A coming together of dreams - The Hindu

28th May 2014 -  Link

This article is written by the Chinese ambassador Wei Wei and expresses his point of view as to how both nations should increase cooperation and built strong relationships serving common interests.

China-India relations will be embarking on a new starting point upon the formation of the new Indian government. The two sides should seize the opportunity to promote smooth transition of bilateral relations and inject new impetus into the China-India strategic and cooperative partnership.

How China plans to improve bilateral relations( according to Wei Wei)

1. We should maintain high-level exchanges: 

• The Chinese side has invited Indian leaders to participate in the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence (Panchsheel) in Beijing next month.
• A series of high-level visits between the two countries will be carried out in the second half of this year.
• The two sides are discussing bilateral meetings between the two leaderships on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Brazil and on other multilateral occasions.

2.We should expand pragmatic cooperation in all fields: 

• The Chinese side is willing to actively participate in India’s development in infrastructure, manufacturing and agricultural fields with focus on promoting cooperation on major projects such as railways and industrial parks. 
• The Chinese side will encourage Chinese companies with adequate capacity and good reputation to expand their investment in India, and also welcome Indian entrepreneurs to explore business opportunities in the Chinese market.

3.We should expand people-to-people and cultural exchanges: 

This is the Year of China-India Friendly Exchanges , the Chinese side expects to take this opportunity to carry out the mutual visits by 100-youth delegations and actively promote cooperation between China-India sister cities so as to improve mutual understanding and trust between the two peoples. 

4.We should enhance cooperation in regional and international affairs: 

The Chinese side would like to maintain close communication and coordination with the Indian side on major regional and international issues and conduct pragmatic cooperation under the frameworks of BRICS, China-Russian-India cooperation, G20 and East Asia Summit, so as to safeguard the common interests of the developing countries and work for a more democratic and rational international political and economic order. 

5.We should properly handle the divergences between the two countries: The Chinese side is willing to import more products from India for a balanced trade relationship between India and China.

His Conclusion:

China’s new leadership has advocated the Chinese Dream of realising the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Indian leaders also proposed the Indian Dream of achieving inclusive development. The Chinese and Indian dreams are interconnected and mutually compatible, representing the shared aspiration of our 2.5 billion people together. We have every reason to believe that as long as China and India join hands to pursue common development, we will realise our beautiful dreams and make new positive contributions to peace, stability and prosperity in Asia, and the world at large.

A window of opportunity - The Hindu

26th May 2014 -  Link

Development, for which India needs markets, investments and technology - The U.S. remains the prime source of all three.

How can US benefit from India

• Geo-strategically, some of the big issues that confront the U.S. today, China, Pakistan, and the shaping of the post-2014 transition in Afghanistan, all happen to be in India’s periphery.
• India’s contribution to stabilising the subcontinent.
• Underwriting its integration and development through its own growth.
• Investment in building regional infrastructure and connectivity.
• India’s growing role in protecting maritime routes in the Indian Ocean.

How can India benefit from US

1.India’s focus externally will be on improving relations with the contiguous countries, including China. Given our experience since Independence, this also requires better defence preparedness, for which the relationship with the U.S. will be critical in the years ahead.

2.The inept U.S. handling of its ties with Russia has cemented Sino-Russian strategic relations in a way that India’s preferential customer status of Russian defence supplies is now imperilled.

Reasons:

• The Skovorodino-Mohe pipeline project worth over $60 billion in investment, and nearly half a trillion dollars in overall value over three decades, is about to roll.
• Mr. Putin had given his assent for a deal to sell China — over the objections of his general staff — the state-of-the-art S-400 missile system, capable of shooting down all “enemy aerial targets that are known today.”.
• Talks are at an advanced stage for sale of Su-35 fighter aircraft to China.

Benefits of US relationships in this regard:

On offer from the U.S is 

• the ‘Javelin,’ said to be among the best available crew fired anti-tank weaponry.
• The co-development and manufacture of the next generation of such missiles.
• Long-range surface-to-air missiles.
• The next generation naval gun.

3.As the India-U.S. relationship gathered momentum, and an accord with the U.S. on peaceful uses of nuclear energy began taking shape, not perhaps as a consequence of but certainly as a sequel to it — there has been a spate of small successes in India’s interactions internationally.

 A case in point is the agreement with China in 2005 on the “Political Parameters and Guiding Principles for the Settlement of the India-China Boundary Question.” It was arguably the sole, significant success of the 17th round of talks of the Special Representatives negotiating the India-China boundary. This came when India’s global importance was at a high point, with flourishing relations with Russia, the U.S., the European Union, key European countries, and the start of warming relations with Japan.

The instruments of revival

The right mechanics must be harnessed by the US to revive the relationship between the two nations, some of suggested steps in that direction could be:

• A new U.S. Ambassador in New Delhi.
• An envoy soon to confer with India’s new leadership might be Vice-President Biden, who knows India better than President Obama does (that might also indicate that the White House is taking back the India account from the State Department).

When times are difficult, there is nothing wrong with a give-and-take approach, a prudent and practical engagement that looks at the relative costs and benefits and eschews normative arguments. The congruence of interests of India and the U.S. is self-evident. So also is the current hiatus in the relationship. There is a window of opportunity to resuscitate it now.

Inviting the neighbours

24th May 2014 - Link

In  this article all the content related with the pervious(UPA) government(foreign policies, weaknesses ect.)  is given in Blue and all the content related to current(NDA) government(Modi’s plans,strengths ect.)  is given in orange

Parts in Dr. Manmohan Singh’s foreign policies that Modi is likely to borrow

(The parts of Dr.Singh’s policy are given in blue and their followup action by Modi is given in orange)

1.Dr. Singh’s creative thinking on the neighbourhood:

• Focussed drive for better relations with Pakistan.
• Indian concessions on trade with Bangladesh.
• Massive reconstruction and infrastructure-building efforts undertaken in Afghanistan and Sri Lanka.
• India’s SAARC engagement 

These have India helped its standing in the region.

Invitations to all SAARC leaders on swearing in ceremony.

2.Loyalty to multilateral forums in the face of opposition: 

It was not just SAARC and the Non-Aligned Movement but also the building of BRICS (along with Brazil, Russia, China and South Africa) that gave India a prominence on the world stage that held it in particular stead in the past few years.

BRICS leaders as early as mid-July, when Mr.Modi is expected to travel to Brazil to attend the summit along with Russian President Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.

3.Focus on economic diplomacy.

Modi will be invited to G20 Australia. 

4.Quest for nuclear energy as an alternative source.

Canberra will hope that Mr.Modi’s G20 visit will also see signing of India-Australia uranium deal.

NOTE: Mr.Modi will pave the way for a much needed revision of the Indian Foreign Service’s size. In 2012, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) recorded a strength of about 815 officers, a fraction of the roughly 20,000 the United States has, or the 5,000 that China appoints.

Strengths of Modi Government

1.He isn’t dependent on the approval of State governments: that could try to block him, in the manner in which the Mamata Banerjee government blocked the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) on the Teesta deal with Bangladesh, or the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) governments in Tamil Nadu threatened ties with Sri Lanka over the UNHRC vote.

2.Mr. Modi’s policies will be unchallenged by his party: The Congress party’s disavowal of the Sharm el-Sheikh declaration will probably stand out as a watershed moment in Dr. Singh’s foreign policy, and he never quite stopped looking over his shoulder after that on ties with Pakistan. If UPA-II began on that note, it ended with Dr. Singh’s humiliation on the international stage, when hours before his meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington, his party’s vice-president Rahul Gandhi addressed a press conference “tearing up” his government’s policy ordinance on corruption.

Perils of the past

1.Terror groups: Some within the establishment in Pakistan who will attempt to sabotage any plans for peace talks with an attack. Already, the attack on the Indian consulate in Herat is being chalked up to Inter Services Intelligence (ISI)-backed Taliban elements.

2.Mr. Modi’s own past record: on the 2002 Gujarat riots. As a result, his government’s actions on internal disturbances — riots and insurgencies — will be scrutinised by India’s neighbours for any hint of “majoritarian” bias.

Mr. Modi’s swearing-in could well serve as a kick-off point for a new foreign policy regime for South Asia; that is, if he desires to make a break with past precedents.

Seven steps to an economic rebalancing - The Hindu

23rd May 2014 - Link

Indian economy. After smooth sailing at close to nine per cent growth rate it suddenly dropped to less than five per cent in a very short time, leaving behind unemployment, social unrest, banking woes and stuck projects in its wake.

Seven Steps for Economic Rebalancing

1.Needs to rebalance savings and investments which have deflated over the recent past and are inadequate to sustain a high rate of growth.

2.The share of manufacturing in GDP must be stepped up in accordance with the employment imperative and the need to build an advanced knowledge-intensive, technology-based product profile.

3.The economic mindset has to incorporate a much faster pace of planned urbanisation, along with a humane approach, which would foster higher economic productivity given all factors of production.

4.India’s financial sector requires modernisation and integration with the larger global system, a task which was interrupted by the global financial crisis.

5.India’s major resource — its people — must be critically upgraded in order to effectively participate in a knowledge-driven global economy.

6.Our global integration in terms of the flow of goods, services, technology and funds must be greatly expanded.

7.We must strategise to redress the massive infrastructure gap that we currently face.

WHAT the new government has to do?

1.It needs to focus on immediate measures that would moderate inflation and bring in new growth drivers.

2.It would need to lay strong foundations in all these rebalancing imperatives in order to ensure sustained high growth over the next two to three decades. 

3.Remove poverty and improve the quality of life by improving human development indices. 

4.Create the right conditions of governance, macroeconomic stability, and policy framework for private sector entrepreneurship to flourish.

HOW can the new government do it?

The new government could achieve the required stability and rebalance the economy by focussing on the following sectors:

Agriculture:

Immediate action: Better food-grain management. 

In the long run: 

1.Water management:

It can play a critical role in unleashing a new era of agriculture growth, including new irrigation facilities, water user charges, mapping of micro-districts for best usage, and interlinking of rivers.(Narendra Modi has already announced - Pradhan Mantri Krishi Seechayee Yojana.) 

2.Strengthening of supply chains, both for agri inputs such as fertilizers, farm mechanisation and seeds as also for upstream investments in storage and cold chains. 

3.Corporate sector participation through novel ideas like land leasing, and farmer-producer cooperatives.

Taxation and Savings:

Immediate action: Lower interest rates that could kick-start new household consumption and corporate investments.

In the long run:

1.The Goods and Services Tax is one overarching reform measure that can immediately meet many economic targets such as lowering inflation, raising economic efficiency and productivity, and incentivising investments. 

Steps:

• The government must act quickly to resolve last mile issues to forge an agreement with States and introduce GST without delay
• Stability on tax policies is essential to revive investor sentiment and bring in more capital, particularly from overseas. 

2.Investments need to be greatly escalated in all infrastructure sectors, including power, transport and urban development, among others, as the country can absorb $10 trillion worth of new infrastructure over the next three decades.

Steps:

• Look into restarting the infrastructure and manufacturing projects already on the ground by creating a strong institutional mechanism for project oversight.
• Unlocking stranded projects would be the fastest way to create demand for upstream and downstream sectors.
• Need to identify top projects with multiplier impact and roll them out on the fast track.

3.Strengthening the corporate bond market to make it more efficient and vibrant.

Steps:

• New financial instruments.
• Calibrated tax measures.
• Rationalisation of stamp duties.

Energy Management:

Key constraints for sectors such as manufacturing and infrastructure is the lack of adequate power capacity.

Immediate action: Holistic energy policy to bring together thermal, hydro and renewable sources.

In the long run:  

1.Resolve challenges in electricity pricing, transmission and regulation

Steps:

The Electricity Act, 2003 sets a sound foundation and can be updated to encourage minimisation of transmission and distribution (T&D) losses and strengthen the finances of distribution companies, including by reducing subsidies. 

2.The mining sector is a key corollary to the energy effort as a lack of fuel supply linkages has stymied large power capacities from going on-stream. 

Steps:

• All angles including exploration, bidding and mining practices have to be explored.
• The private sector should be incentivised to play a stronger role in these areas.
• Complicated procedures in environment clearances, land acquisition and other processes in delaying projects and raising transaction costs would have to be streamlined and fast-tracked.

Employment Generation:

1.Leveraging Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) funds for skill development.

2.Deploying private sector expertise under the Apprenticeship Act. 

3.Expansion of the number of Industrial Training Institutes (ITI) and more vocational trades.

4.Consolidate laws as well as shift some social security obligations from the government to the private sector.

Global Trade:

Building export competitiveness would enable India to have a larger presence in global value chains. 

Steps:

• A comprehensive suite of steps to identify the right products and strategies in conjunction with India’s product profile and comparative advantages are central to this endeavour.
• Effective marketing in key global destinations and making India a favoured investment destination can be conducted in tandem.

The rights of prisoners with disabilities - The Hindu

20th May 2014 - Link


No person shall be subjected to degrading, inhuman or cruel punishment that is violative of human dignity; the duty of care to be exercised in this matter during pre-trial custody is of a much higher order. These are standards applicable to all custodial situations and to all persons, irrespective of caste, sex, race, religion, or place of birth.


Treatment in custody

The Veena Sethi case:(early 1980s) 

• Brought to light the treatment of prisoners with mental illnesses and their prolonged incarceration for periods ranging from 16 to 30 years in custody.
• Without bringing them any substantive relief beyond release from illegal custody and transport and food expenses till they reached home. 

Dr. G.N. Saibaba case:

• The conditions under which he is being held in custody.
• The fact needs close and urgent examination here is not whether he has Maoist “links” or whether he is a “sympathiser” or even whether a university professor can be harassed in this manner. 

Laws in this matter


1.UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD):

The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is an international human rights treaty of the United Nations intended to protect the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities. Parties to the Convention are required to promote, protect, and ensure the full enjoyment of human rights by persons with disabilities and ensure that they enjoy full equality under the law.

India is a party to this convention and ratifies it.

Article 4(d): enjoins States Parties “to refrain from engaging in any act or practice that is inconsistent with the present Convention and to ensure that public authorities and institutions act in conformity with the present Convention.

Article 15(1): “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” 


Article 15(2): “States Parties shall take all effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent persons with disabilities, on an equal basis with others, from being subjected to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”

Article 17: “Every person with disabilities has a right to respect for his or her physical and mental integrity on an equal basis with others.”

Under the UNCRPD:

The denial of special provisions, appropriate assistance and specialised health care access to a person with disabilities in custody, who uses a wheelchair and has special health care needs arising from chronic illness, comes firmly within the meaning of degrading, inhuman and cruel treatment in derogation of the state’s obligation to UNCRPD 


2.Laws in the Indian Constitution:


Article 21 of the Constitution: denying the right to accessible facilities for personal care and hygiene is violative of the right to dignity and bodily integrity — both guaranteed under , but also under 


Article 14 of the Constitution: that sets out the substantive right to equality before law
The Criminal Procedure Code (CPC): 
Deals with venerability of women and provides very different standards for involvement of women in custodial situations and  in criminal investigation. 

There are also special standards for the treatment of women prisoners and pregnant women in custody.

Where prison and custodial facilities are not equipped at all to deal with the specific needs of persons with disabilities, arrest and detention in custody should be a measure of last resort

How to prepare Current Affairs from Newspapers in Less than one hour for UPSC IAS IPS CSAT Exam

Source

1. Why is it important to read the newspaper?
2. Can’t I just use Chronicle, Civil Service Times or Pratiyogita Darpan?
3. What are profile-based interview questions?
• Location-based questions
• Academic background based questions.
• Hobby
• Firefighting
4. Which newspapers should I read
5. Should I read more than one newspaper?
6. What are the important items in a newspaper?
• Administration/ Polity
• National News
• International News
• Economy
• FrontPage
• Columns / Editorials
• What to prepare from Columns/ Editorials?
• Sports / music / life-style/ Bollywood
7. How to read the newspaper in less than 1 hour?
• The beginning
• The front-page and second page
• Third, fourth and fifth page
• The 6 to 9 Page
• Page 10-11 (Columns and Editorials)
• Page 12-13 (International)
• Page 14 (TV, Astrology, Cartoon strips)
• Page 15-16 (Business and economy)
• Page 17-20 (Bollywood, Lifestyle, Sports)
8. The Review

Mizoram: bamboozled by land use policy - The Hindu

14th May 2014 - Link


This article is important as it has a mix of Environment & Biodiversity, Culture, Agricultural geography and Polity,
all of these topics are really important from prelims as well as mains point of view.


Bamboo dances of Mizoram
Two spectacular bamboo dances, one celebrated, the other reviled, enliven the mountains of Mizoram. 

Cheraw:

In the colourful Cheraw, Mizo girls dance as boys clap bamboo culms at their feet during the annual Chapchar Kut festival. 

Jhum:

The festival itself is linked to the other dance: the dance of the bamboos on Mizoram’s mountains brought about by the practice of shifting agriculture, locally called jhum or ‘lo.’ 

In jhum, bamboo forests are cut, burnt, cultivated, and then rested and regenerated for several years until the next round of cultivation, making bamboos vanish and return on the slopes in a cyclic ecological dance of field and fallow. 

While Cheraw is cherished by all, jhum is actively discouraged by the State and the agri-horticulture bureaucracy.

Organic Jhum Cultivation

Jhum uses natural cycles of forest regeneration to grow diverse crops without using chemical pesticides or fertilisers. 

Process of Jhum:

1.Early in the year, farmers cut demarcated patches of bamboo forests and let the vegetation sun-dry for
weeks. 

2.They then burn the slash in contained fires in March to clear the fields(that are one to three hectares in area), nourish the soil with ashes, and cultivate through the monsoon. 

3.Each farmer plants and sequentially harvests between 15 to 25 crops. 

4.After cultivation, they rest their fields and shift to new areas each year. 

5.The rested fields rapidly regenerate into forests, including over 10,000 bamboo culms per hectare in five years. 

6.After dense forests reappear on the original site, farmers return for cultivation, usually after six to ten years, which forms the jhum cycle.

Benefits of Jhum:

• Regenerating fields and forests in the jhum landscape provide resources for many years.
• The farmer obtains firewood, charcoal, wild vegetables and fruits, wood and bamboo for house construction and other home needs.
• Prof. P. Ramakrishnan at Jawaharlal Nehru University, “economically productive and ecologically sustainable.”

New Land Use Policy(NLUP)


The State’s NLUP 

• Deploys over Rs.2,800 crore over a five-year period “to put an end to wasteful shifting cultivation” and replaces it with “permanent and stable trades.”
• Under this policy, the State provides Rs.1,00,000 in a year directly to households, aiming to shift beneficiaries into alternative occupations like horticulture, livestock-rearing, or settled cultivation.
• The policy has created opportunities for families seeking to diversify or enhance income. Still, NLUP’s primary objective — to eradicate “wasteful” shifting cultivation

In Mizoram, 1,01,000 hectares have been identified for oil palm cultivation.

Reasons for this policy:

• Government Claims: Jhum often concede that jhum was viable in the past, but claim population growth has forced jhum cycles to under five years, allowing insufficient time for forest regrowth, thereby making jhum unsustainable.
• Govt also claims: Plantations, such as pineapple and oil palm, claiming they are better land use than jhum.
• Promoting and subsidising such plantations and corporate business interests undermines both premise and purpose of present land use policies.
• Following the entry of three corporate oil palm companies, over 17,500 hectares have already been permanently deforested within a decade.

Results of this policy:

• State only supports industry and alternative occupations, leaving both bamboo forests and farmers who wish to continue with jhum in the lurch.
• Oil palm, rubber and horticultural plantations are monocultures that cause permanent deforestation, a fact that the India State of Forest Report 2011 (ISFR).
• Drastically reduces rainforest plant and animal diversity.
• As forest cover and bamboo decline, people in some villages now resort to buying bamboo, once abundant and freely available.

What should be done instead?

• Better use of public money and resources would be to work with cultivators and agroecologists to refine jhum where needed.
• The State can: involve and incentivise communities to foster practices that lengthen cropping and fallow periods, develop village infrastructure and access paths to distant fields, and provide market and price support, and other benefits including organic labelling to jhum cultivators. 

Today, the  Unless a more enlightened government reforms future policies in favour of shifting agriculture, Mizoram’s natural bounty of bamboos is at risk of being frittered away.