Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: IT Act 2000
Mains level: Paper 3- Personal Data Protection Bill and related issues
The existing data protection framework based on IT Act 2000 falls short on several counts. The Personal Data Protection Bill seeks to deal with the shortcoming in it. The article explains how the two differs.
Need for new data protection regime
- The need for a more robust data protection legislation came to the fore in 2017 post the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy (Retd) v. Union of India.
- In the judgment, the Court called for a data protection law that can effectively protect users’ privacy over their personal data.
- Consequently, the Committee of Experts was formed under the Chairmanship of Justice (Retd) B.N. Srikrishna to suggest a draft data protection law.
- The Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019, in its current form, is a revised version of the draft legislative document proposed by the Committee.
Issues with the existing data protection framework
- The Information Technology Act, 2000 governs how different entities collect and process users’ personal data in India.
- However, entities could override the protections in the regime by taking users’ consent to processing personal data under broad terms and conditions.
- This is problematic given that users might not understand the terms and conditions or the implications of giving consent.
- Further, the frameworks emphasise data security but do not place enough emphasis on data privacy.
- As a result, entities could use the data for purposes different to those that the user consented to.
- The data protection provisions under the IT Act also do not apply to government agencies.
- Finally, the regime seems to have become antiquated and inadequate in addressing risks emerging from new developments in data processing technology.
How the new regime under Data Protection Bill 2019 is different
- First, the Bill seeks to apply the data protection regime to both government and private entities across all sectors.
- Second, the Bill seeks to emphasise data security and data privacy.
- While entities will have to maintain security safeguards to protect personal data, they will also have to fulfill a set of data protection obligations and transparency and accountability measures.
- Third, the Bill seeks to give users a set of rights over their personal data and means to exercise those rights.
- Fourth, the Bill seeks to create an independent and powerful regulator known as the Data Protection Authority (DPA).
- The DPA will monitor and regulate data processing activities to ensure their compliance with the regime.
Concerns
- Under clause 35, the Central government can exempt any government agency from complying with the Bill.
- Similarly, users could find it difficult to enforce various user protection safeguards (such as rights and remedies) in the Bill.
- For instance, the Bill threatens legal consequences for users who withdraw their consent for a data processing activity.
- Additional concerns also emerge for the DPA as an independent effective regulator that can uphold users’ interests.
Consider the question “What are the issues with the present framework in India for data and privacy protection? How the Personal Data Protection Bill seeks to address these issues?”
Conclusion
The Joint Parliamentary Committee that is scrutinising the Bill is expected to submit its final report in the Monsoon Session of Parliament in 2021 Taking this time to make some changes in the Bill targeted towards addressing various concerns in it could make a stronger and more effective data protection regime.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Russia-China-US dynamic and its impact on India
Relations between Russia, China and the US have not always been the same. The changes in triangular dynamic offers lessons for India. The article deals with this issue.
India’s changing relations with great powers
- The recent visit of Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov to Delhi and Islamabad is among multiple signs of India’s changing relations with the great powers.
- At the same time, Delhi’s growing strategic partnerships with the US and Europe have begun to end India’s prolonged alienation from the West.
- Also, New Delhi’s own relative weight in the international system continues to increase and give greater breadth and depth to India’s foreign policy.
Shifts in triangular relations between Russia, China and America
1) Russia-China relations
- The leaders of Russia and China — Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong — signed a formal treaty of alliance in 1950.
- Russia invested massively in the economic modernisation of China, and also gave it the technology to become a nuclear weapon power.
- However, by the 1960s, their relations soured and two were arguing about ideology and a lot else.
- The Sino-Soviet split had consequences way beyond their bilateral relations.
- None of them more important than the efforts by both Moscow and Beijing to woo Washington.
- The break-up between Russia and China also opened space for Delhi against Beijing after the 1962 war in the Himalayas.
- Under intense American pressure on Russia in the 1980s, Moscow sought to normalise ties with Beijing.
- Stepping back to the 1960s and 1970s, China strongly objected to Delhi’s partnership with Moscow.
2) Russia-US relations
- Russia, which today resents India’s growing strategic warmth with the US, has its own long history of collaboration with Washington.
- Moscow and Washington laid the foundations for nuclear arms control and sought to develop a new framework for shared global leadership.
- But Delhi was especially concerned about the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty system, with all its constraints on India’s atomic options, that Moscow and Washington constructed in the late 1960s.
3) US-China relations
- Despite fighting Korean War with the US in the early 1950s, China normalised relations with the U.S. in 1971 to counter the perceived threat from Russia.
- Deng Xiaoping, refused to extend the 1950 security treaty with Russia that expired in 1980.
- China turned instead, towards building a solid economic partnership with the US and the West that helped accelerate China’s rise as a great power.
Lessons for India
- The twists and turns in the triangular dynamic between America, Russia and China noted above should remind us that Moscow and Beijing are not going to be “best friends forever”.
- India has no reason to rule out important changes in the way the US, Russia and China relate to each other in the near and medium-term.
- In the last few years, India has finally overcome its historic hesitations in partnering with the US.
- India has also intensified its efforts to engage European powers, especially France.
- Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s visit to India later this month promises a fresh start in India’s difficult postcolonial ties with Britain.
- India is also expanding its ties with Asian middle powers like Japan, Korea and Australia.
- Despite the current differences over Afghanistan and the Indo-Pacific, India and Russia have no reason to throw away their mutually beneficial bilateral partnership.
- The current troubles with China seem to be an unfortunate exception to the upswing in India’s bilateral ties with global actors.
Consider the question “What are the lessons India can draw from the twists and turns in the triangular dynamic between America, Russia and China.”
Conclusion
India has successfully managed the past flux in the great power politics; it is even better positioned today to deal with potential changes among the great powers.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Shaphari Scheme
Mains level: Not Much
Commerce Ministry wants to build confidence in quality, antibiotic-free shrimp products from India for the global market.
Shaphari Scheme
- The Marine Products Exports Development Authority (MPEDA) has developed a certification scheme for aquaculture products called ‘Shaphari’, a Sanksrit word that means the superior quality of fishery products suitable for human consumption.
- The Shaphari scheme is based on the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization’s technical guidelines on aquaculture certification.
- It will have two components — certifying hatcheries for the quality of their seeds and, separately, approving shrimp farms that adopt the requisite good practices.
- The certification of hatcheries will help farmers easily identify good quality seed producers.
- Those who successfully clear multiple audits of their operations shall be granted a certificate for a period of two years.
- The entire certification process will be online to minimize human errors and ensure higher credibility and transparency.
Bolstering confidence in India’s Shrimp production
- To bolster confidence in India’s frozen shrimp produce, the country’s biggest seafood export item, the Centre has kicked off a new scheme called ‘Shaphari’ to certify hatcheries and farms that adopt good aquaculture practices.
- Frozen shrimp is India’s largest exported seafood item.
- But a combination of factors had hurt export volumes in recent months, including container shortages and incidents of seafood consignments being rejected because of food safety concerns.
- Some recent consignments sourced from Indian shrimp farms being rejected due to the presence of antibiotic residue and this is a matter of concern for exporters.
- The National Residue Control Programme for food safety issues in farm produce and pre-harvest testing system is already in place.
- But this certification was proposed as a market-based tool for hatcheries to adopt good aquaculture practices and help produce quality antibiotic-free shrimp products to assure global consumers.
Frozen shrimp export potential
- Frozen shrimp is India’s largest exported seafood item. It constituted 50.58% in quantity and 73.2% in terms of total U.S. dollar earnings from the sector during 2019-20.
- India exported frozen shrimp worth almost $5 billion in 2019-20, with the U.S. and China its the biggest buyers.
- Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu are India’s major shrimp producing States, and around 95% of the cultured shrimp produce is exported.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Resuming India-Pakistan trade ties
The article highlights the key takeaways from Pakistan’s vacillations on resuming the trade ties even in the face of impending economic crisis.
U-turn on resuming trade
- On March 31, Pakistan announced the decision to import cotton, yarn, and sugar from India.
- However, it took a U-turn on that announcement about resuming trade ties.
- This highlights the internal differences and the emphasis on politics over economy and trade.
- It also signifies Pakistan cabinet’s grandstanding, linking the normalisation of ties with India to Jammu and Kashmir.
3 takeaways from the decision
1) Immediate economic needs
- Pakistan’s decision was to import only three items from India, namely cotton, yarn and sugar.
- It was based on Pakistan’s immediate economic needs and not designed as a political confidence-building measure to normalise relations with India.
- For the textile and sugar industries in Pakistan, importing from India is imperative, practical and is the most economic.
- This is because cotton and sugarcane production declined there by 6.9% and 0.4%, respectively.
- By early 2019, the sugar prices started increasing, and in 2020, there was a crisis due to shortage and cost.
- Importing sugar from India would be cheaper for the consumer market in Pakistan.
2) Politics first
- The second takeaway is the supremacy of politics over trade and economy, even if the latter is beneficial to the importing country.
- The interests of its own business community and its export potential have become secondary.
- However, Pakistan need not be singled out; this is a curse in South Asia, where politics play supreme over trade and economy.
- The meagre percentage of intra-South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) trade and the failure of SAARC engaging in bilateral or regional trade would underline the above.
3) Emphasis on Jammu and Kashmir issue
- The third takeaway is the emphasis on Jammu and Kashmir by Pakistan to make any meaningful start in bilateral relations.
- This goes against what it has been telling the rest of the world that India should begin a dialogue with Pakistan.
- There were also reports that Pakistan agreeing to re-establish the ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC) was a part of this new strategy.
Consider the question: “Trade is unlikely to triumph over politics in South Asia; especially in India-Pakistan relations. This is a curse in South Asia, where politics play supreme over trade and economy.” Critically Examine.
Conclusion
Pakistan has been saying that the onus is on India to normalise the process. Perhaps, it is India’s turn to tell Islamabad that it is willing, but without any preconditions, and start with trade.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: RCEP
Mains level: Paper 2- Asia-EU engagement
The article highlights Asia’s growing significance in the wake of the pandemic. This is underscored by Europe’s meaningful engagement with Asia which is based on an understanding of the region’s geopolitical and economic significance.
Asia’s rise
- The pandemic has upended many certainties. But it has reinforced one major trend in global politics: The rise of Asia.
- The region’s rise has created three Asias.
- First, there is the familiar Asia of business — open, dynamic, interconnected.
- Second, an Asia of geopolitics, with ever-starker nationalisms, territorial conflicts, arms races and Sino-American rivalry.
- Lastly, we have an Asia of global challenges.
- These three Asias are also marked by 3 dynamics:
- 1) Geopolitical rivalries that threaten free trade.
- 2) The fight against the pandemic is mutating into a systemic competition between democracy and authoritarianism.
- 3) And frenzied economic growth is fuelling climate change.
European strategy for Indo-Pacific
- Germany together with France and the Netherlands, have commenced work on a European strategy for the Indo-Pacific.
- The strategy seeks cooperation with all countries of the region: For open economies and free trade; for the fight against pandemics and climate change; and for an inclusive, rules-based order.
- Such a European strategy for the Indo-Pacific must take all three Asias into account.
- Europe is a key trading, technology and investment partner for many countries of the region.
- The EU recently concluded groundbreaking free trade agreements with Japan, Singapore and Vietnam that set environmental and social standards.
- In late 2020, the countries of East and Southeast Asia signed Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, encompassing one-third of the global economy.
- It is time for the EU to swiftly conclude the ongoing negotiations on trade agreements with Australia and New Zealand – and to move forward with negotiations with Indonesia and India.
Reducing dependencies
- Following the above policies, Europe will also reduce dependency and following the principle of diversification.
- Together with its Indo-Pacific partners, Europe can set standards for new technologies, human-centred digitisation and sustainable connectivity.
- In this endeavour, Europe can draw on its innovative and economic strength as well as its regulatory power.
- At the EU-India Summit in May, the launch of a connectivity partnership with India will further connect India’s and Europe’s digital economies.
Rising tensions and rules-based Indo-Pacific
- Meanwhile, tensions are rising in the Asia of geopolitics.
- New cold wars or even hot conflicts in the Indo-Pacific would be an economic and political nightmare.
- Europe must, therefore, take a firmer stand against polarisation and more strongly advocate an inclusive, rules-based Indo-Pacific.
- The strategic partnership concluded between the EU and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) last December connects us with like-minded middle powers.
Asia of geopolitical challenges
- Containing geopolitical rivalries in Asia is also a precondition for shaping the future with the Asia of global challenges.
- As the biggest emitters of CO2, the US, China, India and the EU will only win the fight against climate change together.
- The Leaders Summit on Climate that will be hosted by the US next week sets the stage for cooperation.
- Europe and the countries of the Indo-Pacific need each other also in the fight against the virus.
- The EU is by far the biggest supporter of the international vaccine platform COVAX, and India as a leading producer of vaccines is the most important COVAX supplier.
- We will all benefit from this as, without the worldwide vaccination rollout, mutations will keep on setting us back in the fight against the pandemic.
- Europe will continue to stand up for human rights and democracy in the Indo-Pacific.
- This was demonstrated with sanctions against those responsible for human rights violations in Xinjiang — and also against Myanmar’s generals.
Conclusion
Europe is ready for a new partnership — a partnership founded on seeking dialogue with the open Asia of business, taming geopolitical rivalry in Asia together and coming up with responses to the world of tomorrow with the Asia of global challenges. This must be the objective of European policy — for and with the Indo-Pacific
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Maritime zones under UNCLOS
Mains level: Paper 2- Issues with UNCLOS 1982
The explains the implications of a recent incident in which the US 7th fleet asserted navigation freedom and rights inside India’s Exclusive Economic Zone.
Freedom of navigation operation in India’s EEZ
- The US 7th fleet recently declared that on 7th April, 2021 USS John Paul Jones asserted navigational rights and freedom inside India’s EEZ, without requesting India’s prior consent.
- The statement also said that “India requires prior consent for military exercises or manoeuvres in its EEZ, a claim inconsistent with international law.
Which international law the statement referred to
- The “international law” being cited by Commander 7th Fleet is a UN Convention which resulted from the third UN Conference on Law of the Seas (UNCLOS 1982).
- India has ratified the Convention, which came into force in 1994.
- However, amongst the 168 nations who have either acceded to or ratified UNCLOS 1982, the US is conspicuous by its absence.
Background of the UNCLOS
- In 1945, the US unilaterally declared its jurisdiction over all natural resources on that nation’s continental shelf.
- Taking cue from the US, some states extended their sovereign rights to 200 miles, while others declared territorial limits as they pleased.
- To bring order to a confusing situation, conferences for codifying laws of the seas were convened by the UN.
- After negotiations, an agreement was obtained on a set of laws that formalised the following maritime zones:
- (a) A 12-mile limit on territorial sea;
- (b) A 24-mile contiguous zone.
- (c) Amnewly conceived “exclusive economic zone” (EEZ) extending up to 200 miles within which the state would have sole rights over natural resources.
- The EEZ was said to be unique in that it was neither high seas nor territorial waters.
Issues with the UNCLOS 1982
- The signatories UNCLOS 1982 have chosen to remain silent on controversial issues with military or security implications and mandated no process for resolution of ambiguities.
- Resort to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea or a Court of Arbitration are amongst the options available.
- However, many states have expressed a preference for “negotiating in good faith”.
- The time has, perhaps, come for signatories of UNCLOS 1982 to convene another conference to review laws and resolve issues of contention.
Why US refused to ratify UNCLOS
- It was accepted that the seabed beyond the limits of national jurisdiction was not subject to national sovereignty but would be “the common heritage of mankind” .
- This seems to have been at the root of the US opposition to UNCLOS.
- It was felt in the US that this concept favoured the under-developed countries thereby denying America the fruits of its technological superiority.
- The US Senate, therefore, refused to ratify UNCLOS.
- Amongst the areas of major contention or sharp divergence in the interpretation of rules are:
- 1) Applicability of the EEZ concept to rocks and islets.
- 2) The right of innocent passage for foreign warships through territorial seas.
- 3) Conduct of naval activities in the EEZ and the pursuit of marine scientific research in territorial waters and EEZ.
Containing China
- China has insulated itself against US intervention, through the progressive development of its “anti-access, area-denial” or A2AD capability.
- China has accelerated its campaign to achieve control of the South China Sea (SCS).
- In 2013, China commenced on an intense campaign to build artificial islands in the SCS on top of reefs in the Spratly and Paracel groups.
- In 2016, China disdainfully rejected the verdict of the UN Court of Arbitration in its dispute with the Philippines.
- So far, none of the US initiatives including Obama’s abortive US Pivot/Re-balance to Asia, Trump’s Indo-Pacific Strategy and Asia Reassurance Initiative Act, seem to have had the slightest impact on China’s aggressive intent
- Therefore, it seems pointless for the US Navy to frighten the Maldives or friendly India and it needs to focus on China instead.
Consider the question “What are the different types of maritime zones under the United Nations Convention for the Law of the Sea 1982? What are the flaws in the convention?
Conclusion
In this fraught environment, the ever-expanding, worldwide FONOP campaign needs a careful reappraisal by US policy-makers for effectiveness — lest it alienates friends instead of deterring adversaries.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Jyotiba Phule
Mains level: Social reformers in India
The Prime Minister has paid tribute to the great social reformer, thinker, philosopher and writer Mahatma Jyotiba Phule on his birth anniversary.
Mahatma Phule
- Jotirao Govindrao Phule was an Indian social activist, thinker, anti-caste social reformer and writer from Maharashtra.
- His work extended to many fields, including the eradication of untouchability and the caste system and for his efforts in educating women and exploited caste people.
- He and his wife, Savitribai Phule, were pioneers of women’s education in India. Phule started his first school for girls in 1848 in Pune at Tatyasaheb Bhide’s residence or Bhidewada.
- He, along with his followers, formed the Satyashodhak Samaj (Society of Truth Seekers) to attain equal rights for people from exploited castes.
- People from all religions and castes could become a part of this association which worked for the upliftment of the oppressed classes.
- Phule is regarded as an important figure in the social reform movement in Maharashtra. He was bestowed with an honorific Mahātmā title by Maharashtrian social activist Vithalrao Krishnaji Vandekar in 1888.
His social work
Phule’s social activism included many fields, including the eradication of untouchability and the caste system, education of women and the Dalits, and welfare of downtrodden women.
- Education
- In 1848, aged 21, Phule visited a girls’ school in Ahmadnagar, run by Christian missionaries.
- He realized that exploited castes and women were at a disadvantage in Indian society, and also that education of these sections was vital to their emancipation
- Phule first taught reading and writing to his wife, Savitribai, and then the couple started the first indigenously run school for girls in Pune.
- The conservative upper caste society of Pune didn’t approve of his work. But many Indians and Europeans helped him generously.
- Women’s welfare
- Phule watched how untouchables were not permitted to pollute anyone with their shadows and that they had to attach a broom to their backs to wipe the path on which they had travelled.
- He saw young widows shaving their heads, refraining from any sort of joy in their life. He saw how untouchable women had been forced to dance naked.
- He made the decision to educate women by witnessing all these social evils that encouraged inequality.
- He championed widow remarriage and started a home for dominant caste pregnant widows to give birth in a safe and secure place in 1863.
- His orphanage was established in an attempt to reduce the rate of infanticide.
- Along with his longtime friend Sadashiv Ballal Govande and Savitribai, he started an infanticide prevention centre.
- Phule tried to eliminate the stigma of social untouchability surrounding the exploited castes by opening his house and the use of his water-well to the members of the exploited castes.
- Views on religion and caste
- Phule recast Aryan invasion theory, proposing that the Aryan conquerors of India, were in fact barbaric suppressors of the indigenous people.
- He believed that they had instituted the caste system as a framework for subjugation and social division that ensured the pre-eminence of their Brahmin successors.
- He saw the subsequent Muslim conquests of the Indian subcontinent as more of the same sort of thing, being a repressive alien regime.
- But he considered the British to be relatively enlightened and not supportive of the varnashrama dharma system instigated and then perpetuated by those previous invaders.
- In his book, Gulamgiri, he thanked Christian missionaries and the British colonists for making the exploited castes realise that they are worthy of all human rights.
- His critique of the caste system began with an attack on the Vedas, the most fundamental texts of Hindus. He considered them to be a form of false consciousness.
- He is credited with introducing the Marathi word ‘Dalit’ (broken, crushed) as a descriptor for those people who were outside the traditional varna system.
- He advocated making primary education compulsory in villages. He also asked for special incentives to get more lower-caste people in high schools and colleges.
Satyashodhak Samaj
- On 24 September 1873, Phule formed Satyashodhak Samaj to focus on the rights of depressed groups such as women, the Shudra, and the Dalit.
- Through this the samaj opposed idolatry and denounced the caste system.
- Satyashodhak Samaj campaigned for the spread of rational thinking and rejected the need for priests.
- Phule established Satyashodhak Samaj with the ideals of human well-being, happiness, unity, equality, and easy religious principles and rituals.
- A Pune-based newspaper, Deenbandhu, provided the voice for the views of the Samaj.
- The membership of the samaj included Muslims, Brahmins and government officials. Phule’s own Mali caste provided the leading members and financial supporters for the organization.
Published works
- Tritiya Ratna, 1855
- Manav Mahammand (Muhammad) (Abhang)
- Gulamgiri, 1873
- Sarvajanik Satya Dharma Poostak, April 1889
- Sarvajanic Satya Dharmapustak, 1891
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Thwaites Glacier
Mains level: Glacial melting and sea level rise
The melting of Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier – also called the “Doomsday Glacier”– has long been a cause of concern because of its high potential of speeding up the global sea-level rise happening due to climate change.
Thwaites Glacier
- Called the Thwaites Glacier, it is 120 km wide at its broadest, fast-moving, and melting fast over the years.
- Because of its size (1.9 lakh square km), it contains enough water to raise the world sea level by more than half a meter.
- Studies have found the amount of ice flowing out of it has nearly doubled over the past 30 years.
- Thwaites’s melting already contributes 4% to global sea-level rise each year. It is estimated that it would collapse into the sea in 200-900 years.
- Thwaites is important for Antarctica as it slows the ice behind it from freely flowing into the ocean. Because of the risk it faces — and poses — Thwaites is often called the Doomsday Glacier.
What have previous studies said?
- A 2019 study by New York University had discovered a fast-growing cavity in the glacier. Then last year, researchers detected warm water at a vital point below the glacier.
- The study reported water at just two degrees above freezing point at Thwaites’s “grounding zone” or “grounding line”.
- The grounding line is the place below a glacier at which the ice transitions between resting fully on bedrock and floating on the ocean as an ice shelf.
- The location of the line is a pointer to the rate of retreat of a glacier.
- When glaciers melt and lose weight, they float off the land where they used to be situated. When this happens, the grounding line retreats.
- That exposes more of a glacier’s underside to seawater, increasing the melting rate resulting in the glacier speeding up, stretching out, and thinning, causing the grounding line to retreat ever further.
What has the new study revealed?
- The recent Gothenburg study used an uncrewed submarine to go under the Thwaites glacier front to make observations.
- The submersible called “Ran” measured among other things the strength, temperature, salinity and oxygen content of the ocean currents that go under the glacier.
- There is a deep connection to the east through which deepwater flows from Pine Island Bay, a connection that was previously thought to be blocked by an underwater ridge.
Why this is a cause of worry?
- The warm water is approaching the pinning points of the glacier from all sides, impacting these locations where the ice is connected to the seabed and where the ice sheet finds stability.
- This has the potential to make things worse for Thwaites, whose ice shelf is already retreating.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: FCAT
Mains level: Not Much
The Government of India’s decision to abolish the Film Certification Appellate Tribunal (FCAT), under the Tribunal Reforms Ordinance, 2021, has triggered a wave of criticism with filmmakers.
The FCAT was the place filmmakers walked into as a penultimate resort to challenging edits suggested to their films by the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC).
Plunging into crisis
- FCAT is only one of many tribunals in the country that were either abolished or amalgamated under the Ordinance.
- Earlier, if a filmmaker fails to clear the Examining Committee (EC) and Revising Committee (RC) hurdles of the CBFC, the FCAT was the next step of recourse, but that is no longer the case.
- FCAT only charged a nominal fee to hold the screening for its members, and it would pass its judgment immediately.
Fighting the system
- FCAT’s panel is predominantly made up of members from industry veterans who arrive at a judgment after balancing both CBFC and the filmmaker’s points of view.
- Most of CBFC’s decisions were overruled by the Tribunal and that has reassured constitutional rights under Article 19 to filmmakers to express themselves freely.
- A judge will only look at the issue from a legal perspective, not whether a particular edit will constrict the flow of the movie.
Re-classifying certification
- To avoid such issues, the Government constituted the ‘Shyam Benegal Committee’ in January 2016.
- The committee recommended regulations for film certification — a move away from the current practice adopted by CBFC, and submitted its report in April 2016.
- According to many, a revamp of the certification system that doesn’t require censoring or cuts is the need of the hour.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Gangetic and Indus Dolphin
Mains level: Not Much
Detailed analysis of South Asian river dolphins has revealed that the Indus and Ganges River dolphins are not one, but two separate species.
About Gangetic Dolphin
- The Gangetic river system is home to a vast variety of aquatic life, including the Gangetic dolphin (Platanista gangetica).
- It is one of five species of river dolphin found around the world.
- It is found mainly in the Indian subcontinent, particularly in Ganga-Brahmaputra-Meghna and Karnaphuli-Sangu river systems.
- An adult dolphin could weigh between 70 kg and 90 kg. The breeding season of the Gangetic dolphin extends from January to June.
- They feed on several species of fishes, invertebrates etc.
Indus Dolphin is the divergent specie
- Currently, they are classified as two subspecies under Platanista gangetica. The study estimates that Indus and Ganges river dolphins may have diverged around 550,000 years ago.
- The international team studied body growth, skull morphology, tooth counts, colouration and genetic makeup and published the findings last month in Marine Mammal Science.
Conservation status
- The Indus and Ganges River dolphins are both classified as ‘Endangered’ species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
- It is the national aquatic animal and had been granted non-human personhood status by the government in 2017.
- It is also protected under Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act (1972).
- Vikramshila Gangetic Dolphin Sanctuary (VGDS) in Bihar is India’s only sanctuary for the Gangetic dolphin.
- It has been categorised as endangered on the Red List of Threatened Species by the IUCN
- Physical barriers such as dams and barrages created across the river, the declining river flows reduced the gene flow to a great extent making the species vulnerable.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: 1951 Refugee Convention
Mains level: Paper 2- Need for refugee protection policy framework in India
The article highlights the issue of the lack of refugee protection framework in India and suggests enacting domestic law to deal with the issue.
India’s record on refugee protection
- India, for the most part, has had a stellar record on the issue of refugee protection.
- But this moral tradition has come under great stress of late.
- New Delhi has been one of the largest recipients of refugees in the world in spite of not being a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol.
Confusion in policies for immigrants and refugees
- Much of the debate in India is about illegal immigrants, not refugees, the two categories tend to get bunched together.
- Our policies towards illegal immigrants and refugees is confused is because as per Indian law, both categories of people are viewed as one and the same and are covered under the Foreigners Act, 1946.
- The act offers a simple definition of a foreigner — “foreigner” means “a person who is not a citizen of India”.
- There are fundamental differences between illegal immigrants and refugees, but India is legally ill-equipped to deal with them separately due to a lack of legal provisions.
- Also, India is not a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, the key legal documents pertaining to refugee protection.
How absence of policy framework creates problems
- The absence of legal framework for refugees leads to policy ambiguity whereby India’s refugee policy is guided primarily by ad hocism and ‘political utility’.
- At the same time, the absence of a legal framework increases the possibility of the domestic politicisation of refugee protection and complicates its geopolitical faultlines.
- The absence of a clearly laid down refugee protection law also opens the door for geopolitical considerations while deciding to admit refugees or not.
- For example, India’s decision in the recent case of admitting Myanmarese refugees fleeing to India was influence by the possibility of irking the Generals in Naypyitaw.
- However, hypothetically speaking, if New Delhi had domestic legislation regarding refugees it could have tempered the expectations of the junta to return the fleeing Myanmarese.
Why India has not signed convention and protocol on refugee protection
- The definition of refugees in the 1951 convention only pertains to the violation of civil and political rights, but not economic rights, of individuals.
- If the violation of economic rights were to be included in the definition of a refugee, it would clearly pose a major burden on the developed world.
- This argument, if used in the South Asian context, could be a problematic proposition for India too.
- India also need to argue that the North is violating the convention in both letter and spirit, and make its accession conditional on the Western States rolling back the non-entrée (no entry) regime.
- The non-entrée regime is constituted by a range of legal and administrative measures that include visa restrictions, carrier sanctions, interdictions, third safe-country rule, restrictive interpretations of the definition of ‘refugee’, withdrawal of social welfare benefits to asylum seekers, and widespread practices of detention.”
- In other words, India must use its exemplary, though less than perfect, history of refugee protection to begin a global conversation on the issue.
Way forward
- What other options do we have to respond to the refugee situation we are faced with?
- The answer perhaps lies in a new domestic law aimed at refugees.
- The CAA, however, is not the answer to this problem primarily because of its deeply discriminatory nature.
- What is perhaps equally important is that such a domestic refugee law should allow for temporary shelter and work permit for refugees.
- India must also make a distinction between temporary migrant workers, illegal immigrants and refugees and deal with each of them differently through proper legal and institutional mechanisms.
Consider the question “What are the reasons for India’s not singing 1951 Refugee Convention? What are the options India can explore for refugee protection?
Conclusion
Our traditional practice of managing these issues with ambiguity and political expediency has become deeply counterproductive: It neither protects the refugees nor helps stop illegal immigration into the country.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 3- Issue of linking interest rate on small saving with the G-sec yields
The article highlights the issues with linking small savings interest rates with the yield on G-sec and its resetting on a quarterly basis.
Issue of small savings interest rate
- For decades, small savings have constituted an important source of household savings, funded development programmes of state governments and offered a safe and secure source of income to senior citizens.
- Recently, a notification on reducing the interest rates on small savings schemes quickly made headlines and was rescinded after 12 hours.
- For small savers, the pandemic turned into a triple whammy: Battling job losses, higher food prices and a sharp devaluation in the value of their savings and earnings thereof.
- Interest on the Senior Citizens’ Saving Scheme was cut to 7.4 per cent, effective from April 2020, from 8.7 per cent before,
- This was done despite the Gopinath Committee had recommended the rates should never be revised more than 100 basis points in a single year.
Linking small savings rate to G-sec yields
- The suggestion to link small savings rates to G-Sec yields was first made in 2001 by Y V Reddy, then deputy governor of RBI.
- Reddy committee suggested small savings rates should be reset once a year, allowing for a spread of up to 50 basis points.
- Reddy’s recommendations were reiterated by his successor Rakesh Mohan.
- The Gopinath Committee, set up in 2009 gave its report in June 2011 and annual revisions in small savings rates linked to G-sec yields got underway effective April 2012.
- In 2016, however, the government decided to reset them on a quarterly basis.
Why link small savings rate to G-sec yields
- Such linking is premised on the argument that the money collected through these schemes is invested in central and state government securities.
- While the yield on the government securities progressively declined over time, small savings rates remained downwardly rigid.
- This resulted in an asset-liability mismatch that threatened the viability of the NSSF.
- It is also argued that people’s dependence on small savings schemes had significantly declined since formal banking had rapidly expanded.
- Moreover, for those who used small savings as safety nets there were other alternatives such as old-age pension and other similar schemes.
Issues with resetting rates on quarterly basis
- All expert committees that examined the issue had strongly argued against resetting the rates on a quarterly basis.
- The fear was it could result in unfair rewards for small savers in the event the G-sec yields remain artificially low for a certain period of time.
- It did happen in the pandemic year when small savings rates faced the steepest cut in five years.
- The changed policy on small savings is also premised on the belief that markets offer fair outcomes.
- More often than not, that is not true.
- The experience of the past year bears it out.
- While retail inflation spiked, the RBI used every trick in its bag to hold G-sec yields down.
Way forward
- The government could go back to resetting the rates annually, keeping the revision under 100 basis points and allowing small savings rates a spread of at least 50 basis points, not up to 50 basis points, over and above the G-sec yields.
- Also, it may revisit the suggestion made by the Rakesh Mohan Committee to use a weighted average of G-sec yields over preceding two years — two-thirds weight for the later year, one-third for the earlier year.
Consider the question “What was the rationale for linking the interest rates on small savings to yield on G-sec? What are the issues with it?
Conclusion
Adopting the changes suggested here may require setting aside a few thousand crores to fill the resultant gap in the NSSF. But it is worth doing.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: FONOP
Mains level: Freedom of navigation issues
The US Navy has had “asserted navigational rights and freedoms approximately 130 nautical miles west of Lakshadweep Islands, inside India’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), without requesting India’s prior consent, consistent with international law”.
Try this question:
Q.What do you mean by Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPs)? What are its legal backings? Discuss its significance.
Freedom of Navigation Operations
- FONOPs are closely linked to the concept of freedom of navigation, and in particular to the enforcement of relevant international law and customs regarding freedom of navigation.
- It involves passage conducted by the US Navy through waters claimed by coastal nations as their exclusive territory.
- It is carried under the US policy of exercising and asserting its navigation and overflight rights and freedoms around the world”.
- It says these “assertions communicate that the US does not acquiesce to the excessive maritime claims of other nations, and thus prevents those claims from becoming accepted in international law”.
Significance of FONOPs
- FONOPs are a method of enforcing UNCLOS (United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea) and avoiding these negative outcomes by reinforcing freedom of navigation through practice.
- It is exercised by sailing through all areas of the sea permitted under UNCLOS, and particularly those areas that states have attempted to close off to free navigation as defined under UNCLOS.
What about EEZs?
- An exclusive economic zone (EEZ) is prescribed by the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
- It is an area of the sea in which a sovereign state has special rights regarding the exploration and use of marine resources, including energy production from water and wind.
- It stretches from the baseline out to 200 nautical miles from the coast of the state in question.
- It is also referred to as a maritime continental margin and, in colloquial usage, may include the continental shelf.
- The term does not include either the territorial sea or the continental shelf beyond the 200 nautical mile limit.
- The difference between the territorial sea and the exclusive economic zone is that the first confers full sovereignty over the waters, whereas the second is merely a “sovereign right” which refers to the coastal state’s rights below the surface of the sea.
- The surface waters, as can be seen on the map, are international waters.
Is FONOP violative of India’s EEZ?
- As per India’s Territorial Waters Act, 1976, the EEZ of India “is an area beyond and adjacent to the territorial waters, and the limit of such zone is two hundred nautical miles from the baseline”.
- India’s “limit of the territorial waters is the line every point of which is at a distance of twelve nautical miles from the nearest point of the appropriate baseline”.
- Under the 1976 law, “all foreign ships (other than warships including submarines and other underwater vehicles) shall enjoy the right of innocent passage through the territorial waters”.
Back2Basics: UNCLOS
- The Law of the Sea Treaty formally known as the Third United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea was adopted in 1982 at Montego Bay, Jamaica. It entered into force in 1994.
- The convention establishes a comprehensive set of rules governing the oceans and replaces previous U.N. Conventions on the Law of the Sea
- The convention defines the distance of 12 nautical miles from the baseline as Territorial Sea limit and a distance of 200 nautical miles distance as Exclusive Economic Zone limit.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Article 25
Mains level: Not Much
The Supreme Court has said people are free to choose their own religion and lashed out at a PIL claiming that there is mass religious conversion happening across the country.
Right to freedom of Religion
Article 25 of the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion to all persons in India. It provides that all persons in India, subject to public order, morality, health, and other provisions:
- Are equally entitled to freedom of conscience, and
- Have the right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion.
It further provides that this article shall not affect any existing law and shall not prevent the state from making any law relating to:
- Regulation or restriction of any economic, financial, political, or secular activity associated with religious practice.
- Providing social welfare and reform.
- Opening of Hindu religious institutions of public character for all the classes and sections of the Hindus.
What did the Supreme Court say?
- Instead, a Bench led by Justice Rohinton F. Nariman said people have a right under the Constitution to profess, practise and propagate religion.
- Justice Nariman said every person is the final judge of their own choice of religion or who their life partner should be. Courts cannot sit in judgment of a person’s choice of religion or a life partner.
- Religious faith is a part of the fundamental right to privacy.
- Justice Nariman reminded Mr Upadhyay of the Constitution Bench judgment which upheld inviolability of the right to privacy, equating it with the rights to life, dignity and liberty.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: SARTHAQ
Mains level: Not Much
Union Education Minister has launched ‘Students’ and Teachers’ Holistic Advancement through Quality Education (SARTHAQ), the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 implementation plan for school education.
SARTHAQ
- SARTHAQ keeps in mind the concurrent nature of education and adheres to the spirit of federalism.
- The plan delineates the roadmap for the implementation of NEP 2020 for the next 10 years.
- States and Union Territories have been given the flexibility to adapt the plan with “local contextualization”.
- They have been allowed to modify the plan as per their needs and requirements.
Envisaged outcomes
- Increase in Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER), Net Enrolment Ratio (NER), transition rate and retention rate at all levels and reduction in dropouts and out of school children.
- Access to quality ECCE and Universal Acquisition of Foundational Literacy and Numeracy by Grade 3.
- Improvement in Learning Outcomes at all stages with an emphasis on teaching and learning through mother tongue/local/regional languages in the early years.
- Integration of vocational education, sports, arts, knowledge of India, 21st-century skills, values of citizenship, awareness of environment conservation, etc. in the curriculum at all stages.
- Introduction of Experiential learning at all stages and adoption of innovative pedagogies by teachers in classroom transaction.
- Integration of technology in educational planning and governance and availability of ICT and quality e-content in classrooms.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not Much
Mains level: Opium cultivation
The Central government has decided to rope in the private sector to commence production of concentrated poppy straw from India’s opium crop.
What is the move?
- The move aims to boost the yield of alkaloids, used for medical purposes and exported to several countries.
- Among the few countries permitted to cultivate the opium poppy crop for export and extraction of alkaloids, India currently only extracts alkaloids from opium gum at facilities controlled by the Revenue Department.
- This entails farmers extracting gum by manually lancing the opium pods and selling the gum to government factories.
- The Ministry has now decided to switch to new technologies after trial cultivation reports submitted last year by two private firms showed higher extraction of alkaloids using the concentrated poppy straw (CPS).
Opium Poppy
- The milky fluid that seeps from cuts in the unripe poppy seed pod has, since ancient times, been scraped off and air-dried to produce what is known as opium.
- The seedpod is first incised with a multi-bladed tool.
- This lets the opium “gum” ooze out.
- The semi-dried “gum” is harvested with a curved spatula and then dried in open wooden boxes.
- The dried opium resin is placed in bags or rolled into balls for sale.
Why such a move?
- India’s opium crop acreage has been steadily declining over the years.
- The CPS extraction method is expected to help cut the occasional dependence on imports of products like codeine (extracted from opium) for medical uses.
Amendments to NDPS Act
- Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh are the three traditionally opium-growing States, where poppy crop cultivation is allowed based on licences issued annually by the Central Bureau of Narcotics.
- While roping in private players in producing CPS and extracting alkaloids from it is likely to require amendments to the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985.
- The Revenue Department has decided to appoint a consultant to help frame the bidding parameters and concession agreements for the same.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NanoSniffer
Mains level: NA
A Union Minister has launched NanoSniffer, the world’s first Microsensor based Explosive Trace Detector (ETD) developed by NanoSniff Technologies, an IIT Bombay incubated startup.
Can you name some explosives?
NanoSniffer
- NanoSniffer is a 100% Made in India product in terms of research, development & manufacturing.
- It can detect explosives in less than 10 seconds and it also identifies and categorizes explosives into different classes. It detects all classes of military, conventional and homemade explosives.
- It gives visible & audible alerts with a sunlight-readable colour display.
- NanoSniffer provides trace detection of the nano-gram quantity of explosives & delivers result in seconds.
- It can accurately detect a wide range of military, commercial and homemade explosives threats.
- Further analysis of the algorithms also helps in the categorization of explosives into the appropriate class.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 3- Challenge of left wing extremism
The article deals with the counterinsurgency strategies to deal with the issues of left wing extremism in India
Threat of left-wing extremism
- The killing of 22 security personnel by Maoists serves as a grim reminder that left-wing insurgency continues to be one of the biggest internal security threats for the country.
- In the past few years, Maoist violence seemed to have been on a downward spiral.
- The figures associated with the key indicators of violence like the number of incidents also support the contention that “insurgency is on the downward spiral”.
- But the attack should thus serve as a wake-up call to those who had begun to get complacent about the Maoist threat.
Approach in counterinsurgency strategy
- One school believes that given the Maoist insurgency posturing itself as a “people’s war”, the mandate is for a people-centric approach of “winning hearts and minds”.
- Others argues that an enemy-centric approach predicated on kinetic operations is best suited for the Maoist insurgency, where the fear of the population seceding from India is remote.
- The success of the erstwhile state of Andhra Pradesh in curbing the Maoist problem is often attributed to this enemy-centric approach.
- However, there is robust scholarly work available that shows that the Andhra government based its counterintelligence strategy on a judicious mix of the enemy-centric and population-centric approaches.
- Andhra Pradesh had successfully implemented short-gestation-period developmental works in the Maoist-affected rural areas.
- Moreover, the erstwhile state is also the first state to have a comprehensive surrender-cum-rehabilitation policy.
- After the 2014 guidelines of the central government were brought out, many states have crafted attractive surrender and rehabilitation policies.
- Another important question is whether the government should keep the option of talking to Maoists open.
- The willingness to talk to rebel groups seems to incentivise insurgents and may demonstrate that violence pays.
- But bringing an end to civil war invariably involves negotiating with the enemy.
Way forward
- Indian counterinsurgency has to work with a dual objective of defeating the insurgents militarily and fully quell the insurgent impulses.
- This will need institutional overhauls.
- In the last decade or so, insurgency-affected states have started to raise special forces on the lines of Greyhounds.
- These forces are being given rigorous training in “counter-guerrilla” tactics and jungle warfare.
- Besides, the jungles around the interstate borders have always been the preferred hiding spaces for the Maoists.
- States must do more to synergise their efforts by launching coordinated operations, thereby denying Maoists any space for manoeuvrability.
- These efforts need to be supplemented by well-crafted development schemes.
- It is also important to segregate the population from the insurgents both operationally and ideologically.
- The conflict over the distribution of resources can be mended with economic development.
- But the bigger challenge would be to create a system where the tribal population feels that the government is representative, not repressive.
- Opening negotiation channels and policies like surrender and rehabilitation can give such a representative sense to the rebels.
Consider the question “Discuss the causes of left wing extremism in India. Suggest the way forward to deal with the issue.”
Conclusion
The government needs to follow these policies to end the challenge of left wing extremism from India.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Durbar Move
Mains level: Need for multiple administrative capitals
A tradition of a century and a half is set to be broken in Jammu and Kashmir, with only “sensitive records” being taken from Jammu to Srinagar this summer during the “Durbar Move”.
Discuss the feasibility, benefits and constraints caused by multiple administrative capitals in Indian states with special context to Jammu and Kashmir and the state of Andhra Pradesh. (250W)
Durbar Move
- Durbar Move is a bi-annual shifting of the Civil Secretariat and other offices of the state government from Jammu to Srinagar in summer, and vice versa in winter.
- This is done as Jammu & Kashmir has two capitals: Kashmir during summer and Jammu during winter.
- In Jammu, offices shut on the last Friday and Saturday of April and reopen in Srinagar on the first Monday after a gap of a week.
- In Kashmir, offices shut on the last Friday and Saturday of October, to reopen in Jammu on the first Monday after a week’s gap, in November.
The reasons why
- Durbar Move is a tradition started 149 years ago started by the erstwhile Dogra rulers who hailed from Jammu but had expanded their boundaries to Kashmir including what is now Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, and Ladakh.
- Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh are very different from one another geographically, linguistically and culturally, and in those days were poorly connected by road.
- It is generally understood that the Durbar Move was started to take the administration to the doorstep of the people of Kashmir which is closer to Ladakh.
- During summer, ruling from Kashmir also helped in ensuring adequate supplies to Ladakh, which is closer to Kashmir than Jammu, before the winter snowfall would cut off Ladakh.
- The practice also enabled greater interaction and bonding among the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh.
The effort
- Until 2019, the administration used to engage hundreds of trucks and buses for carrying office records and officials from one capital city to another.
- For safe transportation, the Jammu & Kashmir police and paramilitary forces would dominate the entire Jammu-Srinagar national highway.
- Apart from the expenses incurred on hiring trucks and buses, the moving staff also used to be paid TA and DA, besides arrangements for their accommodation.
The criticism
- Voices of protest started during the late 1980s, over the amount of money and time spent on the exercise.
- However, the practice also enjoyed public support.
- In recent years, many criticised the government for spending nearly Rs 200 crore on this exercise every year when it did not have enough funds even to pay salary to its employees.
- Last year, the Jammu & Kashmir High Court observed that there was no legal justification or constitutional basis for the Darbar Move tradition.
- The court recommended that in case the practice was rationalized, the resources and time saved could be utilized towards the welfare and development of the UT.
- The money saved could also be used to address Covid-related issues like food shortage, unemployment and healthcare.
What next?
- The UT government has decided to switch to e-governance, will all office records converted into digital format.
- As a result, while the Secretariat employees and some offices will move from Jammu to Srinagar, as usual, this year, only sensitive records will be shifted from one place to another.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: CVC
Mains level: Not Much
The CVC has modified the guidelines pertaining to the transfer and posting of officials in the vigilance units of government organisations, restricting their tenure to three years at one place.
Revise all statutory and constitutional bodies from your Polity Book at least 2-3 times before the prelims.
Central Vigilance Commission (CVC)
- CVC is an apex governmental body created in 1964 to address governmental corruption.
- In 2003, the Parliament enacted a law conferring statutory status on the CVC.
- It has the status of an autonomous body, free of control from any executive authority, charged with monitoring all vigilance activity under the Central Government of India.
- It advises various authorities in central Government organizations in planning, executing, reviewing and reforming their vigilance work.
Its establishment
- It was set up by the Government Resolution on 11 February 1964, on the recommendations of the Committee on Prevention of Corruption, headed by Shri K. Santhanam.
- N Srinivasa Rau was selected as the first Chief Vigilance Commissioner of India.
Composition
- The Commission shall consist of:
- A Central Vigilance Commissioner – Chairperson;
- Not more than two Vigilance Commissioners – Members.
- The CVC and other VCs shall be appointed by the President on the recommendation of a Committee consisting of the PM (Chairperson), the Minister of Home Affairs (Member) and the Leader of the Opposition in the House of the People (Lok Sabha).
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