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  • RBI Notifications

    Cryptocurrency & India

    op-ed snap | Science Tech | Mains Paper 3: Awareness in various sc and tech fields,Indian Economy

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Blockchain technology

    Mains level: Paper 3- Adopting and regulating cryptocurrencies

    The article highlights the need for coherent cryptocurrency policy and avoid missing the benefits offered by the technology.

    Growing dominance of cryptocurrencies

    • Created by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008, Bitcoin is the most popular cryptocurrency.
    • It is a fully decentralised, peer-to-peer electronic cash system that didn’t need the purview of any third-party financial institution.
    • The Bitcoin, which traded at just $ 0.0008 in 2010, commanded a market price of just under $65,000 this April.
    • Many newer coins were introduced since Bitcoin’s launch, and their cumulative market value touched $ 2.5 trillion this May.
    • Within a span of just over a decade, their value has surpassed the size of economies of most modern nations.
    •  The “cryptomarket” grew by over 500 per cent, even while the pandemic unleashed global economic carnage not seen since the Great Depression.
    • China’s recent crackdown on cryptocurrency had far-reaching consequences.
    • An astounding trillion US dollars were wiped out from the global cryptomarket within a span of 24 hours.
    • This kind of  volatility mentioned above has always been a concern for regulators and investors alike.

    India’s approach

    • Law enforcement and taxation agencies have called for a ban, expressing concerns over cryptocurrencies being used as instruments for illicit activities, including money laundering and terror funding.
    • In 2018, the Reserve Bank barred our financial institutions from supporting crypto transactions — but the Supreme Court overturned it in 2020.
    • Yet, Indian banks still block these transactions, and the government has circulated a draft bill outlawing all cryptocurrency activities, which has been under discussion since 2019.
    • The Reserve Bank has announced the launch of a private blockchain-supported official digital currency, similar to the digital Yuan.
    • India is increasingly mimicking China’s paradoxical attempt to centralise a decentralised ecosystem.
    • India is trying to decouple cryptocurrencies from their underlying blockchain technology, and still derive benefit.
    • Unfortunately, this is impractical, and shows a lack of understanding of this disruptive innovation.
    • The funds that have gone into the Indian blockchain start-ups are less than 0.2 per cent of the amount the sector raised globally.
    • The current central government approach makes it near-impossible for entrepreneurs and investors to acquire much economic benefit.

    Need for regulation

    • Regulation is definitely needed to prevent serious problems, to ensure that cryptocurrencies are not misused, and to protect unsuspecting investors from excessive market volatility and possible scams.
    •  However, regulation needs to be clear, transparent, coherent and animated by a vision of what it seeks to achieve.
    • India has not been able to tick these boxes, and we’re in danger of missing out in the global race altogether.

    Way forward

    • Any new regulations made in this sector should prevent the misuse of these digital assets without hindering innovation and investments.
    • Provisions have to be made to route the value extracted from these networks transparently into our financial system.
    • Regulatory uncertainties over India’s position on cryptocurrency highlights the need for clear-headed policy-making.

    Consider the question “India was a late adopter in all the previous phases of the digital revolution be it the semiconductors, the internet or smartphones. Do you think the same is happening again in India’s adoption of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology?”

    Conclusion

    We are currently on the cusp of the next phase, which would be led by technologies like blockchain. We have the potential to channel our human capital, expertise and resources into this revolution, and emerge as one of the winners of this wave. All we need to do is to get our policymaking right.

     

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  • Data is an essential weapon against Covid

    op-ed snap | Science Tech | Mains Paper 3: Awareness in various sc and tech fields

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: `Paper 3- Role of data analytics during pandemic

    The article highlights how data played an important role in decision-making in dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic. 

    Importance of data in decision making

    • The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted globally how important data is to governments in decision-making.
    • Epidemiological data is of paramount significance for targeting and implementing control measures for public health in a timely manner
    • Such data was used effectively in the evidence-based response and decision-making in countries like South Korea.
    • Modern response to pandemics has focused on exploiting all the available data to inform policy action in real time.

    How data analysis helped during pandemic

    • Data analysis has revealed the need for continuous and repeated tracking of case numbers, fatalities and recoveries.
    • The epidemiological concept of flattening the curve and its predictions are results of data analysis and modelling.
    • Understanding testing adequacy or lack thereof allows us to measure our preparedness, prognostic versus diagnostic ability, and shape our responses to identify, manage, and care for new cases.
    • Epidemic outbreak data like case data, medical and treatment data can be used to understand disease pathogenesis and severity.
    • Genome sequencing surveillance helps identify and track viral genome sequence variants in real time and the evolution of the virus.
    •  The concept of open access to various data enables models to improve forecast and study the spread of the disease.’

    Integration and analysis of multiple datatypes

    • The integration and analysis of multiple heterogeneous datatypes eventually would yield a holistic picture.
    • This helps guide policy decisions for control and management of public health.
    • When genome surveillance data is correlated with the magnitude of cases and their outcomes, then we can understand the transmissibility or infectivity of the virus.
    • Geographical mapping of prevalence of mutants allows us to understand viral spread and explain recoveries or deaths in a specific area.
    • The roll out of vaccinations can shape viral evolution and drug-treatment strategies.
    • Surveillance through studying genome sequencing of the virus, coupled to other epidemiological data allows us to identify these connections.

    Challenges

    • Part of the challenge lies in the standardisation of data collection, curation, annotation and the integration of data analytics pipelines for outbreak analytics.

    Way forward

    • Ensuring data availability and quality under operational constraints is critical.
    • The use of data standards instils consistency, reduces errors and enables transparency.
    • Embedded in the idea of data sharing lies the concept of data security and confidentiality.
    • Concerns of privacy and security calls for a systemic infrastructure with built-in safeguards to ensure data encryption while preserving anonymity and ensuring privacy.
    • As our dependence on data-based decisions becomes more and more critical, an urgent charter for standardised digital health data in India is required.

    Consider the question “The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted globally how important data is to governments in decision-making. Explain how data helps in decision making and challenges in evidence-based decision making based on data.”

    Conclusion

    Rational and scientific methods necessitate data without which neither can we have information, nor knowledge or wisdom. Data sharing, and transparency and timely dissemination of data are critical to overcome the pandemic.

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  • Foreign Policy Watch: India-Nepal

    India must engage with Nepal-without intervening

    op-ed snap | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: India & Its Neighborhood – Relations

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: Paper 2- Engage with Nepal without intervening

    The article suggests recalibration of India’s approach towards political turmoil in Nepal.

    Nepal in political crisis

    • For the second time in weeks, Prime Minister K P Oli has persuaded President Bidya Devi Bhandari to dissolve parliament and call for fresh elections.
    • That is, unless the Supreme Court decides to declare the dissolution of parliament as unconstitutional, as it had done in the recent past.
    • The current dissolution has been challenged in the court by five political parties.

    Medhesi demand fulfilled

    • Prime Minister Oli has also delivered on the longstanding Madhesi demand to reverse a constitutional provision which denied citizenship to children born of Nepali mothers who had foreign husbands.
    • The widespread unrest in the Terai adjoining India in 2015 was triggered by this attempt to deny equal rights to the Madhesi population.
    • This provision had directly targeted the Madhesi population, which has close kinship and marital ties across the border with India.
    • While this provision has now been removed through a presidential ordinance, it could well be reversed in future by Nepali political parties dominated by the higher caste.

    Steps India needs to take

    • Political uncertainty in a neighbouring country is never good news for India, particularly in Nepal with whom we share a long and open border.
    • The Indian government has maintained a studied silence on the current political developments in Nepal and this may be the right thing to do.
    • But this silence should not imply the lack of a proper assessment of the political situation in Nepal and what would serve the interests of India best.
    • Following are the steps India need to take:

    1) India should declare it does not support the revival of monarchy

    •  The abolition of the monarchy is a net gain for India and the government must firmly and unambiguously declare that it does not support the revival of the monarchy, which has already been rejected by its people.
    • India should declare its unconditional support to Nepal’s republican democracy.

    2) Remain engaged with Nepal

    • India should remain fully engaged with Nepal at all levels and across the political spectrum.
    • The safeguarding of India’s vital interests demands such sustained engagement.
    • A hands-off policy will only create space for other external influences, some of which, like China, may prove to be hostile.
    • However, engagement must dispense with the recurrent tendency to label Nepali political leaders as friends or enemies.
    • India should advocate policies rather than persons.

    3) Recognise the role of Madhesi population

    • In India’s engagement with Nepal, the Terai belt and its large Madhesi population plays a critical and indispensable role.
    • In an effort to win over the Kathmandu political and social elite, one should be careful not to neglect citizens living in the plains.
    • Our engagement with Nepal must find an important place for Nepali citizens who are our immediate neighbours and act as a kinship, cultural and religious bridge between our two countries.

    4) Appreciate people-to-people link

    • India needs to appreciate that the people-to-people links between our two countries have an unmatched density and no other country, including China, enjoys this asset.
    • The challenge to our Nepal policy lies in leveraging this precious asset to ensure a stable and mutually-productive state-to-state relationship.
    • India has every reason to approach its relations with Nepal with confidence and assurance.

    Consider the question “What are the factors that make India-Nepal relationship special? What are the recent challenges impacting this special relationship? ” 

    Conclusion

    The safeguarding of India’s vital interests demands India’s engagement with Nepal without intervening in its politics. A hands-off policy will only create space for other external influences.

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  • Social Media: Prospect and Challenges

    New IT Rules 2021

    op-ed snap | Science Tech | Mains Paper 3: Social Media Networks & Internal Security

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Provisions of IT Rules 2021

    Mains level: Paper 3- Issues with IT Rules 2021

    The article highlights the issues with the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.

    Important provision made in the IT Rules 2021

    • The Rules mandate duties such as removal of non-consensual intimate pictures within 24 hours.
    • The rules also mandates publication of compliance reports to increase transparency.
    • Rules provides for setting up of a dispute resolution mechanism for content removal.
    • It provides for adding a label to information for users to know whether content is advertised, owned, sponsored or exclusively controlled.

    Issues with the rules

    1) Affects right to free speech and expression

    • The Supreme Court, in the case of Life Insurance Corpn. Of India vs Prof. Manubhai D. Shah (1992) had elevated ‘the freedom to circulate one’s views as the lifeline of any democratic institution’.
    • So, the rules need to be critically scrutinised for the recent barriers being imposed by it.

    2) Violation of legal principles

    • The rules were framed by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeiTY).
    • However, the Second Schedule of the Business Rules, 1961 does not empower MeiTY to frame regulations for digital media.
    • This power belongs to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
    • This action violates the legal principle of ‘colourable legislation’ where the legislature cannot do something indirectly if it is not possible to do so directly.
    • Moreover, the Information Technology Act, 2000, does not regulate digital media.
    • Therefore, the new IT Rules which claim to be a piece of subordinate legislation of the IT Act, goes beyond the rule-making power conferred upon them by the IT Act.
    • This makes the Rules ultra vires to the Act.

    3) Deprives the fair recourse to intermediary

    • An intermediary is now supposed to take down content within 36 hours upon receiving orders from the Government.
    • This deprives the intermediary of a fair recourse in the event that it disagrees with the Government’s order due to a strict timeline.

    4) Privacy violation

    • These Rules undermine the right to privacy by imposing a traceability requirement.
    • The immunity that users received from end-to-end encryption was that intermediaries did not have access to the contents of their messages.
    • Imposing this mandatory requirement of traceability will break this immunity, thereby weakening the security of the privacy of these conversations.
    • This will also render all the data from these conversations vulnerable to attack from ill-intentioned third parties.
    • The threat here is not only one of privacy but to the extent of invasion and deprivation from a safe space.
    • Recent data breach affecting a popular pizza delivery chain and also several airlines highlights the risks involved in such move in the absence of data protection law.
    • Instead of eliminate the fake news, the Rules proceed to hurriedly to take down whatever authority may deem as “fake news”.

    5) Operational cost

    • The Rules create additional operational costs for intermediaries by requiring them to have Indian resident nodal officers, compliance officers and grievance officers.
    • Intermediaries are also required to have offices located in India.
    • This makes profit making a far-fetched goal for multinational corporations and start-up intermediary enterprises.
    • Therefore, not only do these Rules place a barrier on the “marketplace of ideas” but also on the economic market of intermediaries in general by adding redundant financial burdens.

    Consider the question “What are the challenges associated with the social media? How the  Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 will help is dealing with these challenges? What are the issues with these rules?”

    Conclusion

    Democracy stands undermined in direct proportion to every attack made on the citizen’s right. The IT Rules 2021 have tilt towards violation of rights. Therefore, these rules need reconsideration.

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  • Coronavirus – Health and Governance Issues

    Addressing vaccine hesitancy

    op-ed snap | Governance | Mains Paper 2: Health & Education

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: Paper 2- Dealing with vaccine hesitancy

    The article deals with the issue of vaccine hesitancy and its consequences.

    Why vaccinate?

    • The primary purpose of vaccination is to protect individuals against severe infection.
    • Vaccination also protects populations by providing ‘herd immunity’, if done on a large scale.
    • Globally, vaccinations against polio, small pox, meningitis and so on have seen huge success.

    Need to address the vaccine hesitancy

    • The results of a 2020 Gallup poll, conducted before the vaccine roll-out reveals that 18% of the Indian said that they won’t take the vaccine.
    • But vaccine hesitancy has gone up in India since then, due in part to largely overblown reports of complications or even deaths.
    • The consequences of vaccine hesitancy are disastrous.
    • If herd immunity does not develop, disease outbreaks and pandemics will prevail.
    • The slower the vaccination rate, the wider the spread of infection and the greater the chances of mutations and the emergence of new variants.

    Factors driving vaccine hesitancy

    • The influencing factors include a lack of awareness of the extent of benefits.
    • Fears based on inaccurate information.
    • Lack of access to vaccine.
    • Disinformation, especially on social media.
    • Other factors include civil liberty concepts, cost, cultural issues, and various layers of confidence deficit.

    Way forward

    • To allay vaccine fears, our messaging needs to focus on simple facts.
    • Before attempting to persuade people, we need to understand the basis of their fear, hesitancy and the anti-vax attitude.
    •  By challenging untruths, we inadvertently feed the perception that we are actively suppressing the “real” truth.
    • The objective now should be to reach more people faster with a message that doesn’t just provide more science but includes guidance.
    • Providing practical information through social media, alternatives to apps for those lacking easy access to vaccines, and taking the help of well-informed frontline workers will all help.

    Conclusion

    The possibility of a significant number of people not getting vaccinated thwarts our collective ability to reach the herd immunity threshold against Covid-19. Therefore the issue of vaccine hesitancy needs to be urgently addressed.

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  • Goods and Services Tax (GST)

    Fundamental problems facing GST regime

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

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: Paper 3- Fundamental challenges GST regime faces

    The article highlights the fundamental challenges the GST faces in the form of trust erosion and politicisation of decision making in GST Council.

    Initial issues with GST

    • The multiple rates structure, high tax slabs and the complexity of tax filings as the problems underpinning India’s GST.
    • These were indeed the initial problems in the way GST was implemented, leading to some of its current woes.
    • However, technical fixes such as simplification of GST rates and tax filing systems will not succeed in addressing the fundamental problems with GST.

    Fundamental problems

    1) Politics influence the decision of GST Council

    • The 43rd meeting of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council which consists of 31 States and Union Territorie is to be held on May 28.
    • Ideally, political affiliations should not matter in a Council set up to decide indirect taxes.
    • The GST Council was mandated to meet at least once every quarter, but it had not met for two quarters, due to the pandemic.
    • Several of the 14 members of the groups who belong to parties different from the party ruling in the Centre, requested the Finance Minister to convene the GST meeting to help them manage their finances.
    • None of the 17 members of the ruling group deemed it necessary.
    • Even the need for a meeting to determine tax revenues for States is evidently a political decision.

    2) Lack of trust

    • The GST Council is a compact of trust between the States and the Centre, set in the larger context of India’s polity.
    • The tragedy of the GST Council is that it is afflicted with spite and forced to function under the prevailing cloud of politics.
    • If the functioning of the GST Council is subject to the vagaries of elections and consequent vendetta politics, GST will continue to be just a caricature of its initial promise.

    3) Uncertainty after the guarantee of 14% growth ends

    • The States paid a huge price for GST in terms of loss of fiscal autonomy.
    • GST has endured so far primarily because the States were guaranteed a 14% growth in their tax revenues every year.
    • This minimised the risks of this new experiment for the States and compensated for their loss of fiscal sovereignty.
    • This revenue guarantee ends in July 2022.
    • This can lead to a crumbling of the precarious edifice on which GST stands today.

    Consider the question “What are the challenges faced by the States in the GST regime? What would be the impact on States as a guarantee of 14% growth in tax revenue comes to an end in July 2022?” 

    Conclusion

    The end of India’s grand GST experiment seems inevitable unless there is a radical shift in the tone and tenor of India’s federal politics, backed by an extension of revenue guarantee for the States for another five years.

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  • Coronavirus – Economic Issues

    Tackling rural economic distress

    op-ed snap | Governance | Mains Paper 2: Government Scheme/Policies

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: MGNREGS

    Mains level: Paper 2- Need to strengthen the PDS and MGNREGS

    The disruption caused by the second Covid wave has added to the hardship faced by the migrant workers and the rural poor. Dealing with it requires strengthening of  PDS and MGNREGS.

    Distress due to second Covid wave

    • Several States have imposed lockdown amid second Covid wave which will have severe implications for the livelihoods of those in the informal sector.
    • Migrant workers and the rural poor have been facing great distress over the past one year and the crisis for food and work is only going to intensify further.
    • The migrants have again become vulnerable due to the lockdown in different cities.
    • In this context, there is an urgent need to strengthen the public distribution system (PDS) and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS).

    Steps need to be taken

    • The government announced 5 kg free foodgrains for individuals enlisted under the National Food Security Act (NFSA), for May and June 2021.

    1) Changes in PDS

    • Expand coverage: The government should expand PDS coverage immediately and include all eligible households under the schemes.
    • According to an independent study, about 100 million people are excluded from the ration distribution system owing to a dated database based on the 2011 Census.
    • Extend period: The Centre should also extend the free foodgrains programme to a year instead of limiting it to two months.

    2) Expand MGNREGS

    • The Centre had allocated ₹73,000 crore for 2021-22 for MGNREGS and notified an annual increment of about 4% in wages. 
    • Both these provisions are inadequate to match the requirements on the ground.
    • The central allocation for MGNREGS is about ₹38,500 crore less than last year’s revised estimate.
    • The budget for 75-80 days of employment in the year for 6.5 crore families given the current scale of economic distress.
    • By this rationale, at the current rate of ₹268/day/person, at least ₹1.3 lakh crore will have to be budgeted.
    • The government should also re-consider its decision of a mere 4% increase in MGNREGS wages and hike it by at least 10%.

    Conclusion

    A large population is facing hunger and a cash crunch. The situation is only becoming more dire as the pandemic continues to rage on. Therefore, the Union government should prioritise food and work for all and start making policy reforms right away.

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  • Disasters and Disaster Management – Sendai Framework, Floods, Cyclones, etc.

    Data central to effective climate action

    op-ed snap | Enviro & Biodiversity | Mains Paper 3: Awareness in various sc and tech fields,Conservation, Environmental Pollution & Degradation, Eia

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: Paper 3- Data driven approach to deal with the future disruptions

    Article highlights the importance of data driven approach in dealing with the future disruptions and suggests the reforms in the system.

    Managing the disruption through data-driven tools

    • The data-driven tools were used for managing pandemic induced disruption.
    • This offers an opportunity to restructure the data ecosystem for managing the disruptions of the future that are more likely to be driven by climate change.

    Policies for data sharing in India

    • The National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy (NDSAP), 2012 recognises the importance of data.
    • NDSAP recognised the importance of data in improving decision making, meeting the needs of civil society and generating revenue by permitting access to datasets.
    • In 2012, a government portal, data.gov.in was also established as a unified platform to enable sharing of data available with ministries, departments and other public agencies for wider public use.
    • The sharing of data in this platform, apart from others, is further streamlined through the nodality of Chief Data Officer-CDO in respective ministries.

    Challenges

    • Challenge remains about whether the collected data is usable, accessible and if it captures the details that end users are interested in.
    • Even after years of the portal’s operationalisation, there are multiple data-sets that aren’t updated regularly.
    • Though NITI Aayog has brought indices to track climate actions such as under SDG-13 of SDG India Index, but it remains vague in tracking improvements in climate resilience, by solely using number of lives lost due to extreme weather events.

    Reforms needed in data-ecosystem

    • 1) Complete dataset: There is a need to collect complete datasets required to assess climate risks and vulnerabilities.
    • This involves collection of datasets that are sex-disaggregated and geo-spatial and collect more nuanced dimensions like disaster response capacities.
    • Targeted research: There is a requirement of targeted research for designing better questionnaires and identifying new nodes for data collection.
    • 2) Reliability of data: The data collected has to be made reliable and usable through an accountability framework.
    • Legislation: A separate legislation in this regard would bring in the much-needed consistency in periodic collection of identified datasets and their proactive sharing in designated platforms.
    • 3) Centralisation of data: There is a need for centralising public data that currently exists with different departments and public institutions.
    • The National Data Governance Centre was planned to be set up in 2019 for precisely this objective.
    • But it is yet to be operationalised.

    Consider the question “How data driven approach could help India deal with the future disruptions that are more likely to be from climate change? Suggest the reforms needed in India’s data ecosystem.”

    Conclusion

    It is time that India places itself on track to address the issues around the known unknowns of climate change through data driven apporach.

    Source:

    https://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/data-central-to-effective-climate-action/2258964/

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  • One-state solution, the way forward in Palestine

    op-ed snap | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: Bilateral, Regional and Global Groupings and agreements involving India

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: Paper 2- Israel-Palestine conflict

    The article highlights the challenges in the success of a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict and suggests the one-state solution instead.

    Background of the two-state solution

    • It involves dividing Palestine between the state of Israel and the indigenous population of Palestine.
    • It was first offered by the British in 1937 and rejected by the Palestinians already then.
    •  In 1947 the United Nations insisted that the Palestinians should give half of their homeland to the settler movement of Zionism.
    • The two-state solution, offered for the first time by liberal Zionists and the United States in the 1980s, is seen by some Palestinians as the best way of ending of the occupation of the West Bank .
    • It will also lead to the partial fulfilment of the Palestinian right for self-determination and independence.

    Interpretation of two-state solution

    • The Israeli interpretation, until 2009, was that the two-state solution is another means of having the territories, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, without incorporating most of the people living there.
    • In order to ensure it, Israel partitioned the West Bank which is 20% of historical Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab part.
    • This was in the second phase of the Oslo Accords, known as the Oslo II agreement of 1995.
    • One area, called area C, which consists of 60% of the West Bank was directly ruled from 1995 until today by Israel.
    • Now, Israel is in the process of officially annexing this area.
    • 40% of the West Bank, areas A and B under Oslo II, were put under the Palestinian Authority.
    • Palestinian Authority calls itself the state of Palestine, but in essence has no power whatsoever, unless the one given to it, and withdrawn from it, by Israel.
    • In 2018 a citizenship law was passed known as the nationality law.
    • As per the citizenship law, the Palestinian citizens who live in Israel proper which is Israel prior to the 1967 occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and who are supposedly equal citizens of the Jewish state, will in essence become the Africans of a new Israeli Jewish apartheid state.

    Issues with two-state solution

    • The endless negotiation on the two-state solution was based on the formula that once the two states become a reality, Israel will stop these severe violations of the Palestinian civil and human rights.
    • But while the wait continued, more Palestinians were expelled and the Jewish settler community in the West Bank grew in size.
    • The two-state solution is not going to stop the ethnic cleansing; instead, talking about it provides Israel international immunity to continue it.

    Way forward

    • The only alternative is to decolonise historical Palestine.
    • New state should a state for all its citizens all over the country, based on the dismantlement of colonialist institutions, fair redistribution of the country’s natural resources, compensation of the victims of the ethnic cleansing and allowing their repatriation.
    •  Settlers and natives should together build a new state that is democratic, part of the Arab world and not against it, and an inspiration for the rest of the region.

    Conclusion

    The one-state solution is the way forward in Palestine and that should be the state for all citizens.

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  • Foreign Policy Watch: India-Afghanistan

    As the US exits, Afghanistan finds itself at the crossroads

    op-ed snap | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: India & Its Neighborhood – Relations

    Note4Students

    From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:

    Prelims level: Not much

    Mains level: Paper 2- The U.S. exit from Afghanistan and its implications for the region

    The article highlights the implications of the U.S. exit from Afghanistan for the region.

    Status of the Afghanistan peace process

    • The Afghanistan peace process has been in disarray as the conference to be hosted by the United Nations in Istanbul, remains suspended due to the reluctance of Afghan’s Taliban.
    • Now there is some hope of breaking the impasse as the Taliban have expressed an openness to attend the Istanbul summit.
    • United States President Joe Biden is insistent on withdrawing the troops on September 11, even without any power-sharing deal between the warring parties.
    • Taliban leadership, who may feel the urgency to resuming negotiations than completely abandoning them for fear of losing the international legitimacy they enjoy at the moment.

    How the U.S. exit will affect Pakistan

    • After months of negotiations, the U.S.-Taliban deal was signed in February 2020, and Pakistan took full credit for it.
    • As the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan for almost two decades had kept the U.S. reliant on Pakistan for operational and other support.
    • Pakistan smartly mobilised this factor against India.
    • With the disappearance of this lethal dependence, Pakistan faces an uphill task in conducting a viable Afghan policy.
    • Pakistan cannot keep America invested in it on military, economic, and societal fronts without partnering with the U.S. to ensure a smooth transition of power in Kabul.

    Impact on China

    • The Taliban now draw support from a wide variety of regional powers, including Russia, China and Iran.
    • However, these countries too want the insurgent group to moderate its position.
    • China, which has a beneficiary of the U.S. presence in Afghanistan, seems confused as the American exit looms large.
    • The U.S. exit would leave Beijing vulnerable to its spillover effects particularly in the restive Xinjiang province.
    • That is why China has remained invested in all major regional Afghan-centric negotiations.

    Implications for India

    • India has been the key regional backer of an Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan-controlled peace process.
    • India is concerned that the Taliban-dominated regime in Afghanistan might allow Pakistan to dictate Afghanistan’s India policy.
    • That is why India has underlined the need for a genuine double peace i.e. within and around Afghanistan.
    • But despite being offered a seat at Istanbul at the U.S.’s behest, India remains a peripheral player.
    • The strategic competition between the China and the U.S.,  China’s growing rivalry with India, and New Delhi’s tense relationship with Islamabad are some of the factors which will certainly affect the situation in Afghanistan as the U.S. leaves the country.

    Consider the question “What are the implications of the U.S. exit from Afghanistan for the region? Examine its impact on India.

    Conclusion

    While the exit would bring the U.S.’s “forever war” to an end, it is unlikely to result in peace if Afghan stakeholders show their utter inability to take the process forward.

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