01 Dec 2020: UPSC Exam Comprehensive News Analysis

1 Dec 2020 CNA:- Download PDF Here

A. GS 1 Related
B. GS 2 Related
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
1. Fight ‘fake news’: BRICS Media Forum
2. ‘Israel, exiled opposition killed scientist in complex operation’
POLITY AND GOVERNANCE
1. U.P. conversion ordinance challenges SC orders
2. Hold polls where NOTA got most votes: petition
C. GS 3 Related
ECONOMY
1. ‘Bank credit growth to stay slow in near term’
D. GS 4 Related
E. Editorials
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
1. India - Nepal Ties
ECONOMY
1. The perils of deregulated imperfect markets
INTERNAL SECURITY
1. Moving forward in base areas
F. Prelims Facts
G. Tidbits
1. Cross-border terror biggest challenge for SCO region: Venkaiah
2. ‘India to surpass 350 mn 5G connections by 2026’
3. ‘Bank capital in India, Sri Lanka to fall more than in other EMs’
H. UPSC Prelims Practice Questions
I. UPSC Mains Practice Questions

2. ‘Israel, exiled opposition killed scientist in complex operation’

Context:

• A leading Iranian nuclear scientist and a brigadier general in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was assassinated in Tehran.
• He is seen by Israel as the father of Iran’s nuclear weapons programme.

Read more on this topic covered in 29^th November 2020 Comprehensive News Analysis.

Details:

• The assassination has led to demands for a strong response from Iran’s leadership and calls by some conservative lawmakers to avoid entering into potential negotiations with the U.S.
• Parliament has demanded a halt to international inspections of nuclear site, a step that could prove a fatal blow to the nuclear deal Iran agreed with world powers in 2015.
  • The nuclear deal was signed in 2015 under the efforts of the US administration led by Barack Obama to curb the stockpiling of low enriched uranium.
  • Iran was then estimated to be months away from accumulating enough highly enriched uranium to produce one nuclear device.
  • The JCPOA obliged Iran to accept constraints on its enrichment programme backed by a highly intrusive inspection regime in return for a partial lifting of economic sanctions.
  • However, Donald Trump administration withdrew from the nuclear deal in May 2018.

Category: POLITY AND GOVERNANCE

1. U.P. conversion ordinance challenges SC orders

Context:

The Supreme Court has held that the Uttar Pradesh ordinance criminalising religious conversion via marriage breaks away from a series of Supreme Court judgments, which hold faith that the state and courts have no jurisdiction over an adult’s absolute right to choose a life partner. The choice of a life partner, whether by marriage or outside it, is part of an individual’s personhood and identity.

Background:

• Recently, the Uttar Pradesh government proposed an ordinance seeking to prohibit “unlawful” religious conversions.

This topic has been covered in the 25^th November 2020 Comprehensive News Analysis and 27^th November 2020 Comprehensive News Analysis.

Details:

• Intimacies of marriage lie within a core zone of privacy, which is inviolable, the court has said.
• It said “The absolute right of an individual to choose a life partner is not in the least affected by matters of faith”.

Hadiya case judgment:

• In the Hadiya case judgment, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud wrote that:
  • The matters of dress and food, of ideas and ideologies, of love and partnership, are within the central aspects of identity.
  • Neither the state nor the law can dictate a choice of partners or limit the free ability of every person to decide on these matters.

K.S. Puttuswamy judgment:

• In the K.S. Puttuswamy judgment or the ‘privacy’ judgment, a constitution bench said that:
  • The autonomy of the individual was the ability to make decisions in vital matters of concern to life.
  • Any interference by the State in an adult’s right to love and marry has a chilling effect on freedoms.
• Read more on the Puttuswamy Case (2017) in the linked article.

Lata Singh case:

• Asserting that India is a free and democratic country, the Supreme Court in the Lata Singh case, said, “the Constitution will remain strong only if we accept the plurality and diversity of our culture”.

2. Hold polls where NOTA got most votes: petition

Context:

• An advocate has moved the Supreme Court for a direction that fresh elections should be held in a constituency where NOTA (‘None of the above’ option) garnered the maximum number of votes.
• Besides, none of the candidates who lost to NOTA should be allowed to contest the fresh polls.

Details:

• The petition argues that political parties chose candidates without consulting the voters, which was a truly undemocratic process.
• In turn, if the electorate has rejected these candidates by voting for NOTA, the petitioner asserted that the parties should accept that the voters have already made their discontent loud and clear.
• He opined that the right to reject and elect a new candidate will give power to the people to express their discontent. It would check corruption, criminalisation, casteism, communalism.
• He contended that the ‘right to reject’ was first proposed by the Law Commission in 1999.
  • It also suggested that the candidates be declared elected only if they have obtained 50%+1 of the valid votes cast.
• Similarly, the Election Commission endorsed the ‘Right to Reject’, first in 2001 and then in 2004 in its Proposed Electoral Reforms.
• The ‘Background Paper on Electoral Reforms’, prepared by the Ministry of Law in 2010, had proposed that if a certain percentage of the vote was negative, then election result should be nullified and new election held.

Read more on NOTA (‘None of the above’ option) covered in 26^th February 2020 Comprehensive News Analysis.

Category: ECONOMY

1. The perils of deregulated imperfect markets

Context: Massive protests by the farming community over the recently enacted Farm Acts.

Background: The Central Government has brought in farm acts which are believed to bring about a massive shift in the way agricultural markets are going to function.

1. Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020.
2. Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020.
3. Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020.

Details:

• The Farm Acts, in theory, seek to project that it will establish a ‘Free Market’ for farmers’ produce with a unified national market, which would provide farmers with the freedom to sell to any buyer.
• According to the Central Government, the establishment of many private markets would mean the disappearance of middlemen and subsequently, farmers will fetch higher prices for their produce. However, farmers and several farmer trade unions have raised some legitimate concerns.

The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020

Provisions

• Farmers are free to sell their products to anybody, anywhere.
• Removes barriers for intra and inter-state trade in agricultural produce.
• It supports seamless electronic trade.

How does it help?

• Ends the monopoly of traders.
• Engenders competition among buyers.
• Yields better returns to farmers and raises incomes.
• Farm produce can move freely from surplus to deficit regions.
• Creates a national market; high intimidation cost mandis will go.
• Consumers get quality products at affordable prices.

A) Should mandis pave way for private markets?

• The core idea behind the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020 is that the mandis controlled by Agricultural Produce Marketing Committees (APMCs) have established a market condition in which there is only one buyer and this has created an imperfect market condition in rural India.
• The empirical data reveals that for the two most largely grown crops in terms of gross cropped area, paddy and wheat, only 29% and 44% are sold in mandis and almost half of paddy and one-third of wheat is sold to private entities.
• These numbers suggest that a substantial quantity of agricultural-trade is outside the mandis.

Reasons why farmers resort to selling their produce outside mandis

1. Physical proximity
   1. At present, there are 6,630 mandis across the country with an average coverage area of 463 square kilometres.
   2. This is a far cry from the recommendations of the National Commission on Agriculture, which had recommended that a farmer must ideally be able to reach a mandi in one hour by cart. Hence to achieve this target an average coverage area of a mandi must be brought down to 80 square kilometres. That would require opening up of more mandis and not phasing out.
2. Low marketable surplus
   1. India’s agrarian set-up is dominated by small and marginal farmers who constitute around 85% of the farmers.
   2. Small and marginal farmers have a low marketable surplus, hence it is not economically viable for them to take their harvest to the mandis. They end up selling to the local village trader, even if it means getting a lower price.

B) Freedom to sell outside markets

• One major driver of this particular act is to provide an opportunity for the farmer to sell the product outside the mandis.
• Agriculture being a state subject, states have taken active steps to deregulate agricultural trade.
• 18 states have made provisions for the establishment of private markets outside APMC and a similar number of states have facilitated for direct purchase from the farmers.
• The above-mentioned attempts to take the agriculture trade outside of mandis and establish private markets haven’t exactly picked up momentum.
• Private markets have been geographically sporadic and their reach is nowhere near comparable to the mandis.

C) High transaction costs – A hindrance for private investment in markets

• Private markets must have the physical infrastructure for produce collection, aggregating, grading, storage, transportation.
• It also involves having necessary manpower for the smooth operation of mandis and their associated costs.
• The above factors entice corporate retail chains to see mandis as aggregators and prefer to buy from the mandis in bulk, to circumvent high transaction costs.

Transaction costs v/s Mandi taxes

• Proponents of private markets have raised the issue of burdensome mandi taxes. They believe that these taxes reduce the returns for farmers, however, such an understanding is faulty in nature.
• Mandi taxes have been earmarked for reinvestment in market infrastructure improvement. Example – Punjab Mandi Board deploys the revenues collected as market committee fees and a rural development fee to construct rural roads, run medical and veterinary dispensaries, rural electrification, sanitation facilities, etc.
• Besides, farmers have not been able to secure a higher price for their produce in private markets courtesy of high transaction costs.

D) Minimum Support Prices

• Minimum Support Price (MSP) is a form of market intervention by the Government of India to insure agricultural producers against any sharp fall in farm prices.
• Guaranteed Government procurement had secured protection of the farmers from demand and supply shock but the new farm acts have cast doubts over the future of MSP.

Farmers concerns over MSP

1. Absence of periodic revision in input and labour costs
   1. The MSP growth rate has not matched the pace of growth in costs of living, this hurts the farming income.
2. MSP calculation
   1. The CACP has three different definitions of production costs – A2 (actual paid out cost), A2+FL (actual paid out cost plus imputed value of family labour) and C2 (comprehensive cost including imputed rent and interest on owned land and capital). As is evident, C2 > A2+FL > A2.
   2. The Government has not committed to fixing the MSP at 50% above the C2 cost of production.
3. Commission on Agricultural Prices has been recommending to the Government that open-ended foodgrain procurement should be phased out. Also, the Shantha Kumar committee has recommended that the government should not procure on a full-fledged basis from all states, and must limit its operation to only a few states.

• The above factors along with the Farm Acts have increased anxiety amongst the farmers who rely on MSP based public procurement.
• The farmers feel that a lack of commitment to MSP and a signal towards weaker mandis and the emergence of private markets can be a body blow to their incomes.

Way Forward

1. Expansion in mandi network and ramping up investment in mandi infrastructure should be dovetailed with rejigging the MSP system, increase its coverage in crops and geographical expanse along with universalization of the Public Distribution System – these can be boons to farmers and also the pandemic-affected population that have been struggling to put ‘food on the table’.
2. APMC has to be reformed to overcome some of its age-old maladies, such as high entry fee, internal collusion, merchants cartel. A single point levy market fees and unified national licenses for traders appear as the means to secure the interests of farmers who bring their produce to the mandis.

Category: INTERNAL SECURITY

1. Moving forward in base areas

Context: Additional five battalions of the Central Reserve Police Force have been deployed by the Union Government to strengthen anti-Maoist operations in the south Bastar region.

Details:

• Chhattisgarh state has been the epicentre of Maoist activities, especially the regions of Bastar and Abujhmad.
• Bastar and Abujhmad are referred to as ‘Base areas’ by Maoists because these regions enable Maoists to wage a ‘Mobile war’ with the security forces and enable swift mobilization of units such as the People’s Liberation Guerilla Army battalion.
• CRPF’s specially trained ‘Cobra units’ and State’s Special Task Force and District Reserve Guards are also engaged in operations in the forward areas.

The newly inducted battalions could have multiple advantages for the State

1. Larger combing area
   1. Security forces will occupy a larger area which will help check Maoists’ movement.  Thus frequent combing operations by the security forces will gradually reduce Maoists’ occupancy to a smaller area.
   2. In the event of an attack on the security forces, the Maoists will be vulnerable to retaliation by a higher capacity force. Maoists will run the risk of being outnumbered.
   3. Consequently, the intensity of war will be reduced and the ‘mobile war’ will be reduced to a ‘guerrilla war’. Mobile war attempts to defeat the enemy by incapacitating their decision-making through shock and disruption.
   4. Similarly, the Maoists’ battalions, being personnel heavy, will be more vulnerable and in all likelihood, will have to be scaled down over time to reduce casualties due to continuous pressure from the security forces.
2. Tangible benefits
   1. Deployment of additional security personnel would lead to instantaneous welfare in the adjacent villages.
   2. The district administration would scale up provisioning of water facilities via new borewells and also enable health services that are extended by the medical staff of security camps to be available to the local people by facilitating a larger financial outlay.
   3. The newly established security camps can be utilized alternatively as a development centre, for example, they can be used as an effective implementation mechanism for welfare schemes directed towards the local people.
3. Physical infrastructure
   1. Lack of well-connected roads and mobile connectivity has helped foster Maoist insurgency. These conditions have aided and enabled Left-wing elements to establish a strong foothold in these areas.
   2. The presence of security forces would entail the establishment of a network of roads, mobile towers, electricity poles. The Maoists have been successful in enrolling the support of the local people by highlighting the lack of development in the region.
   3. Hence, bridging the developmental deficit and aiding further development in the form of schools, primary health centres, Anganwadis will wean away the physical and moral support enjoyed by these insurgents.
4. Political empowerment
   1. Political representation and democratic institutions have been blatantly opposed by the Maoists.
   2. The revival of political activities, setting up democratic institutions, providing political leadership, enabling the local people to air their grievances will dissipate the political vacuum and make a dent in the Maoist propaganda.

Important Initiatives for LWE Affected States

1. Road Connectivity Project for LWE affected areas
2. LWE Mobile Tower Project
3. Aspirational District: The Ministry of Home Affairs has been tasked with the monitoring of Aspirational districts program in 35 LWE affected districts.
4. Special Central Assistance (SCA) for 30 most LWE affected districts.
5. Security Related Expenditure (SRE) Scheme.

SAMADHAN Doctrine

A one-stop solution for the LWE problem. It encompasses the entire strategy of government from short-term policy to long-term policy formulated at different levels. SAMADHAN stands for:

• S-Smart Leadership,
• A-Aggressive Strategy,
• M-Motivation and Training,
• A-Actionable Intelligence,
• D-Dashboard Based KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) and KRAs (Key Result Areas),
• H-Harnessing Technology,
• A-Action plan for each Theatre,
• N-No access to Financing.

Read more on Left-wing Extremism in the linked article.

2. ‘India to surpass 350 mn 5G connections by 2026’

What’s in News?

According to a report, India is expected to surpass 350 million 5G subscriptions by 2026, accounting for 27% of all mobile subscriptions in the country.

• India has the highest average monthly mobile data traffic per smartphone.
• In India, the reliance of people on mobile networks to stay connected as well as work from home during the pandemic has resulted in average traffic per smartphone user rising from 13.5 GB a month in 2019 to 15.7 GB in 2020, the highest globally.

3. ‘Bank capital in India, Sri Lanka to fall more than in other EMs’

What’s in News?

In its Emerging Markets Financial Institutions Outlook report, Moody’s Investors Service said that bank capital will shrink moderately in Asia’s emerging markets over the next two years.

• It said that the banks in India and Sri Lanka expected to post larger declines in the absence of public or private funds injections.
• Its forecast states that, in India, stress among non-bank financial institutions will also curtail their capacity to lend.

Q1. Consider the following statements:

Q2. Consider the following statements with respect to Guru Nanak Dev:

Q3. Which of the following are the members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation 
(SCO)?

Q4. Consider the following statements with respect to the Indian peacock 
softshell turtle: