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Anti-Hindu Delhi riots: Delhi court convicts Arif, Mohd. Khalid, Abdul Sattar, Tanveer Ali, and Hunain in connection with Bhajanpura petrol pump violence, read what the court said

OpIndia Staff
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Anti-Hindu Delhi riots: Delhi court convicts Arif, Mohd. Khalid, Abdul Sattar, Tanveer Ali, and Hunain in connection with Bhajanpura petrol pump violence, read what the court said

A Delhi Court on Wednesday (9th September) convicted five accused, namely Arif, Mohd. Khalid, Abdul Sattar, Tanveer Ali, and Hunain in connection with violence at the Bhajanpura petrol pump that happened on February 24, 2020, during the anti-Hindu Delhi riots.

Additional Sessions Judge-03, North-East District, Karkardooma Courts, Delhi, Parveen Singh, pronounced the judgment convicting the five accused of rioting, assaulting/obstructing a public servant when suppressing a riot, voluntarily obstructing a public servant in discharge of public functions, and assault or criminal force to deter a public servant from discharge of duty. The hearing on the accused’s sentencing will take place on September 16, 2026.

“In view of the above findings, I find that prosecution, beyond all reasonable doubts, has proved that the accused had committed offences punishable u/s 147 IPC r/w section 149 IPC; u/s 152 IPC r/w section 149 IPC; u/s 186 IPC r/w section 149 IPC and u/s 353 IPC r/w section 149 IPC,” the court held, noting that the prosecution proved the said charges against the accused beyond a reasonable doubt.

After examining all the material on record, including witness testimonies, the court concluded that a mob of at least 100-150 people gathered at Bhajanpura Petrol Pump with a common object of committing riot, arson, criminal mischief, and vandalism.

The court held that the five accused, Tanveer, Hunain, Arif Malik, Mohd. Khalid and Abdul Sattar were part of the mob, which was an unlawful assembly under Section 141 of the IPC.

The FIR in the case was filed by ASI Arvind Kumar on February 25, 2026. According to the prosecution, the police received information around 2:00 pm on February 24, 2020, about a large gathering near the Bhajanpura petrol pump. On getting the information, ASI Arvind Kumar and some other police personnel reached the petrol pump at around 2:10 pm.

On reaching the petrol pump, they saw a mob of 100-150 people protesting and raising slogans against the CAA/NRC. In no time, the mob turned violent and pelted stones at the police, broke the road divider, vandalised the petrol pump, vehicles, and nearby shops, and set vehicles on fire.

Court observations

The prosecution presented 26 witnesses before the court, of which the Court relied on the testimonies of eight prosecution witnesses, including five police witnesses, to hold the accused guilty. The five police witnesses, ASI Arvind Kumar, Retd. SI/ASI Ved Pal, Retd. HC Arvind, HC Jagroop and Constable Nemi Chand were present at the spot when the mob, including the five accused, unleashed violence at the petrol pump. They identified the five accused and described their acts of violence at the petrol pump to the court.

The court rejected the defence’s claim that the police witnesses were not present at the spot when the violence at the petrol pump happened. The court said the defence failed to prove the police witnesses were not present at Bhajanpura Petrol Pump at the time of the incident. It further noted that the testimonies of the police witnesses sound credible and corroborate one another.

“Apart from the general and bald suggestions, put to only some of them, that they were not present at Bhajanpura Petrol Pump at the time of the incident, or that they had not seen the incident or the accused, nothing could be brought out during the cross-examination of these police witnesses that would significantly dent their credibility. On the contrary, a pattern emerges from their testimonies, including their cross-examinations, by which they corroborate each other,” the Court noted.

The court noted that the police witnesses’ descriptions of the events relating to the incident matched one another and were further corroborated by the testimonies of other witnesses.

The court said that the witnesses’ version of events could not be doubted. “…the version of how the events unfolded, given by these police witnesses, has remained consistent. Not only have they corroborated each other on this aspect, but one independent public witness and one police witness from another district have also corroborated their version. Their presence at Bhajanpura Petrol Pump on 24.02.2020 at or around 2.00 p.m., therefore, cannot be doubted,” the court said.

The court observed that these policemen were present on the ground and came face to face with the rioters. Therefore, their identification of the accused leaves little room for suspicion.

“In view of the foregoing discussion, I am of the considered opinion that through the testimonies of PW2, PW5, PW7, PW8, PW12, PW13, PW14 and PW19 the prosecution beyond all reasonable doubts has proved that at about 2 PM on 24/02/2020, a mob of not less
than 100-150 people had gathered in front of ‘Delhi Diesels’, a petrol pump popularly known as Bhajanpura Petrol Pump. The said mob was
raising slogans against CAA/NRC, and from its conduct it can be safely gathered that it has assembled with a common object of committing riot, arson, criminal mischief and vandalism. Hence, this being an assembly of more than five persons, the common object of which was to commit offences such as rioting, arson, criminal mischief and vandalism, was an unlawful assembly within the definition of section141 IPC,” the court said.

The court further stated that during their cross-examination, the defence has failed to shake the credibility of the witnesses and from their testimonies, it is clear that the unlawful assembly of which the accused were members had used violence and force in prosecution of its common object of rioting and arson and thus, an offence u/s 146 IPC was committed, which is punishable u/s 147 IPC and thus, by
virtue of section 149 IPC, the accused had committed this offence.

The court also noted that while the police [witnesses] were deployed to maintain law and order, the Muslim rioters attacked them by pelting stones upon them, and “ferocity of the attack was such that the police officials fled from the petrol pump by jumping over its wall and thus, in a situation of riot, when the police officials who had fired tear gas shells and tried to pacify the unlawful assembly, were met with force, attacked and had to flee, the unlawful assembly had used criminal force upon the public servants and obstructed them in discharge of their duty while they were suppressing the riot.”

“In view of the aforesaid discussion, it also stands proved that the unlawful assembly had voluntarily obstructed the police officials who were public servants discharging their duty and at the same time by pelting stones upon them, this unlawful assembly had used criminal force upon them in order to prevent them from discharging their duty which was maintaining the law and order,” the court added.

The court held the accused guilty of being part of an unlawful assembly and committing violence, arson, criminal mischief, and vandalism at the Bhajanpura petrol pump.

However, the court did not accept the prosecution’s allegation that the petrol pump was set on fire by the mob, noting that there were inconsistencies and gaps in the evidence concerning this particular allegation.

The anti-Hindu Delhi riots

The violence at the Bhajanpura petrol pump was part of the large-scale anti-Hindu riots and violence that happened in the national capital on February 24 and 25 in 2020. Several parts of Delhi, including Shahdara, Maujpur, Bhajanpura, and Brahmapur, witnessed brutal violence and chaos unleashed by Islamist mobs, which went on a rampage, attacking the police as well as common people. The anti-Hindu riots were a culmination of the anger and hostility manufactured by Islamists during the anti-CAA protests in Shaheen Bagh and other areas.

11 women, four months, one Congress MP-Professor: Why JNU must answer over ‘marks for sexual favours’ allegations against Bimol Akoijam

Amit Kelkar
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11 women, four months, one Congress MP-Professor: Why JNU must answer over ‘marks for sexual favours’ allegations against Bimol Akoijam

Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has long been a campus where protests over politics, ideology and academic freedom can erupt within hours. But when 11 women students approach the university’s Internal Complaints Committee with allegations of sexual harassment against a professor who also happens to be a sitting Congress MP, the question is no longer merely political; it is about whether the institution’s own mechanisms work when the accused is politically influential.

The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) took to the streets outside JNU’s School of Social Sciences on September 9, demanding action against Congress Lok Sabha MP and JNU professor Angomcha Bimol Akoijam. The organisation also questioned why the complaints, reportedly filed in May, have still not reached a conclusion. 

That four-month delay is now at the heart of the controversy.

11 students came forward, but the questions remain unanswered

According to reports, the allegations stem from viva examinations conducted in the first week of May. One student’s account was subsequently shared in a students-only WhatsApp group, following which several other women students reportedly came forward with similar allegations. The complaints were then submitted to JNU’s Internal Complaints Committee in May. 

The allegations reportedly include inappropriate, sexually suggestive remarks and claims that students were offered higher marks in exchange for sexual favours.

These are allegations, not facts, and the outcome of the Internal Committee’s proceedings will determine what actually happened. But precisely because the allegations are serious, the inquiry cannot be allowed to disappear into bureaucratic limbo.

ABVP’s contention is straightforward: if an ordinary professor were facing allegations from 11 students, would the university permit the matter to remain unresolved for months?

And if the answer is no, why should the identity or political standing of the accused change the urgency with which the complaint is handled?

The uncomfortable political question

Akoijam is not merely a JNU professor.

He is a Congress MP representing Inner Manipur in the Lok Sabha, and his political profile has grown considerably since he entered electoral politics in 2024. He won the Inner Manipur seat in his first Lok Sabha election and became one of Congress’ prominent voices on the Manipur crisis. 

That makes the ABVP’s question about political influence particularly significant.

The organisation has accused JNU’s administration and Internal Committee of failing to ensure a transparent and time-bound process. It has also questioned the silence of Congress, NSUI and Left student organisations that routinely position themselves as champions of women’s rights and student welfare. 

This is where the controversy acquires a distinctly political dimension.

Women’s safety cannot become a principle that applies only when the accused belongs to the political camp one dislikes.

If the allegations are false, Akoijam deserves a fair and credible process that clears his name. If they are substantiated, appropriate action must follow. What cannot serve anyone, not the complainants, not the accused, and certainly not JNU, is an inquiry that drags on without clarity.

90-day rule raises serious questions over delay

The delay in the inquiry becomes particularly significant when viewed against JNU’s own rules governing sexual harassment complaints. The university’s Internal Complaints Committee guidelines state that an inquiry “has to be completed within a period of ninety days from the receipt of the complaint.” The inquiry report is then required to be submitted within 10 days of completion.

If the first complaint was received in May, the prescribed 90-day period had already become a critical benchmark by August. This raises an obvious question: why has the inquiry still not been concluded?

The issue is not about declaring anyone guilty before the inquiry is complete. It is about whether the institutional process is functioning within its own prescribed timeline. When 11 women students have reportedly approached the mechanism with allegations against a professor who is also a sitting Congress MP, JNU must explain the delay rather than allow questions about institutional independence to grow.

The more uncomfortable question is whether the complainants have been adequately protected from possible political or institutional influence. If JNU’s Internal Committee is genuinely independent, the university should have little difficulty demonstrating that the proceedings are being conducted impartially, without favour or pressure.

The central questions now are: Is the inquiry into the JNU sexual-harassment allegations already facing an institutional credibility crisis? Why was the 90-day deadline apparently not met? And, most importantly, what safeguards has JNU put in place to ensure that the complainants are not subjected to influence or intimidation while the accused is a politically influential public figure?

Who is Bimol Akoijam?

Akoijam is an academic-turned-politician whose career before electoral politics was rooted in JNU.

JNU’s official profile identifies him as a professor at the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, School of Social Sciences. His academic interests include social and political psychology, identity politics, conflict, nation-state and minorities, intergroup and gender relations, popular culture and politics of knowledge. The university lists an M.A./Ph.D. qualification and 16 years of experience. 

His academic work has extensively dealt with Manipur, conflict and identity politics. He has written on subjects including the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act and the political history of Manipur. JNU’s profile also records the Young Psychologist Award conferred on him by the National Academy of Psychology.

His transition into electoral politics came against the backdrop of the 2023 Manipur violence. Congress fielded him from Inner Manipur in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, where he defeated the BJP’s Thounaojam Basanta Kumar Singh by more than one lakh votes. 

He is currently serving his first term as an MP. PRS records his parliamentary attendance at 81%, with 15 debates and 60 questions listed on his profile. 

A professor, a parliamentarian and now the centre of a campus controversy

The Internal Committee exists precisely to provide an institutional mechanism for such complaints. Its credibility depends on being seen as independent, impartial and capable of reaching conclusions within the applicable framework. But the fact that the first complaint was filed in May raises serious questions on whether the committee was compromised from the start itself.

ABVP has now put JNU in an uncomfortable position: if the university believes the complaints are being handled properly, it should explain the timeline and process. If there has been a delay, it should explain why.

The same principle should apply to political parties and student organisations.

Congress, NSUI and Left student groups cannot credibly demand accountability in cases involving political opponents while treating allegations involving someone within their own political ecosystem as an inconvenient subject best avoided.

The test of a commitment to women’s rights is not whether the accused is politically convenient to condemn. It is whether the same standard is applied when the accused is politically inconvenient.

For now, the allegations remain unproven. But the questions surrounding how the complaints were handled are very real. JNU owes the 11 complainants, and Akoijam himself, a process that is swift, independent, transparent and capable of producing an answer.

Anything less will only deepen the suspicion that, at JNU, political influence can sometimes make an institution move more slowly than it otherwise would.

Get off our roads, Mr Singh: As US Homeland Security Department racist post faces flak, pro-Khalistani voice and Trump administration member Harmeet Dhillon maintains silence

Rukma Rathore
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Get off our roads, Mr Singh: As US Homeland Security Department racist post faces flak, pro-Khalistani voice and Trump administration member Harmeet Dhillon maintains silence

The United States is witnessing a disturbing rise in anti-India rhetoric and hostility, particularly across online spaces. Indians, and especially Hindus, have increasingly found themselves in the crosshairs of white supremacist and neo-Nazi sections of the MAGA movement, who have gone beyond attacking the community to mocking its faith, traditions and culture.

However, what makes the situation even more unsettling is that the racism is no longer confined to some corners of the internet and appears to have found an echo within the highest levels of the Trump administration itself. Now, key government departments are openly fostering an environment where such sentiments can flourish instead of being firmly confronted.

A similar incident occurred on 9th September (Wednesday) when the US Department of Homeland Security shared an AI-generated picture designed to resemble a movie poster for the popular “Transformers” movie series. It was named “Transformers: America for Americans” and displayed an imposing Transformer with Homeland Security’s seal against a brown and bearded Indian man wearing a head covering. The poster warned, “Self deport or find out,” and further read, “Get off our roads, you don’t know how to drive, Mr Singh.”

The poster was accompanied by a popular scene from the franchise featuring its villain and had been altered to include the names of some accused of Indian descent. The move, unsurprisingly, triggered a wave of outrage within the Indian community, with many calling out the federal department for acting as a mouthpiece for racists. However, a similarly revealing occurrence took place simultaneously in the aftermath.

The post did not merely take aim at Indians. It specifically singled out Sikhs, reducing an entire community to the crude stereotype of bad drivers. Yet, as the controversy unfolded, those who are otherwise quick to speak out for Khalistan and claim persecution to denounce India on global platforms maintained a conspicuous silence.

Even the loudest Khalistani voices within the Trump administration, particularly Harmeet Kaur Dhillon, who routinely invoke victimhood to target India, chose to look the other way when their own community was subjected to such a blatant racial attack. Notably, these separatists have sought asylum in Western countries, including the United States, by asserting persecution at the hands of the Indian government and presenting these nations as havens from the alleged atrocities they endured back home.

However, the irony is hard to miss. Those who have repeatedly portrayed the West as their refuge have suddenly decided to remain silent when they experienced xenophobic aggression from the upper echelons of government, which they intended to leverage to undermine India’s international standing.

Indian community pushes back against the racist post

The upload understandably sparked outrage within the Indian American community, many of whom reacted strongly to the deeply offensive and disgraceful move by Homeland Security. Hindu American Foundation wrote, “Singhs are Hindu, they are Sikhs, they are American, and they drive. Racist, un-American, anti-Indian profiling/trolling by the DHS should shock our nation’s collective conscience.”

It inquired whether the filmmakers were comfortable with their cinematic work being utilised for such purposes and even tagged Harmeet Dhillon along with other accounts to seek accountability regarding the reprehensible action.

Kushal Mehra blamed Khalistanis for the growing racism in the United States.

Another user responded that the Trump administration has shifted from enforcing immigration laws to openly propagating against Indian people. He remarked, “This is the language and imagery being attached to the power of the US Department of Homeland Security. A federal government humiliating an ethnic group with racial stereotypes is not America First.” He referred to it as “state sponsored bigotry.”

CoHNA (Coalition of Hindus of North America) told the department to impose the law rather than indulge in a “caricature” of individuals. It highlighted, “Dangerous drivers come from all backgrounds, ethnicities, faiths and last names. Singling out some last names does nothing for safe streets, but it does endanger the safety of hundreds of thousands of Americans with names like Singh and Kumar.”

According to the advocacy group, an act by the official US Government portraying a brown person as “foreign” and “un-American” effectively opens the door for the targeting of Hindus and Indian Americans, even those who are legal residents and citizens. “Especially ironic to see the transformers used to stereotype and put a target on the backs of vulnerable communities and individuals. Stop stigmatising millions of law-abiding Hindu, Sikh and Indian Americans,” it appealed.

Fox 7 Austin anchor Alec Nolan mentioned that his family surname is Singh and his father arrived in America from India several decades ago in pursuit of a better life. “He became a raisin farmer in California. My grandpa eventually took over the family business and also worked as a truck driver,” the journalist stated, adding that the “post is racist and demeaning to anyone with the last name Singh.”

Transformers are extraterrestrial metal lifeforms who have arrived from another planet, but in a twist of irony, they are being employed by the Trump administration to promote racist rhetoric against Indians in the US. Some jokes, as cruel as they might be, truly write themselves.

Harmeet Dhillon turns a blind eye to the racial attack

While the Indian community and others rightly questioned the Department of Homeland Security, Harmeet Dhillon, a close confidante of President Donald Trump and the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division at the US Department of Justice, decided to completely ignore the repulsive exhibit of racism.

Interestingly, she also encountered similar attacks after performing a Sikh prayer to conclude the Republican National Convention in 2024. However, she chose to enjoy the attention instead of opposing the bigotry associated with Trump’s preferred support group. Therefore, her silence following the recent incident is rather predictable.

On the other hand, Dhillon’s approach has often appeared markedly different when the subject is India, where she has been often accused of endorsing Punjab’s secession. She has inflated every trivial or non-significant matter into a major propaganda opportunity or conjured controversies out of thin air to peddle her anti-India narrative while sympathising with and assisting Khalistanis living in the US.

Her position on the killing of terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar and the ensuing barrage of unfounded charges made by then-Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is the clearest evidence of her pro-Khalistan inclination. “Canada’s conservative leader joins other Canadian officials in condemning the extrajudicial murder of Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar. It’s good to see them unite against this shocking act,” she wrote after the country’s opposition leader Pierre Poilievre sided with Trudeau.

Dhillon also cited an article from the controversial British media house “The Economist” about how Indian migrants were promoting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s domestic campaign and international lobbying efforts. She reiterated unproven accusations that New Delhi is killing critics in the diaspora, referencing the report. She charged that the Modi government was operating “death squads” in both the US and Canada.

Dhillon regularly points to unreliable reports to argue that human rights violations are taking place in India, specially in Punjab, to reinforce the Khalistani narrative.

Furthermore, she demonstrated her Hinduphobia by using caste rhetoric against the Democratic leader Kamala Harris. Dhillon reacted to the pronunciation of her name and insisted that she emphasises the second syllable, making it Kamala instead of Camala as it is known in India. “She comes from a high-caste Brahmin family. Her mother is a Brahmin,” she stated while talking to another white supremacist Tucker Carlson.

Of course, Dhillon even keeps the company of like-minded individuals who possess a mutual disdain for India and Hindus. John-Paul S. Deol, her former law firm partner, was caught dog-whistling against Siddhartha Patel, the Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Sacramento Field Office last year.

He made highly disparaging remarks against Lord Shiva over a tweet condemning terrorist Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale in relation to a “The Wire” article in 2023. “There is no civilization sadder and backward than pagan Lindu,” he wrote in another post on social media in that year. Deol demonised the Vedas and associated them with caste. He has also been one the ardent supporters of the anti-caste bill in the US that targets Hindus.

Conclusion

It has become increasingly apparent that Khalistani figures such as Dhillon are opportunists of the highest order. Their sole focus is on their agenda against India, and they are prepared to betray the sensitive concerns of their community members which they assert to champion. The recent event has not only revealed the ugly truths about the US government but have also exposed the claims of this Khalistani faction.

The post has further deepened the unease already felt among Indians, particularly Hindus, in the US. However, Khalistanis who have spent years denigrating India on American soil have found themselves subjected to the same kind of racial stereotyping and othering. In many ways, the chickens appear to have come home to roost for this anti-India faction.

Meanwhile, those who have endorsed the separatist cause, including Dhillon, seem noticeably unwilling to stand up for the very people they profess to represent.

Data centres to space economy: Jefferies highlights six sectors and the Modi government’s policy measures that will drive ‘India’s new Industrial Revolution’

Shraddha Pandey
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Data centres to space economy: Jefferies highlights six sectors and the Modi government’s policy measures that will drive ‘India’s new Industrial Revolution’

In its report titled India’s New Industrial Revolution, global investment bank Jefferies said that space, semiconductors, data centres, electronics, solar manufacturing and aerospace sectors could drive the next phase of India’s industrial growth in the coming years. This “revolution” is expected to be led by a combination of an established manufacturing base, a massive domestic market and a rising global demand for an alternative supply chain that will create opportunities in India across emerging industries.

The Jefferies report published on 8th September stated that this opportunity is being backed by the Modi government’s incentives and policy measures, particularly the schemes for semiconductors, solar manufacturing, electronics, and the opening up of the Space sector for private companies.

“Large domestic opportunity is driving private participation in emergent industries in India across Space, Semi & Electronics, Datacenters and Solar. Support from the govt. is also visible here with action such as opening up space to pvt. sector, long tax holiday for DCs, large incentive schemes for Semi, Electronics & Solar, localisation requirements, GPU purchases etc,” the report reads.

Opening the space sector to private players is a game-changer

The Jefferies report highlighted the Modi government’s decision to open up India’s Space sector for private companies in 2020. It highlighted that since the space sector was opened for private participation, “Startups are advancing from early innovation to commercial execution with companies such as Skyroot (orbital launch in July), Pixxel (high-res observation satellites), Agnikul (3D-printed rocket engine) & Digantara (surveillance satellites).”

Notably, the Modi government’s push to bring private companies into the space sector began explicitly in 2020 as part of the broader economic reforms announced during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In May 2020, the fourth tranche of the Atmanirbhar Bharat package was announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The minister said that the government wanted private companies to become partners in India’s space journey.

The Central government had announced that private companies would be allowed to use ISRO facilities and other relevant assets to improve their capabilities. The government’s intent was never to fully privatise ISRO but to make better use of India’s existing space infrastructure and allow startups and private companies to develop their own capabilities under ISRO’s guidance.

For private participation, IN-SPACe was created as a regulatory and facilitation mechanism, while NewSpace India Limited (NSIL) has a commercial role in taking ISRO-developed technologies and systems to industry.

Later in 2023, the Indian Space Policy allowed private companies a wider role across the space value chain, including the development and operation of space systems.

India’s semiconductor ambitions are moving from policy intent to execution

The Jefferies report highlighted India’s pivot in recent years, from policy to execution in the semiconductor sector. It noted India’s creating an ecosystem and has pumped around $20 billion in investment, has a chip fab under construction and has multiple OSAT projects starting production. A further ~$13 billion incentive plan is also set to boost the ecosystem. Jefferies opines that India is building the foundations of a “credible” semiconductor ecosystem.

“Creating an ecosystem. India’s semiconductor aspirations are moving from policy intent to execution with ~$20bn of investments, including a chip fab under construction and several OSAT projects starting production. A new ~$13bn incentive plan should further expand the ecosystem and boost value addition, including chip design. While supply chain depth, talent, and global competition remain challenges, we believe India is building the foundations of a credible semiconductor ecosystem,” the report reads.

In recent years, the Modi government has, through its policy interventions, attempted to make India self-reliant in the semiconductor sector. India is rapidly expanding and bolstering its semiconductor chip design ecosystem. The Modi government launched the India Semiconductor Mission

In 2021, with Rs 76,000 crore in incentives. The Mission approved at least 10 projects worth Rs 1.6 lakh crore across six states. The initiative is aimed at attracting global manufacturers, building fabs, packaging units and a local supply chain to reduce reliance on imports. 

In May 2025, the Union Cabinet approved India’s sixth semiconductor manufacturing unit in Jewar in western Uttar Pradesh, for establishment through a joint venture between the HCL Group and Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn. 

To support indigenous startups, the Modi government launched the Design Linked Incentive (DLI) Scheme in 2022 to ensure venture capital investment in this sector by curbing upfront risk through financial support, access to advanced EDA tools, IP cores, etc. and greater ecosystem awareness of semiconductor chip design.

In November 2024, the Centre approved C2i Semiconductors for financial support and access to advanced chip design tools under the DLI Scheme.

In the Union Budget 2026-27, the Modi government announced the India Semiconductor Mission 2.0 with Rs 1,000 crore allocated to bolster domestic semiconductor capabilities. In its new phase, the Mission will focus on the production of semiconductor equipment and materials in India. Designing full-stack Indian semiconductor intellectual property and fortifying both domestic and global supply chains will remain in focus.

“5x capacity in 5 years”: India’s data centre space is becoming a strategic digital infrastructure segment

The Jefferies report noted that the colocation capacity of India’s data centre has increased fivefold in five years. This growth is driven by cloud adoption, digitisation and data localisation requirements.

“We expect capacity to grow another 5x to ~10GW over the next five years, supported by favorable cost economics, policy support and rising hyperscaler demand. We calculate this expansion represents a US$9bn revenue opportunity for data center operators and a US$45bn investment opportunity across power, cooling, construction and network infrastructure,” the report states.

Pertinently, the Modi government is aggressively building data infrastructure to boost AI and cloud growth.  In the Union Budget 2026-27, the Centre announced a long-term tax holiday framework designed to attract foreign investment while preserving India’s domestic tax base.

In consequence of India’s policy shift, there has been a significant surge in foreign investment in this sector. In December 2025, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced a US$17.5 billion investment to expand India’s AI infrastructure, develop advanced skills, and strengthen sovereign technological capabilities. In October 2025, Google announced its plans to develop India’s largest AI data centre campus in Andhra Pradesh with an investment of $15 billion over five years. Around $95 billion in investments were pledged between 2019 and 2025 alone.

From assembly to domestic value addition: India’s electronics ecosystem entering the next phase of growth

Jefferies described the electronics sector as a key driver of India’s next phase of growth. It noted that India is focusing on domestic value addition and component manufacturing. The global investment banking company highlighted that Central government initiatives like the Electronics Component Manufacturing Scheme (ECMS) and Mobile Phone Manufacturing Scheme (MPMS) aim to deepen backward integration and reduce import dependence.

The Jefferies report forecasted that the ECMS will cover 50% of mobile component value versus 20% now.

“From assembly to value addition. India’s electronics ecosystem is entering the next phase of growth with a greater focus on domestic value addition and component manufacturing. Electronics exports have grown sharply, while schemes such as ECMS (components scheme) and MPMS (Mobile 2.0) aim to deepen backward integration and reduce import dependence. We forecast ECMS to cover ~50% of Mobile component value (BOM) over the next 6-Y vs <20% now. PCB (both HDI + Multi-layer) is a focus area for Components, with $5bn TAM, 85-90% imports,” it stated.

The Electronics Component Manufacturing Scheme (ECMS) was launched by the Modi government in July 2026 to deepen the domestic supply chain ecosystem and develop a robust electronics component ecosystem in the country. The scheme is designed to attract investments across key components such as Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs), passive components, electro-mechanical components, sub-assemblies, camera modules, optical transceivers, and capital goods required for electronics manufacturing.

As per the Central government, the approved investment under ECMS has increased to ₹69,548 crore, up from the ₹59,350 crore investment originally envisaged under the scheme.

Meanwhile, the Mobile Phone Manufacturing Scheme (MPMS), with a budgetary outlay of Rs 62,500 crore, aims to scale up production, deepen domestic value addition, strengthen supply chain resilience, and enhance global competitiveness.

90% of the solar manufacturing value chain to be localised by 2030

The Jefferies report stated that India is now the world’s second-largest solar PV manufacturer, having 35 GW of cell capacity operational and another 100 GW under construction. Jefferies expects 90% of the value chain to be localised by 2030.

“India is the 2nd largest solar PV manufacturer. India has emerged as the world’s second-largest solar PV manufacturer, with ~35GW of solar cell capacity already operational and another ~100GW under construction. Policy measures such as ALMM (Approved list of Models and Manufacturers, a regulatory quality register), domestic content requirements and PLI (Production-linked incentives) are accelerating backward integration across cells, wafers and ingots. We expect ~90% of the solar manufacturing value chain to be localised by 2030,” it stated.

Notably, by the end of March 2026, India had crossed 150 GW of solar capacity. OpIndia reported earlier that in just 11–12 years, India’s solar capacity has grown nearly 50 times. Nearly 10% of India’s total electricity now comes from solar energy sources.

The remarkable growth was achieved by the Modi government in three phases. During the first phase, from 2014 to 2018, the Central government set aggressive targets, pushed the National Solar Mission and introduced larger solar parks.

In the second phase (2018 to 2022), solar became cheap, with tariffs coming down from around 7-8 rupees per unit to under 2 rupees. Result? Solar energy became not only clean but cheap energy, attracting private sector investment and driving the rise of massive solar parks in Rajasthan, Gujarat, and Karnataka. 

In the third phase, from 2022 to 2026, manufacturing push, Rooftop solar expansion, and better grid readiness were brought together. Solar moved beyond big projects—now homes, farmers, and industries are all part of the system. With this, India added a record 44+ GW of renewable energy in just one year (FY26), the highest ever.

Source: Jefferies

Aerospace: Made in India, Flying Global

The Jefferies report described India as a “beneficiary” of the global demand-supply imbalance in aerospace. It said that India has an opportunity to leverage its cost-competitive manufacturing and engineering talent.

“Indian exports are on the rise with Boeing and Airbus already sourcing $1.4-1.6bn annually from the country. Indian companies such as Aequs, Azad, BHFC, DYTC, RW, MOTHERSO & SANSERA have become suppliers to global OEMs and tier-1s, and are expanding in the segment,” the report states.

Overall, the Jefferies analysis suggests that India is not just adding more factories, but building new industrial ecosystems in sectors that cater not only to the domestic economy but also to global markets.

No, Hindu festivals are not a Sarkari scheme that everyone has a right to: Why VHP’s call to ban Muslims from Garba is neither against the Constitution nor against inclusivity

Shraddha Pandey
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No, Hindu festivals are not a Sarkari scheme that everyone has a right to: Why VHP’s call to ban Muslims from Garba is neither against the Constitution nor against inclusivity

The Islamo-leftist cabal that relentlessly vilifies Hindu festivals as regressive, dogmatic, misogynistic and whatnot, also wants to appropriate and secularise Hindu festivals to enforce unasked ‘inclusivity’. As the Hindu festival of Navratri is approaching and preparations are on for Garba events across the country, the Islamo-leftist coterie has turned on its activism mode for ensuring unrestricted participation of Muslims, primarily Muslim men, in Garba programs.

In the wake of increasing incidents of Muslim crimes during Garba events, the organisers have started restricting the entry of non-Hindus to the Garba Pandals. This year, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad gave a call to ban Muslims from attending garba and dandiya events during Navratri across Maharashtra.

The VHP has issued guidelines for Garba organisers, calling for Aadhaar card checking of participants, applying Tilak on the forehead of entrants, among other measures.

The Hindu rights group stated that their decision was not directed against any religious community but was only a precautionary measure to protect and preserve the Dharmic character of Garba.

However, the VHP’s call triggered an outrage. Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut, who claims to be a champion of Hindutva, gave an absurd statement opposing restrictions on the entry of Muslims in Garba events.

Raut suggested that somehow because Muslims also ‘contributed’ to India’s freedom struggle and cultural struggle, they should not be prevented from participating in Navratri events.

“Muslims also made a significant contribution to this country’s freedom struggle and cultural struggle. Mohan Bhagwat goes abroad and delivers speeches stating that ‘there should be no differences between Muslims and Hindus in our country… yet here, his people engage in this kind of behaviour? Mohan Bhagwat ought to issue a statement on this,” Raut said during a media interaction on 6th September.

Not only anti-BJP political leaders but some of those aligned with the BJP have also invoked ‘inclusivity’ and ‘Constitution’ to oppose a ban on Muslims in Garba events.

In this vein, Union Minister Ramdas Athawale said that the VHP’s call goes against the Constitution and its guarantee of equal rights for people of all religions.

“I feel this stand is not right because India runs on the Constitution. The Constitution given by Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar ensures justice to all religions. Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Jains, Buddhists, Lingayats, Parsis and people of several other faiths live in India, and the Constitution seeks to protect all religions,” he said.

“It is not good to say that Muslims should not attend garba. Hindu and Muslim communities need to come together and work for the country,” the minister added.

Similarly, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s wife Amruta Fadnavis has also opposed the VHP’s call to Garba organisers to restrict entry of Muslims in the events.

“Our festival is inclusive; if any Muslim wants to enjoy Garba, it should not be a problem,” Amruta Fadnavis said.

Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party MLA Rais Shaikh argued that banning Muslims from Garba events goes against the Constitution.

“This is cultural policing by VHP and Bajrang Dal. VHP’s ‘fatwa’ banning Muslims is against the Constitution and the state government should take note of this directive because such extremist positions can potentially give rise to a law-and-order situation,” he said.

Does banning Muslims from participating in Hindu religious celebrations like Garba go against the Constitution? Does the ‘inclusivity’ argument even make any sense?

Invoking the Constitutional guarantee of equal rights for all religions is utterly nonsensical in the present context. Muslims are not guaranteed any Constitutional right to force themselves to participate in the celebration of Hindu festivals. They do not have any right to participate in Hindu festivals against the wishes of the Hindu community. They have as much the right to practice their own religion as Hindus or any other religious community have in India.

However, this does not mean Muslims can, regardless of their intentions and motives, be allowed unrestricted access to Garba or Durga Pandals. Our Constitution allows Hindus to celebrate their festivals without having to mandatorily ensure participation of non-Hindus.

Besides, this whole ‘inclusivity’ argument is also not appropriate. Yes, Hindu festivals, including Durga Puja and Garba, are inclusive; they bring people, specifically devotees of Maa Durga, together. However, this inclusivity is not by default extended to Muslims or Christians or any community or individuals who are not adherents of Hinduism or devotees of Maa Durga.

Remember the mayhem Islamists unleashed in 2022 when then BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma merely quoted a fact stated in the Islamic texts? Sharma had made no insulting remarks or said anything on her own but simply quoted the Islamic text, yet Muslims rioted across the country, raised Sar Tan Se Juda slogans, and burned her effigy because her ‘tone’ was perceived as disrespectful.

Why is it that those who cannot even stand a Hindu, the Kafir of the highest order, even uttering the facts mentioned in Islamic texts, want to participate in festivals of Hindus?

Why would those who kill a Hindu youth over a drop of colour splashing on them during Holi want to participate in a dance performed in honour of Maa Durga?

Why do those who don’t want to say Bharat Mata ki Jai and sing Vande Mataram because it glorifies Maa Durga want to dance in honour of Maa Durga during Navratri?

Why is it that only Muslim men want to participate in Garba celebrations and not Muslim women? Does Islam restrict only Muslim women from partaking in festivities of non-Muslims? Muslim women should stay in Burqa or hijab, but Muslim men can dance in honour of Maa Durga?

What makes anyone think that those who do not want to entertain the idea of Muslim women offering namaz in mosques just as men do believe in inclusivity?

Why are Hindu festivals burdened with the idea of accommodating and promoting ‘inclusivity’?

Garba is sadhana of Maa Durga, not a government scheme Muslims have a right over

The performance of Garba is essentially a religious affair. It is not a party. It is not a cultural event that anybody, regardless of their faith, can attend, shake a leg, enjoy and move on.

Garba is strictly a Dharmic dance performed by the devotees of Maa Durga during Navratri in her honour for liberating the world from the terror of demons and in celebration of the victory of Dharma over Adharma. It is a celebration of the feminine form of the divine. Garba is not a government scheme that every ‘minority’ citizen has a right to. 

In fact, even to avail the benefits of government schemes, there are certain criteria to be met. If any non-Hindu, particularly Muslims whose faith clearly directs them not to associate partners with their God, Allah, or partake in the celebration of the festivals of polytheists like Hindus, want to join Garba celebrations, they should revert to Sanatan Dharma, invoke devotion for Maa Durga and maybe then they can be allowed to participate in Garba events.

Barring Muslims or anyone from entering Durga Puja pandals who does not have genuine devotion for Maa Durga is not discriminatory but simply the preservation of the sanctity of Garba.

If Muslims have really become so secular that they do not see a violation of their Sharia and concept of Tawheed, why don’t they organise Durga Puja in mosques?

For years, Hindus have been conditioned into believing that because they form India’s religious majority, and their polytheistic faith is inherently tolerant and accommodative, it is their unquestionable responsibility to bear the burden of upholding the mythical syncretic culture, ‘Ganga-Jamuni Tehzeeb’, inclusivity, idea of India and whatnot, while other communities are exempt from shouldering this burden.

In the left-liberal understanding of secularism and inclusivity, the Hindu majority must accommodate Islamist intransigence and secularise their festivals, while the Muslim ‘minority’ gets a free pass to be as exclusionary as their religion demands and still not get accused of intolerance.

In recent years, there have been consistent attempts at secularising, rather than de-Hinduising, Hindu festivals to make them absolutely inclusive and reduce them to not Dharmic celebrations but cultural events.

Onam, the Hindu festival rooted in the Hindu scriptural legend of the greatness of King Mahabali (also known as Raja Bali) and how Lord Vishnu, in his Vamana avatar, gave him a boon that he could come back to meet his subjects once a year, has been reduced to a mere harvest festival.

In Tamil Nadu, Hindu-hating Dravidianists have been executing a similar playbook to secularise Pongal or Makar Sankranti and dissociate it from its Hindu religious roots. Just as Onam is being labelled a ‘cultural’ festival in Kerala, Pongal is being promoted as a ‘Tamil’ festival of agrarian gratitude in Tamil Nadu.

This de-hyphenation of religion from Hindu festivals has also been noticed in movies and commercial ad films over the years, with Diwali becoming ‘festival of lights’, Holi becoming ‘festival of colors’ and Garba being reduced to a folk dance.

The same Islamo-leftists who argue that Hindu processions should not stop outside mosques, pass from ‘Muslim areas’ or play loud religious music there to preserve ‘communal harmony’, want Hindus to lay a red carpet for Muslims to enter Garba events even though their religion prohibits them from partaking in the festivities of non-Muslims, and perhaps molest Hindu women or unleash violence.

For Hindus, Garba is worship of Maa Durga; for Islamists, the sacred celebration is a perfect opportunity for rape jihad

Over the years, Islamists have attacked Hindus on their festivals by using trivial excuses to express their hatred and intolerance towards the Hindu community. Every year, OpIndia reports numerous incidents of Muslim mob violence on Holi, Diwali, Ganesh Chaturthi, Ram Navami, Hanuman Jayanti, Navratri, and other Hindu festivals. While Garba events have also faced desecration and violence, this sacred celebration has been targeted for love and rape jihad by Islamists.

In September 2025, during Navratri, Muslim boys were caught filming female participants of a Garba celebration at a college in Mumbai’s Virar West. On checking one of the boys’ phones, the organisers reportedly found multiple videos of girls, alongside obscene chats and conversations that outlined plans to lure Hindu girls into relationships and “ruin” them.

Some of the leaked messages contained disturbing instructions, with one explicitly urging that not a single Hindu girl be “left untouched” after entering the Garba grounds. In the same college, obscene comments were also made by putting videos of students on the Discord App during the Dandiya program.

In a garba programme in Benisar Bari area in 2025, Muslim youths forcibly entered the pandal and molested the women. The Muslim men forcibly danced with women. When other participants resisted, stone pelting began. At least 5 people were injured, and police vehicles were damaged. Police later arrested 12 people in connection with the incident.

Last year, two Muslim youths, Suhail Siddiqui and Saif, were caught infiltrating during the Navaratri event in Kanpur. They made obscene comments about the Hindu girls. After a complaint from a female police officer present at the venue, both were arrested.

A Durg idol was damaged on 21st September 2025 in Mumbai’s Mankhurd area. The incident happened near a mosque where Muslims objected to the sound of drums being played during the welcome procession of the idol.

Last year, one Mohsin Khan threw eggs from the 16th floor of the building during a garba event at the JP North Gardgarn City Society on Mira Road East in Mumbai. 

In October 2024, it was reported that in Madhya Pradesh’s Alirajpur, Muslim youths molested a woman returning from the Garba event.

In another incident during 2024 Navratri, a Muslim youth named Feroz attended a garba event using a fake Hindu identity in Ujjain. Feroz posed as Rahul and entered the Garba Pandal with condoms. Yes, you read it right: he was carrying condoms at the Hindu religious event and was caught by the activists of Hindu Jagran Manch.

In the Guna district, it was reported that five Muslim boys entered the Garba Pandal under suspicious circumstances, as told by the police and were detained in 2024.

In October 2023, it was reported that one Fareed Shah attempted to enter the Garba Pandal in Hyderabad’s Begumpet Hockey Stadium by posing as a Hindu person named Ashish to lure a Hindu girl. He was stopped by Bajrang Dal activists.  

In October 2022, it was reported that 8 Muslim men were detained by the police in Indore for trying to enter garba venues by concealing their identities. In another incident from the same year, it was reported that a Muslim person was arrested for passing lewd remarks about Hindu women at a Garba Pandal in Palsikar colony.

On 1st October 2022, a Hindu youth named Madhusudan Modi was attacked with a knife by three Islamists named Shahrukh, Zubair, and Samir at a dandiya event held in Bikaner in Rajasthan. These Muslim youths were molesting girls who had come to play Garba.

On 1st October 2022, six Hindu students were attacked by four accused, identified as Rathod Amin Gulab Nabi, Nizami Moin Nurmahammad, Ganchi Amanbhai Firozbhai, and Chauhan Mahamadnuman Mahamadhanif, for objecting to Islamic songs being played during a Garba event at BK Patel Arts & Commerce College of Savli in Vadodara. The four accused attacked the Hindu students with iron belts and stones.

On September 30 2022, some Muslim youths forcefully entered the Garba venue in Jaipur, Rajasthan. The Muslim youths, however, fled as soon as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal activists arrived.

In the same year, seven Muslim youths were arrested by the police from the Garba pandal of Pandharinath in Indore. They were reportedly making videos of Hindu girls.

In 2023, OpIndia reported that in Gujarat’s Bharuch, Muslims of the Ikhar village had threatened the Hindu tribal community not to organise Navratri and said they would pelt stones if the event is held, declaring that it was a ‘Muslim area’.

While all Muslims may or may not have malice for Hindus and their festivals, Hindus cannot and should not get guilt-trapped and allow Islamist predators to enter Garba pandals, molest Hindu women and desecrate the sacred celebration, just because suicidally delusional Hindus have to satiate their fetish for unwarranted ‘inclusivity’, ‘secularism’, and ‘composite culture’.

Dr Umar un Nabi detonated IED himself, revived Al-Qaeda-linked AGuH module: NIA chargesheet reveals terror plot behind Red Fort blast

Aditi
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Dr Umar un Nabi detonated IED himself, revived Al-Qaeda-linked AGuH module: NIA chargesheet reveals terror plot behind Red Fort blast

The chargesheet filed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the Delhi Red Fort blast case has revealed that Dr Umar un Nabi, who was inside the  i20 car that exploded, himself pulled the trigger of the explosive. The agency found in its investigation that Nabi was a suicide bomber, and he activated the improvised explosive device (IED), causing a massive explosion outside the Red Fort on November 10, 2025. The blast led to the killing of over a dozen people.

The 7,500-page chargesheet provides the details of the explosion and its links with the Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind (AGuH) terror module as uncovered during the investigation. “…accused Umar Un Nabi (A-1) was inside the car at the time of the explosion, and the IED was initiated by him using the above-mentioned command mechanism,” the chargesheet reportedly states.

Nabi was a doctor by profession and worked as an assistant professor at Al Falah University in Faridabad. His presence inside the exploded i20 car was confirmed by a DNA analysis of the biological material recovered from the blast site. In the chargesheet, the NIA has described Nabi as the mastermind of the explosion. The vehicle used for carrying out the explosion was converted into a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED).

Nabi revived theAl-Qaeda-linked terror module

According to the NIA, Nabi revived the Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind (AGuH) terror module, a designated offshoot of Al-Qaida in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), and was its ‘operational in-charge’. The chargesheet reveals that the blast was not a sudden attack but a well-planned conspiracy. Since early 2022, Nabi had been working to revive the dormant AGuH terror module and build a network of terrorists to engage in terrorist activities. He procured weapons and ammunition to be used in the terrorist activities of his terror group.

The charge sheet says that he had been plotting the Red Fort blast for at least two years. He and his associates had been visiting the blast site repeatedly. The chargesheet notes that Nabi and his associates conducted a reconnaissance of the Red Fort in December 2023. However, the blast did not happen on the decided day, but was preponed and carried out in panic after Nabi’s associates were arrested by authorities in Srinagar. The Jihadists selected the Red Fort to carry out the blast as they perceived it as a “symbol of the Indian state”.

NIA found terrorist literature promoting Jihad

During the investigation, the NIA found documents containing detailed instructions and practical guidance for the members of his terror module. The states that the contents of the documents included instructions on operational security, including concealment, stealth infiltration, and the creation of multiple false identities to evade law enforcement.

The documents contained attack strategies, including ambush-style targeted attacks, lone-wolf operations, and martyrdom or suicide strikes. The documents included “Definition of Jihad”, “The Requirements of Jihad”, “The 21 Aims and Objectives of Jihad”, “39 Ways to Serve and Participate in Jihad”, and “44 Ways to Support Jihad”. An AQAP-linked manual, titled “Lone Mujahid Pocket Book/How to Become an Assassin,” was also found by the NIA during the investigation.

The NIA found handwritten notes from his flat at Al-Falah University, revealing the Jihadi network’s intentions of overthrowing democracy and imposing Sharia law. The terrorist network advocated for Jihad against existing political systems, which they described as “Satanic and tyrannical systems”.

The documentary evidence disclosed that the terror group presented Jihad as a religious duty rather than a personal choice. The documents contained messages like “Muslims cannot attain honour without jihad” and called for Gazwa-e-Hind, and praised Islamic insurgencies in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the US.

India becomes the only country with a fully electrified dedicated freight corridor: How the Modi Government turned a two-decade-old project into reality

Aditi
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India becomes the only country with a fully electrified dedicated freight corridor: How the Modi Government turned a two-decade-old project into reality

In a major infrastructural achievement, India’s ambitious rail infrastructure development project, the Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC), became fully operational. On Tuesday (September 8, 2026), Prime Minister Modi inaugurated the final sections of the Western Dedicated Freight Corridor (WDFC), one of the two parts of the DFC.

The Prime Minister inaugurated three remaining sections of the WDFC, namely, New Sanand-North-New Makarpura, New Umbergaon-New Saphale, and New Saphale-New JNPT. The sections stretched up to 326 km were built at a cost of over ₹20,700 crore. They link the Jawaharlal Nehru Port in Mumbai, Maharashtra, with Dadri in Uttar Pradesh, where it intersects with the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (EDFC).

With the inauguration of three sections, the entire stretch of 2,843-km dedicated freight network, combining the 1,506-km WDFC and the 1,337-km-long Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (EDFC), has become operational.

Modi government made the project a reality

The freight network project was conceived in 2004, during the BJP coalition government led by the late Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. In 2006, the two corridors were approved by the UPA-I government led by the late PM Manmohan Singh. The Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Limited (DFCCIL) was incorporated to execute the project.

However, the project existed only on paper till 2014, after which the project was revived by the Modi government. The government resolved the long-pending issues that blocked the project, and it finally became a reality about two decades after its approval.

India is the only country with a fully electrified DFC

With the completion of the DFC, India has become the only country with a fully electrified dedicated freight corridor built for routine double-stack container operations. The electric double-stack arrangement enables two containers to be carried one above the other, leading to reduced time and fuel consumption and more cargo per train.

The rail tracks in the EDFC and the WDFC have been specifically designed for the electric double-stack arrangement, with overhead wires fitted higher than usual. Even though both corridors are capable of double-stack container operations, they are more prominent on the WDFC. The cargo on the EDFC mostly carries coal, steel, food grain, and other bulk mineral freight.

As per the railways, the DFCCIL handled approximately 5.21 lakh freight train trips, averaging around 435 trains per day as of August 31, 2026. The DFCCIL has generated approximately 658 billion Gross Tonne Kilometres (GTKM) and 360 billion Net Tonne Kilometres (NTKM). At present, 27% of the total freight is carried via rail route. The National Rail Plan intends to increase this share by 45% by 2030. In the last financial year, the Railways recorded its highest-ever loading of 1,670 million tonnes.

The Eastern and the Western freight corridors

The existing freight network comprises the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (EDFC) and the Western Dedicated Freight Corridor. The EDFC starts from New Sahnewal in Punjab and extends up to New Sonnagar in Bihar via Haryana and Uttar Pradesh and connects four states: Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Bihar.

The EDFC from Ludhiana (Punjab) to Sonnagar (Bihar) became fully operational in October 2023. Subsequently, a proposed 538-km Sonnagar-Dankuni (West Bengal) extension was taken out of the sanctioned DFC project and planned separately under the PPP model.

The WDFC starts from New Dadri in Uttar Pradesh and extends up to New Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) in Maharashtra. It links the National Capital Region and the industrial belts of northern and western India directly to the country’s busiest container port while passing through Haryana, Rajasthan, and Gujarat.

An expanding network

The freight corridor will not be limited to the Eastern and Western corridors and is set to be expanded. This year’s Union Budget announced a third Dedicated Freight Corridor proposed to start from Dankuni in West Bengal and connect to Surat in Gujarat, linking six states: West Bengal, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Gujarat, on the way.

According to Dr Swapnil Nila, Chief Public Relations Officer (CPRO), Central Railway, the government is examining the possibility of developing a new freight corridor parallel to the Samruddhi Mahamarg in Maharashtra.

How the DFC will help the economy

The project will provide a major boost to the economy as it will strengthen connectivity between industrial centres and ports, thereby facilitating faster movement of goods. It is also expected to reduce logistics costs and help reduce pressure on the usual railway tracks where passenger trains run.

A dedicated freight network will provide uninterrupted movement of cargo to the JNPT as freight containers will move directly between the ports and industries in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana, Delhi-NCR, and western Uttar Pradesh. This will lead to increased revenue for the Railways, whose earnings through freight account for over 65 per cent of its total revenue. Smoother and heavier freight movements on the DFC will significantly increase this amount.

ECI clarifies C.N.R. Rao SIR row: No notice issued to Bharat Ratna scientist or his family over name discrepancy

Shriti Sagar
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ECI clarifies C.N.R. Rao SIR row: No notice issued to Bharat Ratna scientist or his family over name discrepancy

The Election Commission of India (ECI) has denied reports that Bharat Ratna awardee and eminent scientist Professor C.N.R. Rao was served a notice over a “self-name mismatch” during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Karnataka.

The clarification came after reports claimed that Rao had been asked to appear for a hearing because of a discrepancy in his name between the 2002 electoral roll and the current voter list. According to those reports, his name appeared as “Prof. C.N.R. Rao” in the older roll, while the current roll reportedly mentioned it as “Proff. C.N.R. Rao”, with an additional “f”.

However, the ECI clarified that this information is “factually incorrect”.

According to the Commission, Rao’s name in the 2002 electoral roll actually appears as “Rama S/O H. Nagesh”, while the current electoral roll lists him as “Proff. C.N.R. Rao S/O Nagesh Rav. H.” The ECI also clarified that it has not served any notice to Rao or his family so far, taking into account his stature and contribution to the country.

ECI rejects ‘extra f’ claim

The clarification effectively rules out the earlier claim that Rao was asked to appear before election officials because the word “Prof” had been incorrectly recorded as “Proff”.

Reports had said that the 92-year-old scientist was facing a “self-name mismatch” and that a hearing had been scheduled in Bengaluru’s Malleshwaram area, near the Indian Institute of Science (IISc).

The latest ECI statement, however, makes it clear that no such notice has been issued to Rao or his family at present. It also specifically rejected the claim that the alleged notice was linked to an extra “f” in his name.

C.N.R. Rao’s contribution to science

Prof. C.N.R. Rao has made major contributions to solid-state and structural chemistry and is considered one of the most decorated scientists in his field. His work has covered areas including solid-state materials, nanomaterials and structural chemistry, helping open new areas of research in modern chemistry.

He founded the Solid State and Structural Chemistry Unit at IISc in 1976 and later served as the institute’s director from 1984 to 1994. He also founded the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR) in Jakkur and served as its founding president.

His contribution was not limited to scientific research. Rao also played an important role in shaping India’s science and research policies. Over the years, he has received several major national and international honours. 

Bharat Ratna among several major honours

Rao has received some of the country’s highest civilian honours and several major international awards. He was awarded the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian honour, and became the third scientist to receive the award.

His other honours include the Padma Vibhushan, Padma Shri and Karnataka Ratna, besides numerous other awards and recognitions.

Earlier reports had raised questions

The reports about the alleged SIR notice had attracted attention because of Rao’s age and stature as a Bharat Ratna awardee. A representative from his office had earlier said that they had not received any physical notice.

“It appears to have been put online on the ECI website. I am not clear about that one; I have not seen it,” the representative had said. The representative had also said that, apart from the alleged additional letter in “Proff”, there did not appear to be any other issue with the electoral records.

“According to the office records and email, there is no notice as of now. A physical letter also has not reached us,” the representative said.

However, following the ECI’s latest clarification, those earlier reports cannot be treated as an accurate account of the current position. The Commission has specifically denied issuing such a notice to Rao or his family and has rejected the claim about the alleged “extra f” mismatch.

SIR exercise in Karnataka

The clarification comes amid Karnataka’s ongoing SIR exercise, under which electoral records are being checked against older rolls, and voters are being flagged in cases involving discrepancies or where their names cannot be mapped.

The Chief Electoral Officer’s office had earlier said that more than 43.81 lakh notices had been generated as part of the exercise, while around 7.31 lakh notices had been delivered to electors.

The notices relate to categories including “no mapping” and “anomalies”, according to officials.

Other prominent personalities have also faced scrutiny during the electoral roll revision exercise. Padma Shri awardee and social worker Harekala Hajabba was among those whose name was reportedly flagged over discrepancies, though the Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer later clarified that the issue in his case had been resolved.

In Rao’s case, however, the ECI has now made its position clear: no SIR notice has been issued to the Bharat Ratna scientist or his family so far, and reports claiming that he was served a notice over an extra “f” in his name are factually incorrect, according to the Commission.

US accuses Chinese AI companies of doing industrial-scale distillation of American AI models: Read what it means

Shraddha Pandey
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US accuses Chinese AI companies of doing industrial-scale distillation of American AI models: Read what it means

Days after claiming to have disrupted a Chinese botnet network that was allegedly targeting American critical infrastructure, the US has accused Chinese AI companies of ‘copying’ proprietary functionalities and capabilities of US AI companies. America’s Cyber Defense Agency, Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), said in a release issued on 8th September that Chinese AI companies are conducting “industrial-scale knowledge distillation campaigns” to extract proprietary capabilities from leading AI models.

“China-based artificial intelligence (AI) companies are conducting systematic extraction of proprietary functionalities and capabilities of U.S. AI companies’ models through industrial-scale knowledge distillation campaigns that form the core—not merely a supplement—of their AI development strategy,” the press release stated.

The US authorities acknowledged that distillation is a legitimate and useful technique in AI research. However, the US officials claimed that China-based AI companies are engaging in “aggressive, malicious, and targeted distillation activities at an industrial scale that extract restricted proprietary functionalities and capabilities of U.S. frontier AI models.”

DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, Alibaba and other Chinese AI companies with CCP awareness are extracting capabilities of top US AI models like Claude, GPT, Gemini, and Grok

US officials have alleged that top Chinese AI models DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, Alibaba, MiniMax, StepFun, and Z.AI extracted “billions of tokens across millions of exchanges/requests” from US frontier AI models, including variants of Claude, GPT, Gemini, and Grok, since at least late 2024. These alleged distillation campaigns are allegedly being conducted with Chinese government awareness.

The US authorities alleged that since 2024, DeepSeek has conducted organised distillation campaigns targeting reasoning capabilities, specialised optimisations, and domain-specific functions to train its R1 and V3 models.

Similarly, Alibaba allegedly leveraged industrial-scale distillation to improve its Qwen family of AI models.

The US authorities claimed that top Chinese AI models, including Moonshot AI, MiniMax, Stepfun, and Z.AI, also engaged in “malicious knowledge distillation of U.S. AI companies’ models.”

“Likely with Chinese government awareness, DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, Alibaba, MiniMax, StepFun, and Z.AI extracted billions of tokens across millions of exchanges/requests from U.S. frontier AI models, including variants of Claude, GPT, Gemini, and Grok, since at least late 2024. DeepSeek has conducted organized campaigns since at least 2024 targeting reasoning capabilities, specialized optimizations, and domain-specific functions to train its R1 and V3 models. Alibaba leveraged industrial-scale distillation to improve the company’s Qwen family of AI models. Moonshot AI, MiniMax, Stepfun, and Z.AI also engaged in malicious knowledge distillation of U.S. AI companies’ models,” the US officials said.

The modus operandi

Explaining the modus operandi of the Chinese distillation campaigns targeting US frontier AI models, the US authorities said that several top Chinese AI companies route distillation requests via multiple pathways to obtain unauthorised access and violate the terms of the targeted US AI companies.

These pathways include native application programming interfaces (APIs), remote cloud providers, and third-party aggregators that automatically obfuscate user metadata to avoid detection.

In addition, the China-based AI companies allegedly use a gray market of proxies known as “transfer stations” to bypass geographic restrictions placed by US AI companies.

Through bulk procurement of the U.S. AI companies’ premium subscriptions shared across teams of developers, several China-based AI companies secure cost savings for their industrial-scale distillation campaigns.

Various Chinese AI companies have allegedly conducted prompt injection techniques against large language models (LLMs) by inserting prompts specifically designed for jailbreaking.

The advanced distillation methods include chain-of-thought (CoT) reasoning extraction, automated failover between pathways during blocking attempts, and sophisticated quality evaluation frameworks to detect defensive countermeasures. This tactic was used by DeepSeek.

Notably, the CoT data teaches student models not only factual knowledge but reasoning methodologies for complex agentic tasks, coding challenges, and logical proofs.

According to the US authorities, these Chinese AI entities use aggressive and adaptive discovery to systematically identify valuable extractable data.

With the help of these tactics, China-based AI models demonstrate rapid operational adaptation. The US officials said that the Chinese AI model MiniMax redirected exchanges to a new Claude model within 24 hours of release, demonstrating real-time provider monitoring and pre-positioned infrastructure for immediate retargeting.

Chinese AI companies employing industrial-scale distillation against US AI models are able to not only reduce financial expenditures in training a frontier model but also significantly cut AI development timelines.

The US officials have alleged that the Chinese AI company DeepSeek conducted organised distillation campaigns against US frontier AI models, particularly those of Claude, Gemini, GPT, and Grok.

“DeepSeek has been conducting an organized distillation campaign against U.S. AI companies’ frontier AI models since at least late 2024 to generate synthetic training data for its models, including R1, released in early 2025. The company targeted specific knowledge domains to extract proprietary functionality and reasoning capabilities to reduce their compute and research costs. DeepSeek’s publicly quoted training costs of $5.6M are misleading as it does not include the true cost of the data acquired through extensive malicious distillation.”

Similarly, Moonshot AI targeted Claude Fable 5 data to train its Kimi-K3 model and GPT-4o data to train its Kimi-K2 model in mid-2025. Moonshot AI used various models of Claude, GPT, Gemini, Nano Banana, and Grok, distill SFT optimisation, reinforcement learning (RL), software engineering, and math capabilities.

Source: US CISA press release

The US CISA has recommended three immediate actions to the US AI companies. It urged the AI companies to implement comprehensive detection and mitigation, deploy targeted response changes, and establish cross-organisation intelligence sharing.

China denies US’s ‘malicious copying of AI tech’ allegations

Hitting back at the US, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has asked the US to “refrain from making unfounded accusations or smears” against China.

“China’s AI development is the result of high-level technological self-reliance and strength. We maintain that all parties should strengthen cooperation to promote AI development that is open, inclusive, universally beneficial and oriented toward the common good,” the ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a press conference.

Chinese AI models offering features equivalent to those offered by expensive US AI models at way lesser costs

While China denies any wrongdoing the US has accused it of, the unreal price gaps between equivalent US and Chinese AI models raise suspicion.

Pertinently, knowledge distillation trains a student model on the outputs, often reasoning traces, of a stronger teacher model. If done legitimately on one’s own large model or open weights it creates smaller, cheaper and faster models. However, if conducted at industrial scale against a competitor’s APIs without proper permission, distillation allows a lab acquire specialised behaviours without having to pay the full cost of pre-training from scratch or operating equivalent post-training compute.

Chinese labs have, as per US allegations, achieved architectural efficiency, reinforcement-learning techniques for reasoning, like DeepSeek-R1 style, force efficiency from US chip export controls, and aggressive price competition and open-weight releases that recruit global inference providers and fine-tuners.

Consequently, AI models like DeepSeek V3/V4/R1, Alibaba Qwen series, Moonshot Kimi K2/K3, Z.AI GLM, and MiniMax, which score close to or occasionally match mid-to-high US models on coding, math, reasoning and agentic benchmark, while API prices are usually 5 to 7x lower.

For example, while Chinese DeepSeek V4 Flash costs around $0.14/M input and $0.28/M output tokens, the rates of comparable GPT or Claude mid-tiers are far higher. Similarly, while DeepSeek V4 Pro costs around $0.435/$0.87, key flagship US models cost $5/$25–30.

While US labs still lead on the latest flagship models, safety alignments, various enterprise features, and ecosystem lock-in, for many production workloads, the performance-per-dollar gap became significant.

With Chinese models capturing around 30-46% of US enterprise token share on AI API aggregators like OpenRouter at peaks. Result? The enterprises facing high bills moved traffic. In very short time, Chinese AI models emerged as rivals to the US ones.

This forced top US AI companies to cut prices. OpenAI reduced the price of its GPT-5.6 Luna by 80%, to $0.20/M input and $1.20/M output, Terra by 20% though flagship Sol’s high pricing remained unchanged. In fact, Open AI executives have openly compared the new cheaper tiers to the Chinese AI models like Z. AI’s GLM. Anthropic also grappled with similar pressure.

This indicates a classic commoditisation dynamic wherein high fixed costs of frontier pre-training require high inference prices to recoup, while low-cost competitors, be it though open weights, efficiency, subsidies, or alleged free-riding, particularly large-scale distillation campaigns against rival AI models, collapse those prices.

The US allegations suggest that besides efficiency work and open-source distribution, distillation of industrial scale is allowing Chinese AI companies to shorten development timelines and slash compute costs for acquiring specific capabilities that would otherwise need expensive original research and training runs, and thus produce models good enough for most tasks for a fraction of the price high-priced US advanced agentic AI models can perform.

It is notable that Chinese labs have previously published genuine technical contributions and open-source Chinese models have themselves got distilled by others. However, distillation of industrial scale becoming a core strategy, as alleged by the US, has accelerated catch up for Chinese AI models and enabled the price pressure on US AI companies. For US, this is an IP theft and Terms of Use violation, and the US authorities see it as a national security issue, since capabilities were transferred without original safety work.

It appears that Chinese tech entities are countering the strategy of US AI models of producing highly advanced models and charging high prices, by commoditising frontier-level AI. The claims by US officials that Chinese AI companies are doing industrial scale distillation of frontier US AI models lends further credence to the accusations that Chinese AI strategy is nothing but a sophisticated ‘copy the rival’s proprietary functionalities and capabilities for low costs, produce equivalent models, and offer them at way cheaper prices than rivals’ shortcut.

Houthis attack Saudi Arabia: Is the Middle East sliding towards another war?

Jinit Jain
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Houthis attack Saudi Arabia: Is the Middle East sliding towards another war?

The Middle East is once again staring at the possibility of a major regional conflagration, but what makes the present situation particularly dangerous is that the region is not dealing with a single isolated conflict anymore, with the United States and Iran already locked in a confrontation around the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz while Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen have simultaneously escalated their attacks against Saudi Arabia, striking civilian and economic infrastructure and threatening to turn another long-running proxy conflict into a much wider war.

At least 73 people were injured after the Houthis launched a series of missile and drone attacks against Saudi Arabia, with the strikes targeting several locations in the southern part of the kingdom, including energy installations, Abha International Airport and King Khalid air base, while Saudi authorities reported fires and temporary disruptions at some energy facilities.

The Houthis have claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying they targeted Saudi military and economic infrastructure, including facilities belonging to Saudi Aramco, while Riyadh has vowed to take all necessary measures to defend its sovereignty and neutralise what it describes as a growing threat from the Iran-backed militia.

On the surface, this may appear to be another escalation in Yemen’s decade-long civil war, but that would be a dangerously simplistic reading of what is happening because the Houthi-Saudi confrontation is unfolding at precisely the moment when another and potentially far more consequential confrontation is taking place between Washington and Tehran around the Strait of Hormuz.

The Middle East is therefore beginning to look less like a collection of separate conflicts and increasingly like one interconnected battlefield.

The Houthis have reopened the Saudi front

The Houthi movement seized Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, in 2014 and subsequently became one of the most powerful armed groups in the region, receiving extensive political and military backing from Iran while fighting Yemen’s internationally recognised government, which has in turn received support from Saudi Arabia and its regional allies.

Saudi Arabia led a military coalition that intervened in Yemen in 2015, beginning a conflict that quickly became one of the most prominent examples of the wider Saudi-Iranian rivalry playing out through proxy forces, although a UN-backed truce in 2022 substantially reduced the intensity of fighting and created hopes that the two sides might eventually move towards a political settlement.

Those hopes are now looking increasingly fragile.

The Saudi-backed Yemeni government has launched a counteroffensive against Houthi forces, while the Houthis have responded by expanding their attacks beyond Yemen and striking targets inside Saudi Arabia, with the latest barrage being particularly significant because the militants did not restrict themselves to military targets but also targeted civilian and economic infrastructure.

That distinction matters because Saudi Arabia is not merely another country involved in the Yemen conflict; it is the world’s largest oil exporter and one of the central pillars of the global energy market, which means that attacks on its energy infrastructure can have consequences far beyond the immediate battlefield.

Why Riyadh cannot simply absorb the attacks

Saudi Arabia has repeatedly demonstrated that it will not tolerate sustained attacks on its territory, particularly when those attacks threaten the country’s oil infrastructure, airports and other strategic economic assets, and the latest strikes have therefore created a situation in which Riyadh faces considerable pressure to retaliate.

Saudi authorities have already described the latest escalation as dangerous, while the Saudi-led coalition has warned that it will take necessary operational measures to neutralise the threat posed by the Houthis.

The problem is that retaliation itself could become the trigger for another round of escalation, because a Saudi strike against Houthi positions could lead the militants to launch another barrage against Saudi cities or energy facilities, which could then force Riyadh to respond even more forcefully.

This is the classic escalation trap that has repeatedly transformed limited confrontations in the Middle East into prolonged wars, with each side insisting that it is merely responding to the other while simultaneously increasing the scale and intensity of its own military operations.

And there is another reason the latest attacks are particularly worrying: the Houthis have demonstrated that they are willing to use economic warfare as part of their military strategy.

Iran’s shadow over the Houthi escalation

It would be inaccurate to claim, without evidence, that Iran directly ordered every Houthi attack against Saudi Arabia, because the Houthis have their own political objectives, military command structure and calculations concerning Yemen.

At the same time, it would be equally naive to pretend that Iran’s role is irrelevant.

The Houthis are one of the most important components of Iran’s regional network of armed partners, and their position along the Red Sea gives Tehran an important strategic pressure point against Saudi Arabia and against international shipping moving through one of the world’s most important maritime corridors.

This means that even when Tehran is not directly involved in a particular Houthi operation, the existence of a powerful Iran-backed force capable of threatening Saudi territory and Red Sea shipping inevitably complicates the strategic calculations of Riyadh, Washington and other Gulf states.

The timing becomes even more significant because Iran itself is currently under intense pressure from the United States.

The Strait of Hormuz is already another battlefield

The United States and Iran are locked in a confrontation around the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway connecting the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman, through which a huge share of the world’s oil supplies traditionally passes.

The conflict has already spilt into maritime operations, with American and Iranian forces confronting each other around commercial shipping and energy transportation, creating fears that a prolonged confrontation could disrupt one of the world’s most important energy corridors.

This is what makes the Houthi escalation so dangerous.

The Houthis operate on the western side of the Arabian Peninsula, near the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb, while Iran and the United States are confronting each other on the eastern side around Hormuz.

These are not two completely disconnected theatres.

The Bab el-Mandeb Strait connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden, while the Gulf of Aden opens into the Arabian Sea and the wider Indian Ocean, creating a maritime chain that ultimately links the Red Sea to the Persian Gulf through the surrounding waterways.

If both Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb become seriously disrupted at the same time, the consequences for global energy markets and international shipping could be enormous.

The real danger is the merging of conflicts

For years, policymakers could treat the Yemen war, the Iran-Saudi rivalry and the US-Iran confrontation as separate geopolitical problems, but the latest developments make that separation increasingly difficult because the same actors, alliances, shipping routes and energy infrastructure are now appearing across multiple theatres.

The Houthis have already threatened Red Sea shipping and launched attacks against Saudi Arabia, while Iran remains locked in its confrontation with Washington, and Saudi Arabia finds itself attempting to protect its territory and energy infrastructure without allowing the conflict to spiral completely out of control.

If Saudi Arabia responds with a major military campaign against the Houthis, the militants could intensify their attacks, potentially drawing Iran more directly into the confrontation or prompting the United States to increase military assistance to Riyadh.

At that stage, what began as a Saudi-Houthi confrontation could rapidly become another front in the wider US-Iran conflict.

That is the scenario that should worry the world.

Saudi oil infrastructure is the biggest vulnerability

The targeting of Saudi energy infrastructure is particularly significant because Saudi Arabia sits at the centre of the global oil market, and even temporary disruptions can create uncertainty among traders, insurers and energy companies.

The latest attacks reportedly caused fires at several locations and temporarily halted operations at some energy facilities.

A sustained campaign against Saudi oil infrastructure would be an entirely different proposition, however, because repeated attacks on refineries, pipelines, processing facilities or export infrastructure could create a genuine supply shock at precisely the moment when global energy markets are already dealing with uncertainty around Hormuz.

That could push crude prices higher, increase transportation and manufacturing costs and create another wave of inflation across countries that are already struggling with elevated energy and commodity prices.

In other words, the Houthis do not need to destroy Saudi Arabia’s entire oil industry to create global economic damage; they merely need to convince markets that Saudi energy infrastructure is no longer reliably secure.

The Red Sea could become a war zone again

The other major concern is international shipping.

The Houthis have already demonstrated their ability to threaten commercial vessels operating around the Red Sea, and any sustained expansion of their attacks could once again force shipping companies to avoid the Suez route and send vessels around the Cape of Good Hope.

That would add days or even weeks to shipping journeys, increase fuel consumption, raise insurance premiums and ultimately increase the cost of transporting goods between Asia and Europe.

For India, which has significant commercial and energy interests in the Gulf and relies heavily on maritime trade, this is not an abstract geopolitical problem happening somewhere far away.

A simultaneous disruption of Hormuz and the Red Sea would put pressure on both India’s energy imports and its shipping costs, while any sustained increase in global crude prices could also affect the country’s import bill, inflation and broader economic stability.

Could this become another Middle Eastern war?

There are several possible outcomes, and the least dangerous would involve Saudi Arabia carrying out limited retaliatory strikes while simultaneously using diplomatic channels to prevent the confrontation from escalating into a full-scale campaign.

The more dangerous possibility is that the Yemen war simply returns to the intensity seen during its worst years, with Saudi-backed forces advancing inside Yemen while the Houthis respond with increasingly sophisticated missile and drone attacks against Saudi territory and shipping.

But the nightmare scenario is the third one: the conflicts merge.

If the US-Iran confrontation around Hormuz continues to intensify, while the Houthis simultaneously increase pressure on Saudi Arabia and Red Sea shipping, Riyadh could find itself pulled deeper into the wider confrontation, potentially bringing the United States and other Gulf states into an increasingly interconnected military conflict.

At that point, the world would no longer be dealing with a series of separate Middle Eastern crises.

It would be dealing with a regional war.

The Middle East is once again playing with fire

The most dangerous feature of the current situation is not simply that the Houthis have attacked Saudi Arabia, nor that Saudi Arabia has promised retaliation, but that these events are occurring in an already unstable regional environment in which Iran, the United States, Saudi Arabia and multiple armed groups are operating across interconnected theatres.

One attack can trigger another, a retaliation can provoke a counter-retaliation, and a conflict that begins with missiles and drones can eventually draw in air forces, naval assets and entire countries that initially had every intention of staying out.

The Middle East has witnessed this pattern repeatedly, and there is little reason to assume that the present crisis will automatically remain contained.

The Houthi attack on Saudi Arabia could therefore prove to be much more consequential than another episode in Yemen’s endless war, because it has the potential to connect the Yemen conflict with the US-Iran confrontation, threaten Saudi Arabia’s critical energy infrastructure and place both the Red Sea and Strait of Hormuz under simultaneous pressure.

The world should therefore not make the mistake of looking at the Houthi attacks as an isolated Yemen story.

Because if the Houthis continue striking Saudi Arabia, if Riyadh responds with overwhelming force, if Iran’s confrontation with Washington continues to intensify and if shipping through the region is increasingly threatened, the Middle East could find itself moving from multiple contained conflicts towards one interconnected regional war.

And when that happens, the consequences will not stop at the borders of the Middle East; they will arrive at petrol pumps, shipping terminals, factories and household budgets across the world.

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