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  • Festivals, Dances, Theatre, Literature, Art in News

    Festival in news: Nuakhai Juhar

    Prelims Only | History | Mains Paper 1: Arts & Culture

    The PM has greeted the people on the auspicious occasion of Nuakhai Juhar.

    Try this PYQ:

    Q.Consider the following pairs:

    Tradition State
    1. Chapchar Kut festival : Mizoram
    2. Khongjom Parba ballad : Manipur
    3. Thang-Ta dance : Sikkim

    Which of the pairs given above is/are correct? (CSP 2018)

    a) 1 only

    b) 1 and 2

    c) 3 only

    d) 2 and 3

    Nuakhai Juhar

    • Nuakhai or Nuakhai is an agricultural festival mainly observed by people of Western Odisha and Southern Chhattisgarh.
    • It is celebrated at the time when the newly grown Kharif crop (autumn crop) of rice started ripening.
    • According to the calendar it is observed on Panchami tithi (the fifth day) of the lunar fortnight of the month of Bhadrapada or Bhadraba (August–September), the day after the Ganesh Chaturthi festival.
    • This is the most important social festival of Western Odisha and adjoining areas of Simdega in Jharkhand, where Odia culture is much predominant.

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  • Coronavirus – Economic Issues

    Differential impact of COVID and the lockdown

    | Economics | Mains Paper 3: Inclusive Growth & Issues

    Though pandemic has been called as the great leveller, closer look at the impact of Covid on the marginalised section indicate otherwise. This article examines the impact of pandemic with respect to responsible factors.

    The marginalised at risk

    • Preliminary data and early indirect evidence from several parts of the world indicate that the incidence of the disease is not class-neutral.
    • Poorer and economically vulnerable populations are more likely to contract the virus as well as to die from it.
    • Economic consequences of the current pandemic are likely to be most concentrated among the low wage earners.
    • Disaggregated data on COVID-19 incidence and mortality are not available for India.
    • Thus, we cannot comment on whether certain caste groups are more vulnerable to the virus than others.

    Cast factor: Let’s look into CMIE survey

    • India’s lockdown was among the most stringent.
    • The first month of the severe lockdown, April 2020, witnessed a sharp rise in unemployment.
    • Let’s examine shifts in employment and unemployment rates using data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE)’s Consumer Pyramids Household Survey (CPHS) database.
    • That the proportion of employed upper castes dropped from 39% to 32% between December 2019 and April 2020, a fall of seven percentage points.
    • The corresponding fall for Scheduled Castes (SCs) was from 44% to 24%, i.e. a fall of 20 percentage points.
    • Other Backward Classes and Scheduled Tribes (STs) the fall was from 42% to 34%, 40% to 26% and 48% to 33%.
    • Thus, the fall in employment for SCs and STs was far greater in magnitude than that for upper castes.

    Education factor

    • The global evidence suggests that job losses associated with COVID-19 are much more concentrated among individuals with low levels of education.
    • Those with more than 12 years of education, were much less likely to be unemployed in April 2020 than those with less than 12 years of education.
    •  Data from the India Human Development Survey for 2011-12 (IHDS-II) show that 51% of SC households have adult women who have zero years of education, i.e. are illiterate, and 27% have an illiterate adult male member.
    •  Thus, in the face of current school closures, parents of SC children would be much less equipped to assist their children with any form of home learning.

    Access to technology and other factors

    • The proportion of households with access to the Internet is 20% and 10% for UC and SC households, respectively.
    •  Only 49% of SCs have bank savings, as compared to 62% of Upper Caste households.
    • Differential access to information technology, as well as disparities in the ability to invest in technology, will be critical in shaping access to online education.

    Consider the question “Examine the impact of Covid on the vulnerable section of society. Suggest the measures to mitigate the impact.”

    Conclusion

    Early impacts of the pandemic-induced lockdown indicate that the resultant economic distress is exacerbating pre-existing structures of disadvantage based on social identity, and investments in education and health.

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  • Mother and Child Health – Immunization Program, BPBB, PMJSY, PMMSY, etc.

    Increasing age of marriage will be exercise of carceral power by state

    op-ed snap | | Mains Paper 2: Laws, Institutions & Bodies Constituted For The Vulnerable Sections

    The article examines the issue of the age of marriage of girls and its relation with their education level and economic status.

    Trends in early marriage

    • The National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) data 2015-16 points to certain trends in early marriages:
    • That rural women are likely to marry earlier than their urban counterparts.
    • The higher up a woman is on the wealth quintile, the later she marries.
    • Most importantly, it establishes a direct causal link between education levels and delayed age of marriage.
    • Women with 12 years or more of schooling are most likely to marry later.
    • Only 8 per cent rural girls who drop out in the age group 6 to 17 years cite marriage as the reason.

    Impact on STs and SCs

    • According to the wealth quintile data, the poorest households are concentrated in rural India.
    • The lowest quintile, which is most likely to marry off their girls early out of socio-economic necessities, have 45 per cent of the Scheduled Tribe (ST) and 25.9 per cent Scheduled castes.
    • The NFHS-4 data on women aged 15-49 by number of years of schooling completed shows that 42 per cent ST women and 33 per cent SC women have received no schooling.

    Issues

    • Marriages in India are governed by various personal laws which set varying minimum ages for girls as also the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act (PCMA), 2006, where it is 18 years for girls and 21 for boys.
    • This is compounded by The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012, that increased the age of consent, from 16 years to 18 years.
    • Several studies have shown how this has criminalised self-arranged adolescent marriages as parents often misuse it to punish couples marrying without their approval, especially in cases of inter-caste marriages.

    Way forward

    • The National Human Rights Commission showed how higher education levels lead to a lower likelihood of women being married early and recommended that the Right to Education Act, 2009, be amended to make it applicable up to the age of 18 years.
    • Noting the law’s patriarchal underpinnings, the 18th Law Commission report (2008) asked for uniformity in the age of marriage at 18 years for both men and women and lowering the age of consent to 16 years. Government could act on such a recommendation.

    Consider the question “What are the advantages of increasing the minimum age of marriage for girls. Also, examine the issues with the move.

    Conclusion

    The median age at first marriage for both men and women in India has registered a significant decadal improvement with more people now marrying later than ever before. Any attempt to leapfrog through quick-fix and ill-conceived punitive measures will only considerably reverse these gains.

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  • North-East India – Security and Developmental Issues

    Naga peace process

    op-ed snap | Polity | Mains Paper 2: Federalism

    The article analyses the issue of Naga peace process and the problem of identifying the stakeholders in the process.

    Naga Polity and aspirations

    • The  Nagas family comprises over 25 tribes.
    • Each of these is a proud owner and inheritor of a distinct culture, language, tradition and geography, supporting a distinct world view.
    • However, many Nagas aspire to Naga unity, and they view those tribal loyalties as residues of a premodern past and an obstacle to Naga solidarity.
    • Naga nationalism is connected with the idea Naga homeland  that includes contiguous areas in a number of Northeastern states, and even parts of Myanmar.

    “Unique history” formulation

    • The source of the phrase can be traced back to a joint communiqué that NSCN-IM General Secretary Thuingaleng Muivah and former Home Secretary K Padmanabhaiah signed in Amsterdam on July 11, 2002.
    • Meaning of the phrase “unique history” is not self-explanatory.
    • Despite the lack of clarity, it is adopted by officials and political leaders intended to accept two things-
    • (a) the characterisations long favoured by security bureaucrats of the Naga political struggle as a separatist insurgency or a terrorist movement that makes false claims to Naga unity, are inaccurate and
    • (b) rejecting those labels [ such as separatist insurgency or terrorist movement] is a necessary condition for negotiations based on mutual respect.
    • Those are significant achievements that should not be allowed to wither away.

    Negotiating with NSCN-IM and issues with it

    • NSCN-IM had declared the Shillong Accord of 1975 a sellout, and a betrayal of the Naga cause.
    • But it emerged as a serious political force precisely because it stood for Naga unity.
    • However, it is argued that NSCN-IM’s appeal is limited to the Tangkhul tribes of Manipur only.

    Consider the question “The issues of identifying the stakeholders in the Naga peace process is at the root of the solution to the peace problem. Also, examine the other factors which make the resolution elusive. Suggest the measures to resolve the issue.”

    Conclusion

    That a more nuanced negotiating strategy is now emerging is a positive development. But the fundamental question about who all the stakeholders in the Naga conflict are, still needs a satisfactory answer, one that is based on an in-depth mapping of the conflict. Only then can we expect peaceful dialogue and patient negotiations to end the conflict and bring about a durable peace.

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  • Foreign Policy Watch: India-Pakistan

    Explained: Pakistan-Saudi Rift

    Explained | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: Bilateral, Regional and Global Groupings and agreements involving India

    The rift between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia over Jammu and Kashmir is out in the open after a delegation led by Pak Army Chief was denied a meeting with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS).

    Try this question:

    Q. Discuss the new geopolitical realignment in the Arab world and India’s role in it.

    Take a look after how the ties emerged and deteriorated:

    Saudi-Pakistan ties: A Recap

    • The relationship between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan was most prominent during the 1971 war between India and Pakistan.
    • Saudi Arabia is also reported to have transferred arms and equipment including the loan of some 75 aircraft to Pakistan.
    • After the war, Saudi Arabia consistently supported the call for the return of Pakistan’s prisoners of war and for dropping the Dacca (Dhaka) Trial against 195 of them.
    • After the war, Saudi Arabia gave loans to Pakistan enabling it to buy arms worth about $1 million by 1977, including F-16s and Harpoon missiles from the US.
    • Saudi oil and dollars have kept Pakistan’s economy on its feet after sanctions following the nuclear tests.
    • Over the last two decades, Saudi Arabia has provided oil on deferred payments to Pakistan whenever it ran into economic difficulty.
    • Saudi funding of madrasas has also led to their mushrooming, later giving rise to religious extremism.
    • In 1990, Pakistan sent its ground forces to defend Saudi Arabia against Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait.

    Alignment over Kashmir

    • The alignment over Kashmir at the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) crystallized since 1990 when the insurgency in J&K began.
    • While the OIC has issued statements over the last three decades, it became a ritual of little significance to India.
    • Last year, after India revoked Article 370 in Kashmir, Pakistan lobbied with the OIC for its condemnation of India’s move.
    • To Pakistan’s surprise, Saudi Arabia and the UAE issued statements that were nuanced rather than harshly critical of New Delhi.
    • Over the last year, Pakistan has tried to rouse the sentiments among the Islamic countries, but only a handful of them — Turkey and Malaysia — publicly criticised India.

    The Saudi perspective

    • Saudi Arabia’s change in position has been a gradual process under Crown Prince MBS.
    • As it seeks to diversify from its heavily oil-dependent economy, it sees India as a valuable partner in the region.
    • New Delhi, for its part, has wooed the Arab world over the last six years.
    • From Saudi Arabia to the UAE, it worked the diplomatic levers through high-level visits and dangled opportunities for investment and business
    • MBS, who is looking to invest in India, has taken a realistic view, along with UAE’s crown prince Mohammed bin Zayed.

    Energy connection to India

    • Saudi Arabia is India’s fourth-largest trade partner (after China, US and Japan) and a major source of energy: India imports around 18% of its crude oil requirement from the Kingdom.
    • Saudi Arabia is also a major source of LPG for India.
    • And, with India stopping oil imports from Iran due to the threat of US sanctions, Saudi Arabia is key in this respect as well.

    Saudi-Pakistan tension

    The tension between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan has been brewing for some time.

    • In 2015, Pakistan’s Parliament decided not to support the Saudi military effort to restore an internationally recognised government in Yemen.
    • Later, Pakistan’s then army chief General Raheel Sharif led the Saudi-led Islamic Military Alliance to Fight Terrorism, comprising 41 Muslim countries.
    • In February 2019, after the Pulwama terror attack, it was Saudi Arabia and the UAE that pulled their weight to get Wing Commander Abhinandan released, apart from the US.
    • The Saudi Crown Prince visited Pakistan and India at that time and made it clear that he valued economic opportunities. He did not wade into the Kashmir issue in India or the terrorism issue in Pakistan.

    Frustration over Kashmir

    A year after Article 370 was revoked, Qureshi belled the cat.

    • Pak accuses that Saudi Arabia has failed to deliver on the Kashmir and OIC had not played a leadership role in backing Pakistan against India.
    • This angered Saudi Arabia, which in November 2018 had announced a $6.2 billion loan package for Pakistan.
    • The package included $3 billion in loans and an oil credit facility amounting to $3.2 billion.
    • Riyadh demanded the return of the $3 billion loans and refused to sell oil to Islamabad on deferred payment. Pakistan immediately returned $1 billion, displaying the rift.
    • But, in the current economic situation, Pakistan is unable to pay the next tranche.
    • What has also angered Saudi Arabia is that Pakistan has been trying to pander to Turkey and Malaysia.

    The China factor

    • Pakistan and China have called themselves “all-weather allies” and “iron brothers” (during FMs meet).
    • Over the last year, Beijing has supported Pakistan on Kashmir, raising the issue at the UN Security Council thrice.
    • China has also emerged as Pakistan’s biggest benefactor through its funding of the CPEC.
    • Saudi Arabia too has invested in CPEC projects, to the tune of $10 billion, but Pakistan now looks towards Beijing for both diplomatic and economic support.

    Implications for India

    • Saudi’s silence on J&K as well as CAA-NRC has emboldened the Indian government.
    • At a time when India and China are locked in a border standoff, India has to be wary of Pakistan and China teaming up.
    • But with Saudi Arabia in its corner, for now, it may have leverage over Pakistan — Riyadh would not want a conflict and regional instability.
    • What is key to India’s calculus is that the Pakistan-China and the Pakistan-Saudi axes are not fused together at the moment: It is not a Saudi-Pakistan-China triangle.

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  • Judicial Reforms

    Mulgaonkar principles in Contempt Cases

    | Polity | Mains Paper 2: Executive & Judiciary

    In the criticism against the Supreme Court’s ruling that held advocate Prashant Bhushan guilty of contempt of court, his counsel has invoked the ‘Mulgaonkar Principles’, urging the court to show restraint.

    Try this MCQ:

    Q. The Mulgaonkar principles recently seen in news are related to:

    Diplomacy/ Economy/ Judiciary/ Environment

    The Mulgaonkar principles

    • S Mulgaonkar v Unknown (1978) is a case that led to a landmark ruling on the subject of contempt.
    • By a 2:1 majority, the court held Mulgaonkar not guilty of contempt although the same Bench had initiated the proceedings.
    • Justices P Kailasam and Krishna Iyer formed the majority going against then CJI M H Beg.
    • Justice Iyer’s counsel of caution in exercising the contempt jurisdiction came to be called the Mulgaonkar principles.

    What was the case about?

    • An article by A G Noorani in the newspaper about certain judicial decisions during the Emergency period, especially the Habeas Corpus case, had displeased then CJI Beg.
    • The Habeas Corpus case, often referred to as the “Supreme Court’s darkest hour” upheld the detention law, citing that even the right to life can be suspended during an emergency.
    • Justices A N Ray, Beg, Y V Chandrachud and P N Bhagwati formed the majority while Justice H R Khanna was the sole dissenter.

    What did the ruling say?

    • The first rule in the branch of power is a “wise economy of use by the Court of this branch of its jurisdiction”.
    • The Court will act with seriousness and severity where justice is jeopardized by a gross and/or unfounded attack on the judges, where the attack is calculated to obstruct or destroy the judicial process.
    • The court is willing to ignore, by a majestic liberalism, trifling and venial offenses-the dogs may bark, the caravan will pass.
    • The court will not be prompted to act as a result of an easy irritability.

     

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  • Wildlife Conservation Efforts

    Gorumara National Park

    Prelims Only | Enviro & Biodiversity | Mains Paper 3: Conservation, Environmental Pollution & Degradation, Eia

    A bison (Indian Gaur) was allegedly poached in Gorumara National Park.

    Try this PYQ:

    Which one of the following National Parks lies completely in the temperate alpine zone?(CSP 2019)

    (a) Manas National Park

    (b) Namdapha National Park

    (c) Neora Valley National Park

    (d) Valley of Flowers National Park

    Gorumara NP

    • It is located in the Eastern Himalayas’ submontane Terai belt.
    • This region has rolling forests and riverine grasslands, and is known as the Dooars in West Bengal.
    • The park is located on the flood plains of the Murti River and Raidak River. The major river of the park is the Jaldhaka river, a tributary of the Brahmaputra river system.
    • In this regard, Gorumara is a significant watershed area between the Ganges and Brahmaputra river systems.
    • The park is rich in large herbivores including Indian rhinoceros, gaur, Asian elephant, sloth bear, chital, and sambar deer. Small herbivores include barking deer, hog deer and wild boar.

    About Gaur

    • The Gaur called the Indian bison, is native to South and Southeast Asia and has been listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List since 1986.
    • It is the largest species among the wild cattle.
    • The domesticated form of the gaur is called gayal (Bos frontalis) or mithun.

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  • Water Management – Institutional Reforms, Conservation Efforts, etc.

    In news: Srisailam Dam

    Prelims Only | Economics | Mains Paper 3: Infrastructure: Energy, Ports, Roads, Airports, Railways Etc.

    The major fire accident at the Srisailam hydroelectric power station has resulted in heavy loss of lives.

    Try this PYQ:

    What is common to the places known as Aliyar, Isapur and Kangsabati? (CSP 2019)

    (a) Recently discovered uranium deposits

    (b) Tropical rain forests

    (c) Underground cave systems

    (d) Water reservoirs

    About Srisailam Dam

    • The Srisailam Dam is constructed across the Krishna River in Kurnool district, AP near Srisailam temple town.
    • It is the 2nd largest capacity working hydroelectric station in the country.
    • The dam was constructed in a deep gorge in the Nallamala Hills in between Kurnool and Mahabubnagar districts, 300 m (980 ft) above sea level.
    • It has a reservoir of 616 square kilometres.

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  • Mother and Child Health – Immunization Program, BPBB, PMJSY, PMMSY, etc.

    Increasing the age of marriage for girls and related issues

    op-ed snap | Governance | Mains Paper 2: Laws, Institutions & Bodies Constituted For The Vulnerable Sections,Poverty & Hunger

    The article analyses the issues with objectives of increasing the age of marriage for girls.

    Poverty of mother: Important factor

    • Raising the age of marriage is the could be the way to improve the health and nutritional status of mothers and their infants.
    • An article published in the journal The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health analyses data on stunting in children and thinness in mothers in the latest round of the National Family Health Survey 4 (2015-16).
    •  The authors examine the strength of the association between many different causal factors.
    •  As it turns out, the poverty of the mother plays the greatest role of all by far.
    • Instead of early pregnancy causing malnourishment, they may both be the consequences of poverty.
    • The best way to go about breaking such a cycle would be to pick the factors perpetuating it, it would be the poverty of the mother in this case.

    Declining fertility rate in India

    • India’s fertility rates have been declining to well below replacement levels in many States, including those with higher levels of child marriage.
    • This could be the reason for the shift from fuelling fears about booming populations to expressing concern for the undernourishment of children.
    • So, the problem of “populations explosion” is not the real problem as the demographic data suggests.

    Concern

    • The change in the marriage age will leave the vast majority of Indian women who marry before they are 21 without the legal protections.

    Conclusion

    The proposal and the objective to be achieved through raising the age of marriage needs reconsideration for the reasons cited above.

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  • Labour, Jobs and Employment – Harmonization of labour laws, gender gap, unemployment, etc.

    Three areas to work on to put India on the path to growth

    op-ed snap | Economics | Mains Paper 3: Indian Economy

    The article suggests the three areas on which country should work on to make it resilient in the future. These three areas include the labour laws for informal employment, conditions of our cities and the strength of our rural economy.

    Background

    • The Prime Minister, while addressing the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) annual meeting urged to think big and partner with the government in putting India on the path to growth.
    • There is much that we can be achieved if government and industry work towards the same objective, and in a spirit of mutual trust.

    Let’s look into some areas

    1) Employment

    • Over 85 per cent of employment in India is in the informal sector.
    • The Centre for Monitoring the Indian Economy (CMIE) estimates that between mid-March and mid-April, 120 million people lost their jobs.
    • With this unemployment rise to an all-time high of 27 per cent.
    • There was reverse migration on an unprecedented scale — some 10 million people abandoned cities to return to their native villages.
    • As economic activity has restarted in cities, CMIE reports that unemployment is now down to around 9 per cent.

    3 Problems we must address

    1) Need for labour regulation

    • We have stringent labour laws to protect workers, but this covers only the 15 per cent formal sector employment.
    • The 85 per cent of our workforce who are informally employed have almost no protection, and employers have almost complete flexibility.
    • We need to address both the formal and informal labour spectrum to get the balance right between flexibility and protection for all labour.

    Way forward

    • Everyone must have a minimum level of protection, and every employer a minimum level of flexibility.
    • This calls for a new social contract to define a well-calibrated social security system.
    • This huge project demands good faith and strong leadership by industry, labour and government.

    2) Living conditions of our cities

    • We need a massive private home-building programme.
    • It probably needs much more liberal land-use regulations — our cities have among the least generous floor-space indices (FSI) in the world.
    • New York, Hong Kong, and Tokyo have an FSI five times Mumbai’s.
    • Again, this is a multi-year project, and it involves state and city governments partnering with private developers.
    • India is unique in having 70 per cent of our population still residing in rural areas.
    • We must encourage the migration of people to higher productivity occupations in our cities.
    • And we must ensure that clean, affordable and accessible housing is available for all in our cities.

    3) Strength of our rural economy

    • Reverse migration is also an opportunity to collaborate in spreading the geography of development.
    • We need a three-pronged approach:
    • 1) As Ashok Gulati has often argued, the easiest way to grow farmer incomes is by having them grow more value-added crops.
    • Exports of fruits and vegetables must be consistently encouraged.
    • The cultivation of palm plantations with potential for huge import substitution, we need corporate farming as the gestation period of seven years for the first crop is too much for the average farmer to handle.
    • The Atmanirbhar agricultural reforms, which permit contract farming, and open up agricultural markets, are major medium-term reforms. Implemented right, they can transform agricultural markets.
    • 2) We need to encourage agro-processing near the source.
    • Fostering entrepreneurship in rural and semi-urban areas would combine nicely with local processing.
    • 3) We need to invest even more massively in rural connectivity.
    • Today, we would add digital connectivity to road connectivity to level the playing field for all regardless of where they live.

    Consider the question “What are the vulnerabilities in our economic structure that were highlighted by the covid pandemic? Also suggest the measures to make our rural economy strong and resilient to such shocks.”

    Conclusion

    The task is huge, and only collaboration between all levels of government (Union, state, and city) and our dynamic private sector can hope to make substantial progress.

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