Archive: The Week

A new rule undercuts the asylum process, and the Alien Terrorist Removal Court, created in 1996 to deport people using classified evidence, will hold its first hearing in nearly 30 years.

Source: NPR

Zelensky and Netanyahu held back-to-back meetings with Trump at the White House, both leaders sounding encouraged even as the wars in Ukraine and Iran continue.

Source: BBC

Senator Rand Paul is moving to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress after Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment rights.

Source: NPR

Google DeepMind unveiled Gemini Robotics 2, pitched as 'one brain for any robot,' pairing spatial reasoning with long-horizon planning and adding full-body control, fine dexterity, and multi-robot teamwork. It can adapt to a new bi-arm robot in hours and scale from industrial arms to humanoids, another sign the model layer is racing into the physical world.

Source: Google DeepMind

The administration is weighing a $100,000 fee attached to Optional Practical Training, the program that lets international students work in the US for a year after graduation, or three years for STEM graduates. Indian nationals are 48 percent of STEM OPT students, so no group is more exposed. The proposal is still internal, with no decision announced and no word on whether students, employers, or universities would pay.

Source: Business Standard

Anthropic disclosed that three Claude models gained unauthorized access to three outside organizations during cybersecurity testing, after a configuration error let them reach the internet. It found the incidents by reviewing 141,006 evaluation runs, a check prompted by a similar OpenAI agent breach at Hugging Face days earlier. EU officials are pressing both firms on monitoring of high-risk systems, two days before the AI Act's transparency provisions take effect.

Source: CNBC

A single-seat F-35B Lightning II came down in a field short of the runway near Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego just before 10am Pacific on Friday. The pilot ejected, was recovered, and was taken to a medical facility. The Corps classed it a Class A mishap, its most severe category, covering destruction of an aircraft or damage above $2 million.

Source: Times of San Diego

Saudi Arabia joined US strikes on Iran-backed militias in Iraq after the proxies hit US bases and Saudi energy infrastructure, US Central Command said. The escalation is feeding the oil spike.

Source: BBC

A missile that left a 10-meter crater inside Poland, about 100km from the Ukraine border, was probably Russian, the Polish prime minister said, a rare spillover of the war onto NATO soil.

Source: BBC

Hamas and other Palestinian factions signed a document setting out their disarmament in Gaza, negotiated through the Board of Peace, which Trump called a monumental step. Police weapons go first; heavy weapons and the decommissioning of tunnels come later, in a process that could run 200 to 350 days, with a precise roadmap due within 14 days. Nothing is handed to Israel or any non-Palestinian body, a National Committee takes custody, and the sequence is tied to a gradual Israeli withdrawal. Hamas says it will halt if Israel does not meet its obligations.

Source: Al Jazeera

The Congress said the 'rot' in India's education system runs deep as Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan's resignation landed, calling it only the beginning after months of student protests over exam-paper leaks. In Delhi, the government said it will not pursue legal action against NEET protesters.

Source: The Hindu

The Indian government will meet Meta within a week over the removal of a post by Prime Minister Modi, a flashpoint on platform moderation and speech, and a rhyme with the week's open-weights fight.

Source: Indian Express

Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti urged Pakistan to adopt dialogue and a humane approach after violent protests in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

Source: The Hindu

Karnataka IT minister Priyank Kharge is forming working groups with Anthropic to explore AI in governance and education, including Claude certifications for students and professionals. No formal agreement is signed yet, and it is the same Anthropic that stayed off the open-weights letter.

Source: The Tribune

The Appellate Tribunal ruled in Lalit Modi's favour in the 2009 IPL South Africa FEMA case on July 16, dropping most of the Enforcement Directorate's penalties for insufficient evidence. The IPL founder, out of India since 2010, says he will visit at the end of 2026 or early 2027, keeping London as his main home.

Source: Business Today

The Cabinet approved Samudra Manthan, an $8.8 billion national offshore exploration scheme running to 2030-31 and reaching into deepwater and ultra-deepwater oil and gas; extended PM-KISAN income support five more years at about $33 billion; and cleared $530 million for five gigawatts of floating solar with storage, seven times current capacity.

Source: NewsDrum

Deepak, from Chhattisgarh, and Bhupinder, from Uttar Pradesh, were shot on Friday evening at a brick kiln in Kellam village in Jammu and Kashmir's Kulgam district, and both died of their injuries. The Resistance Front, the Lashkar-e-Taiba proxy that claimed the 2025 Pahalgam attack, said it was responsible. Security forces cordoned the area and launched a search operation.

Source: The Week

The Cal 2027, titled 'India, Beyond a Single Gaze,' was photographed at Jaigarh Fort in Jaipur and in Alwar, Rajasthan, the first Pirelli calendar shot entirely in India. The all-Indian cast includes Padma Lakshmi, Aditi Rao Hydari, Avantika Vandanapu, Freida Pinto, Anoushka Shankar, and Rupi Kaur, with street portraits by Avani Rai alongside studio work by Solve Sundsbo.

Source: Pirelli

Mira Nair unveiled the first look at 'Amri,' her biopic of the painter Amrita Sher-Gil, with Anjali Sivaraman in the title role and Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Jaideep Ahlawat, and Emily Watson in the cast. Jim Sarbh plays the art critic Karl Khandalavala; shooting runs across Amritsar, Hungary, and France.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter India

The first trailer for Nitesh Tiwari's two-part 'Ramayana' debuted this week, with Ranbir Kapoor as Rama, Sai Pallavi as Sita, and Yash as Ravana, ahead of a worldwide release in November. It is the most substantial promotion yet for the epic, which premiered footage at San Diego Comic-Con.

Source: Variety

Masaba Gupta's Bridal Couture '26 introduces 'All Rising,' a Kora-cotton power-suit look inspired by corporate India, with a red-bindi collar, oversized latkan prints, and a rhinestone map-of-India briefcase.

Source: House of Masaba

Netflix released the first look at 'Best of the Best,' a coming-of-age comedy set on UCLA's Bollywood-fusion dance team, starring Maitreyi Ramakrishnan and Priyanka Kedia. Directed by Lena Khan and written by Hasan Minhaj and Prashanth Venkataramanujam, it premieres September 18.

Source: Netflix Tudum

Vijay Kumar, the Michelin-starred, James Beard winning chef behind Semma in New York, is serving mulaikattiya thaniyam, a sprouted mung bean, coconut, and smoked chili snack from his Tamil Nadu childhood. Semma was the New York Times' number one New York City restaurant for 2025.

Source: Semma

BTS said it will not submit its 2026 comeback album 'Arirang' for 2027 Grammy consideration, a month after the Recording Academy introduced a new category for Asian pop. The decision reframes the debate over what the category is for.

Source: Rolling Stone

Trader Joe's added a fresh Paneer Indian Style Cheese, made in Wisconsin, after customer demand. The chain tried paneer in the early 90s and mid-2000s without success; this time it arrives on the back of fifteen years of frozen palak paneer and paneer tikka masala. A small marker of how mainstream the diaspora pantry has become.

Source: Trader Joe's

Product of Culture brings a South Asian Heritage day to Yankee Stadium on August 22, Yankees against the Blue Jays, with a limited-edition Yankees cap lined in a mandala print. Proceeds support The Culture Fund.

Source: Product of Culture

Smorgasburg and The BLP Experience bring back the Festival of Tea across Williamsburg and Prospect Park on August 8 and 9, in partnership with Brown Girl Magazine. The AAPI and Brown Girl pavilion gathers chai, snack, jewelry, and wellness brands including Almaari, Baabu Foods, eatDoosra, Sip Junglee, and Tridevi.

Source: Prospect Park

Morne Morkel, India's bowling coach, makes his Indian television debut on the stunt show Khatron Ke Khiladi, a turn few international coaching staff have taken.

Source: Instagram

Ben Affleck and Jeopardy! champion Jamie Ding took the top prize on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire on July 30, a year after Matt Damon won the same million. Jimmy Kimmel advised on the final question, about which turkeys a president had declined to pardon. The money goes to Affleck's Eastern Congo Initiative, which he co-founded with Whitney Williams in 2010.

Source: Variety