By Ella Rolfe.

Recent curbs on civil liberties are attempts to grasp slipping control over population

While Pakistan may seem to be descending into a pitched battle between state and Taliban, the current power relations are much more nuanced than this. To be sure, the Pakistani authorities are engaged in a large military operation against the Taliban in the country's north-western tribal areas; but there is a power struggle within the Pakistani polity as well. And the army, not the civilian government, is firmly in charge of efforts against militancy.

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By Chris Ogden .

New FPC Research Associate Chris Ogden looks into the future of India's Hindu nationalist opposition party - the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP - Indian People's Party)- that faces a potentially uncertain and unstable future after its 2009 election defeat. Despite remaining as India's second largest political force, and indeed the country's only other national party besides Congress, the BJP faces a period of repackaging for India's electorate. Given that the BJP's current head, LK Advani who turns 82 on Sunday 8th November, and has announced his plans to step-down, any re-branding will be underscored by a phase of internal restructuring, most prominently involving the emergence of a new leader.

Download FPC Briefing: India's BJP Contemplate their Future (240 kilobyte PDF)