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 Hindustan Times December, 21, 2020 Xi replaces PLA commander who started Ladakh standoff; fingers crossed in Delhi The change of guard in the leadership of the Western Theatre Command has sparked hope in New Delhi that General Zhao’s replacement may not be as vitriolically anti-India. Gen Zhao, who had also engineered the 2017 Doklam conflict with India, has been seen as a hardliner against India and Bhutan. Chinese President Xi Jinping has moved out General Zhao Zongqi, the People’s Liberation Army’s powerful Western Theatre Commander, seen as the man responsible for the seven-month long military standoff with India in eastern Ladakh, and replaced him with General Zhang Xudong, who has never served along the Indian border. The change of guard in the leadership of the Western Theatre Command has sparked hope in New Delhi that General Zhao’s replacement may not be as vitriolically anti-India. Gen Zhao, who had also engineered the 2017 Doklam conflict with India, has been seen as a ...

By Shruti Srivastava, Bloomberg India’s key manufacturing exports may lose market share to a China-backed Asian trade bloc, from which PM Modi walked away last year to protect the interests of local farmers and industry. Some of India’s top 10 exports such as engineering goods, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and electronics face erosion in market share on account of lower taris that members of the 15- nation Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership enjoy for trading among themselves, according to economists. To put things in perspective, engineering products alone account for a quarter of the nation’s merchandise exports. “In sectors where India is somewhat contributing to the global supply chain, RCEP would prove to be disadvantageous,” Amitendu Palit, a senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore, said by phone. “Under RCEP, cost of trade will come down which is a big advantage.” As the trade pact kicks in, tari will be eliminated on at least 92% of traded good...

The telegraph Dated: September 01, 2020 Tension is running high on the Ladakh border after India said it had pre-empted China’s “provocative military movements to change the status quo” and Beijing responded by asking New Delhi to withdraw troops that had “illegally crossed” the Line of Actual Control (LAC). On Saturday night, Indian soldiers noticed Chinese troop movements and mobilised to deter further encroachment, the Indian Army said. The confrontation did not escalate into a clash, sources said. “On the night of 29/30 August 2020, PLA (Chinese People’s Liberation Army) troops violated the previous consensus arrived at during military and diplomatic engagements during the ongoing standoff in Eastern Ladakh and carried out provocative military movements to change the status quo,” the Indian Army said in a statement on Monday afternoon. “Indian troops pre-empted this PLA activity on the southern bank of Pangong Tso Lake, undertook measures to strengthen o...

 The Indian Express August 08, 2020 After the breakdown of talks at the level of the Corps Commander to restore status quo ante at friction points on the  Line of Actual Control  (LAC) in Ladakh, the division commanders of India and  China  are likely to meet in the coming days to arrive at a plan to reduce tensions in the strategic Depsang Plains. Official sources told  The Indian Express  that the meeting would be held at the Daulat Beg Oldie (DBO)-Tianwendian border meeting point on the LAC. The Indian delegation will be led by the General Officer Commanding of 3 Mountain Division, Major General Abhijit Bapat, at the meeting which is likely to happen “in the next few days,” sources said. The agenda of the meeting, sources said, is to reduce tensions at the Depsang Plains where both sides have massed troops on the disputed border. More than 15,000 Chinese troops are estimated to have been deployed opposite Depsang, where India has also mobilised matc...

The Wire  Date: Aug 06, 2020 PTI,  The economic outlook for an evolving COVID-19 world is that a global recession is now inevitable. And the availability of credit will decide how much of the world economy will survive. In India, access to funds via foreign direct investment (FDI) has been tightened. In a cautious attempt to avert the rising possibility of “opportunistic takeovers” by nations from which large amounts of FDI flows into the country, the Indian government has mandated that all the investments from neighbouring countries, including China, would now require government approval. This has sealed the “automatic route” for nations through which an increasing number of foreign firms and individuals had lately begun to invest. While not overtly stated, the policy change is likely in view of risks to the national interests in a scenario where viable Indian businesses would be sold to foreign Chinese interests. In a direct defence against possible hostile takeovers in an e...

The Economic Times  Date: Aug 05, 2020 Surbhi Agarwal, New Delhi: Nearly 15 new mobile applications such as ByteDance-owned video editing app CapCut and Xiaomi’s browser app were included in a follow-up ban on 47 Chinese apps late last month, according to a list that ET has reviewed. The remaining were ‘lite’ or ‘pro’ versions of the apps that the government banned earlier in June, including TikTok and Helo, both owned by ByteDance, the list showed. Among the new apps included in the list are photo editor AirBrush, short video and prediction tool Meipai and camera app BoXxCAM, which are owned by China’s Meitu, which makes smartphones as well as many popular selfie apps. The company’s flagship app Meitu was banned in the first round. Email service NetEase, gaming app Heroes War and SlidePlus by QuVideo Inc are the other new apps blocked in the latest list issued about 10 days ago. Xiaomi’s Mi Browser Pro has also been blocked after its Mi Community app was banned earlier. Similarly,...

Fistpost Date: Aug 04, 2020 PTI, New Delhi:  The Indian army has categorically conveyed to China's PLA at the fifth round of military talks it will not compromise on India's territorial integrity, and clearly said disengagement of troops from Pangong Tso and a few other friction points in eastern Ladakh should be completed at the earliest, people familiar with the developments said on Monday. Senior commanders of the two armies held intense negotiations for nearly 11 hours on Sunday at a designated meeting point in Moldo on the Chinese side of the Line of Actual Control (LAC). The Indian delegation very clearly and firmly communicated to the Chinese side that restoration of status quo ante in all areas of eastern Ladakh was key for overall ties between the two countries, and that Beijing must ensure complete disengagement of its troops from the remaining friction points, according to the people familiar with the developments. It was also categorically conveyed that the Indian a...

Scroll Date: Aug 05, 2020 PTI, China on Tuesday said the border conflict with India should be seen in a proper bilateral context, and urged New Delhi to ensure that differences do not escalate into disputes. Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson  Wang Wenbin , at a press conference, called for “stronger solidarity and cooperation” between India and China, saying that it would help the development of the two countries as well as “add stability and positive energy to world peace and prosperity”. “The two sides should always place the boundary issue in an appropriate position in bilateral relations and avoid differences escalating into disputes,” Wang said. “It is hoped that India will work with China in the same direction and jointly safeguard the overall interests of bilateral relations with concrete actions.” Wang was responding to a question about Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar’s comment on August 2, that “reaching an equilibrium with Beijing is not going to be easy...

Hindustan Times Date: Aug 02, 2020 Shishir Gupta India’s education ministry has decided to review in the coming week, the setting up of local chapters of the Confucius Institutes in association with seven local colleges and universities after security agencies alerted it to the growing Chinese influence in higher education in India. The ministry also plans to review 54 Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) signed between prestigious educational institutions including IITs, BHU, JNU and NITs and Chinese institutions. It has already issued a notification to the Ministry of External Affairs and the University Grants Commission. The Confucius Institutes are directly funded by Ministry of Education of People’s Republic of China with the ostensible aim to promote Chinese language and Culture. But they have come in for criticism all around the world, including the US and the UK for helping spread Chinese propaganda. Most recently, according to a BBC report of September 2019, Austral...

LiveMint Date: July 30, 2020 Prasid Banerjee  Growing anti-China sentiments in India and the government ban on Chinese apps seems to have helped global companies more than those from India. According to app analytics firm Sensor Tower, only one of the top three apps that gained from the ban on TikTok was Indian—Roposo. The other two were New York-based Dubsmash and short-video app Zili, which is owned by Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi. The number of installations of Zili app surged nearly threefold in the three weeks following the June-end ban on TikTok, rising to 8 million installs from about 3 million in the prior period. Installations of Chinese Snack Video rose to a lifetime high of 23.5 million downloads from India and ranked No.1 on Apple’s App Store in the week of 13 July. Both Zili and Snack Video may face bans in the future, according to recent reports, but they are fully operational in the country right now. A survey by influencer marketing firm, ...

Arun Mampazhy-Jul 13, 2020 On 24 June, in its 8pm show “The Right Stand” CNN News18 presented a hypothesis that China’s aggression against India and attempts to take over more and more of what is rightfully India’s, especially water bodies, is part of its desperation for water, amidst its ambitious growth plans in the semiconductor chip (IC) manufacturing area. In this article, three pertinent matters will be put forth in the spirit and hope of triggering further debate among those interested: What is China’s current status in chip manufacturing, that is, the semiconductor fab area and how desperate are they? I will present a summary mainly based on this detailed semi-engineering study that was published recently. How critical is water for China and in particular for the fab industry. I will use some numbers from this 2013 article. Indeed, “much water has flown under the bridge” since 2013, but the indicative numbers and messages are relevant to-date. I acknowledge Lo...