M C Dinakaran

Anchored in 3 dimensions ; soaring onto the 4th

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@AjayKamalakaran Good Morning! Have a great day

[Kalliopi-thassos @KalliopiThassos]

Θάσος !! Βουνό και θάλασσα μαζί!!

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@TejAdarkar @AgentSaffron Script OK. Grammar has nothing to do with Panini!

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@TejAdarkar @HQuarterma43504 Yes. Didn’t Mandarin originate among the Chinese Malayasians who formulated it as a bureaucratic vehicle. It had some relationship to the Malay-Sanskrit word “Mantri”, if what I had heard is right.

[मनसे रिपोर्ट | MNS Report @mnsreport9]

बोलीभाषेचा गर्व राखाच, बोलाच पण शैक्षणिक मर्यादा, गरजा पण लक्षात घ्या...तुमचा अभिमान.🙏

[Xu Feihong @China_Amb_India]

An ancient sala tree planted by Chinese monk Xuanzang with seeds from India, still flourishes in Shaanxi 🇨🇳 🌳.

Its enduring vitality tells a timeless story: Once the seeds of civilisation exchanges are sown, they naturally grow into a forest that transcends time and borders. 🕊️🌏

#CivilisationalDialogue #CulturalExchange

[Amitav Ghosh @GhoshAmitav]

Only in Keralam would a Chief Minister base policy proposals on a book like 'The Nutmeg's Curse'!

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@gopalears Lovely ! Made my day

[South First @TheSouthfirst]

#Kerala: Women passengers and a woman conductors celebrated the launch of the #Priyadarshini scheme by dancing inside #KSRTC buses, as the free travel initiative was welcomed across several depots in Kerala.

The Kerala Government launched the Priyadarshini scheme on Monday, providing free travel for women and transgender persons on KSRTC buses.

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

How Nations Earn Respect

Because of power differentials, asymmetry is inherent in international negotiations. The parties are rarely equal in economic or military strength. Yet history shows that the stronger side does not necessarily prevail, whether on the battlefield or at the negotiating table. Outcomes between nations often depend less on material capabilities than on leadership, political will, national resilience, strategy and tactics.

In 1962, China, by launching a surprise war against an unprepared India, inflicted a humiliating defeat on an economically and militarily stronger adversary. More recently, the world’s most powerful military, the United States, has struggled to achieve decisive results against a much weaker Iran.

In 1999, China was no match for American power. Yet after the U.S. bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, which killed three Chinese nationals, Washington was compelled to pay $32.5 million in compensation for the damage and for those killed or wounded. The U.S. also issued repeated apologies for the bombing, with President Bill Clinton personally apologizing to help defuse the crisis.

In 1971, defying U.S. military pressure and nuclear blackmail, a relatively weak India helped Bangladesh secure independence in a swift 13-day military campaign that produced the largest number of prisoners of war (POWs) since the end of World War II. The operation succeeded despite President Nixon’s deployment of a nuclear-capable naval task force off the southern tip of India.

In 1998, an economically vulnerable India brushed aside U.S. sanctions threats and conducted a series of underground nuclear tests, declaring itself a nuclear-weapons state. The decision reflected a willingness to bear costs in pursuit of national objectives and ultimately became a defining moment in India's rise and strategic transformation.

In 2026, by contrast, an India widely regarded as a rising power but seemingly lacking comparable political resolve responded fecklessly to the killing of three unarmed Indian merchant mariners by the U.S. Navy, demanding neither an American apology nor compensation for the victims’ families.

These episodes differed in circumstance and scale, but they shared a common lesson: nations earn respect not merely through economic or military power, but through leadership, resolve and a willingness to defend their interests.

Respect is earned, not bestowed. Power alone does not command respect; leadership and resolve do. Without them, even a rising power may find itself unable to defend its interests, uphold its dignity or secure justice for its own citizens.

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@TejAdarkar @ChadSumitMishra @Chemosh_moab The Indian Union tenderly nurtured by Panditji and his team was also an inspiration for the European Union

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@AjayKamalakaran Bring the Yala to amchi Mumbai !

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@TejAdarkar @Yaduvam Shiva worship is a proto-Vedic practice of early Indians. Shiva has been merged into what we consider Hinduism as a later construct. But, the thrust of your argument is valid, the Indic religions transformed into indigenous religions : see how Vajrayana transmuted to Chan,Zen!

[M C Dinakaran @dinameena]

@TejAdarkar @Yaduvam True,Tej. The Balinese is the proof:they practise a religion totally different from the “Vedic” religion of Sanatanis

[katy moukakou @princessekateri]

The Afternoon Sun

[Sabeer Bhatia @sabeer]

I was an A student in India—top grades in school, a 10.0 GPA at BITS Pilani. Yet it was only after coming to the US that I realized EQ often matters more than IQ, both in the workplace and in personal growth.

Too much hubris has been injected into the minds of ordinary Indians. Many have been led to believe that India is an IT superpower. The reality is far more nuanced. Technical skills matter, but curiosity, creativity, empathy, critical thinking, and the ability to work with others matter just as much.

[Kalyan Raman کلیان راماں @kalyanasc]

By God. It's bracing to read an official Congress takedown of our discoursewala-in-chief, in delectable prose at that. Read it, people. I hope it straightens out the other 'pompous, predictable and politically undercooked' opinion-makers-at-large as well.

[Binu Alex @badjourno]

https://t.co/4PBRaf7IJs

[Joy Bhattacharjya @joybhattacharj]

It's Sigmund Freud's birth anniversary. I was quite blown to discover that Freud, Hitler, Stalin, Leon Trotsky and Josef Tito all lived in the same 2 mile radius in Vienna at the same time, 1913!

[Aunindyo Chakravarty @Aunindyo2023]

How did Stalin lose despite such high economic growth in Tamil Nadu?

Actually, he lost because of it.

It is true that factory production has grown at a remarkable pace under the DMK - three times as fast as the rest of India.

But this has come at the expense of the states workers - often from the most exploited castes - who work long hours for poor pay.

This is especially true in the Coimbatore-Tiruppur textile and garment belt. Several investigations have revealed that young underage girls are employed in these factories, under a modern day variant of bonded labour.

Even in the more 'modern' electronics industry, wages have been stagnant for years and workers have been angry for a while. A case in point, is the 38-day Samsung strike in Sriperumbudur in late 2024, where workers complained of poor working conditions and low pay hikes.

But this is no different from other states with robust factory sectors. Everywhere real income of workers has been stagnant for over a decade, while profits have shot up.

What makes Tamil Nadu different is that its business class has a much wider base, unlike other states where a few families and conglomerates control everything.

This means, it is much more difficult for a party in power to develop a symbiotic relationship with the corporates of the state.

In other states, it has been historically possible for the state govt to patronise a few business houses, and in return get funding and financial heft to control institutions, including the media.

In Tamil Nadu, favouritism in govt contracts immediately gets a pushback from those left behind, because they also have signficant clout.

Stalin's govt has been accused of favouring a few corporates in doling out govt contracts in several sectors. The AIADMK even submitted a formal dossier, this January, alleging irregularities in govt contracts worth ₹4 lakh crore.

It is not that Tamil Nadu doesn't have large business houses. There are several - TVS, Murugappa, Amalgamation, Sanmar, Ramco, etc - and their relationship with Dravidian politics has been well studied by scholars. But many of these have had a love-hate relationship DMK-aligned entitites like the Sun group, owned by the Marans.

Although Stalin fell out with his cousins - the Marans - they reconciled and the relationship has been stable since then. There were even reports last year that Stalin had personally intervened to resolve disputes within the Maran family.

That is why Sun's shares crashed on the 4th, when it became clear that the DMK was heading for a crushing defeat.

The point is that Tamil Nadu's stellar economic growth hides internal tensions - from inter-capitalist rivalries to worker agitations - which erupt every now and then.

This time, these tensions have combined to push up Joseph Vijay, and take down MK Stalin.