Dolby

I had honestly hoped that as part of the deal with the World, Taliban would be allowed to take over Afghanistan and in return they won't indulge in overt discrimination and human rights abuses. Alas!!!

India's lone representative in Beijing WOG was Arif Mohd Khan, a Kashmiri. Apart from him, a large number of our winter sportsperson come from Jammu & Kashmir. In Cricket, a couple of Kashmiris have represented India. Suresh Raina, a Kashmiri Pandit by ethnicity, was an integral part of Indian cricket team for more than a decade. But probably the biggest J&K sportsperson to represent India would be rifle shooter Chain Singh. As J&K puts the past of terrorism behind and moves ahead on the path of normalcy and peace, I am sure that we will see many more Indian champions from J&K.

I would put Malvika in the same category as Unnati and Tasnim. She does seem to have potential. We need to be a bit lenient with this batch as they have missed out on 2 years due to COVID and hence, there development will be slower compared to others. Considering that, I still have high hopes from these 3. Even Samiya and Aakrishi are not that old and can improve a lot. One more name to watch out is Anupama Upadhyay. In MS, Meiraba is still young and has performed decent in his debut year on senior circuit. So, I still have hopes from him. Though I don't have high hopes from Kiran, but I think it is early to discount him. He is just 21 and already has some decent wins on senior tour. He can be next gen Prannoy. Among the rest, I think Priyanshu is another one who can be a top player. Also, for Paris, I have really high hopes on Lakshya Sen. And Srikanth still should be among top for 3-4 years more. For Doubles, we have 3 very good doubles players in Tanisha Crasto, Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand. On men's side we have a number of good young players (Krishna, Vishnu, Ishaan, Sai) Plus we have the beasts Satwik and Chirag. So, there is hope that among such a talented pool (and with return of Tan Kim Her), we should get some decent doubles team as well.

Mr. President, what should be our strategy to prevent Nuclear War? Arrange a zoom call with TikTokers https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/11/tik-tok-ukraine-white-house/

Same thing with Indian thread. I am following the thread so I get the notification but it is not visible in latest replies.

Indian Men's Hockey team will be coached by the legend Sardar Singh. We have already declared that we will be fielding a young team with the senior team focusing on Asian Games.

More importantly, almost surely, Asian Games would be a qualifying tournament for Paris Olympics.

Roman Abramovic has decided to sell Chelsea

Following the respective decision of the IOC Executive Board and a meeting with the IOC President, the ISSF decided that athletes from the Russian Federation and Belarus will not be allowed to take part in ISSF Championships. This decision entered into force at 16.00 CET on March 1, 2022 and is valid until upon further notice. Link

Yes, we don’t care for Ukraine that is why we are plainly saying Russia must stop violence. That is why we are sending humanitarian aid to Ukraine. Still waiting to know what concrete steps has EU/NATO taken.

ISSF had one of the best livescoring systems 2 years back. Sadly, now it is one of the worst.

And what has NATO/EU exactly done to help Ukraine? Apart from empty speeches? NATO watched silently when Crimea was annexed. Everybody knew that Russia was going to invade Ukraine but did they do anything? Tell me how many NATO soldiers are there in Ukraine? Sanctions on Russia excludes energy sector, which is Russia's major export. They were even debating if diamonds and hand bags should be exempted or not. And yet it is India's "not my problem" approach which is preventing peace. We depend a lot on Russia for defence equipment. If Pakistan and/or China try some mischief, how much can we rely on USA/NATO? We know we are on our own, which was more than visible in the initial days of Delta wave, and we will do what is best in our interest. World does the same.

NAM is a useless organisation with zero effect on Indian foreign policy or any country's foreign policy for that matter. But, funny that you mentioned pro-Russia Belarus while ignoring that NAM also has almost all Africa, Caribbean and Asia as its members including Singapore, Thailand and Philippines.

India is not a player in the conflict. For us the primary concern is 1) Trying to avert a global World War and 2) safe evacuation of 20K Indians stuck in Ukraine. And I reiterate Indian government is doing the best it can to meet both goals.

I am perfectly fine with India being neutral. I think our govt has handled a difficult situation quite well. But difference between Indian and Chinese position is while we are calling for an end to violence, Chinese are talking about Russia's legitimate security demands.

I would like if you didn't include India alongside China. Though abstaining, we have categorically said there should be cessation of violence from Russia. We are abstaining because we need Russian veto in case of Pakistan/China resolutions. Also, our dependence on Russia for defence equipments.

This is the problem, we don't have an escalation ladder. You annex Crimea, no problem pass us some more of the Vodka while we enjoy the Football World Cup. You do peacekeeping in Donbas, aah tough luck Ukrainians, busy booking my tickets to Moscow. Tanks surrounding Kyiv, that is it. No Russian shall even think of sports. Also, need to figure out how to allow local protests while maintaining sports code. For example, for us tanks surrounding Kyiv is war of conquest but I am sure for Ukrainians even Crimea was war of conquest. And what if some nation wants to boycott another nation for some other things. Take for an example, if some nation wants to boycott Qatar WC, should they be allowed to do so? What should be the sanctions, if any, they face? IOC even threatened consequences if a nation skipped Tokyo Olympics. (Not sure if they followed up on it or not).

Sadly there appears to be some truth in this. Seen too many videos and testimonies from many Indian and African students alleging racial discrimination. Disappointing.

And Iran has faced bans for that. Iran can't even think of hosting any prominent sports where there is a good chance Israelis would qualify. Also, the general consensus among sports fans is that Irani policy is wrong. I am ok with Russia being banned but then we can't suddenly say that don't mix politics and sports when India denies visa to Pakistani sportspersons or an Irani athlete refuses to compete against Israeli.

I can understand people's emotions but this is setting a precedent, which will be used in future. Iran will claim that Israel is at war with it and hence they are within their rights to deny their athletes visa, which is much lower than banning Russia. Same with India-Pakistan Serbia-Kosovo and many others.

There are an estimated 15-20K Indians stuck in Ukraine. Indian embassies are working really hard to evacuate all of them. And from all accounts, we are receiving exemplary support from all the neighbours, Poland, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia. We are thankful to all of you. Till now around 1000 Indians have been rescued.

I have seen some videos of Indian students alleging discrimination from Ukrainian official but I would personally give them benefit of doubt because of the volatile situation. I think the reality is a combination of many different things, where some official must be angry at India and discriminated against some students, tense students mistaking the delay as discrimination and a variety of other issues.

Time to rewatch Yes Prime Minister

He blamed Lenin for creating Ukraine. He sees himself as a successor of Nicholas II and not Yeltsin.