Oct. 10 - President Bush on Wednesday signed legislation that reverses three decades of U.S. policy and allows American businesses to enter India's multibillion-dollar nuclear market.

The U.S. agreement on civil nuclear cooperation permits American businesses to sell nuclear fuel, technology and reactors to India in exchange for safeguards and U.N. inspections at India's civilian — but not military — nuclear plants.

The deal will give India access to US civilian nuclear technology and fuel in return for inspections of its civilian, but not military, nuclear facilities. "India can count on reliable fuel supplies (from US) for its reactors," Bush said, adding "We will give consent to India for advanced reprocessing."

Oct. 1 - With the nuclear deal poised for an approval by the US Congress, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit India next month to sign the 123 bilateral agreement that will seal the landmark deal."We are discussing the possibility of the visit of the Secretary of State to India. We have been trying it for sometime and looking for possibility of dates," Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon told the Hindustan Times.

"Rice will come to India early next month. If the Congress approves the 123 pact, it will be signed during Rice's visit," an official, privy to nuclear negotiations, confirmed with the IANS.

Sept. 25 - India has and will retain its position as the second most-preferred global destination for foreign investment until 2010, lagging only behind China, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) announced in the World Investment Report 2008, released in New York.

Sept. 23 - India is reworking and strenghtening its ties with its northern neighbors - Nepal and Pakistan.

While India and Nepal recently held landmark meetings to discuss the 1950 Indo-Nepal treaty of Peace and Friendship, a decades-old pact governing bilateral relations, India and Pakistan also recently, reignited talks between the two nations.

Pushing ahead with their peace process, India and Pakistan on Monday finalised modalities to open up the Line of Control (LoC) for cross-Kashmir trade on Monday.

Sept. 16 - The ballooning crisis in the U.S. financial market is expected to have more than just an indirect impact on India. The culmination of jittery FIIs spooking Indian markets, the sale of Merrill Lynch to Bank of America and Lehman Brothers filing for bankruptcy will affect a number of Indian companies.

What's more, if the trouble brewing in AIG turns into a crisis, it could spell worse news for India as AIG has a large array of interests in India ranging from the financial market to real estate.

Over the weekend the 158 year old international Investment bank filed for bankruptcy wiping off Rs 20 billion (US$400 million) from the market valuation of more than two dozen Indian companies in which the U.S. financial major holds equity investments, The Business Standard reported. The Sensex, the Bombay Stock Exchange 30-share index recovered from a 728-point dive to close 470 points down. The dollar crossed the Rs 46-mark, as the rupee fell for the sixth day in a row. Oil prices also tumbled to below US$93.

Sept. 8 - The deal is done. And it’s a big deal for India. It has gained the unique status of being the only nuclear weapons country to be included in global nuclear commerce without signing either the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty or the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty—until now a precondition for entering mainstream nuclear trade.

The bitter sweet deal also signaled an ironical twist of fate in India's nuclear history. The Times of India reported that when the NSG “adjusted its guidelines’’ for India after 76 hours of high-voltage drama to waive the precondition and open the door for New Delhi to join the nuclear high table, a delicious piece of irony was enacted—the NSG was formed 34 years ago as a response to India’s 1974 Pokharan test and it was bending its rules to mainstream India’s nuclear ambition.

Sept. 1 -  India's first-quarter economic growth slowed to 7.9 percent, the weakest in three-and-a-half years as interest rate hikes hit demand, but AFP quoted analysts said long-term prospects still looked solid.

The figure for the three months to June was far below the previous quarter's growth of 8.8 percent and the 9.2 percent expansion logged by Asia's third-largest economy in the first quarter a year earlier.

Aug. 26 - India Inc is on a shopping spree and energy and technology deals seem to be the best buys. Ironically, both these deals are not with American companies, long considered the safest buys by Indian companies investing abroad.

Reuters reported that India's ONGC Videsh is finalizing a 1.4 billion pounds (US$2.6 billion) bid for Russia-focused oil explorer Imperial Energy Corp Plc while AFP reported that Indian outsourcing giant Infosys plans to buy British consultancy Axon Group for US$753.1 million (409 million pounds) in a bid to expand its business advisory footprint.

Aug. 25 - Rising the heat on India's controversial nuclear deal further, Indian foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee, refused to accept any new conditions laid out by the Nuclear Suppliers Group, throwing the deal into limbo.

Accepting any new multilateral agreements such as inspections of Indian civilian nuclear sites and cancellation of any waiver if India tests bombs again are not possible for the Indian government, Mukerjee told the 45-nation delegation in Vienna last week. "We have to see what kind of amendments come. Then only we can decide. But we cannot accept prescriptive conditionalities," the Press Trust of India news agency quoted Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee as saying.

Aug. 21 - On the same day that India can boast of three Olmpic medals, 600,000 Indian public, rural and cooperative bank employees have gone on strike to protest the consolidation of state-run banks. The nationwide strike spearheaded by the banks unions is opposing the merger of the State Bank of Saurashtra with its parent SBI.

"The government is hurriedly pursuing mergers without addressing our concerns. We will decide on what to do next," C.H. Venkatachalam, convenor of the United Forum of Bank Unions told Reuters.