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![[Sansad TV] India’s Leadership in Digital Public Goods (DPGs)](https://d18x2uyjeekruj.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/sansad.jpg)
[Sansad TV] India’s Leadership in Digital Public Goods (DPGs)
Why in news?
- Digitization initiatives in India and the work with digital public goods have been extraordinary, said Microsoft chairman and CEO Satya Nadella.
Context
- India’s digital infrastructure has not only changed how Indians live and operate but it has also caught the fancy of other countries around the world.
- In this article, we will focus on a global technology commons that has the ability to address some of the world’s toughest challenges which India has much to contribute.
What are Digital Public Goods (DPGs)?
- Digital public goods are public goods in the form of software, data sets, AI models, standards or content that are generally free cultural works and contribute to sustainable national and international digital development.
- Several international agencies, including UNICEF and UNDP, are exploring DPGs as a possible solution to address the issue of digital inclusion, particularly for children in emerging economies.
How is it different from physical public good?
- Abundance: The nondepletable, nonexclusive, and nonrivalrous nature of digital public goods means the rules and norms for managing them can be different from how physical public goods are managed.
- Everlasting: DPGs can be infinitely stored, copied, and distributed without becoming depleted, and at close to zero cost.
- Inclusiveness: DPG is a good that is both non-excludable (no one can be prevented from consuming this good) and non-rivalrous (the consumption of this good by anyone does not reduce the quantity available to others).
Examples of DPGs
- Wikipedia
- DHIS2, an open source health management system.
- Free and open-source software (FOSS), since FOSS is licensed to allow it to be shared freely, modified and redistributed, it is available as a digital public good.
- Open educational resources, which by their copyright are allowed to be freely re-used, revised and shared.
Digital public goods in India
- Aadhaar: Built on the foundation of Aadhaar and India Stack, modular applications, big and small, are transforming the way we make payments, withdraw our PF, get our passport and driving license and check land records, to name just a few activities.
- Unified Payment Interface (UPI): To give an example, consider the surge in UPI-based payments in India. This kind of growth doesn’t happen with a few entitled and privileged people using UPI more and more; it happens with more and more people using UPI more and more.
- DIKSHA Portal: The use of DIKSHA, the school education platform built on the open-source platform Sunbird, has followed the same trajectory — today close to 500 million schoolchildren are using it.
Key Indian initiative: ‘India Stack’
- India Stack is a set of (application programming interface) APIs that allows governments, businesses, startups and developers to utilize a unique digital Infrastructure to solve India’s hard problems towards presence-less, paperless, and cashless service delivery.
- The Open API team at iSPIRT has been a pro-bono partner in the development, evolution, and evangelization of these APIs and systems.
APIs included in India Stack:
The following APIs are considered to be a core part of the India Stack-
- Aadhaar Authentication
- Aadhaar e-KYC
- eSign
- Digital Locker
- Unified Payment Interface (UPI)
- Digital User Consent – still work in progress.
- GSTN –Goods and Services Tax Network
- BBPS –Bharat Bill Payment System
- ETC – Electronic Toll Collection (known under the brand FASTag)
Why need DPGs?
- Cost Effectiveness: The cost of setting up an open source-based educational infrastructure, to supplement the physical infrastructure, for an entire country is less than laying two kilometers of high-quality road.
- Lower investment required: The investments required for transporting digital public goods are minuscule in comparison and there is no chance of a debt trap. Also, the code (platform) is highly reusable.
- Instantly visible outcomes: Unlike physical infrastructure such as ports and roads, digital public goods have short gestation periods and immediate, and visible impact and benefits.
- Faster service delivery: Processes get streamlined and wait times for any service come down dramatically. Issuances of passports, PAN cards and driving licences are such examples.
- Plugging the leakages: It eliminates ghost beneficiaries of government services, removes touts collecting rent, creates an audit trail, makes the individual-government-market interface transparent and provides efficiencies that help recoup the investments quickly.
- Wider outreach: Productivity goes up and services can be scaled quickly. Benefits can be rapidly extended to cover a much larger portion of the population.
Most significant utility of DPGs: Digital Diplomacy
(1) Boost India’s Image as a leading technology player
- It will take made-in-India digital public goods across the world and boost India’s brand positioning as a leading technology player in the digital age.
- India’s digital diplomacy will be beneficial to and welcomed by, all emerging economies from Peru to Polynesia, from Uruguay to Uganda, and from Kenya to Kazakhstan.
(2) Enhancing the productivity of emerging economies
- Emerging economies are characterized by gross inefficiencies in the delivery of government services and a consequent trust deficit.
- Digital public goods spread speed, transparency, ease and productivity across the individual-government-market ecosystem and enhance inclusivity, equity and development at scale.
Challenges associated with DPG Diplomacy
- Privacy issues: Potential violations of privacy and possible weaponization of data is a primary issue related to such digital initiatives.
- Increase in Inequalities: Success in the digital provision of services is dependent on many underlying factors, including digital literacy, education and access to stable and fast telecommunication services.
- Cybersecurity threats: While channels and databases used by the Government for transmission and storage are usually secure, other players in the ecosystem may not possess the requisite expertise or security to prevent and respond to breaches.
- Unserved remote areas: With digital services not being uniformly distributed, communities in remote areas often require on-ground staff to deploy and supplement digital tools.
Global liaison over DPGs: Digital Public Goods Alliance (DPGA)
- The DPGA is a multi-stakeholder initiative with a mission to accelerate the attainment of sustainable development goals in low- and middle-income countries by facilitating the discovery, development, use of, and investment in digital public goods.
- It is a UN initiative launched in 2019.
Way Forward
- Data localization: India needs to ensure that digital goods diplomacy doesn’t become an exercise to gather data and provisions must be made for data localization.
- Training of Individuals: Individuals across the countries need to be trained in cyber security for successful digital goods diplomacy. A lead can be taken up by CERT-In.
- No Authoritative nature: India needs to ensure that data with the state doesn’t lead to authoritarianism in these countries. Decentralized and distributed storage using Blockchain technology can be used by India.
- Ensuring Inclusivity: Digital ecosystems should be guided by factors of availability, accessibility, affordability, value and trust.
- Citizen-Centralism: There is a need to ensure the design is citizen-centric and ensures inclusive access to services at the last mile will help drive adoption and sustain these ecosystems.
- Data privacy robustness: Designing privacy-protection and secure databases are critical. It is, therefore, imperative that regulations governing any digital initiative must take into account provisions of the Personal Data Protection Bill.
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MISHTI: Budgetary push for Mangroves
The Union Budget for 2023-24 announced an initiative for mangrove plantation along the coastline and on saltpan lands, under MISHTI (Mangrove Initiative for Shoreline Habitats & Tangible Incomes).
MISHTI
- MISHTI is a new programme that will facilitate mangrove plantation along India’s coastline and on salt pan lands.
- This new programme will aim at intensive afforestation of coastal mangrove forests.
Implementation strategy
- The Budget states that MISHTI will be implemented through convergence between-
- MGNREGS (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme),
- CAMPA (Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority) Fund and other sources.
What are Mangroves?
- Mangroves are salt-tolerant plant communities found in tropical and subtropical intertidal regions.
- They are important refuges of coastal biodiversity and also act as bio-shields against extreme climatic events.
- With the threat of climate change and frequent tropical storms looming large, planting more mangroves is a welcome development for India which has a coastline of about 7,500 km.
Mangroves in India
- India has about 4,992 sq km (0.49 million hectares) of mangroves, according to the Indian State of Forest Report (IFSR) 2021.
- Mangroves in India are distributed across nine States and three UTs with West Bengal having the highest mangrove cover of 2,114 sq km.
- The IFSR report also points out that there has been an increase in the mangrove cover from 4,046 sq km in 1987 to 4,992 sq km in 2021.
Why protect mangroves?
- Infrastructure projects — industrial expansion, shifting coastlines, coastal erosion and storms, have resulted in a significant decrease in mangrove habitats.
- Between 2010 and 2020, around 600 sq km of mangroves were lost of which more than 62% was due to direct human impacts, the Global Mangrove Alliance said in its 2022 report.
Importance of mangroves
- Biodiversity: Mangrove forests — consisting of trees and shrub that live in intertidal water in coastal areas — host diverse marine life.
- Fishing grounds: They also support a rich food web, with molluscs and algae-filled substrate acting as a breeding ground for small fish, mud crabs and shrimps, thus providing a livelihood to local artisanal fishers.
- Carbon sinks: Equally importantly, they act as effective carbon stores, holding up to four times the amount of carbon as other forested ecosystems.
- Cyclone buffers: When Cyclone Amphan struck West Bengal in May, its effects were largely mitigated by the Sundarbans flanking its coasts along the Bay of Bengal.
Threats to Mangroves
- Anthropogenic activities: They are a major threat to the mangroves. Urbanization, industrialization and the accompanying discharge of industrial effluents, domestic sewage and pesticide residues from agricultural lands threaten these fragile ecosystems.
- Saltpan and aquaculture: This causes huge damage to the mangroves. Shrimp farming alone destroyed 35,000 hectares of mangroves worldwide.
- Destruction for farming: 40% of mangroves on the west coast has been converted into farmlands and other settlements in just 3 decades.
- Sea-level rise: This is another challenge to these mangroves- especially on the Bay of Bengal coast.
What lies ahead?
- A contract-based one-time plantation under MGNREGS and CAMPA alone may not work unless the local communities take ownership of the forests.
- Discharge of untreated domestic and industrial effluents into the rivers should be immediately stopped.
- The natural inter-tidal flow along the coast should be conserved.
Try this PYQ:
Q. Which one of the following is the correct sequence of ecosystems in the order of decreasing productivity?
(a) Oceans, lakes, grasslands, mangroves
(b) Mangroves, oceans, grasslands, lakes
(c) Mangroves, grasslands, lakes, oceans
(d) Oceans, mangroves, lakes, grasslands
[wpdiscuz-feedback id=”7fvmdn1tyf” question=”Please leave a feedback on this” opened=”1″]Post your answers here.[/wpdiscuz-feedback]
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73rd establishment day of Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of India is hosting its celebration of the 73rd anniversary of its establishment today.
Why in news?
- This year’s event is being aired on social media platforms and will witness Singapore’s Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon, who is of Indian origin, as the chief guest.
When was the Supreme Court founded?
- On January 28, 1950, two days after India became a sovereign democratic republic, the Supreme Court of India came into being.
- The first CJI of India was H. J. Kania.
- The inauguration took place in the Chamber of Princes in the Parliament building which was the home to the Federal Court of India for 12 years preceding the Supreme Court’s establishment.
- The Parliament House was to be the home of the Supreme Court for years that were to follow until the court acquired its own present building with lofty domes and its signature spacious colonnaded verandas in 1958.
History of established
- In 1861, the Indian High Courts Act 1861 was enacted to create high courts for various provinces and abolished Supreme Courts at Calcutta, Madras and Bombay and also the sadar adalats in presidency towns in their respective regions.
- These new high courts had the distinction of being the highest courts for all cases till the creation of the Federal Court of India under the Government of India Act 1935.
- The Federal Court had jurisdiction to solve disputes between provinces and federal states and hear appeals against judgment of the high courts.
Premise of the Supreme Court
- In 1958, when the court shifted its premises, the building was shaped to project the image of scales of justice, in the central wing.
- In 1979, two new wings – the East wing and the West wing – were added to the complex. In all, there are 19 Courtrooms in the various wings of the building.
- The Chief Justice’s Court is the largest of the Courts located at the Centre of the Central Wing.
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What is the North Star?
Vice President said Parliament is the “North Star” of democracy, “a place of discussion and deliberation to realize the aspirations and dreams of the people”.
What is North Star?
- North Star is a metaphor to refer to something constant/permanent that leads and provides direction.
- Polaris, also known as the North Star or the Pole Star, is a very bright star (around 2500 times more luminous than our sun) placed less than 1° away from the north celestial pole.
- Its position and brightness have made humans use it for navigation since late antiquity.
- It is a part of the constellation Ursa Minor and is around 323 light-years away from Earth.
How it helps navigation?
- It stands almost motionless in the night sky, with all the stars of the northern sky appearing to rotate around it.
- This makes it an excellent fixed point from which to draw measurements for celestial navigation.
- Simply the elevation of the star above the horizon gives the approximate latitude of the observer and in the northern hemisphere, if you can see Polaris you can always tell which way is north.
- Upon crossing the equator to the South, the North Star is lost over the horizon and hence stops being a useful navigational aid.
When the North Star was first used to navigate?
- Polaris seems to have been first charted by the Roman mathematician and astronomer Ptolemy, who lived from about 85 to 165 B.C.
- While there does exist some evidence pointing at how the star was used for navigation in late antiquity, it is during the ‘Age of Exploration’ that it becomes such a central part of human history.
- Christopher Columbus, on his first trans-Atlantic voyage of 1492, “had to correct (his ship’s bearings) for the circle described by the pole star about the pole”, wrote his son in his biography.
- As European colonizers set sail for exotic locations across the world, the North Star became an ever-so-important feature.
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Muons and their use to analyse large structures
As per a new study, researchers are examining the fortress wall of Xi’an, an ancient city in China, by using tiny outer space particles ‘Muon’ that can penetrate hundreds of metres of stone surfaces.
What are Muons?
- Muons are subatomic particles raining from space.
- They are created when the particles in Earth’s atmosphere collide with cosmic rays — clusters of high-energy particles that move through space at just below the speed of light.
- About 10,000 muons reach every square metre of the Earth’s surface a minute.
- These particles resemble electrons but are 207 times as massive.
- Therefore, they are sometimes called “fat electrons”. Because muons are so heavy, they can travel through hundreds of metres of rock or other matter before getting absorbed or decaying into electrons and neutrinos.
- In comparison, electrons can penetrate through only a few centimetres. Muons are highly unstable and exist for just 2.2 microseconds.
What is muon tomography or muography?
- Muography is conceptually similar to X-ray but capable of scanning much larger and wider structures, owing to the penetration power of muons.
- As these high-energy particles are naturally produced and ubiquitous, all one needs to do is place a muon detector underneath, within or near the object of interest.
- The detector then tracks the number of muons going through the object from different directions, to form a three-dimensional image.
Muons and archaeology
- The technique was first used in the late 1960s, when Nobel Laureate and US experimental physicist Luis Alvarez joined hands with Egyptologists to search for hidden chambers in the Pyramid of Khafre, Giza.
- Nothing was found at the time.
Recent feats achieved
- In 2017, modern archaeologists repeated the experiment with more sophisticated and advanced muon detectors and stumbled upon a major finding.
- By placing several detectors, the archaeologists were able to discover a previously unknown chamber at least 30 metres long.
- It was the first major inner structure to be found in the pyramid since the 19th century.
Uses of muography beyond archaeology
- Apart from archaeology, muography has found use in customs security, internal imaging of volcanoes and others.
- Around 2015, scientists used the technique to look inside the Fukushima nuclear reactors after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan.
- As the site was highly radioactive, they put the two muon detectors in 10 centimetres thick boxes to protect them from radiation and then carried out the scanning.
- Muography is also being used by researchers to analyse Mount Vesuvius, a volcano in Italy.
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Crackdown against child marriage in Assam
Context
- The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals call for global action to end human rights violations by 2030. There has been tremendous development in India on that front, as seen, for example, in the decline in child marriage from 47.4 per cent in 2005 to 23.3 per cent in 2021. The year 2021 also marked a 50 per cent decline in child marriage in South Asia.
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Why in news?
- Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has launched a state-wide crackdown against child marriage.
- Booking men marrying girls below 14 years of age under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, and those marrying girls aged 14-18 under the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act.
- The CM has also announced that the police will retrospectively book people who participated in child marriage in the last seven years.
Background: Data from Assam
- Maternal mortality rate in Assam: According to data given by the Registrar General of India in 2022, Assam has the highest maternal mortality rate in the nation, with 195 fatalities per one lakh live births in the years 2018 to 2020.
- Infant mortality rate in Assam: With 32 newborn deaths for every 1,000 live births, Assam has the third highest infant mortality rate, according to the National Family Health Survey-5.
- Government’s aim to address the issue: The Assam government has declared that its aim is to confront the high maternal mortality and infant mortality rates in the state, which it has linked to early motherhood.
What is Child Marriage?
- Child marriage refers to any formal marriage or informal union between a child under the age of 18 and an adult and another child.
- The Prohibition of Child Marriage (Amendment) Bill, 2021, fixes 21 years as the marriageable age for women.
Effect of Covid-19 Pandemic
- According to estimates by UNICEF, 10 million more girls were at risk of becoming child brides globally because of the pandemic, affecting the prosperity and growth of communities and nations for generations.
- India has been working to ensure it doesn’t lose the momentum gained in dealing with the scourge of child marriage.
How child marriage is negatively correlated to national development?
- Impact on basic rights: Child marriages deny a child his/her basic right to education, health, and the freedom to build full, thriving lives.
- Increased susceptibility to abuse and violence: There is overwhelming evidence that child marriage renders girls more susceptible to abuse, violence, and exploitation.
- Gender Inequality: Child marriage is a gendered form of violence a cause and effect of gender inequality and discrimination and is a significant challenge facing girls and their families throughout the developing world.
- Disturbed childhood: Child marriage conclusively devastates a girl’s childhood, saddling her with adult responsibilities before she is physically and mentally mature.
- Increased risk of forced pregnancy and maternal mortality: With little bodily autonomy, child brides are more likely to undergo forced pregnancy, increasing the likelihood of maternal and infant mortality.
- Negative effect on education: A girl’s education is less likely to be valued evidence is clear that girls with less education are more likely to marry young, and child marriage typically ends a girl’s education.
- Support systems declines: The lack of education and isolation from peers further shrink a child bride’s support systems. Without skills or mobility, her ability to overcome poverty for herself and her children is hindered.
- Negative impact on community and national development: These social and economic vulnerabilities that child brides live with impinge on their ability to contribute to their community’s and country’s growth and development.
- Intergenerational consequences: They are also more likely to experience intimate partner violence and have worse economic and health outcomes than their single peers, which eventually trickles down to their own offspring, placing further strain on the nation’s ability to offer quality healthcare and education.
Prevalence of child marriage in India
- Though legislation prohibiting child marriage in India has been in place since 1929, the majority of child brides in the world 223 million of them, or one-third of the total live in India.
- Despite it being illegal for girls under the age of 18, and for boys under the age of 21, to marry in India under the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, the UNFPA-UNICEF estimates indicate that at least 1.5 million underage girls get married annually here.
- Ending the practice of child marriage is crucial to address the several human rights violations that stand in the way of gender equality for girls.
Understanding the key drivers behind child marriage is necessary to combat it
- Common reasons: While the origins of the practice differ across nations and cultures, it is perpetuated by poverty, lack of educational opportunities, and limited access to healthcare.
- Financial burden: Some families choose to marry off their daughters in order to reduce their financial burden. Other reasons cited are shrinking living spaces and increasing concerns about adolescent girls’ safety.
- Mentality of securing daughter’s future: Families also act in this manner because they think it will protect their daughters’ futures. The practice is also supported by gender roles and marriage-age norms, stereotypes, and the socioeconomic risks of unmarried pregnancies.
Conclusion
- Though legal protections and their strict implementation are important, they form only one part of the solution. To end child marriages, state and non-state actors alike must put girls, across the diverse spectrum of society and marginality, at the centre of the solution. The state can penalise and criminalise the act, but society at large has the important role to play.
Mains question
Q. Highlight the key drivers behind child marriage and Discuss how child marriage is negatively correlated to national development?
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FREE CSAT Masterclass: 15 *Golden Hacks* for clearing CSAT | UPSC Prelims 2023 special session by Zeeshan sir, a senior IAS mentor
Concluded successfully on 6th February (Monday) | A must for non-science/ non-engineering background aspirants | Get FREE PDF, Telegram group link, and mentorship session
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But the mysterious, unpredictable, and devious nature of CSAT paper can send shivers down the spine of even the veteran UPSC aspirants. AIR 109, Areeba; IPS Shubham Nagargoje; and many such aspirants have failed to clear Prelims due to CSAT in their UPSC journeys at one point in time or the other.
15 Golden Hacks by Zeeshan sir will help in balancing CSAT-GS preparation for UPSC Prelims 2023
Also, you’ve likely heard the myths: only engineers or those with strong math and English skills can succeed in CSAT. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. In reality, anyone with the right strategy and bent of mind with smart preparation can score 90+ in CSAT.
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Date and Time: 6th February, 7:30 pm (Monday)
Link: Zoom link will be shared on email post registration
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Important Takeaways:
- 15 Golden Hacks by Zeeshan sir. We will also share a PDF of these so please register.
- Trend analysis of the last 4 years of CSAT paper. How UPSC CSAT has been evolving, changing patterns and difficulty levels?
- How to deal with maths and logical reasoning questions irrespective of your academic background?
- Balancing CSAT and GS preparation? Avoid over-preparing or under-preparing for CSAT.
- How do select topics and sections which are high scoring and have a high return of investment wrt time spent during preparation?
- List of super easy topics for CSAT that you must not ignore.
- From where and how to start reading and practicing comprehension. How many comprehensions you should try to solve in the paper?
- How to approach the CSAT paper for best time management and high score?
- How to use smart elimination techniques in CSAT paper? The most important part of this webinar masterclass.
CivilsDaily’s FREE Webinar package
Post-webinar we will share important PDFs, timetable framework, and notes.
Other than this a strategy package will be emailed to you.
Note: Entry is on a first-come, first-served basis. Limited seats are available.
What do our students have to say about Zeeshan sir’s CSAT and Prelims sessions?
6th February (Monday) | 1-1 LIVE Masterclass on Clearing CSAT is easy even if you are terrible in maths and belong to a non-science or engineering background by Zeeshan Hashmi sir.
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Budget and the Health expenditure
Context
- In her 2023-24 Union Budget speech, the finance minister announced that the total central government budget for health (not including research) will be roughly Rs 86,175 crore ($10 billion) that is, roughly Rs 615 for every citizen. This is a 2.7 per cent increase from the previous fiscal year and lower than the rate of inflation.
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Government’s current Health spending
- Current health spending lower than middle income countries: India currently spends about Rs 8 lakh crore ($100 billion) or about 3.2 per cent of its GDP on health. This is much lower than the average health spending share of the GDP at around 5.2 per cent of the Lower- and Middle-Income Countries (LMIC)
- Health expenditure in India compared to other countries: Of this, the government (Centre and states put together) spends about Rs 2.8 lakh crore (about $35 billion) roughly 1.1 per cent of the GDP. Contrast this with the government health expenditure in countries like China (3 per cent), Thailand (2.7 per cent), Vietnam (2.7 per cent) and Sri Lanka (1.4 per cent).
How health expenditure affects people especially poor?
- Hospitalisation cost for a day: A Day of hospitalisation at a public hospital is estimated at Rs 2,800. At a private hospital, it is Rs 6,800.
- Disproportionate financial impact on poor households: A greater proportion of disposable incomes is taken away from a poor household as compared to a non-poor one, further broadening the gap between the two.
- Impact of Health expenditure on employment and income: If sickness hits a working member of the household, she/he must often withdraw from active employment and their main source of income dries up at the time when they urgently need more money for treatment.
- Sell or mortgage of assets to cover treatment costs: Households have to often sell or mortgage their productive assets, such as land and cattle, to cover the treatment costs.
- Burden of health expenditures on vulnerable populations: The poor, elderly and sick are already at a disadvantage and the burden of health expenditure makes this even worse.
- Falling into poverty due to health expenditures: This further reduces their capacity to bounce back. According to the WHO, 55 million people fall into poverty or deeper poverty every year due to catastrophic expenditures on health.
Areas where greater spending by the government could help in the immediate term
- Focus should be balanced for both communicable and noncommunicable: The National Health Mission allocates less than 3 per cent (Rs 717 crore) to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) compared to communicable diseases and reproductive and child health services, despite NCDs causing more than half of the total burden of disease and this proportion further increases in both rural as well as urban areas.
- Public health and primary health care focus on rural areas: Urban areas have poorly developed infrastructure for primary care even if secondary and tertiary health care services are better. For example, immunisation coverage is now lower in urban India than in rural India. A third of the country now lives in urban areas and greater resources are needed to improve health here.
- Health research has been neglected for too long: The allocation for the Department of Health Research in this year’s budget is Rs 2,980 crore, flat from last year. Spending Rs 20 per Indian is inconsistent with the need for innovations and technologies in the sector. The bulk of the resources provided to the Indian Council of Medical Research goes towards maintaining a large payroll of scientists and the output is poor.
Way forward
- Maximizing India’s potential: India stands on the brink of a massive opportunity. Quality education and health for the 26 million children born each year and the 65 per cent of the population under the age of 35 could help provide a workforce that would propel India forward.
- Harnessing the Demographic Dividend: India has a growing working-age population, but needs urgent action to harness the demographic dividend and potentially become a developed country within a generation.
- Adopting Competitive funding System for health research: India should adopt a competitive grant system for government-funded health research like other successful countries, to encourage top-notch research. The Wellcome Trust/DBT-India Alliance is a successful example of this system.
Conclusion
- The health (and education) of Indians is the most important determinant of what the country can achieve during the next 25 years of Amrit Kaal. We must find ways to both find more money for health, and also more health for the money to ensure that all Indians achieve their true potential.
Mains question
Q. Highlight the present status of Government’s healthcare spending. How out of pocket health expenditure affects people especially poor? Suggest what government must do and areas where it must focus in the immediate term?
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Artificial intelligence(AI): An immediate challenge flagged by ChatGPT
Context
- With the launch of Open AI’s ChatGPT late last year, the impending changes in the nature of work, creativity and economy as a whole have moved from being the subject of futuristic jargon to an immediate challenge.
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Background
- Since at least 2015 when Klaus Schwab popularised the term Fourth Industrial Revolution at that year’s World Economic Forum terms like 4IR, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things, Future of Work, entered the lexicon of politicians, bureaucrats, consultants and policy analysts.
Sample developments over just the last few days
- A judge in Colombia included his conversations with ChatGPT in a ruling;
- Microsoft is integrating the bot with its search engine, Bing, and other products;
- Google is reportedly trying to launch a similar tool and there are reports that ChatGPT can already code at entry level for Google engineers.
What are the Concerns?
- Lifestyle may become redundant: Concerns about plagiarism in universities and beyond, as well as the fear that many white-collar jobs may become redundant in the coming years, as AI becomes more ubiquitous and sophisticated.
- Implications on labour, education and authenticity: The AI revolution is likely to have serious implications on labour, education, authenticity of content and its authorship, and much else.
- Case of Social media’s influence in US elections: The concerns around social media’s influence on politics and society became sharp in the aftermath of the 2016 US presidential elections and accusations of voter manipulation by foreign agents. Much of the world is still struggling with the questions raised then.
Do you what exactly ChatGPT is?
- Simple definition: ChatGPT is a chatbot built on a large-scale transformer-based language model that is trained on a diverse dataset of text and is capable of generating human-like responses to prompts.
- A human like language model: It is based on GPT-3.5, a language model that uses deep learning to produce human-like text.
- It is more engaging with details: However, while the older GPT-3 model only took text prompts and tried to continue on that with its own generated text, ChatGPT is more engaging. It’s much better at generating detailed text and can even come up with poems.
- Keeps the memory of the conversations: Another unique characteristic is memory. The bot can remember earlier comments in a conversation and recount them to the user.
- Human- like resemblance: A conversation with ChatGPT is like talking to a computer, a smart one, which appears to have some semblance of human-like intelligence.
Anticipating possible futures requires engagement with the opportunities
- The Struggle to keep up with technology in policymaking:
- Governments worldwide face a challenge in creating policies that keep up with the rapid pace of technological advancement.
- Policymakers should understand that they must work to bridge the gap between technology and regulation, as a growing divide could lead to problems.
- Preparing for technological change in education and workforce:
- In addition to creating regulations that support innovation, it’s crucial to plan for the changes that new technology will bring to education and employment.
- This includes anticipating new job types and skills required, as well as updating the education system to prepare future workers.
- Importance of Preparing for technological change for India:
- India has been facing the challenge of balancing privacy and regulation in the handling of data for several years.
- Successfully adapting to technological changes is crucial for India to make the most of its large, young workforce. If not addressed in time, the consequences could be severe
Conclusion
- The transformations the new technology is bound to bring about must be met with swift adjustments in the broader national and international legal and policy architecture. The lag between technology innovation and policy that was seen with the rise of Big Data and social media can serve as a lesson.
Mains Question
Q. With the rapid innovations and launching of Artificial intelligence models everyday will change the nature of work, creativity and economy as a whole. comment