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Snapshot of the day
August 31, 2026
Siddharth Varadarajan, Anirudk SK and Kalrav Joshi
Narendra Modi is in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit. He met with Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, and called for expanding bilateral trade. Devirupa Mitra notes that the call to expand trade comes at a time when India-Iran commerce has contracted dramatically under the impact of US sanctions and the disruption caused by the war. “Last week, the Trump administration launched Operation Economic Outcast against Iran, expanding sanctions and warning countries and companies that continue doing business with Tehran that they could face measures affecting their access to the US financial system.”
Mitra notes that Pezeshkian’s account of the talks “specifically mentioned Chabahar” – the Persian Gulf port India has invested in but backed out of under US pressure – and the Iranian readout also said “the two sides discussed transport and maritime cooperation, developments related to the Strait of Hormuz and “the process of cooperation in Chabahar port”." But neither Modi’s post on the meeting nor the Indian government’s detailed readout, mentioned Chabahar by name.
So is Modi signalling a newfound willingness to confront Trump on the issue of trade with Iran? Or is he making a rhetorical declaration to buttress claims to an independent foreign policy?
Whatever the truth, there is no denying the carefully scripted jumla, or slogan, that Modi unveiled during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at Bishkek. “We must move from ‘endless war’ to ‘end of war’ for the benefit of humanity”, he said in a reference to the Ukraine conflict, though the fact that the PM read this alliterative ‘gem’ from a piece of paper robbed it of much of its flourish. However, the PMO spent the evening hard-selling this phrase to reporters and editors so don’t be surprised if all the newspapers lead with this in the morning.
“These words are fair and true. Ukraine is thankful for them,” said an advisor to the Ukrainian government. “However, Putin doesn't understand words, he understands actions. So India's refusal to purchase Russian oil would be more persuasive. If India stops financing Russia's budget through buying Russia's crude and then helping Russia with gasoline, Gandhi's teachings will come true quicker.”
Incidentally, Modi’s words apply equally forcefully to the ‘endless war’ the US is waging against Iran, now in its seventh month. Perhaps Modi will find a way to convey this message to Trump.
India’s GDP growth rate reached 7.8% in the first quarter of this year, driven by manufacturing and some services, according to government data. This is slower than Q1 last year but quicker than last year, reports TCA Sharad Raghavan.
Keeping in view the “feelings and aspirations of the people of Manipur”, the Union and state governments today decided that the census exercise there must be deferred until further orders, chief minister Y. Khemchand Singh said. The ‘people’ the CM has referred to are the state’s Meitei and Naga communities, who have demanded that the census be put off until a National Register Citizens is implemented in Manipur so that ‘illegal immigrants’ are not counted. That label is often applied to members of the Kuki-Zo community in the state. The past two years has witnessed ethnic conflict between the Kuki-Zo, Meitei and Naga communities. The Kuki-Zo Council had called the demand for an NRC preceding the census as premature.
The houselisting phase of the census was scheduled to begin in Manipur tomorrow, on September 1, in the run-up to which protesters in the Imphal valley had disrupted training activities and enforced shutdowns. Meanwhile the special intensive revision of voter rolls has carried on in this strife-torn
