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By:

Anil D. Salve

21 March 2026 at 8:11:09 pm

A Drought of Wisdom in an Ocean of Information

We live in an age where information is everywhere. With a single click, we can access news from across the world, thousands of opinions, countless videos and endless claims. Knowledge has never been so accessible. Yet, in this overwhelming flow of information, something increasingly scarce is discernment-the ability to distinguish what deserves our belief from what deserves our doubt. Information and knowledge are not the same. Reading, watching or hearing something does not automatically...

A Drought of Wisdom in an Ocean of Information

We live in an age where information is everywhere. With a single click, we can access news from across the world, thousands of opinions, countless videos and endless claims. Knowledge has never been so accessible. Yet, in this overwhelming flow of information, something increasingly scarce is discernment-the ability to distinguish what deserves our belief from what deserves our doubt. Information and knowledge are not the same. Reading, watching or hearing something does not automatically make it true. We need the ability to verify information, understand its context, recognise its purpose and only then form an opinion. In the digital age, this ability has become one of the most important forms of wisdom. Social media has transformed the way information travels. WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook and other platforms have made communication faster, wider and more accessible. But the same speed that connects society can also overwhelm it. Information often reaches us before facts do. A headline is read before the full story. A short video is watched without knowing what happened before or after it. A photograph is circulated without its original context. A message arrives with the familiar words, “Forwarded as received,” and within minutes it may reach thousands of people. By the time the truth catches up, the rumour may already have done its work. The problem becomes even more serious when misinformation is deliberately created and circulated. Rumours may be planted not merely to mislead individuals but to divert public attention from an important issue, create suspicion, damage someone's reputation or push society towards a particular narrative. A distraction does not always need to be completely false. Sometimes a small piece of truth is mixed with exaggeration, selective facts or emotional language. The result can be more powerful than an outright lie because it appears believable. This is how narratives are manufactured. Social media platforms can become powerful tools in this process. A repeated claim begins to look familiar, and familiarity is often mistaken for truth. A provocative post attracts attention. Thousands of reactions create the impression that “everyone” believes it. One emotional video triggers another, comments intensify the mood, and before facts have an opportunity to speak, public sentiment may have already shifted. This is where mob psychology enters the picture. A society can move from calm to anger, suspicion to trust, or optimism to fear with surprising speed. People who would ordinarily think carefully may react differently when they see thousands of others expressing outrage, fear or hostility. The individual begins to follow the crowd, and the crowd begins to reinforce the individual. The danger is not limited to negative emotions. The same mechanism can also be used positively-to mobilise people for social causes, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, public awareness and community action. Technology itself is neither wise nor foolish. Its impact depends on how information is created, amplified and consumed. The greatest danger, therefore, is not that we have too much information. It is that we may lose the habit of thinking while consuming it. We are increasingly becoming consumers of information rather than creators of thought. Everyone has access to information today, but access does not necessarily mean understanding. The boundaries between a rumour and a report, an opinion and a fact, popularity and truth are becoming increasingly blurred. A post does not become true because thousands of people have liked it. A video does not become evidence merely because it has gone viral. An opinion does not become a fact because it is expressed confidently. An idea does not become correct simply because it confirms what we already believe. This last point deserves particular attention. We often accept information not because it is accurate, but because it is comfortable. We are naturally attracted to information that confirms our existing beliefs and suspicious of information that challenges them. In the digital world, this tendency can be amplified by algorithms that repeatedly expose us to content similar to what we have already watched, liked or shared. Gradually, we may find ourselves living inside an information bubble where we hear many voices-but mostly voices that agree with us. That is not diversity of information. It is an illusion of certainty. Discernment does not mean doubting everything. It means thinking before believing. It means asking simple but powerful questions: Who is saying this? What is the evidence? What is the context? What may be missing? Who benefits if I believe it? And have I heard the other side? These questions may take only a few seconds, but they can prevent hours, days or even years of misunderstanding. This responsibility is particularly important for the younger generation. Children today are growing up in an environment of unprecedented information exposure. They can encounter more information in a few hours than earlier generations might have encountered in weeks. Therefore, education cannot merely teach students how to collect, remember and reproduce information. It must teach them how to question, verify, analyse and interpret it. A student who can write the correct answer in an examination may be academically successful. But a student who knows how to ask the right question is better prepared for life. The classroom of the future must therefore produce not merely informed students, but thinking citizens. They must learn that forwarding a message is also a form of responsibility. Sharing a post is not an innocent act when it can affect someone's reputation, create public fear or influence social behaviour. The challenge becomes even greater in the age of Artificial Intelligence. AI can generate information, images, audio and video with extraordinary speed and sophistication. The distinction between what is real and what merely appears real may become increasingly difficult. In such a world, human judgment becomes more valuable, not less. Technology can produce an answer in seconds. It cannot automatically tell us whether that answer deserves our trust. Some answers require experience. Some require context. Many require the ability to think independently. We have more information, more technology and more connectivity than any previous generation. Yet our real challenge is to preserve something technology cannot manufacture for us: the capacity to think for ourselves. The ocean of information will only become larger. The question will no longer be, “How much information do we have?” The more important questions will be: What should we accept? What should we question? What should we verify? And what should we reject? No technology can completely answer these questions for us. No number of likes can substitute for evidence. No viral trend can replace judgment. No majority can turn misinformation into truth. That responsibility belongs to human beings. Information can tell us what happened. Discernment helps us understand what it means, why it happened, what may be missing from the story and how we should respond. Perhaps, therefore, the greatest educational challenge of our time is not to teach people how to find more information. They already know how to do that. The greater challenge is to teach them how to pause-to pause before believing, to pause before reacting, to pause before forwarding and to pause before joining the crowd. Because sometimes the most intelligent response to information is not an immediate reaction, but a moment of reflection. The ocean is already around us. It is growing deeper every day. What we need now is not more information to swim through it-but the wisdom to know which direction to take. (The writer is the Principal of Podar International School, Ausa, Latur. Views personal.)

A Desert Bridge

Writer: Dr. V.L. Dharurkar
Dr. V.L. Dharurkar
Dec 28, 2025
3 min read

India’s courtship of Jordan blends history, hard interests and quiet diplomacy.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to Jordan, the first full bilateral visit by an Indian prime minister in nearly four decades, was stripped of ceremony and sentimentality and marked a careful recalibration of India’s engagement with a pivotal, if understated, West Asian partner at a moment of regional flux.


India and Jordan have enjoyed cordial relations since 1950, but for much of that period the relationship remained polite rather than purposeful. The two countries occupied different strategic orbits during the Cold War, and New Delhi’s diplomatic energies in West Asia were traditionally focused on the Gulf monarchies, Israel and Iran. Jordan, a resource-poor kingdom with an outsized diplomatic footprint, was rarely at the centre of India’s regional calculations. That neglect is now being corrected.


Modi’s visit, that was timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the countries, was intended to signal continuity as much as change. India has increasingly cast itself as a ‘bridging power’ - a country able to talk to rival camps without becoming captive to any. Jordan, ruled by King Abdullah II, plays a similar role in a fractured West Asia: maintaining peace with Israel, hosting waves of refugees, and acting as a discreet interlocutor in regional crises, including the war in Gaza. Their convergence is not accidental.


Maturing Relationship

The substance of the visit lay in five memoranda of understanding covering renewable energy, water management, digital transformation, cultural exchange and tourism. Individually, none is revolutionary. Collectively, they point to a maturing partnership focused less on rhetoric and more on problem-solving. Water scarcity and energy transition are existential issues for Jordan; digital public infrastructure and low-cost renewables are areas where India has accumulated practical experience. For New Delhi, Jordan offers not only a stable partner but also a strategic waypoint in a wider regional vision.


That vision increasingly revolves around the India–Middle East–Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), an ambitious plan to link South Asia with Europe through ports, railways and digital networks across West Asia. Jordan’s geographic position and political moderation make it a natural stakeholder. While IMEC remains aspirational, India’s courtship of Jordan suggests an effort to anchor the project in countries that value predictability over posturing.


Economic ties, though modest, are being nudged upwards. Bilateral trade stands at roughly $2.8bn; both sides now speak of doubling it to $5bn. More significant than the headline figure is the composition of trade. Jordan is a key supplier of phosphates, vital for India’s fertiliser security. Joint ventures such as the India–Jordan Fertiliser Company have helped insulate Indian farmers from volatile global prices. In an era of supply-chain anxiety, such arrangements carry weight disproportionate to their size.


Culture, too, was pressed into diplomatic service. An agreement to ‘twin’ Petra with the Ellora Caves may reflected a deeper logic rooted in civilisational diplomacy. Both sites are not merely tourist attractions but monumental expressions of how ancient societies blended faith, technology and landscape into enduring works of art. Petra, carved into Jordan’s rose-red sandstone, and Ellora, hewn from basalt cliffs in the Deccan, testify to an age when architecture travelled alongside trade, ideas and belief systems. Twinning them is less about symbolism for its own sake than about institutionalising cooperation in conservation, archaeology and heritage management.

India’s Archaeological Survey, now a century old, has developed a formidable reputation in conservation at home and abroad. Jordan, custodian of some of the world’s most fragile heritage sites, has reason to tap that expertise. Modi was keen to invoke ancient trade routes linking Gujarat to the Mediterranean - an allusion meant to place contemporary cooperation in a longue durée of exchange.


Regional security hovered in the background. India has consistently argued for dialogue over force, whether in Ukraine or Gaza, a position that resonates in Amman. Jordan’s own balancing act - condemning radical Islamic violence while maintaining channels to all sides - mirrors India’s instinctive caution. Counter-terrorism cooperation and food security were discussed without bombast, reflecting a shared preference for incrementalism.


There was, inevitably, some stage-setting. Jordan has expressed interest in joining the International Solar Alliance, an Indian-led initiative that blends climate diplomacy with geopolitical branding. India, for its part, hinted at a role in post-conflict reconstruction in Syria, aligning itself with Jordan’s hopes for regional stabilisation without overcommitting.


At a time when America is raising trade barriers and West Asia remains unsettled, India is diversifying its partnerships with care. Jordan, pragmatic and well-connected, fits neatly into that approach. For both countries, the relationship offers reassurance rather than adventure.


(The writer is a foreign affairs expert. Views personal.)

 


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