Release of ‘VIF Perspective: Issues & Trends, 2017’

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Hon’ble Shri Suresh Prabhu, Minister for Railways, Government of India, released the publication ‘VIF Perspective - Issues & Trends, 2017 : Securing India’, at a public event organised by the Vivekananda International Foundation on 27 Jul 2017. The book contains altogether fifteen essays on topical themes, all of which were chosen very carefully by a balanced panel of distinguished policy experts, and written from a perspective of India’s national interests and security by some of India’s well-known thinkers and security experts These luminaries included Shri S Gurumurthy, General NC Vij, Amb Kanwal Sibal, Lt Gen Ravi Sahney and Shri C D Sahay, among others, of the VIF’s faculty.

General NC Vij, former Chief of the Indian Army and Director, VIF, who made the opening remarks, billed the said publication as a flagship publication of the VIF, to be brought out annually to cover key issues and trends as they arise before the nation. He also took the occasion to underscore the VIF’s growing eminence as a think tank, with its expanding global outreach and close linkages with as many as fifty one think tanks established over a relatively short period.

Commending the outstanding performance of VIF as a think tank, the Hon’ble Minister, Shri Suresh Prabhu, stressed that while it is important to critically examine issues that lie before the nation, examining the evolving trends is perhaps even more important because these would determine the course of future events against which the nation needs to remain fully prepared well in advance. The Minister highlighted, among other things, Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s foreign tours over the last three plus years that aimed at meeting India’s domestic interests.

The itinerary planned for the release of publication, also included reading out key extracts from the book and on-the-spot commentaries by three of the contributor, namely, Amb Kanwal Sibal, former Foreign Secretary, Shri Tilak Devasher, former Special Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat, and Lt Gen Davinder Kumar (Retd), former Signal Officer Commanding- in-Chief, Indian Army. Amb Kanwal Sibal briefly touched on the evolving dynamics in the US-India relationship as also the US policies towards Russia, China and other major world powers and their broader implications for India, while Shri Tilak Devasher, whose book ‘Pakistan: Courting the Abyss’ hit the stand last year, dwelt on the evolving dynamics in Pakistan, focusing especially on the civil-military complex in Pakistan, its economy, radicalization and terrorism, among other challenges. Lt Gen Davinder Singh, for his part, discussed the emerging trends in militarization and weaponisation of outer space.

Following the three presentations, an interactive session was held between the audience and the three speakers.