Dharavi and Pakistan: Unlikely COVID success stories

Dharavi and Pakistan: Unlikely COVID success stories

These unlikely COVID success stories actually make virtue out of unpalatable reality. And, of ACCIDENTAL SUCCESSES.
Let’s look at Dharavi first. With that kind of population density (80 people sharing a toilet), there is no way that an effective lockdown can be enforced. Pakistan has a relatively lower population density and a young population. But a meaningful lockdown has hardly been enforced because of religious hardliners who insist on communal prayer.

The Great Game comes full circle

The Great Game comes full circle

Therefore, the strategic objective in the 1940s was to physically separate a soon-to-be independent India from the then USSR and Afghanistan. Pakistan was to be the buffer state to realise the insidious British strategic objective. That explains why the India-Pakistan border is roughly parallel to the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

India’s strategic culture: Conquer or be conquered

India’s strategic culture: Conquer or be conquered

The fact is our nation states are recently imagined realities. They are an amalgamation of ethnic, communal and linguistic identities – each driven by powerful political forces with vested interests. So, it is easy for an invading power to divide and rule – historically and even now.