PARAGRAPH, WORDS AND MEANING
PARAGRAPH OF THE DAY-
Interdependence vital
A no less seminal benefit for India is that by joining the renamed CPEC, it would gain land access, through Pakistan, to Afghanistan, Iran, Central Asia and western China. And if our leaders show vision, ambition and resolve, the CPEC-plus-India can be linked to the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar Corridor, thus creating a grand garland of connectivity and integration for the whole of South Asia. If 1947 divided our subcontinent, here is an opportunity for India, Pakistan and all other countries in the region to come together and rise in shared progress and prosperity. Regrettably, the same short-sighted advisers who have misled Mr. Modi on the BRI and CPEC are selling India the pipe dream of an alternative connectivity project by the “Quadrilateral” of the U.S., Japan, Australia and India. This is unlikely to take off. Even if it does, its developmental benefits to India will be limited since it will seek to keep China and Pakistan out. We are also told that India does not need the CPEC since it has already partnered with Iran in building the Chabahar port. India’s gains due to Chabahar are modest, and nowhere comparable to those that would accrue by India having a direct land access to Afghanistan through Pakistan, courtesy a renamed CPEC. The latter is also indispensable for the success of two other mega projects that are critical for India’s energy security and accelerated economic growth — the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) and Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipelines. Here is another huge potential gain for South Asia. The proposed connectivity initiative, which would create strong new bonds of regional cooperation and interdependence, could also help resolve three long-standing geopolitical problems in the region, in which countless people have been killed — terrorism, Kashmir and Afghanistan. To realise this vision of a resurgent South Asia, two obstacles will have to be removed blind nationalism and the unfriendly designs of extra-regional powers. As Karl Marx would have said: peoples of South Asia and China, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains; you have a bright new future to win.
WORDS AND MEANING –
Prosperity
Meaning: The state of being prosperous.
Example: “a long period of peace and prosperity”
Synonyms: Wealth, Success
Antonyms: Hardship, Failure
Short-sighted
Meaning: Lacking imagination or foresight.
Example: “a short-sighted government”
Synonyms: Narrow-minded, Unimaginative
Antonyms: Far-sighted, Imaginative
Pipe Dream
Meaning: An unattainable or fanciful hope or scheme.
Example: “free trade in international aviation will remain a pipe dream”
Synonyms: Fantasy, Delusion
Indispensable
Meaning: Absolutely necessary.
Example: “he made himself indispensable to the parish priest”
Synonyms: Essential, Crucial
Antonyms: Dispensable, Superfluous
Accelerated
Meaning: Increase in rate, amount, or extent.
Example: “inflation started to accelerate”
Synonyms: Increase, Rise
Antonyms: Decelerate, Drop
Resurgent
Meaning: Increasing or reviving after a period of little activity, popularity, or occurrence.
Example: “resurgent nationalism”
