Dipu Rai

Xi Jinping got a rare runway welcome in Washington. But US data show China now supplies less than eight per cent of the goods America imports, down from 21 per cent.

More than half the state is in severe drought, the most since mid-September 2021. The state's first drought notice is due by Saturday.

A birth in a private hospital cost a family 16 times as much as in a government one in 2025. The government spent less than Rs 8 a day on each person's health.

A kilo of onions has doubled in price in a year. India's monsoon is 15 per cent short, but more than half of this year's rise in food prices came before it failed.

From October 15, most shops will pay 0.4 per cent on bigger UPI payments, capped at Rs 300. Customers and small merchants pay nothing.

This is the third in a three-part story. The institute that counts India's stubble fires added a line to its bulletins this year: satellites do not record fires lit when nothing is overhead. September 15 was the first time it appeared in a paddy season, the season that produced the 93 per cent fall everyone quotes.

The NPCI met with banks and payment firms on Tuesday to start setting a fee on UPI. The government has already fixed where UPI stops being free. Its own data shows 98 per cent of shop payments sit below that line.

This is the second of a three-part story. Punjab's crop-fire detections fell 93 per cent in five seasons. Delhi's worst days eased; its everyday autumn air did not. And the counted burning moved to the states next door.

Measured by what its economies produce, the bloc meeting in New Delhi has gone from 15 per cent of world output in 1992 to 40 per cent today. Measured in dollars, it's a smaller story.

This is the first of a three-part story. Everyone talks about the autumn stubble burning that's allegedly responsible for Delhi's bad air. But the spring burning that nobody mentions is usually twice as big.

For every Rs 100 Indian households hold in financial savings, they now owe Rs 32, against Rs 27 four years ago. Reserve Bank of India data shows borrowing running ahead of both savings and the economy.

India hosts the 18th BRICS Summit on September 12 and 13, 20 years after the bloc was founded and with its oil map redrawn.

Sugar barely moved for 10 months. Then it rose by Rs 15 a kilo in August. The Centre has now cut the stock limit for dealers a second time, everywhere except Kolkata.

Parliament has cleared the way to charge shops for UPI payments. NPCI's own data shows the fee would miss almost everything India buys.

Of the 257 artificial intelligence models the world can buy today, two were built in India. Almost all of the country's AI work is answered by machines made in America and China.

A big quake hit Colombia on August 10. Four days later, Indonesia was hit twice, almost exactly opposite on the globe. A published paper says that is a real pattern. We tested it on 36 years of earthquakes. The answer changed on one technical choice almost nobody has heard of.

Nearly half of India's districts are short of rain, a third of the country is drying out, and farmers have planted less than they had by this time last year.

Across 19 sitting days, MPs spoke for a total of 12 hours and eight minutes. Of the 487 the House tracks, 430 said nothing on any government bill.

The Assembly wants the sharing formula changed. The Finance Commission has already said the protection Tamil Nadu is asking for is going away.

India is still arguing about it. Two of its states have announced bans without a bill, and an under-16 rule would cover about 36 crore people, a quarter of the country.