Open Forum

New Delhi, 9 September 2026

Hottest Month & Year

PLANET AT TIPPING POINT?

By Dhurjati Mukherjee 

August was the hottest month for the world as it was for India. The IMD shared a recent report by climate science platform, Climate Brink, which forecast that 2026 is likely to become the warmest ever. This year is on track for 1.62⁰ C above pre-industrial levels, which is over the annual global average rise recorded in 2024, in range of 1.55⁰ C and 1.60⁰ C benchmark. 

The IMD data showed the national average mean temperature soared to 28.01⁰C, surpassing the historical normal of 27.24⁰C by 0.67⁰ C. Reports reveal the world is set to permanently enter the 1.5⁰ C temperature rise era, with the average temperature potentially settling at around 1.8⁰ C, though several climate models predict the rise to reach 2⁰ C or beyond.   

Europe too is reported to be battling its worst heat wave on record amid research suggesting the human body may be less tolerant of extreme heat than previously believed; reinforcing global warming could make parts of the planet too hot for human survival. A study published in April found that earlier heat waves in Australia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Spain had breached physiological heat-stress thresholds. And latest reports of June and July reveal conditions have worsened. 

Reviewing the global situation, reports indicate global average temperature has risen by only 1.5⁰C and that has been enough to transform the Northern Hemisphere temperatures, once considered exceptional – 40⁰C, becoming the norm. Prolonged droughts, destructive wildfires and shrinking rivers are no longer freak events. Last year, the European Union lost one million hectares to wildfires and this by July-end reached 450,000 hectares. 

The European continent has been reeling under searing heat waves that have burned 500,000 hectares and killed over 10,000 people. Climate emergency is also in the United States, which saw yellow-grey smoke drift across Canada’s wildfires onto its shores. Scientists opine European-type situation beats the human fingerprint of climate change, primarily driven by the burning of fossil fuels that releases Earth-warming carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. 

Studies also have pointed that heat waves have been occurring at high temperature and humidity levels which were once thought to remain within levels of human survival. Earlier assessments have underestimated the danger. 

Extreme heat costs South Asia the equivalent of 32 million full-time jobs every year. The recent World Development Report (WDR) report ‘A Liveable Future: Tackling Extreme Heat for Jobs and Growth in South Asia’s Cities’ warned that without action, the region’s GDP could fall nearly 7 percent by 2050. Informal workers would be hit hardest – a single heat wave can slash their earnings by 40 percent.  

Another study published in the Earth System Science Data journal, presented at the global climate meeting in Germany, revealed that all indicators of global climate change have increased since the last UN assessment report was published about years ago.   

“Human activities pushed global warming to 1.37^0-C in 2025, and its level is predicted to surpass 1.5⁰ C in about four years. Currently the rate at which heat is accumulating in the Earth system suggests high levels of future warming”, warned the report. According to the data, India’s surface air temperature has risen significantly over the past century, leading to severe and prolonged heat waves. Summer monsoon, a lifeline for agriculture and economy has become unpredictable. Moreover, rainfall is forecast to be at least 10 percent less this year than the long-term average due to global climate changes, coupled with a severe El Nino phenomenon. 

A recent Yale Centre for Environ Law and Policy report titled Environment Protection Index 2026 ranked India 176 out of 177 countries, scoring 22.46 out of 100due to India’s low standing on air pollution, high reliance on coal and inadequate biodiversity protection. The very poor ranking of the country is obviously a cause of serious concern. 

An interdisciplinary group of scientists of the Stockholm Research Centre has adopted a method called Planetary Boundaries Framework. Accordingly, there are nine key earth systems which, if treated beyond safety limits through human activities, could result in large, sudden changes in nature that have so far not been experienced. These nine critical earth systems for monitoring include climate change, biodiversity loss, phosphorus and nitrogen cycles, chemical pollution, ocean acidification, ozone depletion, land use patterns, freshwater use and atmospheric aerosol loading. Initially 200-odd scientists involved in the project found the complimentary nature of these problems have been accentuating with every passing year.   

Clearly, efforts underway to protect the planet are grossly inadequate. The extent of global warming is getting accentuated year after year. The big question is what strategy needs to be adopted to ensure that heat is tolerable and that its effect in the realm of agricultural as well as industrial production would not be harmful. 

Apart from natural resources, water obviously is crucial and strategic planning of its use and treatment is critical. More cost-effective plans as well as the much-publicised rainwater harvesting schemes are needed. The most important thing, however, are high levels of wastewater recycling that is evident in water-stressed countries like Israel and Singapore. Even domestic use must be regulated and wastage punished with a heavy penalty.    

Experts believe that water constraints will shape India’s growth. In practice, this means future industrial capacity will concentrate in regions that can demonstrate long-term water security, efficient allocation and advanced reuse systems. Over time, water resilience will influence both industrial and agricultural activity. India cannot pursue a linear growth model in a non-linear water environment. 

The recent wars in Russia-Ukraine and West Asia have led to grave environmental catastrophe and ecocide. But such ecocide is not expressly banned or defined under the framework of international law. Article 8(2)(b)(iv) of the Rome Statute has proved to be inadequate in this regard. The International Criminal Court is yet to prosecute any nation under the particular provision. Moreover, it is not known whether there has been any attempt to document the ecological damages from the West Asian crisis, which would be enormously grave, affecting the Gulf nations severely. 

In sum, various factors put together ring alarm bells. The challenge ahead to combat global warming is enormous. It must be met and decisively. ---INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)

Economic Highlights

New Delhi, 7 September 2026

Himalayas Losing Balance

GREATER STRAIN ON ECONOMY

Shivaji Sarkar 

Unfathomable! In a matter of seconds, an immense mass of ice, rock and frozen earth broke loose high in the Himalayas, unleashing a violent cascade from the Tibetan heights into Nepal. What began at nearly 5,000 metres high became a wall of water, mud, rock and ice racing through the Lhende Khola, Bhote Koshi and Trishuli valleys, tearing through settlements, roads and bridges and radicallyaltering the landscape below. 

The sheer force was extraordinary. The collapse produced a seismic signal initially mistaken for an earthquake, while the debris travelled more than 20 km before the flood surged through the Himalayan valleys. Entire riverside settlements disappeared beneath what survivors described as a moving mass of mud and debris. The destruction extended across Tibet and Nepal, with the downstream consequences reaching into India. 

But the visible destruction is only the beginning. It is, the geological experts aver, is the beginning of a swifter Indian sub-continental warming as 74 percent of the northern hemisphere permafrost stored in Tibet being lost is likely to cause searing heat in Europe, the Atlantic Ocean region extending to Greenland. Would we see many larger icebergs? Likely, but no one knows. 

This was not merely another Himalayan flood;it was a geological warning. The Himalayas are a young, restless mountain system, increasingly stressed by warming glaciers, thawing frozen ground, unstable slopes and intense human intervention. Roads, tunnels, dams, hydropower projects and expanding settlements are penetrating terrain whose geology remains inherently fragile. 

What makes the disaster particularly disturbing is what cannot yet be seen. A major collapse can destabilise slopes, alter river channels and create or disturb lakes, setting off chain of landslides, debris flows and floods. One rupture can generate another, turning a single catastrophe into a chain of events unfolding over years or decades. 

And the loss is not merely economic majorly for the subcontinent and particularly a vast swathe of Nepal, Bangladesh and particularly the Indian landmass. A landscape shaped over millennia can be transformed in minutes. Villages, forests, farmland, river courses and ecological systems carry not only material wealth but the accumulated memory of generations. Roads and bridges can be rebuilt; a vanished landscape, ecosystem or cultural inheritance cannot simply be reconstructed. 

Nor does the Himalayan disaster end where the mountains descend into the plains. The rivers carry its consequences across borders into Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and beyond, exposing agriculture, settlements, infrastructure and economies downstream. What happens at height of 5,000 metres can become a crisis thousands of kilometres away. 

The question, therefore, is no longer whether the Himalayas are changing. It is whether the subcontinent/South Asia is prepared for what that change could unleash— and what generations yet unborn may inherit from our choices today. 

It is yet to be assessed how much land would remain agriculturally productive from a limited perspective of Himachal, Uttarakhand, Nepal, northern Bengal, Sikkim, Arunachal and beyond. Perhaps large farmlands would degenerate into sand fields and dunes, many depositions of rubbles and further impoverish the people. 

The breadbasket may shrink, hunger could grow in the region and food prices the world over could spike. These are possibilities as indicated by bridge, dam and barrage collapses, including the mighty Farakka leading to a severe flood in Bangladesh. Damage and losses are incalculable as well as not limited to time schedule. 

Such was the force of the event, it was initially reported as an earthquake of magnitude 4.4. The US Geological Survey later determined the tremor was caused by glacial rock and ice collapsing, registering a magnitude of 5.2.The collapse triggered a huge release of water, mud, rock and ice that thundered down valleys and swept down the Lhende Khola, Bhotekoshi and Trishuli rivers –the Gandak system in India. 

The high-speed flash floods careered towards northern Nepalese towns, including areas popular with mountaineering tourists and pilgrims.Horrifying videos from the Gyirong border post, which connects Nepal and Tibet, showed people running for their lives as the wall of debris obliterated buildings and swept away lines of transport. 

Third Pole Collapse - River Projects Useful?

The Third Pole, as the Himalayas are called, collapse may usher in a severe earth heating from eastern Asia to Europe and Greenland.Power lines under constructions and tunnels of the working of innumerable power projects are choked with engineers, workers and technical teams missing and cars blocking tunnels. Many projects may never be revived. Perhaps it would lead to probes to find whether such schemes are profitable, eco friendly or at all useful. 

Massive downstream dam and hydropower ambitions in sensitive zones like Arunachal Pradesh face severe exposure to sudden upstream high-altitude flooding and mass-destructing events.It has washed away railway stations, roads, offices, markets, and what not for over a week in northern Bihar, and Bengal. 

Magnitude Surpasses Kedarnath

Deaths are uncountable. Latest estimates say it has surpassed the 2013 Kedarnath-Uttarakhand tally of 8000. Perhaps right. It’s in a far wider, higher and more critical area that has shaken the foundation of the Himalayas –world’s roof to floor shaken and now the race to the Nepal to the Bay of Bengalis on. 

Many ports and river routes may face disruption, potentially reshaping both the ecology and economics from Nepal to Northeast India. Restoring connectivity would be costly—and harder amid regional geopolitical tensions. 

The losses include rare Himalayan flora, expensive medicinal plants, herbs, aromatic, life-saving plants and extremely precious, forget about stones,minerals that are stored for millennia. Does the Ganga water gets its speciality and unique qualities from these preserved soils? None knows and now it would not be easy to establish the link. 

Permafrost to Global Warming

Thawing Himalayan permafrost is more than a geological concern. Its release of carbon and methane can accelerate warming, while destabilising slopes and water systems. The Nepal tragedy exposes India’s vulnerability across its fragile Himalayan states. 

At around 17,000 feet, the scale and consequences of the detached ice-rock mass remain uncertain. The Qinghai–Tibet Plateau—the Earth’s Third Pole—holds the world’s largest expanse of alpine permafrost, covering roughly one million sq km and storing enormous quantities of carbon while regulating regional hydrology. 

As this frozen system thaws, risks of glacier loss, landslides, floods and further warming increase, with possible implications for Asia’s desertification. A next rupture may be awaiting! 

India has a formidable task ahead. Extant institutions like the Planning Commission and entire agriculture and earth sciences system need reorientation requiring billions. Can a strained economy do it?---INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)

Political Diary                                                                                                                 

New Delhi, 8 September 2026

7.8% GDP Growth

BUT WHERE IS THE HAPPINESS?

By Poonam I Kaushish 

India has a new magic number: 7.8%. The economy grew by 7.8% in first quarter of 2026-27 giving Government reason to celebrate. Yet before drums roll louder and champagne is popped, one question deserves an answer: Where is this growth in the life of an ordinary Indian? 

Not in a spreadsheet, but in the household. GDP may be soaring, but are jobs? Are wages keeping pace? Is household purchasing power up? Is disposable income rising? Is poverty falling? Is the middle class breathing easier? And if the economy is doing so well, why does economic security remain so elusive for so many? And, most importantly, are Indians happier?

The question is not whether 7.8% is real. The Centre has defended the new GDP methodology, critics have questioned whether the revised calculations adequately reflect what is happening on the ground. Both sides have made their case. But reducing the debate to whether the number is “right” or “wrong” or celebration vs cynicism misses the larger point: Where is its multiplier effect on employment, wages and household prosperity? Can one turn an economic statistic into a political certificate of good governance?

And nowhere is this disconnect more visible than in India’s middle class. GDP is a measure of economic output. It is not a measure of human wellbeing or how people experience growth. A country can produce more cars, build more roads, sell more financial services, consume more, record higher industrial output and invest more without automatically making every household more secure while a young graduate may struggle to find a decent job. 

A salaried family may see its savings eaten by school fees, a retiree may wonder whether one medical emergency will wipe out his lifetime savings as millions remain unemployed, worry about healthcare, insurance, housing and the next electricity bill. GDP does not measure sleepless nights. 

Ironically, the middle class is India’s economic workhorse but increasingly its political orphan. Think. It earns, spends and pays taxes: income tax on earnings, GST on consumption, service tax, road tax, private security, school fees, healthcare, insurance and funds public services through taxation. 

It receives fewest subsidies with zilch in return except patchy services: inflated bills, broken roads, potholes, flooding, ghoos, hafta, cut money etc. It is expected to applaud growth, absorb inflation, comply with every new digital requirement and somehow keep consuming to keep the economy humming. Alongside, the extraordinary expectation that it should pay privately for what the State promises publicly. 

Any wonder the middle class is angry as India has become a democracy of vote banks. Every caste is counted, courted and compensated. The poor have welfare politics, farmers organised pressure, caste groups political arithmetic, communities political negotiators, disadvantaged groups champions and rich are accommodated. Leaders can tell exactly how many votes they need from every caste, community and beneficiary group.

But ask about the middle class and suddenly their arithmetic goes blank as it is neither sufficiently poor for welfare nor sufficiently powerful to demand concessions. But has a tax department and is expected to cope. Bringing things to such a pass where it increasingly feels its’  the ATM of the Republic.

Do our leaders care about the middle class who pay bills? Given rising household costs and cost of living. Has politics become focused on redistribution that the productive, tax-paying middle class is taken for granted? Why is there no improvement in services as Government’s tax revenues boom?

It is expected to celebrate GDP growth, absorb inflation when prices rise, pay taxes when incomes rise and applaud digitisation when transactions become easier. But when does the State ask whether citizen’s disposable income, job security and quality of life have risen with the economy?

A nation is not a spreadsheet. GDP can grow but citizens do not eat GDP, educate children, pay taxes and hospital bills with GDP. They are too fragmented to become a vote bank and too law-abiding to make its grievances electorally threatening. Governments cannot ask citizens to judge the economy by macroeconomic numbers when they experience it through microeconomic realities.

Why do we measure success through production, consumption and investment but treat wellbeing as a sentimental afterthought? The World Happiness Report doesn’t pretend GDP is irrelevant. It simply recognises that income is only one component of a good life. Social support, health, freedom and ability to lead a meaningful life matter too. 

If growth is 7.8% it is an opportunity Government must seize, not merely rejoice. Strong growth should generate investment, employment, higher incomes and eventually a larger, more secure middle class. The Government has spent considerable political capital telling middle class it is its Government. Prime Minister Modi describes middle class as central to nation-building and highlights tax relief and “ease of living.” If it is so important to Government, why does it have so little political voice? 

The real test of growth is not how much the economy produces but what production does for people’s lives? How many jobs are created? What is happening to household purchasing power? Is productivity translating into wages, social security, trust, opportunity and a sense of wellbeing? 

Is the benefit of growth reaching the bottom and middle or accumulating disproportionately at the top? Because growth without distribution creates prosperity statistics; growth with opportunity creates prosperity.  

India’s ambition to become a developed economy by 2047 should mean more than becoming a larger economy. Development is not merely becoming richer. It is becoming better off. That means growth creating jobs that pay, not merely jobs that count. It means wages rising with productivity, a family not being financially devastated by illness, parents not having to spend their life savings on exorbitant private education and uncertain public alternatives.

Women should not have to calculate whether their economic independence is worth the cost of inadequate safety and infrastructure and elderly should not regard retirement as a financial cliff, they should have dignity rather than dependence and opportunity should become broad-based rather than concentrated. 

Perhaps the real GDP debate is not whether India grew by 7.8%. It is whether the middle class grew with it. Because, an economy can become richer on paper while its citizens remain poorer in opportunity, security, confidence and hope. At some point, GDP must leave the Government spreadsheet and enter the citizen’s kitchen, classroom, workplace and wallet. 

The Government sees GDP, citizen sees EMI, Government sees consumption, citizen sees grocery bill, Government sees digital transactions, citizen sees dwindling bank balance. The Government sees growth. The citizen asks: what grew for me? Somewhere between the two lies the real story of India’s growth. Until then, 7.8% may be a remarkable economic number. But a number is not a national mood. --- INFA 

(Copyright India News & Feature Alliance)

REWIND

New Delhi, 4 September 2026

A DEMOCRATIC ALTERNATIVE

By Inder Jit

(Released on 25 April 1978) 

Appraisals and reappraisals, many agonising, appear to have become the order of the day for various political parties and politicians in quest of power. Top Janata leaders have held another exercise in heart-searching and “operation survival”, stimulated by Mr Nanaji Deshmukh’s timely think bomb. The CPM and the CPI lenders have informally met to explore the possibility of unity among left democratic forces to fight back the renewed threat from the ‘fascists’ and their storm-troopers. Equally important are the informal discussions now on among Congressmen, led by Mr Swaran Singh, Mr Chavan and Mr Brahamanda Reddi, about their role in national affairs and prospects for the future in the light of Mrs Indira Gandhi’s increasing success in getting their partymen to join her colourful bandwagon. Many appropriately ask: is the Congress still relevant? Or, is it now set to be cast unceremoniously into the dust-bin of history? 

Most people appear to have already written off the Congress in keeping with our characteristic inclination to swing to conclusions. The party’s present eclipse is being generally confused with irrelevance. Yet leading Congressmen and many intellectuals are of the view that the Congress in not only relevant but has a positive role to play in the crisis that currently grips the country. Indeed, a few go further and assert that the Congress is as relevant today as it was prior to independence. In 1947, the party brought about political independence and achieved one of its two historic tasks. The other task of ushering in economic and social independence still remains to be accomplished. As aa top Congress leader put its “Our party today has neither power nor money. We are, therefore, in a position to identify ourselves with the common man once again, understand his hopes and frustrations better and draw upa minimum grass-roots programme.” 

The Indira Congress, no doubt, claims to be the “real Congress”. However, Mr Swaran Singh and others draw pointed attention to basic differences between the two Congresses. Mrs Gandhi’s Congress, it is urged, is based on “authoritarian personality cult and has little regard for democracy or the democratic way of life.” In sharp contrast, the Congress, it is emphasised, stands firmly by its commitment to democracy, democratic methods and fundamental freedoms. Indeed, Congressmen claim that their party alone offers “democratic alternative” to the Janata Party. Such a democratic alternative is required at any time in a parliamentary democracy to ensure its healthy functioning and growth. But it is needed even more so today in view of the increasing disenchantment of the people with the Janata Party and because of the character of Indian politics, the broad pattern of Indian voting and the outlook and approach of the average Indian to punishment for crime against individuals or the community. 

Voting in India shows two broad trends. First, voters generally seem to move in waves, depending upon the emotions roused. Second, the approach is more negative than positive; a vote is often given not so much for a party as against another. In 1967, for instance, the people were angry with the Congress and voted the party out in many States. Four years later, the voter turned against the non-Congress parties and the country saw Mrs Gandhi ride to power on an unprecedented Indira wave. In March last year, the people, conscious of their power, turned their wrath against Mrs Gandhi and her caucus and knocked the Congress for a six. In Karnal recently, the country witnessed yet another wave. An angry people decided to teach the Janata Party a lesson for its poor performance -- and for taking them for granted. The Janata candidate’s margin of victory was slashed from some three lakh votes to barely about 18,000 votes. 

Conscious of this trend, top Congress leaders are determined to keep their flag aloft and be available as democratic alternative. The task, it is conceded, is not easy. They lack Mrs Gandhi’s dynamism and charisma-- as also the money power and the muscle power of the Indira Congress. But they are clear that there is no scope whatsoever of any honourable unity”, a point emphasised by Mr Chavan at the meeting of the Maharashtra P.C.C. Unity, in fact, is seen as an illusion and nothing other than “humiliating surrender” since there is no scope for any compromise on the question of personality cult and authoritarianism. Not a few among Congressmen eager somehow to get back into power have angrily argued that their party will be reduced to the position of the Congress (0). Mr Chavan has, however, countered the argument by saying: “Yes the Congress (0) was reduced to a small party. But history will record that Congress (0) provided India with its fourth Prime Minister.” 

Some clever Indira Congressmen have tried to exploit these remarks to embarrass Mr Chavan by unfairly remarking: “So, Mr Chavan wants to be Prime Minister.” But Mr Chavan and his colleagues are not deterred in their resolve by such tactics. Few at the last meeting of the Congress Working Committee in New Delhi were inclined to go along with Mr V.P. Naik, who put forward his views on the question of unity. In any case, the Maharashtra P.C.C. resolution tossed the ball in the court of the Indira Congress. The response so far from the Congress (I) has not only been negative but has confirmed the view put forward by Mr Chavan. The Indira Congress is no longer willing to take any Congressman “honourably” into its fold. The “open-door” policy is now a thing of the past. Instead, the Indira Congress has announced its decision to go in for selective admissions. “If this is not asking one to surrender, what else is it?”asked another Congress leader. 

In their resolve to stay separate, top Congress leaders have also gone by the advice of a veteran of many political battles and victories. Some three months ago he visited New Delhi from his place of retirement and intellectual pursuit and advised his colleagues in so many words: “Indira Congress will become Sanjay Congress in three years from now. You friends will have no place in it. Why then allow Mrs Gandhi to exploit you once again? Instead, keep your identity and fight for principles.” Significantly, his assessment was based on a talk with Mrs Gandhi some ten months earlier. He then told Mrs Gandhi: “The people still have regard for you. But they will not tolerate Sanjay. My advice, therefore, is: Make a public declaration that you have advised Sanjay to withdraw from politics and you will not either help or encourage him.” Mrs Gandhi, according to this veteran, replied after a brief pause: “I don't know why people are against Sanjay. What has he done...” 

Happily for Mr Swaran Singh, Mr Chavan and Mr Reddi the morale of their party is not as low as is widely made out to be. In fact, Mr Swaran Singh has decided to continue as President only as part of the collective decision not to do anything which may in any way cause demoralisation. During his absence abroad, Mr Chavan will look after the work of the President. In fact, Mr Chavan is now busy travelling around and recently visited Assam and Orissa where he found Congressmen like Mr Sarat Sinha and many others standing rock-like on the decision to keep the “real Congress” going. Earlier, Mr Chavan visited Kerala and was happy to find the State’s Chief Minister, Mr Antony, and other Congressmen, including Mr Vyalar Ravi and Mr K.P. Unnikrishnan, both MPs, solidly with him. Mr Chavan is now hoping that together with like-minded partymen they can hold their AlCC meeting or national convention on May 14 and 15 and do two things. Reassert their separate democratic identity; and put forward a clear-cut programme before the nation. 

For the present, attention is being directed to the forthcoming poll battle in Azamgarh where Mr Chandrajit Yadav is contesting the by-election to the Lok Sabha against a former supporter, Mr Ram Bachan Yadav, now contesting on the Janata ticket, and an erstwhile colleague, Mrs Mohsina Kidwai, nominee of the Indira Congress. (In 1967, Mr Ram Bacchan Yadav had reportedly met some members of the Congress Central Parliamentary Board to plead for a Lok Sabha ticket for Mr Chandrajit Yadav). Unlike in the South, the Congress Party proposes not to be on the defensive and gracefully admit its Himalayan blunder in supporting Mrs Gandhi and her authoritarian rule. A few leaders are even talking in terms of some demonstration of praischit (atonement) for their sins of omission and commission. Azamgarh, it is realised, offers the party both a challenge and an opportunity. Time and patience, its leaders claim, are on their side---INFA 

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)