South Asia Investor Review

As the Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rolls out "Nakbah 2023", a former senior US diplomat has been caught on a viral video telling an Arab street food vendor in New York that the killing of 4,000 Palestinian children in Gaza is "not enough". The video shows Stuart Seldowitz, who worked on the National Security Council South Asia Directorate under President Barack Obama, beginning by insulting Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) and the Holy Quran, and then goes on a hateful anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian tirade. Seldowitz also served as deputy director/senior political officer in the U.S. State Department’s Office of Israel and Palestinian Affairs from 1999 to 2003. This incident raises the question: Is Islamophobia shaping the US policy in the Middle East and South Asia regions?  Stuart Seldowitz, Former US Senior National Security Official US-Pakistan Ties: US-Pakistan relations hit an all-time low during the Obama years when Stuart Seldowitz w...

Gallup Law and Order Survey 2021 shows that Pakistan (score 82) is safer than Bangladesh (79) and India (80) and Sri Lanka (80).  Gallup’s survey is based on responses to four questions to measure “people’s sense of personal security and their personal experiences with crime and law enforcement”. The questions are as follows: 1) In the city or area where you live, do you have confidence in the local police force?; 2) Do you feel safe walking alone at night in the city or area where you live?; 3) Within the last 12 months, have you had money or property stolen from you or another household member?; 4) Within the past 12 months, have you been assaulted or mugged?  Gallup interviewed 127,000 people in 120 countries to compile the report. Gallup Law and Order Survey Results 2022. Source: Gallup The survey, conducted by global analytics firm Gallup, ranks Singapore, Tajikistan, Norway, Switzerland and Indonesia as the safest countries in the world.  It ranks Sierra Leone,...

Female labor force participation rate in India has recently fallen to just 19%, the second lowest after Afghanistan's 15% in the South Asia region. By contrast, Pakistan's  women's labor force  participation rate is 21%, Sri Lanka's 31% and Bangladesh's 35%. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's mishandling of the COVID19 pandemic has hit Indian women particularly hard, with 90% of those who lost their jobs now shut out of the workforce.  Female Labor Force Participation Rate in South Asia. Source: World Bank The precipitous loss of women workers is disastrous news for India's economy, which had started slowing before the  COVID19  pandemic, according to a  Bloomberg  report. Rosa Abraham, an economics professor at Azim Premji University in Bengaluru, tracked more than 20,000 people as they navigated the labor market during the pandemic.. She found that after the first lockdown, women were several times more likely to lose their jobs than men and far less lik...

Male ancestors of the vast majority of present-day South Asians (Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis) came from West Eurasia, Central Asia and Iran, according to the latest DNA research led by Harvard geneticist Dr. David Reich. Reich's team came to this conclusion after studying the Y-chromosomes of present-day Indians. Some Hindu Indian scientists have used mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) samples, extracted from the bones of recently discovered ancient skeletal remains of a couple in Rakigarhi in Haryana, to claim the local indigenous origins of all Hindus. Y-chromosomes are passed from father to son while mitochondrial DNA is passed from mother to children. The Harvard team's findings thoroughly debunk Hindu Nationalists' "racial purity" myth similar to that promoted by  White Supremacist racists  in the West.  Reich writes: "The Hindutva ideology that there was no major contribution to Indian culture from migrants from outside South Asia is undermined by the fact...

Only 18% of Pakistanis and 19% of Indians under the age of 24 have the skills required for  21st century jobs , according to a  United Nations and Business Coalition for Education study . It's the percentage of all school age children on track to complete secondary AND reach the learning benchmarks spelled out  by National Achievement Test (NAT) 2016 for Pakistan  and NCERT 2017 for India. South Asian economies have experienced some of the fastest  growth rates  in the world. They are driven by young and growing populations in the region. Sustaining growth will become increasingly difficult unless significant investments are made to prepare South Asian youth for 21st century jobs. Today, South Asia is home to the largest number of young people of any global region, with almost half of its population of 1.9 billion below the age of 24, according to data produced by the Global Business Coalition for Education (GBC-Education), the Education Commission, an...

It was in early 1980s when I was driving through Yuba City with a couple of friends. It was lunch time and we were looking for a halal restaurant when we spotted Rasul's. At the restaurant we met a man who introduced himself as Mohammad Ali Rasul. He spoke in Mexican accented English but he told us his father came from the Punjab region now in Pakistan and his mother was of Mexican ancestry.  There were 400 such marriages between Punjabi men and Mexican women by 1940, according to Professor Karen Leonard of UC Irvine. Rasul gave us a warm welcome when we told him him we are also originally from Pakistan. He offered us his "Roti Quesadilla" special without charge as a gift. The fusion dish is a variation on Queso Quesadilla made with Indian "nan"(flat bread) topped with traditional rich, melting cheese which originated in Mexico and Texas. I had forgotten all about it until memory was refreshed by a story titled " California’s Lost (and Found) Punjabi-Mexica...

World Happiness Report 2019 says that India is among the world's biggest losers while Pakistan is among the biggest gainers on World Happiness Index. Under Prime Minister Narendra's Modi's leadership, India's ranking has worsened from 118 in 2016 to 140 in 2019. In the same period, Pakistan's ranking has improved from 92 in 2016 to 67 in 2019.  World Happiness index  is considered a better representation of people's well-being than other economic and social indicators individually. World Happiness Trends in India and Pakistan. Source: United Nations Contrary to the Indian and western media hype about Modi-nomics, it was recently reported that  unemployment rate  in India has reached its highest in 45 years. Indian  GDP growth figures  have been challenged as too optimistic by top Indian and western economists. Modi's  demonetization  has turned out to be a major disaster for India's largely cash-based economy. Farmers are continuing to ...

The West, particularly the United States and Canada, are geographically far removed from South Asia. This distance makes many think that any  nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan  would not have a significant impact on life in America and Europe. Dr. Owen Brian Toon and Professor Alan Robock dispute this thinking. They believe the nuclear winter following an India-Pakistan nuclear exchange will kill crops as far as the United States and cause a global famine. Another study by Nobel Peace Prize- winning International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War and Physicians for Social Responsibility reached the same conclusion. Professors Robock and Toon have calculated that the smoke from just 100-200 Hiroshima sized atomic bombs exploding in South Asia would cover the entire globe within two weeks. This smoke would hang 30-50 miles above the surface of the earth where it never rains. This thick layer of smoke would block the sun causing farmers to lose their crop...