Within days of the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, his second-eldest son, Mojtaba, was announced as his successor on Monday. The top political leadership of Iran has been a key target in a bid to influence regime change in the ongoing West Asia conflict. The US President Donald Trump had earlier declared that the new leadership in Iran would have to be approved by his administration. Trump had also told Axios last week that Mojtaba, then a frontrunner, was “unacceptable” and a “lightweight.” In response, Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Abbas Araghchi, asserted, “we will allow nobody to interfere in our domestic affairs”. What does the choice say about Iran’s outlook on the war? Here’s what we know about Mojtaba.
With that, let’s move on to the top stories from today’s edition:
- Gas shortage in India’s big cities
- No more alerts from FSI
- Gurmeet Ram Rahim’s acquittal
🚨 Big Story
The Rajya Sabha witnessed a stormy start to the second part of the Budget Session on Monday, with the Opposition demanding a short discussion on India’s energy security in view of the ongoing West Asia conflict. The Leader of Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge also raised the issue of cooking gas cylinder price rise by nearly Rs 60, burdening poor families, following which the Chairperson handed over the floor to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. The entire Opposition staged a walkout from the House while the EAM was making his statement. Leader of the House J P Nadda attacked the Opposition saying it was “irresponsible,” and was not interested in debate or the interests of the country, but only in anarchy and creating “hooliganism”.
Here’s what Jaishankar said: Underlining that the West Asia conflict has led to “numerous casualties, including at the leadership level in Iran”, Jaishankar outlined in the Rajya Sabha three broad messages of the government: it favours a return to dialogue, views the security of the Indian diaspora as a priority, and considers energy security paramount. Amid protests and slogan-shouting by the Opposition which demanded a “full-fledged” discussion on the issue, Jaishankar said that nearly 67,000 Indian nationals have returned from the region since the war began on February 28.
Early trends: A day after the international crude oil prices surged to nearly $120 a barrel amid the ongoing West Asia conflict on Monday, global oil prices fell sharply on Tuesday after Trump signalled the war might not last long. Speaking in an interview with CBS News, Trump said the conflict was “very complete, pretty much” and suggested the fighting could end soon. Following his remarks, Brent crude fell sharply and settled at $98.96 per barrel by the end of Monday’s trading.
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Chokepoint: A day earlier, oil prices retreated, however, still traded over $100 per barrel. The conflict has led to growing concerns of an extended supply disruption due to effective suspension of tanker movements through the critical chokepoint of the Strait of Hormuz, and key Gulf oil producers cutting oil production as they run out of storage. With India’s economic vulnerability to oil price volatility, owing to its oil import dependency level of over 88%, the current surge will have a bearing on the country’s current account deficit, foreign exchange reserves, the rupee’s exchange rate, and inflation rate, among others. My colleague Sukalp Sharma explains.
Meanwhile, gas shortage is slowly hitting commercial users of cooking gas or LPG, especially restaurants in India’s big cities such as Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru. Industrial users of LNG and propane-LPG such as tile and ceramic makers in Morbi, Gujarat have also been hit. The Centre has asked refiners and fuel retailers to prioritise domestic LPG supply to households over commercial users, whereas for the latter, it has set up a committee of three executive directors of oil marketing companies. Despite the rise in crude oil prices, officials said there were no plans to increase retail prices of petrol and diesel for the time being.
⚡ Only in Express
The construction of a major gravitational wave observatory in Maharashtra’s Hingoli district, one of the country’s biggest science projects, remains in limbo. The Rs 1,600-crore work tender floated in April last year is yet to be awarded, according to records accessed by The Indian Express under the RTI Act. The Directorate of Construction Services and Estate Management of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) has maintained that the project would be completed as scheduled within the next four years. The showpiece Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) is designed to work in sync with two similar facilities in the US which, in 2015, detected gravitational waves for the first time — exactly 100 years after their existence was predicted in Albert Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity.
📰 From the Front Page
The Forest Survey of India (FSI) has stopped issuing the fortnightly alerts through which it used to keep a watch on deforestation activities in near-real time for more than two years. The portal, operational since January 2024, has been using satellite data and machine learning to enable FSI to issue location alerts about the loss of forest cover to states every 15 days enabling targeted field inspections. However, active monitoring through the portal was halted this January, sources said, and states stopped receiving the fortnightly deforestation alerts. Stating the reason for the halt, FSI joint director Shivani Dogra said Anavaran had been running only as a pilot project, and its utility was currently being assessed.
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Grief prevails: Jaahnavi Kandula’s memories continue to haunt her sister Meghana Kandula who grapples with prying glances and questions from neighbours, relatives and friends who consider her the heir to a fortune. The Seattle city’s awarded the Kandulas a compensation of $29 million or Rs 260 crore, to be precise, owing to the wrongful death of Jaahnavi three years ago. In January 2023, Jaahnavi, a 23-year-old student pursuing a master’s degree in information systems at the Seattle campus of Northeastern University – was fatally struck while crossing a street, by a speeding police vehicle driven by an officer, who was responding to a drug overdose call. Three years later, Jaahnavi’s closest friends and family are struggling to keep their lives private.
The Ministry of Home Affairs has now specified that statutory bodies with no criminal jurisdiction cannot issue direct requests to the Bureau of Immigration to prevent any Indian or foreigner from leaving the country, The Indian Express has learnt. In a significant modification to its guidelines for Look Out Circulars (LOCs), the MHA has underlined that all such requests have to be routed through a law enforcement agency. The MHA also updated the LOC proforma to include three standardised options — “detain and inform originator”, “prevent departure and inform originator”, and “see remarks for action”.
📌 Must Read
Acquitted: The Punjab and Haryana High Court has acquitted Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh in the 2002 murder of journalist Ram Chander Chhatrapati. The Special Bench held in a 113-page ruling, last Saturday, that the prosecution failed to prove the charge of criminal conspiracy against him beyond a reasonable doubt. Chhatrapati was the editor of the evening newspaper, Pura Sach, which had published articles alleging sexual exploitation of women followers by the Dera chief. The editor who was shot outside his home in Sirsa on October 24, 2002, and he died of his injuries on November 21, 2002. The Bench cited several reasons for the acquittal, including lack of corroboration for the conspiracy claim and failure to examine a key police witness, among others. We elaborate.
In our Opinion section today, Salman Khurshid and Pushparaj Deshpande delve deeper into India’s actions amidst the ongoing war, which has led to significant global shifts. Calling Jaishankar’s statement in the Parliament as “vapid,” and offering “no blueprint” of India’s stances, both experts call for an “urgent recalibration of India’s foreign policy.” They write: “Given our civilisational, geo-economic and strategic stakes in West Asia, the BJP government should ideally have deployed India’s relationships, painstakingly forged since Independence, to de-escalate and reassert that security, sovereignty, justice and prosperity are inalienable public goods.”
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Caution? The fall in the benchmark stock market index Sensex since the West Asia war began on February 27, has wiped out investors’ wealth, as nervous investors dumped stocks to cut their losses, fearing a further crash in the market. The big question is: Should investors sell everything and keep away from the market, or deploy surplus cash when many stocks are available at rock-bottom prices? Analysts suggest investors should adopt a cautious and disciplined approach in the near term. While investors should prioritise capital preservation, maintain strict stop-loss levels, and avoid aggressive leverage amid rising volatility, it may be time for some bargain hunting as well. We explain.
⏳ And Finally…
Boom Boom Boomrah: Just when the batsmen think they know, Jasprit Bumrah’s “wrist snaps sideways — a single, violent, almost invisible rotation, as if turning a doorknob. The arm speed is preserved. The ball is not. By the time the batsman realises, he is already through the shot,” writes Venkata Krishna B in his analysis of the bowler’s shots that brought India closer to victory in most of its matches at the T20 World Cup 2026. From South Africa’s Ryan Rickelton, West Indies’ Roston Chase, Harry Brook, to New Zealand’s Rachin Ravindra and James Neesham, seven batsmen saw it coming but couldn’t do anything.
🎧 Lastly, tune in to today’s episode of our 3 Things podcast, where we discuss India’s emphatic 96-run victory against New Zealand in T20 World Cup. We also share insights from document discrepancies and lapses in the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in West Bengal; and the Delhi excise policy case which has returned to the High Court following CBI’s challenge to Arvind Kejriwal’s release.
That’s all for today. Have a wonderful day!
Until next time,
Ariba
Business As Usual by E P Unny
