In this episode of India Today Explains, Akshita Nandagopal talks about Prime Minister Modi's1947 reference to PoK on what Nehru did with a very interesting AI throwback, India's push to get Pakistan back on the FATF grey list, the controversy over Mysore Pak's name, Trump's crackdown on Harvard University and more.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Hello and welcome. You're watching India Today Explains. I'm Akshita Nandakopal and here's what we'll be talking about in this episode.
00:16The Prime Minister's 1947 reference to POK on what Nehru did with a very interesting AI throwback.
00:23India has been pushing for Pakistan to be back on the FATF grey list. So we'll tell you all about what the FATF does and why India is making this push.
00:34Also, a fallout of the India-Pakistan conflict is a strike on India's most famous desert, the Mysore Park.
00:41What does the name actually mean? We'll break down if there's actually a park link.
00:45Away from the India-Pakistan conflict, we'll also talk about the Trump-Howard Rao and how the U.S. government is cracking down on a private university.
00:55Also on the show, amid the Yashwant Varma controversy, we'll recap for you the impeachment process and finally, what's triggered the early monsoon onset in India.
01:06So lots lined up for you. Let's get started.
01:08Prime Minister Modi, while speaking on Park-sponsored terror this week, mentioned how terrorists should have been dealt with in 1947.
01:21It was a clear taunt at former Prime Minister Nehru and a reference to Patel's advice to reclaim POK.
01:28So we've recapped what happened then using AI to recreate the conversation between Nehru Patel and Sam Manakshaw.
01:38Prime Minister Modi, while speaking on Park-sponsored terror this week, has been dealt with in 1947.
02:08What's the situation Manak ji?
02:22Sir, if we don't act now, Srinagar is lost.
02:27What about the UN, international opinion?
02:31Jawahar, do you want Kashmir or not?
02:34Of course I do.
02:35Sam, you've got your orders.
03:05Sam, you've got your orders.
03:35As part of the strategy to curb financial flows that aid terror activities, India plans to present this dossier in the next FETF meeting.
03:49What exactly is FETF and what does being on an FETF grey or blacklist actually entail?
03:55The FETF stands for the Financial Action Task Force.
03:58It's an intergovernmental organization that designs and promotes policies and standards to combat financial crime.
04:04In simple terms, it's a global money laundering and terror financing watchdog with 39 members, excluding Russia, whose membership was suspended in 2023.
04:14The FETF was created in 1989 at the behest of the G7.
04:20It's headquartered in Paris.
04:23Originally started to combat money laundering, it's been expanded to also target the financing for weapons of mass destruction, corruption and terrorist financing.
04:32The body, to read out from its website, researches how money is laundered and terrorism is funded, promotes global standards to mitigate the risks and assesses whether countries are taking effective action.
04:45A large number of international organizations participate in the FETF as observers, each of which has some involvement in anti-money laundering activities.
04:54These organizations include the Interpol, the IMF, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
05:02So let's explain to you what's an FETF grey list.
05:05The FETF grey list is officially known as jurisdictions under increased monitoring.
05:11So this identifies countries with significant deficiencies in their anti-money laundering and countering or financing of terrorism.
05:18These countries are under increased scrutiny by the FETF and are expected to work with the organization to address these very deficiencies.
05:26While not being as severe as blacklisting, grey listing can lead to economic and reputational consequences for a country, which affect the inflow of foreign investment and international aid as well.
05:37Indian officials had previously said that Pakistan being on this grey list from 2018 to 2022, as I told you earlier, had helped to actually curtail illicit fund flows into India, particularly Jammu and Kashmir.
05:51There are currently 24 countries in this grey list.
05:54Pakistan is not on it right now.
05:57So let's explain to you what's the next step.
05:59The FETF blacklist, which is high-risk jurisdictions subject to a call for action.
06:05This comprises of countries with serious strategic deficiencies.
06:10The FETF urges all other jurisdictions to not only apply enhanced due diligence while dealing with countries in this list, but also in some cases, countermeasures to protect the international financial system.
06:22Three countries are in the blacklist at the moment.
06:24North Korea, Myanmar and Iran.
06:27They have been slapped with mandated economic sanctions by FETF member countries as a result.
06:32India's campaigning hard globally to ensure Pakistan is not blacklisted, but grey listed.
06:39So there is a deterrence that Pakistan faces financially for funding terror.
06:43The Mysore Park.
06:49One of my favourite sweets from the south.
06:51It's something I eat all the time here in Delhi too.
06:55There's a reason for it.
06:57It's a very simple dessert of sugar, gram flour and of course loads of ghee.
07:02And it's one of my favourites yet in the midst of a controversy.
07:07And I'm not talking about its origins because I know that's a heated debate which I'm not going to enter into.
07:12But the controversy surrounding this dessert is over its name.
07:17What I started off with, Mysore Park.
07:20I'm sure you'd have guessed by now what this is about.
07:22It's about the fact that it's called Park.
07:26Many assuming that's actually short for Pakistan.
07:30And that's why it's got the name Mysore Park which has no connect I know.
07:34So I thought I'll kind of explain to you exactly what the name actually means.
07:39And no, sorry to burst your bubble, it has nothing to do with Pakistan.
07:44So I'm sure you've figured Mysore comes of course from its place of origin.
07:48Mysore now, Mysore.
07:49And so that part figured.
07:52What does Park mean?
07:53So Park in Kannada, essentially it's short for a Kannada word called Parka which means cooking, baking, frying, any of it.
08:01It also is a sugary syrup.
08:03So sugar mixed with water, that is referred to as Parka.
08:07And so short for that is Park.
08:10Mysore, Park, Mysore, sweet if I were to literally translate that for you.
08:15So again, it's got nothing to do with Pakistan.
08:18It's not short for Pakistan.
08:19It just means sweet and of course a humble and yet proud Indian dessert that's stayed for generations together in our country's culture and tradition.
08:31So let me take you back in time and talk about the origins of Mysore Parka, of this dessert.
08:36Well, it came into being under Krishna Rajavodiyar, the fourth of the Mysore dynasty, of the Vodiyar dynasty.
08:46He ruled essentially the Mysore kingdom between 1902 to 1940.
08:50He was a visionary.
08:51So much so that Bangalore became the first city in Asia to get electricity under his rule.
08:57He was also a big, big foodie.
08:59So in his palace, the Ambavilla's palace, very often they keep coming up with different dishes.
09:06And the most renowned cook in this palace was Kakasura Madhapa.
09:10So Madhapa would constantly, you know, wait different dishes to suit the king, to essentially ensure that the king was happy.
09:17So one dessert that he came up with during one of his experimental phases is the humble Mysore Park,
09:23where he essentially combined gram flour, sugar and ghee.
09:26And so, voila, you had Mysore Park.
09:29The king loved it and so immediately asked, what should we name this suite?
09:33So Madhapa said, it's up to the king.
09:35I can't name it.
09:36I have no name.
09:37It's something I came up with in the kitchen.
09:39And so you had Krishna Rajavodiyar coming up with the name Mysore Park.
09:43Very fitting considering it comes from Mysore.
09:45So he wanted to honor his area.
09:47He wanted to honor his city.
09:49And so Mysore Park, which is suite.
09:52And that's where the name came from.
09:53And from Bon Palace back in that generation to now, Mysore Park continuing to roll hearts across.
10:03So interestingly, you can actually get the OG Mysore Park because Madhapa's family still runs a suite shop,
10:10which is known for its Mysore Park in Mysore.
10:12So for that, you'll have to make a trip to Mysore in Karnataka.
10:16You can call it whatever you want, Mysore Park, Mysore Street, though there's no reason to get offended with the original name,
10:23considering I've explained to you the origins.
10:25What you can't take away from the suite, however, is the legacy, the rich Indian legacy behind this desert.
10:32With Donald Trump's unprecedented crackdown on Harvard University, students are left in the lurch.
10:43But let me explain how exactly Trump has been choking the university.
10:47Harvard University has been on Trump's hit list for the last many months,
10:50with the latest crackdown being on international students.
10:53The Department of Homeland Security informed Harvard that its certification to enroll international students was revoked.
11:00The university was accused of failing to provide detailed records about foreign students,
11:05particularly those allegedly involved in what the government called illegal and violent activities.
11:11Harvard has filed a lawsuit challenging this decision.
11:15But the Trump administration has put forth a slew of demands to the Harvard administration,
11:19which have been resisted by the university.
11:22And that's what's essentially led to this showdown in the last many months.
11:26Almost 31% of foreigners coming to Harvard,
11:29we give them billions of dollars, which is ridiculous.
11:33We do grants, which we're probably not going to be doing much grants anymore to Harvard.
11:37But they're 31%, but they refuse to tell us who the people are.
11:42We want to know who the people are.
11:43Now, a lot of the foreign students we wouldn't have a problem with.
11:46I'm not going to have a problem with foreign students.
11:48But it shouldn't be 31%.
11:49It's too much because we have Americans that want to go there.
11:52Let me break down for you the government's demands from Harvard.
11:57First, eliminating diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
12:01They want all these programs to be dismissed.
12:04They don't want face masks in the Harvard campus.
12:08So they want a ban on face masks.
12:09The government also has been pushing for adopting merit-based admissions and hiring practices.
12:17The government also has pushed for Harvard to cooperate with federal immigration authorities.
12:22They've also demanded that recognition of funding to student groups accused of criminal activities or illegal harassment be immediately stopped.
12:31So the government will define which groups essentially are indulging in criminal activities.
12:35The government also has been seeking for audits of campus departments suspected of ideological bias or fostering anti-Semitism to take place.
12:45Now, one of the questions that constantly comes up.
12:48How is the Trump administration actually cracking down in this manner on a private institution?
12:54Harvard University, yes, is a private institution, meaning it's not owned or operated by the U.S. government.
12:59But that doesn't mean it's completely independent of government influence.
13:03Harvard received significant federal funding, especially for research.
13:07And so the government can set conditions on how that money is used.
13:11If Harvard wants the money, quite simply, it must comply.
13:15And since it hasn't been, the government has choked this very federal funding.
13:20Then there's student funding.
13:22Many Harvard students receive federal financial aid.
13:25But for students, again, to be able to get these funds for their Harvard programs, the honours falls on the university to follow all federal education norms.
13:34Besides choking funding, the government also can take legal action against Harvard.
13:38Besides which, there's also the accreditation that can be snatched away if the Trump administration wishes to do so.
13:44So essentially, the U.S. government doesn't exactly control Harvard in the way it might a public university.
13:50But through money, through laws, through the courts, it can significantly influence what Harvard does,
13:57especially if the university wants to maintain its funding, reputation and operational flexibility.
14:02The Indian judiciary has been rocked by a possible corruption, scandal and issue that's long been discussed, but also long been ignored.
14:15A judge in the Delhi High Court finds himself in the centre of this debate.
14:18Justice Yashwant Verma is no longer with the Delhi High Court, but has been transferred to the Allahabad High Court.
14:24Why? Because piles of burnt cash were found at his residence.
14:27Now, reportedly, the impeachment process will be kicked off in the monsoon session of Parliament after the judge has refused to step down,
14:36refuting the allegations against him.
14:39So what happens if a judge in India is accused of corruption or misconduct?
14:45Can they be investigated like other public officials?
14:48Well, it's complicated, but not impossible.
14:51So what exactly does that look like?
14:53Well, the in-house inquiry process is a mechanism set up by the judiciary to deal with complaints against sitting judges of the Supreme Court or High Courts.
15:02It's not a law, but a self-regulatory system created by the Supreme Court in the late 1990s
15:08to deal with allegations of misconduct without compromising judicial independence.
15:13Before this process, there was really no formal way to handle complaints
15:17unless they were serious enough for impeachment in Parliament.
15:20But impeachment, again, is a long, of course, political process, and not every complaint warrants that.
15:27So in 1997, the Supreme Court, in consultation with senior judges, introduced an internal mechanism, the in-house procedure.
15:35So the process of inquiry against a judge goes like this.
15:38The CGI-led collegium recommends transfer of the said judge.
15:43The collegium then seeks a report from the Chief Justice of the respective court.
15:46In this case, for example, it was the Delhi High Court Chief Justice.
15:50And then an in-house inquiry will be set up by the collegium if the need arises after the report is submitted.
15:58The accused judge is also given a chance to put forward his or her version of events.
16:03Their response is sought.
16:04Now, if the CGI feels there's misconduct or something's off, the judge can be asked to resign.
16:10But if the judge refuses to step down, this Chief Justice of India then moves to the government,
16:16asks the government to initiate removal process in Parliament.
16:20So the judge can be impeached by a motion passed in Parliament for which you need political consensus.
16:26The actual term isn't impeachment, but the process pretty much is that the judge is impeached.
16:32However, this current process, as I've just described to you, is quite challenging.
16:37And here's why.
16:38First, the only recourse to deal with an errant judge is impeachment via Parliament,
16:44which is a long-drawn process, as I just showed you.
16:47There's also the question of when something like this can happen, only in two instances.
16:51Proven misbehaviour or incapacity.
16:53These are the only two grounds for removal of judges.
16:57The third is, of course, the fact that the standard for impeachment is right up there.
17:02It's high due to political consensus being needed.
17:05If you need it to be passed in Parliament, you need all political parties on board.
17:09So it's difficult to really push for impeachment.
17:13So let's explain to you on whether a sitting judge in the judiciary can actually be removed from office.
17:19Well, to maintain the independence of the judiciary,
17:23the Constitution under Articles 121 and 211 bars Parliament,
17:29bars state legislatures from discussing the conduct of judges.
17:33Parliament can, however, consider a motion to impeach a judge,
17:37according to the procedure laid down in the Judges' Inquiry Act of 1968.
17:41Judges can also be removed from office through in-house guidelines adopted by the Supreme Court,
17:47which I spoke of.
17:48But these are for complaints received by the President,
17:51Chief Justice of a High Court or the Chief Justice of India.
17:54The process is based on the 1991 K. Veeraswamy judgment,
17:58where the Supreme Court said that the judiciary came under the purview of the Prevention of Corruption Act,
18:03but to investigate a sitting judge, prior sanction from the CGI was mandatory.
18:09So how does Parliament actually deal with this entire impeachment?
18:14So let's first explain to you what an impeachment motion is.
18:17It can be moved with the backing of 100 Lok Sabha MPs or 50 Rajasabha MPs.
18:24If admitted, the allegations are investigated by a three-member judicial committee.
18:29If the committee finds merit in the allegations,
18:31both Houses of Parliament have to pass the motion for the impeachment of the judge by a special majority.
18:37Essentially, special majority means the majority of the two-thirds of the members present and voting,
18:42which should not be less than half of the total strength of the House.
18:46So that many need to be present and then two-thirds of that strength is the voting number required.
18:52So has this ever happened before?
18:54Has any judge actually been impeached by Parliament?
18:57No judge, interestingly, has ever been impeached.
19:00Supreme Court Judge Justice V. Ramaswamy faced impeachment proceedings in 1993,
19:05but the motion failed in the Lok Sabha.
19:08Then you had Calcutta High Court Judge Shomitra Sen,
19:10who resigned in 2011 after one House had passed an impeachment motion against him
19:16and it was going to be taken up in the next House.
19:18Now, this entire saga has again led to questions on whether the judiciary should be the judge of the judiciary.
19:25The government cannot intervene on this.
19:28And there's been a growing chorus for reform on the same.
19:35With the monsoon hitting two weeks before the usual schedule,
19:39we're witnessing an unprecedented May filled with rain, particularly in the West Coast.
19:43But what's triggered this early onset?
19:46The onset and spread of the monsoon aren't driven by just a few isolated factors.
20:15There's both natural climatic systems and human-induced changes like global warming and climate change that play a role.
20:23So how exactly does climate change lead to an early monsoon?
20:27Let's break that down for you.
20:29The first factor here is reduced snow cover.
20:32Global warming has led to a reduction in snow cover in two areas, Eurasia and the Himalayas.
20:38Between January and March this year, snow was 15% below the 1990-2020 average.
20:46Less snow increases land surface heating, one of the drivers of stronger monsoon circulation by mid-May.
20:54Then there's higher atmospheric moisture.
20:57With every degree Celsius of global warming, atmospheric moisture increases by 6-8%.
21:03Given their global temperatures in 2025 are about 1.2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels,
21:11this year saw high moisture levels in the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal by May,
21:16fueling early cloud formation.
21:18Cyclonic activity further amplified that effect.
21:21Then there's something called the Somali Jet.
21:24It's a key low-level wind stream originating near Mauritius and Madagascar,
21:29and it intensified in May.
21:31This jet transports moisture-laden air across the Arabian Sea to India's west coast,
21:37including Kerala, Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra.
21:41And its unusual strength this year appears to be because of human-induced influences.
21:47So we've talked about the global warming impact.
21:49Let's also now focus on the natural triggers,
21:52the climatic systems that also had a role to play in the early onset of monsoon.
21:56There's something called the Madden-Julian Oscillation.
22:01It's a 30-60-day eastward-moving disturbance in the tropics
22:05that influences wet and dry phases of the monsoon.
22:09In mid-May, this MJO, the oscillation, was in Phase 3,
22:14which encourages rainfall over South India.
22:16By May 25th, they transitioned into Phase 4,
22:19further boosting moisture transport from the Indian Ocean.
22:22And so all of this created an ideal condition for the monsoon's widespread onset.
22:28I'm sure you've heard of El Nino.
22:31It typically weakens the southwest monsoon
22:33because it warms sea surface temperatures in the Pacific.
22:37This year, however, the El Nino has been in a neutral phase.
22:40So it's removed a major obstacle to a healthy monsoon season.
22:45Now, there's also another condition,
22:47which is essentially in the Indian Ocean,
22:49called the Indian Ocean Dipole.
22:50The temperature contrasts between the western and eastern Indian Ocean.
22:56So a positive IOD, Indian Ocean Dipole,
22:59strengthens monsoon winds by enhancing the west-to-east moisture flow.
23:04And although this is currently neutral,
23:06there are some experts who suggest a slight positive phase
23:09may develop in August and September,
23:11potentially aiding the latter half of the monsoon,
23:15which usually hits in December.
23:17So essentially all the elements seem to have come together
23:19to ensure the rain gods arrive extra early in India this year.
23:24That's all we have time for on this edition of India Today Explains.
23:27Thanks very much for tuning in.
23:28Same time next week.
23:29I'll catch you up on all the latest stories of the week.
23:33I'll catch you up on all the latest stories of the New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York Times New York