ep. 190: pax indica unblocked malacca in 1025 CE; do we need it in 2026?

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-190-the-need-for-pax-indica-malacca?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: Cash cow | DRDO's laser weapon...

• For Korean companies, India is a lucrative cash cow: LG India reported revenue of Rs 24,366 crore and a net profit of Rs 2,203 crore last year. Royalty payments to its Korean parent reached Rs 454.61 crore. But the real headline came with its 2025 IPO: In one stroke, LG India’s market capitalisation surpassed that of its global headquarters’. And it was purely due to generous policy environment.
  
  Hyundai Motor India and its sibling Kia tell a similar tale of extraction masked as investment. Royalty payments stand at 3.5% of sales revenue, translating into thousands of crores annually repatriated to Seoul. Such an anomaly has left Tata Motors and Mahindra to fight an uphill battle against what many term subsidized Korean pricing power.
  
  Samsung India completes the triumvirate of value extractors. Its revenue for the first time crossed Rs 1.11 lakh crore during 2025, making it the only consumer-electronics firm in India to cross the trillion-rupee mark. During 2024, royalty remittances to the Korean parent hit Rs 3,322 crore, roughly 40% of that year’s net profit. Retained earnings have ballooned and been diverted to Vietnam.
  
  Profits earned from Indian consumers through high royalties, IPO cash-outs and dividend flows are effectively subsidizing Vietnamese factories that then export finished goods back into India. Why? Should Korean conglomerates plough cash extracted from India into manufacturing facilities in a smaller neighbor that then undercuts Indian industry? The optics is toxic: India as a lucrative cash cow, Vietnam as the preferred factory floor.
  
  Decades of liberalization were sold on the promise that FDI would catalyze domestic industry, transfer technology and create balanced growth. Instead, the policy has tilted towards foreign giants who repatriate profits, royalties, special dividends and IPO proceeds liberally.
  
  On the other hand, Indian firms struggle with higher compliance costs, delayed approvals, and a royalty burden that starves local innovation.



Part of what pushed this into the open is what Korean firms did here in the last year.

Hyundai and LG listed their Indian arms and between them sent about $4.7 billion back to Seoul through IPOs and special dividends. Samsung's royalty payments to its parent tripled. All within… pic.twitter.com/e2Nbsuxew6

— Amar Govindarajan (@amargov) April 22, 2026




• Draining the economy: The proof is in the math: In just the last 12 months, Hyundai and LG repatriated $4.7 billion in royalties and profits. That is nearly ₹40,000 crore leaving our economy.

Localization of parts is not the same as localization of value. You can source 85% of a car’s weight (steel, rubber, glass) in India, but if the Intellectual Property (IP), engine architecture, and software ownership sit in Seoul, the wealth generated by Indian labor and…

— vijay (@Vic_Vij) April 23, 2026




• Funding the Adversary: India’s trade deficit with China has nearly tripled since Modi took office. Bankrolling China's rise which in turn lays claim to vast Indian territories including an entire state.




• You signed a trade-deal, now we will screw you: Indian exports face rising cost pressure as EU plans carbon tax expansion



• Galgotias School of Innovation: AI making work cheaper and this is a BIG Problem for Indian IT Services




• Trump kissing Xi Jinping's ass: A quiet U.S. favor for Xi Jinping.. A U.S. quota increase at the IMF would rescue China’s bad loans.
  
  Trump is scheduled to visit Beijing in May for a summit with Xi, and he will come bearing at least one surprising gift: A budget request to Congress to hand more money to Mr. Xi’s friends at the IMF.



• Chinese satellites over Mideast battlefield put US on edge: Chinese AI company MizarVision claimed on social media to have tracked the movements of American aircraft carriers, F-22 stealth fighters and B-52 bombers by using AI to analyze satellite data.



• Microwave weapon: 20-gigawatt Chinese microwave weapon touted as ‘Starlink’s worst nightmare’ by country's media — portable 5-ton device can deliver full-minute destructive bursts



• India’s “Star Wars” LASER DEFENCE: DRDO's $3 solution to a $30,000 drone problem. 100 kW Dura-2 can melt drones in seconds.




• Pakistan Is Getting a Stealth Fighter in 2026: China is ramping up the timeline to deliver J-35A to Pak



• Lesson for India, the GREAT consumer of imported tech: Iran claims US exploited networking equipment backdoors during strikes — says devices from Cisco and others failed despite blackout in attack that 'indicates deep sabotage'



• Privacy risk: Google Chrome lacks protection against one of the most basic and common ways to track users online



• Why this Chinese EV terrifies Europe’s carmakers: Luxury car makers staring at Chinese onslaught.



• China's Geely just built one of the most efficient engines ever: Geely now holds a Guinness World Record for thermal efficiency, with its new i-HEV Hybrid system rated at 48.4%



• Raag: Kamod By Manjiri Alegaonkar

iitmaa fireside chat ep 4: masterclass on semiconductors by suraj rengarajan

https://rajeevsrinivasan.substack.com/p/ep-04-masterclass-on-indias-semiconductor

Quick notes: Ditching windows | Dr Kurt Tank...

• Digital sovereignty push: France is ditching Windows for Linux... when will India do this? Claude is there to make the process smooth.



• Dr Kurt Tank and the Marut program:




• “If we can’t build it, host a summit”: India's technological progress occurs primarily in keynote presentations

Watching India pitch itself as a “rule-setter” in AI is a reminder that geopolitics now includes a new category:
Countries whose technological progress occurs primarily in keynote presentations.

India doesn’t have an AI industry, but they have an AI narrative:
“If we can’t build… pic.twitter.com/XnhLmwu2yk

— 𝘊𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘦 (@OopsGuess) February 23, 2026




• R&D poor nation: The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) proposed Rs 28,169 crore but received Rs 21,632 crore at the budget estimates stage — a reduction of nearly Rs 6,500 crore. The ministry proposed Rs 13,000 crore for the semiconductor programme but received Rs 8,000 crore at the budget estimates stage.



• A giant leap for our energy sector: India is now only the second country after Russia to operate a commercial-scale FBR. Parallel development of the third stage to leverage India’s vast thorium resources, a vision conceived by Dr Homi Bhabha.

16/

China has been trying to build a Fast Breeder Reactor for 20 years.

They've spent billions.
Bought Russian technology.
Hired foreign experts.

Their CFR-600 is still being commissioned.

India built theirs:
✅ Indigenously - no foreign reactor design
✅ With domestic…

— CA Vivek Khatri (@CaVivekkhatri) April 7, 2026




• Meta must face youth addiction lawsuit: "...designing a social media platform that capitalizes on the developmental vulnerabilities of children or by affirmatively misleading consumers about the safety of the Instagram platform" . . . . Yoga can reduce gaming addiction.



• Sweden goes back to basics, swapping screens for books in the classroom: Studies have linked heavy digital use to reduced comprehension and memory retention as well as eye strain. . . Sweden’s Education Recalibration



• Non whites are non Americans:

Trump’s lawyers can’t even say for sure if Native Americans are citizens by birth.

This administration is disgusting! pic.twitter.com/GT4iG8tvU2

— Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen) April 1, 2026




• Pakistan’s solar boom shielding it from worst of Iran war crisis: A quarter of Pakistani households are now using solar panels. This insulates millions of families from the energy supply crunch prompted by the US-Israel war on Iran.



• India no Vishwaguru: Acharya S.N. Goenka's interview

Has the Indian army gone woke?

https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/delayed-op-sindoor-strike-at-terror-camps-to-respect-namaz-army-chief-general-upendra-dwivedi-11338467

Next time, why not “bombard” Pakistan with portraits of Ghandy instead? The General’s statement is so problematic. Is is it his job to allow SICKULAR PRINCIPLES to determine military operations? This is consistent with General Mukund Naravane’s statement while he was serving as COAS that “The army will defend the constitution!” and his hesitancy to follow the Defense minister’s advice (revealed in the General’s leaked book after retirement) to “act appropriately” when the Chinese PLA tanks were rolling up towards Indian positions in Ladakh! Why is it Army’s job to defend the constitution, manage the nation’s economy, do diplomacy, PREVENT WAR or PERPETUATE SICKULARISM? One would imagine that the Army’s charter is, exclusively to DEFEND THE BORDERS, DEFEND NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY, CRUSH INTERNAL REVOLTS aimed at balkanizing the nation. The Indian armed forces have always been surprised and found wanting when it comes to preventing encroachment of Indian territory - ex: Ladakh, Kargil, POK, Gilgit-Baltistan, Aksai Chin or even Tibet. I’m particularly grateful to POTUS Trump and Israeli P.M Netanyahu for launching their military operations against Iran, Hizballah - without caring a damn about Ramzan, Eid ul Fitr, etc. Equally alarming is the General’s revelation in the interview that he solicits opinion from his daughters and implements policies pertaining to “gender equity” in the Indian armed forces based on their guidance! Are his daughters soldiers, elected representatives, ministers in the government, etc.? Wonder if that directly informed the decision to perpetrate the spectacle of the stupid “Colonel Sofiya Quereshi” in the context of Operation Sindoor. There was a visual of female Indian Navy personnel struggling to lift and fumbling with Lieutenant Vinay Narwal’s coffin, looking back helplessly - until male officers stepped in to prevent them from dropping it! *Are we a serious nation*? We might as well have a *Ghandy Sena*! I distinctly remember my father’s comment nearly 35 years ago when he disallowed me to write the NDA exam. He had said: *“Do you think we do proper warfare in this country?”* Sorry to say, the General’s comments are deeply demoralizing and come across as extremely woke and clownish. Incidentally, the USA had injected extreme wokeness into its military under Gen. Mark Milley and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin - which is now being visibly rolled back under POTUS Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth! Is India trying to imitate woke western nonsense - as always, a few years behind the trend in everything - with an additional stupid Ghandyian Masala? The Pakistani General Asim Munir, in contrast - is a hardcore Jihadi and a “Hafiz” of the Quran at that - certainly does not have such woke illusions of the mind. The Jihadi Generals of Pakistan must have had a hearty laugh over a peg of Scotch - marveling at this clownish exhibition of woke slavish obsequiousness emanating from the top most echelons of the Indian military! There have always been liberandus among prominent Indian military families - too many examples to name. But, this disturbing trend is apparently now interfering with decision making at the top most level!

no-paywall version of ep. 189: drones are the new step change in warfare

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-189-drones-may-be-a-step-change?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: Converted xtian | F-35 vulnerability...

• Akkala Rami Reddy vs State of AP: Landmark ruling on converted Christians SC status: It all began with land grab for Church.
  
  Rami Reddy found that a parcel of his family land, which had been temporarily given to a distant relative for use as a cattle shed, had allegedly been converted into a Christian prayer hall. The relative had converted to Christianity and changed the site into a place of worship.



• India the big loser in the US-Iran War: At the core the issue is of India being strung out between strategic subservience to the US — that has led to its Gulf policy ending in a cul de sac, and economic dependence on China, with both Washington and Beijing now hanging Modi-Jaishankar and India out to dry.
  
  "Washington will strive to keep India down, preferably under its thumb, economically and in the technology sphere, prop up Pakistan as its main agent in the region, but will expect Delhi to help the US counterpoise China in the Indo-Pacific! The Indian govt is sufficiently spooked by the China threat to want to rely on the US strategically and to do so on American terms. And sure India should arm itself with American weapons, and reproduce any US military goods it wants but under license, thus lighting fire to the atmnirbharta pyre".

🇫🇷🇮🇳 France just drew a hard line… and it hits India’s airpower strategy directly.

Paris is refusing> to give India access to Rafale’s core source codes, which means New Delhi cannot independently modify the jet’s most critical systems, including its radar, mission computer, and… https://t.co/YJ3H46rst0 pic.twitter.com/0Nl22cWZa7

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) April 1, 2026




The UAE has withdrawn from funding the development of the new Rafale F5 after France refused to transfer advanced technology.
The message is clear:
Real partnership with genuine technology transfer — or no deal. pic.twitter.com/MUTheN8DHB

— سيف الدرعي| Saif alderei (@saif_aldareei) April 3, 2026




• Chinese engineer shared trick to shoot F-35 fighters just days before Iran’s strike: F-35 vulnerable to low-cost systems. . Since the Operation Epic Fury started, more Chinese civilians with science, technology, engineering, and math backgrounds have been sharing military analysis online to help Iran counter U.S. airpower. These posts include technical explanations of weapons and tactical advice, and are shared without pay or official support. . . . Dutch Secretary of Defense threatens to 'jailbreak' nation's F-35 jet fighters.

🇨🇳 Chinese civilians with technical backgrounds are increasingly posting detailed military analysis online aimed at helping Iran counter U.S. forces, in a growing grassroots trend across Chinese social media, according to the South China Morning Post.

The effort appears informal… https://t.co/PjGUGvgblR

— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) April 3, 2026




• White man's angry God: Hegseth injects combative Christianity into America’s military. . . Hegseth prays for violence 'against those who deserve no mercy'



• China produces >90% of its ammonia from coal gassofication: China insulated itself against energy shocks with coal gas. India didn’t move from words to action.



• No LPG? No Problem: These Bengaluru Restaurants Run on Gas from Kitchen Waste.



• Black pepper and healthy oils: The ingredients that super-charge the nutrients you get from food



• Protein myths: “There is no evidence that habitual exercise increases protein requirements; indeed protein metabolism may become more efficient as a result of training.” ..just because it’s post workout, doesn’t mean you need oodles of whey



• Bike Bus: "One of the benefits of the bike bus is that when you're cycling as a group you feel a bit safer.
  
  
  
  "There's been a lovely buzz watching the bike bus arrive each week and the children who participated have been really happy, enthusiastic, really energised by their bike ride here to school".
  
  "I think it's great for kids mental health as well as their physical health plus I think it's great for parents too.
  
  "I think for the community more broadly too because there's less cars on the road, less congestion, it's better air quality, so there's a lot of benefits."
  
  
• Solar is winning the energy race: The world's cheapest power source is scaling at warp speed, pushing coal, gas and nuclear aside. In 2015, Pakistan and South Africa each produced less than 1% of their electricity from solar. Ten years later, that has risen to 20% and 10% respectively.



• 'The myth about SIPs': At the end of the day, in order for me to win, someone else must lose. Now, in order to create that population of losers, you need the millions of retail investors, the millions of SIP participants, for their capital to flow somewhere.



• Showing some spine: Malaysia exits US reciprocal trade deal. Becomes the first country to abandon a pact negotiated under Washington’s reciprocal tariff strategy after a court ruling removed the legal basis for the policy.



• End of Bitcoin? Google research suggests encryption technique used by Bitcoin will be cracked by quantum computers around 2029 — search giant says quantum attacks need to be prepared for now



• Google unveils TurboQuant, a new AI memory compression algorithm — and yes, the internet is calling it 'Pied Piper'. . . A simple explanation of the key idea behind TurboQuant



• Pakistani Women's Obsession With Hindu Culture:

ep. 189: drones are a step change in warfare: india better pay attention

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-189-drones-may-be-a-step-change?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

ep 3, iitmaa fireside chat, on gulf war 3

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-03-iitmaa-fireside-chat-with-dr?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

More Damaging to USA Than Any Missile/WMD

Ep. 188: the iran war has no winners, only losers

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-188-the-iran-war-has-no-winners?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: Tariff exemption | Price of intelligence...

• India’s pollution is becoming an economic roadblock: The government’s inaction runs counter to its goals. The latest budget cut funding for pollution control.
  
  It is all getting embarrassing. In December a cricket match between India and South Africa was called off because smog made it impossible to see the ball. In January one the world’s top badminton players pulled out of the India Open in Delhi citing the bad air (and getting a $5,000 fine). Those who did play sent an official complaint to International Olympic Committee.



• Tariff exemption for apparel made with US cotton: US–Bangladesh deal jolts India’s textile calculus



• The Price of Intelligence is Collapsing One developer with Claude Code can now do what took a team a month. The cost of Claude Pro or ChatGPT is $20 dollars a month, while a Max subscription is $200 dollars. The median US knowledge worker costs ~350-500 dollars a day fully loaded. An agent that handles even a fraction of their workflow a day at ~6-7 dollars is a 10-30x RoI not including improvement in intelligence.
  
  The cost collapse is destroying the seat-based software model. There has been no bigger share shift than Microsoft’s seat-based Office 365. Most of the cash today still comes from Office. The core way of how a human interacts with a computer is about to change, and Microsoft sits at the center of the old paradigm.
  
  Why does a company need to standardize Salesforce if an agent is just going to query data on leads on your behalf? Salesforce is a form and workflow wrapper, and the form and workflow can likely be scaffolded by AI into a database and then queried as needed.
  
  AI fears wipe out $50 billion from Indian IT stocks. . . Software ate the world. AI is eating software.



• Dr Vishal Sikka: At a time when there was no ChatGPT, Gemini, or self-driving cars, Vishal Sikka gave a presentation on AI before NITI Aayog at the PM’s request, where officials of 20 Union Ministries were gathered. . . India's risk-averse capitalism has no place people like him

"India Has a Great Opportunity in AI, Period" – Dr. Vishal Sikka (Ex-Infosys)

1. TCS has partnered with him to fight its existential crisis

2. PM & officials have met him multiple times

3. Oracle, GSK, BMW, Stanford have him on their Boards for AI

What is Vishal Sikka Saying:…

— Vikas Vij (@TheClubJunto) February 5, 2026




• Engineering Talent Pipeline: Elon Musk’s impact on a new generation of engineers.




• Starlink, a regime-change weapon? U.S. Smuggled Thousands of Starlink Terminals Into Iran After Protest Crackdown


• Existential threat: The EU should consider either an unprecedented 30% across-the-board tariff on Chinese goods or a 30% depreciation of the euro against the renminbi to counter a flood of cheap imports, according to a French govt strategy report.

China is depleting the world's oceans of fish. Estimates are between 200,000 - 800,000 fishing vessels, going as far as Argentina.

They account for ~half of the world's fishing catch and do not respect stewardship protocols to preserve ecosystems. This is not industrial… pic.twitter.com/BfbJoGTveM

— Isabella Anderson (@IsabellaAn67) January 31, 2026



• The long game: As Trump trashes the dollar, China smells opportunity


• Hindus could be next: Without a Border ‘Invasion,’ Texas G.O.P. Turns to an Old Enemy, Islam. . . Muslims know how to play this game. Hindus..?



• Not everything imported is healthy: Why is eating oatmeal damaging if you eat it every morning?



• Sounds of Isha: Akka Kelavva (ಅಕ್ಕ ಕೇಳವ್ವ)

Ep 187: wapo and rediff

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-187-journalism-ai-washington-post?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: SaaS-Pocalypse | Greater Balochistan...

• The SaaS -Pocalypse Has Begun: For most of the past two decades, enterprise software benefited from a remarkably stable economic story. Software was expensive to build. Switching costs were high. Data lived in proprietary systems.
  
  Once a platform became the system of record, it stayed there. Recurring revenue was treated as a proxy for predictability. Contracts were assumed to be sticky. Cash flows were assumed to be resilient.
  
  AI is now testing every part of that logic at once.
  
  AI doesn't kill the software directly. It kills the headcount that uses the software. Which kills the per-seat revenue model. Which kills the business... "Software becomes a commodity; AI becomes the "brain" and the worker".
  

Satya Nadela is basically describing the death of the traditional SaaS model.

Explains the AI agentic future, and where the "value" lives.

Because business logic is moving from the software application to the AI agents.

Currently, you buy software for its specific features and… pic.twitter.com/LAQVWDg4af

— Rohan Paul (@rohanpaul_ai) January 21, 2026



• Anthropic's new AI tools disrupts data analytics and software companies: AI developer Anthropic launched plug-ins for its Claude Cowork agent that would automate tasks across legal, sales, marketing and ‌data analysis. That move has sparked worries of an impending AI-fueled disruption of the data and professional services industry, which were once seen as major beneficiaries of the AI era.

Goldman Sachs is rolling out Anthropic’s AI model to automate accounting and compliance roles completely.

Anthropic engineers have been embedded at Goldman for 6 months, co-developing systems that act like “digital co-workers” for high-volume, process-heavy tasks.

The new setup… pic.twitter.com/KMvQkkTAMs

— Rohan Paul (@rohanpaul_ai) February 6, 2026




• India's staffing-intensive IT sector shaken: "As Indian enterprises ​integrate Claude for critical coding ​workflows, dependency on large vendor teams may decline, squeezing billable hours and margins. Anthropic’s advanced AI systems also threaten entry‑level talent pool at Indian IT firms by ⁠replacing routine development and testing tasks".




• 'Start Considering Alternative Livelihoods': Sridhar Vembu's advice to coders

Examples are now pouring in about AI-assisted Code Engineering productivity.

The quoted post is a Bhagwad Gita app.

Anthropic has built an entire C compiler with their Claude AI. That is not an easy engineering feat at all.

At this point, it is best for those of us who… https://t.co/KbgVX8G9nU

— Sridhar Vembu (@svembu) February 6, 2026



• Anything but Deep Tech: Indian corporate investment is characterised by low R&D intensity and concentration in real estate-linked, regulated, or quasi-monopolistic sectors with a relative lack of willingness and appetite to invest towards long-term risk absorption and become globally competitive.



• Indian corporate investment had "flatlined since 2012": "The question that the government isn't asking is: how come for 13 straight years, corporate India has not invested?"



• A 'Greater Balochistan'? There is growing trepidation in Pakistan establishment circles that there could be a new great game underway in the region to create a Greater Balochistan comprising Sistan-Baluchistan and Balochistan. This is not just a mineral-rich area, but geographically, a very pivotal area.
  
  A Greater Balochistan will alter the geopolitics of the region, straddling not only the entire Gulf region but also providing a base to access Central Asia and keep a watch over troublesome areas in Iran, Afghanistan and a rump Pakistan. In fact, the geographical relevance that Pakistan keeps talking about comes from its control over Balochistan.
  
  The Pakistanis are losing sleep at the thought of powerful regional and global players waking up to the importance of Balochistan. Operation Herof 2 and the larger Baloch uprising are, therefore, no longer being seen as a local separatist movement but as part of a larger global conspiracy to cut not just Iran but also Pakistan to size. 



• Pakistan Faces Crunch As Demand For China-Developed JF-17 Jets Surges: In the past month, Iraq, Bangladesh and Indonesia have expressed interest in acquiring the JF-17 Thunder, according to Pakistan's Armed Forces. Saudi Arabia and Libya are also exploring the aircraft.



• The United States did not merely abandon the Kurds: It handed them over to terror, to knives, to silence. Allies were turned into expendable bodies. Promises were buried alongside the dead.

The United States did not merely abandon the Kurds it handed them over to terror, to knives, to silence. Allies were turned into expendable bodies. Promises were buried alongside the dead.
I am a Dutch journalist, and I refuse to look away. I feel the pain of the Kurdish people… pic.twitter.com/u5PYTJdbqD

— Botin Kurdistani (@kurdistannews24) January 29, 2026




• Why Indian cities are hostile to pedestrians: Annual pedestrian deaths on Indian roads exceed fatalities reported in several active conflict zones globally, underscoring that Indian streets function as a daily warzone for walkers... “Attempts to redesign roads without prioritising pedestrians are a fundamental part of the problem. Footpaths are a default globally, not here.”




• Win for American farmer: New US-India deal will export more American farm products to India's massive market, lifting prices, and pumping cash into rural America.

Thank you @POTUS for ONCE AGAIN delivering for our American farmers.

New US-India deal will export more American farm products to India's massive market, lifting prices, and pumping cash into rural America.

In 2024, America’s agricultural trade deficit with India was $1.3… https://t.co/Z04eNDfXjD

— Secretary Brooke Rollins (@SecRollins) February 2, 2026

Ep. 186: The indo-US trade 'deal' is smoke and mirrors

at least until we get the small print and analyze it. 

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-186-there-is-less-than-meets-the?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Ep. 185: The Epstein Files simply show elite depravity

reminded of "the great Gatsby", "eyes wide shut"," salo: 120 days of Sodom". the rich and powerful are indeed different from you and me.

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-185-the-epstein-files-simply-show?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: GaN technology | Xiaomi SU7...

• DRDO's GaN technology breakthrough: Denied access to compound chip technology by foreign powers, Indian scientists, operating in tandem from Delhi and Hyderabad, crack the code to make Gallium Nitride (GaN) monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs).
  + How GaN is revolutionising key industries.
  
  
  India is no longer dependent on foreign powers for these high-value, cutting-edge chips. Instead, it broke into a select group of six nations—the US, France, Russia, Germany, South Korea and China. . . . . Defense as well as commercial applications!



• UK FTA was terrible. EU FTA is worse: India gives away market access for nothing. Once CBAM takes effect India will be immensely disadvantaged.

Major concession on Machinery/Electrical equipment. India already runs a $16 billion deficit with EU in it. 0% tariff means domestic mfg in this sector will likely never take off. One hopes that exports from labour intensive sectors go up enough to make up for it. https://t.co/Xl1ZozajOH

— Diva Jain (@DivaJain2) January 27, 2026




• WSJ: I test drove a Chinese EV. Now I don’t want to buy American cars anymore.
Marques Brownlee's negative reviews had bankrupted some automakers in the past.



• Ford CEO Jim Farley: Praises his Xiaomi SU7. 'I don't want to give it up'
  
  Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe: "Chinese are ahead, even more than expected"



• Foolish NRIs: The overconfidence of the Indian settler in the pre-MAGA days led to excesses. Such as the 90-foot-tall statue of Lord Hanuman, dubbed by some over-clever NRIs who installed it, as the “Statue of Union” in Sugar Land, Texas.
  
  Besides being considered an eyesore by the enraged local Texans, it is a goad for the Christian Nationalists of the American south and southwest that make up the MAGA flock. So far they have restricted themselves to mocking the Monkey God, reviling Hindus as savages, Hinduism as satanic, and Hindu religious symbols as an affront to Christianity. Soon they may take a hammer to the statue, and run the Indians out of town.
  
  Two Indian jewelry stores raided in Texas



• Trump betrayed the Kurds?: Tell me something new.

Meet America’s 🇺🇸 newest allies in Syria, brought to you by @USAMBTurkiye.

The Kurds were betrayed for these Islamist barbarians.

Congrats. pic.twitter.com/uPUr4TCIB4

— Diliman Abdulkader (@D_abdulkader) January 25, 2026




• No headscarves in Kosovo's public school classrooms: Over 95% of the population of Kosovo is Muslim.



• Why are strokes rising among young adults?: Stroke deaths are climbing among people ages 25 to 34, even as overall cardiovascular deaths return to pre-COVID levels.



• The scientific case for ping-pong: Why athletes — and you — should play more table tennis



• How Ancient Is Indian Music? Dr. Raj Vedam on the history of Indian music

Gallery of dolts

Posting after a long gap. By now, it is abundantly clear that Modi has surrounded himself with a cabal of self-aggrandizing, largely incompetent loudmouths—endless talk, little to no substance.

This isn’t intended to be a detailed or carefully crafted post, just a few irritants worth calling out.

Take Ashwini Vaishnaw, for example, who repeatedly boasts about initiatives such as indigenous fuel-cell–powered trains. It’s hard to see what problem this actually addresses. Electric traction already exists; the real technological challenge lies in miniaturizing and adapting such systems for automobiles, not in grandstanding about trains.

Here he is once again regurgitating the same “four pillars” rhetoric for the nth time:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HT3B9XC3m_w

Then there’s Amitabh Kant, who once proudly proclaimed that Aarogya Setu was the most downloaded app in the world—as if that were an organic achievement, rather than the result of forcing everyone to install it.

Dharmendra Pradhan, Nirmala Sitharaman, Gadkari...:(

Overall, this administration has let the economy down and has not meaningfully advanced Hindutva either. There may be no credible alternatives, but that only makes the situation all the more dispiriting.

Many, many disappointments from this lot :(

More later.

 

the india EU FTA is not going to save either india or the EU

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-184-the-india-eu-fta-triumph-of?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

geopolitics around venezuela, NATO, greenland, etc.

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/iitmaa-fireside-chat-ep-01-a-masterclass?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: University rankings | H200 chips...

• World University Rankings 2026: China shows remarkable progress. Apart from IISc, no other Indian university managed to secure a top 100 position in any subject area.



• THE Subject Rankings 2026: While the US and UK institutions clinched the top ranks, China showed increasing strength, bagging seven top 10 positions across subjects. . . . . How India is failing its educated youth.



• 'Vishwaguru' is nowhere: From Malaysia to Germany: 10 countries where international students are heading beyond the Big Four... India continues to lag behind Asian peers such as China, Hong Kong and South Korea, Japan and Singapore in research-related performance.

Harvard is number one for Engineering in our latest subject rankings, thanks to its outstanding research environment.

Explore the full table: https://t.co/MZ9efPts8q @Harvard #THEUniRankings pic.twitter.com/4kh1gzPkro

— World University Rankings (@THEworldunirank) January 21, 2026




• “Like Selling Nuclear Weapons to North Korea”: Anthropic CEO blasts U.S. decision to approve NVIDIA’s H200 AI chip exports to China. . . Congress wants veto power over Trump administration for AI chip export



• Why the tech world thinks the American dream is dying: The argument is that tech companies (and their leaders) will become a class unto their own with infinite wealth. No one else will have the means to generate money for themselves because AI will have taken their jobs and opportunities.



• How ASML Conquered The Chip World: Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography - the insane machines that make the most advanced computer chips.




• With TACO help: Chinese EVs blow past Tesla and tariffs en route to global reign... Another record month for EV sales in China!. . . As Trump talks tariffs, his Argentine ally welcomes a first shipload of Chinese EVs



• Erdogan is no Modi: Turkey now buys more Russian oil than India. . . . . RM: "There is no morality or friendship factor, regardless of verbal praise or hugs. Only pragmatic self interest. Hello India! The battlefield is not emotional feel good victories in social media".

TRUMP’S ALGORITHM AND INDIA:
1. There is no morality or friendship factor, regardless of verbal praise or hugs. Only pragmatic self interest. Hard Realism. Soft power is irrelevant.
2. Policy driven by MAGA base & CIA.
3. Desire to “change history” using hypermasculinity.
4. USA…

— Rajiv Malhotra (@RajivMessage) January 6, 2026




• UK considering social media ban for under 16s: The world's first social media ban for young people took effect in Australia in December 2025, prompting other countries, including the UK, to consider following suit.



• Is avoiding carbs and sugar the key to a healthy old age? No, the secret to longevity is NOT skipping carbs. Let's see what the actual data says: the world's longest-living groups (Okinawa, Sardinia, Ikaria, Nicoya, Loma Linda) eat a great amount of carbs.
  
  Okinawans previously ate 85% carbs, and sweet potatoes and rice were their main source. Sardinians eat sourdough bread daily. These people are turning 100+ years old eating carbs in every single meal. The key isn't eliminating carbs - it's eliminating processed garbage. Sugar? Yes, added sugar is something to avoid.



• 5000 year-old heritage city cannot escape ugly bikAss: Manikarnika Ghat in Varanasi - the ancient & most sacred cremation ground for Hindus being bulldozed in the name of ‘redevelopment’.

the center doesn't hold. things fall apart

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-183-things-fall-apart-the-center?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Venezuela, Greenland, Fortress America: the end of globalism means a nasty interregnum is upon all of us. tough times especially for emerging powers like India.

The long-predicted end of the "liberal, rules-based international order" seems to be upon us, with a definite fin-de-siecle feeling. 

trump's gamble with venezuela

it looks more like american weakness rather than american strength.

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-182-the-trump-gamble-on-venezuela-081?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

trump's gamble with venezuela

it looks more like american weakness rather than american strength.

https://open.substack.com/pub/rajeevsrinivasan/p/ep-182-the-trump-gamble-on-venezuela-081?r=66qfh&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Quick notes: Shaksgam Valley | High protein diet...

• China Provokes India With 'Shaksgam Valley' Claim: If the Chinese and Pakistanis join hands, they have the resources to come down to Ladakh and into Leh. However, the presence of Indian troops in Siachen is a deterrent to China and Pakistan from joining hands in the Karakoram. Therefore, if that road is constructed to Aghil Pass and is connected to Khunjerab Pass, it will provide them access. China will connect as much of the Karakoram Pass as they can. They have also constructed a 170-kilometre artery from Gilgit to Siachen.
  
  Claude Arpi's insights on Shaksgam Valley.



• Artificial nation: Pakistan Should Actually Be 4 Different Countries.



• US Companies Face Anti-Indian Backlash: Indian American entrepreneurs who obtained loans from the government-backed Small Business Administration have been singled out for coordinated harassment.



• Why India-US Trade Deal Is Delayed: India has shown willingness to eliminate tariffs on nearly 95 per cent of US industrial exports and lower duties on products such as almonds, apples and avocados. Yet Washington continues to push for unrestricted access for dairy and genetically-modified crops, including corn and soybeans -- an issue deeply sensitive in India due to environmental, political and social concerns.



• On trade, DJT is CCP's biggest asset: Trump's protectionist trade policies allow China to swoop in. Canada allowing Chinese EVs is the latest.



• Transforming India Post into a Rural E-Commerce Powerhouse: Can India Post, a state-run entity with a massive presence and logistical network across India, reposition itself as a leading e-commerce player, not just a logistical support provider?
  
  The answer could lie in harnessing the power of its well-established network, employees, and extensive rural reach to create a transformative e-commerce platform catering specifically to rural markets. It will also enable India Post to have a good share of the emerging e-commerce era pie, in terms of volume of sales, turnover, and profitability, making it a brand like Amul.



• The Effects of High-Protein Diets on Kidney Health and Longevity: High-protein diets may be associated with a number of metabolic complications that may be detrimental to kidney health. . . Kidney disease death rate by country.




• India's State-Sponsored Sugar Addiction : Thanks to our policies, India produces way more sugar than it needs, using up precious water and financial resources; and as a result, Indians end up eating more sugar than is healthy.



• Madhav Gadgil, Kerala’s reluctant prophet: Gadgil was part of the scientific scrutiny that questioned the ecological wisdom of damming Silent Valley. That intervention helped reinforce an idea Kerala would never quite abandon, that development was not automatically virtuous and that expert knowledge could legitimately challenge state power.

Quick notes: Bhajan clubbing | Walkaluru...

• The Pied Piper of the digital age: Why India must shield young minds from algorithmic enchantment. Drawing lessons from Australia’s recent legislation, India must urgently regulate children’s access to social media and artificial intelligence.



• An aversion to alcohol is moving the global party scene in an unexpected direction: From Brisbane to Mumbai, and Paris to Toronto, the movement has quickly gained traction among a segment of Gen Z-ers and younger Millennials who are drinking less and prioritizing sleep, health and wellness in their lives.
  
  
• Bhajan clubbing: Today's Gen-Z have found a new way of partying that involves devotion as well.
  
  
• The Sober Party Girl Revolution: A new generation rejects alcohol but isn’t quite ready to give up the party.
  
  
• When Dry January becomes permanent: ‘Even though I was fit and energetic the weekends were gone’. “You’d have few drinks on Friday night because you’ve worked hard all week long, and then Saturday was sluggish. You might have a few drinks on Saturday night, and Sunday was sluggish. All of a sudden it’s Monday.”
  


• Ugly, smog filled 'bikAss' comes with a price: India is seeing dip in foreign tourists. In contrast, Vietnam became the fastest growing market for foreign tourist arrivals in south east Asia
  


• What urban India needs: Walkaluru walkathon highlights Bengaluru’s pedestrian infrastructure, encourages walking culture




• Indore tragedy: Indore, in spotlight over 20 deaths, allocated Rs 2,450 Crore for 'Clean' Water. What makes the tragedy even more disturbing is the scale of public money that has been spent on Indore's water and sanitation infrastructure over the past five years.



• 60% of top 1,000 stocks delivered negative returns in 2025: Even after the recent correction, the Nifty Smallcap 100 trades at a price-to-earnings multiple of 24.6 based on one-year forward earnings, well above its 10-year average of 18.3.



• Why The Americans Were Opposed To Agni: 'The heat shield technology for re-entry vehicles was first mastered in DRDO for the Agni missile.' 'This is why the Americans were so opposed to Agni in the 1980s, unlike other missiles -- it was a re-entry vehicle.'



• Christian nationalist sarkar: Tulsi Gabbard sidelined from Venezuela planning



• MAGA doesn't like your skin color: Sikh truckers found refuge in trucking until the Trump administration’s crackdown



• DJT, the progressive socialist: Trump suddenly sounds a lot like a progressive Democrat when it comes to business. CEOs on guard.



• The Chinese way: Videos and photographs show how the Chinese authorities have tried to dismantle Zion Church, a Christian network with branches across the country.



• The year of Chinese robotics domination: The real AI story of 2026 will be found in the boring, the mundane—and in China. Washington's fatal miscalculation was assuming its sanctions would hammer Chinese innovation. Instead, it only hampered the viability of the West's own tech.



• Ustad Shujaat Khan: छाप तिलक सब छीनी रे मोसे नैना मिलाइके