While western media are still writing about the African AIDS tragedy, an new and more powerful crisis is on the rise in India. As Indian governments for a much too long time rejected the existence of HIV in the subcontinent and projected the illness to the demoralised western societies, the virus already holds the Indian nation in a tight grip. From big cities to small villages in the country side. And even more, the expectation are, that India will be hit much harder by AIDS in the next few years, than most of the African countries. 2003 had seen 520,000 new infections in India, the Health Ministry said there were just 28,000 in 2004.