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The commander, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, Iran’s top security and intelligence commander, who led the powerful Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, was killed along with several officials from Iraqi militias backed by Tehran in a drone strike at Baghdad International Airport that was authorized by President Trump. It was an American MQ-9 Reaper drone that fired missiles into a convoy that was leaving the airport.
After the air strike Trump justified the action by saying that: "We took action last night to stop a war, we did not take action to start a war."Suleimani made the death of innocent people his sick passion, contributing to terror plots as far away as New Delhi and London. His reign of terror is over.
"He was plotting imminent and sinister attacks on American diplomats and  personnel but we caught him in the act and terminated him."
 The huge step taken by the US government was a staggering blow for Iran at a time of sweeping geopolitical conflict as General Suleimani was the architect of almost every significant operation by Iranian intelligence and military forces over the past two decades.
 Athermath of the Airstrike by the US.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif asked President Donald Trump whether he had ever seen "such a sea of humanity," by sharing photos of the thousands who had turned out to mourn Qasem Soleimani in Iran. He said that Trump cannot break the will of their region and its people and claimed that “End of malign US presence in West Asia has begun”.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas warned, a day after Iran announced it would no longer limit itself to the restrictions imposed by the pact that the killing of Soleimani could mark the “first step towards the end” of the Iran nuclear deal.
 He said “What was announced is not in line with the nuclear agreement…[the situation] has not got easier, and this could be the first step towards the end of this agreement, which would be a big loss," Maas said in an interview with German public radio station Deutschlanfunk.
“We will now weigh this up very, very responsibly,” Maas added.
 On other hand, the Iraqi parliament approves a resolution on expelling US troops after Suleimani’s killing from Iraqi soil . In response to that Trump asked to repay the amount required to build the military base in Iraq or else they will hold huge economic sanctions against Iraq. Iranian parliament has passed a Bill designating all the US military forces as terrorist.

How will it affect India?

After Suleimani’s death, the people of Iran and Iraq are ragging and seeking for revenge. The world is probably in threat of facing a war massacre and India is hugely affected by the action of the US government because in order to reciprocate the act by the US there was a dramatic movement in the oil market, with the Brent crude that hiked by $69.42 a barrel and statistically India trades about 80% of the oil and about 40% of natural gas.  Although successive governments have talked about firm measures to boost India's oil security but the country's domestic oil and natural gas production have been slowing down in the past few years, making the country even more import-dependent.

Statistically,  India imported 207.3 million tons of crude oil in 2018-19, and 4.5 million barrels a day in the April-November period in the year 2019. Moreover, India's import dependency based on consumption has increased to 84.5 per cent compared to 83.3 per cent a year ago in the same period. The country spent $111.9 billion on oil imports in 2018-19, up from $87.8 billion in the previous fiscal year, according to the oil ministry's Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC).

The increase in the price of crude oil has a very significant impact on inflation as it drives monetary policy decisions. The retail food inflation soared up to a six-year high of 7.35 per cent breaching the Reserve Bank of India's upper band of 6 per cent for the first time since the Monetary Policy Committee was created. There is also an impact in the wholesale inflation that just crept up for the month of December as the crude oil and its products have a weight of 10.4 per cent in the wholesale price index. Therefore, any increase in the price of crude oil would tend to impact the WPI inflation number commensurately.

This has increased the tension as the country is already undergoing an economic downfall and it has hugely affected the trade and the economy of the country. As the day after Suleimani’s death the Indian markets crashed and faced about 3 Lakh crore of total loss. The economic downfall will also affect the public transportations, railways and private transportations as currently, the price of petrol in New Delhi hiked up to Rs.75.09 and Rs 80.68 in Mumbai and expected to inflate more. Also the trade will be hugely damaged as India is indulged in trade of about $ 100 Billion with the gulf countries.

Ankita Biswas

 

To read the further articles please get your copy of Eastern Panorama February issue @http://www.magzter.com/IN/Hill-Publications/Eastern-Panorama/News/ or mail to contact @easternpanorama.in