India Would Win with Trump (Abhijnan Rej, The National Interest)

Last week an enterprising, and unknown, far-right outfit in New Delhi performed a traditional Hindu puja, literally praying for a Donald Trump presidency. The Washington Post took this to mean that Trump has fans in India despite his tasteless rants about outsourcing. Britain’s Guardian quoted the fringe leader behind the religious ceremony describing Trump as “our hero.” The Hindu right’s Islamophobia is one that The Donald surely shares. They too, like Trump, are keen on restoring some putative long-lost national glory

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/india-would-win-trump-16363

Building new alliances with BRICS (Samir Saran, Abhijnan Rej, South Asia Monitor)

India’s assumption of the presidency of BRICS (the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa grouping) last month comes at a time when many are questioning the group’s raison d’être. The economic health of the group is patchy and the contemporary political trajectories of its members are, to put it mildly, pulling in different directions.

http://southasiamonitor.org/detail.php?type=n&nid=16112