as during national emergencies.^[141] They are operated in diverse terrain – from Himalayan air bases in North India at 13,000 ft (4,000 m) to Indian Ocean bases in South India.^[142] The C-17s are based at Hindon Air Force Station and are operated by No. 81 Squadron IAF Skylords.^[143][144] The first C-17 was delivered in January 2013 for testing and training;^[145] it was officially accepted on 11 June 2013.^[146] The second C-17 was delivered on 23 July 2013 and put into service immediately. IAF Chief of Air Staff Norman AK Browne called the Globemaster III "a major component in the IAF's modernization drive" while taking delivery of the aircraft at Boeing's Long Beach factory.^[147] On 2 September 2013, the Skylords squadron with three C-17s officially entered IAF service.^[148]