Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- India-Myanmar relations
Context
The recent short visit to Myanmar by India’s Foreign Secretary had a clearly-etched mandate: to deepen cooperation with an important neighbour. His mission succeeded to a large extent, but challenges remain.
Background of the current political scenario in Myanmar
- Transition to democracy and derailment: Since the military coup on February 1, 2021, the international community has stayed divided on how to address the derailment of Myanmar’s transition to democracy.
- For a decade, the country’s system based on power-sharing between the military and elected representatives ran well enough.
- An overwhelming electoral victory of the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in November 2020, unnerved the military leadership.
- The Tatmadaw (Myanmar’s military) moved faster, seizing power in violation of the Constitution and putting down the Opposition with an iron hand.
- Global reaction: Global dismay was evident in the western sanctions, but others such as Russia saw the opportunity to strengthen ties with the new rulers.
- China took urgent steps to stabilise and expand cooperation with the military regime.
- The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) first showed creativity through its ‘Five-Point Consensus’ formula, but later its unity stood damaged once Myanmar’s top leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing refused to cooperate.
India’s position and bilateral concerns
- In Indian foreign Secretary Mr. Shringla visit he succeeded in holding substantive discussions with various stakeholders.
- India’s position: India’s position, as conveyed to Myanmar, is similar to and supportive of ASEAN: release of political prisoners; resolution of issues through dialogue; cessation of “all violence”; and full cooperation with ASEAN.
- Assistance for capacity building: In recent years, India has assisted Myanmar through capacity-building programmes for strengthening the transition to democracy.
- This assistance remains available, but it is not an offer of mediation by India in the military-NLD conflict.
- This burden will have to be borne by ASEAN.
- India’s concerns: India’s principal concerns pertaining to border security and stability in its neighbourhood were clearly conveyed, especially the noticeable escalation of activities of anti-India insurgent groups.
- Refugee issue: The second issue — the outcome of Myanmar’s instability — is that of refugees. Several thousands of Myanmar people have sought shelter in Mizoram.
- This will only be reversed by a political settlement in Myanmar, through dialogue.
- Economic cooperation: Economic cooperation has always been a major agenda item in all bilateral discussions with Myanmar.
- Central to this is India’s long-delayed commitment to “expeditious implementation” of mega initiatives such as the Trilateral Highway and Kaladan projects.
Way forward
- China is not the only friend: India continues to have high equity in Myanmar, which it must now carefully leverage.
- It is reflected in the special gesture made by Senior General Min Aung Hlaing to receive Mr. Shringla and hold detailed discussions in Yangon. This is unusual.
- The protocol departure for Mr. Shringla revealed current political realities which should be carefully factored in against the argument that China is the only friend Myanmar has.
- Leverage the gainst of the visit: India can leverage the gains of this visit and keep up the momentum by inviting Myanmar’s Foreign Minister at an appropriate time as well as other important stakeholders to India for deliberations with their counterparts here.
Conclusion
The single goal should be to put Myanmar back on the path of becoming “a stable, democratic and federal union.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Extending coverage to OP care
Context
Over the past two decades, initiatives announced to extend health care coverage to the indigent sections have come under criticism due to their near-exclusive focus on hospitalisation (inpatient, IP) care.
Significance of outpatient health care
- What is outpatient health care: Outpatient (OP) health care, mainly comprising doctor consultations, drugs, and tests, can be called ‘the elephant in the room’ of Indian public health care policy.
- OP expenses have the majority share in total out-of-pocket (OOP) expenditure on health.
Why do we need to extend OP care coverage?
- How IP care differs from OP care? IP care comprises high-impact and unavoidable episodes that are less prone to misuse than OP care, for which demand is considerably more sensitive to price and is thus more prone to overuse under health insurance.
- IP insurance prioritised: This logic, among other reasons, has led to IP insurance schemes being prioritised.
- [1] OP care and preventive care is neglected: While a price-sensitive demand for OP care entails that it could be misused under insurance, it also means that OP care is the first to come under the knife when there is no insurance.
- In India, where there are many public IP insurance schemes but no OP coverage, this incentive is further amplified.
- The mantra of ‘prevention is better than cure’ thus goes for a toss.
- [2] Against economic sense: It defies economic sense to prioritise IP care over OP care for public funds.
- Preventive and primary care services which often come with externalities, elicit little felt need and demand, and must therefore be the primary recipients of public investment.
- Not conducive to epidemiological profile: Greater investments in IP care today translate to even greater IP care investments in future, further reduction in primary care spending, and ultimately lesser ‘health’ for the money invested.
- None of these are conducive to the epidemiological profile that characterises this country.
Issues with using private commercial insurance to extend OP care coverage nationwide
- Some recent policy pronouncements by the Centre have conveyed an inclination to expand healthcare coverage with little fiscal implications for the government.
- Challenges:
- [1] The OP practices are under-regulated and there is a lack of standards.
- [2] The difficulty to monitor OP clinical and prescribing behaviours and the concomitant higher likelihood of malpractices.
- [3] Low public awareness of insurance products and a low ability to discern entitlements and exclusions.
- [4] Add to it the inexperience that a still under-developed private OP insurance sector brings.
- All these entail tremendous and largely wasteful costs and administrative complexity, and it would be of little help even if the government was to step in with considerable subsidies.
Suggestion
- Need for fiscal and time commitment: Significant improvements in healthcare are implausible without significant fiscal and time commitments.
- No perfect model: There is no ‘perfect’ model of expanding healthcare — the emphasis must be on finding the best fit.
- Implementing even such a best fit could involve adopting certain modalities with known drawbacks.
- Expand public spending: The focus must be on expanding public OP care facilities and services financed mainly by tax revenues.
- For India, wisdom immediately points to successful countries that are (or were, at one point) much closer to its socioeconomic fabric, such as Thailand, than countries like the U.S. which we currently look to emulate.
- Now, the sparse number and distribution of public facilities offers various modes of rationing care, and their expansion is likely to result in a considerable spike in demand.
- Contracting with private players: Contracting with private players based on objective and transparent criteria would also be called for, with just enough centralised supervision to deter corruption while preserving local autonomy.
- To deter supply-side malpractices, low-powered modes of provider payment, such as capitation, may be considered for private providers wherever possible.
Conclusion
There are several compelling reasons for extending outpatient health care coverage even though there are several challenges to overcome to achieve this.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Labour codes
Mains level: Labour reforms in India
India is likely to implement four new labour codes on wages, social security, industrial relations, and occupational safety by the next fiscal year beginning 2022.
Must read:
[Burning Issue] New Labour Laws
New Labour Codes
The four codes likely to be implemented in FY23 are:
- Code on Wages
- Industrial Relations Code
- Social Security Code, and
- Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code
Objectives of the Labour Code
- The new labor codes are aimed at facilitating ease of doing business in the country and seek to replace 29 cumbersome laws.
- The objective is to encompass over 500 million organized and unorganized sector workers—90% of the workforce which has been outside labour laws.
- The idea is to ensure that they receive wage security, social security and health security, gender equality in terms of remuneration, a minimum floor wage, make the lives of inter-state migrant workers easier.
What is the current status of the codes?
- The central government has completed the process of finalizing the draft rules, state governments are in the process of drafting the same.
- With labor being a concurrent subject, states are in the process of pre-publishing draft rules for these reforms.
How many labour laws do Indian states have?
- The simplification of 29 labour laws into the four labour codes is expected be a watershed moment for labour reforms.
- India currently has a web of multiple labour legislations, over 40 central laws and 100 state laws involving labour.
- The Second National Commission on Labour (2002) recommended simplification to bring about transparency and uniformity.
What are the major goals in these codes?
- Social security benefits: With organized sector workers being approximately 10% of the total workforce, the new codes may ensure that social security benefits are for all.
- Take-home salary: As per the proposed labour codes, total allowances such as house rent, leave, travel etc. are to be capped at 50% of the salary, while basic pay should account for the remaining 50%.
- Four days work: There could also be a permissible four-day work week of 12 hours per day.
How will it affect ease of doing business?
- Labour productivity: It is likely to improve with both employees and employers developing a sense of being partners in wealth creation.
- Labour reform: A transparent environment in terms of workers’ compensation, clear definition of employee rights and employer duties.
- Compliance un-burdening: Simplified labour codes making compliance easier are likely to attract investments.
- Formalization of the economy: With more workers in the organized sector, leakage in terms of direct as well as indirect taxes may be plugged.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Trincomalee oil field
Mains level: Indian infrastructure projects in SL
After a year of negotiations, Sri Lanka will ink the deal with India to jointly develop the Trincomalee oil tank farms — a coveted project that has remained controversial for decades.
About Trincomalee oil field
- The facility, built by the British around World War II as a refueling station, has 99 storage tanks that look like giant wells.
- They have a capacity of 12,000 kilolitres each.
- Eighty-four of those are in the 800-acre Upper Tank Farm (UTF). For a good part of a century now, these tanks have remained unused, shrouded in a forest.
- The Lower Tank Farm (LTF) has 16 tanks, spread across 50 acres.
Historical background
- Trincomalee harbor is the second deepest natural harbor in the world.
- The British who were in control of the island decided to make this as their primary logistics station in the east after World War I.
- It is also a lesser-known but important logistic station during World War II.
- British started the oil storage project in 1924 and completed in late 1930s.
- After that it was abandoned by the British in 1948 when Sri Lanka gained independence.
- In 2002, the development of this tank farm was revived by an Indian company Indian Oil Corporation (IOC).
History of India’s interest in Trincomalee
- The development of the Trincomalee Oil Tank farm has been a recurring talking point in Indo-Lanka relations since 1987.
- It was first mentioned in the Indo- Lanka Accord signed by PM Rajiv Gandhi and President Jayewardene.
- Despite that, nothing really took off until 2003, when Indian Oil Corporation set up Lanka IOC, its Sri Lankan subsidiary.
- The agreement remained dormant for years, until the Sirisena- Wickremesinghe administration tried revisiting it through the 2017 MoU.
Significance of Trincomalee
- Demography: Trincomalee is home to 3.7 lakh Muslim, Tamil and Sinhala people and Trincomalee, in Sri Lanka’s post-war years.
- Tourism: It has emerged as a favorite destination for surfers from around the world, gradually transforming with plush resorts and restaurants dotting its coast.
- Important sea route: Trincomalee remains in spotlight as a potential transit point for international trade routes, particularly drawing India which has known strategic interests there.
- Balancing China: From India’s geostrategic viewpoint, Trincomalee is an important counterbalance to the southern Hambantota Port backed substantially by China.
Hurdles to the Project
- Public resistance: India-backed projects in Sri Lanka tend to draw way more public resistance from nationalists among the majority Sinhalese constituency than projects with Chinese or American involvement.
- Anti-India sentiments: Observers in Sri Lanka attribute this to the “baggage” that Indian diplomacy carries, years after its intervention during different stages of Sri Lanka’s civil war.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: E-Shram Portal
Mains level: Welfare of the unorganized workers
Every third informal sector worker in India is now registered on the e-Shram portal with registration on the portal crossing the 14 crore mark in four months.
About E-Shram Portal
- The Ministry of Labour and Employment has launched the E-Shram Portal for creating a National Database of Unorganized Workers (NDUW) this year.
- The E-Shram portal will cover all unorganised workers of the nation and help link them to social security schemes of the Government of India.
- Aadhaar with mobile number linked is mandatory for the registration.
Category of unorganized workers covered:
- Construction Worker
- Migrant Worker
- Gig & Platform Worker
- Street Vendor Worker
- Agriculture Worker
- Others
Broad objectives of this portal
- Creation of a centralized database of all unorganized workers (UWs)
- To improve the implementation efficiency of the social security services for the unorganized workers
- Integration of Social Security Schemes meant for UWs being administered by MoLE and subsequently, those run by other ministries as well
- Portability of the social security and welfare benefits to the migrant and construction workers
- Providing a comprehensive database to Central and State Governments for tackling any National Crises like COVID-19 in future
Benefits of registration
- Under the scheme, Rs 2.0 Lakh Accidental Insurance cover will be provided to every registered (on E-Shram portal) unorganized worker.
- Every registered unorganized worker shall be issued an E- Shram card with a unique Universal Account Number (UAN).
- He/She will be able to access the benefits of the various social security schemes through this Card anywhere anytime.
Who can register on this Portal?
Any individual satisfying the following conditions can register on the portal:
- An unorganized worker (UW).
- Age should be between 16-59 years.
- Not a member of EPFO/ESIC or NPS (Govt. funded)
What is required for registration?
Following is required to register on the portal:
- Aadhaar Number
- Mobile number linked with Aadhaar.
- Savings Bank Account Number with IFSC code
Registrations done so far
- The latest data of the portal shows that the top five States in terms of number of registrations on e-Shram are U.P., West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha and Jharkhand.
- Gender analysis of the data shows that 52.56% are female while 47.44% are male.
- The data show that 42.64% of the registered workers are other backward classes (OBC) followed by 26.45% from general category, 22.54% from the scheduled caste and 8.38% from the Scheduled Tribe.
- It also show that over 94% registered workers’ income is ₹10,000 per month or below while over 4% have income in the rage of ₹10,000 to ₹15,000 per month.
- About 51% workers are farm laborers, 11% in construction, 10% in domestic and household work and 6.5% in the apparel segment.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: GGI
Mains level: Not Much
The Centre has released the Good Governance Index 2021 prepared by DARPG (Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances) on Good Governance Day.
Try this question from CS Mains 2016:
Q. What do you understand by the terms ‘governance’, ‘good governance’ and ‘ethical governance’?
What do you mean by Good Governance?
- It is the process of measuring how public institution conduct public affairs and manage public resources and guarantee the realization of human rights in a manner essentially free of abuse and corruption and with due regard for the rule of law.
12 Principles of Good Governance:
- Participation, Representation, Fair Conduct of Elections
- Responsiveness
- Efficiency and Effectiveness
- Openness and Transparency
- Rule of Law
- Ethical Conduct
- Competence and Capacity
- Innovation and Openness to Change
- Sustainability and Long-term Orientation
- Sound Financial Management
- Human rights, Cultural Diversity and Social Cohesion
- Accountability
About Good Governance Index (GGI)
- The GGI is a uniform tool across States to assess the Status of Governance and the impact of various interventions taken up by the State Government and UTs.
- The objectives are:
- To provide quantifiable data to compare the state of governance in all states and UTs, enable states and UTs
- To formulate and implement suitable strategies for improving governance and shift to result-oriented approaches and administration
Components of GGI
- GGI 2021 Framework covered ten sectors and 58 indicators.
- These ten Governance Sectors are measured on total 50 indicators:
- Agriculture and Allied Sectors
- Commerce & Industries
- Human Resource Development
- Public Health
- Public Infrastructure & Utilities
- Economic Governance
- Social Welfare & Development
- Judicial & Public Security
- Environment
- Citizen-Centric Governance
Categorization of States and UTs
The GGI 2020-21 categorizes States and UTs into four categories, i.e.
- Other States – Group A
- Other States – Group B
- North-East and Hill States and
- Union Territories
Top performers in 2021
- Gujarat, Maharashtra and Goa top the composite rank score covering 10 sectors.
- GGI 2021 says that Gujarat registered 12.3 percent increase and Goa registered 24.7 percent increase over GGI 2019 indicators.
- Rajasthan has topped the Other States (Group B) category in Judiciary and Public Safety, Environment & Citizen Centric Governance.
- GGI 2021 says that in the North-East and Hill States category, Mizoram and Jammu and Kashmir have registered an overall increase of 10.4% and 3.7% respectively over GGI 2019.
- In the UTs category, Delhi tops the composite rank registering a 14 percent increase over the GGI 2019 indicators.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Magnetars
Mains level: Not Much
An international group of researchers has succeeded in measuring for the first time the characteristics of a flare on a distant magnetar.
What is a Magnetar?
- Magnetars are the most magnetic stars in the universe.
- It is a rare compact type of neutron star teeming with energy and magnetism.
- It is an exotic type of neutron star, its defining feature that it has an ultra-powerful magnetic field.
- The field is about 1,000 times stronger than a normal neutron star and about a trillion times stronger than the Earth’s.
- Magnetars are relatively rare objects, with only about thirty having been spotted within the Milky Way so far.
What is the recent study?
- The studied magnetar is about 13 million light years away, in the direction of the NGC 253, a prominent galaxy in the Sculptor group of galaxies.
- Its flare spewed within a few tenths of a second as much energy as the Sun would shed in 100,000 years.
- It was captured accidentally on April 15, 2020, by the Atmosphere-Space Interactions Monitor instrument (ASIM) of the International Space Station.
- This is the first study to characterize such a flare from so distant a magnetar.
How do magnetars form?
- During the course of their evolution, massive stars – with masses around 10-25 times the mass of the Sun – eventually collapse and shrink to form very compact objects called neutron stars.
- A subset of these neutron stars is the so-called magnetars which possess intense magnetic fields.
- These are highly dense and have breathtakingly high rotation speeds – they have rotational periods that can be just 0.3 to 12.0 seconds.
What characterizes Magnetars?
(1) Violent flares
- The observed giant flare lasted approximately 160 milliseconds and during this time 1039 joules of energy was released.
- The flare spewed as much energy in a tenth of a second that our Sun will radiate in 100,000 years.
(2) Starquakes
- Eruptions in magnetars are believed to be due to instabilities in their magnetosphere, or “starquakes” produced in their crust – a rigid, elastic layer about one kilometer thick.
- This causes waves in the magnetosphere, and interaction between these waves causes dissipation of energy.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Desmond Tutu
Mains level: Anti-apartheid struggle in Africa
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and veteran of South Africa’s struggle against white minority rule has died on December 26 at the age of 90.
Try this question from CS Mains 2016:
Q. The anti-colonial struggles in West Africa were led by the new elite of Western-educated Africans. Examine.
Desmond Tutu (1931- 2021)
- Tutu was a South African Anglican cleric who in 1984 received the Nobel Prize for Peace for his role in the opposition to apartheid in South Africa.
- A decade later, he witnessed the ends of that regime and he chaired a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, set up to unearth atrocities committed during those dark days.
- He was considered the nation’s conscience by both, the black majority and the white minority, an enduring testament to his faith and spirit of reconciliation in a divided nation.
His notable works
- During South Africa’s moves toward democracy in the early 1990s, Tutu propagated the idea of South Africa as “the Rainbow Nation”.
- The term was intended to encapsulate the unity of multi-culturalism and the coming together of people of many different nations, in a country once identified with the strict division of white and black under the Apartheid regime.
- In 1995 South African Pres. Nelson Mandela appointed Tutu head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which investigated allegations of human rights abuses during the apartheid era.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Tai Khamti Rebellion
Mains level: Various tribal uprisings in India
The Arunachal Pradesh Deputy CM urged the Centre to recognize the Tai Khamti-British war as India’s first for independence.
Tai Khamti Rebellion
- The Tai Khamti Rebellion is the first such war took place in 1839 between the Tai Khamti people and the British.
- The theatre of this war was some 2,400 km east of Meerut in Uttar Pradesh where the mutiny began.
- Tai Khamtis resisted colonization by the British. Some 80 British soldiers, including Col. Adam White, were killed in the resultant conflict.
Who are the Tai Khamti people?
- The Tai Khamti people, who follow Theravada Buddhism, number a little more than 1,00,000 today and live in areas straddling Arunachal Pradesh and Assam.
Other revolts in Arunachal
- Arunachal Deputy CM also batted for recognition of battles between other communities of Arunachal Pradesh and the British.
- They include a series of Anglo-Abor wars from 1858 to 1911 and the Wancho-British war in Tirap district’s Ninu in 1875.
- The Abors, now called Adis, inhabit central Arunachal Pradesh, while the Wanchos live in the southern part of the State.
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