September, 2020

CURRENT AFFAIRS SEPTEMBER 2020

GS 1

OBC sub-categorisation

OBCs are granted 27% reservation in jobs and education under the central government. The question of sub-categorisation arises out of the perception that only a few affluent communities among the over 2,600 included in the Central List of OBCs have secured a major part of this 27% reservation.

The argument for sub-categorisation or creating categories within OBCs for reservation is that it would ensure “equitable distribution” of representation among all OBC communities.

Commission to Examine Sub-categorisation of Other Backward Classes

The Commission to Examine Sub-categorisation of Other Backward Classes took charge on October 11, 2017. It is headed by retired Delhi High Court Chief Justice G Rohini. Initially constituted with a tenure of 12 weeks ending January 3, 2018, it was granted an extension recently.

It was originally set up with three terms of reference:

 To take up the exercise of identifying the respective castes or communities or sub-castes or synonyms in the Central List of OBCs and classifying them into their respective sub- categories.  A fourth was added on January 22, 2020, when the Cabinet granted it an extension:  To study the various entries in the Central List of OBCs and recommend correction of any repetitions, ambiguities, inconsistencies and errors of spelling or transcription.

Findings so far

In 2018, the Commission analysed the data of 1.3 lakh central jobs given under OBC quota over the preceding five years and OBC admissions to central higher education institutions, including universities, IITs, NITs, IIMs and AIIMS, over the preceding three years. The findings were:

 97% of all jobs and educational seats have gone to just 25% of all sub-castes classified as OBCs;

 24.95% of these jobs and seats have gone to just 10 OBC communities;  983 OBC communities — 37% of the total — have zero representation in jobs and educational institutions;  994 OBC sub-castes have a total representation of only 2.68% in recruitment and admissions

Level of OBC recruitment in central jobs

As per the 2018-19 annual report of the Department of Personnel and Training (accessed online on August 28, 2020), OBC representation is 13.01% in group-A central government services, 14.78% in group-B, 22.65% in group-C (excluding safai karmacharis) and 14.46% in group-C (safai karmacharis).

According to an RTI-based report last year, there was not a single professor and associate professor appointed under the OBC quota in central universities.

Official languages of Jammu and Kashmir

The Union Cabinet approved a Bill to introduce Hindi, Kashmiri and Dogri as official languages in Jammu and Kashmir, in addition to Urdu and English.

The Bill will include Kashmiri, Dogri and Hindi as official languages in the newly-created Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

Only English and Urdu were official languages of erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir was bifurcated on August 5, with Ladakh becoming a separate Union Territory.

Multidimensional Poverty Index to rank states/UTs

Recently, NITI Aayog said it is at an advanced stage for preparation of a Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) parameter dashboard to rank states and Union Territories, along with a State Reform Action Plan (SRAP).

The Aayog, which is the nodal agency for leveraging the monitoring mechanism of the Global MPI to drive reforms, has set up a coordination committee comprising members from different ministries and departments in this regard.

The objective of the Global Indices to Drive Reforms and Growth (GIRG) exercise is to fulfil the need to measure and monitor India’s performance on various important social and economic parameters and enable the utilisation of these indices as tools for self-improvement, bring about reforms in policies, while improving last-mile implementation of government schemes.

Global MPI

Global MPI is an international measure of multidimensional poverty covering 107 developing countries. It was first developed in 2010 by Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative and United Nations Development Programme for UNDP’’s Human Development Reports.

The dimensions of poverty range from deprivations of health facilities, education and living standards.

The MPI measures acute poverty and people experiencing multiple deprivations, for example, those who are both undernourished and do not have safe drinking water, adequate sanitation and clean fuel. These indicators are set to minimum international agreed standards in basic functioning.

Remeasuring the height of Mt Everest

Almost a year after China and Nepal together decided to re-measure the elevation of the world’s highest mountain, the two countries are soon expected to announce its latest official height. Mount Everest

Mount Everest or Sagarmatha, Earth’s highest mountain above sea level, is located in the Himalayas between China and Nepal -– the border between them running across its summit point.

Its current official elevation – 8,848m – places it more than 200m above the world’s second- highest mountain, K2, which is 8,611m tall and located in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

The mountain gets its English name from Sir George Everest, a colonial-era geographer who served as the Surveyor General of India in the mid-19th century. Considered an elite climbing destination, Everest was first scaled in 1953 by the Indian-Nepalese Tenzing Norgay and New Zealander Edmund Hillary.

Height being measured again

Everest’s current official height– 8,848m– has been widely accepted since 1956, when the figure was measured by the Survey of India. The height of the summit is known to change because of tectonic activity, such as the 2015 Nepal earthquake. Its measurement over the decades has also depended on who was surveying.

Another debate is whether the height should be based on the highest rock point or the highest snow point. For years, Nepal and China disagreed over the issue, which was resolved in 2010 when China accepted Nepal’s claim of the snow height being 8,848m, while the Nepali side recognised the Chinese claim of the rock height at 8,844.43m.

Nepal – China Joint Effort

Then in 2019, when Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Nepal, the two countries agreed to remeasure Everest’s height and announce the findings together.

A reason behind the joint effort is that previous measurements of the mountain were by Indian, American or European surveyors, and that the joint effort represents national pride for Nepal and China who will now come up with their own figure.

Both teams are using different points of reference for sea level – China using the Yellow sea and Nepal using a point close to the Bay of Bengal coast, the Nepali Times report said.

Everest’s first survey

The mission to measure the world’s highest peak was taken up in 1847 and was culminated with the finding of a team led by Andrew Waugh of the Royal Surveyor General of India.

The team discovered that ‘Peak 15’ — as Mt Everest was referred to then — was the highest mountain, contrary to the then prevailing belief that Mt Kanchenjunga (8,582 m) was the highest peak in the world.

Women in Indian Navy

Recently, the Indian Navy announced selection of two women officers as Observers in the helicopter stream, making them first women airborne combatants who would be operating from warships.

In another significant development in March, the Supreme Court had upheld that the women Short Service Commission officers in the Navy were eligible for Permanent Commission. The Navy had also inducted the first woman pilot in December last year.

Women in Indian Navy

Prior to 1992, women officers were inducted in the Navy only in the medical stream from the Armed Forces Medical Service. From July 1992, the Navy started inducting women, initially through a special entry scheme and later through the Short Service Commission, in only select branches of the Navy.

Over the years, various branches were added to the list, and currently women officers can join the Navy in the streams of Air Traffic Control, Observers, Law, Logistics, Education, Naval Architecture, Pilots in Maritime Reconnaissance Stream only and the Naval Armament Inspectorate.

Like in the Army and the Air Force, women are currently only inducted as Commissioned Officers and not in Other Ranks which are of categories of Junior Commissioned Officers and Non-Commissioned Officers.

In the early 2000s women officers from the Medical and Logistics stream were deployed on board Naval ships. While these deployments went on only for four-five years, they were discontinued for various reasons.

Women officers in new streams

In December 2019, the Navy announced the induction of a woman officer as pilot of Dornier aircraft, which are fixed wing aircraft operating from ashore establishments, and now the Navy announced induction of two women officers as observers for the helicopter stream.

Observers are airborne tacticians who fly on board helicopters or fixed-wing aircraft operated by the Navy. Till now women were inducted as observers for fixed wing aircraft which take off

and land ashore. Entry in the helicopter stream means that women officers can now be deployed on frontline warships from which helicopters can operate.

The Supreme Court in March 2020, upheld the right of serving women officers from the Short Service Commission in the Navy to be eligible for the getting permanent commission (PC). Short service Commission tenures in the Armed forces are of 10 years, extendable by four years after which officers can be eligible for permanent commission.

Women officers hope that these developments would result in them being posted at commanding positions on the ships which are a key for career advancements in the operational streams and also may lead to women being deployed for most challenging of the deployments including that in the submarines.

Serving and retired women officers from Armed forces in general and Navy believe that the developments will result in more women coming into operational streams and new streams being opened for women. Some are also concerned that too much media and public attention on these new entrants can put unwanted pressure on them.

Women in Indian Navy

Recently, the Indian Navy announced selection of two women officers as Observers in the helicopter stream, making them first women airborne combatants who would be operating from warships.

Women in Indian Navy

Women officers in new streams

Observers are airborne tacticians who fly on board helicopters or fixed-wing aircraft operated by the Navy. Till now women were inducted as observers for fixed wing aircraft which take off and land ashore. Entry in the helicopter stream means that women officers can now be deployed on frontline warships from which helicopters can operate.

Human-induced climate change could increase ‘Medicanes’

Extra tropical storms in the Mediterranean Sea, known as ‘Medicanes’ or ‘Mediterranean Hurricanes’, could become more frequent due to human-induced climate change, experts have warned.

In September, 2020, a medicane named Ianos made landfall along the coast of Greece and caused heavy rainfall and flooding on the islands of Zakynthos, Kefalonia and Ithaca.

Medicanes

Medicanes occur more in colder waters than tropical cyclones, hurricanes and typhoons. Hence, the cores of these storms are also cold, as compared to the warm cores of tropical cyclones. Warmer cores tend to carry more moisture (hence rainfall), are bigger in size and have swifter winds.

Sometimes, warm-cored tropical cyclones transform into cold-cored extratropical cyclones and in rare cases, the opposite can also happen. The rare event of an extra tropical cyclone becoming a tropical cyclone happens because of warmer-than-usual waters in the Mediterranean Sea. Such an event occurred in November 2011 and caused severe flooding in parts of Spain, Italy and France, killing 11 people.

Medicanes are not as rare but might become more frequent owing to global warming due to anthropogenic climate change. They have increased in number in the past half-century.

This might also mean an increased threat from these storms for already vulnerable populations living in North Africa, possibly triggering human migration. They could also be a menace for European countries like Italy and Greece.

Two of these storms, one in 2005 and another in 2012, even formed over the Black Sea, which is a much smaller water body than the Mediterranean Sea.

The September Equinox

There are two equinoxes every year – in September and March – when the Sun shines directly on the Equator and the length of day and night is nearly equal.

Seasons are opposite on either side of the Equator, so the equinox in September is also known as the autumnal (fall) equinox in the Northern Hemisphere and is considered the first day of fall.

In the Southern Hemisphere, it is known as the vernal (spring) equinox and marks the first day of spring.

Earth’s axis is tilted at an angle of about 23.4° in relation to the ecliptic, the imaginary plane created by Earth’s path around the Sun.

Equinox

Equinox, either of the two moments in the year when the Sun is exactly above the Equator and day and night are of equal length; also, either of the two points in the sky where the ecliptic (the Sun’s annual pathway) and the celestial equator intersect.

Global labour income falls 10.7% in 2020

Global labour income, including wages for employees and part of income for the self-employed, is estimated to have declined by 10.7 per cent or $3.5 trillion during the first nine months of 2020. This is equivalent to 5.5 per cent of global GDP for the first nine months of 2019, according to the International Labour Organization (ILO).

Details

The drop is higher for lower-middle income countries, with the labour income losses estimated to be 15.1 per cent, followed by 11.4 per cent in upper-middle-income countries and 10.1 per cent in low-income countries. Workers in high-income countries are estimated to have lost labour income of 9.0 per cent.

The estimated loss of labour income excludes income support provided through government measures.

Global working-hour losses are now projected to be 8.6 per cent in the October-December quarter, which corresponds to 245 million full-time equivalent jobs. This is 75 per cent higher than the ILO’s previous estimate of 4.9 per cent or 140 million full-time equivalent jobs.

One of the reasons for the estimated increases in working-hour losses is that workers in developing and emerging economies, especially those in informal employment, have been much more affected than by past crises, ILO said.

The ILO said that among countries with sufficient data, a clear correlation can be seen; the larger the fiscal stimulus (as a percentage of GDP), the lower the working-hour losses in the April-June quarter of 2020. An average increase in fiscal stimulus by 1 per cent of annual GDP would have reduced working-hour losses by 0.8 percentage points in April-June.

Odisha turns to radio for classes

As online classes fail to reach most students due to poor mobile connectivity, the Odisha government has now turned to radio to reach out to children in remote areas of the State.

The School and Mass Education Department will launch classroom teaching through All India Radio.

Schools in Odisha have been closed since March 17. However, children have been provided textbooks. As the schools could not be opened due to COVID-19 pandemic, we had tried to reach students with online classes, mostly through smart phones. But, virtual classes have their inherent drawbacks. Of the 60 lakh students, we were hardly reaching to 22 lakhs during lockdown.

Recently, the National Human Rights Commission issued notices to Education Ministry over the inability of students to follow online classes.

As per the plan, students from Class I to VIII can learn their lessons through 15-minutes of teaching by experienced teachers through radio. It will be available everyday from 10 a.m. to 10.15 a.m.

A student could cover six pages of his textbook within 15 minutes of radio programme. Though the teaching through radio would not be effective as it could have been in physical classroom, the extraordinary situation has forced us to try different methods for reaching students.

Three hours of classroom instruction are also available through Doordarshan. Since considerable time has been lost due closure of schools, school syllabus has been reduced by 30%.

GS 2

Adjusted Gross Revenue

The Supreme Court held that telecom firms will get 10 years to clear their adjusted gross revenue or AGR dues, and that the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) should decide whether or not spectrum can be sold under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code.

Supreme Court rule on AGR dues

In its judgment, the top court gave all telecoms a 10-year timeline to complete the payments of AGR dues, instead of the old 20-year schedule suggested by the DoT.

The top court also directed telecoms to pay 10 per cent of the total AGR dues by March 31, 2020, following which they can make payments in annual instalments between 2021 and 2031.

Telecom companies would also have to make payments on or before February 7 every year.

The non-payment of dues in any year would lead to accrual of interest and invite contempt of court proceedings against such companies. The managing directors of the telecoms which are required to pay AGR will deposit a personal guarantee within four weeks from today.

The issue of whether the spectrum could be sold under Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code will now be decided by the National Company Law Tribunal.

AGR issue

AGR is a fee-sharing mechanism between government and the telcos who shifted to 'revenue- sharing fee' model in 1999, from the 'fixed license fee' model. In this course, telcos are supposed to share a percentage of AGR with the government.

All the telecom companies that operate in India pay a part of their revenues as licence fee and spectrum charges to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for using the spectrum owned by the government.

In its definition of AGR, the DoT had said that telecoms must cover all the revenue earned by them, including from non-telecom sources such as deposit interests and sale of assets.

The telecom companies were opposed to this and had challenged this definition of AGR in several forums, including the Supreme Court.

In 2019, the SC had upheld the DoT’s definition of AGR and said since the licensee had agreed to the migration packages, they were liable to pay the dues, the penalty on dues, and the interest on penalty due to delay in payments. The top court had then given the telecoms three months to clear their AGR dues.

Though the telecoms sought a review of the judgment, it was dismissed by the top court which had then insisted that telecoms clear all the dues by January 23, 2020.

Question Hour and Zero Hour

Recently, the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha secretariats notified that there will be no Question Hour during the Monsoon Session of Parliament, which has been truncated to September 14- October 1 in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, and that Zero Hour will be restricted in both Houses.

Question Hour

Question Hour is the liveliest hour in Parliament. First hour of every parliamentary sitting is slotted for this. During this time, the members ask questions and the ministers usually give answers. It is during this one hour that Members of Parliament ask questions of ministers and hold them accountable for the functioning of their ministries.

The presiding officers of the two houses are the final authority with respect to the conduct of Question Hour.

Parliamentary rules provide guidelines on the kind of questions that can be asked by MPs.

At the beginning of Parliament in 1952, Lok Sabha rules provided for Question Hour to be held every day. Rajya Sabha, on the other hand, had a provision for Question Hour for two days a week. Then from 1964, Question Hour was taking place in Rajya Sabha on every day of the session. Now, Question Hour in both Houses is held on all days of the session.

But there are two days when an exception is made.

 There is no Question Hour on the day the President addresses MPs from both Houses in the Central Hall. The President’s speech takes place at the beginning of a new Lok Sabha and on the first day of a new Parliament year.  Question Hour is not scheduled either on the day the Finance Minister presents the Budget.

Zero Hour

While Question Hour is strictly regulated, Zero Hour is an Indian parliamentary innovation.

The phrase does not find mention in the rules of procedure. The concept of Zero Hour started organically in the first decade of Indian Parliament, when MPs felt the need for raising important constituency and national issues.

During the initial days, Parliament used to break for lunch at 1 pm. Therefore, the opportunity for MPs to raise national issues without an advance notice became available at 12 pm and could last for an hour until the House adjourned for lunch. This led to the hour being popularly referred to as Zero Hour and the issues being raised during this time as Zero Hour submissions.

The questions are of three kinds, namely, starred, un-starred and short notice.

 A starred question requires an oral answer and hence supplementary questions can follow. Only 20 questions can be listed for oral answer on a day.  An un-starred question, on the other hand, requires a written answer and hence, supplementary questions cannot follow. It Requires a time-period of 10 days.  A short notice question is one that is asked by giving a notice of less than ten days. It is answered orally.

Previous sessions without Question Hour

Parliamentary records show that during the Chinese aggression in 1962, the Winter Session was advanced and there was no Question Hour held.

UNSC Rejects to Designate Indians as Terrorists

Recently, five permanent and non-permanent members of the UN Security Council — the US, UK, France, Germany, and Belgium — blocked an attempt by Pakistan to list two Indians under a UN Security Council regime targeting international terrorism.

Details

Pakistan has been trying for a year now to get four Indians, who had been working in Afghanistan, sanctioned under the UN’s 1267 regime. This was the third time this year that Pakistan’s efforts have been thwarted.

UNSC 1267

The 1267 Committee was first set up in 1999 and strengthened by a series of resolutions after the September 11, 2001 attacks. It is now known as the Da’esh and Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee.

The 1267 list of terrorists is a global list, with a UNSC stamp.

Process by which people are listed under UNSC 1267

Any member state can submit a proposal for listing an individual, group, or entity. The 1267 Committee, which comprises all permanent and non-permanent members of the UNSC, meets as required with a notice of four working days. Decisions on listing and de-listing are adopted by consensus. Any proposal for listing must meet set criteria.

The proposal is sent to all the members, and if no member objects within five working days, the proposal is adopted. An “objection” means curtains for the proposal.

Any member of the Committee may also put a “technical hold” on the proposal and ask for more information from the proposing member state.

The matter remains on the “pending” list of the Committee until such time as the member state that has placed the hold decides to turn its decision into an “objection”, or until all those who have placed holds remove them within a timeframe laid down by the Committee.

Pending issues must be resolved in six months, but the member state that has placed the hold may ask for an additional three months. At the end of this period, if an objection is not placed, the matter is considered approved.

India proposes G-20 principles on cross-border movement

As Saudi Arabia hosted the G-20 foreign ministers’ meeting with focus on cross-border movement amid the pandemic, India proposed development of voluntary ‘G-20 Principles on Coordinated Cross-Border Movement of People’.

External Affairs Minister proposed development of voluntary ‘G20 Principles on Coordinated Cross-Border Movement of People’ with three elements:

 Standardisation of testing procedures and universal acceptability of test results;  Standardisation of ‘Quarantine procedures’;  Standardisation of ‘movement and transit’ protocols.”

He also called on governments around the world to ensure that interests of foreign students are protected and movement of stranded seafarers back to their home country is facilitated.

Earlier in July 2020, the 3rd G-20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBG) meeting was held, and came up with the G20 Action Plan to deal with the pandemic.

The Action Plan includes a list of collective commitments under the pillars of Health Response, Economic Response, Strong and Sustainable Recovery and International Financial Coordination.

G20

The Group of Twenty, or the G20, is the premier forum for international economic cooperation. The G20 brings together the leaders of both developed and developing countries from every continent.

It is an informal group of 19 countries and the European Union, with representatives of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

Collectively, G20 members represent around 80% of the world’s economic output, two-thirds of global population and three-quarters of international trade. Throughout the year, representatives from G20 countries gather to discuss financial and socioeconomic issues.

English as medium of education

The Supreme Court refused to provide an interim relief to the Andhra Pradesh government, which sought to stay a high court order setting aside its decision to make English the medium of instruction in primary education.

Details

The three-judge bench pointed out that Section 29(2)(f) of the Right to Education (RTE) Act says that the medium of instruction shall, as far as practicable, be in a child’s mother tongue.

The court said in its order that “the prayer for interim relief (stay) shall be considered after the caveators have an opportunity to file a response”.

Arguments

Senior council appearing for the AP government, submitted to the Supreme Court that adoption of English language was a progressive and forward-looking measure the state

government had proposed and that around 95% of the students and parents in Andhra wanted English as the medium of instruction. The government has also proposed to provide schools and free transport to those students who wanted Telugu as the medium of instruction.

 The government counsel said children were going to private schools since English medium was not available in government schools. The order on English medium was applicable only to state-run schools and not to private schools, he said.

The counsel for the defendants preferring primary education in mother tongue, argued the AP government was attempting to scuttle the fundamental right of students and parents to choose the medium of instruction and Telugu-medium schools.

Background

Last November, the YS Jagan Mohan Reddy government had issued orders to change the medium of instruction in classes I to VI to English from the academic year 2020-21.

Hearing petitions that challenged the government’s order, the Andhra Pradesh High Court in April held that the freedom to choose the medium of instruction during primary education was recognised as a fundamental right under the Constitution.

The high court had held that the government’s order was unconstitutional, since it abridged the liberty of students to choose their mother tongue as the medium of instruction, as well as violative of several laws including the Right to Education Act.

The state government moved the apex court seeking to stay the lower court’s order.

State of the Young Child in India Report

Kerala, Goa, Tripura, Tamil Nadu and Mizoram are among the top five States for well-being of children, according to a report brought out by non-governmental organisation Mobile Creches.

The young child outcomes index measures health, nutrition and cognitive growth with the help of indicators such as infant mortality rate, stunting and net attendance at the primary school level.

It identifies eight States that have scores below the country’s average: they are Assam, Meghalaya, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.

The index is part of the ‘State of the Young Child’ in India report released the 50-year-old NGO, which works in the field of early childhood care and development by ensuring creche services at construction sites and slum settlements across several cities.

The index has been constructed for two time periods (2005–2006 and 2015–2016) to enable inter-State comparisons as well as provide an idea of change over time.

The report has also developed another index called the young child environment index to understand the policy and environment enablers that influence a child’s well-being.

According to the environment index, Kerala, Goa, Sikkim, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh secured the top five positions. It uses five policy enablers that influence child well-being outcomes, including poverty alleviation, strengthening primary healthcare, improving education levels, safe water supply and promotion of gender equity.

The environment index was constructed for 2015–2016 only due to limitations of data availability. The eight States that have a below average score on the outcomes index also fared poorly on this one.

The report calls for an increase in public spending on children. According to its analysis on expenses towards child nutrition, healthcare, education and other necessary protection services, India spent ₹1,723 per child in 2018–2019, an amount that is insufficient and fails to reach the entire eligible population.

The report points out that while the budgetary allocation for the Ministry of Women and Child Development has seen a year-on-year increase, all the additional funds have been allocated towards nutrition delivery under the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS). While the population of children under six years of age is 158.8 million, the ICDS covers only 71.9 million children as calculated from the total number of beneficiaries across States.

Ease of doing business

The latest ease of doing business rankings for Indian states, released by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), have thrown up some interesting results.

About the ranking

The objective of DPIIT’s reform exercise is to provide a business-friendly environment, for which the regulations in a state have to be made simpler. Therefore, it devised a methodology to rank the states according to the ease of doing business (EoDB) in a state.

DPIIT provides a set of recommendations meant to reduce the time and effort spent by businesses on compliance with regulation called the Business Reform Action Plan (BRAP). BRAP 2019 is an 80-point list of reforms recommended to simplify, rationalise and digitise the regulatory framework in a state.

The reforms are grouped into 12 broad areas like land administration, labour regulation, obtaining electricity and water supply permits, environment regulation, etc. States are required to submit proof of implementing each reform on the DPIIT’s EoDB portal and submit a list of users of these reforms. A sample of these users is then surveyed to determine the efficacy of these reforms.

State performance

Andhra Pradesh continued to hold its fort at the top, while Telangana, Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand ranked third, fourth and fifth respectively. Tripura, Sikkim and Odisha placed at the bottom, according to the fourth State Business Reform Action Plan assessment report.

Uttar Pradesh made its entry into the top ranks of states that have become better destinations to do business in 2019, jumping 10 positions to displace Telangana as the second-best performer, shows a government assessment released recently.

Some top industrial states saw little or no change in their ranking — Maharashtra retained its 13th rank, while Tamil Nadu moved up to 14th place from the 15 in the 2018 assessment.

Gujarat dropped five places to rank 10th in the latest assessment, while Haryana, in one of the steepest falls, was knocked down to 16th from its earlier rank of No. 3

States were ranked based on their performance on 180 reforms initiatives across 45 business regulatory areas, including easy access to information, paying taxes, obtaining utility permits, contract enforcement, labour and construction permit enablers, single-window approval systems and land administration.

One “major change” in the current rankings is the government’s decision to link the state’s performance “exclusively” to user feedback. This means that, unless the impact of the reform is felt on ground, it is not accepted. Over 35,000 users were contacted to gather this feedback.

Lakshadweep, Delhi and UP saw the most improvement, moving up the ranks by 19, 11 and 10 positions respectively.

Himachal Pradesh and Andaman & Nicobar improved by nine ranks each. Lakshadweep placed 15th in the overall state ranking in 2019, while Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Andaman & Nicobar ranked 12th, 7th and 22nd respectively.

The state which showed highest improvement, UP rose up the ranks based on its ability to better implement a range of reforms ranging from single-window clearances to easier access to information. Factoring in user feedback to check progress on reforms was a key change in the methodology this year and some states that slipped attributed their low ranks to that.

Reforms DPIIT recommends

DPIIT recommends all states have a single-window system that provides all necessary information on permits and licences required for starting a business.

Permissions required from municipal or village government bodies or police for activities like filming movies should also be explicitly mentioned.

To reduce delays further, DPIIT recommends that the duration of licences be extended or that they be renewed automatically based on self-certification or third-party verification. A state is also rewarded if a set of regulations (like labour or environment laws) are not applicable to it.

Criticism

DPIIT’S methodology does not consider the actual number of reforms implemented by the states. States like Haryana and Gujarat have implemented all the reforms recommended by the DPIIT, but were ranked low on the EoDB list.

Gujarat has reportedly attributed this to poor response from the survey respondents. The methodology used by the DPIIT awards points on a reform to a state only if there was an adequate response from users of that response.

Ideally, the number of respondents for every state should be decided based on population or number of business clusters to ensure that the sample is representative of the state. It is not clear if DPIIT used representative samples.

Also, business owners’ expectations from the governments can differ. A business owner from Tamil Nadu may assess their state government’s IT portal differently from one in UP.

Basic Structure Doctrine

The landmark ruling in which the Supreme Court announced the basic structure doctrine was in the case of His Holiness Kesavananda Bharati Sripadagalvaru and Ors v State of Kerala.

The ruling is considered among the most consequential decisions by the Supreme Court as it set out the “basic structure” of the Constitution that Parliament cannot amend.

About the case

Kesavananda Bharati was the head seer of the Edneer Mutt in Kasaragod district of Kerala since 1961. He left his signature in one of the significant rulings of the Supreme Court when he challenged the Kerala land reforms legislation in 1970.

The case was primarily about the extent of Parliament’s power to amend the Constitution.

 the court was reviewing a 1967 decision in Golaknath v State of Punjab which, reversing earlier verdicts, had ruled that Parliament cannot amend fundamental rights.  the court was deciding the constitutional validity of several other amendments. Notably, the right to property had been removed as a fundamental right, and Parliament had also given itself the power to amend any part of the Constitution and passed a law that it cannot be reviewed by the courts.

A 13-judge Bench was set up by the Supreme Court, the biggest so far, and the case was heard over 68 working days spread over six months. However, the basic structure doctrine, which was evolved in the majority judgment, was found in the conclusions of the opinion written by one judge, Justice H R Khanna.

The executive vs judiciary manoeuvres displayed in the amendments ended with the Kesavananda Bharati case, in which the court had to settle these issues conclusively.

The Verdict

In its majority ruling, the court held that fundamental rights cannot be taken away by amending them. While the court said that Parliament had vast powers to amend the Constitution, it drew the line by observing that certain parts are so inherent and intrinsic to the Constitution that even Parliament cannot touch it.

Despite the ruling that Parliament cannot breach fundamental rights, the court upheld the amendment that removed the fundamental right to property. The court ruled that in spirit, the amendment would not violate the “basic structure” of the Constitution.

Kesavananda Bharati, in fact, lost the case. But as many legal scholars point out, the government did not win the case either.

The ruling has cemented the rejection of majoritarian impulses to make sweeping changes or even replace the Constitution and underlined the foundations of a modern democracy laid down by the makers of the Constitution.

The basic structure doctrine

The origins of the basic structure doctrine are found in the German Constitution which, after the Nazi regime, was amended to protect some basic laws. The original Weimar Constitution, which gave Parliament to amend the Constitution with a two-thirds majority, was in fact used

by Hitler to his advantage to made radical changes. The new German Constitution introduced substantive limits on Parliament’s powers to amend certain parts of the Constitution which it considered ‘basic law’.

In India, the basic structure doctrine has formed the bedrock of judicial review of all laws passed by Parliament. No law can impinge on the basic structure. What the basic structure is, however, has been a continuing deliberation. While parliamentary democracy, fundamental rights, judicial review, secularism are all held by courts as basic structure, the list is not exhaustive.

Kerala tops literacy rate chart

With 96.2 per cent literacy, Kerala has once again emerged as the most literate state in the country, while Andhra Pradesh featured at the bottom with a rate of 66.4 per cent, showed a report based on National Statistical Office (NSO) survey.

The report on ‘Household Social Consumption: Education in India as part of 75th round of National Sample Survey – from July 2017 to June 2018’ provides for state-wise detail of literacy rate among the persons aged seven years and above.

Highlights of the report

According to the study, after Kerala, Delhi has the best literacy rate at 88.7 per cent, followed by Uttarkhand’s 87.6 per cent, Himachal Pradesh’s 86.6 per cent and Assam’s at 85.9 per cent.

On the other hand, Rajasthan is the second-worst performer with a literacy rate at 69.7 per cent, followed by Bihar at 70.9 per cent, Telangana at 72.8 per cent, Uttar Pradesh at 73 per cent and Madhya Pradesh at 73.7 per cent.

The study has pegged the overall literacy rate in the country at about 77.7 per cent. In rural areas, the literacy rate is 73.5 per cent compared to 87.7 per cent in urban areas of the country.

At all-India level, the male literacy rate is higher at 84.7 per cent compared to 70.3 per cent among women. The survey showed that the male literacy rate is higher than the female literacy rate among all states.

In Kerala, the male literacy rate is 97.4 per cent compared to 95.2 per cent among females. Similarly, the male literacy rate in Delhi stood a 93.7 per cent higher than 82.4 per cent among

females. Even in the worst-performing states, there was a considerable gap in male and female literacy rate.

In Andhra Pradesh, the male literacy rate is 73.4 per cent, higher than 59.5 per cent among females (of the age of seven year or above). In Rajasthan, the gap was even wider as the male literacy rate stood at 80.8 per cent compared to 57.6 per cent of females. In Bihar, the male literacy rate was also higher at 79.7 per cent compared to 60.5 per cent of females.

A sample of 64,519 rural households from 8,097 villages and 49,238 urban households from 6,188 blocks was surveyed all-over India. The report also revealed that nearly 4 per cent of rural households and 23 per cent of urban household possessed computers.

Among persons of age 15-29 years, nearly 24 per cent in rural areas and 56 per cent in urban areas were able to operate a computer. Nearly 35 per cent of persons of age 15-29 years reported the use of the internet during the 30 days prior to the date of the survey. The proportions were nearly 25 per cent in rural areas and 58 per cent in urban areas.

Uttarakhand govt to develop ‘Sanskrit grams’ across state

After the significant progress in a pilot programme to teach Sanskrit to residents of two villages in Uttarakhand, the state government gave it a go-ahead to authorities to develop ‘Sanskrit grams’ across the state.

Sanskrit is the second official language in Uttarakhand. At a meeting of the Uttarakhand Sanskrit Academy, a list of villages was selected for the programme — to be run first at the district level and then at the block level for promotion of the language.

In the same meeting, it was also decided to rename the academy as Uttaranchal Sanskrit Sansthanam Haridwar, Uttarakhand.

The state government currently runs 97 Sanskrit schools, where an average of 2,100 students study each year.

The villages of Kimotha in Chamoli district and Bhantola in Bageshwar district were earlier developed as Sanskrit villages. Residents have started using the language in their daily

communication and they also sing folk songs in Sanskrit. Mattur is a village in Kerala where residents speak only in Sanskrit.

According to officials, villages were selected according to the availability of Sanskrit schools so that teachers may visit the villages often and motivate residents to learn and use Sanskrit.

The focus will be on the school-going children so that they can learn the language from young age.

The aim is to teach people to use Sanskrit regularly and that the programme will start by teaching people smaller sentences which are used most commonly.

40% children not fully vaccinated: NSO report

Although almost all children in India are vaccinated against tuberculosis, and receive their birth dose of polio vaccine, two out of five children do not complete their immunisation programme, according to the ‘Health in India’ report recently published by the National Statistical Organisation (NSO).

The report is based on the 75th round of the National Sample Survey (July 2017-June 2018) on household social consumption related to health.

Highlights of the report

Across the country, only 59.2% of children under five years are fully immunised, according to the NSO report. This contradicts the Centre’s Health Management Information System portal data, which claimed that full immunisation coverage for 2017-18 stood at 86.7%.

Full immunisation means that a child receives a cocktail of eight vaccine doses in the first year of life:

 the BCG vaccine injected in a single dose shortly after birth, which protects against a childhood attack of tuberculosis;  the measles vaccine;  the oral polio vaccine (OPV) whose first dose is given at birth, followed by two more doses at intervals of four weeks; and

 the DPT/pentavalent vaccine, generally injected in three doses, which is meant to protect a child from diphtheria, pertussis or whooping cough, tetanus, Hepatitis B, and meningitis and pneumonia caused by hemophilus influenza type B.  Booster doses for OPV and DPT are also given between 16 and 24 months.

In the national capital, less than half of all children have been given all eight required vaccines. Most of these children remain unprotected against measles, and partially protected against a range of other diseases.

About 97% of children across the country received at least one vaccination — mostly BCG and/or the first dose of OPV at birth — a statistic that remains steady across income groups and geographies. However, only 67% of children are protected against measles.

Only 58% got their polio booster dose, while 54% got their DPT booster dose.

Among States, Manipur (75%), Andhra Pradesh (73.6%) and Mizoram (73.4%) recorded the highest rates of full immunisation. At the other end of the spectrum lies Nagaland, where only 12% of children received all vaccinations, followed by Puducherry (34%) and Tripura (39.6%).

The vast majority of these vaccinations — 95% in rural India and 86% in cities — were carried out in government health facilities and primary health centres which will be the same facilities used to distribute and administer the COVID-19 vaccine whenever it is made available.

The pandemic has already impacted the childhood vaccination programme, however, with an April 2020 study conducted by the advocacy group Child Rights and You finding that only half of Indian families with children under five years were able to access immunisation services during the lockdown.

NSO report on education

A recent report on the latest National Statistical Organisation (NSO) survey shows just how stark is the digital divide across States, cities and villages, and income groups. The survey on household social consumption related to education was part of the NSO’s 75th round, conducted from July 2017 to June 2018.

Highlights of the report

Private coaching

The final report shows that 19.8% of students at all levels — from pre-primary to graduate students — take some form of private coaching.

One in five students in India supplements school education with private coaching, including almost one in three at the secondary school level or Classes 9 and 10. Among Class 9 and 10 students, starting to prepare for the crucial board exams and admission tests, more than 30% do so.

Private coaching fees make up almost 20% of the total cost of education for those in secondary and higher secondary school. In some States, such as West Bengal, students actually spend more on private coaching than on their regular school, according to the National Statistical Organisation’s (NSO) latest report on education.

More than 52% of urban upper caste boys take coaching, in comparison to just 13.7% of rural boys and girls from scheduled tribe communities.

Such coaching comes at a cost. The average annual expenditure on education for secondary school students is ₹9,013, of which ₹4,078 goes towards regular school fees. About ₹1,632, or just over 18%, goes towards private coaching. In higher secondary school, students spend more than ₹2,500, also about 18% of the total expenditure, on private coaching.

Some States in eastern India seem to spend more on private coaching than the rest of the country. In West Bengal, students at all levels spend an average of ₹3,769 on private coaching.

Digital gap

Schools across the country have now been closed for six months due to COVID-19, but this means vastly different things for different people. For the child in urban Himachal Pradesh, where Internet penetration is higher than 70%, it likely means online schooling, Zoom classes and digital textbooks. For the child in rural Odisha, where less than 6% of households have Internet facilities, such options are out of the question.

Across India, only one in ten households have a computer — whether a desktop, laptop or tablet. However, almost a quarter of all homes have Internet facilities, accessed via a fixed or mobile network using any device, including smartphones.

Most of these Internet-enabled homes are located in cities, where 42% have Internet access. In rural India, however, only 15% are connected to the internet.

The biggest divide is by economic status, which the NSO marks by dividing the population into five equal groups, or quintiles, based on their usual monthly per capita expenditure. Even in Odisha, almost 63% of homes in the top urban quintile have Internet facilities. In the poorest quintile of rural Odisha, however, that figure drops to an abysmal 2.4%.

Kerala shows the least inequality: more than 39% of the poorest rural homes have Internet, in comparison to 67% of the richest urban homes. Himachal Pradesh also fares well, with 40% of the lowest rural quintile having Internet. Assam shows the most stark inequality, with almost 80% of the richest urban homes having the Internet access denied to 94% of those in the poorest rural homes in the State.

Digital literacy

Having Internet access is no guarantee that one can use it. The NSO report shows that 20% of Indians above the age of 5 years had basic digital literacy, doubling to just 40% in the critical age group of 15 to 29 years, which includes all high school and college students as well as young parents responsible for teaching younger children.

Basic Literacy

More than one in five Indians above 7 years still cannot read and write in any language. Over the last decade, literacy rates have increased from 71.7% to 77.7%, with the highest gains coming among rural women.

A State-wise split of literacy rates also throws up some unexpected results. Andhra Pradesh has the country’s lowest literacy rate, at just 66.4%, significantly lower than less developed States such as Chhattisgarh (77.3%), Jharkhand (74.3%), Uttar Pradesh (73%), and Bihar (70.9%). Kerala remains at the top of the pile with 96.2% literacy, followed by three northern States: Delhi (88.7%), Uttarakhand (87.6%) and Himachal Pradesh (86.6%).

Maratha quota

The Supreme Court referred to a Constitution Bench the question of whether states can exceed the 50% limit on quotas that was set by a nine-judge Bench in the landmark Indra Sawhney vs Union of India (1992) case. The question will now be taken up by a Bench comprising at least 11 judges.

Case in Supreme Court

The Bench recently, heard a batch of petitions challenging reservations for Marathas in education and jobs in Maharashtra. The petitions appealed a 2019 Bombay High Court decision that upheld the constitutional validity of the Maratha quota under the Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC) Act, 2018. The Bench also heard a petition challenging admission to postgraduate medical and dental courses under the quota in the state.

Bombay HC ruling

A Division Bench of the High Court ruled last year that the 16% quota granted by the state was not “justifiable”, and reduced it to 12% in education and 13% in government jobs, as recommended by the Maharashtra State Backward Class Commission (MSBCC).

The Bench ruled that “the limit of reservation should not exceed 50%”; however, “in exceptional circumstances and extraordinary situations, this limit can be crossed subject to availability of quantifiable and contemporaneous data reflecting backwardness, inadequacy of representation and without affecting the efficiency in administration”.

The court relied heavily on the findings of the 11-member MSBCC, which submitted in November 2018 that the Maratha community is socially, economically and educationally backward.

India and Japan sign logistics agreement

India and Japan signed a logistics agreement that will allow the Armed Forces of both sides to coordinate closely in services and supplies. The agreement was signed in Delhi by Defence Secretary and Ambassador of Japan.

Both Prime Ministers welcomed the signing of the Agreement between the Government of Japan and the Government of the Republic of India Concerning Reciprocal Provision of Supplies and Services between the Self-Defense Forces of Japan and the Indian Armed Forces (so-called “Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement”, or ACSA).

Significance

The agreement will facilitate the smooth provision of supplies and services between the Self- Defense Forces of Japan and the Indian Armed Forces. It will also promote closer cooperation between the forces on the ground, thereby contributing further to global peace and security.

It will also enhance the interoperability between the Armed Force of India and Japan thereby further increasing the bilateral defence engagements under the Special Strategic & Global Partnership between the two countries.

The agreement on ‘Reciprocal Provision Supplies and Services’ will “increase interoperability between the Armed Forces of India and Japan” and assist in maintaining regional security.

The agreement establishes the enabling framework for closer cooperation between the Armed Forces of India and Japan in reciprocal provision of supplies and services while engaged in bilateral training activities, United Nations Peacekeeping Operations, Humanitarian International Relief and other mutually agreed activities.

The signing of the agreement will help both sides coordinate on medical requirements, supplies, maintenance, airlifting and communication.

The agreement signed is mainly aimed at greater maritime cooperation and can dramatically upgrade India-Japan naval exercises as the participants are expected to share maritime facilities for mutual benefit.

Global Innovation Index

India has entered the group of top 50 countries in the global innovation index for the first time, moving up four places to the 48th rank and keeping the top position among the nations in central and southern Asia.

Details

According to the Global Innovation Index (GII) list, 2020 released jointly by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Cornell University and INSEAD Business School, the rankings show stability at the top but a gradual "eastward shift in the locus of innovation" as Asian economies like China, India, the Philippines and Vietnam have advanced considerably in the innovation ranking over the years.

Switzerland, Sweden, the US, the UK and the Netherlands lead the innovation ranking, and the top 10 positions are dominated by high-income countries.

A total of 131 countries were analysed under the GII. The metrics include institutions, human capital and research, infrastructure, market sophistication and business sophistication, knowledge and technology outputs and creative outputs.

India’s highlights

According to GII, India has become the third most innovative lower middle-income economy in the world.

India ranks in the top 15 in indicators such as ICT services exports, government online services, graduates in science and engineering, and R&D-intensive global companies.

India improved the most in three pillars: Institutions (61st), business sophistication (55th), and creative outputs (64th).

Easing tensions along LAC

The two ministers, Jaishankar and Wang held direct talks on the sidelines of a meeting of Foreign Ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.

Outcomes of the meeting

Adopting a five-point approach to resolve the crisis along the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh where the situation has taken a turn for the worse in recent days, India and China announced they had agreed that their troops “should continue their dialogue, quickly disengage, maintain proper distance and ease tensions”.

The two Ministers agreed

 both sides should take guidance from the series of consensus of the leaders on developing India-China relations, including not allowing differences to become disputes  they also agreed that “both sides shall abide by all the existing agreements and protocol on China-India boundary affairs, maintain peace and tranquillity in the border areas and avoid any action that could escalate matters”.  agreed to continue to have dialogue and communication through the Special Representative mechanism on the India-China boundary question.  agreed that the Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination on India-China border affairs (WMCC), should also continue its meetings”.  Agreed in working together to conclude new confidence-building measures.

At the meeting, the Indian side highlighted “its strong concern at the massing of Chinese troops with equipment along the LAC. The presence of such a large concentration of troops was not in accordance with the 1993 and 1996 agreements and created flashpoints along the LAC”.

J&K L-G launches grievance redressal portal

Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant-Governor launched a new grievance redressal portal linked to the Union government’s grievance mechanism, terming it a step towards gaining peoples’ trust.

The Jammu and Kashmir Integrated Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (JK-IGRAMS) is being launched on pilot basis for Jammu, Srinagar, and Reasi districts. It will be rolled out in the remaining districts by October 2.

The system will replace the current portal launched by the government in 2018.

Deputy Commissioners have been placed at the primary level for receiving, disposing of and monitoring grievances. The existing portal has been integrated downwards to the district level by mapping nearly 1,500 public offices in 20 districts of the Union Territory.

Tripura’s first Inland waterway

Tripura opens its first-ever inland waterway with Bangladesh aiming boost in trade in the state.

The route connecting Sonamura, about 60 km from Agartala in the Indian side, and Daudkandi of Chittagong in Bangladesh was included in the list of Indo-Bangladesh Protocol (IBP) routes agreed up on May 20 this year.

Bangladesh and India have a long standing and time-tested Protocol on Transit and Trade through inland waterways. It provides inland waterways connectivity between the two countries, particularly with the North Eastern Region of India and also enhances bilateral trade. This Protocol was first signed in 1972. Tripura’s foreign trade

Tripura’s cross-border trade commenced in 1995. Currently, the state exports a handful of goods and materials worth Rs 30 crore to Bangladesh annually, but imports good worth Rs 645 crore. This huge trade deficit is due to abnormally high import duty apparatus in Bangladesh and the absence of many commodities abundant in the state in the list of goods allowed for export as well as port restrictions.

The forthcoming Agartala-Akhaura rail project, Indo-Bangla bridge over River Feni and a second trade between the two sides.

River Gomati

River Gomati is the largest and longest river of Tripura with cumulative length of 180 km. It is also considered a sacred river and devotees converge along its banks at Tirthmukh every Makar Sankranti.

Gomati is also a regulated river. Due to the high altitude of in its upper catchment and Dumbur dam built in 1974 as part of the Gumti hydro-electric power project, the river erodes a lot of sand and rocky particles in its upper segment.

A river needs at least 4-5 feet depth for goods carriers to navigate on a regular basis. Gomati riverbed remains navigable for less than four months a year, that too only during monsoon days. For rest of the year, scanty rainfall in the hills results in low volume while accumulating sediments raise the average riverbed, rendering Gomati even shallower. In comparison, the inland waterway route with Bangladesh at Karimganj in Assam operates small ships to large boats for nearly six months a year.

Foreign funds & NGOs

Context: The licences of 13 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have been suspended under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA), 2010, this year. Their FCRA certificates were suspended and bank accounts frozen.

What is the FCRA?

The FCRA regulates foreign donations and ensures that such contributions do not adversely affect internal security.

First enacted in 1976, it was amended in 2010 when a slew of new measures were adopted to regulate foreign donations.

The FCRA is applicable to all associations, groups and NGOs which intend to receive foreign donations. It is mandatory for all such NGOs to register themselves under the FCRA.

The registration is initially valid for five years and it can be renewed subsequently if they comply with all norms.

Registered associations can receive foreign contribution for social, educational, religious, economic and cultural purposes. Filing of annual returns, on the lines of Income Tax, is compulsory.

In 2015, the MHA notified new rules, which required NGOs to give an undertaking that the acceptance of foreign funds is not likely to prejudicially affect the sovereignty and integrity of India or impact friendly relations with any foreign state and does not disrupt communal harmony.

It also said all such NGOs would have to operate accounts in either nationalised or private banks which have core banking facilities to allow security agencies access on a real time basis.

Who cannot receive foreign donations?

Members of the legislature and political parties, government officials, judges and media persons are prohibited from receiving any foreign contribution.

In 2017 the MHA, through the Finance Bill route, amended the 1976-repealed FCRA law paving the way for political parties to receive funds from the Indian subsidiary of a foreign company or a foreign company in which an Indian holds 50% or more shares.

The other way to receive foreign contributions is by applying for prior permission. It is granted for receipt of a specific amount from a specific donor for carrying out specific activities or projects.

The association should be registered under statutes such as the Societies Registration Act, 1860, the Indian Trusts Act, 1882, or Section 25 of the Companies Act, 1956. A letter of commitment from the foreign donor specifying the amount and purpose is also required.

In 2017, the MHA suspended the FCRA of the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI), one of India’s largest public health advocacy groups, on grounds of using “foreign funds” to lobby with parliamentarians on tobacco control activities. After several representations by the PHFI to the government, it was placed in the ‘prior permission’ category.

When is a registration suspended or cancelled?

The MHA on inspection of accounts and on receiving any adverse input against the functioning of an association can suspend the FCRA registration initially for 180 days. Until a decision is taken, the association cannot receive any fresh donation and cannot utilise more than 25% of the amount available in the designated bank account without permission of the MHA.

The MHA can cancel the registration of an organisation which will not be eligible for registration or grant of ‘prior permission’ for three years from the date of cancellation.

According to MHA data, since 2011, the registration of 20,664 associations was cancelled for violations such as misutilisation of foreign contribution, non-submission of mandatory annual returns and diversion of foreign funds for other purposes. As on September 11, there are 49,843 FCRA-registered associations.

About international donors

The government has also cracked down on foreign donors such as the U.S.-based Compassion International, Ford Foundation, World Movement for Democracy, Open Society Foundations and the National Endowment for Democracy.

The donors have been placed on a ‘watch list’ or in the ‘prior permission’ category, barring them from sending money to associations without the MHA’s clearance.

Singapore Convention on Mediation

The Singapore Convention on Mediation came into force and will provide a more effective way for enforcing mediated settlements of corporate disputes involving businesses in India and other countries that are signatories to the Convention.

Also known as the United Nations Convention on International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation, this is also the first UN treaty to be named after Singapore.

Under the Convention, businesses can apply directly to the courts of countries that have signed and ratified the treaty to enforce mediated settlement agreements across borders. In the past, such agreements would have had to be enforced as contracts in accordance with each country's domestic process.

The harmonised and simplified enforcement framework under the Convention translates to savings in time and legal costs, which is important for businesses in times of uncertainty, such as during the current COVID-19 pandemic.

The Convention has so far 53 signatories, including India, China and the U.S.

Significance

The Convention is expected to boost India’s ‘ease of doing business’ credentials by enabling swift mediated settlements of corporate disputes.

Businesses in India and around the world will now have greater certainty in resolving cross- border disputes through mediation, as the Convention provides a more effective means for mediated outcomes to be enforced.

In addition, the "conciliatory nature" of the method will help preserve commercial relationships in the resolution process.

US signs defence pact with Maldives

The “Framework for U.S. Department of Defense-Maldives Ministry of Defence Defense and Security Relationship” was signed in US.

The signing of a defence and security agreement between the Maldives and the United States is being seen as consistent with the growing alignment of US and Indian interests in the Indian Ocean (IOR) and Indo-Pacific regions.

The Framework sets forth both countries’ intent to deepen engagement and cooperation in support of maintaining peace and security in the Indian Ocean and marks an important step forward in the defense partnership.

The framework outlines a range of bilateral activities, including “senior-level dialogues, discussions, engagements and opportunities in areas such as maritime domain awareness, natural disasters and humantiarian relief operations”.

While Maldives and the US have had security co-operation before, India had previously opposed a proposed Status of Forces Agreement between the two countries.

Supplementary Grants

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has sought Parliament’s approval for additional spending of ₹2.36 trillion in FY21 to meet the mounting expenses due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Supplementary Grants

The additional grant required to meet the required expenditure of the government is called Supplementary Grants. Details When grants, authorised by the Parliament, fall short of the required expenditure, an estimate is presented before the Parliament for Supplementary or Additional grants. These grants are presented and passed by the Parliament before the end of the financial year.

It is specified by the Article 115 of the constitution of India, along with Additional and Excess Grants.

The Public Accounts Committee examines these excesses and gives recommendations to the Parliament. The Demand for Excess Grants is made after the actual expenditure is incurred and is presented to the Parliament after the end of the financial year in which the expenses were made.

UAE, Bahrain set to ink deals with Israel

US President hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and foreign ministers of the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain for the signing of the historic Abraham Accord, which is the first Arab-Israeli peace deal in 26 years.

The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain will become the latest Arab states to break a longstanding taboo when they sign agreements toward normalising relations with Israel in a strategic realignment of West Asian countries against Iran. First the UAE and then Bahrain

agreed to reverse decades of ill will without a resolution of Israel’s decades-old dispute with the Palestinians.

The deals make them the third and fourth Arab states to take such steps to normalise ties since Israel signed peace treaties with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994.

The President pointed out that these were the only two peace deals between Israel and the Arab States in more than a quarter of a century. Egypt was the first Arab State to sign a peace deal with Israel in 1979. Jordon signed a peace pact in 1994.

As per the agreements, the UAE and Bahrain will establish embassies, exchange ambassadors, cooperate and work together with Israel across a range of sectors, including tourism, trade, healthcare and security.

The Abraham Accords also open the door for Muslims around the world to visit the historic sites in Israel and to peacefully pray at Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam.

Bringing Israel, the UAE and Bahrain together reflects their shared concern about Iran’s rising influence in the region and development of ballistic missiles. Iran has been critical of both deals.

The Palestinians have not embraced the US vision. Palestinian activists held small demonstrations in the West Bank and in Gaza. A poll released found that 86 per cent of Palestinians believe the normalization agreement with the UAE serves only Israel’s interests and not their own.

India joins Djibouti Code of Conduct

India has joined the Djibouti Code of Conduct/ Jeddah Amendment, as Observer, following the high-level meeting of the Djibouti Code of Conduct/ Jeddah Amendment (DCOC/JA) held virtually on August 26 boosting its Indian Ocean Region outreach.

Djibouti Code of Conduct

DCOC/JA is a grouping on maritime matters comprising 18 member states adjoining the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, the East coast of Africa and Island countries in the IOR. India joins Japan, Norway, the UK and the US as Observers to the DCOC/JA.

The DCOC, established in January 2009, is aimed at repression of piracy and armed robbery against ships in the Western Indian Ocean Region, the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea.

The Code of Conduct concerning the Repression of Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in the Western Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden (the Djibouti Code of Conduct) provides a framework for capacity building in the Gulf of Aden and Western Indian Ocean to combat the threat of piracy.

It is a partnership of the willing and continues to both deliver against its aims as well as attract increasing membership.

It has evolved with the addition of the Project Implementation Unit and the Trust Fund into a popular conduit for donors to support ‘bespoke’ counter-piracy projects in the region.

The Code was signed on January 29 by the representatives of: Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Maldives, Seychelles, Somalia, the United Republic of Tanzania and Yemen. Since the meeting further countries have signed bringing the total to 18 countries from the 21 eligible.

As an Observer at the DCOC/JA, India looks forward to working together with DCOC/JA member states towards coordinating and contributing to enhanced maritime security in the Indian Ocean Region.

Delhi has been steadily increasing its strategic footprints in Western and Eastern Indian Ocean besides Eastern African coastal states. France is India's key partner in this part of Indo-Pacific region.

Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement for Geo-Spatial cooperation (BECA)

U.S. is keen that India sign the last foundational agreement, Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement for Geo-Spatial cooperation (BECA), at the next India-U.S. 2+2 ministerial dialogue likely to held in October end.

2+2 talks

2+2 talks are a dialogue between two appointed ministers from each country and so the name two plus two came into existence. This meeting aims to discuss issues of strategic and security interests between the two countries.

India holds such talks with Japan and Australia, at the foreign secretary and defence secretary level. India holds ministerial-level talks only with the USA.

Foundational agreements

Beginning 2016, India has signed three foundational agreements: the Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA), the Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) while the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) was signed a long time ago.

An extension to the GSOMIA, the Industrial Security Annex (ISA), was signed at the last 2+2 dialogue.

Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA): It will enable exchange of geo-spatial information between the two countries, enhancing the operational efficiency of the U.S. platforms currently being operated by India.

COMCASA is the India specific version of CISMOA. It would allow the United States to supply India with its proprietary encrypted communications equipment and systems, allowing secure peacetime and wartime communication between high-level military leaders on both sides.

The LEMOA allows Indian and US defence forces to use each other’s facilities and establish procedures of easier access to supplies and services required by them.

The Industrial Security Annex (ISA) to the India-U.S. General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) will provide a framework for exchange and protection of classified military information between the U.S. and Indian defence industries. Under GSOMIA, such information is exchanged between the Government authorities of the two countries but not between private parties. It will enable greater industry-to-industry collaboration for co- production and co-development in the defence sector, in line with the GOI’s objective of promoting Make in India in the defence sector.

Indus Water Treaty

September 19 marks the 60th anniversary of the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) between India and Pakistan, a treaty that is often cited as an example of the possibilities of peaceful coexistence that exist despite the troubled relationship. The World Bank, which, as the third party, played a pivotal role in crafting the IWT.

About Indus Water Treaty (IWT)

Signed in the year 1960 by former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and the then President of Pakistan, Ayub Khan, the Indus Water Treaty is an agreement that was made to chalk out the control over the 6 rivers that run across India and then Pakistan into the Indus basin.

The origin of the six rivers that make the Indus basin take place in Tibet from where they flow across the Himalayan ranges and end in the Arabian sea south of Karachi. The Treaty was devised as the Indus basin was one of the networks between the two nations and because Pakistan was unsurprisingly threatened with the prospect of being fed by India.

Before 1960, in order to sort the water sharing issue, the Inter-Dominion accord was laid down in order to release enough waters to Pakistan from India in return for annual payments. However, the problem of this arrangement was soon realised. A new alternative solution was considered necessary.

Then in 1960, India and Pakistan eventually reached a decisive step for the issue with the intervention of the World Bank.

While Jhelum, Chenab and Indus (3 western rivers) were allocated to Pakistan, India received the control of Ravi, Beas and Sutlej (3 eastern rivers). The treaty also stated that aside of certain specific cases, no storage and irrigation systems can be built by India on the western rivers.

India’s share of water from Ravi, Beas and Sutlej rivers came to 33 million acres feet (MAF). While about 95 per cent of the water was being used in the country after the construction of three main dams across the rivers, close to 5 per cent water or 1.6 MAF would flow to Pakistan.

Renegotiation

While the treaty may have served some purpose at the time it was signed, now with a new set of hydrological realities, advanced engineering methods in dam construction and de-siltation, there is an urgent need to look at it afresh.

Article XII of the IWT says that it “may from time to time be modified” but carefully notes “by a duly ratified treaty concluded for that purpose between the two governments”.

India has been woefully wanting in not utilising the 3.6 million acre feet (MAF) of “permissible storage capacity” granted by the IWT on the western rivers.

Poor water development projects have allowed 2-3 MAF of water to easily flow into Pakistan which needs to be urgently utilised. Further, out of the total estimated capacity of 11406 MW electricity that can be harnessed from the three western rivers in Kashmir, only 3034 MW has been tapped so far.

Country-of-origin

The Customs (Administration of Rules of Origin under Trade Agreements) Rules, 2020 (CAROTAR, 2020), notified on August 21, shall come into force from September 21, the Ministry said in a statement.

Details

In the Budget speech, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had mentioned the need to protect domestic industry from misuse of free trade agreements.

CAROTAR 2020 supplements the existing operational certification procedures prescribed under different trade agreements.

Importers will have to do their due diligence from September 21 to ensure that imported goods meet the prescribed ‘rules of origin’ provisions for availing concessional rate of customs duty under free trade agreements (FTAs).

Also, an importer would now have to enter certain origin related information in the Bill of Entry, as available in the Certificate of Origin.

This follows completion of the 30-day period that was given to importers and other stakeholders to familiarise themselves with new provisions. The CBIC has been actively engaging with stakeholders through webinars and other means to guide them on compliance with the new Rules and to clarify any doubts that they may have.

The new Rules would strengthen the hands of the Customs in checking any attempted misuse of the duty concessions under FTAs.

The new rules will support the importer to correctly ascertain the country of origin, properly claim the concessional duty and assist customs authorities in smooth clearance of legitimate imports under FTAs.

Major imports to India come from five ASEAN countries — Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Vietnam. The benefit of concessional customs duty rate applies only if an ASEAN member country is the country of origin of goods.

This means that goods originating from China and routed through these countries will not be eligible for customs duty concessions under the ASEAN FTA.

India has inked FTAs with several countries, including Japan, South Korea and ASEAN members.

Under such agreements, two trading partners significantly reduce or eliminate import/customs duties on the maximum number of goods traded between them.

Providing gadgets, Internet pack to poor students for online classes

The Delhi High Court directed private as well as government schools to provide gadgets and an Internet package to poor students for online classes, saying the absence of such facilities prevent children from pursuing elementary education.

The bench said private unaided schools “shall be entitled to claim reimbursement of reasonable cost for procurement of the equipment and Internet package from the State under the Right to Education (RTE) Act, 2009, even though the State is not providing the same to its students”.

The bench directed constitution of a three-member committee, comprising education secretary from the Centre or his nominee, Delhi government’s education secretary or his nominee and a representative of the private schools, to expedite and streamline the process of identifying and supplying the gadgets to poor and disadvantaged students.

The court said the committee shall also frame standard operating procedures (SOPs) for identifying the standard of the equipment and Internet package to be supplied to the poor and disadvantaged students.

This would ensure uniformity in the gadgets and Internet package being used by all the poor and disadvantaged students, the bench said.

The judgment came on a PIL by NGO Justice for All, seeking directions to the Centre and the Delhi government to provide free laptops, tablets or mobile phones to poor kids so that they can access classes online during the COVID-19 lockdown.

Government Initiatives

Online resources are provided through the various initiativesof the Government - SWAYAM, SwayamPrabha, DIKSHA, e-Pathshala, e-PGPathshala, Virtual Labs, National Digital Library (NDL) and National Repository of Open Educational Resources (NROER).

A comprehensive initiative called PM eVIDYA has been initiated which unifies all efforts related to digital/online/on-air education to enable multi-mode access to education.

The initiative includes: -

 Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) ranked in top 100 NIRF or NAAC score of 3.26 can offer online programme without prior approval of UGC. Institutions with NAAC score of 3.01 to 3.25 can offer online programme with prior approval of UGC.  For conventional courses, the online content has been increased from up to 20% to 40% in regular degree programmes.  DIKSHA the nation’s digital infrastructure for providing quality e-content for school education in states/UTs: and QR coded Energized Textbooks for all grades (one nation, one digital platform)

 Study materials have been provided on an experimental basis for 12 channels for classes 1 to 12 on SWAYAM Prabha and actions are expedited to run these channels in a full- fledged manner.  Extensive use of Radio, Community radio and CBSE Podcast- ShikshaVani  Special e-content for visually and hearing impaired developed on Digitally Accessible Information System (DAISY) and in sign language on NIOS website/ YouTube.

Parliamentary Committee

The government pushed through two crucial agriculture Bills in Rajya Sabha, rejecting Opposition demands that they be referred to a Select Committee of Rajya Sabha.

Role of parliamentary committee’s in the passage of a Bill

Parliament scrutinises legislative proposals (Bills) in two ways.

 The first is by discussing it on the floor of the two Houses. This is a legislative requirement; all Bills have to be taken up for debate. The time spent debating the bills can vary.  The second mechanism is by referring a Bill to a parliamentary committee. It takes care of the legislative infirmity of debate on the floor of the House. Referring of Bills to parliamentary committees is not mandatory.

Select Committee

India’s Parliament has multiple types of committees. They can be differentiated on the basis of their work, their membership and the length of their tenure.

First are committees that examine bills, budgets and policies of ministries. These are called departmentally related Standing Committees. There are 24 such committees and between them, they focus on the working of different ministries. Each committee has 31 MPs, 21 from Lok Sabha and 10 from Rajya Sabha.

 Departmentally related Standing Committees have a tenure of one year, then they are reconstituted and their work continues throughout the term of a Lok Sabha. Ministers are not members; key committees like those related to Finance, Defence, Home etc are usually chaired by Opposition MPs.

There are committees constituted for a specific purpose, with MPs from both Houses. The specific purpose could be detailed scrutiny of a subject matter or a Bill. These are Joint Parliamentary Committees (JPC).

 In 2011 the issue of telecom licences and spectrum was examined by a JPC headed by Congress MP P C Chacko. In 2016, the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill was sent to a JPC chaired by BJP MP Rajendra Agarwal.

Third, there is a Select Committee on a Bill. This is formed for examining a particular Bill and its membership is limited to MPs from one House.

 Last year Rajya Sabha referred the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2019 to a Select Committee of 23 of its MPs from different parties.  Since both the JPCs and Select Committees are constituted for a specific purpose, they are disbanded after their report. Both these types of committees are chaired by MPs from the ruling party.

Examination of the Bill

Bills are not automatically sent to committees for examination. There are three broad paths by which a Bill can reach a committee.

The first is when the minister piloting the Bill recommends to the House that his Bill be examined by a Select Committee of the House or a joint committee of both Houses.

 Last year Electronics and IT Minister moved a motion in Lok Sabha referring the Personal Data Protection Bill to a Joint Committee.

If the minister makes no such motion, it is up to the presiding officer of the House to decide whether to send a Bill to a departmentally related Standing Committee.

A Bill passed by one House can be sent by the other House to its Select Committee.

 In 2011, the Lokpal Bill passed by Lok Sabha was sent by Rajya Sabha to its Select Committee.

The committee undertakes a detailed examination of the Bill. It invites comments and suggestions from experts, stakeholders and citizens. The government also appears before the committee to present its viewpoint. All this results in a report that makes suggestions for strengthening the Bill.

While the committee is deliberating on a Bill, there is a pause in its legislative journey. It can only progress in Parliament after the committee has submitted its report. The parliamentary committees are supposed to submit their reports in three months, but sometimes it can take longer.

The report of the committee is of a recommendatory nature. The government can choose to accept or reject its recommendations.

Select Committees and JPCs have an added advantage. In their report, they can also include their version of the Bill. If they do so, the minister in charge of that particular Bill can move for the committee’s version of the Bill to be discussed and passed in the House.

In the current Lok Sabha, 17 Bills have been referred to committees. In the 16th Lok Sabha (2014-19), 25% of the Bills were referred to committees, which was much lower than the 71% and 60% in the 15th and 14th Lok Sabha respectively.

The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020

The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 was passed in the Rajya Sabha by voice vote. This was one of the three Farm Bills that were passed despite vehement remonstration from farmers across India, especially in Haryana and Punjab.

The Bill, which amended the Essential Commodities Act, 1955, empowers the Union government to regulate the supply of food items such as cereals, pulses, onions, potatoes, edible oil and oilseeds, and remove the stock limit on such farm produce.

Essential Commodities Act, 1955

The Essential Commodities Act, which came into effect in 1955, empowers the Union government to designate certain commodities — food items and important drugs — as essential items. This was enacted “to ensure the easy availability of essential commodities to consumers and to protect them from exploitation by unscrupulous traders”.

When an item is declared as essential, the Union government can control its production, supply and distribution, and even impose a stock limit, that is, how much stock can be held by a trader.

This also means that retailers and wholesalers cannot create an artificial price rise (for example, selling products at a price higher than the Maximum Retail Price) or hoard that item during a shortage, among other regulations.

The Act lists out seven categories of essential commodities:

 Drugs (medicines)  Fertiliser (inorganic, organic or mixed)  Foodstuffs (including edible oilseeds and oils)  Hank yarn made wholly from cotton  Petroleum and petroleum products  Raw jute HI jute textiles  Seeds of food-crops and seeds of fruits and vegetables, cattle fodder and jute seeds.

2020 Amendment

With the Amendment, the Union government can regulate the supply of certain foodstuffs, including pulses, cereals, onions, potatoes, edible oil and oilseeds, but only during dire circumstances, like an extraordinary price rise (for example, stockpiling, weather or environmental conditions).

Further, the government cannot impose a stock limit. Stock holding limit refers to the amount of commodity a trader can buy and stock up to prevent hoarding and arrest inflation.

No imposition of stock limits means that traders and others can hoard food items, unless there is a 100% or 50% increase in the price of perishable and non-perishable goods respectively, over a period of 12 months or if there is a rise in the average retail price in the last five years, whichever is lower.

This does not apply to a value chain participant of any agricultural produce, including wholesalers, processors, importers and exporters, among others.

Monitoring net neutrality

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) suggested the setting up of a multi- stakeholder body (MSB) to ensure that internet service providers in the country adhere to the principles of net neutrality.

Recently, the Delhi High Court censured the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) for failing to act against the unregistered telemarketers, who send unsolicited commercial communications to the customers on their phones.

The court asked Trai to decide, in accordance with the law, within eight weeks, the show-cause notices issued to those entities found violating the regulations.

Suggestions made

The MSB should be a forum which would contain representatives and stakeholders from all telecom and internet service providers, content providers, researchers from the academic and technical community, as well as the government.

An MSB such constituted, shall assist the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) in monitoring, and proposing technical standards and methodologies for the best practices to be adopted for traffic management practices.

The said committee of representatives and stakeholders shall also assist the DoT in enforcement of the best practices and handling of complaints on net neutrality.

Net Neutrality

Net neutrality is the principle that internet providers treat all web traffic equally, and it’s pretty much how the internet has worked since its creation. But regulators, consumer advocates and internet companies were concerned about what broadband companies could do with their power as the pathway to the internet — blocking or slowing down apps that rival their own services, for example. Net Neutrality in India

The regulator had released its recommendations on net neutrality in November 2017 which barred discrimination in internet access based on content.

The discrimination of content includes practices like blocking, degrading, slowing down or granting preferential speeds or treatment to any content. Penalising for violation of license rules on net neutrality.

Recommendation includes exceptions for critical services such as remote healthcare diagnostics, self-driving cars, etc. It also exempts content delivery networks, which do not use public Internet from open web rules.

The government had accepted most of the recommendations of Trai, and later in 2018, issued principle directives on net neutrality. Also, DoT amended licence conditions for service providers and introduced relevant requirements to conform to the principles of net neutrality.

Shuchi scheme

Distribution of sanitary napkins has come to a halt as no funds have been allocated this year for the ‘Shuchi’ scheme, a menstrual hygiene project, which is now affecting over 17 lakh school and college girls.

About the scheme

The scheme, started in 2013-14, was initially a Centrally-sponsored scheme and later the Centre asked States to take over the scheme from 2015-16.

It was aimed at instilling awareness about menstrual hygiene even among girls in the rural areas.

Every year, the State government has been spending a little over ₹49 crore on the scheme.

School toilets without handwashing facilities in 15 states: CAG report

Over half of the government school toilets built by central public sector enterprises (CPSEs) do not have even the basic hand-washing facility, an even greater necessity in Covid-19 affected times, a survey of over 2,000 schools by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has found.

Lack of running water, poor maintenance and unavailability of separate toilets for girls too continue to affect school students, according to the recent CAG report tabled in Parliament.

Details

The report mentions that the HRD ministry had under the Swachh Vidyalaya Abhiyan (SVA) sought help of CPSEs for construction of toilets in government schools.

 Separate toilets for boys and girls have also been suggested under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act 2009 (RTE Act) norms.

The CAG examined the construction of toilets by the seven CPSEs by surveying 2,695 toilets across 2048 schools in 15 States.

According to the findings, the CPSEs did not construct 83 toilets though these toilets were identified by them for construction. Of the remaining 2,612 toilets which were reported to have been constructed, 200 toilets were not found constructed in the respective schools and 86 toilets were only partially built.

The non-existing and partially constructed toilets constituted 11 % of toilets surveyed, the CAG report pointed out.

Of the 1,967 coeducational schools, 99 schools had no functional toilets while 436 schools had only one functional toilet. The aim of providing separate toilets for boys and girls was not fulfilled in 535 schools, a sizeable 27 % of the sample.

Out of 2,326 constructed toilets surveyed, 691 or 30% were found not in use mainly due to lack of running water, lack of cleaning arrangements, damages or other reasons like use of toilets for other purposes.

During the survey, 1,679 (72 %) out of 2,326 constructed toilets were found without running water.

Further, hand washing facility was not available in 1,279 (55 per cent) out of 2,326 constructed toilets, according to the report.

There were also cases of defective construction of toilets, non-provision of foundation/ramp/staircase and damaged/overflowed leach pit etc.

The audit also found that proper maintenance or sanitation was not available in 1,812 out of 2,326 toilets. 715 out of 1,812 toilets were not being cleaned. 1,097 toilets were being cleaned twice in a week to once in a month.

75 per cent of selected toilets were not maintained hygienically. Cases of non-provision of soap, bucket, cleaning agents and disinfectants in toilets and inadequate cleanliness of pathway were also noticed, the report found.

The CAG recommended the concerned ministries to look into the issue of non-existing and incomplete toilets that were claimed as constructed. It also asked the Navratanas and the ministries to address absence of basic amenities in the toilets like running water, hand wash facility, urinals, drainage of waste water, etc.

Since the audit survey covered 2 per cent of total toilets, the CPSEs are advised to review the remaining 98 per cent toilets and take appropriate action, the report said.

As per MHRD data and the Swachhta Status Report (2016) of the National Sample Survey Office, the CPSEs constructed all the approved toilets as of 1 March 2016 and the number of toilets completed by these seven CPSEs was 1,19,530.

Comparison of the two reported figures indicated that the figures for number of toilets completed was overstated to the extent 11,173 toilets by power and coal ministries, report said.

The audit also found that some of the CPSEs appointed implementing agencies on nomination basis which was not in accordance with the directions.

The agencies were paid implementation charges at 10 to 15 per cent of completion cost which were high as compared to 2.5 to 3 per cent paid to State Government Agencies (SGAs) and involved an extra expenditure of Rs 49.30 crore, the report said.

Official Secrets Act

The Delhi police has arrested a strategic affairs analyst and two others – a 30- year-old Chinese woman and her “Nepalese accomplice” – under the Official Secrets Act (OSA).

About Official Secrets Act

OSA has its roots in the British colonial era. The original version was The Indian Official Secrets Act (Act XIV), 1889. This was brought in with the main objective of muzzling the voice of a large number of newspapers that had come up in several languages, and were opposing the Raj’s policies, building political consciousness and facing police crackdowns and prison terms.

It was amended and made more stringent in the form of The Indian Official Secrets Act, 1904, during Lord Curzon’s tenure as Viceroy of India.

In 1923, a newer version was notified. The Indian Official Secrets Act (Act No XIX of 1923) was extended to all matters of secrecy and confidentiality in governance in the country.

It broadly deals with two aspects — spying or espionage, covered under Section 3, and disclosure of other secret information of the government, under Section 5.

 Secret information can be any official code, password, sketch, plan, model, article, note, document, or information.  Under Section 5, both the person communicating the information and the person receiving the information can be punished.

For classifying a document, a government Ministry or Department follows the Manual of Departmental Security Instructions, 1994, not under OSA. OSA itself does not say what a “secret” document is. It is the government’s discretion to decide what falls under the ambit of a “secret” document to be charged under OSA. It has often been argued that the law is in direct conflict with the Right to Information Act, 2005.

Efforts in changing the provisions of OSA

In 1971, the Law Commission became the first official body to make an observation regarding OSA.

 In its report on ‘Offences Against National Security’, it observed that it agrees with the contention that merely because a circular is marked secret or confidential, it should not attract the provisions of the Act if the publication thereof is in the interest of the public and no question of national emergency and interest of the State as such arises. The Law Commission did not recommend any changes to the Act.

In 2006, the Second Administrative Reforms Commission (ARC) recommended that OSA be repealed, and replaced with a chapter in the National Security Act containing provisions relating to official secrets.

In 2015, the government had set up a committee to look into provisions of the OSA in light of the RTI Act. It submitted its report to the Cabinet Secretariat on June 16, 2017, recommending that OSA be made more transparent and in line with the RTI Act.

Ban on sale of loose cigarettes & beedis

The Maharashtra government has banned the sale of loose cigarettes and beedis, in a bid to reduce the consumption of tobacco and to comply with the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act (COTPA) 2003.

Chhattisgarh had banned the sale of loose cigarettes earlier this year, while Karnataka banned the sale of loose cigarettes, beedis and chewing tobacco in 2017.

As per the Tobacco Free Union, over 1 million people die from tobacco-related diseases in India every year.

Why Maharashtra take this step

The government’s aim is to make sure that users are able to see the mandated warnings on cigarette packaging.

Under COTPA, tobacco products need to be sold with graphic health warnings on their packaging and loose cigarettes do not comply with this rule. The Act also mentions that the warning should be specified on not less than one of the largest panels of the packet in which the cigarettes or any other tobacco products have been packed for distribution, sale and supply.

Further, India is a signatory to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, whose core tobacco demand reduction provisions include regulating the packaging and labelling of tobacco products and product disclosures. India ratified the WHO FCTC in 2004.

Tobacco use in India

According to the Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS) 2016-2017, 10.7 per cent of all adults (99.5 million) in India smoke tobacco and 28.6 per cent of all adults (266.8 million) use tobacco (smoked or smokeless tobacco).

Among the tobacco smokers, roughly 4.4 per cent are cigarette smokers and 7.7 are bidi smokers. In India, the average monthly expenditure of a daily cigarette smoker comes around to about Rs 1,100 and that of a daily beedi smoker is estimated to be around Rs 284. As per this survey, Maharashtra has the lowest prevalence of tobacco smoking in the country.

Further, over 91 per cent of current smokers in the country believe that smoking causes serious illness.

The GATS survey was a household survey conducted on over 74,000 people aged 15 years or more. The survey also showed that 68 per cent of smokers, 17 per cent bidi smokers, and 50 per cent of smokeless tobacco users in India purchase loose tobacco.

Are such bans effective

According to a 2017 study published in the Journal of the Scientific Society, raising tax on tobacco products is one of the key ways of controlling tobacco consumption. Even so, while on one hand making tobacco products dearer may lead to an overall decrease in consumption of tobacco globally, on the other hand, it can lead to an increase in the sale of loose cigarettes.

The study found that 57 per cent of cigarette smokers (3.46 million approximately) in India (based on data from the Global Adult Tobacco Survey, India 2009–2010) bought loose cigarettes.

Study also note that the proportion of buying loose cigarettes decreased with increased levels of education and was least among government employees. Study also associated loose cigarette buying with decreased intensity of smoking.

GS 3

Special Frontier Force- Vikas Battalion

Context: There have been reports that a Special Frontier Force (SFF) unit, referred to as Vikas Battalion, has been instrumental in occupying some key heights on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China in Ladakh to thwart any occupation by the Chinese troops.

Special Frontier Force (SFF)

SFF was raised in the immediate aftermath of the 1962 Sino-India war.

It was a covert outfit which recruited Tibetans (now it has a mixture of Tibetans and Gorkhas) and initially went by the name of Establishment 22.

It was named so because it was raised by Major General Sujan Singh Uban, an Artillery officer who had commanded 22 Mountain Regiment. He, therefore, named the new covert group after his regiment.

Subsequently, the group was renamed as Special Frontier Force and it now falls under the purview of the Cabinet Secretariat where it is headed by an Inspector General who is an Army officer of the rank of Major General.

The units that comprise the SFF are known as Vikas battalions.

The SFF units are not part of the Army but they function under operational control of the Army. The units have their own rank structures which have equivalent status with Army ranks.

They are highly trained special forces personnel who can undertake a variety of tasks which would normally be performed by any special forces unit.

The SFF units, therefore, function virtually as any other Army unit in operational areas despite having a separate charter and history. They have their own training establishment where the recruits to SFF are imparted special forces training. Incidentally, women soldiers too form a part of SFF units and perform specialised tasks.

There are several overt and covert operations in which SFF units have taken part over the years. They took part in operations in the 1971 war, Operation Blue Star in Golden Temple Amritsar, Kargil conflict and in counter-insurgency operations in the country.

In 1971, the SFF operated in the Chittagong hill tracts in East Pakistan (later Bangladesh) to neutralise Pakistan Army positions and help the Indian Army advance ahead. The operation was code-named ‘Operation Eagle’.

Robot to measure Covid-19 patients’ vital signs

Researchers have shown that a robot can measure vital signs such as body temperature and breathing rate in people, from a distance. They now plan to test it in patients with Covid-19 symptoms, and hope the innovation can reduce the risk faced by healthcare workers who assess people with symptoms of Covid-19.

About the robot

The robot, called Spot, has been developed by Boston Dynamics, of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Controlled by a handheld device, it can walk on four legs, similarly to a dog. Researchers from MIT and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Massachusetts showed it can measure skin temperature, breathing rate, pulse rate, and blood oxygen saturation in healthy patients, from 2 metres away.

Working

On the robot are mounted four cameras — one infrared, three monochrome.

BODY TEMPERATURE: The infrared camera measures skin temperature on the face. An algorithm then correlates the facial skin temperature with core body temperature.

BREATHING RATE: When a patient wearing a mask breathes, their breath changes the temperature of the mask. The infrared camera measures this temperature change, enabling researchers to calculate the breathing rate.

PULSE RATE & OXYGEN LEVEL: When haemoglobin binds to oxygen and flows through blood vessels, it results in slight changes in colour. These changes are measured with the help of the three monochrome cameras, which filter lights of three different wavelengths. Using these measurements, the algorithm calculates pulse rate and blood oxygen saturation.

Significance

The researchers said that in triage areas where suspected cases of Covid-19 assemble, healthcare workers can avoid exposing themselves to risk, by manoeuvring the robot to wherever patients are sitting. The robot can also carry a tablet that allows doctors to ask patients about their symptoms without being in the same room.

In the longer term, the researchers suggest that these robots could be deployed in hospital rooms.

Researchers detect virus using mass spectrometer

Using mass spectrometer, researchers at the Delhi-based Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB) and the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) have been able to detect COVID-19 with 95% sensitivity and 100% specificity with respect to RT-PCR (reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction).

Detection of the virus takes less than three minutes; time from sample preparation to detection takes less than 30 minutes.

The new method can directly detect the virus without amplifying the RNA for detection, as is the case with RT-PCR. The new method relies on detecting the presence of two peptides unique to SARS-CoV-2 and not seen in any other coronavirus or other viruses.

Though seven peptides were found to be unique to SARS-CoV-2, only two peptides are used for quick virus detection. One of the peptides is the spike protein and the other is a replicase protein.

Steady decline in farm sector suicides

Suicides in the farm sector have steadily declined over four years, according to the latest data released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).

A comparative study of data on Accidental Deaths and Suicides released by NCRB shows that suicides in the agriculture sector have declined by 10% — from 11,379 in 2016 to 10,281 in 2019.

When cultivators and farm labour are taken separately, there is a much steeper decline in suicides among the latter. According to the data, while suicides among cultivators (landowners and those cultivating on lease) declined by 5 per cent, suicides among farm hands declined by 15%.

The 2016 data, the year had seen a 21% drop in suicides by farmers (cultivators) compared to 2015, but a 10% increase in suicides by farm labour. Overall suicides in the farm sector in 2016 witnessed a drop over 2015.

With two successive years of drought, the year 2015 had seen a sharp jump in suicides among cultivators. More than 8,000 suicides were recorded that year, an increase of almost 40% over 2014.

While the data shows that suicides in the farm sector dropped by 10% from 2016 to 2019, suicides among cultivators saw a steady decline from 2016 to 2018 but registered a marginal

increase of 3.4% in the last year. Suicides among farm labour, though, have steadily declined from 5,109 in 2016 to 4,324 in 2019.

The state-wise data for 2019 show that Maharashtra continues to lead with over 3,900 farm sector suicides, of which 2,680 (65%) are of cultivators and the rest farm labour. This is followed by Karnataka (1,992), Andhra Pradesh (1,029), Madhya Pradesh (541), Telangana (499) and new entrant in the list Punjab (302).

Dead coral reefs as important as live ones- new study

More life can be supported by ‘dead’ coral rubble than live coral, according to a recent study. ‘Dead’ coral reefs supported ‘cryptic’ animals — hidden sea creatures, including fishes, snails, tiny crabs and worms — who hide under this rubble to save themselves from predation.

‘Live’ coral reefs — considered among the most diverse ecosystems of the world — are under threat from rising temperatures, as they are sensitive to temperature changes.

Oceans are massive sinks for greenhouse gases and as they heat up, seawater chemistry changes, calcifying coral reefs, affecting their photosynthesis processes. When corals become stressed due to any changes, including pollution or warming, they can expel algae and get bleached, meaning the ‘death’ of the coral.

While ‘live’ coral reefs provide protection and nourishment to fish and other marine organisms, the role of reef rubble must not be overlooked, the study pointed out.

Researchers teamed up with UQ Innovate and designed three-dimensional-printed coral stacks called RUbble Biodiversity Samplers (RUBS) to survey ‘cryptic’ organisms. The 3D-printed coral mimicked surrounding reef rubble and invited unwitting reef organisms to be monitored.

By sampling the RUBS’ structures over time, the team were able to identify changes in the cryptic population, adding pieces to the puzzle and filling in the unknowns of coral reef food webs.

Three mass bleaching events in 1998, 2010 and 2016 impacted five major coral reef regions in Andaman, Nicobar, Lakshadweep, Gulf of Mannar and Gulf of Kutch, all under the Indian Ocean itself. Similarly, a recent oil spill in Mauritius — that leaked more than 1,000 tonnes of fuel oil — can be responsible for the devastation of coral reefs around the island as well.

This technology by UQ researchers, thus, provides a new opportunity for reef management, particularly for reef education and awareness, according to Wolfe.

The study was a collaboration between UQ’s School of Biological Sciences and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies.

RBI alters priority sector norms

Recently, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) brought financing of start-ups under the priority sector lending (PSL) category of the banking sector, proposed more credit flow to districts with lower PSL, and doubled loan limits for renewable energy and health infrastructure “to align it with emerging national priorities and bring sharper focus on inclusive development.”

Highlights

In a bid to address regional disparities in the flow of priority sector credit, the RBI, in its revised PSL guidelines, decided to rank districts on the basis of per capita credit flow to the priority sector, and build an incentive framework for districts with lower flow of credit and a disincentive framework for districts with higher flow of priority sector credit.

As many as 184 districts with low per capita PSL credit flow will benefit from the RBI move.

The RBI has also brought loans to farmers for installation of solar power plants for solarisation of grid-connected agriculture pumps, and loans for setting up compressed bio gas (CBG) plants as fresh categories eligible for finance under the priority sector.

RBI has said bank loans up to a limit of Rs 30 crore to borrowers for purposes like solar-based and biomass-based power generators, windmills, micro-hydel plants, and non-conventional energy-based public utilities – such as street lighting systems and remote village electrification — will be eligible for priority sector classification.

Commercial banks, including foreign banks, are required to mandatorily earmark 40 per cent of the adjusted net bank credit for priority sector lending. Regional rural banks and small finance banks will have to allocate 75 per cent of adjusted net bank credit to PSL.

The RBI move, which comes at a time when credit growth has remained sluggish at 6.7% and GDP for the first quarter contracted by 23.9%, is aimed at enabling better credit penetration to credit deficient areas, increasing the lending to small and marginal farmers and weaker sections and boosting credit to renewable energy and health infrastructure.

Significance

 The changes will enable better credit penetration to credit deficient areas, increase the lending to small and marginal farmers and weaker sections and boost credit to renewable energy, and health infrastructure.  Revised PSL guidelines will enable better credit penetration to credit deficient areas, increase the lending to small and marginal farmers and weaker sections and boost credit to renewable energy and health infrastructure,” the RBI said.

Kaziranga set to be expanded by 3,053 hectares

The Assam government has approved the addition of 30.53 sq. km ( 3,053 hectares) to the 884 sq. km Kaziranga National Park.

The additions include encroachment-evicted areas and suitable wildlife habitat on river islands (sandbars) that are vulnerable to encroachment.

It is a move to consolidate the wildlife areas anticipating better wildlife conservation and reduction in human-wildlife negative interactions in the future.

The three additions are habitat corridors and would help provide connectivity to Orang and Nameri National Parks across river Brahmaputra, besides the hills of Karbi Anglong to the south of the park, where the rhino, tiger, deer and other animals take refuge during the floods.

Kaziranga National Park

Kaziranga National Park situated in Assam state of India, is a UNESCO world heritage sites of India and known for Great Indian one horned Rhinoceros.

It is also recognized as an Important Bird Area by BirdLife International for the conservation of avifaunal species.

Project Dolphin

Prime Minister announced the government’s plan to launch a Project Dolphin in his Independence Day Speech this year. The proposed project is aimed at saving both river and marine dolphins.

About Project Dolphin

Project Dolphin will be on the lines of Project Tiger, which has helped increase the tiger population.

The National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), which implements the government’s flagship scheme Namami Gange, has been taking some initiatives for saving dolphins.

Gangetic dolphin

The Gangetic dolphin is one of four 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.

The other three are:

 The ‘Baiji’ now likely extinct from the Yangtze River in China,  The ‘Bhulan’ of the Indus in Pakistan, and  The ‘Boto’ of the Amazon River in Latin America.

Protection Status

IUCN Status: Endangered

It is listed on CITES Appendix-I.

Conservation measures

WILDLIFE ACT PROTECTION: After the launch of Ganga Action Plan in 1985, the government on November 24, 1986 included Gangetic dolphins in the First Schedule of the Indian Wildlife (Protection), Act 1972. This was aimed at checking hunting and providing conservation facilities such as wildlife sanctuaries. For instance, Vikramshila Ganges Dolphin Sanctuary was established in Bihar under this Act.

CONSERVATION PLAN: The government also prepared The Conservation Action Plan for the Ganges River Dolphin 2010-2020, which “identified threats to Gangetic Dolphins and impact of river traffic, irrigation canals and depletion of prey-base on Dolphins populations”.

NATIONAL AQUATIC ANIMAL: In 2009, the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while chairing the maiden meeting of the National Ganga River Basin Authority, declared the Gangetic river dolphin as the national aquatic animal. Now, the National Mission for Clean Ganga celebrates October 5 as National Ganga River Dolphin Day.

Aquatic life as an indicator of the health of a river system

Aquatic life is an indicator of the health of river ecosystems. As the Gangetic dolphin is at the top of the food chain, protecting the species and its habitat will ensure conservation of aquatic lives of the river.

Globally, there have been such examples. For instance, the Rhine Action Plan (1987) of the International Commission for the Protection of the Rhine (ICPR) — representing Switzerland, France, Germany, Luxemburg and the Netherlands — brought back the salmon. The return of the migratory fish is taken as an indicator of the river’s improved health.

Salmon used to migrate from the North Sea to the Rhine every year and reproduce, but this stopped when pollution increased in the river. After a chemical accident in 1986 that caused the death of fish and microorganisms, the Action Plan was launched. This led to improvement in the quality of the river water, and the salmons began to return.

Ease of doing business

The latest ease of doing business rankings for Indian states, released by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), have thrown up some interesting results. About the ranking

State performance

Some top industrial states saw little or no change in their ranking — Maharashtra retained its 13th rank, while Tamil Nadu moved up to 14th place from the 15 in the 2018 assessment.

Gujarat dropped five places to rank 10th in the latest assessment, while Haryana, in one of the steepest falls, was knocked down to 16th from its earlier rank of No. 3

Lakshadweep, Delhi and UP saw the most improvement, moving up the ranks by 19, 11 and 10 positions respectively.

Reforms DPIIT recommends

DPIIT recommends all states have a single-window system that provides all necessary information on permits and licences required for starting a business.

Permissions required from municipal or village government bodies or police for activities like filming movies should also be explicitly mentioned.

Criticism

Also, business owners’ expectations from the governments can differ. A business owner from Tamil Nadu may assess their state government’s IT portal differently from one in UP.

DRDO successfully flight tests hypersonic technology vehicle

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) successfully flight tested a Hypersonic Technology Demonstrator Vehicle (HSTDV), which is an unmanned scramjet vehicle with the ability to travel at six times the speed of sound.

What is HSTDV

The Hypersonic Technology Demonstrator Vehicle (HSTDV) is an unmanned scramjet demonstration aircraft for hypersonic speed flight, developed by India's DRDO. HSTDV is not a weapon itself but and is being developed as a carrier vehicle for hypersonic and long-range cruise missiles.

The HSTDV cruise vehicle is mounted on a solid rocket motor, which takes it to a required altitude. Once it attains certain mach numbers for speed, the cruise vehicle is ejected out of the launch vehicle. After that, the scramjet engine is ignited automatically.

The hypersonic vehicle and its scramjet engine

The HSTDV tests the indigenously developed hypersonic air-breathing scramjet technology which means that it uses atmospheric oxygen for propulsion.

The scramjets are a variant of air breathing jet engines and have the ability to handle airflows of speeds much higher than the speed of sound. Hypersonic speeds are five times (or more) higher than the speed of sound.

At hypersonic speeds, the system has to handle very high fluctuating temperatures, as well as air speed, and thus, development of the material is one of the main challenges, among other complex technologies.

The unit tested by the DRDO can achieve upto six times the speed of sound or Mach 6, which is well over 7000 kilometers per hour or around two kilometers per second.

Scramjet Engine

A scramjet engine is an improvement over the ramjet engine because the former operates efficiently at hypersonic speeds and allows supersonic combustion.

Ramjets, in contrast, operate well at supersonic speeds around Mach 3 but their efficiency drops at hypersonic speeds.

Development of the technology

The DRDO started on the development of the engine in early 2010s. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has also worked on the development of the technology and has successfully tested a system in 2016. DRDO too has conducted a test of this system in June 2019.

The special project of the DRDO consisted of contributions from its multiple facilities including the Pune headquartered Armament and Combat Engineering Cluster.

HSTDV a breakthrough

American think-tank Rand Corporation terms hypersonic missiles as "a new class of military threat" as these are capable of maneuvering and flying faster than 5,000 kilometers per hour.

The speed and maneuverability enable hypersonic missiles to penetrate most missile defenses, and further compress the timelines for a response by a nation under attack.

The only countries in the world which have hypersonic technology are the United States of America, Russia and China.

In addition to war applications, India will also use HSTDV for multiple civilian applications including the launching of small satellites at low cost.

Delhi Master Plan 2041

The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) is holding public consultations for the preparation of the Master Plan for Delhi 2041, a vision document for the city’s development over the next two decades.

The draft policy focuses on water bodies and the land around it, which is referred to as the “Green-Blue policy”, which promises to give the city a new shape.

The existing Master Plan 2021 will be outdated next year, and the agency wants to notify the new plan by the time that happens.

Green-Blue infrastructure

‘Blue’ infrastructure refers to water bodies like rivers, canals, ponds, wetlands, floodplains, and water treatment facilities; while ‘Green’ stands for trees, lawns, hedgerows, parks, fields, and forests.

The concept refers to urban planning where water bodies and land are interdependent, and grow with the help of each other while offering environmental and social benefits.

How does DDA plan to go ahead

In the first stage, the DDA plans to deal with the multiplicity of agencies, which because of the special nature of the state, has plagued it for several years.

DDA wants first map out the issues of jurisdiction, work being done by different agencies on drains, and the areas around them. Thereafter, a comprehensive policy will be drawn up, which would then act as the common direction for all agencies.

Delhi has around 50 big drains (blue areas) managed by different agencies, and due to their poor condition and encroachment, the land around (green areas) has also been affected.

DDA, along with other agencies, will integrate them and remove all sources of pollution by checking the outfall of untreated wastewater as well as removal of existing pollutants. A mix of mechanised and natural systems may be adopted, and dumping of solid wastes in any of these sites will be strictly prohibited by local bodies, through the imposition of penalties.

The areas after redevelopment

Land around these drains, carrying storm water, will be declared as special buffer projects. A network of connected green spaces would be developed in the form of green mobility circuits of pedestrian and cycling paths. It will be developed along the drains to serve functional as well as leisure trips.

There is also a plan to develop spaces for yoga, active sports (without formal seating), open air exhibitions, museums and information centres, open air theatres, cycling and walking facilities, arboretums, greenhouses, community vegetable gardens, facilities for boating, restaurants, and other low impact public uses that may be encouraged as part of special projects.

The nature of use, extent of public access, type of vegetation, suitability for developing water bodies, etc. shall be ascertained on a case-to-case basis through scientific assessments.

Challenges

The biggest challenge is the multiplicity of agencies. DDA wants to bring together different agencies like Delhi Jal Board, Flood and Irrigation Department, and municipal corporations as stakeholders in the project.

Secondly, cleaning of water bodies and drains has been a challenge for agencies in Delhi for years now.

 A report by researchers of IIT-Delhi on 20 major sewer drains and five prominent sites on the River Yamuna found abundant presence of coliform and other pollutants. Only rainwater is supposed to flow in these drains, but the study found sewage waste and even industrial waste in some.  A similar attempt made by DDA earlier, where a special task force was created to check dumping of waste in Yamuna, has not been successful.

Flying-V design

A team of researchers and engineers along with a drone pilot from the Dutch-based Technical University of Delft (TU Delft) have successfully conducted the first real test flight of the scaled model of the ‘Flying V’, a futuristic and fuel-efficient long-distance aircraft that could one day carry passengers in its wings.

The Flying-V design, which derives its name from its noticeable ‘V’ shape, integrates the passenger cabin, the cargo holds and the fuel tanks in the wings.

The ‘Flying V’ project was first presented at the 100th anniversary of the Dutch airlines KLM, which has also been a partner in the project since its beginning last year.

Significance: Computer calculations have predicted that the aircraft’s improved aerodynamic shape and reduced weight will reduce fuel consumption by 20% compared to today’s most advanced aircraft.”

Analysis of the jobs situation in India

Rising levels of unemployment have been brought into sharp focus by a sharp contraction of 23.9% in India’s GDP in the first quarter.

The lockdowns are likely to result in the Indian economy contracting by over 10% in the full financial year, and this is expected to result in more and more people losing jobs, apart from fewer new entrants finding work.

The number of unemployed is likely to grow not just because more and more people entering the labour force fail to find jobs, but also because several already employed are likely to lose their jobs.

Lack of data

Any analysis of the jobs situation in India is marred by the lack of prompt data on employment and unemployment.

India’s official data on unemployment — provided through the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), which is conducted by the National Statistical Office under the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation — comes out with a considerable lag. The PLFS is an annual survey that also provides quarterly updates but the latest PLFS report, which was released in June, pertains to July 2018 to June 2019 period.

Background

In November 2019, a research paper published by the Centre of Sustainable Employment at the Azim Premji University, analysed PLFS 2017-18 data and found that for the first time in Independent India the total number of employed people declined between 2011-12 and 2017- 18. They calculated that total employment fell from 474 million in 2011-12 to 465 million in 2017-18 — a drop of 9 million.

PLFS 2017-18 also found that the unemployment rate had trebled in this period of 6 years, reaching a 45-year high, which meant the total number of unemployed went up from 10 million in 2011-12 to 30 million in 2017-18.

The worst affected were the youth, those between ages 15 and 29. The total number of unemployed youth went up marginally from 8.9 million in 2004-05 to 9 million in 2011-12 but shot up to 25.1 million by 2017-18. Worse, the rate of unemployment rose as one improved on educational attainment.

According to the calculations, India needs to add around 10 mn to 12 mn new jobs each year for the coming decade. A recent McKinsey study, too, pegged the total number of non-farm jobs that India needed to create in the coming decade between 90 mn to 140 mn.

PEDA plans to use paddy stubble

With a problem as big as stubble burning is hounding the Punjab government, one of Punjab government’s own agencies, the Punjab Energy Development Agency (PEDA) along with the science and the technology department is making important contributions in weeding out the problem by creating alternatives for stubble utilisation.

Details

PEDA, a state nodal agency working towards promotion and development of renewable energy for the past three decades, has gotten set up 11 biomass power plants where 97.50 mega watts (MW) of power is generated.

In these plants, 8.80 lakh metric tonnes of paddy stubble, which is less than 5 per cent of the total 20 million tonnes paddy stubble generated in Punjab, is used annually to generate power.

Most of these plants are 4-18 MW and are consuming 36,000 to 1,62,000 metric tonnes stubble annually.

Two more biomass power projects with 14 MW capacity are under execution and will be commissioned from June 2021. These will also require 1.26 lakh metric tonnes paddy stubble per annum. These projects are environmentally friendly due to relatively lower CO2 and particulate emissions and displace fossil fuels such as coal.

Other fields by PEDA

Other than biomass projects, eight projects of BIO-CNG are under execution in the state. Most of these projects will be commissioned in 2021 and 2022. These will need around 3-lakh metric tonnes of paddy stubble annually.

After commissioning of all these projects, Punjab will be able to utilise 1.5 million tonnes (7 per cent of the total) paddy stubble.

Experts say ethanol can be used to run vehicles after blending with diesel and petrol.

Benefits of a paddy straw-based industry

Farmers can benefit hugely if they can sell paddy stubble to the industry instead of burning it. Apart from this there are also environment benefits; fertile soil will be saved from burning every year in which a huge amount of organic matter also gets burnt, said experts.

Experts in PEDA said that educated unemployed youth in rural Punjab where such projects will be set up can get big job opportunities.

Oil exploration in forests to become cheaper, easier

Oil exploration in forests is set to become cheaper and easier as the Centre has simplified norms to allow mining companies to pay a fee for the land affected by each borehole and not for the total forest area leased out for exploration.

The Union mines ministry had sought simplification of norms for the exploration of hydrocarbons, as well as metallic and non-metallic minerals inside forests. It has also requested that prospecting and exploration in forest areas may be exempted from the purview of the Forest (Conservation) Act and hence from prior approval.

The environment ministry is also considering allowing flexibility in prescribing scales of maps for exploration so that exploration projects can be cleared faster.

Net Present Value

Mining companies earlier paid 2% to 5% of Net Present Value (NPV) of the forest areas leased out to them for the exploration of hydrocarbons. As per the simplified norms, the NPV would be based on the area dug up for each borehole (around 0.1 ha) which is likely to be a fraction of what is charged earlier.

NPV is the upfront payment made to compensate for the loss an infrastructure project causes to a forest and its ecosystem services and is used for conservation efforts. The Supreme Court in 2002 mandated NPV for all infrastructure projects in forest areas.

The NPV is calculated depending on the canopy density and quality of a forest. These payments go to the Compensatory Afforestation Fund (CAF) and are used for afforestation and reforestation.

Some projects have been provided exemption from paying NPV like construction of Schools, Hospitals, village tanks, laying down of optical fibre, laying of underground drinking water pipeline up to 4” diameter etc with certain conditions. Projects like underground mining and wind energy plants have been given a 50% exemption from NPV.

Hybrid warfare

A major international media investigation has revealed that a technology firm Zhenhua Data Information Technology Co. Limited has created and mined a global database of 2.4 million individuals – many of them political leaders, scientists, journalists and others in positions of influence – based on their online presence in order to monitor them and their networks.

Details

Claiming to work with Chinese intelligence, military and security agencies, Zhenhua monitors the subject’s digital footprint across social media platforms, maintains an “information library,” which includes content not just from news sources, forums, but also from papers, patents, bidding documents, even positions of recruitment.

It targets individuals and institutions in politics, government, business, technology, media, and civil society.

Domestic security agencies use such data for law and order applications such as tracking protests but in the hands of foreign agencies with no supervision or oversight, such data can serve a range of purposes. This information can be used for strategic and intelligence services of China for hybrid warfare.

Hybrid warfare

Hybrid warfare is a set of techniques through which a country attempts to shape the information environment in a target state by systematic influence and interference operations,

alongside the use of other coercive tools, in order to achieve strategic objectives without open warfare.

In 1999, Unrestricted Warfare, a publication by China’s People’s Liberation Army, talked about hybrid warfare and the need for a shift in the arena of violence from military to political, economic and technological.

There have been many recent reports on China’s attempts to collect sensitive military, intelligence or economic information in the USA and Europe through social media.

Graphene mask inactivates coronaviruses under sunlight

Researchers from the City University of Hong Kong have produced graphene masks with an anti-bacterial efficiency of 80 per cent, which they say can be raised to almost 100 per cent with exposure to sunlight for 10 minutes.

Graphene is known for anti-bacterial properties. The researchers created a laser-induced form of graphene and tested it on E coli. It showed anti-bacterial efficiency of about 82 per cent. Most of the E coli were dead after 8 hours.

Initial tests on two human coronavirus species showed the graphene inactivated over 90 per cent of the virus in five minutes and almost 100 per cent in 10 minutes under sunlight. The team also plans to test the graphene on the Covid-19 virus.

Living Planet Report 2020

The world is steadily losing its vertebrate population due to enormous changes in land use patterns, according to the Living Planet Report 2020. The Asia Pacific region lost 45 per cent of its vertebrate population in four-and-half decades, while the global average is 68 per cent.

The biennial report, prepared jointly by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and Zoological Society of London, is based on the global dataset analysed between 1970 and 2016.

Details of the report

The Living Planet Report is based on data from the Living Planet Index produced by the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). The index is statistically created from journal studies, online databases and government reports for 20,000 populations of 4,200 species of mammal, bird, reptile, amphibian and fish, or approximately 6 percent of the world’s vertebrate species.

Global biodiversity is in steep decline, the WWF has warned in its flagship Living Planet Report 2020. The numbers of mammals, birds, fish, plants and insects have fallen an average of 68 percent from 1970 to 2016, which is more two thirds in less than 50 years.

The Freshwater Living Planet Index shows that freshwater biodiversity is declining far faster than that in oceans or forests, with an alarming 84 percent decline in freshwater species, which is equivalent to 4 percent per year since 1970.

In the tropical sub-regions of the Americas, there is a catastrophic 94 percent decline, the largest fall observed in any part of the world in the past 50 years.

Land conversion for agriculture has caused 70 percent of global biodiversity loss and half of all tree cover loss, and of the total amount of water withdrawn from available freshwater resources, 75 percent is used for crops or livestock.

Since 2000, 1.9 million square km of previously wild and undeveloped land – an area the size of Mexico – has been lost through conversion, mostly in tropical and subtropical grasslands, savanna and shrubland ecosystems, and Southeast Asian rainforests.

In the marine environment, overfishing in wild capture fisheries is the primary driver of change, with one in three fish stocks overfished. Pollution, coastal development, and climate change are also affecting ocean productivity.

Shrinking Vertebrates

India has lost 12 per cent of its wild mammals, 19 per cent amphibians and 3 per cent birds over last five decades.

The scientist pointed out that the vertebrate population has been declining at a rate of about 60 per cent in India, a figure close to global benchmark.

The Indian factsheet provided by WWF India also pointed out that while the Living Planet Index indicated India’s ecological footprint per person to be less than 1.6 global hectares (gha) / person (smaller than that of many large countries), its high population size have made the gross footprint significantly high.

According to the National Footprints Accounts (2014), India has a bio-capacity of approximately 0.45 gha per person, which means it is a ‘bio-capacity debtor’ or an ‘ecologically deficit country’ with a 148 per cent more demand than supply on its natural resources,” noted the report.

The report tracked almost 21,000 populations of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles globally to reach its conclusions — it showed the loss of vertebrate population was the highest in Caribbean and Latin America (94 per cent), followed by Africa (65 per cent) with Europe and central Asia showing the least loss (24 per cent).

Biodiversity loss

The report pointed out five major reasons behind the biodiversity loss across the planet, including changes in land and sea use (habitat loss and degradation), overexploitation of species, invasive species and disease, pollution and climate change.

In Asia Pacific region including India, habitat loss was the biggest trigger followed by species overexploitation and invasive species and disease. At the same time, the role of pollution and climate change was proportionately higher at 16 per cent.

“More than 85 per cent wetlands have been affected,” pointed out the report. The WWF factsheet stated that almost a third of Indian wetlands have been affected under combined pressure of urbanisation, agricultural activities and pollution.

It added that “about 43 per cent of forest land recommended for diversion in 2019 falls in ecologically sensitive wildlife habitats”.

Phytoplankton biomass in Bay of Bengal

Researchers have discovered way to measure the quantity of chlorophyll-a in the Bay of Bengal (a dominant pigment found in phytoplankton cell and present in a few areas of the ocean) in real-time. The research was carried out by a team of scientists from the Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS).

Phytoplanktons

Phytoplanktons are tiny microscopic plants found in the ocean. They are important ecological indicators that regulate life in ocean. They have chlorophyll to capture sunlight and use photosynthesis to turn it into chemical energy. They consume carbon dioxide and release oxygen.

All phytoplankton photosynthesise, but some get additional energy by consuming other organisms.

Phytoplanktons contribute to more than half of the oxygen that we breathe. That apart, they influence our climate by absorbing human-induced carbon dioxide, a heat-trapping greenhouse gas. They also serve as the foundation of the aquatic food web.

Highlights of the study

The team of scientists closely tracked the long-term trends of chlorophyll-a in the northwestern Bay of Bengal. They also studied the co-existing factors that affected the increasing pattern of chlorophyll-a.

The study was based on in-situ and satellite data spanning over the last 16 years. They observed significant increase of chlorophyll-a concentration during pre-southwest monsoon seasons. The other parameters studied were total suspended matter (TSM) and coloured dissolved organic matter (CDOM), which are optically active substances in water.

There were two peaks of chlorophyll-a — the primary peak occurred during the pre-southwest monsoon due to the recurrent phytoplankton bloom in the coastal water; the secondary peak occurred during the end of the southwest monsoon, spreading to far offshore areas.

Apart from phytoplankton bloom contributing to this increase of chlorophyll-a in nearshore waters, the study found physical forces such as upwelling, wind-induced vertical mixing, convective overturn and local circulation pattern influenced the peaks by supplying dissolved chemical input from various sources including river / terrigenous runoff.

Significance

The information on marine environmental parameters has become increasingly important as they serve as a basis for monitoring climate change, river discharge, and impact of pollution in the ocean.

The study added that though such trends could tell an overall improved health status of the ecosystems as a whole, they could be detrimental to ocean health because of eutrophication.

The piece of work revealed that the study area experienced maximum spatial variability during pre-southwest monsoon with salinity and nutrients — the major controlling factors for the abundance and distribution of phytoplankton.

Land run-off that deposits an excess of nutrients from agricultural land to the coastal waters facilitates growth of harmful algal blooms at a large scale. These algal blooms deplete the oxygen level in water, disrupting the ocean ecosystem. As a result, oceanic fauna such as fish assemblages are badly affected. This leads to decline in fish catch.

Like terrestrial plants, the eco-friendly phytoplankton is largely dependent on light, temperature and nutrients. Continuous monitoring of the ocean ecosystem is, therefore, the need of the hour to devise mitigation system to encounter disruption caused by algal bloom because of excessive phytoplankton enrichment in the coastal water.

Serial interval and Covid-19

A recent research paper published in the journal Science, said China, which has now gone over a month without any locally transmitted Covid-19 cases, was able to contain Covid-19 due to its ability to manage the serial interval.

What is serial interval?

The serial interval is the duration between symptom onset of a primary case and symptom onset of secondary cases (contacts) generated by the primary case. In simple terms, the serial interval is the gap between the onset of Covid-19 symptoms in Person A and Person B, who is infected by Person A.

The term was first used by British physician William Pickles, who had initially referred to it as transmission interval with reference to a hepatitis epidemic in the United Kingdom during 1942- 45. Later, another British physician used the term serial interval, defining it as the interval between successive illness onsets.

The researchers explained that the serial interval depends on other epidemiological parameters such as the incubation period, which is the time between a person’s exposure to the virus and symptom onset, and the reproduction rate or R naught, the number of people who will be infected by one infected person.

What does changes in serial interval indicate?

The serial interval helps to gauge the effectiveness of infection control interventions besides indicating rising population immunity and forecast future incidence. Thus, the more quickly persons who contracted Covid-19 are identified and isolated, the shorter the serial interval becomes and cuts down opportunities for transmission of the virus. To manage serial interval, a robust system of contact tracing, quarantine, and isolation protocols should be in place.

Agriculture reform Bills

Three Bills on agriculture reforms – The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020; The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 – were introduced in the Parliament to replace the ordinances issued during the lockdown.

Farmers and farmer associations across the country have protested against the ordinances. The tractor protest by farmers of Punjab and Haryana in July was in opposition to these. The Punjab Assembly in August passed a resolution rejecting the Centre’s ordinances.

The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020

 The bill on Agri market seeks to allow farmers to sell their produce outside APMC ‘mandis’ to whoever they want.  To promote barrier-free inter-state and intra-state trade of farmers' produce  Farmers will get better prices through competition and cost-cutting on transportation.  To provide a facilitative framework for electronic trading Objections

 Though ‘commission agents’ of the ‘mandis’ and states could lose 'commissions' and 'mandi fees' respectively.  It may eventually end the MSP-based procurement system.

The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020

 The legislation on contract farming will allow farmers to enter into a contract with agri- business firms or large retailers on pre-agreed prices of their produce.  This will help small and marginal farmers as the legislation will transfer the risk of market unpredictability from the farmer to the sponsor.  Also enabling farmers to access modern tech and get better inputs  Will reduce cost of marketing and boost farmer's income.  Effective dispute resolution mechanism with redressal timelines Objections

 Farmers in contract farming arrangements will be the weaker players in terms of their ability to negotiate what they need.  The sponsors may not like to deal with a multitude of small and marginal farmers  Also, the sponsors will have an advantage in disputes, being large private companies

The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020

 Bill seeks to remove commodities like cereals, pulses, oilseeds, edible oils, onion and potatoes from the list of essential commodities. It means the legislation will do away with the imposition of stock-holding limits on such items except under extraordinary circumstances such as war and natural calamities.

 The provision will attract private sector/foreign direct investment into the agriculture sector.  To bring investment for farm infrastructure like cold storages, and modernising food supply chain.  Will help in creating competitive market environment and cut wastage of farm produce. Objections

Big companies will have the freedom to stock commodities, means they will dictate terms to farmers which may lead to less prices for the cultivators.

Reversing Global Wildlife Decline

Species are going extinct at an unprecedented rate. Wildlife populations have fallen by more than two-thirds over the last 50 years, according to a new report from the World Wildlife Fund.

The sharpest declines have occurred throughout the world’s rivers and lakes, where freshwater wildlife has plummeted by 84 per cent since 1970 — about four per cent per year.

Concern

Healthy ecosystems are the foundation of today’s global economies and societies, and the ones we aspire to build. The emergence of new infectious diseases like COVID-19 tend to be related to the destruction of forests and wilderness

As more and more species are drawn towards extinction, the very life support systems on which civilisation depends are eroded.

Of the nine greatest threats to the world ranked by the organisation, six relate to the ongoing destruction of nature.

Way ahead

There must be renewed ambition from the world’s governments to establish large-scale conservation areas, placed in the most valuable hotspots for biodiversity worldwide, such as small islands with species found nowhere else. These reserves, in which wildlife will live and roam freely, will need to cover at least 40% of the world’s land surface to help bend the curve from decline to recovery for species and entire ecosystems.

Habitat restoration and conservation efforts need to be targeted where they are needed most – for species and habitats on the verge of extinction.

Transforming our food systems to produce more on less land. If every farmer on Earth used the best available farming practices, only half of the total area of cropland would be needed to feed the world. There are lots of other inefficiencies that could be ironed out too, by reducing the amount of waste produced during transport and food processing.

Efforts to restore degraded land, such as farmland that’s becoming unproductive as a result of soil erosion, and land that’s no longer needed as agriculture becomes more efficient and diets shift. This could return 8% of the world’s land to nature by 2050.

Glacier retreat in Himalayas to cause water crisis: study

A study commissioned by the Observer Research Foundation, published recently has found that the retreat of glaciers in the Himalayan Hindu Kush region is now affecting the surface water and groundwater availability in the region, and has adversely affected springs – a lifeline for the population in hill areas.

The HKH region extends across 3,500 km over eight countries—Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal and Pakistan. It has the biggest reserves of water in the form of ice and snow outside the polar regions and is the source of 10 of the largest rivers in Asia. About 1.3 billion people directly depend on the HKH ecosystems, including for irrigation, power and drinking water.

Highlights of the study

The study, carried at the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad, says that unless a coherent nationwide policy is developed for springs and Himalayan groundwater, villages and towns in the region will face a severe water crisis in coming decades.

Studies by ISRO show that approximately 75 per cent of the Himalayan glaciers are retreating at an alarming rate.

These retreats will increase the variability of water flows to downstream areas and endanger the sustainability of water use in the earth’s most crowded basins. Receding glaciers would also have an impact on the rates of groundwater recharge in some areas,” says the study.

Study adds, the decline in groundwater due to anticipated decline of glacial meltwater is likely to affect the Ganges basin the most.

Glacial decline is closely related to climate change. There are 5 million springs in the Himalayas and they are showing a decline because of overuse by an increasing population, but also because of retreating glaciers and depleting ground water levels.

 This is alarming because the populations that live in the upper and middle Himalayas, in villages and even towns, are dependent on spring water. NITI Aayog has set up a committee to look at springs in the Himalayas.

In many parts of HKH springs are drying up due to prolonged pre-monsoon drought as a result of climate change, threatening the way of life for local communities and downstream areas.

For the upper Indus basin, glacier melt may contribute up to 41 per cent of the total runoff, 13 per cent in the upper Ganga basin and 16 per cent in upper Brahmaputra. While initially the retreating glaciers will not have a direct impact on water flow in rivers, except in the Indus where 26 per cent flow is from glacier melt, which is likely to change soon, says the study.

Climate warming is affecting hydrological regimes in the HKH region because of factors like changes in seasonal extremes, increased evapotranspiration, and changes in glacier volume.

The study forecasts that in all three basins, there would be a decrease in snow and a rise in glacier melt by the middle of the century. Initially, there will be an increased amount of meltwater available, but this quantity will decline abruptly as the glacier storage is reduced.

Arsenic-affected habitations

The number of arsenic-affected habitations in the country increased by 145 per cent in the last five years, according to data shared with the Parliament.

Details

The country had 1,800 arsenic-affected habitations in 2015. This increased to 4,421 as on September 17, 2020, according to a reply given to Lok Sabha by Jal Shakti ministry.

The 4,421 habitations were mainly in Assam, Bihar, West Bengal, Punjab, and Uttar Pradesh (UP). Jharkhand, which did not have any such habitation in 2015, has two now.

Habitations are the group of households at a community level in a village. These are the smallest level of settlements that can have between 10-100 households.

Under Jal Shakti Ministry’s ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ that started last year with the aim to provide piped water supply to every household by 2024, priority has been given to such quality- affected habitations through community water purification plants (CWPP) to meet with drinking and cooking needs — until potable water supply through tap connection is provided.

Most of the arsenic-affected habitations lie in the Ganga and Brahmaputra alluvial plains; in the states of Assam, Bihar, UP and Bengal. Assam had the highest share of such habitations (1,853), followed by Bengal (1,383).

However, the number of fluoride affected habitations has significantly come down in the last five years — from 12,727 in 2015 to 5,485 as of September 13, 2020. Rajasthan had the highest number of such habitations (2,956), followed by Bihar (861).

FinCEN and FIU-IND

The FinCEN Files refer to a set of over 2,100 “Suspicious Activity Reports” (SARs) filed by banks with the United States Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crime Enforcement Network, the agency that serves as the leading global regulator in the battle against money laundering.

The files identify at least $2 trillion in transactions between 1999 and 2017 flagged as possible evidence of money laundering or other criminal activity by compliance officers of banks and financial institutions.

Suspicious Activity Report (SAR)

SAR or Suspicious Activity Report is a document filed by banks and financial institutions to report suspicious activity to USA FinCEN.

SARs are meant to red flag, within 30 days of the transaction’s occurrence: criminal funds or any form of dirty money; insider trading; potential money laundering; terror financing; any transaction that raises suspicion.

These include round-dollar amounts — for example, $100,000 — being sent in multiple transactions; transfers where there is no apparent economic connection between the parties (a diamond dealer paying a pizzeria for computer parts); transactions in high-risk jurisdictions (offshore havens, conflict zones); transactions to/by PEPs (politically exposed persons) and, finally, adverse media reports on the parties.

Significance

A SAR is not an accusation, it is a way to alert regulators and law enforcement to possible irregular activity and crimes.

FinCEN shares SARs with law-enforcement authorities including FBI, US Immigration and Customs; they are used to detect crime but cannot be used as direct evidence to prove legal cases.

Financial Intelligence Unit-India (FIU-IND)

The Financial Intelligence Unit-India (FIU-IND) performs the same functions as FinCEN in the US.

Under the Finance Ministry, this was set up in 2004 as the nodal agency for receiving, analyzing and disseminating information relating to suspect financial transactions.

The agency is authorised to obtain cash transaction reports (CTRs) and suspicious transaction reports (STRs) and cross border wire transfer reports from private and public sector banks every month under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

It is mandatory for banks in India to furnish a monthly CTR to the FIU on all transactions over Rs 10 lakh or its equivalent in foreign currency or a series of integrally connected transactions that add up to more than Rs 10 lakh or its equivalent in foreign currency.

The STRs and CTRs are analysed by FIU and suspicious or doubtful transactions are shared with agencies like the Enforcement Directorate, the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Income Tax for the purpose of launching probes to check possible instances of money laundering, tax evasion and terror financing.

FIU’s 2017-2018 annual report reveals that it had received a record number of 14 lakh STRs following demonetization which was three times the number of STRs filed in the previous year.

New Labour Reform Bills

The government has introduced new versions of three labour codes – Industrial Relations Code Bill, 2020, Code on Social Security Bill, 2020 and Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code Bill, 2020 — in Lok Sabha. While it proposes to increase the ambit of social security by including gig workers and inter-state migrant workers, it has also proposed measures that will provide greater flexibility to employers to hire and fire workers without government permission.

Key proposals

In the Industrial Relations Code Bill, 2020, the government has proposed to introduce more conditions restricting the rights of workers to strike, alongside an increase in the threshold relating to layoffs and retrenchment in industrial establishments having 300 workers from 100 workers or more at present — steps that are likely to provide more flexibility to employers for hiring and firing workers without government permission.

The Industrial Relations Code has raised the threshold for requirement of a standing order — rules of conduct for workmen employed in industrial establishments — to over 300 workers.

This implies industrial establishments with up to 300 workers will not be required to furnish a standing order, a move which experts say would enable companies to introduce arbitrary service conditions for workers.

 The Standing Committee on Labour, in its report submitted in April, had also suggested hiking the threshold to 300 workers, noting that some state governments like Rajasthan had already increased the threshold and which, according to the Labour Ministry, has resulted in “an increase in employment and decrease in retrenchment”.  The Industrial Relations Code states that the provision for standing order will be applicable for “every industrial establishment wherein three hundred or more than three hundred workers, are employed, or were employed on any day of the preceding twelve months”.

The Industrial Relations Code also introduces new conditions for carrying out a legal strike. The time period for arbitration proceedings has been included in the conditions for workers before going on a legal strike as against only the time for conciliation at present.

It has also proposed to set up a re-skilling fund for training of retrenched workers with contribution from the employer, of an amount equal to 15 days last drawn by the worker.

Concerns raised over the new labour codes

Analysts say the increase in the threshold for standing orders will water down the labour rights for workers in small establishments having less than 300 workers.

The IR Code proposes that no person employed in an industrial establishment shall go on strike without a 60-day notice and during the pendency of proceedings before a Tribunal or a National Industrial Tribunal and sixty days after the conclusion of such proceedings. Thus, elongating the legally permissible time frame before the workers can go on a legal strike, making a legal strike well-nigh impossible.

The IR code has expanded to cover all industrial establishments for the required notice period and other conditions for a legal strike. The Standing Committee on Labour had recommended against the expansion of the required notice period for strike beyond the public utility services like water, electricity, natural gas, telephone and other essential services.

At present, a person employed in a public utility service cannot go on strike unless he gives notice for a strike within six weeks before going on strike or within fourteen days of giving such notice, which the IR Code now proposes to apply for all the industrial establishments.

The mention of ‘other sources’ for funding the re-skilling fund is vague. The reskilling fund is arbitrarily framed as the Code has no idea from where the funds for the same will come apart from employers’ contributions.

Other Labour Codes

The other two codes have also proposed changes for expanding social security and inclusion of inter-state migrant workers in the definition of workers.

Social Security Code Bill, 2020

The Social Security Code proposes a National Social Security Board which shall recommend to the central government for formulating suitable schemes for different sections of unorganised workers, gig workers and platform workers.

Also, aggregators employing gig workers will have to contribute 1-2 per cent of their annual turnover for social security, with the total contribution not exceeding 5 per cent of the amount payable by the aggregator to gig and platform workers.

Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code Bill, 2020

The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code has defined inter-state migrant workers as the worker who has come on his own from one state and obtained employment in another state, earning up to Rs 18,000 a month.

The proposed definition makes a distinction from the present definition of only contractual employment.

The Code has dropped the earlier provision for temporary accommodation for workers near the worksites. It has though proposed a journey allowance — a lump sum amount of fare to be paid by the employer for to and fro journey of the worker to his/her native place from the place of his/her employment

Life on Venus

Context: Recently, an international team of astronomers has announced the discovery of traces of a molecule known as phosphine on Venus. This has caused great excitement because, given the chemical and geological composition of Venus, this can imply the existence of life forms that release this substance through bio-chemical pathways.

Details

The researchers first observed phosphine on Venus using the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope in the Mauna Kea observatory in Hawaii in 2017. Pursuing the search further with the 45- telescope array ALMA (Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array) in Chile led to a confirmation of their observations by this extremely sensitive instrument in 2019.

The detected presence of phosphine on Venus does convey the possibility of life there. Also, they do not rule out the possibility that there could be unknown natural processes (photochemistry or geochemistry) that can produce this amount of the biomarker.

Phosphine gas as a biomarker of life

A molecule of phosphine gas consists of a phosphorus atom surrounded by three hydrogen atoms, just like ammonia consists of a nitrogen atom surrounded by three hydrogen atoms.

On Earth, this molecule is produced by industrial processes. It is also produced by some anaerobic bacteria, which live in oxygen-sparse environments such as sewers, landfills, or even animal guts.

Ruling out the production of the gas through chemistry, it is the biochemical processes that form a source of the gas — the anaerobic bacteria — hence it is considered a biomarker in astronomy.

Presence of phosphine on other planets

It has been seen on Jupiter and Saturn. As early as the 1970s, when the first exoplanets were not even discovered experimentally, phosphine was seen on Jupiter. But there it is said to form deep in the interiors of the gas giant and rise to the top, in a purely chemical process.

Space missions to Venus

There have been several space missions to study Venus, and some of the recent dedicated missions are the European Space Agency’s Venus Express and JAXA’s Akatsuki.

NASA is planning a mission to Venus to be launched next year.

The Indian Venus mission is being developed. Formally unnamed, it is referred to as Shukrayaan-1.

Monetising highways through InvITs

The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister had approved the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) setting up Infrastructure Investment Trust(s) (InvIT) in December 2019, the company has recently started meeting investor groups, as it prepares to come up with its InvIT issue.

The InvIT issue will enable NHAI to monetise its completed National Highways that have a toll collection track record of at least one year. The NHAI reserves the right to levy toll on identified highways and it will help the company raise funds for more road development across the country.

InvIT

Infrastructure investment trusts are institutions similar to mutual funds, which pool investment from various categories of investors and invest them into completed and revenue-generating infrastructure projects, thereby creating returns for the investor.

Structured like mutual funds, they have a trustee, sponsor(s), investment manager and project manager. While the trustee (certified by Sebi) has the responsibility of inspecting the performance of an InvIT, sponsor(s) are promoters of the company that set up the InvIT.

In case of Public–private partnership (PPP) projects, it refers to the infrastructure developer or a special purpose vehicle holding the concession.

While the investment manager is entrusted with the task of supervising the assets and investments of the InvIT, the project manager is responsible for the execution of the project.

NHAI’s InvIT will be a Trust established by NHAI under the Indian Trust Act, 1882 and SEBI regulations. The InvIT Trust will be formed the objective of investment primarily in infrastructure projects.

Need

In October 2017, the Centre had launched Bharatmala Pariyojana, its flagship highway development programme, for development of 24,800 km of roads at a total investment of Rs 5,35,000 crore.

In order to complete the projects, NHAI needs adequate funds and one of the options is to monetise the completed and operational NH assets and offer attractive schemes to private players to invest in construction of National Highways.

Benefits

At a time when private sector investment in the economy has declined, fund-raising by NHAI and spending on infrastructure will not only provide a fillip to the economy but will also crowd- in private sector investment.

An InvIT also offers the company the leeway to fulfil its debt obligations quickly.

InvIT holders also benefit from favourable tax norms, including exemption on dividend income and no capital gains tax if InvIT units are held for more than three years.

Bacteria behind deaths of 330 Botswana elephants

The deaths of hundreds of elephants in Botswana this year which had baffled and alarmed conservationists were caused by toxins produced by cyanobacteria in water, officials said.

Cyanobacteria

Cyanobacteria are microscopic organisms common in water and sometimes found in soil. Not all produce toxins but scientists say toxic ones are occurring more frequently as climate change drives up global temperatures.

Some cyanobacterial blooms can harm people and animals and scientists are concerned about their potential impact as climate change leads to warmer water temperatures. Southern Africa’s temperatures are rising at twice the global average, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

 Cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae, is found worldwide especially in calm, nutrient-rich waters  People may be exposed to cyanobacterial toxins by drinking or bathing in contaminated water  Symptoms include skin irritation, stomach cramps, vomiting, nausea, diarrhoea, fever, sore throat, headache  Animals, birds, and fish can also be poisoned by high levels of toxin-producing cyanobacteria.

African elephants

African elephants are the largest land animals on Earth. They are slightly larger than their Asian cousins and can be identified by their larger ears that look somewhat like the continent of Africa. Their herds wander through 37 countries in Africa.

They are vulnerable as per the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

There are two subspecies of African elephants—the Savanna (or bush) elephant and the Forest elephant.

 Savanna elephants are larger than forest elephants, and their tusks curve outwards. In addition to being smaller, forest elephants are darker and their tusks are straighter and point downward.  Forest elephants, a distinct subspecies of African elephants, are uniquely adapted to the forest habitat of the Congo Basin, but are in sharp decline due to poaching for the international ivory trade. It is estimated that probably one quarter to one third of the total African elephant population is made up of forest elephants.

Africa’s overall elephant population is declining due to poaching but Botswana, home to almost a third of the continent’s elephants, has seen numbers grow to around 130,000.

Whales dying in Australia

Over 450 long-finned pilot whales have died in Australia in what is being called the biggest stranding of whales on record in Australia. The whales were beached at a remote beach in Tasmania’s west coast.

Why do whales beach themselves?

Whales are known to strand themselves on beaches across the world and they do so singularly or in groups.

The beaching of a single, live animal is usually the result of sickness or injury. Bad weather, old age, navigation errors, and hunting too close to shore also contribute to beaching.

There are also a few theories that might explain this behaviour.

 One reason could be that some whales follow schooling fish or other prey into shallow waters, which causes the whales to become disoriented, as a result of which they get stranded.  Another could be panic from being trapped by a predator such as killer whales or sharks.  Another possibility is that whales might be drawn to land by prey-rich currents.  Further, the shape of the beach and the coastline could also have a role to play. For instance, if the beach has gently-sloping shorelines, whales that are dependent on echolocation for navigation can be deceived.  According to Australia’s Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment, the species that most often get stranded on Australian beaches are those that use echolocation or sonar for navigation, such as pilot and sperm whales.

Are such strandings common?

Whale stranding is neither an uncommon nor a recent phenomenon. While dead individuals would naturally wash up ashore, mass beaching has baffled humans since at least 300 BC.

Centuries ago, the Romans thought stranding was a whale’s punishment for offending Neptune, the god of the seas.

Before this, the largest stranding that has occurred in Tasmania happened in 1935 when over 294 whales were stranded. This stranding also involved long-finned pilot whales.

China vows to go carbon neutral by 2060

Environmentalists have welcomed the pledge by China’s leader, Xi Jinping, to speed up reductions in emissions in the world’s top-polluting nation and reach carbon neutrality by 2060.

Speaking to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly, Chinese President Xi Jinping renewed his support for the Paris climate accord and called for a ‘green focus’ as the world recovers from the COVID-19 crisis.

 China has long argued that as a developing economy it should not have to share the same burden of curbing emissions as developed nations whose pollution went unchecked for decades. China is now pledging to lead by example, setting itself goals befitting a country that aspires to be a superpower.

Under the Paris climate deal reached in 2015, China pledged that its emissions would peak around 2030. Xi also pledged to reach “carbon neutrality” — meaning China’s net carbon emissions will reach zero — by 2060.

More than 60 other countries have pledged carbon neutrality by 2050, a consensus deadline that scientists believe must be met to have a reasonable chance of averting the worst climate catastrophe.

Paris Agreement

At COP 21 in Paris in December 2015, Parties to the UNFCCC reached a landmark agreement to combat climate change and to accelerate and intensify the actions and investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future.

The Paris Agreement’s central aim is to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change by keeping a global temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Additionally, the agreement aims to increase the ability of countries to deal with the impacts of climate change, and at making finance flows consistent with a low GHG emissions and climate- resilient pathway.

The Paris Agreement requires all Parties to put forward their best efforts through “nationally determined contributions” (NDCs) and to strengthen these efforts in the years ahead.

 This includes requirements that all Parties report regularly on their emissions and on their implementation efforts.

There will also be a global stocktake every 5 years to assess the collective progress towards achieving the purpose of the agreement and to inform further individual actions by Parties.

World Risk Index (WRI) 2020

The WRI is part of the World Risk Report 2020 released by the United Nations University Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) and Bundnis Entwicklung Hilft, in cooperation with the University of Stuttgart in Germany.

The WRI is calculated on a country-by-country basis, through the multiplication of exposure and vulnerability. The WRI, released annually since 2011, indicates which countries are in the greatest need to strengthen measures for coping with and adapting to extreme natural events.

Performance of India and South Asian countries

India was ‘poorly prepared’ to deal with ‘climate reality’, due to which it was more vulnerable to extreme natural disasters, according to the World Risk Index (WRI) 2020.

India ranked 89th among 181 countries on the WRI 2020. The country was fourth-most-at- risk in south Asia on the index, after Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Sri Lanka, Bhutan and the Maldives fared better than India in their abilities to cope with extreme disasters, the report said.

India also lagged behind these three neighbours in terms of lack of adaptive capacities or the preparedness to deal with extreme events.

India and other south Asian nations did improve their ranking marginally in the World Risk Index during the course of a year. Bhutan improved its ranking the most, followed by Pakistan.

But all south Asian countries had slipped on their ability to adapt to the reality of climate emergency, a comparison with the World Risk Index 2019 shows.

India also slipped on strengthening adaptive capacities. This is worrying given that the country’s first comprehensive climate change assessment report has set alarm bells ringing about the impacts of ‘climate crisis’

Countries with a score above 52.73, were ‘very poor’ in their capacities to adapt to extreme natural disasters, according to the index.

Hence, all south Asian countries fared poorly in the 2020 index (as compared to 2019) on strengthening their abilities to prepare and adapt to extreme events.

Small island nations and Africa

The index showed that Oceania was the continent most at risk, followed by Africa and the Americas. Vanuatu was the country with the highest disaster risk worldwide. It was followed by Tonga and Dominica.

Small island states, especially in the South Pacific and the Caribbean, were disproportionately represented among high-risk countries, due to their high exposure to extreme natural events. These also included countries at risk from the rise in sea level as a result of global warming.

The small island states had limited financial resources and had made small contributions to climate change, but were affected the most by its consequences. Hence, merely providing financial resources for adaptation to climate change was not sufficient. They needed to be compensated for the climate damage and losses already incurred, the report suggested.

Qatar had the lowest risk (0.31) according to the global index.

The report identified Africa as a hotspot of vulnerability. More than two-thirds of the most vulnerable countries in the world were located on the continent.

The Central African Republic was the most vulnerable country, followed by Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Niger and Guinea-Bissau.

Modern grand solar minimum

The sun is going through a period of decreased activity known as the modern grand solar minimum. The last time such an event occurred led to the Little Ice Age

Details

The Sun had no Sun spots for around 71 per cent in 2020 through September 21, 2020, compared to 77 per cent in 2019, according to the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Space Environment Centre. In May this year, it was as high as 78 per cent, sparking fears of a Little Ice Age.

Sun spots are areas of strong magnetic forces on the surface of the Sun, sometimes as large as planets that appear as darker spots because they are cooler.

Scientists say the Sun may be going through a long period of decreased activity known as the Modern Grand Solar Minimum from 2020 to 2053.

 The last time such an event occurred was during the Maunder Minimum — from 1645 AD to 1710 AD, which was part of what is now known as the Little Ice Age — when Earth went through a series of elongated cold periods during the medieval centuries.

The alarm went off when a study predicted that the surface temperatures on Earth will go down noticeably during the Modern Grand Solar Minimum due to a 70 per cent reduction in solar magnetic activity.

During the Maunder Minimum in the middle ages, the solar irradiance went down by 0.22 per cent or 3 watt per square metre (W/sqm) in 1710 AD when the period ended. This brought

down the temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere, especially in Europe, by 1-1.5 degree Celsius and led to frozen rivers, long cold winters and cold summers.

Also, the planet’s temperature might plummet by 1°C during the current grand solar minimum. The possible decrease in temperatures has led to people to predict that the solar minimum cooling might cause a Little Ice Age and offset the rising temperatures due to global warming.

Retrospective taxation

In a unanimous decision, the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague ruled that India’s retrospective demand of Rs 22,100 crore as capital gains and withholding tax imposed on the British telecommunication company for a 2007 deal was “in breach of the guarantee of fair and equitable treatment”. The court has also asked India not to pursue the tax demand any more against Vodafone Group.

About the case

In May 2007, Vodafone had bought a 67% stake in Hutchison Whampoa for $11 billion. This included the mobile telephony business and other assets of Hutchison in India.

In September that year, the India government for the first time raised a demand of Rs 7,990 crore in capital gains and withholding tax from Vodafone, saying the company should have deducted the tax at source before making a payment to Hutchison.

Vodafone challenged the demand notice in the Bombay High Court, which ruled in favour of the Income Tax Department. Subsequently, Vodafone challenged the High Court judgment in the Supreme Court, which in 2012 ruled that Vodafone Group’s interpretation of the Income Tax Act of 1961 was correct and that it did not have to pay any taxes for the stake purchase.

The same year, the then Finance Minister circumvented the Supreme Court’s ruling by proposing an amendment to the Finance Act, thereby giving the Income Tax Department the power to retrospectively tax such deals. The Act was passed by Parliament that year and the onus to pay the taxes fell back on Vodafone. The case had by then become infamous as the ‘retrospective taxation case’.

About retrospective taxation

The retrospective taxation allows a country to pass a rule on taxing certain products, items or services and deals and charge companies from a time behind the date on which the law is passed.

Countries use this route to correct any anomalies in their taxation policies that have, in the past, allowed companies to take advantage of such loopholes. While governments often use a retrospective amendment to taxation laws to “clarify” existing laws, it ends up hurting companies that had knowingly or unknowingly interpreted the tax rules differently.

Apart from India, many countries including the US, the UK, the Netherlands, Canada, Belgium, Australia and Italy have retrospectively taxed companies, which had taken the benefit of loopholes in the previous law.

PCA ruling

One of the major factors for the Court of Arbitration to rule in favour of Vodafone was the violation of the BIT and the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL).

In 2014, when the Vodafone Group had initiated arbitration against India at the Court of Arbitration, it had done so under Article 9 of the BIT between India and the Netherlands.

Article 9 of the BIT says that any dispute between “an investor of one contracting party and the other contracting party in connection with an investment in the territory of the other contracting party” shall as far as possible be settled amicably through negotiations.

The other was Article 3 of the arbitration rules of UNCITRAL, which, among other things, says that “constitution of the arbitral tribunal shall not be hindered by any controversy with respect to the sufficiency of the notice of arbitration, which shall be finally resolved by the arbitral tribunal”.

In its ruling, the arbitration tribunal also said that now since it had been established that India had breached the terms of the agreement, it must now stop efforts to recover the said taxes from Vodafone.

Bilateral Investment Treaty

In 1995, India and the Netherlands had signed a BIT for promotion and protection of investment by companies of each country in the other’s jurisdiction.

Among the various agreements, the treaty had then stated that both countries would strive to “encourage and promote favourable conditions for investors” of the other country.

The two countries would, under the BIT, ensure that companies present in each other’s jurisdictions would be “at all times be accorded fair and equitable treatment and shall enjoy full protection and security in the territory of the other”.

While the treaty was between India and the Netherlands, Vodafone invoked it as its Dutch unit, Vodafone International Holdings BV, had bought the Indian business operations of Hutchinson Telecommunication International Ltd. This made it a transaction between a Dutch firm and an Indian firm.

The BIT between India and the Netherlands expired on September 22, 2016.

Artemis program

Recently, NASA published the outline for its Artemis program, which plans to send the next man and first woman to the lunar surface by the year 2024. The last time NASA sent humans to the Moon was in 1972, during the Apollo lunar mission.

About Artemis program

With the Artemis program, NASA wishes to demonstrate new technologies, capabilities and business approaches that will ultimately be needed for the future exploration of Mars.

The program is divided into three parts, the first called Artemis I is most likely to be launched next year and involves an uncrewed flight to test the SLS and Orion spacecraft. Artemis II will be the first crewed flight test and is targeted for 2023. Artemis III will land astronauts on the Moon’s South Pole in 2024.

Highlights

For NASA, going to the moon involves various elements – such as the exploration ground systems (the structures on the ground that are required to support the launch), the Space Launch System (SLS), Orion (the spacecraft for lunar missions), Gateway (the lunar outpost around the Moon), lunar landers (modern human landing systems) and the Artemis generation spacesuits.

NASA’s new rocket called SLS will send astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft a quarter of a million miles away from Earth to the lunar orbit.

Once the astronauts dock Orion at the Gateway — which is a small spaceship in orbit around the moon — they will be able to live and work around the Moon, and from the spaceship, will take expeditions to the surface of the Moon.

The astronauts going for the Artemis program will wear newly designed spacesuits, called Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit, or xEMU. These spacesuits feature advanced mobility and communications and interchangeable parts that can be configured for spacewalks in microgravity or on a planetary surface.

NASA and the moon

The US began trying to put people in space as early as 1961. Eight years later, on July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first human to step on the Moon as part of the Apollo 11 mission.

Apart from the purpose of space exploration NASA’s endeavour to send Americans to the Moon again is to demonstrate American leadership in space and to establish a strategic presence on the Moon, while expanding the US global economic impact.

Moon exploration

In 1959, the Soviet Union’s uncrewed Luna 1 and 2 became the first rover to visit the Moon. Since then, seven nations have followed suit. Before the US sent the Apollo 11 mission to the Moon, it sent three classes of robotic missions between 1961 and 1968.

After July 1969, 12 American astronauts walked on the surface of the Moon until 1972. Together, the Apollo astronauts brought back over 382 kg of lunar rock and soil back to Earth for study.

In the 1990s, the US resumed lunar exploration with robotic missions Clementine and Lunar Prospector. In 2009, it began a new series of robotic lunar missions with the launch of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS).

In 2011, NASA began the ARTEMIS (Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence, and Electrodynamics of the Moon’s Interaction with the Sun) mission using a pair of repurposed spacecraft, and in 2012, the Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) spacecraft studied the Moon’s gravity.

Apart from the US, the European Space Agency, Japan, China, and India have sent missions to explore the Moon. China landed two rovers on the surface, which includes the first-ever landing

on the Moon’s far side in 2019. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) recently announced India’s third lunar mission Chandrayaan-3, which will comprise a lander and a rover.

Groundwater NOC must for apartments, industries

The Centre has notified new guidelines to regulate extraction of groundwater, making it mandatory for new and existing industries, group housing societies, and private water supply tankers to get a no objection certificate (NOC) for withdrawal of groundwater. Non- compliance of NOC conditions may attract a penalty between Rs 50,000 and Rs 10 lakh.

Details

The guidelines have exempted 5 categories from getting a NOC —

 individual domestic consumers in both rural and urban areas for drinking water and domestic uses;  rural drinking water supply schemes;  Armed Forces Establishments and Central Armed Police Forces establishments in both rural and urban areas;  agricultural activities; and  micro and small enterprises drawing groundwater less than 10 cubic metre/day.

NOC will be required for groundwater extraction for drinking and domestic use for residential apartments or group housing societies in urban areas where “local government water supply agency is unable to supply requisite amount of water”. The entities will also have to pay charges.

The NOC issued under the new guidelines will be valid for 2-5 years depending on the entity.

Bulk water suppliers through tankers drawing groundwater in safe, semi-critical and critical assessment units shall pay abstraction charges at the rate of Rs 10/ cubic metre in safe areas, Rs 20/ cubic metre in semi-critical areas, Rs 25/ cubic metre in critical areas, and Rs 35/ cubic metre in over exploited areas.

For residential apartments, group housing societies and government supply agencies in urban areas, there will be no abstraction charge for domestic use up to 25 cubic metre/month. Beyond this, they will have to pay charges at the rate of Re 1/cubic metre for groundwater

withdrawal between 26-50 cubic metre per month and Rs 2/cubic metre for over 50 cubic metre per month.

The guidelines say extraction of groundwater for commercial use by industries, infrastructure units and mining projects without a valid NOC will be considered illegal and they will be liable to pay Environmental Compensation for groundwater extracted.

The guidelines authorise district authorities to take enforcement measures like sealing of abstraction structures and prosecuting those violating the NOC conditions.

New groundwater guidelines were necessitated because the guidelines issued by the Centre on December 12, 2018 were struck down by the National Green Tribunal in January 2019. Since then, there were no guidelines under which NOC for groundwater withdrawal can be issued. There was a policy paralysis as far as issuance and renewal of NOC is concerned.

NASA’s sonification project

While telescopes offer glimpses of outer space by translating digital data into stunning images, NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Center (CXC) has gone a step further by unveiling a new ‘sonification’ project that transforms data from astronomical images into audio.

Users can now ‘listen’ to images of the Galactic Centre, the remains of a supernova called Cassiopeia A, as well as the Pillars of Creation Nebula, which are all located in a region around 26,000 light years away from Earth. The data has been collected by NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory, Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope — each of which is represented by a different musical ‘instrument’.

Data sonification

Data sonification refers to the use of sound values to represent real data. Simply, it is the auditory version of data visualisation.

In NASA’s recent Chandra project data is represented using a number of musical notes. With this data sonification project, users can now experience different phenomena captured in astronomical images as an aural experience. The birth of a star, a cloud of dust or even a black hole can now be ‘heard’ as a high or low pitched sound.

Translating astronomical images into sound

NASA’s distant telescopes in space collect inherently digital data, in the form of ones and zeroes, before converting them into images. The images are essentially visual representations of light and radiation of different wavelengths in space, that can’t be seen by the human eye.

The Chandra project has created a celestial concert of sorts by translating the same data into sound. Pitch and volume are used to denote the brightness and position of a celestial object or phenomenon.

The astronomers behind Project Chandra have released three examples made using data collected from some of the most distinct features in the sky — the Galactic Centre, Cassiopeia A, and Pillars of Creation Nebula.

The Galactic Centre

Galactic Centre is the rotational centre of the Milky Way galaxy. It comprises a collection of celestial objects — neutron and white dwarf stars, clouds of dust and gas, and most notably, a supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A*, that weighs four million times the mass of the sun.

Cassiopeia A

Located around 11,000 light years away from Earth in the northern Cassiopeia constellation, Cassiopeia A is one of the most well-known remnants of a once-massive star that was destroyed by a supernova explosion around 325 years ago, according to NASA.

The Pillars of Creation

The iconic Pillars of Creation is located in the centre of the Eagle Nebula, which is also known as Messier 16. The Hubble Star Telescope was used for images of the celestial structure, which comprises wispy towers of cosmic dust and gas.

Significance

The sonification project was led by the Chandra X-ray Center in collaboration with NASA’s Universe of Learning Program (UoL), which aims to “incorporate NASA science content into the learning environment effectively and efficiently for learners of all ages”.

Over the years, NASA has been working towards making data about space accessible for a larger audience. According to a statement released by team Chandra, sonification projects like this allow audiences — including visually-impaired communities — to experience space through data.

ESG funds

ESG investing is used synonymously with sustainable investing or socially responsible investing.

It looks at three core areas: environment, social responsibility and corporate governance.

While picking up a stock for investment, the ESG fund first shortlists companies that score high on these three parameters and then look into the fundamentals and financial factors in its investment decision-making process. So, the schemes will focus on companies that adopt environment-friendly practices, follow ethical business practices and are employee-friendly among others.

Globally, ESG is getting bigger with each passing year. There are over 3,300 ESG funds globally and the number has tripled over the last decade. The value of global assets applying ESG for investment decisions today stands at $40.5 trillion.

As ESG funds gain momentum in India, fund managers say companies will be forced to follow better governance, ethical practices, environment friendly and social responsibility.

Why so much focus on ESG

Fund houses say that modern investors are re-evaluating traditional investment approaches and when they invest, they look at the impact it is having on the planet as a whole. This paradigm change is forcing corporations, investment companies and asset managers to realise that investors are no longer only worried about returns. As a result, asset managers have swiftly started incorporating ESG factors into the investment practices.

Even on the performance front, fund managers say globally ESG non-compliant companies tend to perform poorly over the long-term due to issues such as a higher cost of capital, higher

volatility due to controversies, labour strikes, accounting fraud, and other governance irregularities.

Majority of studies highlight that companies with good ESG scores tick-off most of the check- boxes for investing, tends to mitigate environmental and social risks and have stronger cash flows, lower borrowing costs and durable returns.

Significance

Globally there has been a big shift on this front as many of the pension funds, sovereign wealth funds etc don’t invest in companies that are seen a polluting, don’t follow social responsibility or tobacco companies and so experts feel this will force companies to do business more responsibly.

Sectors/Companies which loses out

Experts say while tobacco and coal sector companies, those that generate hazardous waste from their chemical plant and do not manage them properly as well as sectors that use lot of water and do not follow best practices on reuse of water along with companies that discharge untreated waste in soil, water or air will find it tough to get funds parked in them.

Link between climate change and wildfires

In an updated review of scientific articles that try to establish a link between climate change and fire risk published since January 2020, scientists note that human-induced climate change promotes the conditions on which wildfires depend, enhancing their likelihood and challenging suppression efforts.

It also notes that climate change increases the frequency and severity of fire weather around the world and that land management alone “cannot explain recent increases in wildfire because increased fire weather from climate change amplifies fire risk where fuels remain available.

The results of the new analysis notes that natural variability is superimposed on the increasingly warm and dry conditions that have resulted from climate change, which has led to more extreme fires and more extreme fire seasons.

They also note that there is an “unequivocal and pervasive role of climate change in increasing the intensity and length in which fire weather occurs”.

While land management is also likely to contribute to the wildfires, it does not alone account for the recent increases in the extent and severity of the wildfires in the western US and in southeast Australia.

Factors influencing fire weather

The Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which was published in 2013, identified a few factors that could influence the way wildfires play out. These include global increase in average temperatures, global increases in the frequency, intensity and extent of heatwaves (breaching of historically extreme temperature thresholds) and regional increases in the frequency, duration and intensity of droughts.

While wildfires are typical in both California and parts of Australia in the summer months, the intensity and scale of wildfires that these areas have seen in recent years has raised some concerns among scientists about the linkages between human-induced climate change and fire risk.

Using cloud computing for better flood inundation mapping

The Kerala rains of July-August 2018 caused substantial loss of lives and property and left major cities flooded for days.

Maps showing where flooding may occur or flood inundation maps can help in better flood risk preparedness. Using openly accessible satellite data and a cloud computing platform, an international team has now developed a powerful tool for a near real-time mapping of flood extent.

The recent paper published notes the new flood inundation maps showed an accuracy of over 94%. Space-based sensors known as synthetic aperture radar (SAR) have been used widely for monitoring and mapping of flood-water inundation. SAR is capable of acquiring data in all- weather condition, making it useful for mapping and monitoring flood inundation areas.

These sensors operate on the constellation of two SAR satellites belonging to the Copernicus Programme launched by the European Space Agency.

The data from the satellites was utilised on a cloud-based platform known as Google Earth Engine (GEE) for the rapid processing of big data. The GEE also has publicly made available numerous satellite image collections and has functions for image processing and analysis.

The team studied water inundation maps from 2015 and their analysis was clearly able to show the areas submerged underwater in 2018.

The team also analysed the rainfall data from 1981 to 2018 and were able to predict the major reasons behind this flood. The monsoon season of Kerala has seen an increasing rainfall trend and this has played a major role. This also depicts that more floods are likely to happen in the near future. Other studies have also pointed out that the flooding event would have not taken place if the capacity of the major six reservoirs would have been 34% more.

Sandalwood Spike Disease

India’s sandalwood trees, the country’s pride, particularly of Karnataka are facing a serious threat with the return of the destructive Sandalwood Spike Disease (SSD). The infection has resurfaced in the aromatic tree’s natural habitats in Karnataka and Kerala.

Details

According to a study by scientists of the Bengaluru-based Institute of Wood Science & Technology (IWST), the natural population of sandalwood in Marayoor of Kerala and various reserve forests in Karnataka, including MM Hills, are heavily infected with SSD for which there is no cure as of now.

Presently, there is no option but to cut down and remove the infected tree to prevent the spread of the disease, caused by phytoplasma bacterial parasites of plant tissues which are transmitted by insect vectors.

With between 1 and 5% of sandalwood trees lost every year due to the disease, scientists warn that it could wipe out the entire natural population if measures are not taken to prevent its spread. Also, they fear that any delay in arresting the trend may result in the disease spreading to cultivated sandalwood trees.

About SSD

SSD has been one of the major causes for the decline in sandalwood production in the country for over a century.

The disease was first reported in Kodagu in 1899. More than a million sandalwood trees were removed in the Kodagu and Mysuru region between 1903 and 1916, prompting the Maharaja of Mysuru to announce a reward in 1907 of ₹10,000 for anyone finding a remedy. Later 98,734 trees were extracted during 1917-1925 in Salem also due to SSD.

Such was the impact of this disease in Karnataka that the growing stock had been reduced to 25% of its initial level between 1980 and 2000. The devastating impact in natural habitats resulted in sandalwood being classified as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature in 1998.

Presently, the natural populations of sandalwood are available in Marayoor in Kerala and some patches of reserve forests and adjoining areas in Karnataka — both these stands are now heavily infected with SSD.

India has been the traditional leader of sandalwood oil production for perfumery and pharmaceuticals. As early as 1792, Tippu Sultan had declared it a ‘Royal Tree’ of Mysuru. The much-loved and much-valued tree now faces a threat to its existence from SSD.

Way Ahead

The present rapid spread of the infection is largely due to restrictions on green felling in forests, which has allowed vectors to spread the disease to healthy trees, says the IWST study.

In an effort to combat the killer disease, the IWST will join hands with the Pune-based National Centre for Cell Sciences for a three-year study, initiated by the Union Ministry of Ayush with a financial allocation of ₹50 lakh.

The study will try to identity the vectors that transmit SSD and also identify alternative plant hosts, their ecological and epidemiological mapping besides examining optimisation of non- chemical methods of pest-management.

PRELIMS

International Literacy Day

UNESCO declared September 8 as International Literacy Day to raise awareness and remind people of the importance of literacy as a matter of dignity and human rights.

This year, the Literacy Day will focus on the changes and challenges in learning during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The international community is focusing on 2030 with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and has aimed to “ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning” within its goals of SDG 4.

The 50-year review of South Asia (which includes Bangladesh, India, Islamic Republic of Iran, Nepal and Pakistan) states that the large scale illiteracy is ever-present among adults, according to UNESCO

Meanwhile, in India, as per the last census in 2011, a total of 74.04 per cent are literate, an increase of 9.2 per cent from the last decade 2001-11. The country will take another 50 years to achieve universal literacy, which is 2060, as per UNESCO.

Background

The importance of literacy was first observed at the 1966 UNESCO’S General conference which stated- “The hundreds of millions of illiterate adults still existing in the world, make it essential to change national education policies.”

Following the UNESCO’S General conference, the first International Literacy Day was celebrated on September 8, 1967 and this tradition has been held annually for over 50 years. Despite progress made, literacy challenges persist with at least 773 million adults worldwide lacking basic literacy skills today, as per UNESCO.

Yanomami tribe

Context: The Yanomami tribe has launched a global campaign to expel 20,000 gold miners from their land amid the coronavirus pandemic.

About the tribe

The Yanomami live in the rainforests and mountains of northern Brazil and southern Venezuela, and are, according to Survival International, the largest relatively isolated tribe in South America.

The Yanomami are believed to have crossed the Bering Strait from Asia into North America perhaps 15,000 years ago, and travelled southward to their home in the Amazon.

Survival International says the tribe numbers around 38,000 today, and its members live in contiguous forested territory of around 9.6 million hectares in Brazil and 8.2 million hectares in Venezuela.

The Yanomami practise an ancient communal way of life. They live in large, circular houses called yanos or shabonos, some of which can hold up to 400 people.

Rituals, feasts and games are held in the main, central area. Each family has its own hearth where food is prepared and cooked during the day. At night, hammocks are slung near the fire which is stoked all night to keep people warm.

The Yanomami consider all people to be equal, and do not have a chief. Instead, all decisions are based on consensus after long discussions and debates.

Indira Gandhi Peace Prize 2019

The Indira Gandhi Peace Prize 2019 have been presented to renowned naturalist and broadcaster David Attenborough best known for his BBC nature documentaries.

About the Prize

The Indira Gandhi Peace Prize which is named after former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is a prestigious prize awarded annually by the Indira Gandhi Memorial Trust since 1986.

It consists of a monetary award of Rs 25 lakh along with a citation.

The Indira Gandhi Peace Prize is given to individuals or organizations who are working towards ensuring international peace and development, ensuring that scientific discoveries are used to further the scope of freedom and better humanity, and creating new international economic order. U.S. spacecraft named after late Indian- American astronaut Kalpana Chawla

An American commercial cargo spacecraft bound for the International Space Station has been named after fallen NASA astronaut Kalpana Chawla, the first India-born woman to enter space, for her key contributions to human spaceflight.

Details

Northrop Grumman, an American global aerospace and defence technology company, announced that its next Cygnus capsule will be named the “S.S. Kalpana Chawla”, in memory of the mission specialist who died with her six crewmates aboard the space shuttle Columbia in 2003.

For the NG-14 mission, the Cygnus spacecraft will deliver approximately 3,629 kg of cargo to the space station.

Kalpana Chawla

Chawla was born in Karnal, Haryana on March 17, 1962. She received a Bachelor of Science degree in aeronautical engineering from Punjab Engineering College in India in 1982.

Chawla then moved to the United States to pursue her graduate education; in 1984 she received a Master’s degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas, and a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from the University of Colorado in 1988.

She held commercial pilot’s licenses for single- and multi-engine aeroplanes, seaplanes and gliders, and was also a certified flight instructor.

Chawla began her career at NASA in 1988 as a powered-lift computational fluid dynamics researcher at the Ames Research Center in California.

Her work concentrated on the simulation of complex air flows encountered by aircraft flying in ground-effect.

After becoming a naturalised US citizen in April 1991, Chawla applied for the NASA astronauts corps. In November 1996, Chawla was assigned as a mission specialist on STS-87 aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia, becoming the first woman of Indian descent to fly in space.

Chawla’s second spaceflight experience came in 2001 when she was selected for the crew of STS-107. The flight was dedicated to science and research, with approximately 80 experiments completed.

Chawla lost her life during the STS-107 mission when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated upon reentering the Earth’s atmosphere.

Global economic freedom index

India slipped 26 places to 105 among 162 countries and territories on the index of global economic freedom, according to the Economic Freedom of the World: 2020 report released by the Fraser Institute in Canada.

The country ranked 79th in the previous edition of this report, which measures the ‘economic freedom’, or the ability of individuals to make their own economic decisions in a country, by analysing policies and institutions of these countries.

It is based on the indicators like regulation, the freedom to trade internationally, size of government, property rights, government spending and taxation.

In India, the report was co-published by Delhi-based Centre for Civil Society.

Performance of India

According to the 2020 report, which uses data from 2018 as the latest year of comparable statistics, India performed worse in terms of size of government, regulations and the freedom to trade internationally.

In 2018, India ranked 54 in size of government, compared with 11 in 2017. Its rank dropped to 122 in regulation from 108 during this time, while its rank in freedom to trade internationally also dropped to 137 from 131 previously.

The country marginally improved its position in areas of ‘legal system and property rights’ and ‘sound money’, moving up a rank each to place 79 and 88, respectively.

China ranked worse than India overall and was positioned at 124 on the index. At the same time, it performed better than India in terms of its freedom to trade internationally, scoring the 112th rank for this indicator.

Bradykinin storm

Context: Scientists are still trying to understand the causes for the rapid deterioration in some patients with COVID-19.

A supercomputer’s recent analysis of data on the contents collected earlier from the lungs of patients with the COVID-19 infection has showed that a phenomenon called a ‘bradykinin storm’ might explain how the virus works in the body, including some of the more puzzling extreme events.

Bradykinin hypothesis

Bradykinin is a compound that is related to pain sensation and lowering blood pressure in the human body.

According to the researchers, “SARS-CoV-2 uses a human enzyme called ACE2 like a ‘Trojan Horse’ to sneak into the cells of its host. ACE2 lowers blood pressure in the human body and works against another enzyme known as ACE (which has the opposite effect).

The virus causes the levels of ACE to fall in the lungs, and consequently pushed up the levels of ACE2. As a chain reaction, this increases the levels of the molecule bradykinin in the cells, causing a bradykinin storm.

Bradykinin causes the blood vessels to expand and become leaky, leading to swelling of the surrounding tissue.

In addition, the levels of a substance called hyaluronic acid, which can absorb more than 1,000 times its own weight in water to form a hydrogel, increased.

The bradykinin storm-induced leakage of fluid into the lungs combined with the excess hyaluronic acid would likely result in a Jello-like substance that is preventing oxygen uptake and carbon dioxide in the lungs of severely affected COVID-19 patients.

This rapid accumulation of fluid in the lungs of patients sometimes makes even the most sophisticated intensive care, including ventilators, futile.

Targeting the bradykinin pathway to evolve more therapeutic interventions to offset the severe effects of COVID-19.

National Hispanic Heritage Month

The National Hispanic Heritage Month began in the US.

The annual event, which honours the history, culture and contributions of American citizens whose ancestors hailed from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean and Central and South America, is marked every year from September 15 to October 15.

The observation was started by President Lyndon Johnson in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week, and was extended to an entire month by President Ronald Reagan in 1988, the year it was enacted into law.

The Hispanic Heritage Month “pays tribute to the generations of Hispanic Americans who have positively influenced and enriched our nation and society.”

Significance

The Hispanic Heritage Month begins in the middle (and not at the beginning) of September, because of the significance September 15 holds in Latin American history — being the Independence Day of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. The five Central American nations declared their independence from Spain together on September 15, 1821.

The next two days– September 16 and September 18– are also important, being the Independence Days of Mexico and Chile, respectively. Both became free from Spanish rule in 1810 at the height of the Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815). Another nation on the American continent, Belize, became independent from Great Britain on September 21, 1981.

Columbus Day or Día de la Raza, a culturally important celebration, also falls on October 12 during the 30-day period.

Hispanics in the US

With a population of over 5.7 crore, Hispanic Americans are currently the largest minority group in the US, making up a fifth of the total US population, according to the Pew Research Center.

More than half– 3.5 crore– are of Mexican origin, followed by Puerto Rican (53 lakh), and about 10 lakh each of Salvadorans, Cubans, Dominicans, Guatemalans and Colombians.

The community is referred to as Hispanic, Latino or Latinx– terms that refer to a person’s origin or culture, without considering their race.

Human Capital Index 2020

India has been ranked at the 116th position in the latest edition of the World Bank’s annual Human Capital Index that benchmarks key components of human capital across countries.

The 2020 Human Capital Index update includes health and education data for 174 countries covering 98 per cent of the world’s population up to March 2020, providing a pre-pandemic baseline on the health and education of children, with the biggest strides made in low-income countries.

Details

The analysis shows that pre-pandemic, most countries had made steady progress in building human capital of children, with the biggest strides made in low-income countries.

Despite the progress, and even before the effects of the pandemic, a child born in a typical country could expect to achieve just 56 per cent of their potential human capital, relative to a benchmark of complete education and full health.

The pandemic puts at risk the decade’s progress in building human capital, including the improvements in health, survival rates, school enrollment, and reduced stunting.

Due to the pandemic’s impact, most children more than 1 billion have been out of school and could lose out, on average, half a year of schooling, adjusted for learning, translating into considerable monetary losses. Data also shows significant disruptions to essential health services for women and children, with many children missing out on crucial vaccinations.

Last year, India had raised “serious reservations” over the Human Capital Index, wherein India was ranked 115 out of 157 countries. This year India finds itself at 116th from among 174 countries. India’s score increased to 0.49 from 0.44 in 2018, as per the Human Capital Index report released by the World Bank.

World Bamboo Day

World Bamboo Day is a day of celebration to increase the awareness of bamboo globally. Where bamboo grows naturally, bamboo has been a daily element, but its utilization has not always been sustainable due to exploitation.

The World Bamboo Organization aims to bring the potential of bamboo to a more elevated exposure – to protect natural resources and the environment, to ensure sustainable utilization, to promote new cultivation of bamboo for new industries in regions around the world, as well as promote traditional uses locally for community economic development.

Bamboo Importance

Known as green gold, bamboo is ubiquitous as it dominates rural and urban landscapes.

Also Known as ‘poor man’s timber’, bamboo is omnipresent in tribal cultures and community living. Rural communities engage with bamboo handicrafts, textiles, artifacts, and household utilities. Examples include Tripura bamboo silks, heritage cuisines with roasted and pickled bamboo shoots, cultural symbols like the Assamese ‘Jaapi’ (made of bamboo, cane, and palm), widely popular bamboo tree houses, machans, besides modern sustainable architectural concepts and musical instruments.

Bamboo shoots are emerging as high-value and safe edibles and growing in utility globally along with all other value-added bamboo products. The protein content in fresh bamboo shoots, considered as nutraceutical, can range between 1.49-4.04%. They also contain 17 amino acids, eight of which are essential for the human body.

Bamboo has been a key ingredient in new antimicrobial soaps and hand mists developed by Filipino scientists to fight the novel coronavirus.

More than 3 million tonnes of bamboo shoots are consumed across the earth annually, but the shoot production and consumption in India are confined mostly to the north-eastern States.

According to reports, India is the world’s second-largest cultivator of bamboo after China, with 136 species and 23 genera spread over 13.96 million hectares, according to the State of Environment report 2018. Government initiatives

The National Bamboo Mission, under the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, has been initiated to provide a boost to livelihood and environmental acreage.

In 2017, Parliament ‘declassified’ bamboo as ‘a tree’ on non-forest lands.

Similarly, a scheme called SFURTI (Scheme of Fund for Regeneration of Traditional Industries) is being implemented by the Ministry of Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSME) in order to boost traditional industries and bamboo artisans.

Komodo dragons

A new international study, led by the University of Adelaide and Deakin University, has found that the impact of both global warming and sea-level rise threatens the extinction of Komodo dragons, which already have restricted habitats, and this must be better incorporated.

Climate change was likely to cause a sharp decline in the availability of habitat for Komodo dragons, reducing their populations, according to the authors of the study.

About Komodo dragon

The Komodo dragon, Varanus komodoensis, is the world's most iconic lizard species which has existed on Earth for more than a million years, but only an estimated 4000 individuals survive in the wild.

They are endemic to five islands in southeast Indonesia: Komodo, Rinca, Nusa Kode and Gili Motang which are part of Komodo National Park, and Flores, the fifth and largest island which has three nature reserves.

IUCN Status: Vulnerable

CITES: Appendix I: komodo dragon is threatened with extinction and affected by international trade. Jasmonate Hormone

Targeting a specific plant hormone would help rice plants have greater tolerance to potassium deficiency, in turn, improving rice productivity, a new study has suggested.

The plant hormone called Jasmonate (JA) is often associated with the plant’s defence against biotic factors like insects, pests and other pathogens.

 The overexpression of a gene called OsJAZ9 helped make rice plants more tolerant of potassium deficiency, the study noted.  There was an enhanced accumulation of JA-Ile — a bioactive form of the hormone, in rice on potassium deficiency, the scientist found. The JA-Ile then activates potassium transporters for its uptake from the media.

The study was conducted by a team of scientists at the Department of Biotechnology’s New Delhi-based National Institute of Plant Genome Research (DBT-NIPGR).

The Green Revolution of the 1960s was driven by another plant hormone called Gibberellins (GA). The new study suggests that future research could be targeted towards JA that could help achieve both, nutrient- efficient crops and protection against pests.

Potassium- macronutrient

Potassium is one of the most important macronutrients for plants. Plants require, among other things, a high and relatively stable concentration of potassium ion to activate many enzymes that are involved in respiration and photosynthesis. Potassium is also involved in key cellular processes such as energy production, and cell expansion.

Despite being among the most abundant minerals in the soil, its availability to plants is limited. This is because most of the soil potassium (about 98 per cent) is in bound forms and its release into the soil solution is far slower than the rate of its acquisition by the roots.

The availability of potassium in the soil solution or exchangeable form depends on multiple factors like soil acidity, presence of other monovalent cations like sodium and ammonium ions and the type of soil particles.

Deficiency in potassium affects plants by inhibiting the growth of the roots and the shoots. Studies have shown that plants that are deficient in potassium are more susceptible to salt, drought, chilling and other abiotic and biotic stresses.

Future agriculture has to be input efficient rather than input intensive. The study adds to the molecular/genetic resources for improving fertiliser use efficiency in rice which is of prime value for achieving sustainable agriculture.

Fridays For Future

Context: Students and youth under the banner of Fridays For Future (FFF), a global movement demanding climate justice, protested outside the Union Environment Ministry.

About Fridays For Future

The school strike for climate also known variously as Fridays for Future (FFF), Youth for Climate, Climate Strike or Youth Strike for Climate, is an international movement of school students who skip Fridays classes to participate in demonstrations to demand action from political leaders to take action to prevent climate change and for the fossil fuel industry to transition to renewable energy.

The FFF is a global climate strike movement that started in August 2018, when 15-year-old Greta Thunberg began a strike in Sweden. In the three weeks leading up to the Swedish election, she sat outside the Swedish Parliament every school day, demanding urgent action on the climate crisis that turned into a global movement.

One of the main goals of the movement is to put moral pressure on policy-makers, to make them listen to scientists and then to take action to limit global warming.

Their demand for Delhi includes saving the Aravallis, improved sewage management plants to prevent pollution of the Yamuna, public participation in policy-making and better environmental education in schools.