Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Planet Nine, Dwarf Planets
Mains level: NA
A new study’s “treasure map” suggests that a planet several times more massive than Earth could be hiding in our solar system, camouflaged by the bright strip of stars that make up the Milky Way.
Do not wonder. This too was a PYQ:
Q.Which planet was downgraded to dwarf planet status?
(a) Pluto
(b) Mars
(c) Earth
(d) Venus
Post your answers here!
Planet 9
- Planet Nine is a hypothetical planet in the outer region of the Solar System.
- Its gravitational effects could explain the unlikely clustering of orbits for a group of extreme trans-Neptunian objects (ETNOs), bodies beyond Neptune that orbit the Sun at distances averaging more than 250 times that of the Earth.
- Based on earlier considerations, this hypothetical super-Earth-sized planet would have had a predicted mass of five to ten times that of the Earth, and an elongated orbit 400 to 800 times as far from the Sun as the Earth.
Curiosity for the ninth Planet
- In August 2006, the International Astronomical Union broke several hearts when it announced that it had reclassified Pluto as a dwarf planet. ‘
- The decision was based on Pluto’s size and the fact that it resides within a zone of other similarly-sized objects.
Is everyone convinced that Planet Nine exists?
- Researchers from across the globe have carried out several studies on Planet Nine and there are several theories about it, including one that stated Planet Nine could in fact be a black hole.
- Another research has argued that the unknown object causing anomalous orbits of the trans-Neptunian objects could be a primordial black hole.
- Yet another study noted that a trans-Neptunian object called 2015 BP519 had an unusual trajectory because it was affected by Planet Nine’s strong gravity.
Back2Basics: Dwarf Planet
- A dwarf planet is a small planetary-mass object that is in direct orbit of the Sun – something smaller than any of the eight classical planets, but still a world in its own right.
- As of today, there are officially five dwarf planets in our Solar System.
- The most famous is Pluto, downgraded from the status of a planet in 2006.
- The other four, in order of size, are Eris, Makemake, Haumea and Ceres. The sixth claimant for a dwarf planet is Hygiea, which so far has been taken to be an asteroid.
- These four criteria are – that the body orbits around the Sun, it is not a moon, has not cleared the neighborhood around its orbit, and has enough mass for its gravity to pull it into a roughly spherical shape.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Humboldt Penguins
Mains level: In-situ conservation
Last week, Mumbai’s Byculla Zoo announced the addition of two new Humboldt penguin chicks this year.
Humboldt Penguins
- Humboldt penguins are medium-sized species among at least 17 species.
- The exact number of distinct species is debated, but it is generally agreed that there are between 17 and 19 species.
- The largest, the Emperor penguin, stands at over 4 ft tall while the Little penguin has a maximum height of 1 ft. Humboldt penguins have an average height of just over 2 ft.
- The Humboldt penguin (Spheniscus Humboldt) belongs to a genus that is commonly known as the ‘banded’ group.’
Relation with the Humboldt Oceanic Current
- Humboldt penguins are endemic to the Pacific coasts of Chile and Peru.
- They are so named because their habitat is located near the Humboldt Current, a large oceanic upwelling characterized by cold waters.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Dengue
Mains level: NA
The Union Health Ministry has flagged the emerging challenge in 11 States across India of serotype 2 dengue, which it said is associated with “more cases and more complications” than other forms of the disease.
Try this PYQ from CSP 2015:
Q. Consider the following statements:
- In tropical regions, Zika virus disease is transmitted by the same mosquito that transmits dengue.
- Sexual transmission of Zika virus disease is possible.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 1 only
(b) 2 only
(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) Neither 1 nor 2
Post your answers here!
What is Dengue?
- Dengue is a mosquito-borne viral infection, found in tropical and sub-tropical climates worldwide, mostly in urban and semi-urban areas.
- It is transmitted by female mosquitoes mainly of the species Aedes aegypti and, to a lesser extent, Ae. albopictus.
- These mosquitoes are also vectors of chikungunya, yellow fever and Zika viruses.
- Dengue is widespread throughout the tropics, with local variations in risk influenced by rainfall, temperature, relative humidity and unplanned rapid urbanization.
Its transmission
- The virus is transmitted to humans through the bites of infected female mosquitoes, primarily the Aedes aegypti
- Other species within the Aedes genus can also act as vectors, but their contribution is secondary to Aedes aegypti.
- Mosquitoes can become infected from people who are viremic with dengue.
Various serotypes
- Dengue is caused by a virus of the Flaviviridae family and there are four distinct, but closely related, serotypes of the virus that cause dengue (DENV-1, DENV-2, DENV-3 and DENV-4).
- Recovery from infection is believed to provide lifelong immunity against that serotype.
- However, cross-immunity to the other serotypes after recovery is only partial and temporary.
- Subsequent infections (secondary infection) by other serotypes increase the risk of developing severe dengue.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Delhi-Mumbai Expressway
Mains level: NA
The Minister for Road Transport and Highways Union Minister Nitin Gadkari concluded the review of the work progress on the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway.
Delhi-Mumbai Expressway
- The ambitious infra project started in the year 2018 is being constructed at a cost of Rs 98,000 crore and is scheduled for completion by March 2023.
- States: Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Maharashtra
- Once ready, the expressway will feature a spur to Noida International Airport and Jawaharlal Nehru Port to Mumbai through a spur in the financial capital.
- It will reduce travel time between certain cities to 12-12.5 hours from 24 hours.
- The project is expected to improve connectivity to economic hubs of India like Jaipur, Ajmer, Kishangarh, Chittorgarh, Kota, Udaipur, Ujjain, Bhopal, Indore, Vadodara, Ahmedabad, and Surat.
Key features of the expressway
- The expressway which is eight-lane access-controlled can be expanded to a 12-lane expressway depending on the traffic volume
- It will boast wayside amenities such as resorts, food courts, restaurants, fuel stations, logistics parks, facilities for truckers
- For accident victims, it will offer a helicopter ambulance service as well as a heliport, which will use drone services for business
- Along the highway, over two million trees and shrubs are planned to be planted
- The highway project is Asia’s first and the world’s second to include animal overpasses in order to facilitate unrestricted wildlife movement
- Besides, it will also involve two iconic eight-lane tunnels
- The project will result in annual savings of more than 320 million litres of fuel as well as reduce Carbon dioxide emissions by 850 million kg
- Over 12 lakh tonnes of steel will be consumed in the project’s construction, which is equivalent to constructing 50 Howrah bridges
- For the project, 80 lakh tonnes of cement will be consumed, which is around 2 percent of the country’s annual cement production capacity
- The ambitious Delhi-Mumbai Expressway project has also created job opportunities for thousands of trained civil engineers apart from generating over 50 lakh man-days of work
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: LFPR
Mains level: Paper 3- Rising unemployment
Context
India’s unemployment rate in August was 8.3 per cent. This was higher than the 7 per cent recorded in July. The month-to-month variations notwithstanding, these are all very high unemployment rates.
Why inflation gets more attention in India than unemployment?
- Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) results showed the historically high unemployment rate of 6.1 per cent for 2017-18 (July to June). It was at a 45-year high.
- New norm at 7-8 per cent: Till then, India was used to recording an unemployment rate of around 3 per cent.
- Today, an unemployment rate of 7-8 per cent seems to be the norm and such levels do not seem to matter.
- The unemployment rate is not the most important labour market indicator for a country like India.
- Why inflation gets preference: Between inflation and unemployment, the two economic indicators conjoined theoretically by the Phillips curve, it is inflation that wields political power.
- Inflation hurts almost the entire population.
- Equally importantly, high inflation rates can upset financial markets that in turn exert pressure on regulators to keep inflation in control.
- Unemployment directly impacts only the unemployed, who don’t count much.
- Worse still, society perceives being unemployed as an individual shortcoming, and not an outcome of a macroeconomic malaise.
What does low labour force participation rate (LFPR) indicate about the labour market in India?
- The unemployment rate is a measure of the economy’s inability to provide jobs only for those who seek work.
- But, in India, very often people do not look for jobs in the belief that none are available which is reflected in a low labour force participation rate (LFPR).
- India’s LFPR is at around 40 per cent when the global rate is close to 60 per cent.
- It is important that this belief in the futility of a job hunt is overcome by an explosive creation of new good quality formal jobs.
Why employment rate is a useful indicator for India
- A useful labour market metric for a country like India is the employment rate.
- This measures the proportion of the population over 14 years of age that is employed.
- The definition of employment needs to be changed, at present, engaging in some economic activity for just one hour in any of the past seven days is counted as employment.
- India’s record in providing employment to its people has been abysmally poor.
- CMIE’s definition of employment indicates that in 2016-17, only 42.8 per cent of the working-age population was employed.
- In the year of the pandemic, it fell to 36.5 per cent.
Reverse migration in employment from manufacturing to low productivity employment
- People are moving away from factories as manufacturing jobs shrink, to farms that provide shelter largely in the form of disguised unemployment.
- It cannot be the desire of a nation to move people away from high productivity, better quality jobs in manufacturing to low productivity employment in agriculture or as gardeners or security guards in the household sector.
- Employment opportunities need to expand in areas where labour is deployed to deliver higher productivity for enterprise and higher returns to labour.
Way forward
- Increase investment: A large part of the solution to this lack of adequate jobs is in increasing investments.
- Focus on demand size: For this, the investment climate needs to be business-friendly and government interventions must shift away from supply-side support to spurring demand.
Conclusion
The government needs to come up with policies for generating employment opportunities and stemming the reverse migration from manufacturing jobs to low productivity employment.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: National Monetization Pipeline
Mains level: Issues with Asset Monetization in India
The government of India recently announced an asset monetization plan, wherein existing public assets worth Rs 6 trillion would be monetized by leasing them out to private operators for fixed terms.
The plan has generated a lot of print so it is worth discussing its pros and cons.
About NMP
- The identified assets are primarily concentrated in roads, railways, power, oil and gas, and telecoms.
- The lease proceeds are expected to be used for new infrastructure investment which, in turn, will contribute to the government’s ambitious Rs 111 trillion infrastructure investment plan.
Important issues raised by the plan
[I] How much should the government expect to raise from the plan?
Revenue Potential
- In deciding the amount to bid for leasing rights, bidders compute the present discounted value of the annual cash flow from the asset for the duration of the lease.
- The biggest uncertainty in this calculation surrounds the cash flow on these public assets.
- Rates of return estimates on public capital in the US have been estimated to be upwards of 15 per cent.
- However, this is India with its myriad uncertainties regarding pricing, bill collection, asset quality, regulatory framework as well as policy reversals.
- Hence there is significant uncertainty regarding the revenue potential of the plan.
[II] Is the plan likely to increase the efficiency of the economy?
a. Efficiency of the economy
- The NITI Aayog believes that the private sector is better at managing and operating the identified public assets than the public sector.
- There is certainly scope for efficiency gains. However, there are significant efficiency impediments too.
- One set of efficiency issues surrounds usage fees. A second factor related to efficiency is the effect of the plan on competition.
b. Stressed sectors
- The identified assets belong to core sectors of the economy spanning transport, energy and communication.
- Sectors like telecoms and ports have already seen rising concentration of ownership in recent years.
- An acceleration and extension of this trend to other segments of the infrastructure landscape would be seriously worrying.
- While some of this could well be rationalized through the stipulation of rules for the allocation of leasing rights, the plan is silent on this.
c. Financing of the lease bids
- If bidders finance their bids using domestic savings, there is a clear opportunity cost of the plan since these savings would otherwise have been invested in alternative projects.
- Moreover, the bidding for scarce domestic savings by prospective investors will also raise domestic interest rates which will put downward pressure on domestic private investment.
- It would also be worth reminding ourselves that the last round of PPP-based infrastructure funding routed through banks ended up with a heap of NPAs in public sector bank balance sheets.
Biggest flaw of the NMP
- No clear objective: The biggest drawback of the plan is that it fails to articulate the reasons for public sector inefficiency in asset management.
- No focus on management: If it is personnel-related, then privatizing management may be the right answer. If the inefficiency is related to constraints on pricing and bill collection, then the roots of the problem are unlikely to be addressed by leasing out their management to private operators.
- No clear assessment of underperforming sectors: The plan document also fails to outline whether the identified brownfield assets are the public sector’s highest cash flow assets or the relatively under-performing ones.
Better alternatives for the govt
- The way around this is to welcome foreign investors to bid for the assets.
- But this will require serious political will since entrenching foreign influence on Indian public assets will generate controversy.
- On this aspect too, the announced plan is low on details.
Way forward
- If the private sector is indeed more efficient in running infrastructure assets, the most efficient strategy would be to lease out the worst-performing assets rather than the best performing ones.
- The NITI Aayog would do the policy landscape a big service by following up the proposal with a white paper that addresses some of these efficiency-related issues.
- Without that, the monetization plan, while intriguing, is incomplete.
Conclusion
- A monetization plan envisages the private sector paying an upfront fee to the government which the government uses for new infrastructure investment.
- As much as private bidders finance themselves by borrowing, this amounts to the private sector borrowing and handing over the funds to the government to invest in infrastructure.
- This could enhance efficiency in infrastructure investment only if the government faces higher interest rates in capital markets than the private sector.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: WTO, Agreement on Agriculture
Mains level: Read the attached story
The Agreement on Agriculture at the WTO is riddled with deep imbalances, which favour the developed countries and have tilted the rules against many developing countries, a Union Minister has said.
Agreement on Agriculture
- The AoA is an international treaty of the World Trade Organization.
- It was negotiated during the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and entered into force with the establishment of the WTO on January 1, 1995.
Three pillars of AoA
The Agreement on Agriculture consists of three pillars—domestic support, market access, and export subsidies.
(1) Domestic support
- AoA divides domestic support into two categories: trade-distorting and non-trade-distorting (or minimally trade-distorting).
- It the classification of subsidies by “boxes” depending on consequences of production and trade:
- Amber (most directly linked to production levels)
- Blue (production-limiting programs that still distort trade)
- Green (minimal distortion)
(2) Market access
- Market access refers to the reduction of tariff (or non-tariff) barriers to trade by WTO members.
- The 1995 AoA consists of tariff reductions of:
- 36% average reduction – developed countries – with a minimum of 15% per-tariff line reduction in next six years.
- 24% average reduction – developing countries – with a minimum of 10% per-tariff line reduction in next ten years.
- Least developed countries (LDCs) were exempt from tariff reductions, but they either had to convert non-tariff barriers to tariffs—a process called tariffication—or “bind” their tariffs, creating a ceiling that could not be increased in future.
(3) Export subsidies
- The AoA required developed countries to reduce export subsidies by at least 36% (by value) or by 21% (by volume) over six years.
- For developing countries, the agreement required cuts were 24% (by value) and 14% (by volume) over ten years.
Criticism of AoA
- AoA has been criticized for reducing tariff protections for small farmers, a key source of income in developing countries, while simultaneously allowing rich countries to continue subsidizing agriculture at home.
- In 2017 India and China jointly submitted a proposal to the WTO calling for the elimination – by developed countries – of the most trade-distorting form of farm subsidies,
- They are known in WTO parlance as Aggregate Measurement of Support (AMS) or ‘Amber Box’ support as a prerequisite for consideration of other reforms in domestic support negotiations.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Taxing of fuels
Mains level: Limitations of GST
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council has decided to keep petroleum products out of the GST regime.
Present taxation of Fuels
- Currently, taxes on petroleum products are levied by both the Centre and the states.
- While the Centre levies excise duty, states levy value added tax (VAT).
- For instance, VAT on petroleum products is as high as 40% in Maharashtra, contributing over ₹25,000 crore annually.
- By being able to levy VAT on these products, the state governments have control over their revenues.
Impact of inclusion of fuel under GST
- If petroleum products are included under the GST, there will be a uniform price of fuel across the country.
- However, petroleum products coming under GST not necessarily means that taxes or prices will come down.
- If the GST council decides to opt for a lower slab, taxes may come down.
- At present, India has four primary GST rates – 5 percent, 12 percent, 18 percent and 28 percent.
- Levying a standard rate of GST on petrol would mean that the prices increase dramatically in Andaman and Nicobar, but on the flip side, they would fall in Maharashtra if the cumulative rate is lower than the current rate.
Key takeaways from States VAT
- Among the states, Rajasthan levies the highest tax across the country keeping VAT on petrol at 36 percent, followed by Telangana at 35.2 percent.
- Other states with more than 30 per cent VAT on petrol include Karnataka, Kerala, Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Delhi and Madhya Pradesh.
- On diesel, the highest VAT rates are charged by states like Odisha, Telangana, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.
- So far, five states, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Meghalaya, Assam and Nagaland have cut taxes on fuel this year.
Back2Basics: Petroleum Pricing Mechanism
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Pigmentation of Tigers
Mains level: Not Much
A team of scientists has resolved the genetic mystery of Simlipal’s so-called black tigers.
What are Black Tigers?
- Tigers have a distinctive dark stripe pattern on a light background of white or golden.
- A rare pattern variant, distinguished by stripes that are broadened and fused together, is also observed in both wild and captive populations.
- This is known as pseudo-melanism, which is different from true melanism, a condition characterized by unusually high deposition of melanin, a dark pigment.
- This pseudo-melanism is linked to a single mutation in Transmembrane Aminopeptidase Q (Taqpep), a gene responsible for similar traits in other cat species.
Where are they mostly found?
- While truly melanistic tigers are yet to be recorded, pseudo-melanistic ones have been camera-trapped repeatedly, and only, in Simlipal, a 2,750-km tiger reserve in Odisha, since 2007.
- Launched in 2017, the study was the first attempt to investigate the genetic basis for this unusual phenotype (appearance).
Why they are rare?
- Mutants are genetic variations which may occur spontaneously, but not frequently, in nature.
- A cub gets two copies of each gene from both parents, and a recessive gene can show up only in the absence of the dominant one.
- So, two normal-pattern tigers carrying the recessive pseudo-melanism gene will have to breed together for a one-in-four probability of giving birth to a black cub.
- But recessive genes are rare and it is unlikely that two unrelated tigers will carry the same one and pass it on together to a cub.
Connection with Simlipal TR
- In an ideal tiger world, where far-ranging individuals are never short of choices for partners, that makes succession of black tigers a rarity.
- Under exceptional circumstances, a black tiger may succeed as part of a very small population that is forced to inbreed in isolation for generations.
- As it turned out, that is what happened at Simlipal.
- Pseudo-melanistic tigers are also present in three zoos in India — Nandankanan (Bhubaneswar), Arignar Anna Zoological Park (Chennai) and Bhagwan Birsa Biological Park (Ranchi) — where they were born in captivity.
- All of them have ancestral links to one individual from Simlipal.
What about natural selection?
- Natural selection eliminates the weakest from a gene pool, and the traits of the more successful get passed on.
- Niche modelling, the study said, shows higher frequency of melanistic leopards in darker tropical and subtropical forests than in drier open habitats.
- Likewise, darker coats may confer a selective advantage in both hunting and avoiding hunters in Simlipal’s tropical moist deciduous and semi-evergreen closed-canopy forest, with a relatively darker understory.
Try this PYQ:
Two important rivers – one with its source in Jharkhand (and known by a different name in Odisha), and another, with its source in Odisha – merge at a place only a short distance from the coast of Bay of Bengal before flowing into the sea. This is an important site of wildlife and biodiversity and a protected area.
Which one of the following could be this?
(a) Bhitarkanika
(b) Chandipur-on-sea
(c) Gopalpur-on-sea
(d) Simlipal
Post your answers here.
Back2Basics: Project Tiger
- Project Tiger is a tiger conservation program launched in April 1973 during PM Indira Gandhi’s tenure.
- In 1970 India had only 1800 tigers and Project Tiger was launched in Jim Corbett National Park.
- The project is administrated by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA).
- It aims at ensuring a viable population of Bengal tigers in their natural habitats, protecting them from extinction etc.
- Under this project the govt. has set up a Tiger Protection Force to combat poachers and funded relocation of villagers to minimize human-tiger conflicts.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: CTSO, NATO
Mains level: Not Much
The Prime Minister has participated virtually in the Joint SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization)-CSTO Outreach Session on Afghanistan.
What is CSTO?
- The CSTO is a Russia-led military alliance of seven former Soviet states that was created in 2002.
- Current CSTO members are Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Russian Federation and Tajikistan. Afghanistan and Serbia hold observer status in the CSTO.
- Its purpose is to ensure the collective defence of any member that faces external aggression.
- It has been described by political scientists as the Eurasian counterpart of NATO, which has 29 member states, while the CSTO has just six.
Outlined functions of CSTO
- CSTO supports arms sales and manufacturing as well as military training and exercises, making the CSTO the most important multilateral defence organization in the former Soviet Union.
- Beyond mutual defence, the CSTO also coordinates efforts in fighting the illegal circulation of weapons among member states and has developed law enforcement training for its members in pursuit of these aims.
What does CSTO membership provide?
- While CSTO membership means that member states are barred from joining other military alliances, limiting, for example, their relationship with NATO.
- Its members receive discounts, subsidies, and other incentives to buy Russian arms, facilitating military cooperation.
- Most importantly, membership presumes certain key security assurances – the most significant of which is deterring military aggression by third countries.
- In the CSTO, aggression against one signatory is perceived as aggression against all.
- It however remains unclear whether this feature works in practice.
Back2Basics: NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization)
- NATO was found in the aftermath of the Second World War.
- Its purpose was to secure peace in Europe, to promote cooperation among its members and to guard their freedom – all of this in the context of countering the threat posed at the time by the Soviet Union.
- It is a military alliance established by the North Atlantic Treaty (also called the Washington Treaty) of April 4, 1949.
- It sought to create a counterweight to Soviet armies stationed in Central and Eastern Europe after World War II.
- Its original members were Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
- NATO has spread a web of partners, namely Egypt, Israel, Sweden, Austria, Switzerland and Finland.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: General Sherman Tree
Mains level: NA
Two wildfires in California are burning through the Sequoia National Park in the Sierra Nevada that is home to some of the largest trees in the world.
Among these trees is the world’s largest tree popularly known as General Sherman, which firefighters are now trying to protect from the blaze.
About General Sherman
- The General Sherman tree is the world’s largest in terms of volume and exists in the Giant Forest sequoia grove of the national park.
- As per recent estimates, General Sherman is about 2,200 years old.
- It stands at a height of 275 feet (taller than the leaning tower of Pisa) and has a diameter of 36 feet at the base.
- Even 60 feet above the base, the tree has a diameter of 17.5 feet.
- Giant sequoia trees have existed in the national park for thousands of years and there are an estimated 2,000 such trees in the park.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: TRIPS waiver
Mains level: Paper 3- Sustaining recovery
Context
To revive and sustain growth, action is needed both at the international and national levels.
Hopes of V-shaped recovery of Indian economy
- The National Statistical Office (NSO) had recently estimated that India’s economic growth has surged to 20.1% in the April-June quarter.
- In its recently launched Trade and Development Report 2021, UNCTAD has estimated global growth to hit 5.3% in 2021 and growth in India to hit 7.2%.
- According to the report, India showed strong quarterly growth of 1.9% in the first quarter of 2021, on the back of the momentum of the second half of 2020 and supported by government spending in goods and services.
- Given the inherent fragilities, India’s growth in 2021 as a whole is estimated at 7.2%, which is one of the fastest compared to most countries in the analysis.
- But it is still not sufficient to regain the pre-COVID-19 income level.
- However, going forward, the economy is likely to experience a deceleration of growth to 6.7% growth in 2022.
Ways to sustain growth
1) Efforts at the International level
- To revive and sustain growth, action is needed both at the international and national levels.
- TRIPS waiver: The report strongly supports India’s proposed temporary suspension of the World Trade Organization TRIPS waiver.
- Waiver is considered as a necessary step to enable the local manufacture of vaccines in developing countries
2) Steps to be taken at the national level
- Resilience: At the national level, COVID-19 has reinforced the idea that resilience is a public good and responsibility of the state.
- It has to be delivered through a robust public sector with the resources to make the necessary investments, provide the complementary services and coordinate the multiple activities that building resilience involves.
- Mobilising financial resources: We need a financial system that accords a more significant role to public banks, breaks up and guards against the emergence of megabanks, and exercises stronger regulatory oversight is more likely to deliver a healthier investment climate.
- Minimum wage: Wages are a critical source of demand and their growth can stimulate productivity and underpin a strong social contract.
- Minimum wages and related labour legislation are needed for appropriate protection against abusive practices.
- Policies for informal sector: Policies targeting informality are of particular importance, especially for a country like India with a large informal economy.
Conclusion
It is important to build a healthy, diversified economy. For this, a strong industrial policy focusing on building digital capacities is needed. A resilient economy goes beyond offering a residual category of safety nets designed to stop those left behind from falling further.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: E-Shram Portal
Mains level: National database for workers: Prospects and challenges
The E-Shram portal has come into existence more than a decade after the passage of the Unorganized Workers’ Social Security Act in 2008.
E-Shram
- On August 26, 2021, the Ministry of Labour and Employment (MOLE) launched the E-Shram, the web portal for creating a National Database of Unorganized Workers (NDUW), which will be seeded with Aadhaar.
- It seeks to register an estimated 398-400 million unorganized workers and to issue an E-Shram card.
Better late than never move
- It has come about even after repeated nudging by the Supreme Court of India.
- It is the result of state apathy.
- Had the Central and the State governments begun these legally mandated processes on time, much of the distress of lakhs of vulnerable workers would have been avoided.
- In fact, the political class owe an ‘apology’ to informal workers.
Issues with E-Shram
(A) Time constraints
- Long process: Given the gigantic nature of registering each worker, it will be a long-drawn process.
- No gestation period: The Government has not mentioned a gestation period to assess its strategy and efficiency.
- No hasty process: Employers are or required their workers to register even.While the Government can appeal to them, any penal measure will hurt the ease of doing business.
(B) Pandemic hides
- Considering the estimated 380 million workers as the universe of registration — debatable as the novel coronavirus pandemic has pushed lakhs of workers into informality.
(C) Data security
- Privacy: One of the vital concerns of e-portals is data security, including its potential abuse especially when it is a mega-sized database.
- No national framework yet: There are also media reports pointing out the absence of a national architecture relating to data security.
- Local server issues: It has been reported that in some States such as Maharashtra, the server was down for a few days.
(D) Structural issue
- Aadhaar seeding: Many workers will not have an Aadhaar-seeded mobile or even a smartphone. Aadhaar-seeding is a controversial issue with political overtones, especially in the North-eastern regions.
- Eligibility: There are several issues concerning the eligibility of persons to register as well as the definitional issues.
- Exclusion: By excluding workers covered by EPF and ESI, lakhs of contract and fixed-term contract workers will be excluded from the universe of UW. Hazardous establishments employing even a single worker will have to be covered under the ESI, which means these workers also will be excluded.
- No benefits for the aged: The NDUW excludes millions of workers aged over 59 from its ambit, which constitutes age discrimination.
(D) Complex identities of workers
- Migration: Many are circular migrant workers and they quickly, even unpredictably, move from one trade to another.
- Mixed work: Many others perform formal and informal work as some during non-office hours may belong to the gig economy, for example as an Uber taxi or a Swiggy employee. They straddle formal and informal sectors.
- Gig workers: Even though MOLE has included gig workers in this process, it is legally unclear whether the gig/platform worker can be classified first as a worker at all.
(E) Other impediments
- Dependence on States: The central government will have to depend on the State governments for this project to be successful.
- Lack of coordination: In many States, the social dialogue with the stakeholders especially is rather weak or non-existent. The success of the project depends on the involvement of a variety of stakeholders apart from trade unions.
- Corruption: There is also the concern of corruption as middle-service agencies such as Internet providers might charge exorbitant charges to register and print the E-Shram cards.
Benefits: No immediate carrot
- Workers stand to gain by registration in the medium to long run.
- But the instant benefit of accident insurance upto ₹0.2 million to registered workers is surely not an attractive carrot.
- The main point of attraction is the benefits they stand to gain during normal and crisis-ridden periods such as the novel coronavirus pandemic now which the Government needs to disseminate properly.
Way forward
- E-Shram is a vital system to provide hitherto invisible workers much-needed visibility.
- It will provide the Labour Market Citizenship Document to them.
- The govt should go one step further for triple linkage for efficient and leakage-less delivery of all kinds of benefits and voices to workers/citizens: One-Nation-One-Ration Card (ONOR), E-Shram Card (especially bank account seeded) and the Election Commission Card.
- Last but not least, registrations cannot be a source of exclusion of a person from receiving social assistance and benefits.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Bad Banks
Mains level: Asset reconstruction initiaitives by the govt
Paving the way for a major clean-up of bad loans in the banking system, the Union Cabinet has cleared a ₹30,600-crore guarantee programme for securities to be issued by the newly incorporated ‘bad bank’ for taking over and resolving non-performing assets (NPAs) amounting to ₹2 lakh crore.
What is a Bad Bank?
- A bad bank conveys the impression that it will function as a bank but has bad assets to start with.
- Technically, it is an asset reconstruction company (ARC) or an asset management company that takes over the bad loans of commercial banks, manages them and finally recovers the money over a period of time.
- Such a bank is not involved in lending and taking deposits, but helps commercial banks clean up their balance sheets and resolve bad loans.
- The takeover of bad loans is normally below the book value of the loan and the bad bank tries to recover as much as possible subsequently.
Bad Banks to be established
- The NARCL-IDRCL structure is the new bad bank.
- The National Asset Reconstruction Company Limited (NARCL) has already been incorporated under the Companies Act.
- It will acquire stressed assets worth about Rs 2 lakh crore from various commercial banks in different phases.
- Another entity — India Debt Resolution Company Ltd (IDRCL), which has also been set up — will then try to sell the stressed assets in the market.
How will the NARCL-IDRCL work?
- The NARCL will first purchase bad loans from banks.
- It will pay 15% of the agreed price in cash and the remaining 85% will be in the form of “Security Receipts”.
- When the assets are sold, with the help of IDRCL, , the commercial banks will be paid back the rest.
- If the bad bank is unable to sell the bad loan, or has to sell it at a loss, then the government guarantee will be invoked.
- The difference between what the commercial bank was supposed to get and what the bad bank was able to raise will be paid from the Rs 30,600 crore that has been provided by the government.
Will a bad bank resolve matters?
- From the perspective of a commercial bank saddled with high NPA levels, it will help.
- That’s because such a bank will get rid of all its toxic assets, which were eating up its profits, in one quick move.
- When the recovery money is paid back, it will further improve the bank’s position.
- Meanwhile, it can start lending again.
Why do we need a bad bank?
- The idea gained currency during Rajan’s tenure as RBI Governor.
- The RBI had then initiated an asset quality review (AQR) of banks and found that several banks had suppressed or hidden bad loans to show a healthy balance sheet.
- However, the idea remained on paper amid lack of consensus on the efficacy of such an institution.
- ARCs have not made any impact in resolving bad loans due to many procedural issues.
- While commercial banks resume lending, the so-called bad bank, or a bank of bad loans, would try to sell these “assets” in the market.
Good about the bad banks
- The problem of NPAs continues in the banking sector, especially among the weaker banks.
- The bad bank concept is in some ways similar to an ARC but is funded by the government initially, with banks and other investors co-investing in due course.
- The presence of the government is seen as a means to speed up the clean-up process.
- Many other countries had set up institutional mechanisms such as the Troubled Asset Relief Programme (TARP) in the US to deal with a problem of stress in the financial system.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: MMD Biosphere Reserve, BRs in India
Mains level: Not Much
UNESCO has designated Mura-Drava-Danube (MDD) as the world’s first ‘five-country biosphere reserve’.
About Mura-Drava-Danube BR
- The biosphere reserve covers 700 kilometres of the Mura, Drava and Danube rivers and stretches across Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Hungary and Serbia.
- The total area of the reserve — a million hectares — in the so-called ‘Amazon of Europe’, makes it the largest riverine protected area on the continent.
- The reserve is home to floodplain forests, gravel and sand banks, river islands, oxbows and meadows.
- It is home to continental Europe’s highest density of breeding white-tailed eagle (more than 150 pairs), as well as endangered species such as the little tern, black stork, otters, beavers and sturgeons.
- It is also an important annual resting and feeding place for more than 250,000 migratory birds, according to WWF.
- Almost 900,000 people live in the biosphere reserve. (UPSC may ask if it is uninhabited.)
Significance of this BR
- The new reserve represented an important contribution to the European Green Deal and contributes to the implementation of the EU Biodiversity Strategy in the Mura-Drava-Danube region.
- The strategy’s aim is to revitalize 25,000 km of rivers and protect 30 per cent of the European Union’s land area by 2030.
- The declaration as BR puts river revitalization, sustainable business practices enhancing cross-border cooperation into focus.
Ignore at your own risk! Its better to correct it here itself.
Such PYQs are ought to repeat any number of times in UPSC CSE.
Q. Consider the following statements:
- The boundaries of a National Park are defined by legislation.
- A Biosphere Reserve is declared to conserve a few specific species of flora and fauna.
- In a Wildlife Sanctuary, limited biotic interference is permitted.
Which of the above statements is/are correct?
(a) 1 only
(b) 2 and 3 only
(c) 1 and 3 only
(d) 1, 2 and 3
Post your answers here.
Back2Basics: UNESCO Biosphere Reserves
- Biosphere reserves are ‘learning places for sustainable development’.
- They are nominated by national governments and remain under the sovereign jurisdiction of the states where they are located.
- They are designated under the intergovernmental MAB Programme by the Director-General of UNESCO following the decisions of the MAB International Coordinating Council (MAB ICC).
- Their status is internationally recognized. Member States can submit sites through the designation process.
- Biosphere reserves include terrestrial, marine and coastal ecosystems.
They integrate three main “functions”:
- Conservation of biodiversity and cultural diversity
- Economic development that is socio-culturally and environmentally sustainable
- Logistic support, underpinning development through research, monitoring, education and training
(a) Core Areas
It comprises a strictly protected zone that contributes to the conservation of landscapes, ecosystems, species and genetic variation
(b) Buffer Zones
It surrounds or adjoins the core area(s), and is used for activities compatible with sound ecological practices that can reinforce scientific research, monitoring, training and education.
(c) Transition Area
The transition area is where communities foster socio-culturally and ecologically sustainable economic and human activities.
UNESCO recognized BRs in India
Year of
recognition
|
Name
|
States
|
| 2000 |
Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve |
Tamil Nadu |
| 2001 |
Gulf of Mannar Biosphere Reserve |
Tamil Nadu |
| 2001 |
Sundarbans Biosphere Reserve |
West Bengal |
| 2004 |
Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve |
Uttarakhand |
| 2009 |
Pachmarhi Biosphere Reserve |
Madhya Pradesh |
| 2009 |
Nokrek Biosphere Reserve |
Meghalaya |
| 2009 |
Simlipal Biosphere Reserve |
Odisha |
| 2012 |
Achanakmar-Amarkantak Biosphere Reserve |
Chhattisgarh |
| 2013 |
Great Nicobar Biosphere Reserve |
Great Nicobar |
| 2016 |
Agasthyamala Biosphere Reserve |
Kerala and Tamil Nadu |
| 2018 |
Kanchenjunga Biosphere Reserve |
Part of North and West Sikkim districts |
| 2020 |
Panna Biosphere Reserve |
Madhya Pradesh |
|
|
|
|
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Shankhlipi Script, Gupta Period
Mains level: Zenith of arts and cultural development during Gupta Period
Last week, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) discovered remains of an ancient temple dating back to the Gupta period (5th century) in a village in Uttar Pradesh’s Etah district.
Findings of the excavation
- The Bilsarh site was declared ‘protected’ in 1928.
- Every year, the ASI undertakes scrubbing work at the protected sites.
- This year, the team discovered two decorative pillars close to one another, with human figurines resembling an ancient temple.
- The stairs of the temple had ‘shankhalipi’ inscriptions, which were deciphered by the archaeologists as saying, ‘Sri Mahendraditya’, the title of Kumaragupta I of the Gupta dynasty.
You will find tons of PYQs on Gupta Period. Try this recent one:
Q. With reference to the period of Gupta dynasty in ancient India, the towns Ghantasala, Kadura and Chaula were well known as:
(a) ports handling foreign trade
(b) capitals of powerful kingdoms
(c) places of exquisite stone art and architecture
(d) important Buddhist pilgrimage centres
Post your answers here.
Who was Kumaragupta I?
- Kumaragupta I was an emperor of the Gupta Empire of Ancient India.
- A son of the Gupta emperor Chandragupta II and queen Dhruvadevi, he seems to have maintained control of his inherited territory, which extended from Gujarat in the west to Bengal region in the east.
- In the 5th century, Kumaragupta I ruled for 40 years over north-central India.
- Skandagupta, son and successor of Kumaragupta I is generally considered to be the last of the great Gupta rulers.
- He assumed the titles of Vikramaditya and Kramaditya.
What is the Shankhalipi script?
- Shankhalipi or “shell-script” is a term used by scholars to describe ornate spiral characters assumed to be Brahmi derivatives that look like conch shells or shankhas.
- They are found in inscriptions across north-central India and date to between the 4th and 8th centuries.
- Both Shankhalipi and Brahmi are stylised scripts used primarily for names and signatures.
- The inscriptions consist of a small number of characters, suggesting that the shell inscriptions are names or auspicious symbols or a combination of the two.
Chronology and meaning
- The script was discovered in 1836 on a brass trident in Uttarakhand’s Barahat by English scholar James Prinsep, who was the founding editor of the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal.
- A year later, he came across two more similar scripts at Nagarjuna group of caves in the Barabar Hills near Gaya.
- Prominent sites with shell inscriptions include the Mundeshwari Temple in Bihar, the Udayagiri Caves in Madhya Pradesh, Mansar in Maharashtra and some of the cave sites of Gujarat and Maharashtra.
- In fact, shell inscriptions are also reported in Indonesia’s Java and Borneo.
- Scholars have tried to decipher shell script but have not been successful.
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Back2Basics: Gupta Empire
- The Gupta Empire was an ancient Indian empire which existed from the early 4th century CE to late 6th century CE.
- This period is considered as the Golden Age of India by historians.
- The ruling dynasty of the empire was founded by the king Sri Gupta; the most notable rulers of the dynasty were Chandragupta I, Samudragupta, and Chandragupta II alias Vikramaditya.
- The 5th-century CE Sanskrit poet Kalidasa credits the Guptas with having conquered about twenty-one kingdoms, both in and outside India, including the kingdoms of Parasikas, the Hunas, the Kambojas, tribes located in the west and east Oxus valleys, the Kinnaras, Kiratas, and others.
- Many of the literary sources, such as Mahabharata and Ramayana, were canonized during this period.
- The Gupta period produced scholars such as Kalidasa, Aryabhata, Varahamihira, and Vatsyayana who made great advancements in many academic fields.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: White Goods, PLI Scheme
Mains level: Success of the PLI Scheme
A total of 52 companies have filed their application with a committed investment of Rs 5,866 crore under the PLI scheme to incentivize the domestic manufacturing of components of White Goods.
What are White Goods?
- White goods refer to heavy consumer durables or large home appliances, which were traditionally available only in white.
- They include appliances such as washing machines, air conditioners, stoves, refrigerators, etc. The white goods industry in India is highly concentrated.
Why PLI scheme for white goods?
- Indian appliance and consumer electronics (ACE) market reached INR 76,400 crore (~$10.93 bn) in 2019.
- Appliances and consumer electronics industry is expected to double to reach INR 1.48 lakh crore (~$21.18 bn) by 2025.
- The PLI Scheme on White Goods is designed to create complete component ecosystem for Air Conditioners and LED Lights Industry in India and make India an integral part of the global supply chains.
- Only manufacturing of components of ACs and LED Lights will be incentivized under the Scheme.
What is PLI Scheme?
- As the name suggests, the scheme provides incentives to companies for enhancing their domestic manufacturing apart from focusing on reducing import bills and improving the cost competitiveness of local goods.
- PLI scheme offers incentives on incremental sales for products manufactured in India.
- The scheme for respective sectors has to be implemented by the concerned ministries and departments.
Criteria laid for the scheme
- Eligibility criteria for businesses under the PLI scheme vary based on the sector approved under the scheme.
- For instance, the eligibility for telecom units is subject to the achievement of a minimum threshold of cumulative incremental investment and incremental sales of manufactured goods.
- The minimum investment threshold for MSME is Rs 10 crore and Rs 100 crores for others.
- Under food processing, SMEs and others must hold over 50 per cent of the stock of their subsidiaries, if any.
- On the other hand, for businesses under pharmaceuticals, the project has to be a greenfield project while the net worth of the company should not be less than 30 per cent of the total committed investment.
What are the incentives offered?
- An incentive of 4-6 per cent was offered last year on mobile and electronic components manufacturers such as resistors, transistors, diodes, etc.
- Similarly, 10 percent incentives were offered for six years (FY22-27) of the scheme for the food processing industry.
- For white goods too, the incentive of 4-6 per cent on incremental sales of goods manufactured in India for a period of five years was offered to companies engaged in the manufacturing of air conditioners and LED lights.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NITI Aayog
Mains level: Evolving concept of urban development
NITI Aayog has launched a report titled ‘Reforms in Urban Planning Capacity in India’ on measures to ramp up urban planning capacity in India.
Reforms in Urban Planning
- The report has been developed by NITI Aayog, in consultation with concerned ministries and eminent experts in the domain of urban and regional planning.
- It underscores urban challenges, including town planning and emphasizes need greater policy attention in our country.
Why such report?
- India is home to 11% of the total global urban population.
- By 2027, India will surpass China as the most populous country in the world.
- Unplanned urbanization, however, exerts great strain on our cities. In fact, the Covid-19 pandemic has revealed the dire need for the planning and management of our cities.
- The existing urban planning and governance framework is complex, which often leads to ambiguity and lack of accountability.
Highlights of the report
The report makes several recommendations that can unblock bottlenecks in the value chain of urban planning capacity in India. Some of them are:
Programmatic Intervention for Planning of Healthy Cities:
- Every city must aspire to become a ‘Healthy City for All’ by 2030.
- The report recommends a Central Sector Scheme ‘500 Healthy Cities Programme’, for a period of 5 years, wherein priority cities and towns would be selected jointly by the states and local bodies.
Programmatic Intervention for Optimum Utilization of Urban Land:
- All the cities and towns under the proposed ‘Healthy Cities Programme’ should strengthen development control regulations based on scientific evidence to maximize the efficiency of urban land (or planning area).
- The report recommends a sub-scheme ‘Preparation/Revision of Development Control Regulations’ for this purpose.
Ramping Up of Human Resources:
- To combat the shortage of urban planners in the public sector, the report recommends that the states/UTs may need to a) expedite the filling up of vacant positions of town planners.
- It asks to additionally sanction 8268 town planners’ posts as lateral entry positions.
Ensuring Qualified Professionals for Undertaking Urban Planning:
- State town and country planning departments face an acute shortage of town planners.
- This is compounded by the fact that in several states, ironically, a qualification in town planning is not even an essential criterion for such jobs.
- States may need to undertake requisite amendments in their recruitment rules to ensure the entry of qualified candidates into town-planning positions.
Re-engineering of Urban Governance:
- The report recommends the constitution of a high-powered committee to re-engineer the present urban-planning governance structure.
- The key aspects that would need to be addressed in this effort are:
- clear division of the roles and responsibilities of various authorities, appropriate revision of rules and regulations, etc.,
- creation of a more dynamic organizational structure, standardisation of the job descriptions of town planners and other experts, and
- extensive adoption of technology for enabling public participation and inter-agency coordination.
Revision of Town and Country Planning Acts:
- Most States have enacted the Town and Country Planning Acts, that enable them to prepare and notify master plans for implementation.
- However, many need to be reviewed and upgraded.
- Therefore, the formation of an apex committee at the state level is recommended to undertake a regular review of planning legislations (including town and country planning or urban and regional development acts or other relevant acts).
Demystifying Planning and Involving Citizens:
- While it is important to maintain the master plans’ technical rigour, it is equally important to demystify them for enabling citizens’ participation at relevant stages.
- Therefore, the committee strongly recommends a ‘Citizen Outreach Campaign’ for demystifying urban planning.
Steps for Enhancing the Role of Private Sector:
- The report recommends that concerted measures must be taken at multiple levels to strengthen the role of the private sector to improve the overall planning capacity in the country.
- These include the adoption of fair processes for procuring technical consultancy services, strengthening project structuring and management skills in the public sector, and empanelment of private sector consultancies.
Steps for Strengthening Urban Planning Education System:
- The Central universities and technical institutions in all the other States/UTs are encouraged to offer PG degree programmes (MTech Planning) to cater to the requirement of planners in the country.
- The committee also recommends that all such institutions may synergize with Ministry of Rural Development, Ministry of Panchayati Raj and respective state rural development departments.
Measures for Strengthening Human Resource and Match Demand–Supply:
- The report recommends the constitution of a ‘National Council of Town and Country Planners’ as a statutory body.
- Also, a ‘National Digital Platform of Town and Country Planners’ is suggested to be created within the National Urban Innovation Stack of MoHUA.
- This portal will enable self-registration of all planners and evolve as a marketplace for potential employers and urban planners.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: National Development Council
Mains level: Paper 3- Dealing with the recession
Context
The Centre is facing a serious financial crisis because of the exigencies created by the pandemic and its own policies. However, monetising assets and cutting down funds to states could aggravate the crisis.
3 Policies aggravating the crisis
1) NMP and disinvestment
- Union Finance Minister, while announcing the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP), said that asset monetisation is based on the philosophy of creation through monetisation and is aimed at “tapping private sector investment for new infrastructure creation”.
- Loss of dividend: Disinvestment of profitable Navratna companies will result in a loss of dividend, a major source of income for the Centre.
- Loss due to tax exemptions: Tax exemptions to the investors will take away another major share of income.
- Central funds will be squeezed and this, in turn, will have a bearing on state finances.
- NMP will seriously hurt the interests of the country.
2) Cutting down funds to States
- Kerala’s case: The state was getting about 3.92 per cent from the divisible pool in the 1970s and 1980s.
- It came down to 2.66 per cent and 2.34 per cent in the awards of the 12th and 13th Finance Commissions.
- The 14th Finance Commission award increased it to 2.45 (2.50) per cent.
- Now, the 15th Finance Commission has reduced it to 1.92 per cent.
- This arbitrary cut is a result of the adoption of certain new yardsticks by the commission without considering the state government’s views
- The 15th Finance Commission’s special grant (RD grant) of Rs 19,800 crore for this year will no longer be available in the coming years.
- Karnataka and many other states have also suffered because of the policy to reduce the divisible pool share.
3) Tax exemptions and surcharge
- Exemptions amounting to Rs 99,842.06 crore were extended to corporate houses in 2019-20.
- Many taxes on goods were reduced because of electoral compulsions. This reduced central revenues.
- Along with such tax exemptions, the increased use of cesses and surcharges is responsible for the shrinking of the shareable pool.
- The shareable resources with the Centre was around Rs 6.8 lakh crore in 2019-20 which has come down to Rs 5.5 lakh crore in 2020-21.
- All the cesses and surcharges that are not shared with states come to about 20 per cent of the total revenues of the Centre.
- States have been demanding that this money should be shared with them, particularly while fighting a pandemic.
- States complaining for resources does not augur well for cooperative federalism.
Way forward
- Developing basic infrastructure and the production sector is the only way to face an economic crisis.
- That should not be done by selling or handing over public assets to private individuals and corporations.
- We need massive public investment that will help people to form cooperatives and collectives in agriculture and industrial production.
- Parliament, the National Development Council and the GST Council should discuss this unprecedented situation.
Conclusion
We need to find a way out collectively. Handing over the rights on public properties to private individuals will take the country back to the colonial era. This must not be allowed.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: New Development Bank
Mains level: Paper 2- India-China relations
Context
Deng Xiaoping had told then-Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1988 that the 21st century would be “India and China’s century”, the current Chinese leadership has no patience for such pablum. They believe — indeed believe they know — that it is destined to be China’s century alone.
The policy of side-stepping contentious issues and encouraging bilateral economic relations
- There have always been political tensions, both over each country’s territorial claims over land controlled by the other, and China’s alliance with Pakistan, and India’s hospitality to the Dalai Lama.
- But neither country had allowed these tensions to overwhelm them:
- China had declared that the border dispute could be left to “future generations” to resolve.
- India had endorsed the “One China” policy, refusing to support Tibetan secessionism while limiting official reverence for the Dalai Lama to his status as a spiritual leader.
- India actions and statements have usually been designed not to provoke, but to relegate the border problem to the back burner while enabling trade relations with China (now worth close to $100 billion) to flourish.
- India made it clear that it was unwilling to join in any United States-led “containment” of China.
- From negligible levels till 1991, trade with China had grown to become one of India’s largest trading relationships.
- India engages with China diplomatically in the BRICS as well as conducting annual summits of RIC (Russia-India-China).
- India is an enthusiastic partner in the Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the New Development Bank (NDB).
- However, it has become increasingly apparent that the policy of side-stepping contentious issues and encouraging bilateral economic relations has played into Chinese hands.
Chinese strategy in Galwan
- In the Galwan clash, the Chinese troops seem to have been engaged in a tactical move to advance their positions along areas of the LAC that it covets, in order to threaten Indian positions and interdict patrols.
- They are threatening India’s construction of roads, bridges and similar infrastructure on undisputed Indian territory, a belated effort to mirror similar Chinese efforts near the LAC in Tibet.
- They have established a fixed presence in these areas well beyond China’s own ‘Claim Line’.
- The objective seems to be to extend Chinese troop presence to the intersection of the Galwan river and the Shyok river, which would make the Galwan Valley off bounds to India.
- The Chinese have constructed permanent structures in the area of their intrusion and issued statements claiming that sovereignty over the Galwan valley has “always belonged” to China.
- Consolidation of LOC: China’s strategy seems to be to consolidate the LAC where it wants it, so that an eventual border settlement — that takes these new realities into account — will be in its favour.
- Implications for India: In the meantime, border incidents keep the Indians off-balance and demonstrate to the world that India is not capable of challenging China, let alone offering security to other nations.
India’s options
- India has reinforced its military assets on the LAC to prevent deeper incursions for now.
- And hopes to press the Chinese to restore the status quo ante through either diplomatic or military means.
- Chinese and Indian officials are currently engaged in diplomatic and military-to-military dialogue to ease tensions, but de-escalation has been stalled for months.
- Economic options: India has responded with largely symbolic acts of economic retaliation.
- India has also reimposed tighter limits on Chinese investment in projects such as railways, motorways, public-sector construction projects, and telecoms.
Limits to India’s economic retaliation
- India is far too dependent on China for vital imports — such as pharmaceuticals, and even the active ingredients to make them, automotive parts and microchips that many fear it will harm India if it acted too strongly against China.
- Imports from China have become indispensable for India’s exports to the rest of the world.
- Various manufacturing inputs, industrial equipment and components, and even some technological know-how come from China; eliminating them could have a seriously negative effect on India’s economic growth.
- And there are limits to the effectiveness of any Indian retaliation: trade with China may seem substantial from an Indian perspective, but it only represents 3% of China’s exports.
- Drastically reducing it would not be enough to deter Beijing or cause it to change its behaviour.
Consider the question “State of India-China relationship hardly indicate the 21st Century being the “India and China’s century”. In light of this, examine the factors responsible for this and suggest the way forward for India.”
Conclusion
This range of considerations seems to leave only two strategic options. Playing second fiddle to an assertive China or aligning itself with a broader international coalition against Chinese ambitions. Since the first is indigestible for any democracy, is China de facto pushing India into doing something it has always resisted — allying with the West?
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