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Best of BS Opinion: Strategic conflicts, cricket, and genetic comeback
We've all been there. Two delivery guys, scooters head-on, in a narrow lane near the market. Nobody wants to reverse, both have mirrors folded in, and tempers folded out. You stop and watch the standoff. Will someone blink first? Or will this end in honks and verbal fireworks? Today's stories feel just like that alley. From nuclear neighbours with fingers hovering near red lines, to cricket authorities checking bat widths, nobody's backing down. The collisions are real, rhetorical, and sometimes, revelatory. Let's dive in.
First, there's the dangerously narrow alley of India-Pakistan ties. After the Pahalgam terror attack, India's retaliatory chokehold on trade and travel is turning into a full-scale diplomatic freeze, as Shyam Saran writes. Pakistan, instead of introspection, is roaring back with denials, direct threats, and theatrical diplomacy. Defence Minister Asif's chilling warning about terror reprisals if civilians are hurt has set a new low. The alley just got narrower — and a whole lot darker.
Aditi Phadnis explores another pressure point: water. By suspending the Indus Waters Treaty — a rare hydrological handshake that has survived six decades of conflict — India is now holding Pakistan's economic jugular in a tight grip. With 25 per cent of its GDP tied to this lifeline, Islamabad finds itself in a historic choke. But water wars are slower, more patient than gunfire. And in this alley, India's quiet grip could rewrite the rules of geopolitical pressure.
Meanwhile, in the far more flamboyant alley of cricket, Sandeep Goyal watches IPL batsmen go ballistic. But now, umpires are measuring bats mid-match to ensure fairness. Think of it as traffic cops pulling over modified vehicles in the middle of a drag race. Cricket's alley, it turns out, has speed limits too — and someone's finally enforcing them.
Back in the dark alleys of covert war, Shekhar Gupta offers a gut-punch history lesson. The ISI's 40-year-old playbook of targeting Hindus isn't just terrorism — it's a trap, baiting India into communal self-implosion. But India's collective restraint — across political lines — has thwarted that bait time and again. The message? You may enter the alley swinging, but sometimes, the biggest strength is holding the punch.
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