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Rahul Shivshankar

Rahul Shivshankar

The Times of India

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Opinion | Age Of Consent: Why 16 Is Still Too Young

Opinion | Age Of Consent: Why 16 Is Still Too Young

It may be true that some 16- to 18-year-olds possess the maturity to decide when, where, and with whom they want to have sex. But the exception...

yesterday 30

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Even Islam Can’t Undo What Pakistan Has Brought Upon Itself

Opinion | Even Islam Can’t Undo What Pakistan Has Brought Upon Itself

If Pakistan’s rulers still believe faith alone can hold the nation together, they are mistaking dogma for nationhood

14.10.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | 5 Reasons Why India Is Right To Change Its Mind About Taliban

Some have already begun lashing out at the Modi government for its dalliance with the Taliban

11.10.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Statue, Faith, And A Shoe: Has Hindu Patience Become A Burden?

Opinion | Statue, Faith, And A Shoe: Has Hindu Patience Become A Burden?

The shoe-throwing incident may be the first indication that prolonged patience is being severely tested

08.10.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | The US-Pakistan Tango Is A Reset That Has Consequences For India

Since the Cold War, the US-Pakistan relationship has always tilted in Washington's favour but never without consequences for India

07.10.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | India Bashing Peaks In America: Not Desi Diaspora’s Duty To Speak Up?

The Indian-American community can look across to the Jewish-American community, which is highly organised politically

04.10.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | I Love Muhammad Vs Jai Shri Ram: The Chronicle of A False Equivalence

On the surface, both slogans are religious incantations. Yet, the two are fundamentally different in origin, history, and philosophical underpinning

02.10.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Don’t Mistake India-Pakistan Sport For Virtue: It’s War By Other Means

The Indian team captain’s decision to not shake his counterpart’s hand in Dubai is very much in keeping with the tradition of using cricket to...

30.09.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | ‘I Love Muhammad’ Marches & The Question Of Weaponising Piety

Those who are today citing the Constitution in defence of the parade participants are the very people who objected to mobilisation marches under the...

26.09.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | When Silence Becomes Betrayal: Tharoor’s Call To The US Desi Diaspora

Tharoor’s invocation will only make an impression if the Indian diaspora still feels obliged to consider itself Indian.

25.09.2025 40

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | The Question Of Palestine & India’s Self-Interest

Is recognising Palestine as a state still in India’s national interest? The facts suggest otherwise

24.09.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Selectively Secular Gaze Blinds CJI Gavai’s Justice?

The entire post-independence project has focussed on somehow taking the ‘Hindu out of the Indian’

19.09.2025 20

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: Do UK’s Nativist Rallies Pose A Worrying Threat To Indian Migrants?

Concerns over immigration, ignored for too long, have reached a peak

17.09.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: Handshake Snub, A Post Dedicating Win to Bharat’s Armed Forces Can’t Whitewash BCCI’s Sin

The India-Pakistan rivalry drives viewership. Viewership guarantees TV ad revenues: the real money-spinner.

16.09.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: Not A Revolution, Mobocracy Ousted Oli-garchy In Nepal

It’s being said that the eruption in Nepal was a spontaneous coming together of long-felt resentments.

11.09.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: A ‘Cathay-logue’ For Posterity

The question is whether Tianjin is the exception that proves the rule

08.09.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: Trump’s Got It Wrong, Discovering Oil Will Be The Ruin Of Pakistan

Far from a lifeline, oil as a primary resource could push the state closer to the brink of implosion

21.08.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | The Selective Amnesia On Partition

Does the Left shun Partition talk because it shatters the 'both sides equally guilty' myth?

15.08.2025 20

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Human Rights Vs Dog Rights: Activist Ire Over SC Order Missing The Point?

Far too many are mauled by packs of prowling dogs on the capital’s streets. Most of the victims are toddlers and the aged who can’t look out for...

13.08.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Has Trump's Tariff Tyranny Made The Case For BRICS Stronger?

Such non-West platforms offer India diplomatic flexibility and, with that, elbow room in trade talks with America

08.08.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Let Trump Have It, The Nobel Has Lost Its Nobility Long Back

The question that we need to engage with is not whether US President Donald Trump will win, but how the once-coveted Nobel Peace Prize is now reduced...

05.08.2025 8

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Malegaon Verdict Decimates A Narrative Project To Stigmatise Sanatan

With the exoneration of Sadhvi Pragya, Lt Col Purohit, and five others in the Malegaon blast case, the myth of “Hindu terror” lies dead and buried.

01.08.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | ‘Call Trump A Liar’: Why PM Modi Has Done Well By Ignoring Rahul’s Dare

To call upon Prime Minister Modi to publicly label the head of a partner nation—a key strategic ally—as a liar is shallow, inflammatory, and...

31.07.2025 50

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Shukla’s Liftoff Renews India’s Once Self-Imposed Moratorium On Thinking Big

Nations that stop innovating, regenerating, and reimagining themselves fade into history. This is true for even civilisations

26.06.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: India Has Got The Balance Right In West Asia

In the Israel-Iran fight to the brink of cataclysm, neutrality is not a byword for indecisiveness

24.06.2025 20

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | What's Behind The MELODI Meme Fest?

When two leaders with a fawning fan following like PM Modi and PM Meloni meet, they not only immediately light up the formal media sphere but also the...

20.06.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Air India Plane Crash: Is Boeing The New Union Carbide? | Opinion

The essay compares Boeing to Union Carbide, citing corporate negligence and impunity, drawing parallels between Boeing's 787 Dreamliner crash in...

17.06.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Loss Angeles! How A Crazed Wokeism Connects America And India

From Delhi to DC, the Left now views illegal immigration as a moral cudgel to beat down ideological opponents and snatch political turf

11.06.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Beating Retreat Resumes: Let’s Stop Normalising Pakistan’s Terror Army

By reviving this pageant of synchronised stomping, we’re not projecting power, but we’re performing a dangerous dance of denial

21.05.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

OPINION | The Indo-Pak 'Understanding' Is An Undeclared Indian Win

Pakistan now understands that any future reliance on terrorism will invite a full-spectrum declaration of war from India.

12.05.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Operation Sindoor: Modi Rewrites The Rules Of Deterrence

Operation Sindoor shows retaliation need not always be static; that it can be agile, pre-emptive, assertive yet contained

09.05.2025 9

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Post-Pahalgam: The Pakistan-Turkey Tango & India’s Unnoticed Strategic Play To Outflank Both

New Delhi’s latest tactical gambit will help outflank Pakistan — and by extension, even blunt the emerging Pakistan–Turkey defence axis

29.04.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | A Short History Of What Really Ails Kashmir And Why The NDA Is Going Wrong

It is now clear that development is not the path to deradicalisation

24.04.2025 8

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Reality Check: India’s Ties With Saudi Arabia Will Ever Only Be Based On Conditional Trust. But That’s Okay

The fact is that Gulf countries, including Saudi Arabia, may be reliable partners in economic and technological spheres, but as geopolitical allies,...

23.04.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | General Munir's Rant Is A Verbal Cross-Border Strike. Indians Stay Alert

General Munir's rant should serve as a reality check for those in India who push for peace talks with Pakistan

19.04.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion: Tahawwur Rana Is More Than An ISI Agent, He Is The Horseman Of A Jihadi Apocalypse

Over the next few weeks, even months, Tahawwur Rana is expected to incriminate many of his associates in Pakistan. His confessions will further cement...

12.04.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Waqf Showdown Takeaway: Modi Is Not A ‘One-Third PM’; NDA Is Not A ‘Paralytic’ UPA

The power of a government, especially a coalition, is measured not by its proclamations and not by how many elections it wins but by its ability to...

03.04.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Justice Varma Scandal: Taking Judicial Autonomy Too Far?

The time has come to move towards an open justice. A great democracy such as ours deserves this

25.03.2025 30

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Aurangzeb’s Shadow: How Historical Amnesia Fuels Communal Tensions In India

As Dr BR Ambedkar pointed out, till a history of mutual animosities in the political and religious realms goes unconfronted, the Aurangzebs of yore...

22.03.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Message For Delhi: A Pact With Trump’s America Is A Faustian Bargain

If it hasn't already, India must very quickly internalise that a strategic embrace with America under Trump is no guarantee against Beijing...

05.03.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Delimitation Debate: Is The DMK Being Selectively Parochial?

The Narendra Modi-led NDA is aware of the sensitivities of southern states that fear that delimitation based on the latest population data (2026...

28.02.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Maha Kumbh: Secretly Hoping Secular Fundamentalists Aren’t Entirely Wrong

If the Maha Kumbh is succeeding in evoking a sense of oneness, it may not be a bad thing. It gives Hinduism—and its inherent pluralism—a fighting...

23.02.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Modi’s Mastery Over The Art Of The Deal Is The Biggest Revelation From The Meeting With Trump

Trump has shown that when it comes to India, he is willing to take a more pragmatic view. A more understanding view. Perhaps because, as he himself...

15.02.2025 20

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Kejriwal Becomes ‘Aam Aadmi’: Key Takeaways

The AAP will see churn. In the immediate term, there will be a reordering. Will Kejriwal still command the moral authority to reshape the...

11.02.2025 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Dunki Business: India Needn’t Worry, Trump’s Deportation Spree Will Fizzle Fast

05.02.2025 10

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Soros-Yunus Dhaka Meet: ‘Agent’ Of Regime Change At Delhi’s Door?

30.01.2025 50

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Will The ‘Maha’ Saffron Wave Push INDIA To The Brink Of A Break-Up?

23.11.2024 5

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | SoBo’s No-Show Isn’t Because Of Ennui Or Disenchantment, But Arrogance Of Access

21.11.2024 3

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Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | India Knows A Harris Presidency Will Be Even More Moralistic Than Biden’s

06.11.2024 10

News18

Rahul Shivshankar

Opinion | Rise of the Non-West: BRICS+ and Big Takeaways from Kazan

Written By: Rahul Shivshankar News18.com Last Updated: October 23, 2024, 09:21 IST New Delhi, India (From left) President of China Xi Jinping,...

23.10.2024 5

News18

Rahul Shivshankar