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Q.1) According to UN Comtrade, a significant drop in China’s low-end manufacturing over the coming decades would leave a large gap for lower-cost countries to exploit.  How can India reap the benefits of China’s shift from low-end, labour-intensive manufacturing in the wake of unemployment crisis faced by it?

https://thewire.in/184571/can-india-capitalise-chinas-shift-away-low-end-manufacturing/

Rising wages in the Chinese manufacturing market is leading to erase the competitiveness of cheaper Chinese goods. This is in turn resulting in other developing economies replacing China in these sectors viz Apparels, Textiles, leather goods etc.

Abundant supplies of low-cost labour, government incentives, tax exemptions and an efficient customs administration are the critical factors that need to be considered by India to replace China in the low end, low cost manufacturing sector.

• Labour force: India has large supplies of cheaper labour (estimated 1.72 US dollars per hour in 2015) and world’s largest working age population which needs to be utilised to reap its full potential.
• Probable sectors: Leather, apparels, Textiles are sectors in which India already has strong foundations and needs to be given more tax incentives.. Eg. Leather industries in Mumbai and Kanpur.
• Services may not sustain India’s growth trajectory:It has been argued by the IMF that Indian manufacturing sector needs to increase its share in the GDP in order to sustain India’s growth trajectory. Hence, China’s gradual decline in the sector will create global demand for Indian goods.
• Innovative initiatives like Make in India, Skill India, Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor etc need to be implemented with focus on low cost manufacturing.
• The RBI differentiator: Unlike the Chinese interventions changing the way its currency fluctuates; Indian central bank does not allow such interventions. This curbs fluctuations and speculations in currency markets and will allow more certainty to its manufactured products.
• Competitive advantage over other Asian economies: India has a huge English-speaking working population and it should use this competitive advantage over other countries like Malayisa, Thailand, Vietnam and South Korea who are also vying to fill the vacuum created by China.

According to a Delloite survey of 2016 it has been argued that India will spurt to 5th rank, from the current 11th rank, in the list of top manufacturing hubs of the world (USA, China, Japan and Germany being the top 4).

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Q.2.) India’s healthcare suffers from quality, quantity, footprint, access and affordability issues. Discuss the major problems of India’s healthcare system? Also discuss what needs to be done to improve the condition of public healthcare in India?

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/6S9Hvo31dR3aA8h7snIWKL/What-ails-Indias-public-healthcare.html

Articles 41, 42, 45 and 45 of the Indian constitution talk about providing efficient healthcare to various sections of society. However, India has not been able to fulfil this obligation in its spirit.

Major bottlenecks in India’s healthcare system-

• Lack of sufficient spending: India spends only 1.5% of its GDP on public healthcare. India also spends lowest per capita on health.
• Inadequate professional manpower: There is acute shortage of professional manpower in healthcare sector with lack of supply of specialised doctors, which in turn is due to lack of sufficient Post Graduate seats in medical colleges
• Insufficient infrastructure: Acute shortage of secondary and tertiary hospitals
• Lack of accessibility and affordability: 62 per cent of medical costs are met through out of pocket expenses. The high out-of-pocket expenses in India stem from the fact that 76 percent of Indians do not have health insurance.
• Disproportionate spread of skilled professionals: Majority of healthcare professionals are concentrated in urban areas, leaving rural areas underserved
• Structural inadequacies: The hospitals are, as we said, understaffed and under-financed, forcing patients to visit private medical practitioners and hospitals.

Way forward in this situation-

• • Increase in public spending: The Union Budget of 2017-18 has increased expenditure on healthcare by 27 per cent.
  • Insurance for all: enrolling all BPL families in the country in health-insurance programmes. This will help in lowering the out of pocket expenses of poor households.

 

• Encouraging indigenous knowledge via Ministry of AYUSH: Diversification of knowledge and utilising potential of scientific heritage will help reach out to masses with different needs.

 

• IT and IT enabled services through mobile and internet technology – Innovative apps like Swastha Bharat, ANMOL-ANM and e-RaktKosh.
• The National Innovation Council should encourage creative solutions to India specific problems.

Healthcare sector is in dire need of restructure and reform. In this case the report of        Dr.A. Pangariya Committee (2016) assumes immense significance and needs to be implemented in spirit.

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Q.3.) Sharjah ruler’s recent Kerala visit shows that States can play an important role in not only implementing foreign policy, but also in formulating it.  Critically analyse.

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/states-in-indian-diplomacy/article19803262.ece?homepage=true

India is the one fastest emerging developing nation. This requires a nation to have a proactive foreign policy that involves active participation from both Center and the States. The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister negotiated with foreign governments to make Hyderabad an IT capital, prompting even presidents and prime ministers to visit the city on state visits and the recent visit by Sharjah ruler to Kerala highlights this fact.

The importance of States in foreign policy formulation

 

• The Constitutional provision-

 

• Article 37 under Directive Principles of State Policy provides that states shall endeavor to promote international peace and security and maintain honorable relations with nations.
• Also Article 365 also provides for the Centre to give directions to States to implement foreign policy decisions.

1. Competitive Federalism– The engagements of the states with various nations helps to foster competitive and cooperative federalism.
2. Global practices– In USA, Japan, Singapore and China, states play an important and effective role in foreign policy formulation attracting much required foreign investment.
3. Technology Transfer- Example the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat will participate in the recent Shinkensen Bullet Train project.
4. The sates of Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh are collaborating with UK, Japan and USA for the Smart City Mission.
5. Strategic importance– The North eastern states have helped in establishing strategic agreements with neighbouring countries thus, securing external security.
6. Broad based policy formulation– It is the result of healthy policy exchange between the Centre and the States.
7. The states actions will help benefitting Indian Diaspora– Example: Maximum Indians in Gulf region are from Kerala.

However, there are some concerns regarding the larger role for states in foreign policy formulation-

1. National Interests may be subjudiced by the States– Examples : The Chief Minister of West Bengal stopped then Prime Minister from signing an agreement on sharing of Teesta waters with Bangladesh after the agreement was negotiated and in the Italian marine case Kerala itself had insisted that the Italian marines should be tried in India and punished here, causing a rift in India’s relations with the European Union.
2. Lack of expertise at the State level–  The States must also develop expertise on foreign affairs to be able to take responsible decisions in their interaction with foreign lands.

Way Forward

1. There is a need for a new structure in MEA in which the states are fully represented. Also, Ministry of External Affairs should have offices in key states.
2. Think tanks should be established in states to facilitate policy options and to provide inputs to the states and the Centre.
3. States should be encouraged to form strong relations with countries in which they have a special interest on account of proximity or the presence of diaspora from that State.

The Ministry of External Affairs now has a States division, which keeps in touch with the States which is a very positive step. But, the larger interests of India on the global scene should not be put at stake.

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Q.4 ) President’s recent visit to Djibouti and Ethiopia suggests India is finally waking up to the extraordinary geopolitical significance of a region that is called the Horn of Africa. Discuss the significance of this region for India. How can India counter China’s strategic advances in the region?

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/raja-mandala-india-and-djiboutis-geopolitical-scrum-ram-nath-kovind-abroad-visit-4871697/

The Horn of Africa at the confluence of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean connecting Africa, the Middle East and Asia and the region’s multiple conflicts inter-state and intra-state  have made it a very attractive piece of geopolitical real estate. The four different states Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti constitute Horn of Africa.

India is initiating re-engagement in this area for modern India has a long tradition of critical involvement in the Horn.

Significance of the Horn of Africa

1. Horn of Africa can be a gateway to India’s greater role in the African region with respect to its rich resource base.
2. The new reliance on the sea lines of communication for India’s economic growth saw the rejuvenation of India’s maritime sensibility. Almost 95 percent of the trade by volume takes place through oceans and Red sea is the linchpin.
3. The trade route of Suez Canal is very important for India and Horn of Africa is a choke point.
4. It provides a node for India to manage its affairs in the countries of Asia minor and Middle East, example–Yemen crisis at a time its relations with Pakistan are strained.
5. To counter the growing International influence in the region especially of China has recently opened first ever foreign military base for China.  France, which ruled Djibouti during the colonial era, has the largest concentration of its foreign legions in the country.
6. To contain Piracy in the region especially off the coast of Somaila- Japan in 2011 acquired a facility to support its anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden.
7. The countries of the Horn of Africa can help India in future at various global fora such as UNSC, NSG, etc.
8. Asia Africa growth corridor- It will essentially be a sea corridor linking Africa with India and other countries of South-East Asia and Oceania by rediscovering ancient sea-routes and creating new sea corridors.

Chinas presence in the region has been increasing which is a cause of worry for India. India can counter Chinas strategic advances in the region by

1. Increasing Diplomatic relations that is, opening embassys in the countries of Horn of Africa like Djibouti will help in India’s reengagement with the region.
2. Greater engagement with the region through organizations like AARDO, International Solar Alliance, East African Community etc.
3. Defense Engagement with the region can be enhanced by India through defense exports, surveillance, defense exercises and anti piracy operations.
4. Engagement with the Indian diaspora in the region be enhanced.
5. India should provide for greater help to the region in the areas of pharmaceutical that is genric medicines and telemedicine.

Although India is a late starter in the region, she can still play a vital role in the development of the region thereby increasing her sphere of influence.

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Q.5) While investment in new projects is always a good idea, what is an even better idea for a country like India, especially at the helm of an economic slowdown is the upgradation of it’s existing infrastructure. Analyse.

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/tackling-the-economic-slowdown/article19787811.ece

Economic growth has slowed for five consecutive quarters, that is from late 2015-16 onwards. The economy needs a shot in the arm in the form of a fiscal stimulus which will transform the economy, and that its policies will have long-term favorable consequence. More investments and new projects are no doubt good for the economy and will encourage private investment boosting growth. However, Greater public investment must now flow into the repair and reconstruction of infrastructure which is better rationale approach.

Investments a good idea!

Investment is an immediate source of demand as firms that invest buy goods and services to do so, but it also expands the economy’s capacity to produce. Not only does increased public investment increase demand and quicken growth but it may be expected to encourage private investors, as the market for their goods expands.

The supply side focus at usual cases has made it easier for private firms to produce. But considering demand shortage in the economy, the immediate thing to do is to expand public investment in infrastructure which will set the tone for momentum recovery.

The argument made for  new land and labour market reforms as a pre-requisite for accelerating growth today must be able to account for how the economy came close to achieving 10% growth in the late 1980s.

But upgrading the existing infrastructure is a better idea:

• Repair and reconstruction of India’s creaking infrastructure is the direction in which greater public investment must now flow. It is the most direct and potent measure that can be undertaken to address the slowdown the economy is experiencing.
• Other things being the same, increased public investment leads to a higher deficit, which is the gap between the government’s expenditure and its receipts.
• There is resistance to governments running a deficit for fear that it may be inflationary.  So any plan for increasing the rate of growth, not just at the present moment but in general, must reckon with agricultural shortages. 
• Banks are already reeling under NPA problems and twin balance sheet problems. This, coupled with low investments levels in the economy, would further dampen it if any new project/scheme is announced.
• The existing infrastructure programmes are mired by misadministration and it entails bring governance reforms rather than anything new.
• With the economy already adjusting to effects of GST and demonetisation, any new step would impede that process.
• We are also facing the problems of overcapacity in the sectors of steel, which makes it imperative that we take remedial steps to increase the demand.

Thus, in essence, there exists immense opportunities for India to strengthen its existing infrastructure and economy which would address the problems of poverty, poor investment levels, unemployment, low growth etc. thus preparing the ground for the success of new projects and programmes thus creating a virtuous development cycle for the economy.

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Q.6)   Police reforms have been long awaited in India despite directions given by the Supreme Court on police reforms. Discuss the major police reforms needed in India.

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/awaiting-police-reforms/article19793527.ece

The police even today are not very trusted by the people. They are perceived as a force which is partisan, politicized, and generally not very competent. The Indian Police Foundation was inaugurated in 2015 to mount pressure on State governments to implement the directions of the Supreme Court on police reforms (Prakash Singh v. Union of India).

The pertaining challenges being faced by police force in the country:

• Collection and analysis of preventive intelligence especially pertaining to terrorists and insurgents is weak.
• Criminal Investigation: Standards have declined sharply in the last few years. Unfortunately, the so-called premier investigation agencies like state CIDs and the CBI are no exception.
• Vacancies: Many states continue to have huge vacancies. Even the apex court’s direction to fill these posts has not yielded the desired results.
• Outdated arms and equipment: Most state police forces continue to use obsolete equipment and arms, and lack the latest technology that would help in investigation and intelligence-gathering.
• Lack of Organization
• Lack of proper training

It is in the above context that the court in 2006 had issued seven binding directions to implement those reforms enumerated below:

• Institutional:

• Constitute a National Security Commission to appoint chiefs of Central Armed Forces.
• Constitute a State Security Commission to lay down policy, evaluate performance and ensure operational autonomy.
• A Police Establishment Board to oversee transfers, pensions etc
• A Police Complaint Authority to look into allegations of serious misconduct.

• Administrative:

• Separation of wings of investigation and law and order is a must needed reform to increase transparency and efficiency
• Secure the tenure of officers at DGP level
• Implement Lokpal to oversee functioning of CBI

• Increased Manpower and Capital infusion is as necessary as the above.
• The modernization of forces with keeping them abreast with changing crime dynamics like cybercrimes, use of technology followed by adequate training to execute is very necessary as suggested by ARC.
• International collaboration for better intelligence gathering and best practices from INTERPOL and others will enhance their capacity.

There has been a call for SMART police. Besides the above said reforms, Police forces need to adapt and show temperament in setting themselves as examples to win back the trust of people.

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Q.7 )  In what ways has urbanization in cities affected the rural migrants in India? What steps need to be taken to preserve cultural & social values of rural migrants in cities?

http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/hsaQJmzFMas9VpkkDMkqSK/Do-rural-migrants-favour-class-or-caste-in-the-city.html

Urbanization refers to the population shift from rural to urban areas which is the gradual increase in the proportion of people living in urban areas. It has influenced the rural-urban dynamics of migration patterns.

Urbanization in cities has been happening at a rapid pace and has affected the rural migrants in the following ways:

• Most of the migrants have temporarily relocated their families to the city. Instead, they circulate between village and city several times a year. Such circular migrants are an important population in India, with estimates suggesting they number between 60 million and 90 million.
• Absence of systematic information, portrayals of these communities premised on stereotypes or anecdotes.
• Most migrant communities are assumed to replicate village society in the city, and stay tightly wedded to their caste communities.
• They are moulded into adopting class-based identities and attitudes practically upon arrival.
• The competition has manifested in the practice of wage-cutting, where one migrant undercuts another to gain employment from prospective employers at labour chowks.
• The caste and region has shaped migrant preferences for political candidates running in destination city elections, and in their rural regions of origin. 

Steps need to be taken to preserve cultural & social values of rural migrants in cities:

• Through TRIFED, MG BUNKAR Yojana, the indigenous artisanship and craftsmanship of local rural migrants can be promoted.
•  Affordable rural housing through Housing For All scheme needs to be incorporated.
• Schemes like Stand Up India should cater to the rural entrepreneur demands and aspirations of rural women and youth.
• Civil society and young volunteers from cities can be engaged to bring about the social values of these rural migrants and generate awareness of various government schemes.
• Skill training and upgradation through Skill India Mission should reach them.
• Cluster based approach to rural urban development can be adopted.

Though growing population is urban areas is a big challenge and initiatives to arrest this growth is utmost important, preserving social and cultural values of rural migrants is equally important. An integrated approach towards this issue besides the steps mentioned will go a long way in addressing this natural process of migration.

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Q.8 ) “An incremental, technology-neutral approach to the adoption of electric vehicles is the way forward for Automobile Sector in India” Comment.

https://www.civilsdaily.com/hybrid-electric-vehicle-2/

Introduction:

• The automobile industry is one of the key drivers that boost the economic growth of the country. Increasing number of vehicles which uses fossil fuels as energy poses threat to environment as they release harmful gases which cause many health hazards. Vehicular emissions have been identified as one of the important reason for climate change in recent time. To deal with the situation, Government has adopted various measures such as shifting from BS 4 to BS 6 by 2020, NeMP, FAME-India etc.
• In this regard Technology neutral approach for the adoption of electric run vehicles seems to be the another milestone remedy to effectively deal with the environmental problems apart from addressing various other issues.

Electric Vehicles in India:

• In order to promote the use of hybrid vehicles Union Government has launched Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric Vehicles (FAME)-India Scheme. This is simply supporting the hybrid or electric vehicles market development and its manufacturing eco-system in the country in order to achieve self sustenance in stipulated period.
• Hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) are powered by an internal combustion engine or other propulsion source that can run on conventional or alternative fuel in combination with an electric motor that uses energy stored in a battery. HEVs combine the benefits of high fuel economy and low tail pipe emissions with the power and range of conventional vehicles.

Advantages of Electric Vehicle:

• Environment Friendly: One of the biggest advantages of Electrical vehicle over gasoline powered vehicle is that it runs cleaner and has better gas mileage which makes it environment friendly.
• Employment Generation: India went through a radical transformation from a minor manufacturer of automobiles to the fastest growing auto-hub within a short span. This has contributed towards huge employment generation by providing direct and indirect employment to 32 million people with an annual turnover of nearly 6,00,000 crore rupees.
• Less dependence on Fossil Fuels: A Hybrid car is much cleaner and requires less fuel to run which means less emissions and less dependence on fossil fuels. This in turn also helps to reduce the price of gasoline in domestic market.
• Built From Light Materials: Electric Vehicles are made up of lighter materials which mean less energy is required to run. The engine is also smaller and lighter which also saves much energy.
• Financial Benefits: Electric Vehicles are supported by many credits and incentives that help to make them affordable. Lower annual tax bills and exemption from congestion charges comes in the form of less amount of money spent on the fuel.
• Higher Resale Value: With continuous increase in price of gasoline, more and more people are turning towards hybrid cars. The result is that these green vehicles have started commanding higher than average resale values.

However, certain disadvantages are also associated with Electric vehicle which becomes important to deal in order to promote its use in India:

• Adequate Charging Points: The government will have to ensure that adequate charging points are available at every reach.
• Meeting the demand: The government would have to ensure that it meets the demand that is created by this mechanism. Hence, more electricity generating sources will have be developed with the availability of electricity all the time.
• Cost: The high cost associated would this will have to be garnered. Issuing municipal bonds for this can be of great help.
• Presence of High Voltage in Batteries: In case of an accident, the high voltage present inside the batteries can prove lethal. There is a high chance of you getting electrocuted in such cases which can also make the task difficult for rescuers to get other passengers and driver out of the car.

Conclusion:

• In order to promote Electrical Vehicle use and its production in India, the Government needs to push more aggressively for the Pure Electric Vehicle which uses energy stored in batteries obtained from the grid and support the full range of electric technologies for other vehicle segments with a clear roadmap for the evolution towards Fuel Cell Vehicles (FCVs).
• Hopefully, to reduce fossil fuel consumption, lower pollution and encourage electric mobility, a more holistic approach needs to be adopted by the government.

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Q. 9 ) Kigali agreement on phasing down climate-damaging HFCs is one of the historic steps in global fight against climate change. Discuss the significance of this agreement. Do you think India will be a beneficiary of this agreement? Examine.

https://www.civilsdaily.com/kigali-agreement-prospects-and-issues/

Hints:

• Kigali is a capital city of a tiny African country Rwanda where world leaders have gathered on Oct 15, 2016 in order to sign an amendment to Montreal Protocol which came to be known as the Kigali Agreement.
• As per the agreement, 197 UN member countries expected to reduce the manufacture and use of Hydro-fluoro-carbons (HFCs) (Potential Green House Gas) by roughly 80-85% from their respective baselines till 2045.
• HFCs are world’s fastest growing green house gas largely used in refrigerants in home and car air conditioners. HFCs tap thousands of times more heat in the Earth’s atmosphere than carbon dioxide (CO2).
• This proved to be an historic agreement where phase down is expected to arrest the global average temperature rise up to 0.5 degrees C by 2100.

Significance of Kigali Agreement:

• Montreal Protocol initially conceived only to plug gases that were destroying the ozone layer, but now the latest Kigali agreement includes gases responsible for global warming including HFCs.
• Paris agreement that will come into force by 2020 doesn’t legally bind countries to their promises to cut emissions but the currently amended Montreal Protocol will bind countries to their HFC reduction schedules from 2019.
• There are also penalties for non-compliance as well as clear directives that developed countries provide enhanced funding support estimated at billions of dollars globally.
• Grants for research and development of affordable alternatives to hydro-fluoro-carbons will be the most immediate priority.
• This agreement along with the recently ratified Paris agreement pushes countries to cap global warming to “well below 2 degrees Celsius” by 2100.
• Kigali Agreement has shown a considerable flexibility in approach while setting phase-down targets for different economies accommodating their developmental aspirations, different socio-economic compulsions, and scientific & technological capabilities.

How it benefits India?

• With Developed nations agreeing to cut 70 per cent of their HFC use by 2029, India will start reducing its HFC consumption when the developed countries would have reduced their consumption by 70 per cent. Thus giving sufficient time for India to phase out HFCs.
• The Agreement upholds the principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities and Respective Capabilities, which means the agreement recognizes the development imperatives of high-growth economies like India, and provides a realistic and viable roadmap for its implementation.
• With the recent agreement, India gets to participate in a positive global climate action, while gaining time to allow its heating, ventilation and air-conditioning sectors to grow and refrigerant manufacturers to find a comfortable route to transition and cost of alternatives to fall. Analysts also concluded that Kigali agreement is fair to the realities of India’s future economic development.

However, there remain certain challenges towards realization of this goal such as:

• Financial implications: Industries have to either invest in R & D to find out the substitutes for HFCs or they have to buy patented substances and technologies from other MNCs. Consequently, the cost of production will increase which may ultimately shrink the buyer base for their products.
• Technological implications: Some of the developed nations have already started using substitutes of HFCs in their products and have a sound technological knowledge about their use. Without technology transfer or research, it would be difficult for domestic industries to compete with them in global as well as domestic market.

Conclusion:

• There is no doubt that the Kigali agreement on phasing down climate-damaging HFCs is one of the historic steps in global fight against climate change. It will play substantial role in holding global temperature rise below 2°C by 2100 as agreed in Paris agreement.
• Similarly the deal would provide a mechanism for countries like India to access and develop technologies that leave a low carbon footprint. The deal keeps the Paris agreement on track and along with a new deal to cap aviation emissions, it is overwhelmingly positive.

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Q.10) It is commented that success of UDAN scheme will depend on proper implementation and traffic demand/load factors. Critically comment.

https://www.civilsdaily.com/udan-scheme-opportunities-and-challenges/

Hints:

• The Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik (UDAN) Scheme is an endeavour to make regional air connectivity easy. It aims to stimulate regional connectivity with flights covering distances up to 800 km through a market based mechanism.
• The scheme is a component of the National Civil Aviation Policy (NCAP) which was released on June 15, 2016, aims at making flying affordable by capping fares at Rs. 2500 per seat per hour. Airfare for a 1-hour journey of approximately 500 km on a fixed wing aircraft or for 30 minute journey on a helicopter would be capped at Rs. 2,500.
• A major reason for the poor regional air connectivity in India is that airlines do not find it lucrative to operate from small cities. The government has tried to address this concern by an adroit combination of subsidies and fare caps.

Criticisms:

• UDAN is a market-based policy intervention that builds on similar programmes in the US, Canada and Australia. It is also consistent with universal service approaches established for other network-based services such as railways and telecom. The aviation business has high operating costs, which include aircraft, capital charges, airport charges, cabin crew, fuel and maintenance.
• Unless there is sufficient air traffic, airlines will not be able to generate necessary revenues to cover their operating costs and recover their cost of capital. It is self-evident that airlines will not fly unprofitable routes.
• In order to compensate the losses born by the aviation company, the government will provide subsidy in the form of Viability Gap Funding. There is no strict mechanism to put on effective check on this VGF and the chances of mismanagement seem to high. This will further cost on the government exchequer increasing fiscal burden in the time of economic stress.
• Providing regional air connectivity is an important policy goal for the government. Such services deliver a host of benefits by fulfilling latent consumer demand for convenient travel, making businesses and trade more efficient, unlocking India’s tourism potential, enabling fast medical service and promoting national integration.
• Moreover, building connections to tier-2 and tier-3 cities also generates powerful network effects with many regional passengers transferring on to the national aviation network between tier-1cities. However, this requires huge infrastructural development and at the same time proper security system for effective traffic management and also is a time consuming process.
• One of the biggest challenges in developing regional routes is the lack of depth in the market, translating into low load factors.
• Also, there is no mechanism to monitor the beneficiary for using UDAN scheme. This will also affect other flights which are already under operation in a specific route in terms of number of passenger, traffic congestion and competition etc.
• The schemes finances and supports airlines only for three years under the perception that within three years the routes will become sustainable. It also does not consider the hike in oil prices within three years and Airline’s high levy of Air Turbine Fuel is also an area of concern.

Conclusion:

• UDAN will jump start regional air connectivity and strengthen the overall aviation network at a modest market-discovered price. Passengers will benefit from enhanced air services, airlines will see more traffic on their metro routes and India will gain through faster economic growth and national integration. Thus UDAN will surely be a meaningful contributor to India’s overall transformation.
• However, the success of the scheme is well dependent on various factors and if properly managed, will boost the aviation sector in India within the reach of poor.

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Ethics Questions

Q.11) “Civil Servants should be fully aware to office politics, however they should be minimally concerned with it”. Critically examine the statement.

Civil Servants are expected to work in offices within various organization. For them it is important they should know about office polities so that they know what is going on in the organization. Being aware about the politics gives him a view of the way things are progressing. At the same time, however, it is essential they should not be affected by this politics or make themselves a part of any of the group otherwise it will lead to split within the organization finally leading to decrease in the efficiency of the workers.

It is important the civil servants should make sure that the internal politics of the workers does not affect the work performance of the organization. For this he should strike a balance with the workers. If the civil servants themselves become a part of office politics, it will lead to biasness and the leader showing favour towards a particular group and this will give rise to factionalism and split. So, it is responsibility of the civil servants to make sure that the efficiency of workers does not get affected due to office politics of organization.

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Q.12) There is a popular station House Officer of an urban police station. Under his jurisdiction, several cases of Motor Bike/Scooter theft, mobile phone theft and pickpocket have been reported. Most of these cases have not been properly attended and investigated by thepolice. The citizens are annoyed because of this. The SHO has decided to bring a citizen charter to focus on these issues in a time bound manner.

Suppose you are SHO of the concerned Police Station. Draw out a citizen charter and suggest how you will bring continuous improvement in the charter. Also discuss merits/ demerits of your citizen charter.

Before preparing the citizen charter, detailed discussion could be made with the subordinates and prominent citizens. Having decided upon the priorities, necessary capacity building of the organization including necessary infrastructure, training could have been ensured.

• Citizen charter could be a follows.

1. Name of the office – XYZ Police Station, Delhi
2. Types of services being provided –

(i) Registering of complaints an spot of theft, pickpocketing,etc.

(ii) Action on the complaint to be taken as soon as possible.

(iii) The police department will ensure to cooperate with the citizens to resolve their cases.

3. Detailed information about services- Can be obtained from the reception. Also available on the website.
4. Name /telephone no of Grievance Redressal office – Mr. ‘B’ with telephone no and ‘e’ mail.

(time to be specified) Grievances to be redressed within 3 days.

 

Merit of the Charter – Charter is a modest start through which time bound delivery of service are being promised. Every services are being delivered time bound. Formats and all necessary informations are available both on reception and on organization website. Since subordinates have been consulted while preparing the charter, they will provide assistance in preparing the charter and they will provide all assistance to make it succeed.

Difficulties – since it is time bound delivery of services, hence initially some difficulties are bound to come. There could be large number of grievance petitions and hence the concerned office and other members will have to take necessary extra steps for redressal. Touts and other corrupt people could also work against the charter so that it may fail and their golden days are returned.

Revision and upgrading the charter – After 6 month a third party evaluation by a team comprising of retired officials, citizen groups/people could be done and having satisfied with the result it could be upgraded like online registration of application etc., could be attempted.



 



 

1. Marketing of Agricultural Produce in India: Definition; Role; APMC Act, Model APMC Act, 2003
2. Private and Co-operative Sector in Marketing of Agriculture Produce in India

January 7-14, 2018

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1. Land Tenure System in Pre-Independent India: Zamindari System; Mahalwari System; Ryotwari System
2. Land Reforms in India

 

Land Reforms in India

Definition

Land Reforms usually refers to redistribution of Land from rich to poor. Land reforms include;

• Regulation of Ownership
• Operation, Leasing, sale
• Inheritance of Land

In an agrarian economy like India with massive inequalities of wealth and income, great scarcity and an unequal distribution of land, coupled with a large mass of people living below the poverty line, there are strong economic and political arguments for land reforms.

Due to all these compelling reasons, Land reforms had received top priority by the governments at the time of independence. The Constitution of India left the adoption and implementation of the land reforms to the state governments. This has led to a lot of variations in the implementation of land reforms across states.

Economic Arguments in Favour of Land Reforms

Given these observations, one could make an argument in favour of land reform based not only on equity considerations but also on efficiency considerations. For example, the inverse relationship between farm size and productivity suggests that land reform could raise productivity by breaking (less productive) large farms into several (more productive) small farms. Also, lower productivity under sharecropping suggests that land reform could raise productivity by converting sharecroppers into owner-cultivators.

The Objectives of Land Reforms in India were:

After Independence, attempts had been made to alter the pattern of distribution of land holdings on the basis of four types of experiments, namely;

The Government over the years defined the aim of land reforms to cover the following:

 

The land reforms legislations passed/undertaken by all the state governments mainly covers and converges to the common themes/measures of the following:

Abolishment of Intermediaries

1. It was widely recognised that the main cause of stagnation in the agriculture economy was to a large extent due to exploitative agrarian relations.
2. The Chief instrument of the exploitation were the intermediaries like Zamindars, patronised and promoted by the British government.
3. About 60% of the area under cultivation was under the Zamindari system on the eve of the Independence. The States took the task of abolishing the intermediaries like Zamindars by passing the legislations.
4. The government estimates state that in total during first four Five years Plan, 173 million acres of land was acquired from the intermediaries and two crores tenants were given land to cultivate.
5. Abolition of intermediaries is generally agreed to be one component of land reforms that have been relatively successful. The record in terms of the other components is mixed and varies across states and over time. Landowners naturally resisted the implementation of these reforms by directly using their political clout and also by using various methods of evasion and coercion, which included registering their own land under names of different relatives to bypass the ceiling, and shuffling tenants around different plots of land, so that they would not acquire incumbency rights as stipulated in the tenancy law.
6. The success of land reform has been driven by the political will of specific state administrations, the notable achievers being the left-wing administrations in Kerala and West Bengal.

Tenancy Reforms

Tenancy reforms included the following set of measures:

• Regulation of rent
• Security of tenure
• Ownership rights of tenants

Tenants in India are classified into

• Occupancy Tenants: They enjoy permanent right over land and cannot be evicted easily.
• Tenants at will: They do not enjoy any right over land and can be evicted by the landlords anytime.

Therefore, to protect the tenants at will and subtenants, the tenancy reforms are passed by the various state governments.

Regulation of Rents: Under the British Government, the rents charged was highly exploitative with no sound economics behind it. These highly exploitative rents spelt high misery on the tenants and trapped them into vicious circles of debt and poverty.

To provide relief to the tenants from exploitative rents, the Indian government after independence passed legislations to regulate the rents (maximum limits on rent was fixed) and to reduce the miseries of the tenants.

Security of Tenure: To protect the tenants from arbitrary evictions and to grant them permanent rights over land, legislations had been passed in most states.

Legislations passed by the States has three essential aims; Evictions must not take place except in accordance with the provisions of law; Land may be resumed by the owner, if at all, for the “Personal Cultivation” only; In the event of land taken by the owner, the tenant is assured of a prescribed minimum area.

However, the vague definitions of Tenants Personal Cultivation and landowner under the law made it difficult to implement the tenancy reforms. The rights of resumptions provided in the law combined with the flaws in the definitions of the personal cultivation rendered all tenancies insecure.

Ownership Rights of Tenants: It has been repeatedly emphasised by the government, that the ownership rights of the land should be conferred to the actual cultivator. Accordingly, most states have passed legislations to transfer ownership rights to the tenants.

However, the success of the states in conferring the rights to the tenants varied widely. Some states like West Bengal, Kerala and Karnataka, has performed exceptionally well in this regard. In West Bengal due to the “Operation Barga” maximum sharecroppers were given ownership of land.

Land Ceilings

Land Ceiling on agriculture land means a statutory maximum limit on the quantity of land which an individual may hold. The imposition of the Land ceiling has two main aspects:

• Ceiling on future acquisitions.
• Ceilings on existing land holdings.

By 1961-62, ceiling legislation had been passed in all the States. The levels vary from State to State and are different for food and cash crops. In Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, for example, the ceiling on existing holding is 40 acres and 25 acres. In Punjab, it ranges from 27 acres to 100 acres, in Rajasthan 22 acres to 236 acres and in Madhya Pradesh 25 acres to 75 acres.

In order to bring about uniformity, a new policy was evolved in 1971. The main features were:

1. Lowering of ceiling to 28 acres of wetland and 54 acres of unirrigated land
2. Change over to the family rather than the individual as the unit for determining land holdings lowered ceiling for a family of five.
3. Fewer exemptions from ceilings.
4. Retrospective application of the law for declaring Benami transactions null and void,
5. No scope to move the court on the ground of infringement of fundamental rights.

Why was Land Ceiling needed?

The Argument against Land Ceiling

Land Consolidation

Land Consolidation means merging of multiple consolidated farms and giving it to each farmer. The measure is adopted to solve the problem of land fragmentation. The Land consolidation program required granting of one consolidated land to the farmer, which is equal to the total land holdings in different scatters under the farmer possession. It simply means instead of holding multiple small lands in different places; the farmer will be given a single big piece of land.

Why the Program Failed?

• The programme failed to achieve its desired objective because the farmers are reluctant to exchange their lands for the new one. The arguments given by the farmers is that there existing land is much more fertile and productive than the new land provided under land consolidation.
• The farmers also complained about nepotism and corruption in the process of consolidation. The farmers complained that the rich and influential often bribes and manage to get fertile and well-situated land, whereas the poor farmers get unfertile land.

Cooperative Farming

Cooperative farming is advocated to solve the problem of sub-divisions of land holdings. The idea was to make farming profitable for small and marginal farmers having small pieces of land.

Under Cooperative Farming setup farmers having very small holdings come together and join hands to pool their lands for the purpose of cultivation. Pooling of farms helps in increasing production, and the farmers can have more produce to sell in the markets after taking out their subsistence need.

Cooperative farming also helps in mechanisation of agriculture as the owner of the multiple small farms can pool their money to buy a mechanical tractor or other equipment’s which they could not afford otherwise.

Arguments in favour of Cooperative Farming

 

Land Tenure System in Pre-Independent India

At the time of independence, there were three major types of land tenure systems prevailing in the country. The basic difference in these systems was regarding the mode of payment of land revenue.

Zamindari System	Mahalwari System	Ryotwari System
Under the Zamindari system, the land revenue was collected from the farmers by the intermediaries known as Zamindars.	Under the Mahalwari system, the land revenue was collected from the farmers by the village headmen on behalf of the whole village.	Under the Ryotwari system, the land revenue was paid by the farmers directly to the state.
Zamindari system was started by the Imperialist East India Company in 1793.	In this system, the entire village is converted into one big unit called ‘Mahal’ and treated as one unit as far as payment of land revenue is concerned.	In this system, the Individual cultivator called Ryot had full rights regarding sale, transfer, and leasing of the land. The ryots could not be evicted from his land as long as he pays the rent.
Lord Cornwallis entered into ‘Permanent Settlement’ with the landlords with a view to increase land revenue. Under this arrangement, the landlords were declared as zamindars with full proprietorship of the land. The Zamindars were made responsible for the collection of the rent.	Mahalwari system was popularised by Lord William Bentinck in Agra and Awadh. It was later extended to Madhya Pradesh and Punjab. The responsibility of collecting and depositing the rent lied with the village headmen.	In this system, the responsibility of paying the rent lies with the individual cultivator called “Ryot”. There exist no intermediaries between the government and the individual cultivator.
The share of the government in the total rent collected by the zamindars was kept at 10/11th, and the balance going to zamindars.	The Mahalwari system is found to be less exploitative than the Zamindari system.	The ryotwari system though appears satisfactory and better than Zamindari and Mahalwari, in reality, the system had several deficiencies. The system was dominated by the mahajans and moneylenders who granted loans to cultivators by mortgaging their land. The moneylenders exploited the cultivators and evicted them from their land in case of loan default.
The system was most prevalent in West Bengal, Bihar, Orrisa, UP, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.	The system was prevalent in Agra, Awadh, Punjab, Orrisa and Madhya Pradesh.	The system was first introduced in Tamil Nadu and later extended to Maharashtra, Berar, East Punjab, Coorg and Assam.

 

1. Farm Subsidies in India: Definition; Working; Need; Negative Impacts
2. Types of Farm Subsidies in Indian Agriculture: Irrigation and Power Subsidies; Fertilizer Subsidy; Seed Subsidy; Credit Subsidy
3. Government Intervention in Indian Agriculture
4. Minimum Support Prices in Indian Agriculture: MSP definition; Working; Issues; Drawbacks; Way Ahead; Buffer Stocks

 

Technology Missions in India

The technological missions in India was initiated in 1987 by the Rajiv Gandhi led Congress government. Rajiv Gandhi had chosen his close aid Sam Pitroda to lead the Mission. The mission had the task to cover five critical area which were considered very important for the development of the Indian economy and society.

The Core Focus areas were:

The sixth goal of Dairy Production was added in the succeeding years.

The Specific Goals of the Technology mission was

 

The Progress Made

Drinking Water: The drinking water mission identified 100,000 problem villages. Research was done, using geohydrological mapping, to determine where to drill new wells, increasing water sources.

Many villages had some water, but did not have access to clean water. Water was tested in labs, and official standards of quality and quantity were established.

The mission also included an effort to educate people how to repair broken pumps when they broke. Before, when pumps broke, they usually stayed broken due to lack of local knowhow. Easy to understand repair manuals were distributed in each of India’s fifteen languages, and later made available online.

Immunization: In 1987, India had the highest amount of polio in the world. The mission met with top immunization experts decided to begin immunizing the country using an oral vaccine. As a live virus vaccine, the oral version had to be refrigerated. They developed a cold chain for handling the vaccines with industrialists to get refrigeration to all parts of India.

The mission also launched India’s polio vaccine production capacity. In 1987, India had zero production capacity. With government backing, they began to study France and Russia’s methods. Several years later, India was producing all of their own vaccines.

25 years later, in 2013, India was declared polio-free.

Literacy: When the Technology Missions began, India’s literacy rate was around 50%. Several hundred million adults were illiterate, most of them women.

The mission had the dual focus of motivating people (adults in particular) to learn, and providing materials and teachers.

Oilseeds: India was importing one billion dollars of cooking oils each year, when large portions of Indian land are well suited to growing oil crops. Farmers did not grow these crops because they found other crops were more profitable. This was causing India costly economic situation.

Their goal was to make farmers see the benefits of planting oilseeds.

Kurian, who handled buffer stocks, described his plan as such: “We move into areas where there is gross exploitation and try to restructure the marketing system so that the small producer is not fleeced by middlemen or the oil kings.”

Once the intervention on oil was complete, India was exporting oil cakes at the rate of 600 million per year.

Telecommunication: The official goal of the telecom mission was to improve service, dependability, and accessibility of telecommunications across the county, including rural areas. This was through indigenous development, local young talent, rural telecom, digital switching networks, local manufacturing and privatization.

Today, India has made maximum progress in providing accessible and cheap telecom services to 924 Million people.

Dairy Farming: The goal of the dairy mission was to develop and implement technologies to improve breeding, animal health, and fodder and milk production.

Today, India is the number one producer of milk in the world.

After the Defeat of Rajiv Gandhi led Congress Government at the centre, the successive governments have transferred the responsibility of each of the core areas to the respective parent ministries.

Technology Missions in Agriculture and Horticulture

National Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture

A Centrally Sponsored Scheme of MIDH has been launched for the holistic development of horticulture in the country during XII Plan. The Scheme, which took off from 2014-15, integrates the ongoing schemes of National Horticulture Mission, Horticulture Mission for North East & Himalayan States, National Bamboo Mission, National Horticulture Board, Coconut Development Board & Central Institute for Horticulture, Nagaland.

 

Horticulture Mission for North East and Himalayan States

HMNEH is a part of Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH), being implemented for overall development of horticulture in NE and Himalayan states. The Mission covers all NE states including Sikkim and Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh & Uttarakhand. The Mission addresses the entire spectrum of horticulture from production to consumption through backward & forward linkages.

 

National Horticulture Mission

A National Horticulture Mission was launched in 2005-06 as a Centrally Sponsored Scheme to promote holistic growth of the horticulture sector through an area based regionally differentiated strategies. The Scheme has
been subsumed as a part of Mission for Integration Development of Horticulture (MIDH) during 2014-15.

 

National Mission on Oilseeds and Palm Oil

NMOOP envisages increase in production of vegetable oils sourced from oilseeds, oil palm & tree borne oilseeds. The Mission is implemented through three Mini Missions (Oilseeds, Oil Palm & TBOs) with specific targets.

The strategy includes increasing Seed Replacement Ratio with focus on varietal replacement; increasing irrigation coverage; diversification of area from low yielding cereals; intercropping; use of fallow land; expansion of cultivation in watersheds & wastelands; increasing availability of quality planting materials; enhancing procurement of oilseeds and collection & processing of TBOs.

 

Technology Mission on Coconut

The Mission was launched to converge & synergize all the efforts through integration of existing programs & address the problems and bridge the gaps through appropriate programs in mission mode to ensure adequate, appropriate, timely & concurrent action to make coconut farming competitive & to ensures reasonable returns.

 

Technology Mission on Oilseeds, Pulses and Pulses

The Mission was launched 1986 to increase the production of oilseeds to reduce import and achieve self-sufficiency in edible oils. Subsequently, pulses, oil palm & maize were also brought within the purview of the Mission.

Schemes under TMOP are:

• Oilseeds Production Program
• National Pulses Development Project
• Accelerated Maize Development Program
• Post-Harvest Technology
• Oil Palm Development Program
• National Oilseeds and Vegetable Oil Development Board

 

National Livestock Mission

The Mission covers all activities required to ensure improvement in livestock production systems & capacity building of all stakeholders. It covers everything for improvement of livestock productivity & support projects & initiatives subject to condition that such initiatives cannot be funded under other Centrally Sponsored Schemes

It has 4 Sub-Missions:

1. Livestock Development;
2. Pig Development in NE Region;
3. Feed & Fodder Development; and
4. Skill Development, Technology Transfer & Extension
5. Technology Mission on Cotton.

The aims of the Mission are: to improve the yield and quality of cotton; to increase the income of cotton growers by reducing the cost of cultivation & by increasing the yield; to improve the quality of processing of cotton.

It had four Mini Missions-

I: Cotton Research and Technology Generation;

II: Transfer of Technology and Development;

III: Development of Market Infrastructure;

IV: Modernization / Setting up of new G&P factories

Technology Mission on Literacy

National Digital Literacy Mission

The Digital Saksharta Abhiyan (DISHA) or National Digital Literacy Mission (NDLM) Scheme has been formulated to impart IT training to 52.5 lakh persons, including Anganwadi & ASHA workers and authorised ration dealers in
all the States/UTs so that non-IT literate citizens become IT literate so as to enable them to actively & effectively participate in the democratic and developmental process and also enhance their livelihood.

 

National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology

NMEICT has been envisaged as a Centrally Sponsored Scheme to leverage the potential of ICT in teaching and learning process for the benefit of all the learners in higher education institutions in any time anywhere mode.
​It has two major components: providing connectivity, along with provision for access devices to institutions & learners; & content generation.

 

Nano Technology Mission

The Government of India, in 2007, approved the launch of a Mission on Nano Science & Technology (Nano Mission) with an allocation of Rs. 1000 crore for 5 years.

The Department of Science and Technology is the nodal agency for implementing the Nano Mission. Capacity-building in this area of research will be of utmost importance for the Nano Mission so that India emerges as a global knowledge-hub in this field.

Other important Technological Missions

Technology Missions on Indian Railways

TMIR is a consortium of Ministry of Railways, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Ministry of Science and Technology and Department of Heavy Industry  on an investment sharing model for taking up identified railway projects for applied research and use on Indian Railways.

It will also monitor progress of research projects of the existing Railway Research Centre, Kharagpur & other 4 upcoming Railway Research Centres sanctioned in Budget 2015-16. Thus, Railways’ investment in applied research activities will be fruitfully converted to technology development for actual use in railway working.

 

Technology Mission on Railway Safety

A Technology Mission has been launched to focus attention and drive modern technologies of monitoring, control, communications, design, electronics and materials for railway safety. It will help to initiate and incubate design & development projects of significant national importance.

Its objective is to develop & adopt state-of-the-art safety, control and design technologies defined by needs related to Indian conditions. It will formulate and implement projects aimed towards achieving higher throughput, lower cost of transmission per unit & safer train movement.

 

Technology Mission on Technical Textiles

The Mission was announced in 2007 to address the “major constraints for improving production & consumption of technical textiles”.

In 2008-09, 4 Centres of Excellence were set up to catalyse industry support & build capacity in the area of Geotech (geotextiles used in civil engineering applications), Protech (personal & property protective clothing), Meditech (medical textiles) and Agrotech (specialized agriculture use).

Technology Mission on Water and Clean Energy

Water Technology Initiative Program

It was initiated in August 2007 aims to promote R&D activities aimed at providing safe drinking water at affordable cost and in adequate quantity using appropriate Science and Technology interventions evolved through indigenous efforts.

Since quality is the main consideration of safe drinking water, processes which imply nano-material and filtration technologies have been focused.

The initiative also includes the pilot testing of credible number of products and referencing of selected technologies to the social context of the application region.
In pursuance of directives of Hon’ble Supreme Court, Technology Mission on Winning, Augmentation and Renovation (WAR) for Water has been launched in August 2009 to undertake research-led solutions, through a coordinated approach, to come out with technological options for various water challenges in different parts of the country.

Aims and Objectives

This pro-active India – centric ‘solution science’ endeavour aims to strengthen the R&D capacity and capability to develop the technological solutions for existing and emerging water challenges facing the country.

1. Promote national and collaborative developmental Research to address prevalent and emerging water challenges
2. Capacity building of research professionals and water managers
3. Evolve methodology for development of customised solutions suited to social context
4. Develop synergies with line departments at Central/ State level for last mile connectivity of the research findings
5. Evolve S&T based sustainable models with industry and recommend appropriate policy inputs
6. Conduct techno- economic-social analysis of technologies and their suitability in specific context
7. Support Impact Assessment Studies/ development of Research Packages/ Technology Status Reports and other documentation required by different users/ agencies
8. Upscaling and Replication of technologies/ solutions to credible scale.

 

Scope and Thrust Areas

This demand oriented user centric initiative includes development research in laboratories as well as application research in field.

The scope of initiative covers the entire value chain of R&D right from water oriented basic and applied research, pre competitive technology development , technology based classification & assessment of technology options, pilot-demonstration of technology leads from laboratories and academic institutions assessment of available technology options to evolve a basket of technology options and mounting of technically, socially, environmentally and eventually affordable convergent solutions based on evolving, novel as well as known technologies suited to socio-economic context.

It also envisages to nurture enabling activities such as human and institutional capacity building such as fellowships for researchers, training of water managers to enable identify and select most appropriate technology option, promoting centers of excellence for water research and nurturing nascent water technologies for last mile connectivity etc.

The thrust areas for initiative dynamically evolve based on need for technology based solution from the users, requirement of R&D inputs by stakeholders, assessment of S&T requirements to enable achieve technology prowess in water sector etc. The thrust areas specific to call for proposals are articulated in call document uploaded on DST website periodically.

Clean Energy Research Initiative

It was initiated in January, 2009 the initiative aims to develop national research competence to drive down the cost of clean energy through pre-competitive translational research, oriented research led disruptive innovations & human and institutional capacity development.

Aims and Objectives

CERI has been envisaged to –

1. Support upstream end of research, where knowledge, more advanced than the current practice in the industry must have a space.
2. Develop India centric innovations developed around user needs and forge collaboration between industry and academics as much as possible and gain value for such collaborations.
3. To develop critical mass of researchers to meet requirement of R&D professionals for clean energy.

Scope and Thrust Areas

The scope of initiative includes support for solar oriented fundamental research for solar devices, sub-systems and systems. The initiative supports feasibility assessment of fresh ideas/ concepts, including various emerging and disruptive technologies, for their potential conversion into useful technology/ product.

The envisaged thrust areas are –

• Solar energy materials
• Solar energy devices (for user direct load applications)
• Storage devices
• Power electronics for grid synchronization
• Capacity building to create critical mass for solar energy research
• Development of systems/ subsystems for solar photovoltaic, solar thermal, storage smart energy grid and building energy efficiency.
• Convergent Solar thermal technology solutions (25 kw to 1 MW)
• Convergent Solar Photo Voltaic Technology solutions
• Any other topic, considered to be of relevance to country needs.

 

Targeted PDS in India

PDS began as a Universal Programme in India due to food shortages of the mid 1960’s. But, since 1997 it has been exclusively targeted towards the poor, providing Wheat, Rice, Sugar and Kerosene at a highly subsidised to the below poverty line households.

The objective was to help very poor families buy food grains at a reasonably low cost to enable them to improve their nutrition standards and attain food security. The new system followed a two-tier subsidised pricing structure: one for BPL families, and another for Above the Poverty Line (APL) families.

How Cheap Food Grains ensure Nutritional Security?

In both the cases, whether Substitution dominates or the Income effect dominates, the end result will be an increase in calories intake by consumer’s and reduction in nutritional deficiencies.

Note for Students:

In order to make Targeted PDS more effective the Government had launched the Antyodaya Anna Yojana in December 2000.

Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY): The objective of the scheme was to identify the poorest households among the BPL category and to provide each of them with the following:

• Total 25 KG of food grains per month @ fixed price of RS 2 per KG for Wheat and RS 3 Per KG for Rice.

Individuals in the following priority groups are entitled to an AAY card, including:

1. landless agricultural labourers,
2. marginal farmers,
3. rural artisans/craftsmen such as potters and tanners,
4. slum dwellers,
5. persons earning their livelihood on a daily basis in the informal sector such as porters, rickshaw pullers, cobblers,
6. destitute,
7. households headed by widows or terminally ill persons, disabled persons, persons aged 60 years or more with no assured means of subsistence, and
8. all primitive tribal households.

The Food Corporation of India (FCI) is the nodal agency at the centre that is responsible for transporting food grains to the state godowns. Specifically, FCI is responsible for:

1. procuring grains at the MSP from farmers,
2. maintaining operational and buffer stocks of grains to ensure food security,
3. allocating grains to states,
4. distributing and transporting grains to the state depots,
5. selling the grains to states at the central issue price to be eventually passed on to the beneficiaries.

Important Prices Related to the PDS

How to Strengthen the Public Distribution System.

Aadhaar Based Enrolment.

The key problem in the efficient functioning of the PDS is the inclusion errors and the exclusion errors. Aadhaar cards could be used to identify the real poor households, thereby eliminating the inclusion errors. The use of Aadhar would also help in eliminating the duplicate and ghost beneficiaries.

Use of E-Technology and ICT.

Technology based reforms would help in reducing the leakages. The current system of manual recording the beneficiary is prone to corruption and tampering. The computerisation of records will resolve this problem. The end-to-end computerisation could curb large-scale diversion of grains to the open markets and help track the delivery of food grains from state depots to beneficiaries.

Technology based reforms undertaken by States:

Removing the Urban Bias.

It has been found that most of the Ration shops are situated in the urban areas of cities rather than the backward areas and slums, where most of the people poor live. The poor often have to travel miles to procure their quota of grains. The situation of Ration shops in the Urban centres also increase the risk of inclusion errors as urban middle class have a strong incentive to enrol themselves in the local Ration shops. If the ration shops are restricted to slums than the urban middle class will find it difficult to travel to slums to buy grains. Thereby eliminating the wrongful inclusions.

Choice of Commodities sold.

The PDS in India provides cereals like Wheat and Rice to the poor. However, various studies have found that the poor generally prefers coarse grains like ragi, maize, Jowar and Bajra. These cereals are not only rich in carbohydrates and protein but are also less consumed by the rich and urban middle class. If coarse cereals are sold in the PDS shops, then the rich will automatically stop using ration shops. Thereby eliminating the inclusion problem.

Decentralisation of the PDS.

The current system of centralised PDS where the centre procures the grain and then distribute it to each state is highly inefficient. The centralised PDS further adds to the unbearable administrative cost of transporting the grains from FCI to the state depots. It would be better if the states are given the power to procure and distribute grains on their own at the MSP and CIP decided by the centre.

Alternative to the PDS

Universal PDS:

Under the Universal PDS the grains are provided to every household of the state irrespective of the income level. The non-classification of the households eliminates the risk of inclusion and exclusion errors. It also reduced the cost of running the scheme as it reduced the administrative cost of identifying the poor and cost of monitoring the scheme.

Food Coupons:

Food Coupons are another alternative to PDS. Beneficiary are provided with food coupons which are equivalent to money. The food coupons are used to buy grains from local markets and grocery stores.

Retailers or grocery shop owners take these coupons to the local bank and are reimbursed with money. According to the Economic Survey 2009-10 reports, such a system will reduce administrative costs. Food coupons also decrease the scope for corruption since the store owner gets the same price from all buyers and has no incentive to turn the poor buyers away. Moreover, BPL customers have more choice; they can avoid stores that try to sell them poor-quality grain.

Direct Benefit Transfer:

DBT provides for cash transfers to the poor. Under DBT, beneficiaries will be given money by the government in their respective bank accounts which can be used to but grains from the open markets. Under the DBT system the government will provide money directly to the target group usually poor households. The identification of the poor households are much easier under the DBT system, since the bank accounts are linked with Aadhaar and can be easily monitored.

Some of the potential advantages of these programmes include: (i) reduced administrative costs, (ii) expanded choices for beneficiaries, and (iii) competitive pricing among grocery stores.

• In PDS leakage arises due to ghost ration cards. Under DBT “the identity of a person is known and ration cards will be Aadhaar-verified, due to which, only the right beneficiaries will get the subsidy.
• The savings from DBT on food subsidy is expected to be much larger than that for LPG. According to budget estimates, India’s food subsidies for the 2015-16 will be Rs.1.24 trillion. So, if government manages to save 40% of the subsidy, it will be around Rs.50,000 crore annually.
• The saved money could be invested by Government in Infrastructure, health or education where social returns would be much higher.
• Usually the PDS grains are of inferior quality. DBT would ensure that the poor families will buy good quality grain from the open market. This would certainly improve the nutritional outcome for the people and will be a step towards equality.
• Currently More than 40% of the foodgrains in PDS are diverted to open markets. High diversion of PDS items, pilferage, transport cost ,administration cost and graft issues would be avoided under DBT.
• Providing subsidies directly to the poor would both bypass brokers as well as reduce the waste and holding costs of storing grains in government silos.
• Cash transfers would help reduce fiscal deficit by curbing expenditures earmarked for the PDS that are siphoned off through corruption, as well as avoiding substantially higher costs of transferring food rather than cash.
• DBT system Respects the autonomy of beneficiaries and ensures that the person has choice in terms of spending the money in-accordance with his priorities and cultural preferences.
• DBT will ensure that Ensures that the inefficient and corruption-prone procurement regime of government is done away.

Some issues with the DBT:

• Cash transfers may expose recipients to price fluctuation, if they are not frequently adjusted for inflation.
• Additionally, since cash transfers include the transfer of money directly to the beneficiary, poor access to banks and post offices in some areas may reduce their effectiveness.
• It is also possible for people to spend cash transfers not on more nutritious food, as proponents suggest, but instead on non-food items, which would decrease the amount of household money left for buying food.

Advantages of PDS and DBT: A Comparison

Disadvantage of PDS and DBT: A Comparison

The National Food Security Act

The NFSA was passed in the Parliament in the year 2013, the NFSA seeks to provide the food to all individuals by making it a statutory right.

A comparison of existing TDPS and NFSA

Scope	TPDS	NFSA
Legal Status	An Anti-Poverty Programme with no legal backing.	Passed by the Parliament with the statutory backing for “Right to Food”.
Coverage	Restricted to the Poor BPL Households. APL families can get grains from ration shops but not at subsidised prices.	Up to 75% of the rural population and 50% of the Urban population are included. Total coverage is 67.5% of all Population.
Categorisation	AAY households, BPL Families and APL families.	AAY Households, Priority Households and Excluded Households.
Entitlements	BPL and AAY: 35 KG/FAMILY/MONTH. APL: 15-35 KG/Family/Month	Priority HHs: 5 KG/Person/Month AAY HHs: 35 KG/Family/Month
Prices	AAY HHs: RS 3/KG of Rice RS 2/KG of Wheat RS 1/KG of Coarse Grains	All Categories: RS 3/KG of Rice RS 2/KG of Wheat RS 1/KG of Coarse Grains
Identification	Cooperative Structure with Centre creating identifying criteria for the poor household using poverty and consumption estimates. States are responsible for identifying eligible households.	Cooperative Structure with Centre realising the state wise estimates of the household to be covered under the NFSA. States are responsible for creating criteria and identifying eligible households.
Role of Centre and State	Centre: Procurement at MSP and Distribution and Transportation through FCI. State: Delivery of grains to final beneficiaries through ration shops.	Centre & State: Some provisions are same as with TPDS. Except that centre will provide food security allowances to states to pass on to the beneficiaries. State and Centre are not responsible to supply food grains during the time of natural calamities like flood and drought.
Grievances	States are responsible for monitoring and vigilance at district and block level.	District grievances redressal officers will be appointed; Establishment of the State Food Commissioners; Vigilance committees at district and block levels.