BrahMos with extended range tested

India's conventional precision-strike capabilities now have a longer reach. A new BrahMos supersonic cruise missile, with an extended range of 450 km, from the earlier 290 km, was successfully test fired from the integrated test range at Balasore off the Odisha coast on Saturday.
The land-attack version of the missile, which flies at the speed of Mach 2.8, was fired at “an electronic target“ at 11.30 am. The launch, executed from the mobile autonomous launcher deployed in full configuration, met all the test parameters, said defence scientists.

Punjab saves face for the Congress

Congress returned to office in Punjab after 10 years with a near two-third majority, riding the popularity of its veteran functionary, Captain Amarinder Singh. The scion of the erstwhile Patiala royalty could not have asked for a better present on his 75th birthday. Both Amarinder and cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu, who won the Amritsar East seat, projected the Congress sweep as the beginning of its revival across the country and challenged BJP's bid to make India “Congress-mukt“.

However, the party's tally of 77 out of 117 seats is surprising because it garnered just 38.4% of the total votes compared with 40.90% it had got in 2012. SAD bagged 25.2% and AAP just 23.8%.

A lot was at stake for Amarinder once he had publicly announced that 2017 would be his last poll after which he would like to retire from politics. What the former chief minister was looking for was personal redemption after losing the 2012 elections when most pollsters had predicted a majority for Congress. Even after scripting one of the biggest upsets of the 2014 Lok Sabha elections by defeating BJP's Arun Jaitley in Amritsar, Captain Amarinder Singh appeared uninterested in carving out a space for himself in national politics. His only wish was to become chief minister one last time and he even threatened to quit Congress if the central leadership did not declare him chief of the Punjab unit, ahead of this year's assembly elections.

The party's decision to finally relent and make Amarinder the face of the campaign in the state, a strategy suggested by Prashant Kishor and his IPAC team has paid off.

Amarinder, who contested from two seats, won his pocket borough of Patiala Urban by more than 52,000 votes, the biggest victory margin in the state. He lost against SAD's Parkash Singh Badal in Lambi, bu many believe his sheer presence in the crucial Malwa helped Congress cut into AAP's popularity in the region.

AAP, which ended up with just 20 seats was banking heavily on winning a majority of the 69 constituencies in Malwa, but managed 18 Congress won 39 seats in Malwa and crushed the opposition. In Majha, Congress romped home in 23 of the 25 seats. AAP's ally Lok Insaaf Party won two seats. AAP found itself caught on the wrong foot on many issues, including being branded as outsiders by other parties, alienating Hindus by allegedly getting close to some Sikh groups and not projecting a CM candidate. Among the setbacks for AAP was the defeat of its heavyweights, LS MP Bhagwant Mann in Jalalabad and Punjab AAP convener Gurpreet Waraich in Batala.

Outgoing CM Parkash Singh Badal and his entourage will not even be the main opposition party in the assembly now with AAP snatching that space. The Akali Dal-BJP combine got 18 seats, its worst performance ever. SAD drew a blank in Faridkot and Moga, the two districts in Malwa, where incidents of sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib in 2015 had become the epicentre of mass protest.

Assembly Election Results 2017

A `tsuNaMo' ­ swept India's most populous and politically heavyweight state of Uttar Pradesh. Powered by a mighty social coalition of upper castes, “most backward“ OBCs and a section of Dalits, BJP crushed rivals SP-Congress and BSP by mopping up 41% of the popular vote, translating into a mandate of 325 seats in the 403-member assembly.

The result established PM Modi as the most popular leader of the country since Indira Gandhi at her peak, and cemented BJP's position as the dominant political player. The spectacular win in India's heartland should ensure that BJP gets its choice elected as the next President in July. It will also help turn the Rajya Sabha arithmetic in its favour, though not immediately.

Apart from a setback in Punjab, where the SAD-BJP combine lost comprehensively, BJP ended up neck and neck with Congress in Manipur and was in with a chance to retain power in Goa despite finishing behind Congress. BJP returned to office in Uttarakhand with a thumping majority , with Congress chief minister Harish Rawat losing both the seats he contested.

The results mean Congress's poor run continues with only Punjab and, to a lesser extent, Goa offering succour. Its attempt to ride on the coat tails of a strong regional party came a cropper in UP. It will be, psychologically speaking, at a disadvantage when it faces off with BJP in Modi's backyard of Gujarat later this year.

The results also sent a sobering message to SP leader Akhilesh Yadav and BSP's Mayawati. The Dalit czarina saw her party suffering another electoral humiliation after drawing a blank in the 2014 LS polls: a clear signal that her tested caste-driven formula has lost its appeal with voters, apart from die hard supporters. Akhilesh's attempt to break free of the image of being a leader of a party which caters principally to Yadavs and Muslims did not find favour with voters either.

The win heralds BJP's return to the Hindi heartland, after a long exile of 14 years forced upon it by political forces unleashed by the Mandal revolution of the 1990s. The win is particularly gratifying for Modi as it helps overcome the setback he suffered in Bihar in 2015.

Meanwhile, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal's hopes of replacing the Congress as a secular national force suffered a setback. His party came in second in Punjab amid indications that AAP's flirtations with pro-Khalistani sections may have caused many voters to reject a party that was once seen as the favourite to win the state. AAP fared even worse in Goa, drawing a blank.

Winning UP was necessary for Modi and BJP as they look ahead to the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. With a contribution of 73 seats, the state played a big role in BJP's 2014 victory and better synergy between Delhi and Lucknow may help BJP's effort to retain most of the seats it holds.

The team of Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah will see the handsome victory as a vindication of the government's policies, and look to press ahead with a mix of economic reform and welfarism in the run-up to the next LS elections. The strategy is sharply focused on carving a large right-of-Centre constituency by wooing the middle-class through growth and a focus on financial inclusion programmes for the poor.

Though elections in the other four states were keenly fought, the UP landslide dominated the political discourse as the results were seen as a referendum on demonetisation, Modi's most risky gambit.

The sweep in UP and Uttarakhand has given demonetisation a seal of popular approval and saw Shah asserting that “notebandi“ had entrenched Modi in the hearts and minds of the poor. The political messaging aimed at non-Yadav OBCs and non-Jatav Dalits was substantially undergirded by Hindu mobilisation that hinged on communal tension in western Uttar Pradesh and a perception that law and order was subject to the diktat of local party bosses.

Modi's move to polarise the electorate on the “kabristan-shamshan ghat“ rhetoric was intended to amplify BJP's charge that the SP government has played politics with development. The signaling on law and order was read by voters as a reference to the clout SP bosses like Azam Khan, Gayatri Prajapati and Shivpal Yadav enjoyed in influencing police and administration. CM Akhilesh Yadav's bid to distance himself from this aspect of his legacy came too late.

The future looks more dire for BSP chief Mayawati who had laid great store in fielding 99 Muslim candidates in a desperate bid to lure the minority vote from SP-Congress. Her candidates did get a slice of the Muslim vote but this might have only helped BJP. Her reliance on a solid Dalit base took a battering as it is clear that a goodly section of non-Jatav votes went to BJP. A low tally of 19 MLAs means the party will not even be able to elect a single Rajya Sabha MP in the next five years.

TaMo, Skoda to Jointly Develop Products

Homegrown auto major Tata Motors will form a long-term partnership with Volkswagen Group and Skoda to explore strategic alliance opportunity for joint development of products, technologies and component sourcing. Tata Motors and Skoda Auto, representing the Volkswagen Group, will detail out the guiding principles and terms of cooperation in the next few months. The agreement for the alliance was signed by Guenter Butschek, managing director of Tata Motors, Matthias Mueller, CEO of Volkswagen AG, and Bernhard Maier, CEO of Skoda Auto on the sidelines of the Geneva Auto Show.

At least 55,000 villages off mobile phone network

At least 55,000 villages in the country do not have mobile connectivity and efforts are being made to provide it, the government informed Rajya Sabha. Minister of state for communications Manoj Sinha said the ministry had sent letters to all chief ministers and chief secretaries seeking a list of villages that didn't have mobile connectivity .

Sinha said that, according to the 2011 Census, there are 55,000 villages that don't have mobile connectivity .The government, he added, had drawn up a plan to ensure the villages are brought on the mobile telephony network, especially in hilly areas and Left-wing extremism-affected regions.

The baby wept

A baby monkey that lost its mother in a road accident made all those who witnessed the scene cry. The baby wept sitting near the body of its mother that was knocked down by a speeding vehicle near Elanthur on the Tamil Nadu-Karnataka National highway on Friday.

The baby monkey hugged its mother and tried to wake her. Soon, realising that its mother had died, it started to weep. Villagers then took the body to a burial ground and conducted the last rites as the baby watched from a distance.

Industrial growth rebounds in January

Industrial output growth rebounded in January on the back of some revival in manufacturing, mining, capital goods and consumer durables sectors as key segments displayed signs of recovering from the impact of demonetisation.

Industrial output rose 2.7% in January from a decline of 1.6% during the same month a year earlier and above the revised 0.1% contraction in December.

The manufacturing sector rose 2.3% in January compared to a contraction of 2.9% in January 2016, while the electricity sector rose 3.9% year-on-year during the month compared to 6.6% expansion in the same month last year.

The mining sector rose an annual 5.3% in January compared to 1.5% growth in January 2016. Overall industrial output growth during April to January rose 0.6% compared to 2.7% in the year earlier period, highlighting the fact that the sector still remained sluggish.

The capital goods sector, a key gauge of industrial activity, rose an annual 10.7% in January compared to a decline of 21.6% during the same month last year. The data on capital goods has remained volatile prompting economists to call for a revamp.