23 Jun 2018: UPSC Exam Comprehensive News Analysis

A. GS1 Related

• Ambubachi Mela is a four-day fair to mark the annual menstruation of the goddess at Kamakhya temple, centre for Tantra worship.
• Kamakhya, atop Nilachal Hills in Guwahati, is one of 51 shaktipeeths or seat of Shakti followers, each representing a body part of Sati, Lord Shiva’s companion.

Significance

• The ritualistic fair celebrating the goddess’ period is one of the reasons why the taboo associated with menstruation is less in Assam compared to other parts of India.
• The attainment of womanhood of girls in Assam is celebrated with a ritual called ‘Tuloni Biya’, meaning small wedding.
• Ambubachi Mela is also an occasion to promote awareness on menstrual hygiene.

The legend

• Kamakhya Temple denotes the spot where Sati used to retire in secret to satisfy her amour with Shiva, and it was also the place where her yoni fell after Shiva danced with the corpse of Sati.
• The only ones that avoid the temple are the descendants of the medieval Koch royalty, who had reconstructed Kamakhya temple in 1565.
• This is because the goddess is believed to have cursed the royalty after the king and his brother Chilarai — one of Assam’s revered generals — had secretly watched her dance.
• There are legends about the goddess dancing when Kendukoli, a priest during Naranarayan’s reign, performed puja with his eyes shut.
• Naranarayan and Chilarai convinced the priest to allow them to watch the goddess’s dance.
• Incensed, the goddess punished the priest besides cursing the duo and their descendants with doom if they visited the Kamakhya temple ever.

The temple

• The current structural temple, built and renovated many times in the period 8th-17th century, gave rise to a hybrid indigenous style that is sometimes called the Nilachal type: a temple with a hemispherical dome on a cruciform base.
• The temple consists of four chambers: garbhagriha and three mandapas locally called calanta, pancharatna and natamandira aligned from east to west.
• The temple’s sanctum sanctorum houses the yoni — female genital — symbolised by a rock.

B. GS2 Related

• The Seychelles National Assembly will not ratify India’s plans to build a naval base in the western Indian Ocean region.
• Officials of the Seychelles government announced the decision when the country’s President, Danny Faure, arrived in India on a six-day state visit.
• The state visit of President Faure is part of regular high-level exchanges between India and the Seychelles and will accord an opportunity to review the wide-ranging bilateral cooperation, including in the fields of defence and security and development partnerships.

Concerns

• Seychelles has indicated that instead of allowing India to run the base, it would like to develop a coast guard facility at the Assumption.
• The Indian project was to include a facility for Indian ships and an airstrip that would allow New Delhi to guard the energy lanes vital to India’s economy.
• The Opposition members in the Seychelles National Assembly argued against allowing India to build a naval base on the strategically located Assumption island, saying it would infringe on the country’s sovereignty.
• The government said the proposal to seek ratification of the project would not be presented to National Assembly as the Opposition had already said it would not clear it.
• The National Assembly’s decision follows several protests by civil society activists in the archipelago nation who have urged the government to remain non-aligned and avoid tilting towards either India or China.

C. GS3 Related

• While Maharashtra may be gearing up for a stringent ban on plastic, experience from across the country suggests that States’ claims on reigning in plastic are stronger on paper than on the ground.

Rules

• According to the Centre’s Plastic Waste Management (PWM) Rules, 2016, all States have to annually apprise the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) on the steps taken to reign in plastic use, whether a ban is in force, and the strength and performance of a recycler and waste-processing network.
• The latest such report — as of July 2016 — notes that only 24 States and Union Territories have complied with these directions.

Ground reality

• Most States, while claiming a ban, qualify it by saying that the ban is imposed in specific towns or cities.
• Or that it is focussed on particular categories of plastic.
• Take Assam. Its performance report states that while there is a complete ban on plastic carry bags in Kamrup, Sonitpur, Nalbari, Dibrugarh, it allows the import of substandard plastic carry bags, provided the Commissioner of Taxes, Assam is informed.
• In Gujarat, the estimated plastic waste generation is approximately 2,69,294 tonnes per annum and there are nearly 689 plastic waste recyclers, all of them registered.
• But only Gandhinagar — the capital city but with less than 4% of neighbouring Ahmedabad’s population — has an explicit ban on the use of plastic carry bags.
• Delhi, which reportedly generates the largest quantity of plastic waste in the country, has not provided information on its plastic management initiatives to the CPCB.
• The law requires that all plastic waste recyclers register themselves but there were around 312 unregistered plastic manufacturing/recycling units in Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Manipur, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Uttrakhand and Uttar Pradesh.
• It is observed that most of the States/UTs have not set up proper monitoring system for use of carry bags as per the specified guidelines.
• It has been observed that those States/UTs, who have imposed complete ban on use and sale of plastic carry bags, the plastic bags are stocked, sold and used indiscriminately.
• Besides, substandard carry bags (<50 micron) are used widely in other States/UTs, violating PWM Rules, 2016, the CPCB highlights in the report.
• India generates an estimated 32 million metric tonnes of packaging waste each year, of which plastic waste constitutes 16%. But only 60% of the collected plastic waste is recycled.

Single-use plastics

• Around 43% of manufactured plastics are used for packaging, most of it single-use plastic.
• So far, not a single one of the 24 States that report their plastic waste management performance have plans in place to tackle single-use plastics.
• Independent experts say that while Maharashtra’s initiative is laudable, it still hinges on extremely efficient enforcement.
• Maharashtra has increased its collection centres in the last three months but the problem remains as there are no alternatives to single-use plastics.
• The manpower requirements and enforcement challenges are enormous.

Examples to learn from

• Kerala and Sikkim are the States with the most creditable plastic waste management policies.
• Sikkim has a system of buying back plastic from consumers. Maharashtra needs to implement such a system.

Read more about effects of plastic and its management.

D. GS4 Related

E. Editorials

Why in news?

• A draft privacy bill proposes sweeping reforms to the way personal data is collected, processed and stored in India.

Details

• Titled Indian Privacy Code, 2018, the draft proposes that “all data collected, processed and stored by data controllers and data processors prior to the date on which this Act comes into force shall be destroyed within a period of two years from the date on which this Act comes into force”.
• The draft has been put together by a group of lawyers and policy analysts and uploaded on the website of ‘Save our Privacy’ — a public initiative to put forth a model law on data protection. The initiative is backed by the India Privacy Foundation.
• No person, including a data controller and data processor, shall collect any personal data without obtaining the consent of the data subject to whom it pertains, the draft bill says.

Collection of personal data without consent can happen only when:

1. It’s necessary for the provision of an emergency medical service.
2. Prevent, investigate or prosecute a cognizable offence.
3. Exempted by a privacy commission that the draft seeks to institute.

• Also, the draft bill proposes that no person shall store any personal data for a period longer than is necessary to achieve the purpose for which it was collected or received. The same applies to the processing of personal data.
• The draft bill has been submitted to the Justice Sri Krishna Committee — which will deliberate on a data-protection framework for the country.
• The bill prescribes punishment for offenses related to interception of communication, surveillance, abetment, repeat offenders and offenses by companies.

Seven principles

• The bill is based on seven principles.
  1. The importance of individual rights
  2. A data protection law must be based on privacy principles and guidelines discussed in the report of Justice AP Shah Committee of Experts; the Supreme Court judgement on Right to Privacy and European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation.
  3. A strong privacy commission must be created to enforce privacy principles. The commission should be granted wide powers of investigation, adjudication, rule-making and enforcement. The privacy commission must have jurisdiction over the government as well as private bodies.
  4. The government must respect user privacy. The government cannot deny essential services to citizens if they choose not to share data with it. The draft says government withholding services on pretext of collection of information effectively amounts to “extortion of consent”.
  5. A complete privacy code must come with surveillance reform. Even when individual interception and surveillance is carried out this should be severely limited in substance and practiced through procedural safeguards.
  6. Strengthen the Right To Information Act and exempt information commissioners from interference or control by the privacy commissioner
  7. International protection and harmonisation is a must to protect the open internet. The group suggests the law must have extraterritorial effect and apply to web services and platforms which are accessible in India and gather personal data of Indians.

• The bill takes inspiration from the Privacy (Protection) Bill, 2013 which was drafted over a series of roundtable discussions and inputs conducted by the Centre for Internet and Society, Bengaluru.

1. Kharif crop sowing slows down as monsoon stalls

2. ‘Cannot share Aadhaar data for crime probe’

3. Are we ready for a pandemic?

4. India to teach satellite tech to students from abroad

5. Oil rises after OPEC agrees to lift output

6. South Korean President to visit India in July

7. Jaitley defends Centre’s ‘muscular’ policy in J&K

Question 1. Which of the following is to organize the traditional industries and artisans into 
clusters to make them competitive and provide support for their long-term sustainability by way 
of enhancing the marketability of products, improving the skills of artisans, making provision 
for common facilities and strengthening the cluster governance systems?

1. IMPRINT
2. SWAYAM
3. SFURTI
4. ASPIRE

See

H. UPSC Mains Practice Questions

1. Plastics have been responsible for the transformation of everyday life. Comment.