With the second dose being given to around 65 percent of the population there is now increasing pressure on the government from various quarters for relaxations. There are nudges and pushes and pulls from many sectors. This in the backdrop of the government on the verge of completing its third …

NEW DELHI – It is rare for a public-opinion survey to shake established perceptions of a country in the way a recent Pew Research Center study of religion in India has done. The revelations in Pew’s comprehensive survey, based on interviews with 30,000 adults in 17 languages between late 2019 and early …

Bhutan has once again achieved an impressive task of vaccinating more than 90 percent of its eligible adult population within one week, drawing global acclaim once again. If that was not enough, the country has now started vaccinating those between 12 and 17 which has the potential to push us …

DHAKA – From 1990 to 2019, the number of people living in extreme poverty (according to the World Bank threshold of $1.90 per day) plummeted, from 1.9 billion to 648 million. COVID-19 has reversed much of this progress. By the end of 2021, the pandemic will have pushed approximately 150 million people back …

The recent third phase of monetary measures gives loan deferral for all sectors to June 2022. This is an important relief measure for an economy hit by COVID-19. The banks initially wanted to give relief to only certain affected sectors like hotels, manufacturing etc but the government led by the …

Although it is completely a personal choice to wear a badge that one wishes, however, it is utterly odd to see wide ranges of badges being worn by our youth today. It is tempting for me to share my personal feelings and so I am sharing this as a concerned …

As of Friday evening Phuentsholing has had a total of 498 cases since the recent outbreak with cases growing daily despite multiple lockdowns and restrictions since the first two cases were detected on 16th April 2021. Samtse also has had 399 cases in a relatively short period of time despite …

SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA – The year 2020 was unforgettable for all of us, and tragic for many. No one had imagined that a lethal virus originating in horseshoe bats could spread so fast and upend our lives so thoroughly. And in most countries, there is still no sign that normalcy …

As India went through a massive second wave and stopped the export of its vaccines, there were doubts in Bhutan about where it could get its second dose from. The prognosis did not look good as many countries around the world were desperately competing for vaccines. However, now Bhutan not …

LONDON – Having been postponed from 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Tokyo Olympic Games are approaching their opening on July 23 amid a chorus of doom. Japanese and foreigners alike are predicting, or even outright demanding, the event’s cancellation. Among those coming out in favor of scrapping the Games is …