"Mark my words"...

Astrologer called it right, for once :) ..his other predictions fell flat, though

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