Answers: Mains Marathon – UPSC Mains Current Affairs Questions – April 25, 2019

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Q.1) What is intuition? Why intuition is considered as a special attribute of a good leader?

Answer:

Intuition is the ability to understand something instinctively, without the need for conscious reasoning. It is the inner knowledge we all possess.

Many successful leaders are said to have taken crucial decisions based on intuition.

Importance of intuition:

1. It bridges the information gap. Most of the times, decisions have to be taken in the void, where the potential consequences cannot be assessed.
2. It is based on experience and observation. The keener the observation, wiser will be the intuition.
3. Intuition is something that provides understanding and judgment without any rational justification.
4. Highly complex situations do not lend themselves to cognitive processing alone.
5. Leaders gather data and seek input but at some point, they reach the over-thinking tipping point. That’s the point where the time needed to gather more data and input exceeds the value. That’s when they have to make a decision.

Q.2) Stability in Afghanistan is beneficial for both India and Pakistan in particular and region in general. Examine

Answer:

Importance of Afghanistan for the region:

1. Any takeover of the government by Taliban will fuel terrorist groups in the region – from Central Asian countries to Pakistan, China and India
2. Afghanistan lies at the crossroads of South Asia and West Asia. Thus, its stability is essential for the trade and economies in the regions around.
3. Already, West Asia is suffering huge ethnic clashes and political instabilities. Afghanistan further deteriorates the situation by providing a haven for such groups.
4. India recently constructed Chabahar port in Iran to bypass Pakistan and connect with Afghanistan. It is essential for India’s trade further north and west.
5. India has invested large sums in development infrastructure in Afghanistan. The benefit from these investments can only be realised from a stable Afghanistan.

Q.3) What do you mean by integral humanism? Discuss the relevance of integral humanism in modern times?

Answer:

Integral Humanism was a set of concepts drafted by Deendayal Upadhyaya as political program and adopted in 1965 as the official doctrine of the Jan Sangh.

It was developed as an indigenous economic model with human being at center stage. This approach made this concept different from Socialism and Capitalism.

Philosophy:

1. Humankind had four hierarchically organized attributes of body, mind, intellect and soul which corresponded to the four universal objectives of dharma(moral duties), artha (wealth), kama (desire or satisfaction), and moksha (total liberation or ‘salvation’)
2. While none could be ignored, dharma is the ‘basic’, and moksha the ‘ultimate’ objective of humankind and society
3. The problem with both capitalist and socialist ideologies is that they only consider the needs of body and mind, and were hence based on the materialist objectives of desire and wealth
4. It rejected social systems in which individualism ‘reigned supreme’. It also rejected communism in which individualism was ‘crushed’ as part of a ‘large heartless machine

Relevance:

1. It places the welfare of human as the primary motto of any society
2. A large population of our world lives in poverty. After having tried various development models with mixed results, the world is in search of model of development which is integrated and sustainable
3. He believed that every individual, family and our society has a role to play in the development of our nation
4. the purpose of politics is to bring about social and economic changes
5. Policies and principles that can balance the use the labour, natural resources and capital so that we can provide a life of dignity to every human being

Q.4) Analyze the major reasons behind the recent slowdown of Chinese economy? Discuss its impact on India and global economy?

Answer:

Reasons:

1. Overcapacity in crucial industries like steel
2. Growing wages reducing the competitiveness of Chinese economy
3. Global slowdown
4. Ongoing trade war with the US
5. Other long term reasons like serious and growing worries over the lack of regulation that sets doing business in China apart from that of the rest of the world. These include China’s complex and shady “shadow banking” problem of unregulated lenders, its cyber espionage activities and lax protection of intellectual property rights.

Impact:

1. Softening demand in China is being felt around the world, with slowing sales of goods from iPhones to automobiles, prompting warnings from the likes of Apple and Jaguar Land Rover.
2. Chinese industry is closely integrated into international supply chains. At the turn of the century, China accounted for about 7%of global economic activity.
3. China has the biggest share in India’s imports, at more than 16%. It is also the fourth largest export market for the country, with a 4.39% share. So the impact on India is unlikely to be huge.
4. If yuan weakens, it makes imports from China cheaper; excess capacities in China could lead to dumping of products. This could hurt Indian companies. India’s exports of raw material to China could suffer.
5. India could become a destination for Chinese companies; it would make economic sense for Chinese companies to shift manufacturing of products they sell in India.