Physician Scientist | Neurologist | Director | Educator | Mentor | CEO @GlobalNeuroLab | 2022 Australian Global Talent Awardee
#Neurology #GlobalHealth #Policy
Aug 28 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
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What do great nations do when one door is slammed shut?
Amid the India–US tariff war, India is not sulking: it is strategising.
The Economic Times (via Reuters) reports that India has drawn up a new export strategy covering nearly 50 countries.
Yes, 50 nations! 🌏🇮🇳
A thread 🧵2/5
This isn’t just a reaction; it’s realignment.
Outreach is widening to China, the Middle East, and Africa.
Free trade agreements with Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland take effect on October 1.
The UK deal comes into force next April. Talks with Oman, Chile, Peru, Australia, New Zealand, and the EU are already finalised.
Aug 25 • 11 tweets • 6 min read
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What happens when faith cloaks politics?
It’s time to challenge the myth of “tolerant Sufism” with a critical examination, and yes, with receipts.
Sufism, often romanticised as “poetry, peace, and love" or “mystical Islam,” was not always just poetry & whirling dervishes.
Behind the music and mysticism, history shows Sufi orders often acted as Trojan horses - embedding Islam into non-Muslim societies through culture, settlement, and shrines.
It wasn’t just about devotion; it was about expansion.
As J.S. Trimingham (The Sufi Orders in Islam, 1971) explains, Sufi brotherhoods were not just mystical circles but mass organisations with military, political, and economic clout, crucial in the Islamisation of Africa, Anatolia, and Asia.
They offered a “velvet glove” for the iron fist of conquest.
A thread you don't want to miss! 🧵
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Take Bengal. Richard M. Eaton’s The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204–1760 (1993) is the landmark study here.
He shows how Sufi pirs spearheaded Islamisation by clearing forests, cultivating land, and founding shrines.
Conversion wasn’t sudden or forced - it was a slow transformation tied to settlement.
People entered the economic orbit of the Sufi lodge (khanqah), and gradually, Islam became embedded.
Eaton concludes: Sufis were the “frontier agents” of Islamisation, expanding Muslim presence without armies, but with ploughs and mosques.
Jul 23 • 12 tweets • 5 min read
🧵 Who was Swami Vivekananda 🪷, and why does his voice still echo across continents, generations, and civilisations?
A young monk from India🇮🇳stunned the West, reawakened the East, and redefined the soul of India.
His words still burn like fire.
Here’s his story. 👇
A thread.1/
Born in 1863 as Narendranath Datta, he was brilliant, rebellious, and deeply spiritual.
He mastered Western philosophy and devoured the Vedas but remained spiritually restless, until he met Sri Ramakrishna, the saint who didn’t preach God; he lived Him.
“Ramakrishna Paramahamsa is the latest and the most perfect incarnation the world has yet seen.”
(The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda - CWSV, Vol. 3)
Renouncing all, he wandered barefoot across India.
He saw a country crushed by poverty but lit by potential.
“Let the common soul awaken,” he believed—not through rituals, but realisation.
He was not content with his own salvation.
His vow: to raise humanity through Vedanta, service, and fearlessness.
Jul 23 • 12 tweets • 8 min read
🧵 Why is Erdogan furious at Israel’s strikes in Syria?
It’s not just about Gaza.
It’s about power, Islamism, and the collapse of Turkey’s covert influence.
Over the past week, Israel expanded its air campaign beyond Gaza and Lebanon: targeting key sites in Syria, including Suwayda, Hama, and the T4 airbase in Homs.
Israel stated the strikes were in response to threats against the Druze minority and to eliminate extremist factions planning cross-border attacks.
But according to Israeli officials, they were also a clear message to Turkey, which has been quietly embedding itself in Syria militarily and ideologically.
🧵 Did the Indus Valley Civilisation descend from migrants—or were its people native to South Asia all along?
A new chapter in Indian school textbooks just shifted the narrative, with ancient DNA from Rakhigarhi offering compelling answers.
Here's why it matters.👇
Shinde et al “An Ancient Harappan Genome Lacks Ancestry from Steppe Pastoralists or Iranian Farmers.” Cell vol. 179,3 (2019)
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The Indus Valley Civilization (also called Harappan Civilization) was one of the world's earliest urban societies, contemporary with Mesopotamia and Egbetween ~2600 and ypt.
It flourished in the Indian subcontinent ~2600–1900 BCE, with advanced cities like Mohenjo-Daro, Harappa, and now Rakhigarhi.
Can a stroke trigger a blood clot in your lungs, even without a leg DVT?
As Principal Investigator of the PEARL-AIS (Pulmonary Embolism Assessment and Risk-stratified Learning in Acute Ischaemic Stroke) project, I’m chuffed to share the latest publication from our team @GlobalNeuroLab, which investigates a critical yet often overlooked frontier:
Pulmonary Embolism (PE) in Acute Ischaemic Stroke (AIS)
A Deadly Intersection with profound clinical implications.
A big shout-out to a brilliant member of our team, Darryl Chen!
Israel’s “Operation Rising Lion” hit Iran’s nuclear sites (Natanz, Fordow), missile bases, and IRGC leadership, killing Hossein Salami and Mohammad Bagheri.
Iran’s firing back with 39+ ballistic missiles on Tel Aviv and Haifa.
Casualties: 224+ in Iran, 24 in Israel. 💥
Jun 6 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
[1/7] 🚨 Recently published in Nature Communications (May 2025)!
Proud to share the findings as a senior collaborator & contributing author in this major GBD 2019 study.
We examined the global burden of acute vs chronic care needs across 204 countries & 379 sequelae.
Let's dig into key insights from this study!
[2/7] Key finding: Chronic care conditions account for 68% of global DALYs (Disability-adjusted life years measure burden), while only 27% are due to acute care.
The burden intensifies with age and affects nearly every health system on Earth.
📈 Chronic ≠ niche. It’s the majority.
May 27 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
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What’s one of the most deadly and under-recognized types of stroke?
Subarachnoid Hemorrhage (SAH).
Proud to share that our global study on the burden and risk factors of SAH has just been published in JAMA Neurology.
As a senior collaborator and co-author, I’m humbled to contribute to this crucial work.
Congratulations to the GBD 2021 Global Subarachnoid Hemorrhage Risk Factors Collaborators!
These findings can help reshape stroke prevention and health system priorities worldwide.2/7
In 2021 alone:
📍700,000 new SAH cases
📍8 million living with SAH
📍350,000 deaths
📍10.6 million DALYs (disability-adjusted life years)
Even as rates fell, the absolute burden grew.
📈 A rising challenge for global health.
May 26 • 11 tweets • 6 min read
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Has the so-called War on Terror come full circle?
When a former Al-Qaeda commander like Abu Mohammed al-Golani is embraced by global powers as a potential leader of Syria, we must ask:
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What should a sovereign nation do when its innocent civilians—targeted for their religion—are slaughtered by cross-border terrorists backed by a hostile neighbor?
On April 22, 2025, 26 civilians (25 Hindus & 1 Nepali citizen) were brutally massacred in Pahalgam, Kashmir by Pakistani-backed terrorists.
They were targeted for their religion, gunned down after being identified as Hindus. India vowed retribution—and that moment came.
This wasn’t random. It was religious cleansing.2/ India launched #OperationSINDOOR on May 6.
✅ 9 terrorist sites obliterated
✅ Targets: Kotli, Muzaffarabad, Bahawalpur
✅ Method: Precision missile strikes & drones
✅ Targets were non-military terror hubs used by Jaish-e-Mohammed & Lashkar-e-Taiba; not civilians, not army posts.
Apr 27 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
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Why have every Islamic reform and every political Islamist project ended in greater suffering?
History has an answer few dare to hear.
Every attempt at reflection was followed by a replacement with control.
Is it time to rethink the path altogether?
A thread on why Atatürk to Nasser failed — and the more profound lesson.
👇
A thread you don't want to miss. 📷 Start
2/11
Atatürk's Turkey (1923–1938)
Abolished the Caliphate.
Banned Islamic dress and religious courts. Secularised education and language.
➡️ Outcome?
Faith retreated underground — only to re-emerge stronger through political Islam decades later.
Apr 27 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
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In routine practice, we come across patients with brain cancer presenting acutely, with sudden weakness, confusion, seizures, or worse.
Yet, behind these "stroke-like" events, the causes vary dramatically:
🔹 Some bleed inside tumors
🔹 Others bleed around them
🔹 Some show ischemia without obvious triggers
This clinical complexity prompted us to take action.
🧠
In a recent publication in the Journal of Stroke Medicine, we introduce a novel way to characterize such patients.
(2/11)
Proud to share our new publication in the Journal of Stroke Medicine:
"Integrated Management of Stroke Risk in Brain Cancer: Insights from the Tumoral Bleeding Classification System and CanStroke Protocol."
Why would Israel’s legendary Mossad wade into a New York short-seller battle?
Because the January 2023 Hindenburg broadside on Adani wasn’t just market gossip—it threatened a flagship of India’s economic rise.
This thread 🧵reveals the inside story of #OperationZeppelin. 🕵️
How a short-seller’s strike on Adani triggered one of the most sweeping, successful national-security counter-offensives ever mounted, as Israel moved to shield its all-weather ally, India.
🇮🇱 ❤️ 🇮🇳
2/10
The Hindenburg report vaporised $150 billion in market cap within days.
It shook a conglomerate whose green-energy and port projects mirror India’s $ 5 trillion GDP ambition.