Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: MOOC
Mains level: Paper 2- Adoption of MOOC and issues with it.
Massive open online courses (MOOC) could not be panacea for the problems education faces. It can’t be the replacement for the learning in the classrooms. This article highlights the issues with adoption of MOOC and why it can’t be the replacement for learning in the classrooms.
UGC circular to adopt MOOC
- In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the University Grants Commission had issued a circular to universities.
- Through this circular, it encouraged them to adopt massive open online courses (MOOCs) offered on its SWAYAM platform for credit transfers in the coming semesters.
- But the move poses a great danger.
- But why it’s danger? Because it is also being seen as an instrument to achieve the country’s target Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in higher education.
- GER in higher education is envisioned to be 30% by 2021; it was 25.8% in 2017–18.
Issues with MOOC and what classrooms offers
- MOOC-based e-learning platforms tend to reinforce a top-down teacher-to-student directionality of learning.
- This misses the point that teaching and learning are skills that are always in the making.
- The teacher is after all “an intellectual midwife” who facilitates in the birth of students’ ideas and insights through engaging in critical dialogue.
- In a conducive classroom environment, this role is often switched and the student plays intellectual midwife to the teacher’s ideas.
- Moving to a MOOC-based degree system would rob young teachers and students of these essential lessons in teaching and learning from each other.
- Policymakers behind the SWAYAM platform have left out courses in engineering, medicine, dental, pharmacy, nursing, architecture, agriculture, and physiotherapy on the grounds that they involve laboratory and practical work.
- This move makes sense.
- But it seems to suggest that the pure sciences, the arts, the social sciences, and humanities curricula are largely lecture- and theory-based, and, therefore, readily adaptable to the online platform.
- Nothing can be farther from such a misconception.
- Implicit in every curriculum is the tacit assumption that the classroom is a laboratory for hands-on testing of ideas, opinions, interpretations, and counterarguments.
- A diverse and inclusive classroom is the best litmus test for any theory or insight.
- Multidisciplinarity happens more through serendipity — when learners across disciplines bump into each other and engage in conversations.
- Classroom and campus spaces offer the potential for solidarity in the face of discrimination, social anxiety, and stage fear, paving the way for a proliferation of voluntary associations that lie outside the realm of family, economy, and state.
- In the absence of this physical space, teaching and learning would give way to mere content and its consumption.
- Without a shared space to discuss and contest ideas, learning dilutes to just gathering more information.
- This could also dilute norms of evaluation, whereby a “good lecture” might mean merely a lecture which “streams seamlessly, without buffering”.
Online mode: add more value to the classroom education
- One could think of greater value-sensitive and socially just architectures and technologies that further foster classroom engagement.
- It also makes it accessible for students of various disabilities and challenges, thereby adding more value to the existing meaning of education.
- But public education modelled on social distancing is a functional reduction and dilution of the meaning of education.
- It could add value only as an addendum to the classroom.
Consider the question “Examine the issues with wide adoption of the MOOC to address the problems education sector in India faces.”
Conclusion
Such platforms must be seen only as stop-gap variants that help us get by under lockdown situations and complement classroom lectures.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Sweet and Sour grade crude oil
Mains level: Fuel prices hike and their impact
India fuel prices are somewhat stagnant these days despite spikes in global crude oil prices. The key beneficiary in this subversion of price decontrol is the government. The consumer is a clear loser, alongside fuel retailing companies as well. Let’s see how.
Do you know?
Grade of crude oil processed in Indian refineries: ‘Sour grade’ (Oman and Dubai average) and ‘Sweet grade’ (Brent)
Oil and India
- In theory, retail prices of petrol and diesel in India are linked to global crude prices.
- There is supposed to be complete decontrol of consumer-end prices of auto fuels and others such as the aviation turbine fuel or ATF.
- It means that if crude prices fall, as has largely been the trend since February, retails prices should come down too, and vice versa.
So, why is there a divergence in the trends?
- Oil price decontrol is a one-way street in India — when global prices go up, this is passed on to the consumer, who has to cough up more for every litre of fuel consumed.
- But when the reverse happens and prices go down, the government — almost by default — slaps fresh taxes and levies to ensure that it rakes in extra revenues, even as the consumer, who should have ideally benefited by way of lower pump prices.
How does decontrol work?
- Price decontrol essentially offers fuel retailers such as Indian Oil, HPCL or BPCL the freedom to fix prices of petrol or diesel based on calculations of their own cost and profits.
- Fuel price decontrol has been a step-by-step exercise, with the government freeing up prices of ATF in 2002, petrol in the year 2010 and diesel in October 2014.
- Prior to that, the Government used to intervene in fixing the price at which the fuel retailers used to sell diesel or petrol.
- While fuels such as domestic LPG and kerosene still are under price control, for other fuels such as petrol, diesel or ATF, the price is supposed to be reflective of the price movements of the so-called Indian basket of crude oil.
Are India’s taxes on fuels high? Obviously, Yes!
- On May 5, the Centre announced one of the steepest ever hikes in excise duty by Rs 13 per litre on diesel and Rs 10 per litre on petrol, following up on another round of sharp hikes in the first week of March.
- All of this effectively cements India’s position as the country with among the highest taxes on fuel.
- Prior to the increase in excise duty (in February 2020), the government, centre plus states was collecting around 107 per cent taxes, (Excise Duty and VAT) on the base price of petrol and 69 per cent in the case of diesel.
- With the second revision in excise duty in May, the government is collecting around 260 per cent taxes, (Excise Duty and VAT) on the base price of petrol and 256 per cent in the case of diesel (as on 6th May 2020), according to estimates by CARE Ratings.
- In comparison, taxes on fuels as a percentage of pump prices was around 65 per cent of the retail price in Germany and Italy, 62 per cent in the UK, 45 per cent in Japan and under 20 per cent in the US.
Do OMCs also benefit?
- The only entity that benefits at the consumer’s expense is the government — in fact, both the Central and state governments.
- OMCs, interestingly, are also among the losers from the sharp downward gyrations in oil prices.
- The problem for companies such as IOC or BPCL is that a continuous slide in fuel prices leads to the prospect of inventory losses.
- It is a technical term for the losses incurred when crude oil prices start falling and companies that have sourced the oil at higher prices discover that the prices have tumbled by the time the product reaches the refinery.
- Including both crude oil and products, companies such as IOC keep an inventory of about 20-50 days.
Also read:
[Burning Issue] Oil Prices and OPEC+
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Sahakar Mitra Scheme
Mains level: Not Much
The Union Ministry for Agriculture has launched Sahakar Mitra: Scheme on Internship Programme (SIP).
Note: Article 19 states that the Right to form co-operative societies is a Fundamental Right and DPSP Article 43-B provides for the promotion of co-operative societies.
Sahakar Mitra Scheme
- The scheme is an initiative by the National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), the cooperative sector development finance organization.
- It aims to help cooperative institutions access innovative ideas of young professionals while the interns will gain experience of working in the field to be self-reliant.
- The scheme is expected to assist cooperative institutions to access new and innovative ideas of young professionals while the interns gain experience of working in the field giving the confidence to be self-reliant.
- Professional graduates in disciplines such as Agriculture and allied areas, IT etc. will be eligible for an internship.
- Professionals who are pursuing or have completed their MBA degrees in Agri-business, Cooperation, Finance, International Trade, Forestry, Rural Development, Project Management etc. will also be eligible.
- Each intern will get financial support over a 4 months internship period.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: IFLOWS
Mains level: Urban floods in India
Integrated Flood Warning System for Mumbai (I-FLOWS Mumbai), a state-of-the-art flood warning system has been developed for the city.
Practice question for mains:
Q. Urban floods in India are consequences of unplanned urbanization in India. Discuss with references to the frequent annual floods in Mumbai.
What is IFLOWS-Mumbai?
- IFLOWS is a monitoring and flood warning system that will be able to relay alerts of possible flood-prone areas anywhere between six to 72 hours in advance.
- The Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) has developed the system with in-house expertise and coordination with the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).
- The system can provide all information regarding possible flood-prone areas, likely height the floodwater could attain location-wise problem areas across all 24 wards and calculate the vulnerability and risk of elements exposed to flood.
- Mumbai is only the second city in the country after Chennai to get this system. Similar systems are being developed for Bengaluru and Kolkata.
How will it work?
- The primary source for the system is the amount of rainfall, but with Mumbai being a coastal city, the system also factors in tidal waves and storm tides for its flood assessments.
- The system has provisions to capture the urban drainage within the city and predict the areas of flooding.
- The system comprises seven modules- Data Assimilation, Flood, Inundation, Vulnerability, Risk, Dissemination Module and Decision Support System.
Why was this system needed in Mumbai?
- Mumbai, the financial capital of India, has been experiencing floods with increased periodicity.
- Floods, especially the ones in 2005 and 2017, are etched in everyone’s memory.
- Last year, post-monsoon and unseasonal rainfall as late as October, two tropical cyclones in the Arabian Sea had caught authorities off guard and left a trail of destruction.
- The flood during 26th July 2005, when the city received a rainfall of 94 cm, a 100 year high in a span of 24 hours had paralyzed the city completely.
- Urban flooding is common in the city from June to September, resulting in the crippling of traffic, railways and airlines.
- As preparedness for floods before they occur, the system will help in warning the citizens so that they can be prepared in advance for flooding conditions.
Benefits
- IFLOWS-Mumbai will enhance the resilience of the city by providing early warning for flooding, especially during high rainfall events and cyclones.
- Using this, it will be possible to have an estimate of the flood inundation three days in advance, along with immediate weather updates.
- The Union Minister said the system was “one of the most advanced” ones and will help the city, which has been experiencing floods with increasing periodicity.
- The hi-tech system will predict floods before they occur, therefore enabling Mumbaikars to take due precautions in advance.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: FSSAI, Food Safety Index
Mains level: Food safety initiaitives in India
The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has recently released its Food Safety report for 2019-20.
Food safety has been in news this year quite frequent. Do make a note of following – Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA), Red Octagon, Eat Right Movement, Food Safety Mitra etc.
The Food Safety Index
- The index ranks states on five parameters of food safety: human resources and institutional data, compliance, food testing facility, training and capacity building besides consumer empowerment.
- This is the second index on food safety, which FSSAI released on the occasion of World Food Safety Day with the theme “Food Safety is everyone’s business”.
- It was dedicated to those in the supply chain who have ensured the uninterrupted availability of safe food during this COVID-19 pandemic.
Highlights of the report
- Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra have topped an index that ranked states ensuring food safety in 2019-20.
- Among the smaller states, Goa came first followed by Manipur and Meghalaya.
- Among UTs, Chandigarh, Delhi and the Andaman Islands secured top ranks.
Back2Basics: Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI)
- The FSSAI is an autonomous body established under the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Government of India.
- It has been established under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 which is a consolidating statute related to food safety and regulation in India.
- It is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the regulation and supervision of food safety.
- It is headed by a non-executive Chairperson, appointed by the Central Government, either holding or has held the position of not below the rank of Secretary to the Government of India.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Depsang Plains
Mains level: Paper 2- India-China relations
Apart from the recent one, there had been several stand-offs between India and China over the border issue. The use of quiet diplomacy to diffuse the situation underlies all these stand-offs. However, politicisation of stand-off could make the situation difficult to resolve. This article explains the use of quiet diplomacy and problems posed by the politicisation of the stand-offs.
Process to diffuse tension began but not at all points
- Both sides have agreed on a broad plan to defuse four of the five points of discord.
- The situation at the fifth, Pangong Lake remains uncertain as also in Galwan valley and north Sikkim.
- At Pangong Tso, the Chinese have entrenched their positions with tents and remain on India’s side of the LAC.
- There is a major point of difference which will not be easy to resolve.
Let’s look into the strategy used by India in the past to resolve stand-offs
- The pattern of resolution of past stand-offs underlines the key role played by quiet diplomacy in unlocking complicated stand-off situations.
- Both the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and National Democratic Alliance (NDA) governments have followed an approach that has coupled quiet diplomacy with a strong military posture, while at the same time allowing the adversary a way out.
- This has been the broad strategy in dealing with challenges from China across the LAC.
- And this strategy has generally worked.
Let’s look into three specific incidents
1) 2013-Depsang plains
- In 2013, when Chinese troops pitched tents on India’s side of the LAC on the Depsang plains, similar to Pangong Tso.
- The UPA government was under fire, both for being weak on China and for its reticence.
- While the government was being publicly attacked for doing nothing, it had privately conveyed to China that if the stand-off didn’t end, an upcoming visit by Premier Li Keqiang would be off.
- If that demand had been made public at the time, China would have only dug in its heels, even if the government may have won the headlines of the day.
2) Chumar stand-off
- The government adopted a similar strategy during the 2014 stand-off at Chumar, which coincided with President Xi Jinping’s visit to India.
- Mr. Xi’s visit went ahead, while India quietly but forcefully stopped the Chinese road-building and deployed 2,500 soldiers, outnumbering the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
- The PLA withdrew.
- Both sides disengaged and followed a moratorium into patrolling into contested areas, which was observed for many months thereafter.
Ultimately, in both cases, the objective was achieved. China, faced with firm resistance, was prevented from changing the status quo.
3) Doklam stand-off in 2017
- In 2017, the government came under particularly intense fire because it stayed studiously silent through a 72-day stand-off at Doklam.
- Indian troops crossed over into Bhutan to stop a Chinese road construction on territory India sees as Bhutanese but China claims.
- By extending the road, India argued, China was unilaterally altering the India-Bhutan-China trijunction.
- Beijing demanded an unconditional withdrawal.
- When both finally disengaged, neither divulged the terms.
- It would later emerge that the deal struck involved India withdrawing first.
- China then stopped construction, and the status quo at the face-off site was restored.
Stand-off politics in the country
- Politics over border stand-offs is not new.
- The Opposition and the media are certainly right to hold the government to account.
- Indeed, neither the Opposition nor the media would be doing its job if they weren’t.
- The tensions on the LAC are neither the first nor likely to be the last.
- With every incident, they are, however, getting increasingly politicised in an environment where there is a 24/7 demand on social media for information — and unprecedented capacity for disinformation.
- Rather than wish away this reality — and adopt a stand that it is above questioning — the government needs to come to terms with it.
Dealing with the politicisation of stand-offs
- First, it needs to keep the Opposition informed, which it is clear it hasn’t.
- Second, it needs to proactively engage with the media, even if that may be through low-key engagement as was the case on June 9, that does not escalate into a public war of words.
- At the same time, expectations of having a public debate about the intricacies of every border stand-off — or for the Prime Minister to weigh in even while negotiations are ongoing — need to be tempered.
- This will only risk inflaming tensions, and reduce the wiggle room for both sides to find an off-ramp.
- The broader objective shouldn’t get lost in political debates.
- That objective is to ensure India’s security interests remain protected — and that the status quo on India’s borders isn’t changed by force.
Consider the question “Border issue between India and China has several times resulted in the stand-off between the two countries but the use of quiet diplomacy helped defuse the tension. But the politicisation of such issue could complicate the situation in the future. Comment.
Conclusion
- Past incidents have shown that quiet diplomacy, coupled with strong military resolve that deters any Chinese misadventures, has been more effective than public sabre-rattling, even if we may be inhabiting a media environment that misconstrues loudness as strength, and silence as weakness.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Data on migrants in India; Organizations which study migration and reports
Mains level: The issues faced by migrants in India and associated solutions
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Reference source: https://www.prsindia.org/theprsblog/migration-india-and-impact-lockdown-migrants
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Sikkim-Tibet Convention of 1890
Mains level: India-China border skirmishes
The skirmishes between Indian and Chinese troops at Naku La in Sikkim that is considered settled may be Beijing’s way of attempting a new claim. Defence experts highlighted the historical Sikkim-Tibet Convention of 1890 as proof of India’s ownership of the territory.
Practice question for mains:
Q. China’s actions on dormant areas mask a hidden agenda of broader assertiveness in the entire Asia-Pacific. Comment.
China creates a new flashpoint
- Referring to a major scuffle that took place at Naku La in May, it was unusual for Chinese troops to open up a part of the LAC that has not been in contention before.
Sikkim-Tibet Convention of 1890
- Of the entire 3,488km Sino-Indian border, the only section on which both countries agree that there is no dispute is the 220km Sikkim-Tibet section of the boundary.
- This is because under the Anglo-Chinese Convention of 1890, the Sikkim-Tibet border was agreed upon and in 1895 it was jointly demarcated on the ground.
- Not only that but the new government of People’s Republic of China, which took power in 1949, confirmed this position in a formal note to the government of India on 26 December 1959.
Chinese claims
- Prior to Sikkim’s merger with India in 1975, the Chinese side accepted the Watershed based alignment of the International Border (IB).
- The Sikkim – Tibet boundary has long formally been delimited and there is neither any discrepancy between the maps nor any dispute in practice.
- The Chinese reiterate that, as per para (1) of the Convention of 1890, the tri-junction is at Mount Gipmochi.
India’s stance
- The geographic alignment of the features was so prominent that it could easily be identified and recognized.
- Even analysing the available Google images of the past, the location of Naku La could be discerned by anyone as the watershed parting line in the area was very prominent. “
- There exist no ambiguity with respect to the location of the pass, since geographic realities cannot be altered.
How Sikkim came into the picture?
- Earlier, Sikkim came into the limelight in 1965 during the India-Pakistan conflict, when the Chinese suddenly and without any provocation sent a strongly-worded threat.
- Then PM Lal Bahadur Shastri neatly sidestepped the issue by stating that if the bunkers were on the Chinese side they were well within their rights to demolish them.
- The point that the Chinese were trying to make was not military, but political, for they wanted to bolster the Pakistani spirit, which by then was rapidly losing steam.
- As India stood firm with the backing of USSR and the US, nothing emerged from Chinese threats on the Sikkim-Tibet border.
Series of activity since then
- In 1967, the Chinese again activated the Sikkim-Tibet border and on 11 September, suddenly opened fire on an Indian patrol party near Nathu La pass. The main point was that India did not lose any position, nor did it yield any ground.
- The next important episode was in 2003. When PM Vajpayee conceded during his visit to China in 2003 that “the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) was a part of the PRC” with the expectation that China would recognize Sikkim as a part of India.
- This did not materialize then but in the joint statement issued by premier Wen Jiabao and prime minister Manmohan Singh on 11 April 2005.
- In part 13, the Chinese recognized “Sikkim State of the Republic of India”. Wen even handed over an official map of the People’s Republic of China to Singh, showing Sikkim as a part of India.
Nothing new about the skirmishes over Sikkim
- History would thus indicate that the present stand-off between India and China over the Sikkim-Tibet boundary is nothing new.
- The latest episode after a road construction party entered Doklam area, despite Bhutanese attempts to dissuade them.
Ignoring usual behaviour
- The clearly orchestrated actions on an otherwise dormant area mask a hidden agenda.
- The Chinese push at several points along the LAC and also the ongoing aggression in the South China Sea and Taiwan Straits are testimony to this.
- The timeline of initiating this incident indicates a high level of pre-planning, possibly at senior levels of the PLA as well as the Chinese government.
Way forward
- There is no question of India bending to Chinese “demands”, for like in 1967, it must stand its ground firmly.
- That would be a sufficient lesson for the Chinese that the Indian Army is no pushover and this is perhaps the only way to deal with China that likes to flaunt its economic and military prowess.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Art. 32
Mains level: Making reservation system more efficient
What did the Hon’ble Supreme Court rule?
- Article 16 (4) and 16 (4-A) are in the nature of enabling provisions, vesting a discretion on the State Government to consider providing reservations, if the circumstances so warrant.
- It is settled law that the State Government cannot be directed to provide reservations for appointments in public posts.
- Similarly, the State is not bound to make reservations for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in matters of promotions.
- The judgment added that it is for the State Government to decide whether this was necessary.
What do the precedents say?
- There are several major Supreme Court judgments that have, in the past, ruled that Articles 15(4) and 16(4) does not provide a fundamental right per se.
- A five-judge apex court bench, as early as 1962 in the R. Balaji v. the State of Mysore had ruled that Article 15(4) is an “enabling provision”, meaning that “it does not impose an obligation, but merely leaves it to the discretion of the appropriate government to take suitable action, if necessary”.
- The court was hearing a challenge to an order passed by the erstwhile state of Mysore reserving 68 percent of seats in engineering and medical colleges for educationally and socially backward classes and SCs and STs.
- Five years later, in 1967, another five-judge bench in A. Rajendran v. Union of India reiterated this position, holding that the government is under no constitutional duty to provide reservations for SCs and STs, either at the initial stage of recruitment or at the stage of promotion.
- Article 16(4), it said, does not confer any right on the citizens and is an enabling provision giving discretionary power to the government to make reservations.
- The position went on to be reiterated in several other decisions, including the nine-judge bench ruling in Indra Sawhney v. Union of India (1992) and the five-judge bench decision in M Nagaraj v. Union of India (2006).
What does the judgment mean?
- Reservations are not rights: The latest judgment is a reminder that affirmative action programs allowed in the Constitution flow from “enabling provisions” and are not rights as such.
- Not a new legal position: This legal position is not new. Major judgments- these include those by Constitution Benches-note that Article 16(4), on the reservation in posts, is enabling in nature.
- The state is not bound to provide reservation: In other words, the state is not bound to provide reservations. But if the state provides reservations, it must satisfy the following two criteria-
- For the backward class: It must be in favor of sections that are backward.
- Inadequately represented: And inadequately represented in the services based on quantifiable data.
Consequences of this judgment
- Possibility of the unequal system: Some may even read into this an inescapable state obligation to extend reservation to those who need it, lest its absence renders the entire system unequal.
- Possibility of perceptible imbalance: For instance, if no quotas are implemented and no study on backwardness and extent of representation is done, it may result in a perceptible imbalance in social representation in public services.
Why reservation needed?
- To correct the historical injustice faced by backward castes in the country.
- To provide a level playing field for backward section as they can not compete with those who have had the access of resources and means for centuries.
- To ensure adequate representation of backward classes in the services under the State.
- For advancement of backward classes.
- To ensure equality as basis of meritocracy i.e all people must be brought to the same level before judging them on the basis of merit.
Argument Against Reservation
- Reservation in state services led to divisions and enmity among government employees, vitiating the atmosphere at workplace.
- Eradication, not perpetuation of caste was the objective of the reservation policy but Caste Based Reservation only perpetuate the notion of caste in society.
- Reservation was introduced to ensure that the historically underprivileged communities were given equal access to resources but irrespective of the economic progress they continue to remain socially disadvantaged.
- Reservation destroys self-respect, so much so that competition is no longer on to determine the best but the most backward.
- Reservations are the biggest enemy of meritocracy which is the foundation of many progressive countries.
- It has became a tool to meet narrow political ends through invoking class loyalties and primordial identities.
- The dominant and elite class within the backward castes has appropriated the benefits of reservation and the most marginalised within the backward castes have remained marginalised.
- Reservation has become the mechanism of exclusion rather than inclusion as many upper caste poors are also facing discrimination and injustice which breeds frustration in the society.
Way forward
- Meanwhile, calls for reform and rethinking reservation policies get louder; one question is whether there’s a need to continue with reservation and if benefits have reached targets.
- The challenge for India is that while many sections of the society remain disadvantaged, political action has resulted in the relative discrimination within reserved groups.
- As the reservation pie grows larger, in effect, it becomes a method of exclusion rather than inclusion.
- It is time that India has to make a critical assessment of its affirmative action programs.
- Simplification, legislative sunsets, and periodic reviews should be important principles in the redesign.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: CITES appendices
Mains level: Illict wildlife trade and its prevention
The Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change (MOEFCC) has issued an advisory saying people importing “exotic live species” will have to make a voluntary disclosure.
Practice questions for mains:
Q. What are Zoonotic Diseases? Discuss how the illicit trade in wildlife has resulted in the spread of zoonotic diseases of the scale of the ongoing COVID-19?
What is the new Advisory?
- According to the advisory, the phrase “exotic live species” includes “animals named under the Appendices I, II and III of the Convention of International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora”.
- It does not include species from the Schedules of the Wildlife (Protection) Act 1972.
- This will create a process where all imports will be screened.
- As of now, the imports are being made through the Director-General of Foreign Trade and State Forest departments are not kept in the loop.
- For new “exotic live species”, the importer should obtain a no-objection certificate from the Chief Wildlife Warden (CWLW) of the State.
- For existing species, stocks shall be declared by the owner/ holder (stock, as on 1 January 2020) to the Chief Wildlife Warden (CWLW) of the concerned State or UT.
Why need such advisory?
- Many exotic species of birds, reptiles and amphibians are imported into India for commercial purposes.
- Some of the most sought after exotic species in India are Ball python, Scarlet Macaw, sea turtles, sugar glider (Petaurus breviceps), marmoset and grey African parrots.
- These imports were happening through the Director-General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), but they were beyond the purview of the forest departments and the chief wildlife wardens weren’t aware of them.
- Wildlife experts have long been asking for stringent laws and guidelines to document and regulate numbers of exotic species being kept as pets by individuals and breeders in India.
Significance
- The move comes as the outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19) has raised global concern about illegal wildlife trade and zoonotic diseases.
- Often these species are illegally trafficked into the country to avoid lengthy documentation and scrutiny.
Issues with guidelines
- Matters such as the spread of invasive species as well as zoonotic diseases had not been taken care of in the advisory.
- There is a growing domestic trade in exotic species of wildlife that is unfortunately not listed under the various appendices of CITES (such as sugar gliders, corn snakes).
- Hence limiting the scope of the latest advisory to only those species covered under CITES drastically limits the scope of the advisory itself.
- It does not have the force of law and could potentially incentivize illegal trade by offering a long amnesty period.
Back2Basics: CITES
- CITES stands for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
- It is as an international agreement aimed at ensuring “that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival”.
- It was drafted after a resolution was adopted at a meeting of the members of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in 1963.
- It entered into force on July 1, 1975, and now has 183 parties.
- The Convention is legally binding on the Parties in the sense that they are committed to implementing it; however, it does not take the place of national laws.
- India is a signatory to and has also ratified CITES convention in 1976.
CITES Appendices
- CITES works by subjecting international trade in specimens of selected species to certain controls.
- All import, export, re-exports and introduction from the sea of species covered by the convention has to be authorized through a licensing system.
It has three appendices:
- Appendix I includes species threatened with extinction. Trade-in specimens of these species are permitted only in exceptional circumstances.
- Appendix II provides a lower level of protection.
- Appendix III contains species that are protected in at least one country, which has asked other CITES Parties for assistance in controlling trade.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NIRF
Mains level: Not Much
The National Institute Ranking Framework (NIRF) ranking list has been released by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD).
Practice question for mains:
Q. What is NIRF? Discuss the parameters and methodology used in the ranking. Also, discuss its key features and limitations.
About NIRF
- The NIRF is a methodology adopted by the Ministry of HRD to rank institutions of higher education in India.
- The Framework was approved and on 29 September 2015.
- There are separate rankings for different types of institutions depending on their areas of operation like universities and colleges, engineering institutions, management institutions, pharmacy institutions and architecture institutions.
- The ranking framework evaluates institutions on five broad generic groups of parameters, i.e. Teaching, Learning and Resources (TLR), Research and Professional Practice (RP), Graduation Outcomes (GO), Outreach and Inclusivity (OI) and Perception (PR).
Why need such rankings?
- Rankings help universities to improve their performance on various ranking parameters and identify gaps in research and areas of improvement.
- The ranking is necessary for transparency and healthy competition.
Highlights of the 2020 rankings
- IIT Madras retains 1st Position in Overall Ranking as well as in Engineering,
- Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru tops the University list.
- IIM Ahmedabad tops in Management Category and AIIMS occupies the top slot in Medical category for a third consecutive year.
- Miranda College retains 1st position amongst colleges for a third consecutive year.
- Maulana Azad Institute of Dental Sciences, Delhi secures 1st position in “Dental” category, dental institutions included for the first time in India Rankings 2020.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: BAT, Customs Duty
Mains level: Not Much
A notable NITI Aayog member has favoured imposing a Border Adjustment Tax (BAT) on imports to provide a level-playing field to domestic industries.
Note how BAT is different from the Custom Duties on imports. Refer to our B2B section.
What is the proposed Border Adjustment Tax?
- BAT is a duty that is proposed to be imposed on imported goods in addition to the customs levy that gets charged at the port of entry.
- It is proposed to be a non-creditable levy on imported goods. The idea is to bring similar goods in the imported and domestic baskets at par.
Why need BAT?
- Generally, BAT seeks to promote “equal conditions of the competition” for foreign and domestic companies supplying products or services within a taxing jurisdiction.
- The Indian industry has been complaining to the government about domestic taxes like electricity duty, duties on fuel, clean energy cess, mandi tax, royalties, biodiversity fees that get charged on domestically produced goods as these duties get embedded into the product.
- But many imported goods do not get loaded with such levies in their respective country of origin and this gives such products price advantage in the Indian market.
Will it be WTO compatible?
- Countries that are members of Geneva-based global watchdog WTO have locked the upper limits of customs levies for product lines that they trade-in.
- Any additional duty that gets imposed by WTO members are scoffed upon and in many instances, extra customs duties led to countries being dragged to international arbitration under WTO.
- Commerce Ministry believes that the proposed extra customs duty through the Border Adjustment Tax is compatible with global trade norms.
- Officials maintain that Article II: 2(a) of GATT allows for import charge that is equal to the internal tax of the country with respect to a “Like Product” or an item from which the imported product is made. Legal opinion on the proposed levy has also been taken.
Back2Basics: Customs Duty
- It refers to the tax imposed on the goods when they are transported across international borders.
- The objective behind levying customs duty is to safeguard each nation’s economy, jobs, environment, residents, etc., by regulating the movement of goods, especially prohibited and restrictive goods, in and out of any country.
Customs duties are charged almost universally on every good which are imported into a country. Some of these are:
- Basic Customs Duty (BCD)
- Countervailing Duty (CVD)
- Protective Duty
- Anti-dumping Duty etc.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Nature Index
Mains level: NA
India has ranked twelfth, globally in science research output as per the recently-released Nature Index table 2020. The top five positions have gone to the United States of America, China, Germany, United Kingdom and Japan.
Note: This nature index has nothing to do with nature conservation. It has only mentioned the rankings of research institutes in natural and physical sciences.
What is the Nature Index?
- The Nature Index is a database of author affiliation information collated from research articles published in an independently selected group of 82 high-quality science journals.
- It serves as an indicator of high-quality research in the Natural and Physical Sciences.
- The database is compiled by Nature Research, a division of the international scientific publishing company Springer Nature that publishes academic journals.
- The index provides a close to the real-time proxy of high-quality research output and collaboration at the institutional, national and regional level.
India’s achievements
- Globally the top-rated Indian institutions in this list are CSIR, a group of 39 institutions at the 160th position and IISc Bangalore at the 184th
- Three of the autonomous institutions of the DST have found their place among the top 30 Indian Institutions.
- Keeping out CSIR, which is a cluster of institutions, IACS Kolkata is among the top three institutions in quality Chemistry Research in India.
- NCASR Banglore ranks 4th among academic institutions in life sciences, 10th in Chemistry and Physical Sciences, 10th among Indian academic institutions, and 469th in the global ranking.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Indian Gaur
Mains level: Not Much
The first population estimation exercise of the Indian gaur carried out in the Nilgiris Forest Division has revealed that more than an estimated 2,000 Indian gaurs inhabit the entire division.
Try this question from CSP 2012:
Q. Which one of the following groups of animals belongs to the category of endangered species?(2012)
(a) Great Indian Bustard, Musk Deer, Red Panda and Asiatic Wild Ass
(b) Kashmir Stag, Cheetal, Blue Bull and Great Indian Bustard
(c) Snow Leopard, Swamp Deer, Rhesus Monkey and Saras (Crane)
(d) Lion-tailed Macaque, Blue Bull, Hanuman Langur and Cheetal
Indian Gaur
- The Indian Gaur also called the Indian bison is one of the largest extant bovines found in India.
- It is native to South and Southeast Asia and has been listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List since 1986.
- The global population has been estimated at maximum 21,000 mature individuals by 2016.
- It declined by more than 70% during the last three generations, and is extinct in Sri Lanka and probably also in Bangladesh.
- In Malaysia, it is called Seladang and Pyaung in Myanmar. The domesticated form of the gaur is called Gayal (Bos frontalis) or Mithun.
- They are highly threatened by poaching for trade to supply international markets, but also by opportunistic hunting, and specific hunting for home consumption.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Lonar Crater Lake, Pleistoscene epoch
Mains level: NA
The colour of water in Maharashtra’s Lonar Lake, formed after a meteorite hit the Earth some 50,000 years ago, has changed to glaring.
Make a note of all saltwater lakes in India. Few of them are Pulicat, Pangong Tso, Chilika, and Sambhar Lakes etc.
About Lonar Lake
- Lonar Lake, also known as Lonar crater, is a notified National Geo-heritage Monument, saline (pH of 10.5), Soda Lake, located at Lonar in Buldhana district, Maharashtra.
- It was created by an asteroid collision with earth impact during the Pleistocene Epoch.
- It is one of the four known, hyper-velocity, impact craters in basaltic rock anywhere on Earth.
- It sits inside the Deccan Plateau—a massive plain of volcanic basalt rock created by eruptions some 65 million years ago.
- Its location in this basalt field suggested to some geologists that it was a volcanic crater.
Why there’s a color change?
- The salinity and algae can be responsible for this change.
- There is no oxygen below one meter of the lake’s water surface.
- There is an example of a lake in Iran, where water becomes reddish due to increase in salinity.
- The level of water in the Lonar Lake is currently low as compared to the few past years and there is no rain to pour fresh water in it.
- The low level of water may lead to increased salinity and change in the behaviour of algae because of atmospheric changes.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Cyclone Nisarga and Amphan
Mains level: Paper 1- Climate change
Covid-19 pandemic has overwhelmed the governments across the world. And the destruction caused by it would impact not only our present but the future as well. So, what this means to our climate future? First and foremost, it will leave the governments with less fund to invest for the greener outcomes. What would be the other impacts? And how can we avoid turning blind eye to the crises waiting for us in the near future? Read the article to know…
Cyclones amid pandemic-what do it signal?
- The very language used to describe the effects of climate change is now being deployed, correctly, to shape our understanding of a covid-ravaged near future: poverty, the failure of markets, uncertainty, and an overwhelmed government.
- In less than a month, we have been given a glimpse of how the climate crisis can yank at the seams of a state already undone.
- We saw Cyclone Amphan transform from a tropical storm to one of the largest cyclones South Asia has ever seen in a matter of hours, aided by warmer than usual waters in the Bay of Bengal.
- We also saw Cyclone Nisarga barrel down on Maharashtra, the second pre-monsoon cyclone to hit the west coast in 127 years.
- Governments would have been hard-pressed to deal with such extremes even in the best of times.
So, how COVID-19 would impact response to climate change?
- There are two strands of opinion.
- The optimistic one sees this as a moment to remake our states and societies in a measured response.
- This includes directing economic packages to areas that increase our resilience to natural disasters and technologies that reduce our emissions.
- This could be an opportunity to reinforce sustainable behaviour — fewer morning commutes and less air travel, for example.
- The other strand is more dire, arguing that this will amount to a lost decade or two as our attention is focused on keeping the teetering ship of economy afloat.
- In this reading, present concerns will trump preparations for an uncertain future.
- Between these two strands there is consensus that we are at a critical juncture.
- What we do now will determine the flow of events decades into the future.
What our climate future holds?
We will have to face the following 3 problems in the future owing to the Covid-19 pandemic today.
1. Scarcity of funds
- It has been two months since India’s lockdown, and we know enough to have a rational conversation about our climate future.
- Perhaps the most important news relates to public and private debt.
- The government has raised its borrowing limit, states will need to borrow more to tide over shortfalls and the private sector has seen returns from investments dry out.
- All three are already heavily indebted, meaning the cost of capital for future borrowing will only grow.
- That leaves limited fiscal room to finance the building blocks of resilience: everything from grain to health, employment schemes, irrigation, efficient water systems and river management infrastructure.
- It could mean that efforts to reduce our energy emissions are left without patient pools of long-term capital.
2. Underdeveloped knowledge infrastructure
- The knowledge infrastructure needed to react to climate change might be left similarly underdeveloped.
- Climate change distinguishes itself from other policy fields in the wide range of analytical tasks it demands, from predicting weather trends to understanding how specific seed varieties react to droughts.
- Thinking about climate change requires a lot of people exploring varied questions simultaneously.
- That involves funding an ecosystem of thinkers from diverse disciplines.
- Only the state can provide for multi-year studies, institutional support and the like.
- These are inherently long-term investments and only really start paying off over decades.
- It means that hamstrung investment in coming years will leave a knowledge vacuum in the future.
3. Impact on the psychology of the government
- The Indian government, reacting to a million crises erupting across the economy, will be hard-pressed to plan for a hazy but sinister future.
- Promises of a greener, less turbulent future will falter against the turbulence of today.
- This instinct will be shared by governments across the world.
- This might well numb the effects of the global climate negotiation architecture.
Way forward
- Crafting a response that carefully balances present and future will take a great deal of collective effort.
- Foremost, it will require policy ideas that deliberately marry employment and industrial priorities with green outcomes.
- Ideas such as pushing to manufacture solar equipment or electric vehicles in India should, at some point, coalesce into something that looks like a climate plan for the country.
- This task will fall to universities, NGOs, think tanks and individuals working together in disciplined debate.
Consider the question “Do you agree with the view that the corona crisis would adversely impact our efforts towards mitigating the impact of climate change? Giver reasons in support of your argument.”
Conclusion
We should be careful not to drag ourselves through one crisis only to emerge into another longer, less predictable, and unstoppable one. So, balancing the present problems and their solutions with an eye on a certain and stable future is the need of the hour.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: IBC
Mains level: Paper 3- Problems with IBC
Following the lockdown, the government announced the suspension of some provision of IBC to soften the blow of economic crisis. Section 10A was inserted to suspend the provision. But it giver rise to other questions. What are these questions? Read the article to know…
What changes were made?
- In mid-May, the Finance Minister announced that the government was planning to bring in an ordinance to suspend provisions enabling filing of fresh insolvency cases for a period of one year..
- Finally, on June 5, the government promulgated an ordinance which inserted Section 10A in the IBC.
- The government said the ordinance was promulgated because the lockdown has caused business disruptions which may lead to default on debts pushing such companies into insolvency.
- Therefore, it felt that suspending Sections 7, 9 and 10 of the IBC would be the right course of action.
What are the issues with section 10A?
- Section 10A provides that “no application for initiation of corporate insolvency resolution process of a corporate debtor shall be filed, for any default arising on or after 25th March, 2020 for a period of six months or such further period, not exceeding one year from this period, as may be notified in this behalf”.
- This means that these provisions shall remain suspended from March 25 till September 25, unless extended for another six months, which would extend the suspension up till March 25, 2021.
- However, the proviso to the section states that no application for insolvency resolution shall ever be filed against a corporate debtor for any default occurring during the suspension period.
- While the main Section 10A suspends such applications for a limited period, the proviso enlarges the scope to provide complete amnesty under the IBC for any default occurring during such period.
- The role of a proviso in a statute is to restrict the application of the main provision under exceptional circumstances.
- However, the proviso here expands the substantive provision in the main section.
- Further, if the main provision is unclear, a proviso may be given to explain its true meaning.
- In this case the main provision appears clear, only to be obfuscated by the proviso.
- The proviso therefore does not appear to be legally tenable.
- As creditors can still approach courts, and as banks/FIs can still approach Debt Recovery Tribunals, the protection given by this proviso seems illusory.
- But Section 10A also suspends provisions of Section 10 of the IBC which enables voluntary insolvency resolution.
- This is difficult to understand as such voluntary insolvency resolution should have been made easier for companies facing distress.
Painting all defaults with the same brush
- The ordinance appears to consider every default occurring during the suspension period to be a consequence of the pandemic.
- There could be cases where defaults were imminent due to other reasons, but which will now still enjoy this protection.
- The ordinance should have protected only such defaults which may occur as a direct consequence of the pandemic or the lockdown and should have left this determination to the National Company Law Tribunal.
- Also, a company defaulting on its payment obligations on March 24 (a day before the lockdown started) would not be provided any relief under the IBC as compared to a company defaulting on or immediately after March 25 due to similar reasons.
- This makes the suspension, in the absence of definition of a COVID-19 default, prima facie arbitrary.
Issue with increasing the default amount limit
- Earlier, the government increased the minimum default amount to trigger corporate insolvency resolution from ₹1 lakh to ₹1 crore.
- This was purportedly done to protect MSMEs from insolvency petitions.
- However, this also operates against such MSMEs because they will now be forced to approach civil courts to recover undisputed debts below ₹1 crore.
- The suspension of these provisions would now impact even claims above ₹1 crore for at least six months to a year.
Conclusion
The ordinance has opened itself up to a legal challenge on grounds of arbitrariness and untenability of the proviso due to the flaw in its drafting. It is unfathomable how these flaws arose despite the government having ample time to think this through.
B2BASICS:
Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2015
The code contains a clear speedy mechanism for early identification of financial distress and initiates revival/re-organisation of the company if it is viable.
Timeline
- The bill proposes a timeline of 180 days to deal with the applications for insolvency resolution with an option of extending it by 90 days for exceptional cases.
Insolvency Resolution Plan
- The insolvency resolution plan has to be approved by 75% of the creditors. If the plan is approved, then the adjudicating authority will give its sanction. In case of rejection of insolvency resolution plan, the adjudicating authority will pass an order for liquidation.
Insolvency Professionals (IPs) & Insolvency Professional Agencies (IPAs)
- The resolution processes will be conducted by licensed insolvency professionals (IPs). These IPs will be members of insolvency professional agencies (IPAs). IPAs will also furnish performance bonds equal to the assets of a company under insolvency resolution.
Information Utilities
- Information utilities (IUs) will be established to collect, collate and disseminate financial information to facilitate insolvency resolution.
Bankruptcy and Insolvency Adjudicator
- The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) will adjudicate insolvency resolution for companies. The Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT) will adjudicate insolvency resolution for individuals.
- The Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT), which has jurisdiction over individuals and unlimited liability partnership firms. Appeals from the order of DRT shall lie to the Debt Recovery Appellate Tribunal (DRAT).
Insolvency regulators
- The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India will be set up to regulate functioning of IPs, IPAs and IUs.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: G7 countries
Mains level: Paper 2- Should India join expanded G7 if invited to join as a member?
There has been a call for expansion of G7 by the U.S. President. Against this backdrop, this article examines the historical background in which the group emerged. But a lot has changed since. So, it would be appropriate for G7 to adjust to the new reality. But what would be the focus of a new mechanism? What are the areas in which India would be interested? All such questions are answered in this article.
Call for expansion of G7 and China’s objection
- Recently, the U.S. President proposed the expansion of G7 to G10 or G11, with the inclusion of India, South Korea, Australia and possibly Russia.
- Elaborating this logic, the White House Director of Strategic Communications said the U.S. President wanted to include other countries, including the Five Eyes countries.
- Five Eye is an intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States.
- The U.S. also stressed said the expanded group should talk about the future of China.
- A Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs official immediately reacted, labelling it as “seeking a clique targeting China”.
Should India care about China’s objection if invited to join?
- China’s objection to an expanded G7 is no reason for India to stay away from it, if invited to join.
- India has attended several G7 summits earlier too, as a special invitee for its outreach sessions.
- India’s Prime Minister was guest invited to Biarritz, France to the G7 summit last year, along with other heads of government.
The historical background of G7
- The G7 emerged as a restricted club of the rich democracies in the early 1970s.
- The quadrupling of oil prices just after the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, when OPEC imposed an embargo against Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, and the United States, shocked their economies.
- Although the French were spared the embargo, the chill winds of the OPEC action reverberated around the world.
- So, French President invited the Finance Ministers of five of the most developed members of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the United States, Germany, Japan, Italy, and the United Kingdom, for an informal discussion on global issues.
- This transformed into a G7 Summit of the heads of government from the following year with the inclusion of Canada in 1976.
- And the European Commission/Community (later Union) joined as a non-enumerated member, a year later.
- On the initiative of U.S. President Bill Clinton and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the G7 became the G8, with the Russian Federation joining the club in 1998.
- This ended with Russia’s expulsion following the annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Declining share G7 and rising of E7 in world GDP
- When constituted, the G7 countries accounted for close to two-thirds of global GDP.
- According to the 2017 report of the accountancy firm, PwC, “The World in 2050”, they now account for less than a third of global GDP on a purchasing power parity (PPP) basis.
- And less than half on market exchange rates (MER) basis.
- The seven largest emerging economies (E7, or “Emerging 7”), comprising Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia and Turkey, account for over a third of global GDP on purchasing power parity (PPP) terms.
- And over a quarter on MER basis.
Predictions for India
- India’s economy is already the third largest in the world in PPP terms, even if way behind that of the U.S. and China.
- By 2050, the PwC Report predicts, six of the seven of the world’s best performing economies will be China, India, the United States, Indonesia, Brazil, and Russia.
- Two other E7 countries, Mexico and Turkey, also improve their position.
- It projects that India’s GDP will increase to $17 trillion in 2030 and $42 trillion in 2050 in PPP terms, in second place after China, just ahead of the United States.
- This is predicated on India overcoming the challenge of COVID-19, sustaining its reform process and ensuring adequate investments in infrastructure, institutions, governance, education and health.
Limitations of G7
- The success or otherwise of multilateral institutions are judged by the standard of whether or not they have successfully addressed the core global or regional challenges of the time.
- The G7 failed to head off the economic downturn of 2007-08.
- This failure led to the rise of the G20.
- In the short span of its existence, the G20 has provided a degree of confidence, by promoting open markets, and stimulus, preventing a collapse of the global financial system.
- The G7 also failed to address the contemporary issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, the challenge of the Daesh, and the crisis of state collapse in West Asia.
- It had announced its members would phase out all fossil fuels and subsidies, but has not so far announced any plan of action to do so.
- And their coal fired plants emit “twice more CO2 than those of the entire African continent”.
Turmoil in West Asia and failure of Europe to act
- Three of the G7 countries, France, Germany, and the U.K., were among the top 10 countries contributing volunteers to the ISIS.
- West Asia is in a greater state of turmoil than at any point of time since the fall of the Ottoman Empire.
- This turmoil has led to a migrants crisis.
- Migrant crisis persuaded many countries in Europe to renege on their western liberal values, making the Mediterranean Sea a death trap for people fleeing against fear of persecution and threat to their lives.
So, to deal with the unprecedented challenge, we need new institution
- The global economy has stalled and COVID-19 will inevitably create widespread distress.
- Nations need dexterity and resilience to cope with the current flux, as also a revival of multilateralism, for they have been seeking national solutions for problems that are unresolvable internally.
- Existing international institutions have proven themselves unequal to these tasks.
- A new mechanism might help in attenuating them.
- It would be ideal to include in it the seven future leading economies, plus Germany, Japan, the U.K., France, Mexico, Turkey, South Korea, and Australia.
- The 2005 ad hoc experiment by Prime Minister Tony Blair in bringing together the G7 and the BRICS countries was a one-off.
What should be the focus of this new institution?
- A new international mechanism will have value only if it focuses on key global issues.
- A related aspect is how to push for observing international law and preventing the retreat from liberal values on which public goods are predicated.
- Global public health and the revival of growth and trade in a sustainable way -that also reduces the inequalities among and within nations- would pose a huge challenge.
What should be India’s priority in new institution?
- India would be vitally interested in three: 1) international trade, 2) climate change, 3) the COVID-19 crisis.
- Second order priorities for India would be cross-cutting issues such as counter-terrorism and counter-proliferation.
- An immediate concern is to ensure effective implementation of the 1975 Biological Weapons Convention .
- And the prevention of any possible cheating by its state parties by the possible creation of new microorganisms or viruses by using recombinant technologies.
- On regional issues, establishing a modus vivendi with Iran would be important to ensure that it does not acquire nuclear weapons and is able to contribute to peace and stability in Afghanistan, the Gulf and West Asia.
- The end state in Afghanistan would also be of interest to India.
- And also the reduction of tensions in the Korean Peninsula and the South China Sea.
Consider the question “There has been a clamour for expanding G7 and India is being considered as one of the prospective candidates in the expanded group. In light of this examine the challenges and opportunities for India if it gets entry into the expanded group.”
Conclusion
The decaying influence in geopolitics and declining share in the world GDP calls for the formation of the new institution. IF and when that institution comes into being India should try to address its immediate concern with the help of new mechanism based on values.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Shyok river, Nubra Valley, Sassar la pass
Mains level: Read the attached story
In the reporting on the LAC stand-off, the Darbuk-Shyok-Daulat Beg Oldie (DSDBO) road has often appeared in news.
Practice questions for mains:
Q. Discuss how India’s all-weather border infrastructure has created new festering points for the Sino-Indian border skirmished.
Daulat Beg Oldie
- DBO is the northernmost corner of Indian Territory in Ladakh, in the area better known in Army parlance as Sub-Sector North.
- DBO has the world’s highest airstrip, originally built during the 1962 war but abandoned until 2008 when the Indian Air Force (IAF) revived it as one of its many Advanced Landing Grounds (ALGs) along the LAC.
The DSDBO Road
- DSDBO is an all-weather 255-km long road 255-km long built by India over nearly 20 years.
- Running almost parallel to the LAC, the DSDBO road, meandering through elevations ranging between 13,000 ft and 16,000 ft, took India’s Border Roads Organisation (BRO) almost two decades to construct.
- Its strategic importance is that it connects Leh to DBO, virtually at the base of the Karakoram Pass that separates China’s Xinjiang Autonomous Region from Ladakh.
A trigger for PLA incursions
- Of the possible triggers cited for the PLA targeting of Indian Territory along the LAC in eastern Ladakh, the construction of DSDBO all-weather road is possibly the most consequential.
- The Chinese build-up along the Galwan River valley region overlooks and hence poses a direct threat to the DSDBO road.
Significance of DSDBO Road
- The DSDBO highway provides the Indian military access to the section of the Tibet-Xinjaing highway that passes through Aksai Chin.
- The road runs almost parallel to the LAC at Aksai Chin, the eastern ear of erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir state that China occupied in the 1950s, leading to the 1962 war in which India came off worse.
- The DSDBO’s emergence seemingly panicked China, evidenced by the 2013 intrusion by the PLA into the nearby Depsang Plains, lasting nearly three weeks.
- DBO itself is less than 10 km west of the LAC at Aksai Chin. A military outpost was created in DBO in reaction to China’s occupation of Aksai Chin.
- It is at present manned by a combination of the Army’s Ladakh Scouts and the paramilitary Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP).
Other strategic considerations
- To the west of DBO is the region where China abuts Pakistan in the Gilgit-Baltistan area, once a part of the erstwhile Kashmir principality.
- This is also the critical region where China is currently constructing the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (PoK), to which India has objected.
- As well, this is the region where Pakistan ceded over 5,180 sq km of PoK to China in 1963 under a Sino-Pakistan Boundary Agreement, contested by India.
Also read:
https://www.civilsdaily.com/burning-issue-india-china-skirmish-in-ladakh/
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: GM crops, BT
Mains level: Issues over GM crops
In the current Kharif season, farmers would undertake mass sowing of GM seeds for maize, soybean, mustard brinjal and herbicide-tolerant (Ht) cotton, although these are not approved. Farmers had carried out a similar movement last year, too.
Practice question for mains:
Q. Indian agriculture is in a way, a victim of its own past success – especially the green revolution. Critically comment.
Genetically Modified (GM) seeds
- Conventional plant breeding involves crossing species of the same genus to provide the offspring with the desired traits of both parents.
- Genetic engineering aims to transcend the genus barrier by introducing an alien gene in the seeds to get the desired effects.
- The alien gene could be from a plant, an animal or even a soil bacterium.
What is the legal position of GM crops in India?
- In India, the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC) is the apex body that allows for the commercial release of GM crops.
- In 2002, the GEAC had allowed the commercial release of Bt cotton.
- More than 95 per cent of the country’s cotton area has since then come under Bt cotton.
- Use of the unapproved GM variant can attract a jail term of 5 years and a fine of Rs 1 lakh under the Environmental Protection Act,1989.
GM crops in India
- Bt cotton, the only GM crop that is allowed in India, has two alien genes from the soil bacterium Bacillus Thuringiensis (Bt) that allows the crop to develop a protein toxic to the common pest pink bollworm.
- Ht Bt, on the other, cotton is derived with the insertion of an additional gene, from another soil bacterium, which allows the plant to resist the common herbicide glyphosate.
- In Bt brinjal, a gene allows the plant to resist attacks of fruit and shoot borer.
Why are farmers rooting for GM crops?
- In the case of cotton, farmers cite the high cost of weeding, which goes down considerably if they grow Ht Bt cotton and use glyphosate against weeds.
- Brinjal growers in Haryana have rooted for Bt brinjal as it reduces the cost of production by cutting down on the use of pesticides.
- Industry estimates say that of the 4-4.5 crore packets (each weighing 400 gm) of cotton sold in the country, 50 lakh are of the unapproved Ht Bt cotton.
- Haryana has reported farmers growing Bt brinjal in pockets which had caused a major agitation there.
Why furore over GM crops?
- Environmentalists argue that the long-lasting effect of GM crops is yet to be studied and thus they should not be released commercially.
- The genetic modification brings about changes that can be harmful to humans in the long run.
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