Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: BaaS
Mains level: Batter Swapping
The NITI Aayog has released a draft battery-swapping policy targeted at electric two- and three-wheelers as the government think tank aims to expedite large-scale adoption of EVs.
What is Battery Swapping?
- Battery swapping is a mechanism that involves exchanging discharged batteries for charged ones.
- This provides the flexibility to charge these batteries separately by de-linking charging and battery usage, and keeps the vehicle in operational mode with negligible downtime.
- Battery swapping is generally used for smaller vehicles such as two-wheelers and three-wheelers with smaller batteries that are easier to swap, compared to four-wheelers and e-buses, although solutions are emerging for these larger segments as well.
What is BaaS?
- Battery-as-a-service (BaaS) is seen as a viable charging alternative.
- Manufacturers can sell EVs in two forms: Vehicles with fixed or removable batteries and vehicles with batteries on lease.
- If you buy an electric scooter with battery leasing, you do not pay for the cost of the battery—that makes the initial acquisition almost 40% cheaper.
- Users can swap drained batteries for a fully charged one at a swap station. The depleted batteries are then charged on or off-site.
- The advantages of swapping include low downtimes for commercial fleets, reduced space requirements, and lower upfront costs.
- It is also a viable solution for those who don’t have parking spots at home.
Draft Battery Swapping Policy: Key Proposals
- Rationalizing taxes on battery: The draft policy has suggested that the GST Council consider reducing the differential across the tax rates on Lithium-ion batteries and electric vehicle supply equipment. Currently, the tax rate on the former is 18 per cent, and 5 per cent on the latter.
- Incentivization for swapping enabled vehicles: The policy also proposes to offer the same incentives available to electric vehicles that come pre-equipped with a fixed battery to electric vehicles with swappable batteries. The size of the incentive could be determined based on the kWh (kilowatt hour) rating of the battery and compatible EV.
- Terms of contracts for battery providers: The government will specify a minimum contract duration for a contract to be signed between EV users and battery providers to ensure they continue to provide battery swapping services after receiving the subsidy.
- Public battery charging stations: The policy also requires state governments to ensure public battery charging stations are eligible for EV power connections with concessional tariffs. It also proposes to install battery swapping stations at several locations like retail fuel outlets, public parking areas, malls, kirana shops and general stores etc.
- Tariff rationalization: It also proposes to bring such stations under existing or future time-of-day (ToD) tariff regimes, so that the swappable batteries can be charged during off-peak periods when electricity tariffs are low.
- Registration ease: Transport Departments and State Transport Authorities will be responsible for easing registration processes for vehicles sold without batteries or for vehicles with battery swapping functionality.
- Unique identification number (UIN): The policy also proposes to assign a UIN to swappable batteries at the manufacturing stage to help track and monitor them. Similarly, a UIN number will be assigned to each battery swapping station.
- Locations: The NITI Aayog has proposed that all metropolitan cities with a population of more than 40 lakh will be prioritized for the development of battery swapping networks under the first phase, which is within 1-2 years of the draft policy getting finalized.
Why hasn’t BaaS taken off yet?
- Hefty taxes: There are economic and operational constraints. Energy service providers offering swapping solutions have to charge 18% goods and services tax (GST) for swapping, compared to 5% GST on the purchase of an EV.
- No incentives yet: Additionally, the government’s FAME-II incentives are not offered to vehicles sold with BaaS or swap station operators.
- Lack of interoperability infrastructure: While these are economic disadvantages compared to direct charging solutions, the lack of a dense and interoperable battery swap infrastructure has also hindered the roll-out.
Does the draft policy talk about EV safety?
- To ensure a high level of protection at the electrical interface, a rigorous testing protocol will be adopted, the draft said, to avoid any unwanted temperature rise at the electrical interface.
- The battery management system, which is a software that controls battery functions, will have to be self-certified and open for testing to check its compatibility with various systems, and capability to meet safety requirements.
- This particularly assumes significance given the recent incidents of electric two-wheelers bursting into flames.
Issues with BaaS
- Standardization of specifications: There is a need for standardization of safety specifications as well as the battery.
- Safety hazard: Swapping in the various permutations and combinations of batteries at a station where they have not been tested for compatibility could lead to safety hazards.
- Non-competitive nature: Also, mandating only one type of battery to be eligible for concessions would be disadvantageous to many players.
Significance of battery swapping
- High Cost of EVs: An EV, by industry standards, is 1.5-2x costlier than IC Engine counterpart and at least half the cost is from the battery pack.
- Cost reduction: Many manufacturers are offering batteries separately from a vehicle, reducing the cost. In that case, a fleet owner can buy vehicles without battery and utilize battery swapping.
- Range Anxiety: Another major reason stopping people from buying EVs is range anxiety, or in simple terms, the fear of battery getting empty without finding a charging station.
- Inadequate charging infrastructure: Unlike petrol pumps, EV charging stations are rare to spot and that further increases the range anxiety exponentially, especially while going on a road trip.
- Hazard management: In case of a Swapping Station, one can simply locate a station, go and replace the empty battery with a new one.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: DSA
Mains level: India's IT Rules 2021
The European Parliament and European Union (EU) Member States announced that they had reached a political agreement on the Digital Services Act (DSA).
What is DSA?
- DSA is a landmark legislation to force big Internet companies to act against disinformation and illegal and harmful content, and to “provide better protection for Internet users and their fundamental rights”.
- The Act, which is yet to become law, was proposed by the EU Commission (anti-trust) in December 2020.
- As defined by the EU Commission, the DSA is “a set of common rules on intermediaries’ obligations and accountability across the single market”.
- It seeks to ensure higher protection to all EU users, irrespective of their country.
- The proposed Act will work in conjunction with the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), which was approved last month.
Whom will the DSA apply?
- Intermediaries: The DSA will tightly regulate the way intermediaries, especially large platforms such as Google, Facebook, and YouTube, function when it comes to moderating user content.
- Abusive or illegal content: Instead of letting platforms decide how to deal with abusive or illegal content, the DSA will lay down specific rules and obligations for these companies to follow.
- Ambit platforms: The legislation brings in its ambit platforms that provide Internet access, domain name registrars, hosting services such as cloud computing and web-hosting services.
- Very large platforms: But more importantly, very large online platforms (VLOPs) and very large online search engines (VLOSEs) will face “more stringent requirements.”
- 45 million monthly users-base: Any service with more than 45 million monthly active users in the EU will fall into this category. Those with under 45 million monthly active users in the EU will be exempt from certain new obligations.
Key features
A wide range of proposals seeks to ensure that the negative social impact arising from many of the practices followed by the Internet giants is minimised or removed:
- Faster removal of illicit content: Online platforms and intermediaries such as Facebook, Google, YouTube, etc will have to add “new procedures for faster removal” of content deemed illegal or harmful. This can vary according to the laws of each EU Member State.
- Introduction of Trusted Flaggers: Users will be able to challenge these takedowns as well. Platforms will need to have a clear mechanism to help users flag content that is illegal. Platforms will have to cooperate with “trusted flaggers”.
- Imposition of duty of care: Marketplaces such as Amazon will have to “impose a duty of care” on sellers who are using their platform to sell products online. They will have to “collect and display information on the products and services sold in order to ensure that consumers are properly informed.”
- Annual audit of big platforms: The DSA adds an obligation for very large digital platforms and services to analyse systemic risks they create and to carry out risk reduction analysis. This audit for platforms like Google and Facebook will need to take place every year.
- Promoting independent research: The Act proposes to allow independent vetted researchers to have access to public data from these platforms to carry out studies to understand these risks better.
- Ban ‘Dark Patterns’ or “misleading interfaces: The DSA proposes to ban ‘Dark Patterns’ or “misleading interfaces” that are designed to trick users into doing something that they would not agree to otherwise.
- Transparency of Algorithms: It also proposes “transparency measures for online platforms on a variety of issues, including on the algorithms used for recommending content or products to users”.
- Easy cancellation of subscription: Finally, it says that cancelling a subscription should be as easy as subscribing.
- Protection of minors: The law proposes stronger protection for minors, and aims to ban targeted advertising for them based on their personal data.
- Crisis mechanism clause: This clause will make it “possible to analyse the impact of the activities of these platforms” on the crisis, and the Commission will decide the appropriate steps to be taken to ensure the fundamental rights of users are not violated.
- Others: Companies will have to look at the risk of “dissemination of illegal content”, “adverse effects on fundamental rights”, “manipulation of services having an impact on democratic processes and public security”, “adverse effects on gender-based violence, and on minors and serious consequences for the physical or mental health of users.”
Bar over Social Media
- It has been clarified that the platforms and other intermediaries will not be liable for the unlawful behaviour of users.
- So, they still have ‘safe harbour’ in some sense.
- However, if the platforms are “aware of illegal acts and fail to remove them, they will be liable for this user behaviour.
- Small platforms, which remove any illegal content they detect, will not be liable.
Are there any such rules in India?
- India last year brought the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.
- These rules make the social media intermediary and its executives liable if the company fails to carry out due diligence.
- Rule 4 (a) states that significant social media intermediaries — such as Facebook or Google — must appoint a chief compliance officer (CCO), who could be booked if a tweet or post that violates local laws is not removed within the stipulated period.
- India’s Rules also introduce the need to publish a monthly compliance report.
- They include a clause on the need to trace the originator of a message — this provision has been challenged by WhatsApp in the Delhi High Court.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: National Edible Oil Mission-Oil Palm (NEOM-OP)
Mains level: India's import dependece for edible oils
The abrupt ban on palm oil exports by Indonesia, its biggest exporter, is expected to rock household economics globally.
Indonesia curbs palm oil export
- Indonesia has clamped down on exports starting 28 April primarily because of soaring inflation in the country.
- This is not the first time the South East Asian country decided to arrest local prices by banning exports—it had announced limited curbs in January too.
- However, brokerages suggest that the ban will probably be a temporary measure of two to three weeks, as Indonesia cannot afford to lose out on exports for long.
- Indonesia’s president Joko Widodo has stated that he would ensure that the availability of cooking oil in the domestic market becomes “abundant and affordable”.
How will this ban affect India?
- Palm oil is among the world’s most-used cooking oils, and India’s dependence on Indonesia is expected to deal a supply-side shock.
- The export ban could send food inflation soaring as India is the largest importer of palm oil from Indonesia.
- It imports about 8 million tonnes of palm oil annually; the commodity accounts for nearly 40% share of India’s overall edible oil consumption basket.
- Edible oil prices could surge as much as 100-200% in India if the government fails to find a new source of palm oil.
- Cooking oil prices are already at record levels as the Ukraine war disrupted shipments of sunflower oil.
- Prior to the war, the Black Sea region made up over 75% of global sunflower oil exports.
How could it impact packaged goods firms?
- Since palm oil and its derivatives are used in the production of several household goods, the impact of the ban could eat into the margins of Indian packaged consumer goods players.
- Analysts said listed firms such as Hindustan Unilever Ltd, Godrej Consumer Products Ltd, Britannia Industries Ltd, and Nestle SA could feel the impact of the ban in the near term.
What are India’s import options?
- India is most likely to turn to Malaysia, the second-biggest palm oil exporter, to plug the gap.
- But Malaysia is also facing a labour shortage owing to the pandemic which has resulted in a production shortfall.
- Hence Malaysia is unlikely to be able to plug the gap.
- Also the bilateral ties have soured since few years due to unwarranted comments by its former PM Mahathir Mohammed on Kashmir.
- India could also explore importing from Thailand and Africa—they produce three million tonnes each.
How can India mitigate the impact of the ban?
- Palm oil prices rose by nearly 5% over the weekend after the announcement of the export ban. Finding an immediate solution is going to be a challenge.
- Even if India manages to find an alternative source, prices will be high as a major exporter is now out of the calculation.
- The industry expects India to engage with Indonesia on an urgent basis, before the ban comes into effect on 28 April.
- Besides, the Centre is likely to negotiate with other oil-supplying nations in Latin America and Canada.
Back2Basics:
National Edible Oil Mission (OP)
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Assam's border disputes with its each neighbours
Less than a month after the Union government gave the seal of approval to an agreement to partially resolve the disputed sectors on the Assam-Meghalaya border, Arunachal Pradesh CM and his Assam counterpart decided to form district-level committees for settling their inter-state boundary disputes.
Arunachal-Assam Boundary Dispute
- Assam has had boundary disputes with all the north-eastern states that were carved out of it.
- While Nagaland became a State in 1963, Meghalaya first became an Autonomous State in 1970 and a full-fledged State in 1972.
- Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram were separated from Assam as Union Territories in 1972 and as States in 1987.
- None of the new States accepted the “constitutional boundary” that they said was dictated by the partisan administration of undivided Assam without consulting the tribal stakeholders.
- They also claimed that the disputed areas were traditionally under the control of tribal chieftains before Assam, post-India’s independence, inherited the “imaginary boundaries” drawn during British rule.
- The issue with Arunachal Pradesh has more to do with a 1951 report prepared by a sub-committee headed by Assam’s first Chief Minister, Gopinath Bordoloi.
Genesis of the dispute
- Arunachal Pradesh and Assam have disputes at about 1,200 points along their 804 km boundary.
- The disputes cropped up in the 1970s and intensified in the 1990s with frequent flare-ups along the border.
- However, the issue dates back to 1873 when the British government introduced the inner-line permit vaguely separating the plains from the frontier hills.
- This area became the North-East Frontier Agency (NEFA) in 1954, three years after a notification based on the 1951 report saw 3,648 sq. km of the “plain” area of Balipara and Sadiya foothills being transferred to the Darrang and Lakhimpur districts of Assam.
- Arunachal has been celebrating its statehood with an eye on China since 1987, but what has been causing resentment is the inability of the people living in the transferred patches.
- Leaders in Arunachal Pradesh claim the transfer was done arbitrarily without consulting its tribes who had customary rights over these lands.
- Their counterparts in Assam say the 1951 demarcation is constitutional and legal.
Earlier attempts for resolving dispute
- There were several efforts to demarcate the boundary between Assam and NEFA/Arunachal Pradesh between 1971 and 1974.
- To end the stalemate, a high-powered tripartite committee involving the Centre and the two States was formed in April 1979 to delineate the boundary based on Survey of India maps.
- About 489 km of the inter-state boundary north of the Brahmaputra River was demarcated by 1984, but Arunachal did not accept the recommendations and staked claim to much of the areas transferred in 1951.
- Assam objected and approached the Supreme Court in 1989, accusing Arunachal Pradesh of “encroachment”.
- The apex court-appointed a local boundary commission in 2006 headed by one of its retired judges.
- In its September 2014 report, this commission recommended that Arunachal Pradesh should get back some of the areas transferred in 1951. However, this did not work out.
Way forward
- Following the model adopted in the exercise to resolve the dispute with Meghalaya, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh have agreed to form district-level committees.
- They will be tasked with undertaking joint surveys in the disputed sectors to find tangible solutions to the long-pending issue based on historical perspective, ethnicity, contiguity, people’s will and administrative convenience.
- The two States have decided to form 12 such committees involving the districts sharing the boundary. Assam has eight districts touching the boundary with Arunachal Pradesh, which has 12 such districts.
Conclusion
- The Assam-Meghalaya boundary agreement has raised hopes of the Assam-Arunachal boundary dispute being resolved.
- This is especially in light of egging the north-eastern States to end their territorial issues once and for all by August 15, 2022, when the country celebrates 75 years of independence.
- Moreover, there is a general belief that the region’s sister-States are in a better position to fast-track the resolution since they are ruled by the present regime with the same dispensation at the Centre.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Chancellor, Vice Chancellor, Article 254
Mains level: Issues with role of Governor
The Tamil Nadu Assembly has adopted two Bills that seek to empower the government to appoint Vice-Chancellors (VCs) to 13 State universities under the aegis of the Higher Education Department by amending the respective Acts.
Role of Governors in State Universities
- In most cases, the Governor of the state is the ex-officio chancellor of the universities in that state.
- Its powers and functions as the Chancellor are laid out in the statutes that govern the universities under a particular state government.
- Their role in appointing the Vice-Chancellors has often triggered disputes with the political executive.
Who is a Chancellor of a University?
- In India, almost all universities have a chancellor as their titular head whose function is largely ceremonial.
- The governor of the state, appointed as the union’s representative of state by the president, is the honorary chancellor of all State owned universities.
- The de facto head of any government university is the vice-chancellor.
- In private non-profit universities, normally the head of the foundation who has established the university is the chancellor of the university and is the head of the university.
What about Central Universities?
- Under the Central Universities Act, 2009, and other statutes, the President of India shall be the Visitor of a central university.
- With their role limited to presiding over convocations, Chancellors in central universities are titular heads, who are appointed by the President in his capacity as Visitor.
- The VCs too are appointed by the Visitor from panels of names picked by search and selection committees formed by the Union government.
- The Act adds that the President, as Visitor, shall have the right to authorize inspections of academic and non-academic aspects of the universities and also to institute inquiries.
What are the highlights of the TN Bills?
- The Bills passed in Tamil Nadu stress that “every appointment of the Vice-Chancellor shall be made by the Government from out of a panel of three names” recommended by a search-cum-selection committee.
- Currently, the Governor, in his capacity as the Chancellor of state universities, has the power to pick a VC from the shortlisted names.
- The Bills also seek to empower the state government to have the final word on the removal of VCs, if needed.
- Removal will be carried out based on inquiries by a retired High Court judge or a bureaucrat who has served at least as a Chief Secretary, according to one of the Bills.
Are other states trying to curtail the Governor’s role in appointing VCs?
- In December, the Maharashtra Assembly passed a Bill amending the Maharashtra Public Universities Act, 2016.
- Under the original Act, the Maharashtra government had no say in the appointment of VCs.
- If the changes take effect, the Governor will be given two names to choose from by the state government.
- In 2019, the West Bengal government took away the Governor’s authority in appointing VCs to state universities.
- It has also hinted at removing the Governor as the Chancellor of the universities.
- But all such motives have been challenged by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
What is at the root of the differences?
- In West Bengal, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, the elected governments have repeatedly accused the Governors of acting at the behest of the Centre on various subjects, including education.
- The regulations, which differ from state to state, are often open to interpretation and disputes are routine.
- In fact, the TN Bills make a case for giving the state government the upper hand in the VC appointment process by citing the examples of Gujarat and Telangana.
- In Karnataka, Jharkhand and Rajasthan, state laws underline the need for concurrence between the state and the Governor.
- The terms “concurrence” or “consultation” are absent from state legislation in most cases.
What is the UGC’s role in this?
- Education comes under the Concurrent List.
- But entry 66 of the Union List states — “coordination and determination of standards in institutions for higher education or research and scientific and technical institutions”.
- This gives the Centre substantial authority over higher education.
- The UGC plays that standard-setting role, even in the case of appointments in universities and colleges.
- According to the UGC Regulations, 2018, the “Visitor/Chancellor” — mostly the Governor in states — shall appoint the VC out of the panel of names recommended by search-cum-selection committees.
- Higher educational institutions, particularly those that get UGC funds, are mandated to follow its regulations.
- These are usually followed without friction in the case of central universities, but are sometimes resisted by the states in the case of state universities.
Judicial observations in this regard
- A Bench of Justices M R Shah and B V Nagarathna said “any appointment as a VC contrary to the provisions of the UGC Regulations can be said to be in violation of the statutory provisions, warranting a writ of quo warranto”.
- It said every subordinate legislation of the UGC, in this case the one on minimum standards on appointments, flows from the parent UGC Act, 1956.
- Therefore, being a subordinate legislation, UGC Regulations become part of the Act.
- In case of any conflict between state legislation and central legislation, central legislation shall prevail by applying the rule/principle of repugnancy as enunciated in Article 254 of the Constitution.
- It reiterated that the subject ‘education’ is in the Concurrent List of the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: India's defence exports, Atmanirbharta in defence
World military spending continued to grow in 2021, reaching a record $2.1 trillion despite the economic fallout of the pandemic, according to new data on global military spending published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
Top defence spenders in 2021
- The five largest spenders in 2021 were the U.S., China, India, the U.K. and Russia, together accounting for 62% of expenditure.
- The U.S. and China alone accounted for 52%.
India’s defence expenditure
- India’s military spending of $76.6 billion ranked third highest in the world.
- This was up by 0.9% from 2020 and by 33% from 2012.
- Amid ongoing tensions and border disputes with China and Pakistan that occasionally spill over into armed clashes, India has prioritised the modernisation of its armed forces and self-reliance in arms production, the report said.
What about Russia and Ukraine?
- Russia increased its military expenditure by 2.9% in 2021, to $65.9 billion, at a time when it was building up its forces along the Ukrainian border.
- On Ukraine, the report remarked that as it had strengthened its defences against Russia, its military spending “has risen by 72% since the annexation of Crimea in 2014”.
- Spending fell in 2021, to $5.9 billion, but still accounted for 3.2% of the country’s GDP.
Also read-
[Sansad TV] Perspective: Self-Reliance in Defence
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Kuril Islands
Mains level: Not Much
Japan has recently described the Kuril Islands (which Japan calls the Northern Territories and Russia as the South Kurils) as being under Russia’s “illegal occupation”.
Note the Islands of Japan in North to South Direction: Hokkaido, Honshu , Shikoku, and Kyushu
What are the Kuril Islands/ Northern Territories?
- These are a set of four islands situated between the Sea of Okhotsk and the Pacific Ocean near the north of Japan’s northernmost prefecture, Hokkaido.
- Both Moscow and Tokyo claim sovereignty over them though the islands have been under Russian control since the end of World War II.
- The Soviet Union had seized the islands at the end of World War II and by 1949 had expelled its Japanese residents.
- Tokyo claims that the disputed islands have been part of Japan since the early 19th century.
Why in news?
- This is the first time in about two decades that Japan has used this phrase to describe the dispute over the Kuril Islands.
- Japan had been using softer language since 2003, saying that the dispute over the islands was the greatest concern in Russia-Japan bilateral ties.
What lies behind the dispute?
- Japan’s sovereignty over the islands is confirmed by several treaties since 1855.
- Russia, on the other hand, claims the Yalta Agreement (1945) and the Potsdam Declaration (1945) as proof of its sovereignty.
- It argues that the San Francisco Treaty of 1951 is legal evidence that Japan had acknowledged Russian sovereignty over the islands.
- Under Article 2 of the treaty, Japan had “renounced all right, title and claim to the Kuril Islands.”
- However, Japan argues that the San Francisco Treaty cannot be used here as the Soviet Union never signed the peace treaty.
Continuing the WW2
- In fact, Japan and Russia are technically still at war because they have not signed a peace treaty after World War II.
- In 1956, during Japanese PM Ichiro Hatoyama’s visit to the Soviet Union, it was suggested that two of the four islands would be returned to Japan once a peace treaty was signed.
- However, persisting differences prevented the signing of a peace treaty though the two countries signed the Japan-Soviet Joint Declaration, which restored diplomatic relations between the two nations.
- The Soviet Union later hardened its position, even refusing to recognise that a territorial dispute existed with Japan.
- It was only in 1991 during Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit to Japan that the USSR recognised that the islands were the subject of a territorial dispute.
Have there been attempts at resolution?
- Since 1991, there have been many attempts to resolve the dispute and sign a peace treaty.
- The most recent attempt was under PM Shinzo Abe when joint economic development of the disputed islands was explored.
- In fact, both countries had agreed to have bilateral negotiations based on the 1956 Japan-Soviet Joint Declaration.
- Russia was even willing to give back two islands, the Shikotan Island and the Habomai islets, to Japan after the conclusion of a peace treaty as per the 1956 declaration.
- Japan’s attempt to improve ties with Russia was driven by its need to diversify energy sources and Russia by its need to diversify its basket of buyers and bring in foreign investments.
- But nationalist sentiments on both sides prevented resolution of the dispute.
Implications for Japan
- Soon after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Japan made its unhappiness with Russia clear.
- Japan has been among the most steadfast of Western allies in denouncing Russian aggression and punishing it with sanctions.
- Japan has probably been spurred by its fears of a Russia-China alliance as Japan itself has territorial disputes and an uneasy history with China.
- Secondly, Japan might have felt that this is a good opportunity to further isolate Russia and paint it as a “habitual offender” of international law.
- Finally, Tokyo might have been prompted to take this position as it feels that the invasion of Ukraine proves that getting back the Kuril Islands is a lost cause.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Covid-19 mortality data
Context
Over the last year, the World Health Organization (WHO) has been busy, in an unprecedented effort, to calculate the global death toll from COVID-19.
Revision of Covid-19 death toll by WHO
- Globally from an estimated six million reported deaths, WHO now estimates these deaths to be closer to almost triple the number.
- The new estimates also take into account formerly uncounted deaths, but also deaths resulting from the impact of COVID-19.
- For example, millions who could not access care, i.e., diagnosis or treatment due to COVID-19 restrictions or from COVID-19 cases overwhelming health services.
- India’s stand: India is in serious disagreement with the WHO-prepared COVID-19 mortality estimates.
- The argument being made by India’s health establishment through a public clarification is that this is an overestimation, and the methodology employed is incorrect.
India’s Covid response
- India’s COVID-19 response has been replete with delays and denials.
- For instance, for the longest time that India’s COVID-19 number rose, the health establishment continued to insist that community transmission was not under way.
- It took months and several lakh cases before they agreed that COVID-19 was finally in community transmission.
- The devastation of the second wave showed how unprepared we were to combat the deadly Delta variant.
- By the time the wave subsided, India’s population was devastated, and helpless, seeing dignity neither in disease nor in death.
Conclusion
The figures ratchet up not only issues of administrative but also moral accountability for governments that they have been previously side stepped.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Palk Bay
Mains level: Paper 2- India-Sri Lanka fisheries issue
Context
After a gap of 15 months, the India-Sri Lanka Joint Working Group (JWG) on fisheries held its much-awaited deliberations (in virtual format) on March 25.
Background of the issue
- As sections of fishermen from the Palk Bay bordering districts of Tamil Nadu continue to transgress the International Maritime Boundary Line (IMBL), cases of many of them getting arrested and their boats being impounded by the Sri Lankan authorities continue.
- Apart from poaching in the territorial waters of Sri Lanka, the use of mechanised bottom trawlers is another issue that has become a bone of contention between the fishermen of the two countries; the dispute is not just between the two states.
- Use of mechanised bottom trawlers: This method of fishing, which was once promoted by the authorities in India, is now seen as being extremely adverse to the marine ecology, and has been acknowledged so by India.
- The actions of the Tamil Nadu fishermen adversely affect their counterparts in the Northern Province.
- Reason for transgression: The fishermen of Tamil Nadu experience a genuine problem — the lack of fishing areas consequent to the demarcation of the IMBL in June 1974.
- If they confine themselves to Indian waters, they find the area available for fishing full of rocks and coral reefs besides being shallow.
- Under the Tamil Nadu Marine Fishing Regulation Act 1983, mechanised fishing boats can fish only beyond 3 NM from the coast.
- This explains the trend of the fishermen having to cross the IMBL frequently.
Way forward
- Transition to deep-sea fishing: While Indian fishermen can present a road map for their transition to deep sea fishing or alternative methods of fishing, the Sri Lankan side has to take a pragmatic view that the transition cannot happen abruptly.
- In the meantime, India will have to modify its scheme on deep-sea fishing to accommodate the concerns of its fishermen, especially those from Ramanathapuram district, so that they take to deep-sea fishing without any reservation.
- Alternative livelihood measures: There is a compelling need for the Central and State governments to implement in Tamil Nadu the Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada Yojana in a proactive manner.
- The scheme, which was flagged off two years ago, covers alternative livelihood measures too including seaweed cultivation, open sea cage cultivation, and sea/ocean ranching.
- During Mr. Jaishankar’s visit, India had signed a memorandum of understanding with Sri Lanka for the development of fisheries harbours.
- This can be modified to include a scheme for deep-sea fishing to the fishermen of the North.
- Joint research on fisheries: . It is a welcome development that the JWG has agreed to have joint research on fisheries, which should be commissioned at the earliest.
- Institutional mechanism: Simultaneously, the two countries should explore the possibility of establishing a permanent multi-stakeholder institutional mechanism to regulate fishing activity in the region.
- Using common thread of culture, language and religion: The people of the two countries in general and fisherfolk in particular have common threads of language, culture and religion, all of which can be used purposefully to resolve any dispute.
Conclusion
What everyone needs to remember is that the fisheries dispute is not an insurmountable problem. A number of options are available to make the Palk Bay not only free of troubles but also a model for collaborative endeavours in fishing.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NFSA 2013
Mains level: Paper 3- PDS reforms
Context
The release of two new working papers, one from the World Bank and the other from the IMF, has led to a renewed debate on poverty in India.
A substantial decline in extreme poverty in India
- Both papers claim that extreme poverty in the country, based on the international definition of $1.90 per capita per day (in purchasing power parity (PPP), has declined substantially.
- The World Bank paper uses the Consumer Pyramid Household Surveys (CPHS) data to conclude that 10.2 per cent of the country’s population was at extreme poverty levels in 2019.
- The IMF paper calculates poverty by using the NSO Consumer Expenditure Survey as the base and adjusts it for the direct effect of the massive food grain subsidy given under the National Food Security Act (NFSA, 2013) and PM Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY) during the pandemic period.
- It claims that extreme poverty has almost vanished – it was 0.77 per cent in 2019 and 0.86 per cent in 2020.
- Another estimate of poverty by the NITI Aayog, the multi-dimensional poverty index (MPI), has put Indian poverty at 25 per cent in 2015 based on NFHS data.
- How MPI is calculated?: This MPI is calculated using twelve key components from areas such as health and nutrition, education and standard of living.
How much should be the coverage under NFSA, 2013?
- The offtake of grains under NFSA in FY20 was 56.1 million metric tonnes (MMT).
- Following the outbreak of Covid-19, the government launched the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY) in April 2020 to distribute 25 kg cereals per family per month in addition to food transfers under the NFSA.
- That catapulted the offtake to 87.5 MMT (under PMGKAY and NFSA) in FY21.
- The scheme continued in FY22, and the grain offtake touched 93.2 MMT.
Issues with the wide coverage
- A further extension of free food on top of the NFSA allocations was uncalled for.
- This will strain the fisc, reduce public investments and hamper potential job creation.
- A look at the size of food freebies will help understand the gravity of this problem.
- As of April 1, the Food Corporation of India’s wheat and rice stocks stood at 74 MMT against a buffer stock norm of 21 MMT – there is, therefore, an “excess stock” of 53 MMT.
- The cost of excess stock: The economic cost of rice, as given by FCI, is Rs 3,7267.6/tonne and that of wheat is Rs 2,6838.4/tonne (2020/21).
- The value of “excess stocks”, beyond the buffer norm, is, therefore, Rs 1.85 lakh crore — this, despite a total of 72.2 MMT grains distributed for free under the PMGKAY in FY21 and FY22.
- Ballooning food subsidy: All this results in a ballooning food subsidy for FY 23, it is provisioned at Rs 2.06 lakh crore, for FY 23, it is provisioned at Rs 2.06 lakh crore.
- But this amount is likely to go beyond Rs 2.8 lakh crore with the continuing distribution of free food under the PMGKAY.
- This would amount to more than 10 per cent of the Centre’s net tax revenue (after deducting the states’ share).
Way forward
- It is all the more important to change the current policy of free food given the massive leakages in the PDS.
- As per the High-Level Committee on restructuring FCI, leakages were more than 40 per cent based on the NSSO data of 2011.
- Ground reports suggest that these leakages hover around 30 per cent or so today.
- Make PDS more targeted: In reforming this system of free food, wisdom lies in going back to the Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY).
- Under AAy, the “antyodaya” households (the most poor category) get more rations (35 kg per household) at a higher subsidy (rice, for instance, at Rs 3/kg and wheat at Rs2/kg).
- For the remaining below poverty line (BPL) families, the price charged was 50 per cent of the procurement price and for above poverty line families (APL), it was 90 per cent of the procurement price.
- This will make PDS more targeted and lead to cost savings.
- Use of technology: There could be some problems in identifying the poor. However, technology can help overcome this difficulty.
- Option of cash transfer: This measure should be combined with giving people the option of receiving cash instead of providing grains to targeted beneficiaries.
- The savings so generated from this reform can be ploughed back as investments in agri-R&D, rural infrastructure (irrigation, roads, markets) and innovations that will help create more jobs and reduce poverty on a sustainable basis.
Conclusion
The government needs to bite the bullet and emulate the Vajpayee government (which had introduced AAY) in using scarce resources more wisely.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Opportunities for India in the wake of Ukraine-Russia conflict
Context
As Mahatma Gandhi’s nation, India must be a committed and relentless apostle of peace and non-violence, both at home and in the world.
How the Russia-Ukraine conflict is reshaping the world order
- Ever since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, a paradigm of free societies, frictionless borders and open economies evolved to be the governing order in many nations.
- This catalysed freer movement of people, goods, services and capital across the world.
- India too has benefited enormously from being an active participant in this interconnected world, with a tripling of trade (as share of GDP) in the last three decades and providing vast numbers of jobs.
- Such tight inter-dependence among nations will lead to fewer conflicts and promote peace, was the established wisdom.
- The Russia-Ukraine conflict has dismantled this wisdom.
- Mutually beneficial to mutually harmful: If inter-connectedness and trade among nations were mutually beneficial, then it follows that its disruption and blockade will be mutually harmful.
- Global Village was built on the foundation of advanced transportation networks, cemented with the U.S. dollar as the reserve currency and fenced by integrated payment systems.
- Any disruption to this delicate balance runs the risk of plunging the ‘Global Village’ into disequilibrium and derailing the lives of all.
Trade opportunity for India
- Trade with other nations should and will always be an integral cornerstone of India’s economic future.
- A reversal towards isolationism and protectionism will be foolhardy and calamitous for India.
- As the western bloc of nations looks to reduce dependence on the Russia-China bloc of nations, it presents newer avenues for India to expand trade.
- It presents a tremendous opportunity for India to become a large producing nation for the world and a global economic powerhouse.
- However, to capitalise on these opportunities, India needs free access to these markets, an accepted and established global currency to trade in and seamless trade settlements.
Suggestions for India
1] Bilateral currency agreements are unsustainable
- The American dollar has emerged as the global trade currency, bestowing an ‘exorbitant privilege’ on the dollar.
- But a forced and hurried dismantling of this order and replacing it with rushed bilateral local currency arrangements can prove to be more detrimental for the global economy in the longer run.
- We had an Indian rupee-Russian rouble agreement in the late 1970s and 1980s, when we mutually agreed on exchange rates for trading purposes.
- Now, with India’s robust external sector, a flourishing trading relationship with many nations and tremendous potential to expand trade, such bilateral arrangements are unsustainable, unwieldy, and perilous.
2] Avoid discounted commodity purchases from Russia
- In the long run, India stands to gain more from unfettered access to the western bloc markets for Indian exports under the established trading order than from discounted commodities purchased under new bilateral currency arrangements that seek to create a new and parallel global trade structure.
- It entails a prolonged departure from the established order of dollar-based trade settlement or jeopardises established trading relationships with western bloc markets, it can have longer term implications for India’s export potential.
3] Non-disruptive geo-economic policy
- India needs not just a non-aligned doctrine for the looming new world order but also a non-disruptive geo-economic policy that seeks to maintain the current global economic equilibrium.
- By the dint of its sheer size and scale, India can be both a large producer and a consumer.
- To best utilise this opportunity, India needs not just cordial relationships with nations on either side of the new divide but also a stable and established global economic environment.
4] Social harmony is a must
- Just as it is in India’s best interests to balance the current geo-economic equilibrium, it is also imperative for India to maintain its domestic social equilibrium.
- Social harmony is the edifice of economic prosperity.
- Fanning mutual distrust, hate and anger among citizens, causing social disharmony is a shameful slide to perdition.
Conclusion
The reshaping and realignment of the world order will be a unique opportunity for India to reassess its foreign policy, economic policy and geo-political strategy and don the mantle of global leadership.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: Encroachment of Public Spaces
A 37-year-old Constitution Bench judgment of the Supreme Court which held that pavement dwellers are different from trespassers. This may become a game-changer in the Jahangirpuri case.
What is the Olga Tellis judgment?
- The judgment, Olga Tellis vs. Bombay Municipal Corporation, was given in 1985 by a five-judge Bench led by then Chief Justice of India Y.V. Chandrachud (F/O Justice D.Y Chandrachud).
- It is agreed that pavement dwellers do occupy public spaces in an unauthorized manner.
Key takeaways of the Judgment
- Opportunity to depart: The court maintained they should be given a chance to be heard and a reasonable opportunity to depart before force is used to expel them.
- No use of force: The Supreme Court reasoned that eviction using unreasonable force, without giving them a chance to explain is unconstitutional.
- Right to life: Pavement dwellers, too, have a right to life and dignity. The right to life included the right to livelihood. They earn a meagre livelihood by living and working on the footpaths.
- No misuse of powers of eviction: A welfare state and its authorities should not use its powers of eviction as a means to deprive pavement dwellers of their livelihood.
What led to the judgment?
- Sometime in 1981, the State of Maharashtra and the Bombay Municipal Corporation decided that pavement and slum dwellers in Bombay city should be evicted and “deported to their respective places of origin or places outside the city of Bombay.”
- Some demolitions were carried out before the case was brought to the Bombay High Court by pavement dwellers, residents of slums across the city, NGOs and journalists.
- While they conceded that they did not have “any fundamental right to put up huts on pavements or public roads”, the case came up before the Supreme Court on larger questions of law.
What were the questions discussed before the Supreme Court?
- One of the main questions was whether eviction of a pavement dweller would amount to depriving him/her of their livelihood guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution.
- The Article mandates that “no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty EXCEPT according to procedure established by law.”
- The Constitution Bench was also asked to determine if provisions in the Bombay Municipal Corporation Act, 1888, allowing the removal of encroachments without prior notice, were arbitrary and unreasonable.
- The Supreme Court also decided to examine the question whether it was constitutionally impermissible to characterise pavement dwellers as trespassers.
What was the State government’s defence?
- The State government and the corporation countered that pavement dwellers should be estopped (estoppel is a judicial device whereby a court may prevent or “estop” a person from making assertions.
- Estoppel may prevent someone from bringing a particular claim from contending that the shacks constructed by them on the pavements cannot be demolished because of their right to livelihood.
- They cannot claim any fundamental right to encroach and put up huts on pavements or public roads over which the public has a ‘right of way.’
How did the Supreme Court rule?
- The Bench threw out the government’s argument of estoppel, saying “there can be no estoppel against the Constitution.”
- The court held that the right to life of pavement dwellers were at stake here.
- The right to livelihood was an “integral component” of the right to life. They can come to court to assert their right.
- If the right to livelihood is not treated as a part of the constitutional right to live, the easiest way of depriving a person of his right to life would be to deprive him of his means of livelihood to the point of abrogation.
- Any aggrieved person can challenge the deprivation as offending the right to life.
- Removal of encroachments without prior notice was arbitrary; the court held that such powers are designed to operate as an “exception” and not the “general rule.”
- The procedure of eviction should lean in favour of procedural safeguards which follow the natural principles of justice like giving the other side an opportunity to be heard.
- Finally, the court emphatically objected to authorities treating pavement dwellers as mere trespassers.
- The encroachment committed are involuntary acts in the sense that those acts are compelled by inevitable circumstances and are not guided by choice.
Way ahead
- It is not a free choice to exercise as to whether to commit an encroachment and if so, where.
- Trespassers should not be evicted by using force greater than what is reasonable and appropriate.
- He/she should be asked and given a reasonable opportunity to depart before force is used to expel him.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Anti-defection law
Mains level: Read the attached story
Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu said that there was a need to amend the anti-defection legislation in the country to plug existing loopholes.
What did VP notice now?
- Stating that there was no clarity in the law about the time frame for the action of the House Chairperson or Speaker in anti-defection cases.
- Some cases are taking six months and some even three years.
- There are cases that are disposed of after the term is over.
What is Anti-defection Law?
- The Anti-Defection Law under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution punishes MPs/ MLAs for defecting from their party by taking away their membership of the legislature.
- It gives the Speaker of the legislature the power to decide the outcome of defection proceedings.
- It was added to the Constitution through the Fifty-Second (Amendment) Act, 1985 when Rajiv Gandhi was PM.
- The law applies to both Parliament and state assemblies.
Cases considered under the anti-defection law
The law covers three scenarios with respect to shifting of political parties by an MP or an MLA.
(1) Voluntary give-up
- The first is when a member elected on the ticket of a political party “voluntarily gives up” membership of such a party or votes in the House against the wishes of the party.
- Such persons lose his seat.
(2) Independent members
- When a legislator who has won his or her seat as an independent candidate joins a political party after the election.
- In both these instances, the legislator loses the seat in the legislature on changing (or joining) a party.
(3) Nominated MPs
- In their case, the law gives them six months to join a political party, after being nominated.
- If they join a party after such time, they stand to lose their seat in the House.
Powers to disqualification
- Under the anti-defection law, the power to decide the disqualification of an MP or MLA rests with the presiding officer of the legislature.
- The law does not specify a time frame in which such a decision has to be made.
- As a result, Speakers of legislatures have sometimes acted very quickly or have delayed the decision for years — and have been accused of political bias in both situations.
Significant role of the Speaker/Presiding Officer
- Pandit Nehru had referred to the Speaker as “the symbol of the nation’s freedom and liberty” and emphasized that Speakers should be men of “outstanding ability and impartiality”.
- Several judgments on the anti-defection law have been rendered by the Supreme Court.
- A common factor that shows up in these rulings is the blatant, partisan conduct of speakers in state assemblies.
Reasons for Speakers’ ambiguous action
- The Speaker continues to belong to a particular political party.
- The electoral system and conventions in India have ‘not been developed to ensure protection to the office, there are cogent reasons for Speakers to retain party membership.
- It would be unrealistic to expect a speaker to completely abjure all party considerations while functioning.
- There are structural issues regarding the manner of appointment of the Speaker and her tenure in office.
Way forward
- Parliament may seriously consider a Constitutional amendment to bring in a permanent Tribunal for dealing with defection cases.
- It is suggested that a scheme should be brought wherein Speakers should renounce all political affiliations, membership, and activity once they have been elected.
- We can learn from the UK model. In practice, once elected, the Speaker gives up all-partisan affiliation, as in other Parliaments of British tradition.
- He/she remains in office until retirement, even though the majority may change and does not express any political views during debates.
Conclusion
- Impartiality, fairness, and autonomy in decision-making are the hallmarks of a robust institution.
- It is the freedom from interference and pressures which provide the necessary atmosphere where one can work with an absolute commitment to the cause of neutrality as a constitutional value.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Communal violence in India
Context
Communal violence, a complex phenomenon, has been over-simplified to suit a convenient political narrative.
India’s syncretic traditions and impact of invasions
- For aeons, India has had syncretic traditions inspired by the Vedic aphorism, “Ekam sad vipra bahudha vadanti” (there is only one truth and learned persons call it by many names).
- Because of this underpinning, Indian society has never insisted on uniformity in any facet of life.
- This equanimity of Indian society was, however, disrupted by invading creeds.
- The first such incursion came in 712, when Muhammad bin Qasim vanquished Sindh, and as Chach Nama, a contemporary Arab chronicle states, introduced the practice of treating local Hindus as zimmis, forcing them to pay jizya (a poll tax), as a penalty to live by their beliefs.
- In the 11th century, Mahmud of Ghazni, while receiving the caliphate honours on his accession to the throne, took a vow to wage jihad every year against Indian idolaters.
- The fact is, ties between the two communities were seldom cordial.
- There were intermittent skirmishes, wars and occasional short-lived opportunistic alliances.
- When Pakistan declared itself an Islamic Republic in 1947, it would have been natural for India to identify itself as a Hindu state.
- It didn’t, and couldn’t have — because of its Hindu ethos of pluralism.
- India, is, and will always be, catholic, plural, myriad and a vibrant democracy.
Conclusion
It’s relevant to recall what Lester Pearson (14th PM of Canada) said: “Misunderstanding arising from ignorance breeds fear, and fear remains the greatest enemy of peace.”
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: Efficay of laws for womens safety
Retired Supreme Court judge Justice BN Srikrishna has said that there is a blatant misuse of rape laws in the country.
What did Justice BN Srikrishna say?
- Lesser convictions: Statistics show that even after the amendment of rape laws, there have been less number of convictions.
- Need for objective analysis: It is time that rape cases be looked at in a very objective manner.
- Authencity of women’s claims needs to be checked: We need to question — is the woman really subjected to cruelty and atrocities? Otherwise, in the general course of things, the accused is presumed to be innocent unless proven guilty should apply.
- Tilt of such laws is always against the men: However, in rape cases, whatever the woman says is treated as the gospel truth. But that is not the intention of the law. It is not the way to empower women.
Various laws for the protection of women
- Various special laws relating to women include:
- Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005
- Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961
- Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act, 1986
- Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013
- Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006
Alleged rape cases these days
- False accusations: Justice BN Srikrishna said that, sometimes some innocent men are being falsely accused of rape and later getting acquitted.
- Consensual sex is later cried as rape: There are many cases either in a consensual relationship or in co-habitation for a long time, there is a disagreement and the woman cries rape.
- Tool to preserve honour: There are instances where a secret affair is going on, people get to know of it and in order to come out of the ignominy of it, she cries rape, Justice Srikrishna said.
Issues with such alleged rape cases
- Whenever the man is accused of rape, he gets arrested, newspapers carry it on the front page.
- But when there is an acquittal, it is not carried in the same way. This is terrible.
- The balance is always tilted in favour of women in such cases.
Various sexual crimes in India
- Sexual Abuse/ Molestation/ Rape: Rape is one of the most common crimes in India. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, one woman is raped every 20 minutes in India.
- Marital Crimes: In India, marital rape is not a criminal offense. India is one of fifty countries that have not yet outlawed marital rape.
- Forced Marriage: Girls are vulnerable to being forced into marriage at young ages, suffering from a double vulnerability: both for being a child and for being female.
- Trafficking and forced prostitution: Human trafficking, especially of girls and women, often leads to forced prostitution and sexual slavery.
- Online abuse: Women are regularly subject to online rape threats, online harassment, cyber-stalking, blackmail, trolling, slut-shaming and more.
- Harassment at the workplace: Sexual harassment at workplace, mostly comprising of indecent remarks, unwanted touches, demands for sex, and the dissemination of pornography.
Various initiative to protect women
The Government has taken a number of initiatives for the safety of women and girls, which are given below:
- Nirbhaya Fund for projects for the safety and security of women
- One-Stop Centre Scheme to provide integrated support and assistance to women affected by violence, both in private and public spaces under one roof
- Online analytic tool for police called “Investigation Tracking System for Sexual Offences” to monitor and track time-bound investigation in sexual assault cases in accordance with Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2018.
- National Database on Sexual Offenders (NDSO) to facilitate investigation and tracking of sexual offenders across the country by law enforcement agencies.
Way ahead
- Breaking the cycle of abuse will require concerted collaboration and action between governmental and non-governmental actors including educators, health-care authorities, legislators, the judiciary and the mass media.
- Gender-based violence, an especially violent crime like rape, is a multifaceted problem.
- Although the incorporation of stringent laws and stricter punishments are important to deter people from committing such crimes, the solution to this is much more than just promulgation.
- Education of both men and women will lead to change in attitudes and perceptions.
- It is a mammoth task. We are just doing bits and pieces. A way ahead is obscure but in our sphere with concrete and pronounced steps.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Five Eyes (FYEY) Alliance, Munich Security Dilogue, Raisina Dilogue
Mains level: India's global prowess
The annual Raisina Dialogue in Delhi held this year by National Security Adviser Ajit Doval will host intelligence agency chiefs of several countries.
What is the conference about?
- The conference is modelled on the lines of the annual Munich Security Conference and Singapore’s Shangri-La dialogue.
- It is expected to bring together heads and deputy heads of the top intelligence and security organisations from more than 20 — mostly Western countries and their allies.
- Intelligence chiefs and deputies from Australia, Germany, Israel, Singapore, Japan and New Zealand are among those expected to attend the conference.
- The meet is held on the sidelines of the “Five eyes alliance” of the U.S., U.K., Canada, New Zealand and Australia, who coordinate on terrorism and security issues.
What is the Five Eyes Alliance?
- The Five Eyes (FVEY) is an intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
- These countries are parties to the multilateral UKUSA Agreement, a treaty for joint cooperation in signals intelligence.
- The origins of the FVEY can be traced to informal secret meetings during World War II between British and American code-breakers.
- It was started before the US formally entered the war, followed by the Allies’ 1941 Atlantic Charter that established their vision of the post-war world.
Back2Basics: Munich Security Conference
- The Munich Security Conference is an annual conference on international security policy that has been held in Munich, Bavaria, Germany since 1963.
- It brings together heads of state, diplomats and business leaders from the world’s leading democracies for three days of meetings and presentations.
- It is the world’s largest gathering of its kind.
- Over the past four decades the MSC has become the most important independent forum for the exchange of views by international security policy decision-makers.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Consumer Expenditure Survey (CES)
Mains level: Need for CES for GDP estimation
The All-India Household Consumer Expenditure Survey, usually conducted by the National Statistical Office (NSO) every five years, is set to resume this year after a prolonged break.
What is the Consumer Expenditure Survey (CES)?
- The CES is traditionally a quinquennial (recurring every five years) survey conducted by the government’s National Sample Survey Office (NSSO).
- It is designed to collect information on the consumer spending patterns of households across the country, both urban and rural.
- Typically, the Survey is conducted between July and June and this year’s exercise is expected to be completed by June 2023.
Utility of the survey
- The data gathered in this exercise reveals the average expenditure on goods (food and non-food) and services.
- It helps generate estimates of household Monthly Per Capita Consumer Expenditure (MPCE) as well as the distribution of households and persons over the MPCE classes.
- It is used to arrive at estimates of poverty levels in different parts of the country and to review economic indicators such as the GDP, since 2011-12.
Why need this survey?
- India has not had any official estimates on per capita household spending.
- It provides separate data sets for rural and urban parts, and also splice spending patterns for each State and Union Territory, as well as different socio-economic groups.
What about the previous survey?
- The survey was last held in 2017-2018.
- The government announced that it had data quality issues.
- Hence the results were not released.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Strontium
Mains level: Cyber espionage
Recently, Microsoft said that it had disrupted cyberattacks from a Russian nation-state hacking group called ‘Strontium’.
What is Strontium?
- Strontium, also known as Fancy Bear, Tsar Team, Pawn Storm, Sofacy, Sednit or Advanced Persistent Threat 28 (APT28) group, is a highly active and prolific cyber-espionage group.
- It is one of the most active APT groups and has been operating since at least the mid-2000s, making it one of the world’s oldest cyber-spy groups.
- It has access to highly sophisticated tools to conduct spy operations, and has been attacking targets in the US, Europe, Central Asia and West Asia.
- The group is said to be connected to the GRU, the Russian Armed Forces’ main military intelligence wing.
- The GRU’s cyber units are believed to have been responsible for several cyberattacks over the years and its unit 26165 is identified as Fancy Bear.
How does it attack networks?
- The group deploys diverse malware and malicious tools to breach networks.
- In the past, it has used X-Tunnel, SPLM (or CHOPSTICK and X-Agent), GAMEFISH and Zebrocy to attack targets.
- These tools can be used as hooks in system drivers to access local passwords, and can track keystroke, mouse movements, and control webcam and USB drives.
- APT28 uses spear-phishing (targeted campaigns to gain access to an individual’s account) and zero-day exploits (taking advantage of unknown computer-software vulnerabilities) to target specific individuals and organizations.
- It has used spear-phishing and sometimes water-holing to steal information, such as account credentials, sensitive communications and documents.
- A watering hole attack compromises a site that a targeted victim visits to gain access to the victim’s computer and network.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Blue Straggler Stars
Mains level: Not Much
Researchers from the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bengaluru have studied the eccentricities of blue straggler stars.
What are Blue Straggler Stars?
- A blue straggler is a main-sequence star in an open or globular cluster that is more luminous and bluer than stars at the main sequence turnoff point for the cluster.
- Blue stragglers were first discovered by Allan Sandage in 1953 while performing photometry of the stars in the globular cluster M3.
What did the Indian researchers study?
- Eccentricity is the deviation of a planets’ or stars’ orbit from circularity — the higher the eccentricity, the greater the elliptical orbit.
- For this, the researchers also made use of the observations by the UVIT instrument (Ultra Violet Imaging Telescope) of ASTROSAT, India’s first science observatory in space.
(a) Stellar ageing of stars
- To know what blue stragglers are, it is necessary to understand how stars are classified and their evolution, studied.
- Our Sun, for example, is what is called a main sequence star, and, given its mass and age, it is expected that once it has converted all its hydrogen into helium, its core will get denser, while outer layers expand.
- So, it will bloat into a red giant.
- After this phase, its fuel spent, it will shrink, becoming a smaller, cooling star called a white dwarf star at the end of its life.
(b) Sequencing of stars
- To study the behaviour of the star, you could plot a graph of the colour of a star, which is an indication of its surface temperature, against its magnitude, which is related to the total energy given off by it.
- If you do this for all the stars in a globular cluster, a large number of stars are seen to find a place within a band known as the main sequence.
- Our Sun is a main sequence star, too, and the expectation is that all main sequence stars follow a pattern of evolution pretty much like our Sun’s fate, which was described earlier.
- There are a few stars that, just at the stage of their lives, when they are expected to start expanding in size and cooling down, do just the opposite.
- They grow brighter and hotter and blue in colour, thus standing out from the cooler red stars in their vicinity in the colour-magnitude diagram.
- Since they lag behind their peers in the evolution, they are called stragglers, more specifically, blue stragglers, because of their hot, blue colour.
Outcome of the research: Reasons for Blue Stragglers behaviour
- The puzzle of why a blue straggler is more massive, and energetic than expected may be resolved in several ways.
- One that these do not belong to the family of stars in the cluster, and hence are not expected to have the group properties.
- Second, the straggler draws matter from the giant companion and grows more massive, hot and blue, and the red giant ends up as a normal or smaller white dwarf.
- The third possibility is that the straggler draws matter from a companion star, but that there is a third star that facilitates this process.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Carbon neutrality
Mains level: Not Much
Palli village in Samba district of Jammu and Kashmir has become the first panchayat in the country to become carbon-neutral, fully powered by solar energy.
Various feats achieved
- All its records have been digitised and the benefits of all the Central schemes are available in this village around 17 km from Jammu.
- Palli village, with its enthusiastic and dedicated elected representatives full of dreams, has shown how to implement the Glasgow pledge (Panchamrita) made by PM Modi.
- It has set an example of the slogan Sabka Prayas (everyone’s efforts).
What is Carbon Neutrality?
- Carbon neutrality refers to achieving net-zero carbon dioxide emissions or buying enough carbon credits to make up the difference.
- This can be done by balancing emissions of carbon dioxide with its removal (often through carbon offsetting) or by eliminating emissions from society.
- It is used in the context of carbon dioxide-releasing processes associated with transportation, energy production, agriculture, and industry.
- The term carbon neutral also includes other greenhouse gases, usually carbon-based, measured in terms of their carbon dioxide equivalence.
- The term “net-zero” is increasingly used to describe a broader and more comprehensive commitment to decarbonization and climate action.
- Net-zero emissions are achieved when your organization’s emissions of all greenhouse gases (CO2-e) are balanced by greenhouse gas removals
Methodology
Carbon-neutral status can be achieved in two ways:
- Carbon offsetting: Balancing carbon dioxide emissions with carbon offsets — the process of reducing or avoiding greenhouse gas emissions or removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to make up for emissions elsewhere. If the total greenhouse gasses emitted is equal to the total amount avoided or removed, then the two effects cancel each other out and the net emissions are ‘neutral’.
- Reducing emissions: Reducing carbon emissions can be done by moving towards energy sources and industrial processes that produce fewer greenhouse gases, thereby transitioning to a low-carbon economy. Shifting towards the use of renewable energy such as hydro, wind, geothermal, and solar power, as well as nuclear power, reduces greenhouse gas emissions.
Agreement and Target
- The Paris Agreement is a legally binding international treaty on climate change. It was adopted by 196 Parties at COP 21 in Paris, on 12 December 2015 and entered into force on 4 November 2016.
- Its goal is to limit global warming to well below 2, preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius, compared to pre-industrial levels.
- Article 4.1 of the Paris Agreement asks countries to reach global peaking of greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible.
- It also requires countries to undertake rapid reductions in carbon emissions to achieve a balance between anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases.
Back2Basics: Panchamrita
- ‘Panchamrita’ is a traditional method of mixing five natural foods — milk, ghee, curd, honey, and jaggery.
- These are used in Hindu and Jain worship rituals. It is also used as a technique in Ayurveda.
- The PM euphemistically termed his scheme as ‘Panchamrita’ meaning the ‘five ambrosia’.
- Under Panchamrita’, India will:
- Get its non-fossil energy capacity to 500 gigawatts by 2030
- Meet 50 percent of its energy requirements till 2030 with renewable energy
- Reduce its projected carbon emission by one billion tonnes by 2030
- Reduce the carbon intensity of its economy by 45 percent by 2030
- Achieve net-zero by 2070
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