OPINION

The subject of 'Happiness' is a matter that every thinking person should examine in his or her own right in the spirit of usefully spending some of the spare time, if nothing else. My firm belief is that the roots of 'Happiness' lie in the mental equilibrium that had to be first achieved through a combination of 'awareness' and 'acceptance' -- particularly in the years that marked the closing quarter of life.

Many recent developments in the Arab world and the change of guard in the USA, has led to many new permutations and combinations on the relationship front amongst western and the Arab world. One such changed consequence has been the relationship of the Palestinians with the rest of the Arab world, and in particular with Saudi Arabia.

After a successful run of 11 years since its founding, Snapdeal started running into major problems leading it to the verge of almost a shutdown in 2017. In less than 12 months, the platform wents from riches to rags, due to acquiring too many new startups and the silent role of financier SoftBank in the fiasco.

2020 has been a year of jolts and interestingly, with earthquakes, it has been a difficult time for dissent all over the world. From the poor section of the society struggling to get food and hope of "Normalcy" to students battling with the anxiety of exams along with the battle against the pandemic, the year had everything in its cup. But at the end of December, it does feel like 2019, as same as December 2019 but even more than that. "Sit-in protest" then, inside the National Capital and now on its borders as well.

The match being played with a pink ball will require both teams to play patiently and carefully. India, a team not very experienced playing in these conditions, will need to play with more grit and determination rather than with just fluency and flamboyancy.

The two schemes combined are expected to bring down costs of bulk drugs in the country and also increase competitiveness in the domestic bulk drug industry, not only for boosting domestic capability but also leading the market globally. These efforts by the government are in tune with PM Narendra Modi's "atma-nirbharta" mission for the country and are in the right direction of providing low-cost healthcare to the marginalised sections of the society. 

The final round of haggling is already a heavy lift. Two bills that have cleared the House (H.R.1044) and Senate (S. 386) need to be blended and slipped into the omnibus funding bill (before Congress adjourns for the year) to lift the existing per-country cap on the number of employment based permanent-residency permits issued to legal immigrants.

The sanctions have been issued under the Section 231 of the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) enacted on August 2, 2017 that states action against any country engaging in a significant transaction with a person that is part of, or operates for or on behalf of, the defence or intelligence sectors of the Government of the Russian Federation.

While foreign policy analysts and economists said that Tai is likely to take on China for its "unfair trade practices" they opined that the tariff measures, considered outdated as a trade weapon, that were put in place by the Trump administration could be eased, which could benefit many countries including India.

The Donald Trump-led skewering of foreign worker visas can't be undone in a hurry when the Trump lame duck ends. The easier task will be to nix executive actions, the tangled web of regulations will be much harder to undo, New York based immigration attorney Cyrus Mehta says during a wide ranging interview on the US work visa playbook in a post-Trump world.