Brief of newspaper articles for the day bearing
relevance to Civil Services preparation
- GS PAPER 1
- A true measure of inequality – {Inequality}
- GS PAPER 2
- Nuclear ambiguities – {Civil Liability Nuclear Damage Bill}
- Schooling without learning – {Education}
- A common cause in personal laws and gender rights – {Personal Laws, Gender Rights}
- Indian ocean region a policy priority: Modi – {International Relations – Importance of Indian Ocean}
- Test triggers emergency UN meet – {International Affairs – North Korea and missile Test}
- Deepening Palestine’s Occupation – {International Affairs – Palestine and Israel}
- GS PAPER 3
- Plan to scrap Income tax get high level hearing – {Taxation System in India}
- With Zika, India firms scales up trial for GM mosquitoes– {Science & Technology – Mosquitoe Borne Diseases}
- The invisible drought – {Drought and its management }
- A start up warning– {Economy – Start Ups}
- Picture this – {Monetary Policy}
GS PAPER 1
[1]. A true measure of inequality
Theme:-
Inequality in lifetime spending power is more important than inequality in current incomes and wealth, the usual measures. Momentary snapshots of the kind provided by the standard estimates are misleading.
A new graduate just starting out isn’t poor in the way that a high-school drop-out is poor, though their current incomes may be the same. And while figures for wealth suggest that a retired person with meagre savings is richer than a new Harvard graduate with student debt, common sense says otherwise.
GS PAPER 2
[1]. Nuclear ambiguities
Context:-
More than five years after it signed the Convention on Supplementary Compensation (CSC), India ratified the insurance pooling agreement, which pertains to civil liability in the event of a nuclear accident in any of the acceding countries.
Good move:-
Prima facie , this was a good move, bringing to an end a game of will-they-or-won’t-they, which had cast India in poor light internationally and which sat uncomfortably beside three hard-fought nuclear landmarks — the India-U.S. Civil Nuclear Agreement (CNA) and the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) waiver, both passed in 2008, and India’s Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act (CLNDA), which became law in 2010.
Concerns:-
However, India’s CSC ratification does not clear the air so far as an important stumbling block to bilateral nuclear commerce is concerned:
Is CLNDA truly in conformity with the CSC, as Indian officials have repeatedly claimed, or does it cast a shadow of doubt on supplier liability, which is a matter of critical importance to U.S. nuclear corporations?
Reason for ambiguity:-
The ambiguity stems from two clauses of CLNDA, Sections 17(b) and 46.
Under Section 17(b), liability for a nuclear accident can be channelled from the operator, which is the Nuclear Power Corporation of India, to suppliers of nuclear material, specifically if the accident is due to an act of the supplier or his employee, which includes supply of equipment or material with patent or latent defects or sub-standard services.
Section 46 permits victims of a nuclear incident to sue the operator or the supplier for damages applying tort law, even though such proceedings would be beyond the scope of CLNDA and its liability cap, and thus exposing suppliers to unlimited liability.
Both clauses are likely to raise suppliers’ cost of insurance cover, possibly beyond what is feasible commercially and within the confines of competitive energy pricing.
Why suppliers still hesistate?
India’s reliance on contractual rules and parliamentary debates to explain away supplier concerns has been greeted with scepticism by representatives of U.S. nuclear corporations —
- First on the grounds that no rule can supersede constitutional statute,
- Second, as there are other, on-record views in Parliament that contradict those cited by the MEA.
Good side:-
While the liability issue has hindered U.S. investment in Indian reactors, Russia, France and Japan have moved forward with their respective bilateral agreements for nuclear commerce.
Conclusion:-
This suggests that the recognition of India as a responsible nuclear power by the international community — the U.S. and the other NSG states — has allowed for windows of opportunity for nuclear commerce in India, even in the post-Fukushima world.
[2]. Schooling without learning
Context:-
Contrary to popular perception, the vast majority of the 3.3 lakh private unaided schools in India are low-fee establishments. Only about 16,000 of them are ‘elite’ high-fee schools affiliated to the Indian Council of Secondary Education and the Central Board of Secondary Education.
Concern:-
Despite giving far greater value for money (learning per unit of cost), thousands of low-fee private schools are being forced to shut down in India.
Reason:-
The reason: the requirement of the Right to Education Act (RTE) that all private schools must mandatorily get government recognition by complying with the norms stipulated in the RTE Act and in State RTE Rules.
For good measure, many additional conditions for ‘recognition’ have been added in States’ Government Orders (GO).
National crisis:-
Simultaneously with private school closures, many government schools are also shutting down because of a lack of demand for dysfunctional schools where teachers are often absent.
Meanwhile, the population of children who are of school-going age is rising by 3.8 per cent per year, according to the Censuses of 2001 and 2011.
This has created a national crisis.
A paradox:-
It has also created a paradox: an Act that vows to promote children’s right to education is itself potentially violating the same. It is also violating fee-paying children’s right to attend a school of their choice.
Problems of government schools:-
As mandated by Section 6 of the RTE Act: government schools are supposed to be established in all neighbourhoods but thats not always the case.
Data also show, a high proportion of the government schools themselves do not fulfil the norms and standards of the RTE Act, but are not obliged under the Act to be closed down.
Discrminatory:-
At one level, this is discriminatory, at another it is cynical: if the Act’s framers believed these norms to be quality-enhancing, then why was it not necessary for government schools (where 70 per cent of the poorest children study) to also comply with the norms as private schools do? Are the comfort, safety and quality of education of the 70 per cent of the poorest children not as important as those of children in the private schools?
Parents prefer Private schools:-
As it happens, parents are delivering a judgment on the relative quality of private and government schools by voting with their feet. Public schools are emptying due to migration towards private schools.
Low levels of teacher accountability and low student-learning levels have caused parents to desert publicly funded schools.
The low-fee private schools which produce higher learning outcomes among children at less than 20 per cent of the per-pupil cost of government schools.
Instead of closing them down, they should take a facilitative approach towards these high value-adding low-fee private schools.
Closure is not the option:-
The closure of private schools without adequate safeguards for the admission of the displaced children in other nearby schools should also wake up child protection agencies to the danger of the likely denial of children their right to education.
Shutting down private schools on the pretext of some infrastructure norms that have a dubious connection with school quality is unhelpful.
Measuring quality of the school:-
School quality needs to be measured by how well children are learning, not by possession of infrastructure; private and public schools where learning is good should be allowed to run, while at the same time encouraging and even helping them to become compliant with the infrastructure norms.
What should be done?
A Right to Quality Education Act needs to be enacted, to underscore the importance of ensuring learning.
- It should give central attention to teacher accountability.
- Second, it should give attention to the use of the power of financial incentives (for instance, making government and aided schools’ funding either through a voucher or a per-student grant such that the school loses funding if student numbers fall, as happens in OECD countries).
- Third, it should give attention to using the power of parental information about the quality of different schools in their town or city, so parents can exit schools where learning is low, thereby giving poorly performing schools an incentive to make more of an effort to retain students.
- Finally, there should be strengthening of teachers’ subject-matter knowledge via restructured teacher training.
Conclusion:-
Anything other than a singular focus on learning, buttressed with a Right to Quality Education Act, will squander the life chances of millions of Indian children.
[3]. A common cause in personal laws and gender rights
Context:-
The article speaks about the need for uniform civil code inorder to uphold gender equality.
Shah Bano case:-
Thirty-one years ago, the JUH and the All India Muslim Personal Law Board had opposed granting maintenance to Shah Bano, a 62-year-old divorced mother of five whose husband had taken a second wife.
Under Muslim personal law, husbands are obliged to pay mehr—an agreed sum of money at the time of marriage—and maintenance for roughly three months, a period known as iddat.
It was largely to placate the Muslim orthodoxy that the Rajiv Gandhi government passed the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights Under Divorce) Act, 1986, that overturned the Shah Bano judgment.
But in a series of judgements ever since, starting with Danial Latifi (who in a strange twist, turned out to be Shah Bano’s lawyer), the Supreme Court has generally remained consistent to the principle that Muslim women have the right to invoke fundamental rights granted to them by the Constitution.
Other minority religions too:-
It’s not just Muslim personal law. Mary Roy succeeded in 1986 to strike down the Christian law of inheritance that discriminated against daughters.
Last year, the courts questioned why Christian couples filing for divorce by mutual consent were required to be separated for two years instead of just the one year that applies to other communities.
Even now, pending before it is a petition filed by a Parsi woman who has asked why her marriage outside her community has resulted in her forfeiting the right to worship at her fire temple.
Uniform civil code:-
The idea of a “uniform civil code” that will govern all Indians in matters of inheritance, adoption, marriage, divorce and maintenance remains a directive principle in the Constitution. In the nearly seven decades since Independence it has become a loaded term
It is not majoritarian:-
Uniform civil code is considered to be Hindu majoritarian one.
Let’s not forget that Hindu women have also had to battle for legal rights, and continue to do so. The Hindu law reforms of 1956 were bitterly opposed by the Jana Sangh and even then stopped short of granting women a right to family property.
That came about only in 2005, and it was as recently as last month that the Delhi high court finally held that the eldest daughter can indeed be a “karta” of a Hindu Undivided Family (HUF).
It does not Appease minorities:-
The second is that personal laws somehow “appease” minorities. This argument forwarded most often by the patriarchal Hindu right is so utterly ridiculous that nobody ever bothered to ask Muslim women what it was that they wanted.
Last year, the first-ever survey of nearly 5,000 Muslim women found that close to 90% opposed both polygamy and triple talaq. So, when you talk of “appeasement”, then who exactly are these discriminatory laws appeasing? Not the women of the community, surely.
At a time when women across faiths are questioning orthodoxy by, for instance, insisting on their right to unfettered access to places of worship, the debate on gender disparity in personal laws is not out of place.
Conclusion:-
It must be a debate that will look at discriminatory laws and practices in all religions.
A good starting point then is not a paternalistic and patronizing “plight of Muslim women” position.
A good starting point is recognizing that the world has changed and along with it notions of social and gender justice. An ideal solution would be for reform from within religious communities. Failing that, of course, there’s always the courts.
[4]. Indian ocean region a policy priority: Modi
Context:-
Prime Minister invited international companies to make in India and make for India and also wanted the youth of the coastal areas to join the endeavour to make India a Blue Economy.
Reigniting the manufacturing sector with the ‘Make in India’ campaign with defence and shipbuilding as its focus areas.
India is a maritime nation and the importance of the Indian Ocean region to the country was also underscored
The Indian Ocean region is one of the foremost policy priorities. Our approach is evident in our vision of ‘Sagar,’ which means “Ocean” and which stands for Security and Growth for All in the Region.
India will continue to pursue and promote our geo-political, strategic and economic interests in the seas, especially the Indian Ocean.
[5]. Test triggers emergency UN meet
Concern:-
An emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on Sunday condemned North Korea’s launch of a satellite in violation of the UN restrictions on ballistic missile technology that are in place against it.
What happened?
The North Korean satellite launch with ballistic missile technology, a month after it tested a nuclear device, pushed the Asia-Pacific region into volatility and set in a motion a series of diplomatic initiatives.
Using China:-
The U.S and South Korea also decided to start talks on the deployment of Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) missile defence system in South Korea, prompting immediate protests from China.
The U.S has been nudging China to bring more pressure on North Korea.
Outcome:-
They agreed on the importance of a strong and united international response to North Korea’s illegal actions, including through an impactful UN Security Council resolution
Chinese Response:-
While China has condemned the North Korean nuclear test and satellite launch, it is also measured in its response.
It pointed out that the new resolution should not provoke new tension in the situation…destabilise the Korean Peninsula. Rather, the goal is to take the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula back to the right track of negotiation.
[6]. Deepening Palestine’s Occupation
Context:-
This is the 49th year of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Israel’s Aggression:-
If Israel had been sensitive to international criticisms and the suffering of the Palestinian people, the occupation wouldn’t have still been in place.
Trigger for the recent violence:-
To be sure, the immediate trigger of the latest crisis was tension at Haram al-Sharif (or Temple Mount, according to Jews), Jerusalem’s most contested religious site. Clashes erupted in mid-September when Palestinians’ access to the compound was restricted.
Underlying reality:-
But the Temple Mount issue was just a spark. It’s the underlying reality of the social and political life of an average Palestinian that has spread the violence across the occupied territories.
Ever since Israel has occupied East Jerusalem in 1967, Jewish settlements in the city have mushroomed while Palestinians have been forced to live in their historical neighbourhoods.
In East Jerusalem where Palestinians predominantly reside, Israel has set aside 52 per cent of land as unavailable for development and 35 per cent for Jewish settlements. The Palestinian population in the city, over 300,000, was left with only 13 per cent.
Most people lived below the poverty line in 2012.
The separation wall Israel has built has effectively cut off the Palestinian population in the city from the West Bank. More than 100,000 Palestinian residents of Jerusalem live beyond the separation wall, drastically affecting their freedom of movement and economic livelihood.
Most Palestinians refuse to seek citizenship as they see such a move legitimising Israel’s occupation and annexation of the city.
The situation in the West Bank is worse. Over the last five decades, Israeli settlements have become an industry in themselves, while the separation wall and the growing number of security checkpoints have capsuled Palestinian towns and villages.
Problem of status Quo:-
Israel has multiplied the exploitation of the occupied territories, while there was practically no improvement in the peace process towards the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, leaving thepalestinians to look for alternatives to get out of the status quo.
Outcomes were through uprisings:-
The Israeli government says there won’t be peace as long as violence continues. But from the Palestinian perspective, whatever concessions they have got from Israel, came only through uprisings. It was after the first intifada that Israel agreed to allow at least limited autonomy in the Palestinian territories.
History tells Palestinians that unless they rise against the occupation, the status quo won’t be ruptured. And for years, they are being stifled by the cruelty of the status quo.
Palestinian frustration is growing under the weight of a half-century of occupation and the paralysis of the peace process.
GS PAPER 3
[1]. Plan to scrap Income tax get high level hearing
Context:-
The proposal from a Pune-based tax research outfit, Arthakranti, advocates replacing the present tax system with a single 2 per cent levy per receipt in bank accounts and recommends that just import duties be retained from the present system.
Whats Different?
Arthakranti’s proposal envisages a system that does not tax consumption or income, as is the case now, but the “velocity of money”.
Benefits:-
The “innovative” proposal was aimed at reducing corruption and eliminating the cost of compliance for taxpayers
The outfit has estimated that the levy it is proposing can be collected through the banking channel rather than the tax collection authorities. Without leading to a loss of revenue, it will plug tax evasion and avoidance. Arthakranti’s calculations show that the 2 per cent tax will yield Rs. 40,00,000 crore.
The other view:-
The claim was contested by the eminent economist and former secretary-general of the FICCI, Rajiv Kumar, who said that at 2 per cent, the proposed new tax will yield Rs.14,00,000 crore. In 2014-15, the Centre’s total tax revenue (revised estimates) were Rs. 9,084,63 crore
[2]. With Zika, India firms scales up trial for GM mosquitoes
Context:-
A Maharashtra company is getting ready to scale up trials to find out whether genetically engineered mosquitoes can be a useful tool to check the growth of the insect.
Who is doing it?
Gangabishan Bhikulal Investment and Trading Ltd. (GBIT), a sister company of the Maharashtra Hybrid Company (Mahyco) that first brought Bt cotton to India, has been breeding male mosquitoes.
How do they work?
These mosquitoes contain genes which when passed on to its progeny render them unable to mature unless they have access to tetracycline, a compound that is not naturally available in the environment.
The idea is that once enough of these laboratory-bred mosquitoes mate with the disease-carrying females in an open environment, they would reduce the region’s mosquito population.
Elsewhere:-
It is being tested in Malaysia and Brazil, which has seen the highest number of Zika cases.
The strain of mosquito, called OX513A, is introduced into local sites.
According to GBIT scientists, international evidence so far shows the strain can reduce the number of mosquitoes in a place by 90 per cent in three or six months.
Key issue:-
The key element being investigated is whether female mosquitoes do indeed choose to mate with the genetically altered males over normal ones.
Such tests would progress quickly as the life span of the Aedes aegypti mosquito was 15 days and the company expected the government’s permission to start larger trials later this year.
Safety guidelines:-
The company said it was following guidelines specified by the Bio-safety Unit of the Department of Biotechnology.
This is a first of its kind experiment, and there are WHO [World Health Organisation] guidelines that have been adapted by India. There will be some similarities to how GM crops are evaluated.
Other options:-
Last week, Bharat Biotech, a Hyderabad-based vaccine maker, said it had two promising vaccine candidates to contain Zika, but would require a vigorous push by the Indian government.
[3]. The invisible drought
Context:-
The author says that the existing drought conditions in India are not given the due attention and relief measures are not undertaken with vigour.
Response of the state:-
The response of the state administration to looming drought is disgracefully dismal and listless, lacking entirely in both urgency and compassion.
People showed empty job cards; public works under the MGNREGA, the most effective instrument to prevent distress migration, were nowhere to be found.
Wages from earlier work had not been paid for over a year.
Even more gravely, neither the Central nor the state government is serious about rolling out the National Food Security Act that should lawfully have commenced a year and a quarter ago. It would have ensured the availability of half of each household’s monthly cereal requirements almost for free for more than 80 per cent of households.
ICDS centres were in a shambles, otherwise they could have been upgraded to also supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought.
No arrangements for augmenting drinking-water supply, including ensuring that Dalit and Muslim hamlets had functioning tubewells, or for transporting water where necessary.
No attempt to create fodder banks and cattle camps were found.
All of these are fundamental elements of sound district administration which used to exist but no longer.
Similar to British Era:-
Even British colonialists developed elaborate protocols for such times codified in famine codes.
Their colonial codes demonstrated how they did attempt to save lives but at minimal cost to the exchequer, disrespectful of human dignity and the equal worth of subjects.
However, in contemporary neo-liberal times, attempts to avoid “burdens” of high public spending on people coping with acute drought and hunger have revived. There seems even less preoccupation with saving lives of dispensable, invisible rural poor populations.
[4]. A Start-up Warning
Context:-
As part of the Start up India action plan, it intends to create a policy and framework for setting up incubators across the country in PPP mode.
The plan envisages setting up 35 new incubators in existing institutions, where 40 per cent of funding shall come from the Centre.
Not a prudent step:-
Research by the Kauffman Foundation demonstrates that the incubation centre strategy is ineffective at promoting entrepreneurial activity.
Strategies anchored in incubators fail to foster entrepreneurship because the tactics are not suited to the experiential and collaborative process that characterises entrepreneurship.
What are incubators?
Incubators are set up to provide start-ups with office space and basic services, which will free up funds and allow them to focus on core business functions.
Not Effective:-
Office space and overheads, however, are hardly effective or vital, and research shows that this support will not necessarily lead to a surge in successful entrepreneurial ventures.
Unless a start-up requires capital-intensive equipment, the incubator does not help it significantly, and may only serve to harbour businesses that would otherwise not survive.
Some incubators purport to go beyond office space and provide more diverse support services, such as accounting and bookkeeping, legal and management advice, and intellectual property assistance. Research, however, provides no evidence to suggest incubator firms perform better than non-incubator firms.
Long term emphasis:-
Instead of focusing on incubators, there must be a long-term emphasis on entrepreneurs as individuals who learn by doing and interacting with others.
Improving connections among entrepreneurs:-
States seeking to promote entrepreneurship must create communities characterised by dense connections among entrepreneurs and organisations that support them.
Research indicates local connections are far more important to the success of entrepreneurs than national or global contacts because entrepreneurs in the same business environment are the best sources of specific information and knowledge for those starting new businesses.
Continual learning:-
Also because entrepreneurs need to interact and learnfrequently and on an ad-hoc basis to meet emerging challenges.
While books and courses may inform continuous learning, there is no substitute for advice from local business owners as entrepreneurs navigate the complicated decisions they face at each stage.
Other entrepreneurs can offer the most effective advice specific to the new business’s situation and locality.
Connections facilitated by state:-
These connections, however, are not easy to make. It is often difficult to find other entrepreneurs or meet investors; and investors have trouble identifying local entrepreneurs.
State governments can facilitate networking between entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship support organisations by bringing them together in an environment that catalyses learning and the formation of relationships, and offers opportunities to discuss challenges candidly and receive feedback and advice. Events that bring entrepreneurs together to learn and connect create vibrant entrepreneurship ecosystems and with minimal investment.
Other steps:-
Simplifying tax:-
Among other steps that the government needs to take to make the Start-Up India initiative successful, is simplifying taxation for start-ups after their three-year holiday.
Taxes matter, but what entrepreneurs are most concerned about is tax complexity. Simplifying tax codes and payment systems so they are easier to understand will relieve what many entrepreneurs feel is a burden on them.
Addressing Land use concerns:-
Also, land-use and zoning regulations are consistently flagged as significant concerns of entrepreneurs. Surveys consistently find that start-ups identify rules relating to zoning and land-use as the ones that create the greatest difficulty for them.
This concern is likely to be significant because about half of all entrepreneurs start their firms within their own homes, while only 40 per cent rent or lease space.
One immediate action states can take is to establish transparent criteria for zoning approvals and institute quick and transparent decision-making processes by local bodies.
Both are crucial to start-ups, especially those in the earliest stages.
Cumbersome and long decision-making processes are detrimental to entrepreneurs who have business ideas, operating cash, and customers, but must wait months to find out where they can locate their businesses.
[5]. Picture This
Context:-
According to the December round of the Inflation Expectations Survey of Households, “the proportion of respondents expecting price rise by ‘more than current rate’ for prices in general as well as prices in all product groups (except cost of services) have decreased marginally as compared with previous round of survey .
However, proportion of respondents expecting price rise by ‘similar to current rate’ for prices in general as well as prices in all product groups has increased as compared with previous round of
Guides RBI’s interest rates:-
Though not the sole or overriding variable on which the RBI bases its decision, households’ inflation expectations provide useful directional information on near-term inflationary pressures.
What does this imply?
Higher inflation expectations affect people’s behaviour accordingly and, in general, lead to central bankers raising interest rates. But higher rates are not the ideal prescription for India as it is trying to ramp up investment.
Investment scenario in India:-
In fact, while the government has been trying to launch one scheme after another to incentivise investment and business activity, the data throws up a rather worrying picture.
According to Care Ratings, in the first eight months of the current financial year, the value of new investments announced fell by a massive 32 per cent. “This decline was witnessed across both the government and private sector.”
The reduced investments have come after a 125 basis point rate cut in 2015.
The feeble transmission (just about 50 per cent) of rate cuts further shows that interest rates are not the only variable holding back growth recovery in India. However, under the circumstances, rising interest rates are a sure-shot recipe for disaster.
Conclusion:-
“inflation is inertial”. That essentially means active steps need to be taken to bring it down because it is unlikely to come down on its own.
Most important of all is the budget as well as the implementation of the Pay Commission recommendation.
Two aspects are critical in this context. One, if the government introduces the pay commission award, then it must offset it by reducing expenditure somewhere else.
Two, the budget must introduce the structural reforms that propel growth.
By: ForumIAS Editorial Team
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