Indo-US Defence Framework Renewed for Another Ten Years; Govt Confirms Indian Companies Have Received Licences to Import Chinese Magnets; India Will Help Taliban Government Build a Dam
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October 31, 2025
Sidharth Bhatia
Meeting on the sidelines of the ASEAN Defence Ministers Plus summit in Kuala Lumpur today, Union defence minister Rajnath Singh and his American opposite number Pete Hegseth renewed the Indo-US Defence Framework Agreement for another ten years, marking its third such extension since the pact was first signed in 1995. Singh said defence will remain a “major pillar” of bilateral ties and that the renewed agreement represents the beginning of a “new era”. Hegseth hailed the two sides’ defence partnership as a “cornerstone for regional stability and deterrence” and as having “never been stronger”. Their positive remarks notwithstanding the deal’s extension comes at a time when bilateral relations have been strained over India’s purchases of Russian oil and Washington’s 50% tariff rate levied in response to that.
Indian Oil, which had cancelled orders of Russian crude after Washington announced sanctions against Russia’s two largest oil firms Rosneft and Lukoil, has purchased some 3.5 million barrels of ESPO oil for delivery in December from non-sanctioned entities, report Nidhi Verma and Siyi Liu. ESPO, which refers to Russia’s Eastern Siberia-Pacific Ocean oil pipeline, has seen prices fall for its oil after China stepped purchases down in light of the US tariffs, “making it attractive for Indian buyers”. Indian Oil’s chief of finance has said that the refiner will continue buying Russian oil as long as the barrels are compliant with American sanction conditions.
Asked about the US sanctions’ impact on Indian deals with Rosneft or Lukoil, external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said that “the decisions that we take naturally take into account the evolving dynamics that is there in the global market”, and that New Delhi’s guiding imperative is to “secure affordable energy from diverse sources” for the Indian people. That’s in line with the ministry’s earlier remark that India is looking to “[broad-base] our energy sourcing and diversifying as appropriate” – seen as a signal that Delhi will reduce its increased reliance on Russian oil – which it issued after US President Donald Trump claimed that Prime Minister Modi had assured him India would cut back on its purchases of crude from Moscow.
Meanwhile, Jaiswal confirmed that some Indian companies did indeed receive licenses to import rare earth magnets from China. CNBC-TV18 had reported that Indian firms Continental India, DE Diamond, Hitachi and Jay Ushin, which provide components to automakers including Maruti, were the first recipients of import licenses after Beijing decided to relax its export controls following Chinese President Xi Jinping and Trump’s meeting in South Korea. The four firms, per the broadcaster, can import rare earth magnets as long as they do not export them to America or use them for defence purposes.
Trade tariffs intended to boost India’s solar manufacturing sector in the face of Chinese dominance are raising prices for projects and consumers, reports Nikkei Asia.
A Chinese deep-sea research vessel, Shen Hai Yi Hao (Deep Sea No. 1), is currently en route to the Indian Ocean, with its Automatic Identification System (AIS) showing Malé, Maldives, as its destination. The voyage has triggered renewed concerns in New Delhi, coming at a time of heightened Chinese activity and influence in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).
India is ready to help the Taliban regime build a dam over the Kunar River – an initiative Kabul recently said it will work towards – the external affairs ministry said yesterday. Jaiswal pointed to the Indo-Afghan joint statement issued earlier this year, which says the two sides “agreed to cooperate on hydroelectric projects with a view to addressing Afghanistan’s energy needs and support its agricultural development”. The Kunar originates in northern Pakistan as the Chinar River, flows into eastern Afghanistan and meets the Kabul River, which in turn courses into Pakistan and meets the Indus at Attock. Past reports of Afghan plans to build dams over either river have sparked some concern in Pakistan. Islamabad had said last week that it is “ascertaining the details” over Kabul’s plans to dam the Kunar.
Jaiswal, when asked about the Pakistani defence minister’s allegation that India is using Afghanistan to fight a proxy war against Islamabad, reiterated New Delhi’s backing for Kabul over its deadly border clashes with Pakistan. “Pakistan is infuriated with Afghanistan exercising sovereignty over its own territories” and India “remains fully committed to the sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of Afghanistan”, he said. Meanwhile, the Turkish government – which along with Qatar has mediated talks between the two sides – announced overnight that they had agreed to maintain their ceasefire and to meet once again in Istanbul on November 6. The talks had appeared to founder, with a Pakistani cabinet minister saying a few days ago that they had “failed” over the Afghan side’s alleged lack of commitment over ousting militants from its territory.
Jailed environmental activist Sonam Wangchuk’s wife, Gitanjali J Angmo, is continuously working to secure his release in the case. Yesterday, she met with Ritam Khare, a Supreme Court lawyer and shared it in a post on X. She stated that during this meeting, Ritam Khare was briefed on the Supreme Court hearing. Khare added that following in Bapu’s footsteps through satyagraha, fasting, and padayatra, Sonam Wangchuk has now reached jail as well. Ultimately, she is confident that this journey, like Bapu’s, will lead to Swaraj – “freedom for all, whether it’s the people of Ladakh, animals, birds, bees, rivers, valleys and glaciers of Ladakh, the Himalayas, and the world.”
While the Modi government is busy proclaiming Wangchuk as an anti-national and a threat to national security under the NSA, Time Magazine is celebrating him as “the world’s most influential leaders driving business to real climate action” in its 2025 100 Time Climate list.
Investigative news organisation Cobrapost held a press conference on Thursday at the Press Club of India in New Delhi, in which it claimed to have unearthed a massive banking fraud of Rs 28,874 crore committed by the Anil Ambani-owned Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (Reliance ADAG), apart from other allegedly illegal transactions. The Cobrapost investigation, according to its editor Aniruddha Bahal, shows Reliance ADAG raised loans from public and private sector banks, and through initial public offerings (IPOs) and bonds, then allegedly diverted these funds through shell companies and offshore entities to promoter group companies. Atul Howale has more details on it here.
A Special Investigation Team of the Karnataka Police investigating the alleged voter theft in Aland constituency has reportedly collected CCTV footage from the residence of former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Subhash Guttedar. The SIT has said that the CCTV footage allegedly shows Guttedar’s associates trying to destroy documents which were Aland voter lists, reports The Indian Express. While opposing the anticipatory bail pleas filed by Guttedar, his son Harsha Guttedar and an associate, Tipperudra, in the Aland case, a Karnataka government prosecutor on Thursday cited the existence of this CCTV footage and the recovery of a digital video recorder from the home of Guttedar.
Today is the 150th birth anniversary of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, the ‘Iron Man of India,’ who forged a united nation from 562 princely states post-independence, embodying Gandhian non-violence and selfless service. Despite his brief post-1947 tenure – dying in 1950 at 75 – Patel’s legacy transcends politics. Yesterday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi met the family of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel at Ekta Nagar. Ironically, Modi – so inspired by Patel’s legacy – went on to rename the Sardar Patel Stadium in Ahmedabad after himself – it is now the Narendra Modi Stadium! In the official tribute video to Patel, Modi’s own visuals outnumber Patel’s, and the celebration at Gujarat’s Statue of Unity feels more like a homage to Modi than to Iron Man himself. The real twist? Sardar Patel once banned the RSS – the very organisation where Modi began his political journey.
As senior journalist Urvish Kothari notes, from the oft-repeated “injustice to Sardar” narrative to the grand Statue of Unity – the world’s tallest statue, ironically made in China and assembled in India at a cost of about Rs 3,000 crore – the focus has always been on spectacle over substance. He says,
“Modi’s tendency to overwrite even Sardar’s name when it suits his image-building was evident in 2021, when the Sardar Patel Stadium in Motera was renamed the Narendra Modi Stadium. Predictably, loyalists flooded social media with justifications: claiming the stadium was originally called Motera Stadium, or that Sardar’s name still applied to the broader sports complex. But old tweets from BCCI President Jay Shah suggest otherwise. Today, signboards across Ahmedabad mention only “Narendra Modi Stadium”—no trace of Sardar Patel, no mention of a sports complex.”
Love jihad is a bizarre enough conspiracy theory but Faridabad’s top education bureaucrat plumbed a new depth earlier this week by issuing a letter to all schools government and private warning against students “engaging in antisocial activities and love jihad in different parks, thereby disturbing the social fabric and polluting the environment”. In order to curb this danger to society posed by children, district education officer Anshu Garg ordered schools to set up WhatsApp groups comprising parents in order to track absentee students and ensure “immediate awareness”. This decision, Sushil Manav cites Garg as claiming, was taken after a complaint was received on the ‘CM Window’ against ‘students engaging in love jihad in different parks’. The DEO had to ultimately “annul” his letter yesterday amid backlash.
Acquitted in all five cases against her after six years in jail, Gadchiroli native Parvati Sandmek stepped out of the Nagpur central prison yesterday only to be whisked away in a car by plainclothed police personnel. No notice or information was given to her husband or other family members. It was only when Sandmek’s lawyer threatened to file a habeas corpus petition in the high court that the police called him and claimed they had taken her “as an act of warning her to not indulge in any Naxal [Maoist] activities in the future”. At night, still with the police, she was able to meet her husband, who was told to take Sandmek with him. Speaking to Sukanya Shantha, a local police officer claimed they were not required to generate legal documentation as they were only detaining Sandmek for questioning – this “not only contrast[s] the mandated process under law but also violate[s] repeated judgments and strictures passed by the Supreme Court”, she notes.
As he allegedly held 18 people, 17 of them children, hostage in a Mumbai building yesterday and threatened them with an air gun, police who arrived there to respond to the situation shot 50-year-old Rohit Arya dead. The Indian Express reports, quoting a police officer who spoke to Arya during the operation, that he was unhappy over his firm not being paid its dues. He had also demonstrated in Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur against the government’s alleged delay in paying his company for a project it undertook under the ‘My School, Beautiful School’ scheme. The children Arya had kept hostage were reportedly in the building on the pretext of an audition and he had rigged the premises with motion sensors, per the newspaper.
US Vice President JD Vance sparked controversy by seemingly sidelining his wife Usha Vance’s Hindu faith. When asked whether her religion conflicted with his hardline views on immigration and religion, Vance said he hopes she embraces Christianity, effectively denying his wife’s religious identity as Hindu. Historian Audrey Truschke criticised the remark, noting that Vance labeled Usha as “currently without a religion” and framed her future solely as Christian.
Sanjay Raut, a leader of Shiv Sena (UBT) and a Rajya Sabha MP, has disclosed that he is facing significant health challenges and is currently receiving treatment. In a message shared on X, Raut mentioned that he has been advised to avoid social interactions and refrain from going out in public for medical reasons. “You have all shown me love and trust. However, I have encountered serious health issues and am undergoing treatment. I am determined to overcome this. Following medical advice, I have been instructed not to go out or engage with the public,” Raut wrote. The prominent leader, recognized for his candid criticism of the ruling BJP and his frequent media engagements, also conveyed optimism about making a full recovery by next year.
In April 2018, the former English captain posted a photo of himself with a young girl on Twitter, predicting that she “would be a star for India.” On Thursday, that young girl, Jemimah Rodrigues led the Indian women’s cricket team to a stupendous victory, when it chased down a score of 339 in the Women’s World Cup semi-final in Navi Mumbai. Jemimah scored 127 runs and her victory was sweeter because she was heavily trolled by the right-wing last year because of unsubstantiated claims that her father had used a club premises in Mumbai for ‘conversion’.
Lawyers for Umar Khalid and others make arguments for bail before SC
Counsel for Umar Khalid, Gulfisha Fatima and Sharjeel Imam – who have all been jailed for over five years in the 2020 Delhi riots ‘conspiracy’ case even as their trial has shown no signs of beginning soon – made their arguments for bail before the Supreme Court today. Fatima’s lawyer Abhishek Manu Singhvi pointed out that what is happening to his client is a “distortion of the criminal justice system”. “If you get bail after 6-7 years, what is the point?” he asked. Khalid’s lawyer Kapil Sibal said that he was not even in Delhi when the riots took place, while other accused in the case who were in the city have already been bailed out. Imam’s counsel Siddharth Dave said that his client was in custody when the riots had occurred. The bench comprising Justices Aravind Kumar and N.V. Anjaria will reconvene on Monday to hear arguments by other accused Meeran Haider, Mohammad Saleem Khan and Shifa ur-Rehman apart from the Delhi police. Gursimran Kaur Bakshi has the report.
Probe agencies have no blanket power to summon lawyers for advising clients, says SC
The Supreme Court ruled that investigating agencies cannot arbitrarily summon advocates for the legal advice they give to clients. A Bench led by Chief Justice of India B R Gavai and Justices K Vinod Chandran and N V Anjaria delivered the ruling in a suo motu case taken up by the apex court after the Enforcement Directorate’s summoned senior advocates Arvind Datar and Pratap Venugopal. While declining to issue exhaustive guidelines or mandate magisterial approval for summons, the court issued specific directions aimed at preserving client confidentiality while allowing legitimate investigation. Justice K Vinod Chandran, who authored the judgment, said the Bench sought to “harmonise the evidentiary rule with procedural safeguards”. The court held that the privilege under Section 132 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam (BSA) belongs to the client and binds the advocate from disclosing confidential communications.
Modi and BJP’s false spin on Rahul Gandhi’s chhath puja remarks
A political storm brewed in Bihar after BJP leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accused Rahul Gandhi of calling Chhath Puja a “drama.” At a rally in Muzaffarpur, Modi branded the Congress and RJD “shameless,” alleging they insulted “Chhathi Maiyya for votes.” However, a fact-check by Alt News debunks this claim. Gandhi never mocked the festival – he criticized Modi’s performance of Chhath rituals as political theatrics.
The Long Cable
Citizens suffer while the Modi government continues making tall claims
Dushyant Dave
Prime minister Narendra Modi and his government are constantly celebrating India ‘s progress and development . Every day the PM and his Ministers dedicated economic and sometimes social projects worth thousands of crores, or even trillions of rupees. However, no one gets to know how much was actually invested and how successful the projects have been .
We are basking under false notions of the Indian economy being the fourth largest in the world, worth four trillion dollars. We brag about 7 percent growth and the stock market index at 80,000 and above . We are being told everyday how great a country we are and that in the world order we now matter significantly .
We are made to believe in all this by a pliable media, both print and electronic and by a very aggressive social media . But most of these are all under the influence of the party in power at the centre. They are controlled by fear and favour . Unfortunately the Indian media has forgotten that their only duty is to publish the truth and nothing but the truth . Almost the entire pliant media has received largesses from the state in form of land , tax concessions , licenses , free airwaves etc . Do they not owe any duty to the citizens?
India is now facing existential challenges on many fronts . Fundamental Ideals of the Constitution of India — Justice - Liberty - Equality - Fraternity — , have been lost in this race to portray India as an economic giant . We must remember that India is a social democracy; to quote B R Ambedkar “ It means a way of life which recognises liberty, equality and fraternity as the principles of life . They form a union of trinity in the sense that to divorce one from the other is to defeat the very purpose of democracy .”
Today the nation is as poor as it was in 2014 , if not poorer . In the absence of credible Census Data , which was due in 2021 , it is difficult to gauge real progress and development . In the party’s 2024 Election Manifesto, Modi loudly proclaimed , “We have provided free ration to 80+ crore citizens since 2020 . We will continue to provide free ration for the next five years under PM Garib Kalyan Anna Yojna”.
It claimed to have ,” empowered citizens by transferring 34 lakh crore directly in their account .”
Modi gave over 20 guarantees to different groups from Poor to middle class to farmers to youth to small traders amongst others .
Yet , today, tens of millions of youth are jobless . The demographic advantage is being fast lost. The few hundred govt jobs advertised anywhere in the country get applications in the tens of lakhs . Private investment is slow and job creation is slower .
Social indices are alarming. Government schools , including in Gujarat, are mostly run in one class with one teacher . Dropouts are increasing . The public health system has collapsed while corporatisation of medical services is increasing burdens on citizens. Even today , power supply is highly irregular in rural areas and many urban areas .
Poverty levels have not come down despite claims to have helped 25 crore people to overcome it, as can be easily seen in rural areas , urban slums and increasing numbers of people forced to beg on streets across India . The gap between the rich and the poor is widening every moment .
No one is denying progress has been made in the country . New airports and ports have been inaugurated . New schemes are announced daily . But does that help India’s social and economic situation? According to an UNDP report , India ranked 130 in the world in 2023 , rising from 133 in 2022, in the human development index. But ‘Inequality reduces India’s HDI by 30.7% , one of the highest losses in the region .
Today’s India under Modi rejects all international and foreign reports , however credible they may be .
We are therefore witnessing a piquant situation . The government bombards us with tall claims and the media highlights them instead of critically examining them, all unflattering outside reports are dubbed anti-India .
But the greatest challenge is the complete absence of fraternity , the brotherhood of man . Dalits and Minorities especially Muslims are vilified , targeted and harmed by fringe elements as also govt machinery . Justice eludes them as the Judiciary is incapable of standing up to the Executive. Even the SC is not free from this challenge as the recent matters of Umar Khalid and other accused, as also the Sonam Wangchuk cases show . On the slightest pretext , homes and businesses of Muslims are bulldozed while CJI claims credit for stopping them . ‘Love jihad’ , cow smuggling and even slogans praising the Prophet are criminalised . Muslims are barred from Garba — even musicians were brought down from the stage and told to leave . Now even shopkeepers are told to sack Muslim sales staff as was seen in Indore.Christian institutions are also not spared as UP and Gujarat have shown . Dalits across India , especially in rural India are repeatedly targeted.
BJP declared, ‘Modi ki guarantee, good governance and vikas’ in 2024 , slightly changing it from ‘Sab ka saath sab ka vikas.’
Ambedkar had feared India may lose its independence , citing the treachery of the likes of Jaichand , King Dahar and Gulab Singh in history.
The last hymn of Rigveda invokes unity thus:
Assembly , speak together ; let your minds be all of one accord ,
The place is common , common the Assembly , common the mind , so be their thought united ,
United the thoughts of all that may happily agree .”
We the Citizens must open our eyes to take us , From the unreal to the real ,
From darkness to light.
(Dushyant Dave is a former president of the Supreme Court Bar Association.)
Reportedly
The Bombay High Court on July 31 ordered the closure of the Dadar Kabutarkhana, a landmark site where pigeons were fed by the public and mainly the Jain community. The civic authorities complied but ran into great resistance from the community. The pigeons moved to nearby streets that led to traffic jams. The protests by the Jain community grew louder and the Maharashtra government, aware that it could have an impact on the coming civic elections, desperately looked for a way out. In the face of evidence that pigeon droppings and feathers can lead to lung diseases, the city’s municipal corporation has now announced it will set up four dedicated spots where pigeons can be fed. Clearly, politics and lobbying by powerful community groups wins over health and even court orders.
Drawn and quartered
Deep dive
In some rural Indian villages that were once centered on farming, cyber-fraud has now become the main source of income. For many residents, digital scams are increasingly viewed as a legitimate profession, while deep-rooted inequalities leave them with few alternatives. In her piece for The Guardian, Snigdha Poonam explores how an obscure district in a neglected state transformed into India’s byword for digital deceit.
Prime number: 135%
In India, there has been a 135% rise in solitary women travellers between 2023 and 2025 but they face unique and tough challenges.Opeds you don’t want to miss
Staying away from international meetings to avoid being embarrassed by Trump is not a diplomatic master stroke, it’s abandonment of strategic space, writes Sushant Singh in this must read piece. “India needs its prime minister to show up, to defend its interests, to negotiate from whatever strength remains, and to stop pretending that domestic political theatre can substitute for international engagement. The question is whether Modi possesses the courage to do so. On current evidence, the answer seems to be no.”
As we celebrate Sardar Patel’s 150th birth anniversary, it is worth recalling, as Parsa Venkateshwar Rao Jr writes in this column, that even though Patel was no ideological liberal he “was absolutely clear in his mind that India cannot be a state for Hindus, and that Muslims are an essential part of Independent India” and had “categorically rejected the RSS view that India should be a Hindu state and Muslims cannot have a place in it”.
Justin Rao interviews Somen Mishra, the Creative Development Head of Dharma Productions, who shepherded the production of Dhadak 2 and Homebound, which is India’s entry for the Oscars this year. A former journalist, Mishra explains the role of the producer in a film and says it is the “peak of his career in terms of love and respect.”
Nothing quite prepares you for reporting from the ground on a natural disaster, and not only must journalists walk a fine line in interacting with grieving persons but they are themselves traumatised by the overall experience, says Shrabana Chatterjee, who covered the devastating north Bengal floods for The Hindu. But at the end of the day, she writes, “even amid all the grief, humanity ran deep. Every single person went out of their way to make space for me.”
Srinath Raghavan’s new book Indira Gandhi and the Years that Transformed India is “fascinating”, “excellently produced” and a model for rigorous scholarship that is also accessible to a wider audience. By “using the concept of Caesarism instead of populism,” writes political scientist K.K. Kailash, Raghavan also “offers a nuanced, original analysis of her policies”.
Listen up
Stand-up comedian Punit Pania says he is not a political activist yet his comedy cannot help but take on a political nature. The topics he lampoons range from poor roads and civic architecture to know-all bhakt uncles and NRIs, but he also talks about social issues. “I feel compelled to say these things. It’s not even a choice in my mind. These are things I have to talk about,” he told Sidharth Bhatia on The Wire Talks podcast.
Watch out
“After 2019, spring is no longer even a pipe dream.” Actor–filmmaker Aamir Bashir on student-activist Umar Khalid, the silence in Kashmir – and the question that lingers: how long can you suppress what you feel?
Over and out
In the late 16th century, Indian miniaturist Basawan created a painting depicting a family of cheetahs set against red rocks, twisting trees and deep-gilt skies, darkening under the evening light. Earlier this week, the artwork fetched £10.2 million ($13.6 million with fees) at Christie’s in London – a single-owner sale from the collection of Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan – setting a record as the most expensive classical Indian or Islamic painting ever sold at auction. It ranks just behind M.F. Husain’s 1954 Gram Yatra, which sold for $13.8 million earlier this year, also at Christie’s, making it the second-highest price achieved for an Indian painting at auction.
Former England cricketer Chris Broad has shared a hilarious story about teasing his son, Stuart Broad, over one of cricket’s most infamous moments. Recalling the aftermath of Stuart being hit for six sixes by Yuvraj Singh in the 2007 T20 World Cup, Chris said he once gifted him a Yuvraj-signed India shirt for Christmas. The joke, however, didn’t land well – “He opened the present, saw it, and threw it in the bin,” Chris revealed, adding that Stuart had “a bit of a sense of humour failure” over the prank.
That’s it for today. We’ll be back with you on Monday, on a device near you. If The India Cable was forwarded to you by a friend (perhaps a common friend!) book your own copy by SUBSCRIBING HERE.