Solar power has always had a reputation for being expensive, but not for much longer. In India, electricity from solar is now cheaper than that from diesel generators. The news - which will boost India's "Solar Mission" to install 20,000 megawatts of solar power by 2022 - could have implications for other developing nations too.

An intensifying space race is taking place in Asia, policy experts say, even if officials from the countries' space agencies are unwilling to acknowledge it.

India and Pakistan today decided to move forward on proposals to extend two key agreements on pre-notification of ballistic missile tests and reducing the risk from accidents related to nuclear weapons, diplomatic sources said.

The countdown has begun. Within three months, India will gatecrash the super-exclusive ICBM (inter-continental ballistic missile) club, largely the preserve of countries like the US, Russia and China that brandish long-range strategic missiles with strike ranges well beyond 5,500 km. India will become a full-fledged member of the ICBM club only when its most ambitious nuclear-capable Agni-V ballistic missile becomes fully operational in 2014.

Buzz Aldrin and other space policy experts argue that the U.S. should not engage in a 'space race' to the moon with China and India as it would tie up resources that could be used to develop Mars-bound technology and would jeopardize the legacy of U.S. dominance in space exploration.

A new multinational initiative plans to launch a satellite containing a large array of solar panels that would collect energy from the sun, then convert this energy into a microwave beam that could be directed back down to Earth. A special receiving antenna on the ground — called a rectenna — would then turn the microwave energy back into electricity, which would be fed into the power grid.

The former President of India and the National Space Society have launched a new prgram, the Kalam-NSS Energy Initiative, with a visionary, ambitious plan for harvesting solar power in space and beaming it down to Earth, turning America and India into net energy exporters.

The Indian Defense Research and Development Organization is working on a range of directed energy weapons, from laser dazzlers to control rioting crowds to high-powered lasers to destroy incoming missiles.

India has begun development of lasers and an exo-atmospheric kill vehicle that could be combined to produce a weapon to destroy enemy satellites in orbit, according to the director-general of India's defense research organization.

India launched its first nuclear-powered submarine in a ceremony in southern port city of Vishakhapatnam on Sunday, becoming one of just six nations in the world to have successfully built one.