Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: tourism as economic driver
Context
- Ministry of Tourism identified Tourism Industryâs potential as a Sunrise Industry.
- There is a need for tourism analysts to hold tourism planners accountable.
What is tourism?
- Tourism is travel for pleasure or business; also the theory and practice of touring, the business of attracting, accommodating, and entertaining tourists, and the business of operating tours.
Types of tourism
- Domestic tourism: Refers to activities of a visitor within their country of residence and outside of their home (e.g. a Indian visiting other parts of India)
- Inbound tourism: Refers to the activities of a visitor from outside of country of residence (e.g. a Spaniard visiting Britain).
- Outbound tourism: Refers to the activities of a resident visitor outside of their country of residence (e.g. an Indian visiting an overseas country).
What does sustainable tourism mean?
- Sustainable tourism is defined by the UN Environment Program and UN World Tourism Organization as âtourism that takes full account of its current and future economic, social and environmental impacts, addressing the needs of visitors, the industry, the environment and host communities.â
What is the main importance of tourism?
- Tourism boosts the revenue of the economy, creates thousands of jobs, develops the infrastructures of a country, and plants a sense of cultural exchange between foreigners and citizens.
Why tourism is needed?
- Tourism is not a fad. It is a compulsion driven by the urge to discover new places. Because we have this compulsion to venture into the unknown, we need each other. When humans travel, meet and exchange ideas, civilisation flourishes.
What should be done to promote tourism?
- National Tourism Authority: A separate National Tourism Authority (NTA) should be established for executing and operationalizing various tourism related initiatives. Simple, flexible and elegant processes will be laid down to allow for nimbleness.
- National Tourism Advisory Board: A National Tourism Advisory Board (NTAB) should be set up to provide overall vision, guidance and direction to the Development of Tourism Sector in the country.
- Creating Synergy in Tourism Eco System: In order to ensure synergy at various levels of Government and with the Private Sector, it is important to have a well-defined framework in place.
- Quality Tourism Framework: A robust framework for quality certification of products and services across all segments like accommodation providers, tour operators, adventure tour operators, service providers like spa and wellness, guides, restaurants etc. should be laid down.
- Enhancing the existing luxury tourism products: The existing tourism products such as Nilgiri Mountain Railway, Palace on Wheels etc. should be enhanced and their numbers will also be increased. Haulage charges will be rationalised to make luxury trains viable.
- Railways can be a game changer: For tourism Railways have presence in most parts of the country. Most of the tourist destinations in the country are connected by rail. Railways is also in the process of connecting more places especially the strategic locations that also are tourist places with limited connectivity at present. Indian Railways is working towards promoting tourism in the country by operating more trains connecting touristsâ destinations and also by providing an array of products starting from luxury tourist trains to budget catering tourist trains
- The acronym âMICEâ stands for âMeetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitionsâ, and is essentially a version of business tourism that draws domestic and international tourists to a destination.
- The policy aims to make Gujarat one of the top five MICE tourism destinations in the country.
Way forward
- Enhance the contribution of tourism in Indian economy by increasing the visitation, stay and spend
- Create jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities in tourism sector and ensure supply of skilled work force
- Enhance the competitiveness of tourism sector and attract private sector investment
- Preserve and enhance the cultural and natural resources of the country
- To ensure sustainable, responsible and inclusive development of tourism in the country
Conclusion
- We know that India has the highest tourism potential of any country. That is because we have every terrain and climate zone, and a range of customs, traditions, cuisines, crafts, art forms and festivals unmatched by any other nation. We should monetize our potential through putting comprehensive National tourism policy in place.
Mains question
Q. What should be done to transform our tourist destinations to provide world class visitor experience making India one of the topmost destinations for sustainable and responsible tourism?
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: national integration
Context
- Recent events of targeted killings of Kashmiri pandits and other Hindus by the militants in the valley lead to the protests which once again brought forward the question of their right to return and the safety of minorities living in the valley
Who are the Kashmiri pandits?
- The Kashmiri Pandits are one of the highest ranked Brahman castes who are the natives of the valley, locally known as pundits.
- They were the minority in the valley comprising only 5% of the total population.
- Traditionally dependent on agriculture and small-scale business and one of the favored sections in the administration.
- Radical Islamists and militants started targeting the Kashmiri pundits putting in front the option of either of conversion or persecution.
- The Growth of militancy in the 1990s forced Kashmiri pandits to leave the valley in greater numbers. They started migrating to the other states, leaving every belonging behind and seeking refuge in other parts.
- While many of them started migrating some decided to stay back in their homeland.
- Conflict arose between radical Islamists organization and the Hindus leading to the mass killings of the Kashmiri Hindus in waves which is termed as exodus.
What has been done so far?
- After the Pandit exodus from the Valley in the 1990s, the first few years of this century saw government efforts to send Pandits back to the Valley.
- Under the Prime Ministerâs return and rehabilitation of Kashmir migrants scheme, created government postings in the Valley for Kashmiri Pandit âmigrantâ youth.
- Mostly, teachers and these government employees have lived in protected high security enclaves, but their work requires them to leave these enclaves and mingle with the rest of the population. Another segment, known as ânon-migrantâ Pandits because they never left the Valley, has lived in their own homes, without state-provided protection.
What is CDR?
- Centre for dialogue and reconciliation (CDR) is a Delhi-based think-tank incorporated in March 2001, aims to be a catalyst for peace in South Asia.
- CDR working for the peace-building process in Jammu Kashmir, supported the initiative of dialogue between the two communities as a part of self-assessment, acknowledging the mistakes.
What did CDR do in Kashmir?
- CDR supported the initiative for a dialogue proposed by two prominent young Kashmiris one a Muslim and the other a Pandit both who have witnessed the violence of 1990 and the subsequent years.
- They believe in the principle of talking could lead to healing.
- It led to CDRâs âShared Witnessâ, a Pandit-Muslim dialogue series, in December 2010.
- Public intellectuals and other influential persons from both communities were participants
Observations of the dialogue
- The dialogue series coincided with the launching of the Prime Ministerâs job scheme.
- Dialogues created a social environment that enabled Kashmiri Pandits to take up government postings in the Valley.
- They focused on the events in and around 1990, and the incidents that triggered the displacement of the Pandit community.
- By the third dialogue, participants were sharing individual experiences that did not fit into the narrative that each community had built about the other.
- The process of the conversation lead them to think on the actual reason behind the conflict, was it communal differences, or was it only religion?
From the eyes of the pandits
- Pandits were aggrieved that the Muslims did not protest the Pandit killings, not even when the killers claimed them. That greater responsibility lay with the Muslims as they were the majority.
- If some social organizations had acted quickly, the exodus could have been stopped.
- They observed that the Pandit community too had suffered from a lack of leadership.
- They demand an apology and to set up of possible âTruth commissionâ
What do the Muslims say?
- The Muslim participants felt the Pandits were in denial of the struggle of the Muslims in the Valley, who were facing violence from the system.
- The Kashmiri Muslim was always portrayed as being misguided, aided, and abetted by Pakistan.
- The protest in Kashmir was not against religion but against structures of power and oppression.
What is the Current situation?
- The fresh spate of targeted killings of Kashmir pandits created an environment of fear and provided a major setback to their rehabilitation in the Kashmir valley.
Way ahead:
- We need urgent civil society engagement between communities in Kashmir once again.
- The government can enable it, but individuals and civil society will need to create conditions on the ground. They will have to encourage people to give up the blame game.
Mains question
Q. Dialogue can bring peace in Kashmir valley. Critically examine.
Â
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: farmers welfare
Context
- The increasing cost of production and the increase in GST on apple cartons has triggered protests in Himachal Pradesh’s apple farmers.
What is the issue?
- The cost of production of agricultural items increased substantially, denying remunerative prices to the poor and marginal apple farmers.
Reason for crisis in apple farming
- Increase in cost of production: The input cost of fertilizers, insecticides, and fungicides has risen in the last decade by 300%, as per some estimates. The cost of apple cartons and trays and packaging has also seen a dramatic rise. In the last decade, the cost of a carton, for instance, has risen from about âš30 to âš The cost borne to market the Produce has also risen.
- High taxation: The increase in the Goods and Services Tax on cartons from 12% to 18%. This was done to ensure that farmers are forced to sell their produce to big buyers instead of selling it in the open market. Just as the three farm laws were designed on the pretext of getting rid of the middlemen, the argument here was that commission agents, who fleece the apple farmers, will be forced to exit the picture. But this leaves the apple growers at the mercy of large giants in procurement, who have precedence of even deciding the procurement price.
- No MSP in Himachal: Unlike in Jammu and Kashmir, where there is a minimum rate for procurement, there is no such law in Himachal. The government also does not seem prepared to bring in such a law. The farmers are demanding that legally guaranteed procurement at a Minimum Support Price (C2+50%) should be ensured to improve apple farmers condition.
How to address this issue?
- Need for a regulator: What is required is an independent body that is duly supported and trusted by the farmers. Such a body should have representatives of apple growers, market players, commission agents and the government. This must be a statutory body that is also given the task of conducting research in the apple economy.
- Directional efforts: Issues such as high input cost, lack of fair price and unavailability of infrastructure such as cold chains should be addressed.
- Required research to support improvements in apple farming systems: Over the past few decades, the priorities in research projects and government policies on apple production were focused on the improvement of tree productivity and product quality. This was important to enhance the net incomes and living standards of apple producers in India. This research should be further enhanced by introducing European varieties in India.
- Focussing on Alternative Market Channels: The alternative market channel works on the principles of decentralisation and direct-to-home delivery. The idea is to create smaller, less congested markets in urban areas with the participation of farmersâ groups and Farmer Producer Companies (FPCs) so that farmers have direct access to consumers.
- Logistics transformation: To sustain the demand for agricultural commodities, investments in key logistics must be enhanced. Moreover, e-commerce and delivery companies and start-ups need to be encouraged with suitable policies and incentives. The small and medium enterprises, running with raw materials from the agriculture and allied sector or otherwise, also need special attention so that the rural economy doesnât collapse.
Conclusion
- Agriculture is dying, not as in the production of food but as a desirable profession. One bad yield, whether due to errant rains, pests, etc., and most farmers have no buffer available. The last point worth considering is that food and agriculture are not the same. Expenditures on food span the value-add, including processing, preparation, service in restaurants, etc. Farmers in India merely get paid for their product and not for the food we eat.
Mains question
Q. Do you think there is urgent need to extend MSP to horticulture sector also? Discuss what can be done to solve the apple farmer crisis in Himachal Pradesh.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: multi drug resistant TB
Mains level: TB control
Context
- Peopleâs participation in the âTB-Mukt Indiaâ campaign can help eliminate the disease by 2025.
What is TB?
- A potentially serious infectious bacterial disease that mainly affects the lungs.
How TB is caused?
- Tuberculosis (TB) is caused by a type of bacterium called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It’s spread when a person with active TB disease in their lungs coughs or sneezes and someone else inhales the expelled droplets, which contain TB bacteria.
What does TB do to humans?
- It mainly affects the lungs, but it can affect any part of the body, including the tummy (abdomen), glands, bones and nervous system.
How long has the TB infected us?
- TB is as old as humanity itself, infecting us for at least 5,000 years. The infecting agent, a bacterium, was identified way back in 1882, by Robert Koch, signalling one of the landmark discoveries which laid the foundation of modern medicine
Is TB painful?
- If TB affects your joints, you may develop pain that feels like arthritis. If TB affects your bladder, it may hurt to go to the bathroom and there may be blood in your urine. TB of the spine can cause back pain and leg paralysis. TB of the brain can cause headaches and nausea.
Can we get TB if vaccinated?
- BCG is a vaccine for TB. This vaccine is not widely used in the United States, but it is often given to infants and small children in other countries where TB is common. The BCG vaccine is not very good at protecting adults against TB. We can still get TB infection or TB disease even if you were vaccinated with BCG.
When do TB symptoms start?
Â
- TB disease usually develops slowly, and it may take several weeks before you notice you’re unwell. Your symptoms might not begin until months or even years after you were initially infected. Sometimes the infection does not cause any symptoms. This is known as latent TB.
Is TB curable permanently?
- TB can usually be completely cured by the person with TB taking a combination of TB drugs. The only time that TB may not be curable is when the person has drug resistant TB.
- Drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) is a form of antimicrobial resistance that is difficult and costly to treat. It is caused by TB bacteria that are resistant to at least one of the first-line existing TB medications, resulting in fewer treatment options and increasing mortality rates.
Risk factors for TB include
- Poverty
- HIV infection.
- Being in jail or prison (where close contact can spread infection)
- Substance abuse.
- Taking medication that weakens the immune system.
- Kidney disease and diabetes.
TB statistic for mains
We are home to 1 in 4 of the worldâs TB patients.
Over 2.5 million Indians are infected.
Government initiatives
- Nikshay Poshan Yojana: in which TB patients receive Rs 500 every month while on treatment was launched. Nikshay Poshan Yojana ensure that the patients have economic support and nutrition during the required period.
- TB Harega Desh Jeetega Campaign: was launched to accelerate the efforts to end TB by 2025. The campaign aims to initiate preventive and promotive health approaches.
- Community-led approach: By applying âmulti-sectoral and community-ledâ approach, the government is building a national movement to end TB by 2025.
- Ni-kshay Mitra: Any individual or organisation can register as Ni-kshay Mitra on the Ni-kshay 2.0 portal to support people affected by the disease. The initiative intends to provide essential nutritional and social support to people with TB and root out stigma and discrimination against them.
Some positive suggestions to eliminate TB
- Sincere efforts need to be made to make our health systems more accessible and reliable.
- It also required to ensure that those seeking care trust the healthcare system and get the appropriate care for completing treatment.
- There is a need to create more labs, point of care tests, an assured drug pipeline, access to new drugs.
- The government should also ensure counselling and support for those affected.
- Every patient who is diagnosed late and does not receive timely treatment continues to infect others.
- To break this cycle, government machinery at the field level should work with communities and provide free diagnosis and treatment to every affected individual.
Conclusion
- We have ignored TB for too long. Itâs time we acknowledge the magnitude of the disease, and work harder at offering individuals equitable healthcare access and resources that the disease warrants.
Mains question
Q. Do you think we can eliminate TB by 2025? Discuss the roadmap and give some affirmative actions to be taken by government.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: disaster management
Context
- Bengaluru floods are alarming us to go for robust disaster management strategies.
What is flood?
- Floods are the most frequent type of natural disaster and occur when an overflow of water submerges land that is usually dry. Floods are often caused by heavy rainfall, rapid snowmelt or a storm surge from a tropical cyclone or tsunami in coastal areas.
Causes of frequent urban floods
Natural
- Meteorological Factors:Heavy rainfall, cyclonic storms and thunderstorms causes water to flow quickly through paved urban areas and impound in low lying areas.
- Hydrological Factors: Overbank flow channel networks, occurrence of high tides impeding the drainage in coastal cities.
- Climate Change: Climate change due to various anthropogenic events has led to extreme weather events.
Anthropological
- Unplanned Urbanization:Unplanned Urbanization is the key cause of urban flooding. A major concern is blocking of natural drainage pathways through construction activity and encroachment on catchment areas, riverbeds and lakebeds.
- Destruction of lakes: A major issue in India cities. Lakes can store the excess water and regulate the flow of water. However, pollution of natural urban water bodies and converting them for development purposes has increased risk of floods.
- Unauthorised colonies and excess construction: Reduced infiltration due paving of surfaces which decreases ground absorption and increases the speed and amount of surface flow
- Poor Solid Waste Management System: Improper waste management system and clogging of storm-water drains because of silting, accumulation of non-biodegradable wastes and construction debris.
- Drainage System:Old and ill maintained drainage system is another factor making cities in India vulnerable to flooding.
- Irresponsible steps: Lack of attention to natural hydrological system and lack of flood control measures.
Impact of the devastation due to floods:
- On economy: Damage to infrastructure, roads and settlements, industrial production, basic supplies, post disaster rehabilitation difficulties etc.
- On human population and wildlife:Trauma, loss of life, injuries and disease outbreak, contamination of water etc.
- On environment:Loss of habitat, tree and forest cover, biodiversity loss and large scale greenery recovery failure.
- On transport and communication: Increased traffic congestion, disruption in rail services, disruption in communication- on telephone, internet cables causing massive public inconvenience.
Solutions for effective flood management
- Improved flood warning systems: effective flood warning systems can help take timely action during natural calamities and can save lives. Pre-planning can significantly reduce the effects of floods, giving people time to migrate to safer locations and stock up essentials.
- Building flood-resilient housing systems: concreting floors can be very useful during floods. Houses should be water proofed and electric sockets should be placed at higher levels up the walls to reduce the chances of shocks.
- Constructing buildings above flood levels: buildings should be constructed a metre above from the ground to prevent flood damage and evacuation during floods.
- Resilience to Climate change: drastic climate changes have increased the frequency of natural disasters in many parts of the world. Governments should bring about environment-friendly policy level changes and eliminate the ones hazardous to the environment to tackle the problem of global warming.
- Create wetlands and encourage reforestation: creating more and more wetlands can help soak up excessive moisture since wetlands act as sponges. Wooded areas can also slow down heavy water flow, minimizing the effects of floods. Reforesting upstream regions can significantly reduce the effects of flood damage.
- Improve soil conditions: improper soil management, animal hooves, and machinery can make soil compacted. As a result, instead of holding water in and absorbing moisture, the water runs off immediately. Properly drained soil can absorb large amounts of rainwater and can prevent it from flowing into the rivers.
- Installing flood barriers: these are flood gates designed to prevent the area behind the barrier from flooding. They can also be kept around buildings to keep floodwaters outside the boundary created.
- Development of GISâ Geographical Information System (GIS) based National Database: for disaster management. GIS is an effective tool for emergency responders to access information in terms of crucial parameters for disaster-affected areas.
- Developing a Federal flood management plan: with responsibilities of union and state clearly defined.
- Creation of 2nd flood commission: (Rashtriya Barh Aayog, created in 1976) to study the flood situation in India under rising challenges of climate change and propose a national-level flood resilience and management plan.
Way forward
- Resilience of people: The rapid transformation in rainfall characteristics and flooding patterns demand building peopleâs resilience.
- Reconsider projects: Construction projects that impede the movement of water and sediment across the floodplain must be reconsidered.
- Use of technology: At the same time, climate-imposed exigencies demand new paradigms of early-warning and response systems and securing livelihoods and economies.
Conclusion
- We can learn to live with nature, we can regulate human conduct through the state and we can strategically design where we build. We need to urgently rebuild our cities such that they have the sponginess to absorb and release water without causing so much misery and so much damage to the most vulnerable of our citizens.
Mains question
Q. We need to urgently rebuild our cities such that they have the sponginess to absorb and release water. Discuss the statement in context of urban flood management strategy in India.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: road safety
Context
- A horrific car accident killed Cyrus Mistry and Jehangir Pandole. This tragedy got plenty of people thinking about road safety measures. Sadly, neither Mistry nor Pandole was wearing their rear-seat safety belts this highlights importance of following road safety norms.
What’s the meaning of road safety?
- Road safety means methods and measures aimed at reducing the likelihood or the risk of persons using the road network getting involved in a collision or an incident that may cause property damages, serious injuries and/or death.
What is road safety education?
- The aim of education, training and encouragement in Road Safety is to educate all road users in the proper and safe use of roads in order to change user attitudes and behaviour and to stimulate an awareness of the need for improvement in road safety.
What affects road safety?
- Several factors most notably speed, traffic density, flow, congestion, demographics (namely age gender and deprivation), driving behaviour (involving alcohol consumption, helmet or seat belt usage) and land use, such as residential or economic zones, were found to have mixed effects on road safety.
What are examples of road safety?
- Pedestrian crossing warning;
- Left turn driver assistance; and
- Approaching emergency vehicle warning.
Road Accidents in India A lookover
- In spite of several years of policymaking to improve road safety, India remains among the worst-performing countries in this area.
- Total 1,47,913 lives lost to road traffic accidents in 2017 as per Ministry of Road Transport and Highways statistics.
- The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) figure for the same year is 1,50,093 road accident deaths.
Do you know?
The âgolden hourâ has been defined as âthe time period lasting one hour following a traumatic injury during which there is the highest likelihood of preventing death by providing prompt medical care.
Causes of Road Accidents in India
- Sub-standard roads: The life of roads is not good due to the substandard raw materials and potholes accidents caused.
- Traffic: The increasing traffic on roads and conditions of roads are not proportionate to each other.
- Use of mobile phone: Most of the people are on call while driving thus they drive recklessly and accidents happen as most of the Indians now have mobile phones.
- Drunk Driving: Drinking makes people lose the ability to focus and function properly. This makes it dangerous for the driver to operate the vehicle.
- Dis-obedience for traffic rules: Indian drivers are quick to learn to drive but they donât learn traffic rules and the purpose of such rules.
- Malpractices: Malpractices such as over-speeding, triple riding, underage driving, etc are reducing the safety of road users.
- Implementation drawbacks: Police are supposed to execute the rules but, it may be a lack of workforce or lack of intention, they also fail to execute.
- Corrupt practices: Mostly police use the rules to mint money either officially by Chalan or in person.
Key data for value addition
Despite being home to only 1% of the worldâs vehicles, India shoulders 11% of the global road crash fatality burden.
- Road Safety: In the area of road safety, the Act proposes to increase penalties to act as deterrent against traffic violations. Stricter provisions are being proposed in respect of offences like juvenile driving, drunken driving, driving without licence, dangerous driving, over-speeding, overloading etc. Stricter provisions for helmets have been introduced along with provisions for electronic detection of violations.
- Vehicle Fitness: Automated fitness testing for vehicles has been made mandatory. This would reduce corruption in the transport department while improving the road worthiness of the vehicle. Penalty has been provided for deliberate violation of safety/environmental regulations as well as for body builders and spare part suppliers.
- Recall of Vehicles: The Act allows the central government to order for recall of motor vehicles if a defect in the vehicle may cause damage to the environment, or the driver, or other road users.
- Road Safety Board: A National Road Safety Board, to be created by the central government through a notification to advise the central and state governments on all aspects of road safety and traffic management. This would include standards of motor vehicles, registration and licensing of vehicles, standards for road safety, and promotion of new vehicle technology.
- Protection of Good Samaritan: The Act lays down the guidelines and provides rules to prevent harassment of Good Samaritan to encourage people to help road accident victims.
- Cashless Treatment during Golden Hour: The Act provides for a scheme for cashless treatment of road accident victims during golden hour.
Value addition for good marks
The 4 âEâ Approach
- The Government of India put forth Engineering, Economy, Enforcement and Education as the fundamental areas to focus on in order to ensure road safety.
Way forward
- Road safety education from the primary level: Those already using our roads and driving or riding on it could have formed bad habits that are difficult to change or undo. So itâs important that we catch them young and start educating children on road safety and correct behaviour on the road.
- Better first aid and paramedic care: In most cases, the public and police are the first ones to reach the site of an accident. But sadly, neither has any first aid training and the police donât even have even simple things like a first aid box or stretcher. This initial trauma care has to improve.
- Stricter criteria for driving licenses: Fortunately, the government has recognized the need for this, and getting a driving license is no longer as easy as before. Lots of the process has been digitalized and made more stringent. But itâs still far from perfect and lots more needs to be done
- Better road design, maintenance, and signage: Many of our roads are poorly designed with badly placed junctions, acute corners, uneven gradients, sudden speed-breakers, etc. And this is made worse by poor road maintenance and many accidents occur because a driver suddenly swerves to avoid a pothole.
- Heavy crackdown against non-compliance: This is one of the leading causes of road accidents in India and while we do have strict laws, the enforcement, particularly on our highways is quite lax. Consumption of drugs by truck drivers while driving is rampant, and this needs to stop completely.
- Stricter enforcement of traffic rules: The Amended Motor Vehicles Act has higher penalties and punishment to deter people from committing traffic offenses and driving rashly. Itâs high time we enforced our traffic rules and imposed discipline while driving and using the road.
- Encouraging better road behaviour: The people should motivate themselves to behave in a better manner on the road. The campaigns such as âBe the Better Guyâ, need to be applauded, encouraged and expanded.
Mains question
Q. In spite of several years of policymaking to improve road safety, India remains among the worst-performing countries in this area. Critically analyse.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: anglicist orientalist controversy
Mains level: qulaity education outcomes
Context
- English should be taught effectively not as the medium, but as a second language
- Over the years, there has been a raging debate over the need for children to have their mother tongue as the medium of instruction in schools.
- While educationists have emphasised the importance of learning in the mother tongue to enhance a childâs learning and overcome glaring inequities, there has been an equally steady demand for English-medium schools in several States.
Historic context to this debate
- Orientalist: Orientalists were the group of people who wanted to give education to Indian people in the Indian language. The emphasis was on the knowledge of the East. They wanted Indians to learn about Indian philosophy, science, and literature. In the Initial stage, company officials favoured oriental learning.
- Anglicist: Anglicists were those people who supported the teaching of modern western education to Indian people in the English language. People who favoured Anglicists were Thomas Babington, Macaulay, Jamesâs mill, Charles wood, Charles Trevelyan, and Elphinstone. The Anglicists were supported by the most advanced Indians like Raja Ram Mohan Roy.
Why mother tongue is important?
- Suitability to child: There is an almost-complete consensus among educationists, linguistic experts and psychologists that the mother tongue, or the language of the region where the child lives, is the only appropriate language of learning for the child.
- Incomprehension: A child can be taught any number of languages, particularly later in life, but the medium of learning should be the mother tongue. As a number of classrooms today are stalked by the curse of incomprehension.
- Pressure of English language: There are a growing number of schools, mostly private, that teach in English. Government schools too in States like Tamil Nadu, unable to bear the pressure from parents and to stop students from migrating to private schools, are switching to English medium.
- Development in every way: The mother tongue, home language or the first language educationally means the language which the child is using to connect to the world, to people, to nature, to the environment, and to make sense of everything thatâs going on. This is the language which helps the child to build, grow and develop in every way.
- Inability to learn: English medium education is a profound tragedy in Indian education today. Millions are languishing because of their inability to learn in English not English as a language but as a medium through which they acquire any knowledge of any subject.
Why English Should Be the Medium of Instruction in Schools, Colleges?
- Connectivity with The Rest of the World: To communicate and be on par with the world, the first language that stands common is English. With English, a student can remain on par with what is happening across the globe. Lack of English knowledge or alone mother tongue does not allow children to progress with the rest of the world.
- Technologies Can Be Used Only With English Instruction: Most of the modern technologies are invented, reinvented and modernized in foreign shores. The inventors keep the English language for the instruction manual of the technological gadget so that the gadget can be used worldwide.
- Higher Education Emphasizes on The English language: The main focus of teaching medium in higher secondary as well as in graduation and post-graduation colleges in India. There is no doubt that lecturers also teach in Hindi or other regional languages. However, question design comes in both English and regional language. But most of the classes are taught in English.
How multilingual approach helps
- Firstly, multilingualism gives equal status to all languages and thereâs enough work, history and research on this.
- Second, children come from different backgrounds, and in some cases, they are first-generation learners with not much support at home.
- The multilingual approach thus, is much more flexible, closer to the child, and inclusive. It is democratic, and it accepts that the teacher is not coming from a place of authority and is only correcting spellings and pronunciations.
Conclusion
- This myth must be broken that our education system is class and caste neutral. A powerful political movement will have to take place to make the language of learning a choice that is made democratically.
Mains question
Q. Should the mother tongue or English be the medium of instruction? Critically explain.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: future preparedness for pandemics
Context
- The outline of an essential global pandemic treaty.
Purpose of the treaty
- A pandemic treaty under the umbrella of the World Health Organization would build coherence and avoid fragmentation of response.
Severity of this pandemic demands such treaty
- COVID-19 would count as being among some of the most severe pandemics the world has seen in the last 100 years. An estimated 18 million people may have died from COVID-19, according various credible estimates, a scale of loss not seen since the Second World War.
- Further, with over 120 million people pushed into extreme poverty, and a massive global recession, no single government or institution has been able to address this emergency singlehandedly.
- This has given us a larger perspective of how nobody is safe until everybody is safe.
Catchy line for value addition
Nobody is safe until everybody is safe
There is widespread inequity in healthcare
- Gross inequity in distribution: Health-care systems have been stretched beyond their capacity and gross health inequity has been observed in the distribution of vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics across the world.
- Irreversible consequences: While high-income economies are still recovering from the aftereffects, the socioeconomic consequences of the novel coronavirus pandemic are irreversible in low and low middle-income countries.
- The monopolies: Held by pharma majors such as Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna created at least nine new billionaires since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and made over $1,000 a second in profits, even as fewer of their vaccines reached people in low-income countries.
- Skewed distribution: As of March 2022, only 3% of people in low-income countries had been vaccinated with at least one dose, compared to 60.18% in high-income countries. The international target to vaccinate 70% of the worldâs population against COVID-19 by mid-2022 was missed because poorer countries were at the âback of the queueâ when vaccines were rolled out.
Indiaâs lead role
- Dynamic response: Indiaâs response to the COVID-19 pandemic and reinstating global equity by leveraging its own potential has set an example to legislators worldwide.
- Vaccine diplomacy: India produces nearly 60% of the worldâs vaccines and is said to account for 60%-80% of the United Nationsâ annual vaccine procurement âvaccine diplomacyâ or âvaccine maitriâ with a commitment against health inequity.
- We lead by example: India was unfettered in its resolve to continue the shipment of vaccines and other diagnostics even when it was experiencing a vaccine shortage for domestic use. There was only a brief period of weeks during the peak of the second wave in India when the vaccine mission was halted.
- A classic example of global cooperation: As of 2021, India shipped 594.35 lakh doses of âMade-in-Indiaâ COVID-19 vaccines to 72 countries a classic example of global cooperation. Among these, 81.25 lakh doses were gifts, 339.67 lakh doses were commercially distributed and 173.43 lakh doses were delivered via the Covax programme under the aegis of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
Why the treaty is needed for?
- Data sharing: A treaty should cover crucial aspects such as data sharing and genome sequencing of emerging viruses.
- Rapid response mechanism: It should formally commit governments and parliaments to implement an early warning system and a properly funded rapid response mechanism.
- Health investments: Further, it should mobilise nation states to agree on a set of common metrics that are related to health investments and a return on those investments. These investments should aim to reduce the public-private sector gap.
Conclusion
- A global pandemic treaty will not only reduce socioeconomic inequalities across nation states but also enhance a global pandemic preparedness for future health emergencies. India must take the lead in this.
Mains question
Q. Nobody is safe until everybody is safe. What do you understand by this? Why there is need of global pandemic treaty?.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: Food security
Context
- Disruption of supply chains due to Ukraine war has implications for Indiaâs food security
What is supply chain in simple words?
- A supply chain is the network of all the individuals, organizations, resources, activities and technology involved in the creation and sale of a product.
Is supply chain management related to agriculture?
- Agribusiness, supply chain management (SCM) implies managing the relationships between the businesses responsible for the efficient production and supply of products from the farm level to the consumers to meet consumers’ requirements reliably in terms of quantity, quality and price.
What are two types of food chain?
- Agriculture food supply chains for fresh agricultural products: (such as fresh vegetables, flowers, fruit). In general, these chains may comprise growers, auctions, wholesalers, importers and exporters, retailers and speciality shops and their input and service suppliers. Basically, all of these stages leave the intrinsic characteristics of the product grown or produced untouched. The main processes are the handling, conditioned storing, packing, transportation and especially trading of these goods.
- Agriculture food supply chains for processed food products: (such as portioned meats, snacks, juices, desserts, canned food products). In these chains, agricultural products are used as raw materials for producing consumer products with higher added value. In most cases, conservation and conditioning processes extend the shelf-life of the products.
- Shelf-life constraints for raw materials, intermediates and finished products and changes in product quality level while progressing the supply chain (decay).
- High volume, low variety (although the variety is increasing) production systems.
- Importance of production planning and scheduling focusing on high capacity utilization.
- Highly sophisticated capital-intensive machinery leading to the need to maintain capacity utilization.
- Variable process yield in quantity and quality due to biological variations, seasonality, random factors connected with weather, pests and other biological hazards.
What should we do to ensure nutritional security?
- Strengthening and shortening food supply chains: reinforcing regional food systems, food processing, agricultural resilience and sustainability in a climate-changing world will require prioritising research and investments along these lines.
- Infrastructure: Lastly, infrastructure and institutions supporting producers, agripreneurs and agricultural micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in their production value chain are central to the transition.
- Potential for crop diversification: Data compiled in the agro-climatic zones reports of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the erstwhile Planning Commission of India reveal enormous potential for crop diversification and precision for enhanced crop productivity based on soil type, climate (temperature and rainfall), and captive water resources.
- Holistic policy approach: In the context of the intensifying economic, environmental and climate challenges and crisis, the need of the hour is a good theory of transition encompassing the spatial, social and scientific dimensions, supported by policy incentives and mechanisms for achieving a sustainable, resilient and food secure agriculture.
- Agro-climatic approach: An agro-climatic approach to agricultural development is important for sustainability and better nutrition.
Way forward
- Transparency: The Indian government could ensure more transparency on food stocks and regulate the private sector.
- Set restriction on hoarding: For that, there is a need to set restrictions on the reserves that the private sector can hold, as they often tend to hoard food stocks to later sell at a profit.
- Speculation should be regulated: This will help prevent the opaqueness of private sector reserves, which often fuels speculation by large international financial actors.
- Positional limits: Internationally, positional limits could be set on speculators but that would require a multilateral accord, a topic which should be on the agenda at the next G-20 meeting.
Mains question
Q. What role supply chain play in nutritional security? Discuss the constraints in supply chain along with way forward.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: particulars of funding
Mains level: corporate governance
Context
- The evolving role of CSR in funding NGOs
What is NGO?
- A non-governmental organization is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically non-profit entities, and many of them are active in humanitarianism or the social sciences; they can also include clubs and associations that provide services to their members and others.
- Corporate social responsibility CSR is a form of international private business self-regulation which aims to contribute to societal goals of a philanthropic, activist, or charitable nature by engaging in or supporting volunteering or ethically oriented practices.
Why NGOâs are important?
- When COVID-19 spurred a nationwide lockdown in India in 2020, a grave need for localised social support emerged. Giving, both private and public, flowed to NGOs working towards combating pandemic-induced challenges such as loss of livelihood for vulnerable communities, food banks, and health and medical support.
CSR key fact
All companies with a net worth of Rs 500 crore or more, a turnover of Rs 1,000 crore or more, or net profit of Rs 5 crore or more, are required to spend 2 per cent of their average profits of the previous three years on CSR activities every year.
Issues with CSR funding to NGO
- No organization development: CSR funders mostly contribute little or no money to organisational development and limit what they pay for indirect costs to a fixed rate often below 5%. 2020 primary research showed that NGOsâ indirect costs range from 5% to 55%, depending on their mission and operating model, much as a corporateâs sales and administration costs vary significantly by industry and product.
- Regulatory framework: These practices are partly a consequence of CSR fundersâ focus on regulatory compliance amendments to the CSR law in 2021 include substantial financial penalties for noncompliance.
- Errors on safety: Many CSRs make errors on safety with the unintended consequence of leaving an NGO with unpaid bills or worse still, drawing on its scarce core funding from other donors to pay for these essential costs.
How to improve CSR governance?
- Increase transparency: Transparency is the ultimate trust-builder, and should be considered a guiding principle for any socially responsible company. This concept should apply to goals, ongoing initiatives, and ultimate progress or results.
- Focus on equity: Equity is a vital lens through which to evaluate business practices and CSR strategy, at both a micro and macro level. Not only is ensuring that program furthers social and racial justice a cornerstone of the very essence of corporate responsibility, but study after study establishes that improved diversity and inclusion leads to better outcomes for everyone from increased innovation and competitiveness, to stronger ethics and team culture.
- Deepen community connections: Deepening your organizationâs connection to those on the other side of your CSR projects will have far-reaching benefits. These could likely include developing a more impactful program, as you strengthen your understanding of the needs of the community served.
- Encourage creativity: Creativity as a principle may feel out of place in a discussion of how to improve CSR. Yet itâs a concept increasingly invoked in philanthropic thought leadership, and for good reason.
Conclusion
- The idea is to move beyond signing cheques to recognising that, ultimately, whatâs good for Indian society is also good for business.
Mains question
Q. why the role of CSR is becoming important in NGO funding? What are the issues with CSR? Discuss the way forward.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Indian national army particuars
Mains level: Modern Indian history developments
Context
- In the year of âAzadi Ka Amrit Mahotsavâ, the nation pays tribute to Subhas Bose on September 8 as his statue rises tall next to India Gate.
Crux of this article in simple words
- The transfer of power to India took place on August 15, 1947. Had Bose and his Indian National Army (INA) succeeded, India would have attained freedom, not inherited it through a transfer of power.
Brief of historical account of his career
- Bose was the ninth child in 14 and the sixth son to Janakinath Bose, a lawyer from the Kayasth caste.
- He passed matriculation in 1913 from Cuttack and joined the Presidency College in Kolkata (then Calcutta).
- The teachings of Swami Vivekananda and Ramakrishna Paramhansa led to a spiritual awakening in Bose at the young age of 15.
- Subhash Chandra Bose reached Singapore on July 2, 1943, at the invitation of Rash Behari Bose. He took charge as the President of the Indian Independence League and took over as the leader for East Asia.
- On October 23 1943, with the help of the Japanese Army, Netaji declared war on the United States and Britain.
- He was fondly called Netaji and was arrested 11 times in his freedom struggle and died under mysterious circumstances in an air crash over Taipei.
His vision for INA march in India
- Creating revolutionary conditions: Bose had hoped to capture Imphal. That would give the INA a large number of Indian soldiers. Once this was achieved, fighting in India would create revolutionary conditions.
- Organization of INA divisions at border: When the fighting commenced, the INA had only one division stationed on Indiaâs borders. Another was on the move towards Burma. And the third was in the process of formation. All three divisions were expected to be in Burma by the time Imphal fell.
- Rapid invasion from north east: Bose was confident of raising three more divisions from among the Indian troops that would fall to him after the capture of Imphal. With six divisions, the INA would be the single largest force in the region. The rapid advance into India would create the right conditions for the Indian army to switch sides along with the people of the Northeast.
His famous quotes for value addition
âIt is our duty to pay for our liberty with our own blood.â
“No great change in history has ever been achieved by discussions”
Azad Hind Radio
- This radio station was created to encourage countrymen to fight for freedom under the leadership of Subhas Chandra Bose.
- The radio station used to broadcast news at weekly intervals in various languages like English, Hindi, Tamil, Punjabi, Urdu, etc.
- The main aim for the formation of the Azad Hind Radio was to counter the broadcast of allied radio stations and to fill Indian nationals with pride and motivation to fight for freedom.
The Rani Jhansi Regiment
- Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose was a firm believer of womenâs power and women were also greatly inspired by his words.
- He had always wanted to form an only womenâs regiment and his dream came to fruition with the formation of the Rani Jhansi Regiment on 12th July 1943.
- About 170 women cadets joined the force and their training camp was set in Singapore.
- They were given ranks according to their educational background.
- By November of 1943, this unit had more than 300 cadets as camps were also established in Rangoon and Bangkok.
- The women cadets were given military and combat training, weapons training, and route marches. Some of them were also chosen for advanced training and some were also chosen for training as a nurse.
- The Rani Jhansi Regiment mainly worked as care and relief givers.
- The unit later disbanded after the fall of Rangoon and the withdrawal of the Azad Hind Government.
Conclusion
- Bose maintained that the Congress leaders wanted freedom in their lifetime. He believed that no revolutionary leader had the right to expect that. A movement, a fight, had to be passed on. Expecting freedom in oneâs lifetime was bound to lead to compromises.
Mains question
Q. Netaji Subhas Bose was an exceptional leader who turned his vision into action. Critically analyse.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: manodarpan initiative
Mains level: mental health
Context
- How to deal with mental wellness challenges in the uniformed forces
What is stress?
- Stress is a feeling of emotional or physical tension. It can come from any event or thought that makes you feel frustrated, angry, or nervous. Stress is your body’s reaction to a challenge or demand.
What is mental wellness?
- Mental wellness encompasses emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It influences cognition, perception, and behaviour. It also determines how an individual handles stress, interpersonal relationships, and decision-making.
Why is Mental Health Important?
- Mental health is more important now than ever before; it impacts every area of our lives. The importance of good mental health ripples into everything we do, think, or say.
- Stigma to seek help: The staggering figures are void of millions of others directly, or indirectly impacted by the challenge and those who face deep-rooted stigma, many times rendering them unable to seek help.
- Lack of awareness: This growing challenge in dealing with mental health issues is further compounded by a lack of information and awareness, self-diagnosis, and stigma.
- Psycho-social factors: Institutions like gender, race and ethnicity, are also responsible for mental health conditions.
- Post-Treatment gap: There is a need for proper rehabilitation of the mentally ill persons post/her treatment which is currently not present.
- Rise in Severity: Mental health problems tend to increase during economic downturns, therefore special attention is needed during times of economic distress.
Ongoing challenges in mental wellness regime
- There is a need to expand understanding of the full scope of what uniformed Services and other mental health experts can achieve.
- Stigma regarding mental health both domestically and around the world remains strong.
- There is a lack of trained personnel and healthcare and public health systems in many areas of the world.
- Training needs are broad and reach beyond direct patient care, especially regarding cultural competence, crisis communication, and consultation.
- There is a need for expanded support for the value of multi-professional and multi-organizational integration and collaboration.
Government Policy initiatives
- National Mental Health Program (NMHP): To address the huge burden of mental disorders and shortage of qualified professionals in the field of mental health, the government has been implementing the NMHP since 1982.
- Mental HealthCare Act 2017: It guarantees every affected person access to mental healthcare and treatment from services run or funded by the government.
- Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2017: The Act acknowledges mental illness as a disability and seeks to enhance the Rights and Entitlements of the Disabled and provide an effective mechanism for ensuring their empowerment and inclusion in the society
- Manodarpan Initiative: An initiative under Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan aims to provide psycho-social support to students for their mental health and well-being.
What needs to be done?
- Open dialogue: The practice of open dialogue, a therapeutic practice that originated in Finland, runs through many programmes in the Guidance. This approach trains the therapist in de-escalation of distress and breaks power differentials that allow for free expression.
- Increase investment: With emphasis on social care components such as work force participation, pensions and housing, increased investments in health and social care seem imperative.
- Network of services: For those homeless and who opt not to enter mental health establishments, we can provide a network of services ranging from soup kitchens at vantage points to mobile mental health and social care clinics.
Conclusion
- Persons with mental health conditions need a responsive care system that inspires hope and participation without which their lives are empty. We should endeavour to provide them with such a responsive care system.
Mains question
Q. Mental disorders are now among the top leading causes of health burden worldwide, with no evidence of global reduction since 1990. Examine.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: environment impact of sand mining
Context
- From flora and fauna to human residents, no one has been left untouched due to the wanton extraction of sand mining from Yamuna River.
What is sand?
- Sand is a granular material made up of finely divided rock and mineral fragments. According to The Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulations) Act of 1957, sand is classified as a “minor mineral”.
What is Sand mining?
- Sand mining is the extraction of sand, mainly through an open pit but sometimes mined from beaches and inland dunes or dredged from ocean and river beds. Sand is often used in manufacturing, for example as an abrasive or in concrete.
Sand Mining overview
- Least regulated: Sand and gravel are the second largest natural resources extracted and traded by volume after water, but among the least regulated.
- Uneven distribution: Sand is created by slow geological processes, and its distribution is not even.
- Desert sand: Available in plenty, is not suited for construction use because it is wind-smoothed, and therefore non-adherent.
- Environmental impact: While 85% to 90% of global sand demand is met from quarries, and sand and gravel pits, the 10% to 15% extracted from rivers and sea shores is a severe concern due the environmental and social impacts.
Concerns of excessive mining
- Deteriorating river banks: Their extraction often results in river and coastal erosion and threats to freshwater and marine fisheries and aquatic ecosystems, instability of river banks leading to increased flooding, and lowering of ground water levels.
- Critical hotspot: The report notes that China and India head the list of critical hotspots for sand extraction impacts in rivers, lakes and on coastlines.
- Broken replenishment: system exacerbates pressures on beaches already threatened by sea level rise and intensity of storm-waves induced by climate change, as well as coastal developments.
- Aesthetic sense is reduced: There are also indirect consequences, like loss of local livelihoods an ironic example is that construction in tourist destinations can lead to depletion of natural sand in the area, thereby making those very places unattractive and safety risks for workers where the industry is not regulated.
- No comprehensive assessment: Despite this, there is no comprehensive assessment available to evaluate the scale of sand mining in India.
- Damage to the environment: Regional studies such as those by the Centre for Science and Environment of the Yamuna riverbed in Uttar Pradesh have observed that increasing demand for soil has severely affected soil formation and the soil holding ability of the land, leading to a loss in marine life, an increase in flood frequency, droughts, and also degradation of water quality.
- Loss to exchequer: It is not just damage to the environment. Illegal mining causes copious losses to the state exchequer.
Innovative use of technology
State governments such as Gujarat have employed satellite imagery to monitor the volume of sand extraction and transportation from the riverbeds.
- Where to mine and where to prohibit mining: District Survey Report for each district in the country, focusing on the river as a single ecological system. ISRO, remote sensing data, and ground truthing are all used.
- Sustainable mining: It involves extracting only the amount of material that is deposited each year.
- District authorities’ participation in the process: The District Collector chairs the District Environment Impact Assessment Authority (DEIAA). The District Collector will be assisted by the District Level Expert Appraisal Committee (DEAC), which is led by the Executive Engineer (Irrigation Department) and is tasked with granting environmental clearance for up to 5 hectares of mine lease area for minor minerals, primarily sand.
Conclusion
- Protecting sand mineral requires investment in production and consumption measurement and also monitoring and planning tools. To this end, technology has to be used to provide a sustainable solution.
Mains questionÂ
Q. A growing global population increasingly living in cities has led to a spiralling rise in the extraction of sand and aggregates, with serious environmental, political and social consequences. Examine.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: Economics, Infrastructure,Transport
Context
- The Indian Railwaysâ experiment to introduce AC III tier economy class coaches has started to pay off. Since its introduction, in the last one year, these coaches have earned the Railways more than Rs.230 crore in revenue.
What is AC III tier economy class coach?
- The AC 3 tier economy class in Indian Railways is a milestone concerning pocket-friendly traveling experience for common man.
- With fare slightly more than sleeper class and lower than conventional AC class.
- The objective of the railway is to move sleeper class passengers to a comfortable AC class with luxurious facilities. AC-3 tier comprises air-conditioned coaches with 64 sleeping berths.
When it is introduced?
- The Indian Railway has introduced the first AC III tier Economy Class for North Central Railway Zone in 2021 to provide a convenient traveling experience to the passengers.
- As of now 7 trains are equipped with AC III tier economy class coaches are running on the tracks
Features of the AC III tier economy coach:
- Pocket friendly: According to the Indian Railways, the fair in these coaches are cheaper than the normal AC three-tier coach. Fares in AC III tier economy are 6%-7% cheaper than the AC III tier class. The economy class has a capacity of 83 berths compared to 72 in the regular coach.
- Divyang friendly and modern designs: The coaches were specially designed for the convenience of the divyangs. Providing Improved and modular design of berths and ergonomically designed ladder for accessing the middle and upper berths etc.
- Modern features: In these, modern arrangements have been made for mobile phones and magazine holders, fire safety, personalised reading lights, AC vents, USB points, mobile charging points.
- Optimum Speed: These air-conditioned three-tier economy class coaches are capable of running at an optimum speed of 160 kilometers per hour.
- More Capacity: The economy class has a capacity of 83 berths compared to 72 in the regular coach.
What is the current status of AC III tier class?
- AC- III tier, the favorite mode of train travel of people falling in the bottom rung of the middle class, is the only class that earns the Railways profit among all its passenger services.
- The AC III tier is the only class of service which has generated consistent profits for the Railways. Between FY16 and FY20,
- AC III tier coaches carried only 1% of the total passengers, but were responsible for 21% of the earnings from travelers. Such a low-passenger, high-revenue dichotomy was not seen in any other class.
- It is not as expensive as the other AC classes and at the same time, its share in revenue has not been impacted by the relatively low pricing
- The overall revenue of Indian Railways at the end of August 2022 was Rs 95,486.58 crore, showing an increase 38 per cent over the corresponding period of last year.
- Goods revenue climbed by Rs 10,780.03 crore (or 20 per cent) to Rs 65,505.02 crore till August-end this year
- The revenue from passenger traffic was Rs 25,276.54 crore, an increase of Rs 13,574.44 crore (116 per cent) year-on-year.
- Passenger traffic also increased compared to last year in both the segments — reserved and unreserved
- Railways’ total revenue during the entire last fiscal (2021-22) stood at Rs.1,91,278.29 crore.
What are the issues faced by Indian railways to increase its revenue?
- Cross Subsidized: The cross-subsidiszation in respect of second class, ordinary class and suburban services has increased continuously in the past five years with subsidy on ordinary class being the maximum,
- Concessional fare: The revenue forgone in passenger earnings due to concessions to various categories of passengers (physically challenged persons, patients, senior citizens, Izzat monthly season tickets, press correspondents, sport persons and war widows among others) increased from Rs 1,994.83 crore in 2018-19 to Rs 2,058.61 crore in 2019-20.
- Low -Revenue dichotomy in Expensive class: A high-passenger, low-revenue dichotomy was seen in the inexpensive classes. For instance, over 90% passengers travelled by second class which accounted for only 37% of the earnings.
- Operational Loss: Operational losses (in crore) incurred while operating various classes of service. For instance, in operating AC first class service, the Railways incurred a loss of 403 crore in FY20
Conclusion
- Adding more AC III tier economy class coaches is a step in the right direction as it has shown positive result in revenue generation for railways and it provides a travel with dignity to a common man. But If Indian railway has to benefit it have to work extensively on operational loss incurred out of low Revenue dichotomy in Expensive classes.
Mains Question
Q. Indian Railways is often referred to as the lifeline of the country but runs at a loss when it comes to running class-divided coaches. In this context discuss the utility of class divided coaches.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: bilateral ties
Context
- Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina’s four-day visit to India to boost bilateral ties.
- Indiaâs links with Bangladesh are civilization, cultural, social and economic.
- There is much that unites the two countries â a shared history and common heritage, linguistic and cultural ties, passion for music, literature and the arts.
- India was one of the first countries, along with Bhutan, to recognise Bangladesh as a sovereign state on 6 December 1971.
- It is also worth recalling that India shares its longest border of 4,096.7 kilometres with Bangladesh, which is also the fifth-longest border in the contemporary world.
Trade between two
- CEPA: Trade will be a focal point during Ms. Hasinaâs visit as the two countries gear up to sign a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement.
- Bangladesh dependency: Bangladesh imports critical industrial raw material from India on which its exports are reliant.
- Leveraging Indian support: Bangladesh also could improve several manufacturing industries by leveraging Indian expertise in service sectors.
Connectivity
- IMT highway: Bangladesh has expressed its interest in joining the India-Myanmar-Thailand highway project.
- Waterway: India-Bangladesh bilateral waterway trade will get boosted as India can now use the Mongla and Chittagong ports.
- Logistics: Indiaâs Northeast and Bangladesh is important for bilateral cooperation. Currently, three express trains and international bus services operate between Indian and Bangladesh.
Key data to remember
Bangladesh is Indiaâs sixth largest trade partner with bilateral trade rising from $2.4 billion in 2009 to $10.8 billion in 2020-21.
Regional geopolitics
- Chinese influence: Chinese inroads into the neighbourhood have been a cause of worry for India. China has been actively pursuing bilateral ties with Bangladesh. Bangladesh had successfully approached China for a mega project to enhance Teesta river water flow.
- Strategic location: From the perspective of Indiaâs Northeast, Bangladesh is Indiaâs most strategic neighbour, whom New Delhi cannot ever afford to ignore.
- Cooperation needed: Indiaâs dream of âAct East Policyâ can only be materialized with the helping hands of Dhaka.
- Gateway to northeast: The bridge âMaitri Setuâ has been built over the Feni River which flows between the Indian boundary in Tripura State and Bangladesh. It is set to become the âGateway of North Eastâ with access to Chittagong Port of Bangladesh, which is just 80 kms from Sabroom.
Way forward
- The future will present itself with an abundance of opportunities to help the two countries to reach a new plane of bilateral relations higher than ever before.
- Both nations should play their diplomatic cards with more maturity and pragmatism, keeping the regional aspirations and nuances of both countries in mind.
- A judicious aggregation of regional expectations on both sides of the border will help in achieving their mutual national objectives.
- To make the recent gains irreversible, both countries need to continue working on the three Cs â cooperation, collaboration, and consolidation.
Conclusion
- For India it will take more than cosy relations with one particular government to have long-term stable relations with its most trusted friend in the neighbourhood.
Mains question
Q. Do you think Bangladesh is most trusted friend in the neighbourhood? Discuss bilateral relations between two in terms of trade, connectivity and geopolitics.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: teacher concerns and issues
Context
- 5 September is teacherâs day. Teachersâ Day or Shikshak Divas marks the birthday of the countryâs first Vice President (1952â1962) who went on to become the second President of India (1962-1967), a scholar, philosopher, Bharat Ratna awardee, a highly-respected teacher and prolific statesman – Dr Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan.
- Less attractive career: It seems that teaching the young is no longer an attractive profession because systemic conditions are so discouraging. It points towards the reforms that education now requires.
- Diversion from teaching: Teaching children is not regarded as a serious profession. Non-teaching duties are routinely assigned, and now the digital regime has washed away the few traces of professional autonomy even in the best of private schools.
- Bureaucratic over vigilance: So deep is official suspicion of their integrity that many states have installed CCTV cameras in classrooms. That is not the only form of insult teacherâs face. They have little power to assert their professional dignity in the face of bureaucratic or managerial authority.
- Marginalisation by coaching institutes: The Indian school teacher now faces new social and economic forces. Coaching institutions have marginalised the secondary-level science teacher. All over the country, children are allowed to bunk school to attend NEET and JEE coaching classes. Science and math teachers were, in any case, aware that their pedagogic effectiveness would be measured by an unreformed examination system.
- Reliability issue due to internet overuse: Social Science teachers are coping with a different kind of challenge to justify their knowledge and interpretation. Childrenâs access to the internet exposes them to a wilderness of socio-political ideas and information. It is not easy for social science teachers to convince children that they are more reliable than a YouTube video or a WhatsApp message.
Catchy line in this context for value addition
Jinke jiwan me guru nahi, unka jiwan abhi shuru nahi.
How to address these challenges
- Supporting teacher control over curriculum and instruction: Classical top-down school leadership needs to be re-examined, and teachers must be recognized as professionals who have expertise to make good learning decisions for their students.
- Establish adequate pay scales and financial incentives: Compensation systems signal what skills and attributes are valued and what kinds of contributions are rewarded.
- Establish and conduct personnel evaluation systems: Teachers need regular feedback and accurate information on job expectations.
- Provide adequate planning time for teachers: While all teachers work under tremendous time constraints, experienced teachers generally are able to complete their planning more quickly. For new teachers, adequate planning time can allay feelings of being overwhelmed.
- Provide a structure for team planning and teaching: Teachers often report feeling isolated in their classrooms. Team planning and teaching can be an important step in retaining a high quality teaching force.
Conclusion
- Since the teacher is the pivot of the entire educational system and is the main catalytic agent for introducing desirable changes in the teaching learning process, all attempts need be made for motivating teachers to become innovative and creative. It goes without saying that a self-motivated and really industrious teacher can utilise his own resources to keep themselves abreast of new knowledge and skills.
Mains question
Q. It seems that teaching the young is no longer an attractive profession because systemic conditions are so discouraging. Critically analyse.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: NA
Mains level: energy secure India
Context
- The Prime Minister has called for âEnergy Atmanirbhartaâ by 2040.
What is Atmanirbharta?
- Atmanirbharta translates literally to self-reliance.
What is the main purpose of Atmanirbhar Bharat?
- The aim is to make the country and its citizens independent and self-reliant in all senses. Five pillars of Aatma Nirbhar Bharat are â Economy, Infrastructure, System, Vibrant Demography and Demand.
How to achieve energy self-reliance?
- Definitional clarity: Atmanirbharta translates literally to self-reliance. Many interpret it to mean self-sufficiency. That should not be our goal. Energy self-sufficiency is infeasible and uneconomic. A better statement of intent would be âstrategic autonomyâ.
- Affordable access to fuel: Our policy must continue to emphasise affordable and secure access to oil and gas. Part of this objective could be met by intensifying domestic exploration.
- Prioritise access to the building blocks of green energy: The sine qua non for realising this forecast will be cost-competitive access to minerals/components (copper, cobalt, lithium, semiconductor chips etc) required to build EVs, solar panels, wind turbines and batteries.
- Infrastructure development: We must expand our strategic petroleum reserves to cover at least 30 days of consumption and upgrade the transmission grid and battery storage systems to scale up renewables and smoothen its supplies. We will need to develop innovative financing mechanisms to fund green infrastructure. It should be emphasised that all such investments will get impaired if state discoms are financially insolvent.
- Green incentives: The governmentâs production-linked incentive scheme (PLI) offers benefits for investment in green energy.
- Demand conservation and efficiency: Energy usage norms must be standardised and tightened. Legislation should be contemplated to ensure compliance.
- Energy diplomacy: Our diplomats should add the arrows of energy diplomacy to their quiver. This is because of our dependence on the international energy supply chains. Success in navigating the cross-currents of economic and geopolitical uncertainties will rest greatly on skilful diplomacy.
- Holistic governance: The current siloed structures of energy governance are suboptimal. A root and branch administrative overall is required. Institutions should be created to facilitate integrated energy planning and implementation.
Case study for value addition
- Costa Rica lasted 300 consecutive days on renewable energy alone. Costa Rica set the record in 2017 for most consecutive days with renewable energy. The previous record for this feat was in 2015 when Costa Rica lasted 299 consecutive days on pure, clean energy.
Challenges ahead
- Anti-nuclear public sentiment: The Fukushima-Daiichi accident resulted in growing concern over the safety of nuclear plants in India .The construction of a nuclear plant in Kudankulam, Tamil Nadu, brought the issue directly into the public domain in 2012.
- Management autonomy: Power sector is dominated by public sector companies or PSUs (owned by the central and state government). Some parts of the energy sector have made very little progress in attracting private investment since 2007.
- Pricing: is the key to ensure the commercial viability of business entities and to attract investment into each fuel sector.
- Rigid tariff setting mechanism: Theoretically, prices should be supervised and adjusted in a timely manner and adequately by independent regulators to reflect changing costs. However, in India, regulators including CERC and SERCs operate in a very rigid way due to political considerations. This jeopardises the operational profitability of companies.
Conclusion
- We need leadership that can reconcile temporal differences and balance the short-term pressures of elections with the longer-term imperatives of sustainability in energy security which calls for bold and pragmatic decision making by the leadership.
Mains question
Q. How India can achieve âEnergy Atmanirbhartaâ by 2040 an ambitious target stated by prime minister? What are the challenges in achieving this goal?.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Indian evidence act
Mains level: Cybersecurity
Context
- There has been a steady spike in cases of cybercrime in the last five years.
- Cybercrime is any criminal activity that involves a computer, networked device or a network. While most cybercrimes are carried out in order to generate profit for the cybercriminals, some cybercrimes are carried out against computers or devices directly to damage or disable them.
What data states?
- India reported 52,974 cases of cybercrime in 2021, an increase of over 5 per cent from 2020 (50,035 cases) and over 15 per cent from 2019 (44,735 cases), according to latest government data.
How many cyber criminals are caught in India?
In 2020, over 18.4 thousand people were arrested on account of cyber-crimes across India.
Who is responsible for cyber security centre or state?
- With âpoliceâ and âpublic orderâ being in the State List, the primary obligation to check crime and create the necessary cyberinfrastructure lies with States.
- At the same time, with the IT Act and major laws being central legislations, the central government is no less responsible to evolve uniform statutory procedures for the enforcement agencies.
Status of cyber investigation
- There is no separate procedural code for the investigation of cyber or computer-related offences.
- As electronic evidence is entirely different in nature when compared with evidence of traditional crime, laying down standard and uniform procedures to deal with electronic evidence is essential.
What are general guidelines for cyber investigation?
- The broad âguidelines for the identification, collection, acquisition and preservation of digital evidenceâ are given in the Indian Standard IS/ISO/ IEC 27037: 2012, issued by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS).
- This document is fairly comprehensive and easy to comprehend for both the first responder (who could be an authorised and trained police officer of a police station) as well as the specialist (who has specialised knowledge, skills and the abilities to handle a wide range of technical issues).
- The guidelines, if followed meticulously, may ensure that electronic evidence is neither tampered with nor subject to spoliation during investigation.
What is the meaning of digital evidence or electronic evidence?
- Digital evidence is information stored or transmitted in binary form that may be relied on in court. It can be found on a computer hard drive, a mobile phone, among other places. Digital evidence is commonly associated with electronic crime, or e-crime, such as child pornography or credit card fraud.
Arjun Khotkar vs Kailash Gorantyal Judgement
- The Court held that a certificate under Section 65B(4) of the Indian Evidence (IE) Act was a mandatory pre-requisite for the admissibility of (secondary) electronic record if the original record could not be produced.
What is Indian evidence act?
- The Indian Evidence Act, originally passed in India by the Imperial Legislative Council in 1872, during the British Raj, contains a set of rules and allied issues governing admissibility of evidence in the Indian courts of law.
Judicial activism for cyber security
- A significant attempt has been made by the higher judiciary in this field also. As resolved in the Conference of the Chief Justices of the High Court in April 2016, a five judge committee was constituted in July 2018 to frame the draft rules which could serve as a model for the reception of digital evidence by courts.
- The committee, after extensive deliberations with experts, the police and investigation agencies, finalised its report in November 2018, but the suggested Draft Rules for the Reception, Retrieval, Authentication and Preservation of Electronic Records are yet to be given a statutory force.
What needs to be done?
- Upgrade cyber labs: The cyber forensic laboratories of States must be upgraded with the advent of new technologies.
- Digital rupee: Offences related to cryptocurrency remain under-reported as the capacity to solve such crimes remains limited. The central government has proposed launching a digital rupee using block-chain technology soon.
- Empowering states: State enforcement agencies need to be ready for new technologies. The Centre helps in upgrading the State laboratories by providing modernisation funds, though the corpus has gradually shrunk over the years.
- Need for localisation of data: Most cybercrimes are trans-national in nature with extra-territorial jurisdiction. The collection of evidence from foreign territories is not only a difficult but also a tardy process.
Conclusion
- Centre and States must not only work in tandem and frame statutory guidelines to facilitate investigation of cybercrime but also need to commit sufficient funds to develop much-awaited and required cyber infrastructure.
Mains question
Q.With the increasing use of computers in society, cybercrime has become a major issue. Analyse the loopholes in cyber security regime of India by giving suggestions to rectify the same.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: particulars of the scheme
Mains level: social security
Context
- The delay in payment of wages has pushed MGNREGS workers in West Bengal to the brink. There are allegations of corruption against the State government, the Centreâs reluctance in releasing payments, and the plight of the workers caught in this tussle.
What is MGNREGA?
- The MGNREGA stands for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act of 2005. This is labour law and social security measure that aims to guarantee the âRight to Workâ. The act was first proposed in 1991 by P.V. Narasimha Rao.
Significant Features of the scheme
- Fixed employment: MGNREGA is unique in not only ensuring at least 100 days of employment to the willing unskilled workers, but also in ensuring an enforceable commitment on the implementing machinery i.e., the State Governments, and providing a bargaining power to the labourers.
- Assured compensation: The failure of provision for employment within 15 days of the receipt of job application from a prospective household will result in the payment of unemployment allowance to the job seekers.
- Locality is ensured: Employment is to be provided within 5 km of an applicantâs residence, and minimum wages are to be paid.
- Legal backing: Thus, employment under MGNREGA is a legal entitlement.
- Non-purposive spending and corruptions: Many works sanctioned under MGNREGA often seem to be non-purposive. Quite often, they are politically motivated hotspots to create rampant corruption by dominant sections of the local population. Even social audits of such projects are locally manipulated.
- Workers penalized for administrative lapses: The ministry withholds wage payments for workers of states that do not meet administrative requirements within the stipulated time period (for instance, submission of the previous financial yearâs audited fund statements, utilization certificates, bank reconciliation certificates etc). There is no logical or legal explanation for this bizarre arrangement. It is beyond any logic as to why workers would be penalized for administrative lapses.
- Genuine job cards being deleted: Genuine job cards are being randomly deleted as there is a huge administrative pressure to meet 100 per cent DBT implementation targets in MGNREGA. In states like Jharkhand, there are multiple examples where the districts had later requested to resume job cards after civil society interventions into the matter.
- Too much centralization weakening local governance: A real-time MIS-based implementation and a centralised payment system has further left the representatives of the Panchayati Raj Institutions with literally no role in implementation. It has become a burden as they hardly have any power to resolve issues or make payments.
- Local priorities being ignored: MGNREGA could be a tool to establish decentralized governance. But, with the administration almost dictating its implementation, it is literally a burden now for the people and especially for the local elected representatives. The Gram Sabhas and gram panchayatsâ plans are never honoured. This is a blatant violation of the Act as well.
Lack of fund has negative implications
- Delayed payment: Due to this, payments for MGNREGA workers as well as material costs will be delayed, unless States dip into their own funds.
- Livelihood loss: MGNREGA data shows that 13% of households who demanded work under the scheme were not provided work.
- Halt of work: Many workers are simply turned away by officials when they demand work, without their demand being registered at all.
- Fall in demands: This has led to stop the generation of work. There is an artificial squeezing of demand.
What can be done according to rural development committee?
- Utilization of funds: A large amount of funds allocated for MGNREGA have remained un-utilised. For example, in 2010-11, 27.31% of the funds remained unutilised. The Committee recommends that the Department of Rural Development should analyse reasons for poor utilisation of funds and take steps to improve the same. In addition, it should initiate action against officers found guilty of misappropriating funds under MGNREGA.
- Context specific projects and convergence: Since states are at various stages of socio-economic development, they have varied requirements for development. Therefore, state governments should be allowed to undertake works that are pertinent to their context. There should be more emphasis on skilled and semi-skilled work under MGNREGA. In addition, the Committee recommends a greater emphasis on convergence with other schemes such as the National Rural Livelihoods Mission, National Rural Health Mission, etc.
- Regulation of job cards: Offences such as not recording employment related information in job cards and unlawful possession of job cards with elected PRI representatives and MGNREGA functionaries should be made punishable under the Act.
- Participation of people with disabilities: Special works (projects) must be identified for people with disabilities and special job cards must be issued and personnel must be employed to ensure their participation.
- Payment of unemployment allowance: Dated receipts for demanded work should be issued so that workers can claim unemployment allowance. Funds for unemployment allowance should be met by the central government.
Some innovation in MGNREGA can address the challenges
1) Looping in the skilled worker
- First, there is a suggestion to use it to meet the wage cost of their employment in small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
- Accordingly, skilled migrant workers may be placed in SMEs and their wages would be charged to MGNREGA.
2) Including farm related works
- In the last few years, un-remunerative prices of several crops have been the root cause of widespread agrarian distress.
- The suggestion is to allow farmers to employ MGNREGA workers in agricultural operations like land preparation, sowing, transplantation of paddy, plucking of cotton, intercultural operations and harvesting of crops etc. so as to reduce the cost of cultivation.
- The idea is to pay part of the wages of labour in agricultural operations from MGNREGA.
3) Increasing the number of Work Schemes
- Currently, there are only 2-3 work schemes (say PMAY) running per panchayat, which is leading to the crowding of workers at worksites.
- To prevent this and to ensure that all willing households are able to access employment through NREGA, the number of schemes needs to be increased, and 6-8 schemes must be introduced in each village.
4) Paying Workers Immediately
- Rural households urgently need cash-in-hand, and so the emerging demand is for immediate payment to workers. NREGA payments are frequently delayed by weeks or months.
- Given the circumstances, such delays will be entirely counterproductive.
- It is recommended that in remote areas, wage payments should be made in cash, and paid on the same day.
Conclusion
- Government and NGOs must study the impact of MGNREGA in rural areas so as to ensure that this massive anti-poverty scheme is not getting diluted from its actual path.
Mains question
Q. Large scale social security programmes like MGNREGA are subjected to undergo several stumbling blocks in the times to come due to lack of fund. Analyse these roadblocks and give some innovative measures to tackle these roadblocks.
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: examples of nutri-cereals
Mains level: climate resilient agriculture
Context
- Government push to coarse cereals as climate change affects wheat, paddy cultivation
- Millets are a group of highly variable small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for human food and as fodder.
Features Millet crops in India
- Big three: The three major millet crops currently growing in India are jowar (sorghum), bajra (pearl millet) and ragi (finger millet).
- Examples: India also grows a rich array of bio-genetically diverse and indigenous varieties of âsmall milletsâ like kodo, kutki, chenna and sanwa.
- Area of production: Major producers include Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Haryana.
What are Advantages of millet cultivation?
- Low input cost: cereals are good for the soil, have shorter cultivation cycles and require less cost-intensive cultivation.
- Climate resilience: These unique features make millets suited for and resilient to Indiaâs varied agro-climatic conditions.
- Drought tolerance: cereals are not water or input-intensive, making them a sustainable strategy for addressing climate change and building resilient agri-food systems.
Reduction in millet production
- Effects of Green Revolution: The Green Revolution succeeded in making India food sufficient, however, it also led to water-logging, soil erosion, groundwater depletion and the unsustainability of agriculture.
- Deficit mind-set: Current policies are still based on the âdeficitâ mind-set of the 1960s.
- Biased policies: The procurement, subsidies and water policies are biased towards rice and wheat.
- Skewed cropping pattern: Three crops (rice, wheat and sugarcane) corner 75 to 80 per cent of irrigated water.
- Lack of diversification: Diversification of cropping patterns towards cereals, pulses, oilseeds, horticulture is needed for more equal distribution of water, sustainable and climate-resilient agriculture.
What can be done to promote millets as nutri-cereals?
1) Rebranding the cereals as nutri-cereals
- The first strategy from a consumption and trade point of view was to re-brand coarse cereals/millets as nutri-cereals.
- As of 2018-19, millet production had been extended to over 112 districts across 14 states.
2) Incentive through hiking MSP
- Second, the government hiked the MSP of nutri-cereals, which came as a big price incentive for farmers.
- From 2014-15 to 2020 MSPs for ragi has jumped by 113 per cent, by 72 per cent for bajra and by 71 per cent for jowar.
- MSPs have been calculated so that the farmer is ensured at least a 50 per cent return on their cost of production.
3) Providing steady markets through inclusion in PDS
- To provide a steady market for the produce, the Modi government included millets in the public distribution system.
4) Increasing area, production and yield
- The Ministry of Agriculture & Farmersâ Welfare is running a Rs 600-crore scheme to increase the area, production and yield of nutri-cereals.
- With a goal to match the cultivation of nutri-cereals with local topography and natural resources, the government is encouraging farmers to align their local cropping patterns to Indiaâs diverse 127 agro-climatic zones.
- Provision of seed kits and inputs to farmers, building value chains through Farmer Producer Organisations and supporting the marketability of nutri-cereals are some of the key interventions that have been put in place.
5) Intersection of agriculture and nutrition
- The Ministry of Women and Child Development has been working at the intersection of agriculture and nutrition by -1) setting up nutri-gardens, 2) promoting research on the interlinkages between crop diversity and dietary diversity 3) running a behaviour change campaign to generate consumer demand for nutri-cereals.
Conclusion
- India should aim for a food systems transformation, which can be inclusive and sustainable, ensure growing farm incomes and nutrition security. As the government sets to achieve its agenda of a malnutrition-free India and doubling of farmersâ incomes, the promotion of the production and consumption of nutri-cereals seems to be a policy shift in the right direction.
Mains question
Q. Promotion of millet crops serves the dual purpose of securing health and supporting farmers. Elucidate.
Â
UPSC 2023 countdown has begun! Get your personal guidance plan now! (Click here)
Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024
Attend Now
What is MICE tourism of Gujarat?
Various Policy Initiatives by government
Supply chain issues 
Reasons for Persistence of 
Revenue of 
What are the issues?