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Distribution: weekly

  • Reshaping the gig economy

    3 min

    The shockwave that pandemic sent through the economy has been reshaping the global job market. Gig economy would have to accommodate the new entrants. This article underlines the changes in the gig economy after the pandemic. Four areas that need attention are also discussed here.

    What constitutes gig economy?

    • The word “gig” includes in its current parlance all freelancers, disconnected from the workplace.
    • Example: drivers of Uber, delivery boys of Zomato, plumbers and electricians of Urban Clap.
    • The gig economy is not confined to low-skilled jobs. Skilled professionals are also part of it.

    How pandemic is reshaping the gig economy

    • Aviation, hospitality, automobile entertainment and retail are some of the hardest hit sectors.
    • The classic gig anchors- Uber and AirBnB, have laid off thousands of people.
    • In contrast to this, highly skilled professionals —laid off by employers — are joining the gig bandwagon.
    • Surely, job demand will far outstrip supply, at least in the short-term.

    What does the future hold?

    • A Deloitte report from April notes that Indian organisations are considering to expand the share of gig workers.
    • Declining full-time jobs will lead to increased assignment-based hiring.
    • For instance, a graphic designer working from home could be in demand with a media house or Netflix may hire AI designer paid by an hour to personalize streaming.
    • But, what is missing in picture? The national database is missing.

    4 focus areas of gig economy

    1. National database: A missing link

    • National database of job seekers and job creators can connect firms with qualified candidates.
    • A prospective employee would need access to a job database, sorted by skill, geography, duration and emoluments.
    • Companies should be able to dip into the data pool of talent, experience, location, qualification and expectation.
    • Currently, both data sets are fragmented and stored in silos.
    • The government could play the role of a facilitator, in partnership with the private sector.

    2. Regulatory protection to gig workforce

    • The gig economy increases employee vulnerability.
    • This segment of the economy so far has been outside the ambit of regulatory labour policies.
    • Social protection like wage protection, health benefits and safety assurance should be made available to gig workers.
    • The Karnataka government has considered introducing a new labour legislation focused on the gig economy.

    3. Prepare college students for freelancing

    • Apart from regular campus placements, the placement cells need to reorient and focus on preparing students for freelancing opportunities.
    • For the educated youth, this could be the first step towards entrepreneurship.

    4. Gender equality

    • Gender is another crucial dimension of the digital labour markets.
    • The low enrolment of girls for higher education in science, technology, engineering and math would constrict their opportunity in the gig world.
    • Going ahead, this would need greater policy attention to ensure gender parity.

    Consider the question “What is the gig economy? Suggest the policy measures to make it more resilient in the present economic context disrupted by the pandemic.”

    Conclusion

    The government and the private sector would need to collaborate along with academia to build adequate safeguards in the unfolding eco-system.

  • Financial Action Task Force (FATF)

    Indian officials attended the virtual 32nd special Eurasian Group on Combating Money Laundering and Financing of Terrorism (EAG) plenary meeting, under the aegis of the FATF.

    Practice question for mains:

    Q. What is FATF? Discuss its role in combating global financial crimes and terror financing.

    What is the FATF?

    • FATF is an intergovernmental organization founded in 1989 on the initiative of the G7 to develop policies to combat money laundering.
    • The FATF Secretariat is housed at the OECD headquarters in Paris.
    • It holds three Plenary meetings in the course of each of its 12-month rotating presidencies.
    • As of 2019, FATF consisted of 37 member jurisdictions.
    • India became an Observer at FATF in 2006. Since then, it had been working towards full-fledged membership. On June 25, 2010, India was taken in as the 34th country member of FATF.

    EAG of FATF

    • The EAG is a regional body comprising nine countries: India, Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Belarus.
    • It is an associate member of the FATF.

    What is the role of FATF?

    • The rise of the global economy and international trade has given rise to financial crimes such as money laundering.
    • The FATF makes recommendations for combating financial crime, reviews members’ policies and procedures, and seeks to increase acceptance of anti-money laundering regulations across the globe.
    • Because money launderers and others alter their techniques to avoid apprehension, the FATF updates its recommendations every few years.

    What is the Black List and the Grey List?

    • Black List: The blacklist, now called the “Call for action” was the common shorthand description for the FATF list of “Non-Cooperative Countries or Territories” (NCCTs).
    • Grey List: Countries that are considered safe haven for supporting terror funding and money laundering are put in the FATF grey list. This inclusion serves as a warning to the country that it may enter the blacklist.

    Consequences of being in the FATF grey list:

    • Economic sanctions from IMF, World Bank, ADB
    • Problem in getting loans from IMF, World Bank, ADB and other countries
    • Reduction in international trade
    • International boycott

    Pakistan and FATF

    • Pakistan, which continues to remain on the “grey list” of FATF, had earlier been given the deadline till the June to ensure compliance with the 27-point action plan against terror funding networks.
    • It has been under the FATF’s scanner since June 2018, when it was put on the Grey List for terror financing and money laundering risks.
    • FATF and its partners such as the Asia Pacific Group (APG) are reviewing Pakistan’s processes, systems, and weaknesses on the basis of a standard matrix for anti-money laundering (AML) and combating the financing of terrorism (CFT) regime.

  • Species in news: Horseshoe Crab

    Horseshoe crabs face an uncertain future in Odisha, their largest habitat in India, even as the world gets ready to celebrate the first-ever ‘International Horseshoe Crab Day’ on June 20, 2020.

    Try this question from CSP 2012:

    Q. Which one of the following groups of animals belongs to the category of endangered species?

    (a) Great Indian Bustard, Musk Deer, Red Panda and Asiatic Wild Ass

    (b) Kashmir Stag, Cheetal, Blue Bull and Great Indian Bustard

    (c) Snow Leopard, Swamp Deer, Rhesus Monkey and Saras (Crane)

    (d) Lion-tailed Macaque, Blue Bull, Hanuman Langur and Cheetal

    Horseshoe Crabs

    IUCN status: (Data insufficient for the Indian variant)

    • Horseshoe crabs are marine and brackish water arthropods. They are not true crabs, which are crustaceans.
    • The crabs are represented by four extant species in the world. Out of the four, two species are distributed along the northeast coast of India.
    • Only T gigas species of the horseshoe crab is found along Balasore coast of Odisha.
    • The crab was included on September 9, 2009, in the Schedule IV of the Wild (Life) Protection Act, 1972, under which, the catching and killing of a horseshoe crab is an offence.

    Their significance

    • The horseshoe crab is one of the oldest marine living fossils whose origin date back to 445 million years before the dinosaurs existed.
    • One of their ecological functions is to lay millions of eggs on beaches to feed shorebirds, fish and other wildlife.

    Threats

    • Poachers kill them for their meat that is popularly believed to have aphrodisiac qualities.
    • The blood of horseshoe crabs, which is blue in colour, is used for detection of bacterial endotoxins in medical applications.

  • We must aspire for nurturing economy

    The sight of thousands of migrant workers walking thousands of kms back home after lockdown has been the watershed moment for the collective conscience of our country. This made us think about the present economic model and policies we have been adopting. So, the answer to the problems created by the present model lies in building “nurturing economy”. What is nurturing economy? Read to know…

    Broadly, we can summarise the impact of pandemic as-

    • Unemployment is shooting up.
    • Supply chains of food and essentials have been disrupted.
    • Dark clouds of economic recession are on the horizon.

    Invisible cost of pandemic

    • The visible cost of the pandemic in terms of the lives lost are being counted by the day.
    • But the invisible cost of hunger and impoverishment of the most vulnerable sections is yet to be effectively addressed.
    • Vulnerable section- our workers, the poor and the migrants, particularly women, are at receiving end of these invisible cost.

    Health of economy before pandemic

    • The pandemic came at one of the worst possible times.
    • India’s economy has been in deep trouble since 2016.
    • In 2019-20, even before the pandemic happened, our GDP growth had dropped to 4.2 per cent, lowest growth seen in the last 11 years.
    • Even the oil prices dropped at their historic low.
    • Non-food bank credit is a good indicator of overall economic robustness.
    • By December 2019, the growth of non-food bank credit had dropped to below 7 per cent. ( lowest in the last 50 years.)

    What happened to economy after the pandemic?

    • After the pandemic arrived, matters, of course, got worse.
    • In March, $16 billion of foreign capital exited the country, which is an all-time record for India.
    • India’s unemployment rate shot up to a record high of 23.8 per cent in April.
    • In the same month, Indian exports dropped by 60 per cent.
    • This was one of the biggest drops seen in any emerging market economy in the world.
    • There is a genuine risk that this year our growth will drop to an all-time low, beating the record plunge of 1979-80.

    So, the pandemic has forced us to think about the building a nurturing economy, one in which Gandhiji’s Talisman is followed in word and spirit, one in which John Rawls ideas are implemented.

    So, What building a nurturing economy involves?

    • Our economic and political policies must not be ends in themselves.
    • Instead, these policies should involve instruments for building a society that is secular, inclusive and nurturing.
    • It should be a society where people of all religions, caste, race and gender feel wanted and at home.
    • Environment sustainability and focus on green economy is also part of nurturing economy.
    • We should strive to create a society that respects knowledge, science and technology, and culture.

    Threefold crisis emerging out of our exploitative behaviours

    • The outcome of our exploitative behaviour is a threefold crisis which describes India’s current predicament.
    • 1) Rising poverty and unemployment despite abundance.
    • 2) Rising intolerance and violence.
    • 3) Environmental catastrophe.

    Consider the question “Pandemic and the predicament of migrant labours has highlighted the lack of inclusive growth in our economy. And we must look for the solution to such shortcomings in our approach. In light of this, suggest the changes that our economy must embrace to ensure inclusive growth.”

    Conclusion

    Our ambition should not be to make India the richest nation in the world. India should be an example of an equitable society, where people are not abandoned without income and work, where no one feels the insecurity of being a minority, and of being discriminated against.

  • India gets re-elected as Non-permanent Member of UNSC

    India gets re-elected as Non-permanent Members of UNSC with 184 out of the 192 valid votes polled in its favour.

    Practice question for mains:

    Q. United Nations is in need of structural reforms suiting to the needs of present times. Discuss.

    What are ‘non-permanent seats’ at the UNSC?

    • The UNSC is composed of 15 members: five permanent members — China, France, Russian Federation, the US, and the UK — and 10 non-permanent members who are elected by the General Assembly.
    • The non-permanent members are elected for two-year terms — so every year, the General Assembly elects five non-permanent members out of the total 10.
    • Even if a country is a “clean slate” candidate and has been endorsed by its group, it still needs to secure the votes of two-thirds of the members present and voting at the General Assembly session — which is a minimum of 129 votes, if all 193 member states participate.

    Sharing of seats

    • These 10 seats are distributed among the regions of the world: five seats for African and Asian countries; one for Eastern European countries; two for Latin American and Caribbean countries; and two for Western European and Other Countries.
    • Of the five seats for Africa and Asia, three are for Africa and two for Asia.
    • Also, there is an informal understanding between the two groups to reserve one seat for an Arab country.
    • The Africa and Asia Pacific group takes turns every two years to put up an Arab candidate.
    • Elections for terms beginning in even-numbered years select two African members, and one each within Eastern Europe, the Asia Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean.
    • Terms beginning in odd-numbered years consist of two West European and Other members, and one each from the Asia Pacific, Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean.

    Current members as on today

    • The current non-permanent members of the Security Council are Belgium, Dominican Republic, Germany, Indonesia, and South Africa, all of whose terms end this year; and Estonia, Niger, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Tunisia, and Vietnam, whose terms end in 2021.
    • India begins its term at the beginning of 2021 and will hold the position until the end of 2022.

    Has India been in the UNSC earlier?

    • India’s term on the 15-member Council will be it’s eighth.
    • India has earlier been a non-permanent member of the Security Council in 1950-51, 1967-68, 1972-73, 1977-78, 1984-85, 1991-92 and 2011-12.
    • For the 2011-12 terms, India won 187 of 190 votes after Kazakhstan stood down from its candidacy.
    • Unlike Africa, which has formalized a system of rotation of its three seats, the Asia Pacific grouping has often seen contests for seats. In 2018, there was a contest between the Maldives and Indonesia.
    • On the occasions when there is a contest, the elections for non-permanent seats can go on for several rounds.
    • Back in 1975, there was a contest between India and Pakistan, which went into eight rounds, with Pakistan finally winning the seat. And in 1996, India lost a contest to Japan.

    Significance

    • Terming India’s winning of a non-permanent seat of the UN Security Council one of its best performances” ever, the Union government said.
    • The strong support by almost the entire U.N. membership demonstrates the goodwill that India enjoys in the U.N. and the confidence that the international community has reposed in India.
    • India’s EAM gave India’s overall objective during its forthcoming UNSC tenure as an acronym ‘NORMS’ — New Orientation for a Reformed Multilateral System.
    • NORMS includes the push for expanding the UNSC permanent membership.

    Back2Basics: United Nations Security Council

    • The UNSC is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations and is charged with the maintenance of international peace and security.
    • Its powers include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, the establishment of international sanctions, and the authorization of military action through Security Council resolutions.
    • It is the only UN body with the authority to issue binding resolutions to member states.
    • The Security Council consists of fifteen members. Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, and the United States—serve as the body’s five permanent members.
    • These permanent members can veto any substantive Security Council resolution, including those on the admission of new member states or candidates for Secretary-General.
    • The Security Council also has 10 non-permanent members, elected on a regional basis to serve two-year terms. The body’s presidency rotates monthly among its members.

  • What is Civil Services Board?

    Punjab government notifying Civil Services Board providing for a fixed tenure of IAS officers has left its leaders in the state upset.

    Practice questions for mains:

    Q. Discuss how fixed tenure for Civil Servants helps provide better administration.

    What is the Civil Services Board (CSB)?

    • Civil Services Board is responsible for the entry-level recruitment and subsequent job promotions below the rank of Joint Secretary.
    • As per a state government notification dated June 2, CSB will be headed by Chief Secretary, with Personnel Secretary, and either Financial Commissioner (Revenue) or Home Secretary (who so ever is senior in the pecking order) as its members.
    • The board provides for the state to follow the Centre’s guidelines on giving a fixed tenure of at least two years for cadre officers.
    • They cannot be transferred before that and if anyone recommends their transfer then the board will examine and affect it.
    • The final authority is the Chief Minister.

    Why had the previous government in the state declined to follow the Centre’s guidelines?

    • The previous government had refused to follow the guidelines on the argument that appointment and transfer of IAS officers are a prerogative of the state.
    • If their term is fixed, it had argued, it will not only create functional and administrative problems but also overstep the authority and jurisdiction of the state government.

    Why are the leaders upset?

    • The political leadership of the ruling party in the state has usually always had a say in postings and transfers of district officials in the state.
    • The opposition has been known to lend supremacy to its leadership over bureaucrats in the state.
    • But ever since the ruling government has taken over, the grouse of its leaders has been that they do not get due respect in their own regime.
    • This has led to several confrontations in the past.
    • With the fixed tenure rule and Chief Secretary’s board having all power to examine a recommendation for a transfer, the leaders feel their influence has been reduced to nought and all power handed to the CS.

    How do they see the board to be lending officer’s supremacy over them?

    • If any officer is to be transferred before completing his minimum tenure, the board will record the reasons for the transfer.
    • It will seek views from the concerned officer and then give a judgement on whether the tenure of the officer is to be ended mid-way.
    • The final authority will be the CM.

    What is the government’s argument in its favour?

    • It says if the officials have a fixed tenure they will be able to provide better administration.
    • They will also feel safe and try to stick to the rules instead of pleasing political bosses.
    • It says every official requires 3-6 months to get into the groove at his new place of posting.
    • If he stays there for two years, it would mean better delivery and stable tenure to people.

    What do the officials say?

    • They feel the rules will not be followed in letter and spirit unless a few officers go to the courts and ensure that the guidelines are followed.
    • They say that neighbouring Haryana had the board in place but the guidelines were not followed.

  • Rule of Law Index and India

    The Supreme Court has asked the government to treat a writ petition for setting up expert panels to boost India’s prospects in the Rule of Law Index.

    Note the various factors/sub-indices on which the index is measured. There can be a direct question on these in line with:

    Q. Which one of the following is not a sub-index of the World Bank’s ‘Ease of Doing Business Index’? CSP 2019

    (a) Maintenance of law and order

    (b) Paying taxes

    (c) Registering property

    (d) Dealing with construction permits

    Why in news again?

    • The cause of action for the petition accrued when the World Justice Project ranked India in the 69th position in its Rule of Law Index.
    • India has never been ranked even among top 50 in the Index, but successive governments did nothing to improve the international ranking of India, said the petition.
    • Poor rule of law has a devastating effect on the right to life, liberty, economic justice, fraternity, individual dignity and national integration.

    What is the Rule of Law Index?

    • The Rule of Law Index is a quantitative assessment tool by the World Justice Project (WJP) designed to offer a detailed and comprehensive picture of the extent to which countries adhere to the rule of law in practice.
    • It measures countries’ rule of law performance across eight factors:

    (1) Constraints on Government Powers, (2) Absence of Corruption, (3) Open Government, (4) Fundamental Rights, (5) Order and Security, (6) Regulatory Enforcement, (7) Civil Justice, and (8) Criminal Justice

    WJP definition of Rule of Law

    The World Justice Project defines the rule of law system as one in which the following four universal principles are upheld:

    • The government and its officials and agents are accountable under the law.
    • The laws are clear, publicized, stable and fair, and protect fundamental rights, including the security of persons and property.
    • The process by which the laws are enacted, administered, and enforced is accessible, efficient, and fair.
    • Justice is delivered by competent, ethical, and independent representatives and neutrals who are of sufficient number, have adequate resources and reflect the makeup of the communities they serve.

  • How ‘Vaccine Nationalism’ could block vulnerable populations’ access to COVID-19 vaccines

    Hundreds of COVID-19 vaccine candidates are currently being developed. Many countries are securing priority access to doses of COVID-19 vaccine.

    Practice question for Mains:

    Q. What is Vaccine Nationalism? Discuss various ethical issues involved and its impact on vulnerable populations across the globe.

    Vaccine nationalism during COVID-19

    • Vaccine nationalism occurs when a country manages to secure doses of vaccine for its own citizens or residents before they are made available in other countries.
    • This is done through pre-purchase agreements between a government and a vaccine manufacturer.
    • Vaccine nationalism is harmful to equitable access to vaccines.

    US begins to secure

    • In India, the privately held Serum Institute is developing one of the leading COVID-19 vaccine candidates.
    • The Serum Institute signalled that, if the development of the vaccine succeeds, most of the initial batches of the vaccine will be distributed within India.
    • At the same time, India, alongside the US and Russia, chose not to join the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator.
    • This was a WHO moves to promote collaboration among countries in the development and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments.

    Vaccine nationalism is not new

    • During the early stages of the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic, some of the wealthiest countries entered into pre-purchase agreements with several pharmaceutical companies working on H1N1 vaccines.
    • At that time, it was estimated that, in the best-case scenario, the maximum number of vaccine doses that could be produced globally was two billion.
    • The US alone negotiated and obtained the right to buy 600,000 doses. All the countries that negotiated pre-purchase orders were developed economies.
    • Only when the 2009 pandemic began to unwind and demand for a vaccine dropped did developed countries offer to donate vaccine doses to poorer economies.

    Issues with such nationalism

    • The most immediate effect of vaccine nationalism is that it further disadvantages countries with fewer resources and bargaining power.
    • It deprives populations in the Global South from timely access to vital public health goods.
    • Taken to its extreme, it allocates vaccines to moderately at-risk populations in wealthy countries over populations at higher risk in developing economies.
    • Vaccine nationalism also runs against the fundamental principles of vaccine development and global public health.

    Why it is unethical?

    • Most vaccine development projects involve several parties from multiple countries.
    • With modern vaccines, there are very few instances in which a single country can claim to be the sole developer of a vaccine.
    • And even if that were possible, global public health is borderless. As COVID-19 is illustrating, viruses can travel the globe.

    Its impacts

    • If COVID-19 vaccines are not made available affordably to those who need them, the consequences will likely be disproportionately severe for poorer or otherwise vulnerable and marginalised populations.
    • Without broad access to a vaccine, these populations will likely continue to suffer more than others, leading to unnecessary disease burden, continued economic problems and potential loss of life.

    Conclusion

    • Nationalism is at odds with global public health principles. Yet, there are no provisions in international laws that prevent pre-purchase agreements like the ones described above.
    • There is nothing inherently wrong with pre-purchase agreements of pharmaceutical products.
    • Vaccines typically do not generate as much in sales as other medical products.
    • If used correctly, pre-purchase agreements can even be an incentive for companies to manufacture vaccines that otherwise would not be commercialized.

    Way forward

    • Equity entails both, affordability of vaccines and access opportunities for populations across the world, irrespective of geography and geopolitics.
    • Contracts should not trump equitable access to global public health goods.
    • Developed countries should pledge to refrain from reserving vaccines for their populations during public health crises.
    • The WHO’s Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator is a starting point for countries to test collaborative approaches during the current pandemic.
    • International institutions — including the WHO — should coordinate negotiations ahead of the next pandemic to produce a framework for equitable access to vaccines during public health crises.

  • “Assessment of Climate Change over the Indian Region” Report

    The Union Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) has released the “Assessment of Climate Change over the Indian Region” Report.

    This newscard discusses a very important concept: the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP). Note its definition.  It can be directly asked as a statement based on prelims MCQ.

    Highlights of the report

    • Average surface air temperatures over India could rise by up to 4.4 degrees Celsius by the end of the century as compared to the period between 1976 and 2005, according to the MoES report.
    • The rise in temperatures will be even more pronounced in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan region where the average could reach 5.2°C.
    • The region is already highly vulnerable to climate-related variability in temperatures, rainfall and snowfall.
    • By 2100, the frequency of warm days and warm nights might also increase by 55 per cent and 70 per cent respectively, as compared to the period 1976-2005 under the RCP 8.5 scenario.
    • The incidences of heat waves over the country could also increase by three to four times. Their duration of occurrence might also increase which was already witnessed by the country in 2019.

    A 100-year record

    • Between 1900 and 2018, the average temperatures of India rose by 0.7°C.
    • This rise in temperatures has been largely attributed to global warming due to GHG emissions and land use and land cover changes.
    • But it has also been slightly reduced by the rising aerosol emissions in the atmosphere that have an overall cooling characteristic.
    • The report predicts that monsoon rainfall could change by an average of 14 per cent by 2100 that could go as high as 22.5 per cent.
    • The report does not mention if this change will be an increase or a decrease but still represents variability.
    • It further says that the overall rainfall during the monsoon season has decreased by six per cent between 1950 and 2015.

    Data on dry spells

    • The assessment also says that in the past few decades, there has been an increased frequency of dry spells during the monsoon season that has increased by 27 per cent between 1981-2011, as compared to 1951-1980.
    • The intensity of wet spells has also increased over the country, with central India receiving 75 per cent more extreme rainfall events between 1950 and 2015. This means that it either rains too little or too much.
    • One of the primary examples of this was the monsoon seasons of 2018 and 2019 where dry spells were broken by extremely heavy rainfall spells, creating a flood and drought cycle in many regions in India.

    What is Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP)?

    • A Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) is a greenhouse gas concentration (not emissions) trajectory adopted by the IPCC.
    • It is defined as a radiative force in watt per square metre due to the rising greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the atmosphere.
    • Four pathways were used for climate modelling and research for the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) in 2014.
    • The pathways describe different climate futures, all of which are considered possible depending on the volume of greenhouse gases (GHG) emitted in the years to come.
    • The RCPs – originally RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6, and RCP8.5 – are labelled after a possible range of radiative forcing values in the year 2100 (2.6, 4.5, 6, and 8.5 W/m2, respectively).
    • Since AR5 the original pathways are being considered together with Shared Socioeconomic Pathways: as are new RCPs such as RCP1.9, RCP3.4 and RCP7.

  • COVID Isolation Coaches and their deployment

    The Union govt. has declared that 500 COVID isolation coaches would be deployed in Delhi. So far, over 5,000 coaches have been converted into COVID isolation coaches across India.

    Practice question for mains:

    Q. Health infrastructure in India is hardly capable of handling any  pandemic. Critically comment.

    What are these COVID Isolation Coaches?

    • In March, Railways was sounded out by the PMO and the government’s multi-ministerial outbreak-containment apparatus that train coaches could also be used as a last resort to keep isolated patients.
    • So far, 5,321 non-AC sleeper class coaches of ICF variety (older design) have been converted by the 16 zonal railways through their workshops spread across India.
    • These are developed as COVID Care Level 1 centres—as per the Health Ministry classification of COVID facilities—where suspected cases or those with mild symptoms are to be kept.
    • Suspected and confirmed cases will be kept in separate coaches.

    How were these coaches selected?

    • Early into the pandemic, health experts were of the view that air-conditioned environments might aid the spread of the virus.
    • Well-ventilated, airy environments were thought to be safer. India’s decision to use non-AC coaches for isolation has to be viewed in that context.
    • As per targets given to the 16 zonal railways, 5,000 older coaches, surplus to Railways’ operational needs, were marked for conversion.

    What were the challenges faced?

    • The summer heat in the coach was always a matter of discussion.
    • Several ideas were discussed, including erecting shamianas over the coaches or painting the roof with “solar reflective” paints.
    • Another question was how to dispose of toilet waste if the coaches were in remote areas and whether such waste was potentially infectious.
    • It was agreed that since chlorine tablets are placed in the chambers of the bio toilets, the risk was neutralised.
    • In any case, bio-enzymes in the toilet tanks take care of human waste.
    • Another question was the placement. The batteries of the coaches need to be charged and the water needs to be replenished. Not all areas in India might have such facilities.
    • The idea was that being mobile units, they could be dispatched to any part of the country to pick up patients and come back to their bases.

    Deployment of such train

    • Each isolation train will be tied to the nearest hospital.
    • The Centre will not deploy these coaches at will; states will have to request for them.
    • At least 10 coaches, or one train, will have to be deployed in one place. States can request for more.
    • Besides the 500 being deployed in Delhi, Telangana has requested for 60 coaches in three locations, and UP has requested in 24 locations.
    • Many states are said to be informally enquiring about the coaches in zones.