Daily Current Affairs - Civil Services - 19-07-2021

Useful compilation of Civil Services oriented - Daily Current Affairs - Civil Services - 19-07-2021

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• SECTION 1 - TEN NEWS HEADLINES

1. Indian Politics - Pegasus snooping and privacy breaches exposed - A huge data leak, passed to 17 media outlets, purported to show that spyware produced by NSO Group, an Israeli tech firm, has been used to snoop on scores of dissidents, human-rights activists and journalists. Many prominent names from the Indian journalism fraternity, and also human rights activists, were found in the list. The government issued a quick denial, even as the monsoon session of the Parliament commenced on 19th July. The Pegasus technology is marketed to governments as a crime-combating tool. It allows authorities to listen into conversations using hacked mobile phones’ microphones, as well as track other data. Among those allegedly targeted were associates of Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered by the Saudi government (in a rogue operation, it says) in 2018. NSO vigorously denied the allegations.
2. Environment and Ecology - New initiatives in "Building Energy Efficiency" 2021 - The Minister for Power and Ministry of New and Renewable Energy inaugurated “Aiming for Sustainable Habitat: New Initiatives in Building Energy Efficiency 2021”. The building sector is the second largest consumer of electricity after industry but is expected to become the largest energy consuming sector by 2030. Realizing the importance, the Government of India is focusing on improving energy efficiency across residential as well as commercial building establishments. These will help enhance the energy-efficiency levels in residential buildings thereby leading to sustainable habitation. With future-driven initiatives like smart home ecosystems, optimizing energy-efficiency in any given structure will surely be the need in the coming years. More energy-efficiency means less energy consumption in household and reduced carbon emissions.
3. Indian Economy - India’s textile sector - The Union Minister of Textiles held an in-depth review of initiatives undertaken by the Ministry of Textiles for boosting the textiles sector. The textiles & garments industry is a labour-intensive sector employing 45 million people in India, second only to the agriculture sector in terms of employment. It contributes 2.3% to Indian GDP, 7% of industrial output, 12% to the export earnings of India and employs more than 21% of total employment. India is the sixth largest producer of technical textiles with a 6% global share, largest producer of cotton & jute in the world. Technical textiles are functional fabrics that have applications in industries such as automobiles, civil engineering and construction,  India is also the second largest producer of silk in the world and 95% of the world’s hand woven fabric comes from India.
4. Defence and Military - Hypersonic missiles - Russia tested a hypersonic cruise missile with a range of 350 kilometres. The Zircon missile was launched from a ship in the White Sea, and performed well. America, Russia and China are developing hypersonic weapons, which can travel more than five times the speed of sound, or around 1.6km per second, and evade missile-defence systems. Hypersonic weapons can travel more than five times the speed of sound, or around one mile (1.6km) per second. They come in two flavours - (i) Hypersonic cruise missiles, powered by rockets or jets throughout their flight and (ii) Hypersonic boost-glide weapons, that are launched into the upper atmosphere in the normal fashion atop existing ballistic missiles, but then release hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs) which fly lower, faster and—to an adversary—much more unpredictably than old-fashioned re-entry vehicles. At ten times the speed of sound, a kilogram of anything has more kinetic energy than you get from exploding a kilogram of TNT. Current ballistic weapons are very fast, but not as manoeuvrable; current cruise missiles are very manoeuvrable, but not as fast. Hypersonic cruise missiles and HGVs are novel because they fuse these qualities of speed and agility.
5. Science and Technology - AI tool for cancer detection - NBDriver - Researchers at IIT Madras have developed an AI tool called NBDriver (neighbourhood driver) for use in analysing cancer-causing mutations in cells. By looking at the neighbourhood, or context, of a mutation in the genome, it can look at harmful “driver” mutations and distinguish them from neutral “passenger” mutations. This technique of looking at the genomic neighbourhood to make out the nature of the mutation is a novel and largely unexplored one. The nature of the mutation depends on the neighbourhood, and how this tool may be used to draw the line between driver and passenger mutations. The method of distinguishing between driver and passenger mutations solely by looking at the neighbourhood is novel.
6. Defence and Military - MH-60R choppers for Indian Navy - The Indian Navy accepted the first two of its MH-60R Multi Role Helicopters (MRH) from US Navy in a ceremony held at Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego on 16 Jul 21. The ceremony marked the formal transfer of these helicopters from US Navy to Indian Navy. MH-60R helicopters manufactured by Lockheed Martin Corporation, USA is an all-weather helicopter designed to support multiple missions with state of the art avionics/ sensors. 24 of these helicopters are being procured under Foreign Military Sales from the US Government. The helicopters would also be modified with several India Unique Equipment and weapons. The induction of these MRH would further enhance Indian Navy’s three dimensional capabilities. In order to exploit these potent helicopters, the first batch of Indian crew is presently undergoing training in USA.
7. Indian Economy - Card payment network companies banned by RBI - The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has so far barred three foreign card payment network companies - Mastercard, American Express and Diners Club - from taking new customers on board over the issue of storing data in India. By the RBI circular on Storage of Payment System Data dated April 6, 2018, all system providers were directed to ensure that within six months the entire data (full end-to-end transaction details, information collected or carried or processed as part of the message or payment instruction) relating to payment systems operated by them is stored in a system only in India. They were required to report compliance to the RBI and submit a board-approved system audit report conducted by a CERT-In empanelled auditor within the timelines specified. However, credit and card firms with global operations have been resisting the move, citing costs, security risk, lack of clarity, timeline, and the possibility of data localisation demand from other countries.
8. World Politics - South Africans get their act together - South Africans marked Nelson Mandela’s birthday by cleaning up after recent riots. Each July 18th the public are encouraged to do 67 minutes of volunteering to mark Mr Mandela’s 67 years of public service. Jacob Zuma, another former president, whose imprisonment sparked the unrest, appeared in court at a corruption trial in relation to an arms deal in the 1990s. In South Africa there are many sources of discontent - unemployment, growing inequality, poor power and water, corruption, cruel police and a tough pandemic! The July '21 riots were not random, but urged on by supporters of Jacob Zuma, the former president whose faction of the ruling African National Congress wants to topple President Mr Ramaphosa. On June 29th the Constitutional Court sentenced Mr Zuma to 15 months behind bars for refusing to appear before a judge-led inquiry into corruption during his time in office from 2009-18. Just before midnight on July 7th, as the highest court’s deadline for the police to arrest him approached, Mr Zuma was taken into custody.
9. Science and Technology - Fastest internet ever - Japan's National Institute of Information and Communications Technology scientists set the fastest internet speed world record by transferring data at 319 Tbps over a distance of 3,001 kilometres. They used a combination of rare earth minerals, a new kind of fiber optic cable, and a laser system. It's almost twice the 178 Tbps record set in 2020 by UCL engineers. The speed test was performed in a lab using advanced fiber optic technology. Many fiber optic cables contain one core and a lot of cladding, or covering, to protect the data inside. NICT’s system used an experimental strand of fiber optic cable with four cores housed in a cable roughly the size of a standard fiber optic line. NICT looped the data through coiled bits of fiber optic that simulated a transmission distance of 3,001 km or about 1,864 miles without a degradation of the signal or speed. That’s impressive, but there’s still a lot of work to do and the method of attaining this speed was complicated.
10. World Politics - Hacking news - (a) US State Department is offering up to $10 million for information that can identify or locate malicious cyber actors working under the control of a foreign government. "Certain malicious cyber operations targeting US critical infrastructure may violate the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act," it said. The violations include extortion threats, intentional unauthorised access to a computer, and others. (b) An Israeli group sold a tool to hack into Microsoft Windows, Microsoft and technology human rights group Citizen Lab said. An Israeli cyber firm, named Candiru, reportedly created and sold software exploit that can penetrate Windows. It said the hacking tool was utilised in multiple countries, including Iran, Spain and the UK, to target various civil society organisations. (c) Facebook said it'd taken down about 200 accounts run by an Iranian hackers' group under a cyber spying operation that targeted mostly US military personnel. Facebook said the group used fake online personas to connect with targets. They later drove the targets onto other sites where they tricked them into clicking malicious links that'd infect their devices with spying malware.

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• SECTION 2 - DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS

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• 1. ECONOMY (Prelims, GS Paper 3, Essay paper)

Inflation rising everywhere like a pandemic

• The story: When the unexpected Covid pandemic destroyed the modern way of life, there was a global shutdowns of factories, refineries, and mines. As countries began recovering, oil prices rose sharply (doubling from November 2020 to July 2021) breaching the $70/barrel level, driving up prices across all sectors.
• India and the West: India can learn from western economies that are now slowly returning to normal. In the US, the Consumer Price Index in June showed a 5.4 per cent increase, the largest year-over-year gain since 2008. The monetary policies to be followed can be tempered as per lessons learnt elsewhere.
• Two kinds of inflation: Inflation can be supply-sided — when the world’s factories cannot satisfy demand — or demand-sided — when too much money chases limited supply. There is inflation on both fronts today.
• Structural changes: As the Work-From-Home (WFH) formula, so prevalent in the services sector, took hold, suddenly everyone realised that to make physical goods, people need to go to work, produce, and ship them through the global supply chain. When the pandemic hit, many semiconductor manufacturers shut down. Auto companies idled plants causing the few microchip manufacturers still running to switch production capacity to make more PCs and phones as demand rose for Zoom-driven technologies.
• Normalcy and chips: With the production of automobiles and other big-ticket items coming back, there was too much demand for a limited supply of chips. Intel and other manufacturers announced new plants, but they won’t start adding to the supply for months. Because demand will remain high and supply will remain constrained, chip shortages will last through 2022 and into 2023. The result was a steep increase in semiconductor prices.

1. Chips are used in products ranging from IOT devices to satellites. Refrigerator prices in the US are up 50 per cent and used car prices 40 per cent compared to pre-pandemic levels.
2. A shortage of cars has caused Hertz, Avis, and other chains globally to push rental prices 200-300 per cent higher in some markets.
3. In parallel, central banks are flooding markets with money, and governments are borrowing and spending trillions of dollars to combat downturns. No one knows when to apply the brakes. The 10-year US Treasury yield is 1.32 per cent. The return on consumer savings bank accounts is practically zero.

• Demand side trouble: There are bad stories on the demand side as well. In North America, where most homes are built from wood, government pandemic cash assistance caused homeowners to engage in do-it-yourself projects. Lumber prices increased, even as sawmills began to shut down. Before the pandemic, lumber was selling at about $350/1,000 footboard. In May, the price in the futures market jumped to $1,250, nearly a four-fold increase for the same quantity of wood. This had a ripple effect in the vast housing industry. Prices of new homes skyrocketed, pulling up existing home prices. Buyer frenzy set in.
• Summary: Of the 10 most-populated countries, life is not back to normal in five (India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Brazil, and Bangladesh). As these economies recover, demand will place even more pressure on already-scarce global supplies. It is clear that for many years, the prices won't stabilise easily now.

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• 2. ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY (Prelims, GS Paper 3, Essay paper)

Environment Ministry's new green norms not good for EIA regime

• The story: The latest guidelines from the Union Ministry for Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) to prevent violations of green norms are being seen by experts as another attempt to weaken the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) regime. This SOP came in response to NGT's orders, which was worried over large-scale violations.
• NGT in picture: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) had asked the ministry to formulate a standard operating procedure (SOP), keeping the ‘polluter-pays’ principle and the ‘principle of proportionality’ in mind. The green bench was concerned by continuous violation of environmental norms by infrastructure and industrial projects.  
• What SOP says: The environment ministry’s office memorandum (OM) dated July 7, 2021, empowers regulatory institutions at both central and state level:

1. To identify and report cases of violation
2. To take action against violators in terms of closure or demolition of a project
3. To levy penalty on them that is akin to the scale of the project

• The EIA process stood weakened over the years, with the final nail in the coffin being the introduction of draft EIA Notification, 2020 that received a lot of flak from civil society, academicians and environmentalists. Consequent to the public outrage, the draft is under scrutiny. Sections of that draft EIA is now being pushed as OMs on the pretext of scrutiny.
• The overall scenario: NGT had come across complaints over many years where projects were completed without grant of prior environmental clearance (EC) and the State Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) failed to abide by the “rule of law” requiring “demolition” or “payment of assessed compensation” from the project proponent.

1. The following case scenarios will be categorised as ‘Violation’: First, on-site construction or installation or excavation without obtaining EC; Second, expanding the production capacity and / or project area beyond the limit specified in the existing EC letter; and Third, changing scope of the project such as modification in product/s without prior approval from the ministry or SEIAA.
2. ‘Non compliance’ refers to not complying with the terms and conditions prescribed in the EC letter of the project awarded by the MoEF&CC or SEIAA.
3. Identification of violation cases and their reporting - Clause 13 of the OM includes the provision to identify, examine and appraise violation projects, to refrain them from causing further environmental damage and also to compensate for causing damage to the environment. Now, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), state pollution control board (SPCB) and union territory Pollution Control Committee (UTPCC) are directed to identify cases of violation under their respective jurisdiction and report it to MOEF&CC in the case of Category A projects and to the SEIAA in case of Category B projects for further action.
4. SPCBs and UTPCCs have also been directed to not issue or renew Consent to Operate (CTO) to entities that do not have prior EC. The violation can also be reported suo motu by the proponent itself. The OM includes an additional provision stating “The CPCB, SPCBs and UTPCCs shall expeditiously examine the references received from the public and others in relation to violation and take necessary actions”.
5. This provision was missing in the draft EIA 2020 notification and has caused a huge outcry. Demand was that the public be allowed to report violations.
6. The current OM has included this provision. But it has not defined what references could be submitted for the consideration of authorities. There is also no mechanism elaborated upon how these complaints are to be registered. There is also no established procedure to ensure that the complaints made against the violator are not dismissed without hearing. This ambiguity in the memorandum leaves scope for a less transparent redressal mechanism.

• Handling of violation cases: Clause 11 of the OM defines three different actions to be taken for the violation projects depending upon their EC status. In case the project has not obtained EC, it will be ordered to close its operations. If the project has undergone expansion without obtaining EC for the expanded portion, it will be ordered to revert the activity / production to the limit granted in the existing EC. There might be projects which do not require EC according to their earlier production. But an EC is required after expansion. Such projects will be ordered to restrict the production / activity where EC was not required. For all these projects, actions will be initiated according to the Environment Protection Act, 1986. The problem is that all the three actions mentioned above for projects will be temporary and will be in effect till those projects do not get the required EC.
• Making violators liable: The detailed mechanism laid out in the current OM to allow operation of permissible and sustainable projects is nothing new and is exactly the same as provided in draft EIA notification, 2020. But the OM misses out on providing any system to demand remediation and restoration of environmental damage from the projects which will be directed permanent closure or demolition. Although these projects will not be allowed to operate further, the violator should be made liable.

1. Penalty on violating cases - To strengthen deterrence, clause 12 of the OM entitles the regulatory authorities to levy penalties on the proponent, in addition to the bank guarantee. The penalties were bifurcated for two kinds of projects — greenfield and brownfield.
2. For greenfield projects where operation have not commenced, the penalty is one per cent of the total project cost incurred upto the date of filling of application alongwith EIA / EMP report. For greenfield project where operation have commenced, the penalty is one per cent of the total project cost incurred upto the date of filling of application alongwith EIA / EMP report plus 0.25 per cent of total turnover.
3. But the penalties on both project cost and turnover will be halved if the proponent suo motu reports the violation. The penalties suggested in the office memorandum could be termed as legitimating non-compliance. First, it is beyond logic as to how a Rs 100 crore company is not aware of  environmental rules and regulations. Second, the penalty is meagre. For example: A Rs 1 crore penalty to be levied on a Rs 100 crore greenfield project will also be reduced to just Rs 50,00,000 if reported first by the proponent. It will never act as deterrence for violation.
4. In March 2017, the MoEF&CC issued a notification that laid down procedures for appraisal of violation cases. The projects were granted a window of six months to be regulated within the existing environmental regime stretching from March 2017 to September 2017, further extended by another six months extending from March 2018 to September, 2018. It was a one-time push for regularising existing violations. The present OM, instead of acting as a deterrent for violators, is instead building on the notion that violations can be course corrected by paying penalties.

• Summary: Looking at the plethora of violation cases that the ministry / SEIAA are swamped with today, it is imperative to develop a mechanism where we do not compromise the existing environmental regulations and adopt a ‘zero tolerance for violation’ stance.

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• 3. FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Prelims, GS Paper 3, Essay paper)

Cuba's protests 2021, and the road ahead

• Cuban protests: July 2021 was a remarkable phase in post-revolutionary Cuba when Cubans protested intensely on streets, opposing the pandemic's handling and demanding regime change. Fidel Castro's given slogan 'Patria o Muerte" (Fatherland or Death) changed to "Patria y Vida" (Fatherland and Life).
• Hardships: American sanctions hurt Cuba in the 1960s too, but recent sanctions have hurt badly, as Covid infections and deaths have surged (though much lower than Latin American countries).

1. It was recently that Cuban scientists announced two local vaccines for Covid-19 - Abdala and Soberana-2 - but overall vaccination rates are low
2. Pandemic brought a tourism collapse, leading to a GDP shrinkage of 11% for Cuba, and the govt. failed to secure enough cash to import fuel, food and basic goods

• Steps taken: The govt. started cutting subsidies, and ending the dual-currency system, resulting in inflation and scarcities. Whatever little relaxations were given by President Obama were tightened by Trump, and since the overseas Cuban community in Florida supports the sanctions, even Biden is unable to reverse.
• Ground situation: Cuba imports 70% of its food, and has a vast welfare programme. The USSR's collapse in 1990s brought trouble, and problems mounted. Social media added fuel to recent fire, and protests escalated.
• Response: President Miguel Diaz-Canel denounced the protests first, and put his own supporters on the streets. The world media covered it extensively, and the President mellowed. He accepted there were shortages, and eased some restrictions.

1. President Diaz-Canel was made the first secretary of ruling Communist Party in 2021, and is the first post-revolution generation president (he didn't take part in the overthrow of the Fulgencio Batista regime, 1959)
2. It was the group of Fidel Castro, Ernesto Che Guevara, Raul Castro, Juan Almeida that started the armed struggle against Batista, propped up by external forces
3. The group succeeded in 1959, and the 26th July Movement became a part of national liberation from 1959 to 1961, and became part of the ORI (Integrated Revolutionary Organisations), and then became the PURSC (United Party of the Cuban Socialist Revolution), and later the PCC (Cuban Communist Party) in 1965.

• Nationalisation: All properties of oligarchs and foreigners was nationalised. Agrarian reforms were on. Stronger ties with the USSR were built.
• Political views: The PCC was the 'vanguard of the people', and a single-party system. The govt. was PCC-led, answerable to a National Assembly of People's Power (Parliament since 1976).

1. Members of this National Assembly come from local electoral districts nominations, from mass organisations (farmers, students, trade unions etc.)
2. Public meetings also nominate representatives
3. Logic is that such public participation keeps politics free from money power and ensures socialism stays alive
4. Dissent is not tolerated

• Since 2010: The PCC has realised that the economic system has grown weak, and Raul Castro (predecessor of Diaz-Canel)    took many slow and steady steps to rectify it. Small businesses, self-entrepreneurs and cooperative got more autonomy. Private property began getting recognised. FDI was welcomed.

1. The hardline orthodox communists disliked all this, and didn't agree on dilution of state control on means of production
2. The PCC wanted to emulate the Chinese example, and started liberalisation
3. But due to US sanctions, progress was slow, and social sectors suffered
4. New generation has litle memory of revolution years, and wants more freedom
5. It thinks that the highly regulated economy is responsible for shortages

• Summary: The regime has to first douse the pandemic fire, using own vaccines, quickly. Then economic reforms must end shortages. There's no point blaming the protestors now.

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• 4. GOVERNMENT SCHEMES (Prelims, GS Paper 2, Essay paper)

What do lockdowns achieve - an analysis

• The story: No one expected the pandemic to hit so hard, in 2020. Soon, it was clear that other than shock lockdowns, there would be little else that governments could do to contain the viral spread.
• Lock them down: So, lockdowns became the handy option amidst the spread of the COVID-19 virus. But with time, it is important to make a cost-benefit assessment of lockdowns in both social and economic terms. A good starting point is the pace of vaccination that will eventually help end lockdowns.
• Vaccination status: As of mid-July-2021, 26.2% of the world population received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Of them, only 1% live in low-income countries. By contrast, the richer nations, such as the U.S., Canada, Germany and Britain, registered above 50% vaccination.

1. For India, the percentage of the adult population that has received at least one dose stands at 34.1%. It is essential to eliminate this inequality in the administration of vaccines to ensure protection against the virus.
2. Clearly, with variants still emerging, till that happens, long or short lockdowns from time to time won't go away.

• Challenges with lockdowns: When entire cities are shut down, the shock to the economic systems is intense and deep. The idea is to protect lives, but livelihoods inevitably come under pressure. The trade-off is not just a dilemma but a trilemma. How so?

1. Harsh lockdowns help humans keep on living, but they prevent them from earning a living.
2. With incomes evaporating, essential expenditures such as those on food, health and education cannot be sustained.
3. That implies that life could not be lived. Extreme lockdowns, hence, imply we cannot quite have our life and live it too, at least not meaningfully.

• What is the way out: This deadly trilemma (Livelihood, Saving life, Living life) is altering the definition of humanity itself! The balance between the expected benefits of the lockdown policy and the costs involved has to be analysed dispassionately. If the latter is higher than the former, it is wise to adopt alternative policies, involving an excess of benefits over costs.
• Cost of lockdowns: It can be measured by the value of lost GDP. Both France and Italy imposed heavy lockdowns and suffered 3% shrinkage in GDP. The 3% shrinkage cost of keeping a number of people alive is not trivial. Finland, which experienced a negligible rise in the mortality rate, experienced a 1% fall in per capita GDP. Lithuania performed miserably on its death rate front, but its GDP per person is expected to rise by 2%. For every infected person cured in poorer countries, 1.76 children die on account of a fall in the quality of life. That is worse than the trilemma scenario mentioned! Then, do consider the sufferings faced by migrant labourers in India, and of the crores of children held back from school, increasing the cases of child labour and child marriages.
• Summary: While human lives are priceless, the lockdown policies that impose great economic costs, need to be carefully designed. A constant recalibration is needed to minimise the damage, and maximise the returns from lockdowns. After all, life is not just about being alive.

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• 5. POLITY AND CONSTITUTION (Prelims, GS Paper 2, GS Paper 3)

How and Why do governments make new Ministries

• The story: As times change, the needs of the country change too. Society evolves, and politics evolves in tandem. In July 2021, the Indian govt. announced the setting up of a "ministry of cooperation". It is clear that creation or dismantling of any ministry is always a political call, meant to carry a political message, to reach out to specific sections of the electorate. Administrative needs also play a secondary role.
• Cooperation function: It has been part of several central ministries. Between 1974 and 1979, it was in the periphery of the ministry of industries and civil supplies; then it got mainstream in 1979, as part of the department of agriculture and cooperation. The web domain name of the ministry of agriculture and farmers welfare continues to be agricoop.nic.in, “coop” being the short form for “cooperation”.

1. In the 1950s, in a new Indian republic, when Jawaharlal Nehru was prime minister, cooperation was one of the functions of the then combined ministry of food and agriculture, the other subjects being agricultural production, marketing, research, agricultural economics, minor irrigation, animal husbandry, fertiliser, land reclamation, et al.
2. The July 2021 move was officially to realise a vision of “Sahkar se Samriddhi”, meaning prosperity through cooperation. So now the ministry would provide a separate administrative, legal and policy framework to strengthen India’s cooperative movement.
3. The Centre will have a mandate to focus on multi-state cooperatives; presently there are some 1,300 such entities, headquartered mainly in Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, New Delhi and Tamil Nadu.

• Politics of it: When the Congress-led UPA came to power in 2004, panchayati raj was made a full-fledged ministry, with Mani Shankar Aiyar the cabinet minister for it (close working relation with former PM Rajiv Gandhi). Such messaging also needs a strong action plan and sufficient money.

1. Nehru’s first cabinet had 14 ministers, and urban development was part of a large portfolio called the ministry of works, housing and supply. It got its new name only in 1985.
2. In 1991, then PM PV Narasimha Rao found it appealing to add employment to the name of the ministry. Thus the ministry of urban affairs and employment was formed.
3. The Bharatiya Janata Party’s first PM, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who rose to power on the back of urban votes, bifurcated the ministry in 1999, with the creation of a full-fledged entity called the ministry of urban employment and poverty alleviation.
4. Vajpayee also created the tourism ministry in 1999, catering to the interest of small traders in urban pockets, his key voters; tribal affairs (1999); and the development of north eastern region (2003), mainly to expand his party’s reach.
5. During the UPA rule (2004-14), the creation of some of the new ministries — panchayati raj (2004), minority affairs (2006) and micro, small and medium enterprises (2007) — had a clear pattern; it wanted to send out a political message to its voter base — rural Indians, minorities and small entrepreneurs.
6. With Modi in 2014, the first new ministry was skill development and entrepreneurship, then positioned as an answer to India’s growing unemployment.

• An issue of jurisdiction: There were worries on overlapping jurisdiction and erosion in federalism. Experts say that cooperatives can play a stellar role if the Centre succeeds in strengthening the existing regulatory framework, and that multi-state cooperatives do come under its jurisdiction. The Centre can announce schemes to incentivise the cooperatives. Some cooperatives like NAFED are profitable because the government procures items through them.

1. NAFED, or the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India, an umbrella organisation of about 850 marketing societies and federations across the nation, primarily helps its farmers by procuring their produce such as food grains, pulses, cotton, fruits and vegetables, and helping the organisation make enough profit to pay an annual dividend of 20% or more to its shareholders.
2. Big names connected with the cooperative movement are from non-BJP parties. The chairman of the Krishak Bharati Cooperative (KRIBHCO), Chandrapal Singh Yadav, is from the Samajwadi Party, while the chairman of the Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative (IFFCO), Balvinder Singh Nakai, is affiliated to the Akali Dal. The paid-up capital of KRIBHCO is made up of contributions from 9,478 cooperative societies across India, and IFFCO, one of the largest cooperatives in India, has a network of about 36,000 cooperative societies involving 5.5 crore farmers.

• Which states lead: Among the cooperative societies registered under the Multi State Cooperative Societies Act, 2002, as many as 567, or 43% of the total, are headquartered in Maharashtra, many controlled by leaders affiliated to the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) or the Congress. These are in sectors such as credit, agriculture, housing, dairy and banking. Karnataka, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu are some other states that have leapfrogged in cooperative movement.
• Summary: If all these factors are considered, and also the fact that the three agricultural laws passed by Parliament in 2020 have gotten stuck at the ground level, then the "Sahkar se Samriddhi" slogan sound political indeed. Cooperatives are one of the last big political frontiers the present ruling party has failed to make inroads into.

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• 6. SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (Prelims, GS Paper 3)

The controversy of Pegasus spyware

• The story: It first came into public limelight in 2019, and then screamed back into centrestage in July 2021. It was reported that Pegasus, a dangerously malicious software, was being used to secretly monitor and spy on an extensive host of public figures in India (and across the world).
• Points to note: Pegasus is a malware (malicious software) classified as a spyware. It is designed to gain access to devices, without the knowledge of users, and gather personal information and relay it back to whoever it is that is using the software to spy. It does not even need the user to click on any link, but just lodges itself onto the machine (device) and begins snooping.

1. Pegasus has been developed by the Israeli firm NSO Group that was set up in 2010.
2. The earliest version of Pegasus discovered, which was captured by researchers in 2016, infected phones through what is called spear-phishing – text messages or emails that trick a target into clicking on a malicious link.
3. Now, NSO’s attack capabilities are more advanced. Pegasus infections are achieved through so-called “zero-click” attacks, which do not require any interaction from the phone’s owner in order to succeed.
4. These often use “zero-day” vulnerabilities, which are flaws or bugs in an operating system that the mobile phone’s manufacturer does not yet know about and so has not been able to fix.
5. Once Pegasus is on a phone, it can spy completely and thoroughly, even the encrypted chats like the ones made through WhatsApp! Researchers have found that Pegasus can read messages, track calls, track user activity within apps, gather location data, access video cameras in a phone, or listen through their microphones.
6. Pegasus hides itself really hard. It self-destructs if it is not able to communicate with its command-and-control (C&C) server for more than 60 days, or if it detects that it was installed on the wrong device with the wrong SIM card.

• Vulnerable targets: Across the world, autocratic governments have targeted human rights activists, journalists and lawyers with phone malware. Various Indian ministers, government officials and opposition leaders also figured in the list of people whose phones may have been compromised by the spyware.
• Twists and turns: Pegasus spyware first came to the limelight in 2016, when an Arab activist got suspicious after receiving a shady message. It was believed that Pegasus was targeting iPhone users. Then, Apple released an updated version of iOS, which patched the security loophole that Pegasus was using to hack phones. By 2017, security researchers found that Pegasus was capable of infecting Android phones. More security patches came.

1. Then, in 2019, FB's WhatsApp filed a lawsuit in the US court against Israel's NSO Group, alleging that the firm was incorporating cyber-attacks on the application by infecting mobile devices with malicious software. That is how the world came to know of the modus operandi behind this extremely costly software, that NSO says it sells only to governments and no one else. So the snooping must have been sanctioned officially. Then in July 2021,
2. On 18th July 2021, many prominent news websites, including the Guardian and the Washington Post, published details of what they called global surveillance operations using Pegasus. It targetted journalists, including over 40 journalists in India, activists and other key public figures.
3. The latest reports claimed that over 10 governments, including India, are involved in surveillance of people using Pegasus spyware.
4. NSO Group called this report — titled "The Pegasus Project" — an attempt to discredit NSO Group on false grounds. It said that it does not own any data captured or created using its surveillance software by any government.

• Official stand: India, in a statement, called the Guardian report "fishing expedition, based on conjectures and exaggerations to malign the Indian democracy and its institutions." But the government did not categorically deny using Pegasus! But in a dark revelation, journalists on Twitter posted excerpts of the Washington Post expose, claiming that the woman who had alleged harassment at the hands of ex-CJI of India Ranjan Gogoi, was also on surveillance (and her entire family too)! Ex CJI Gogoi had later given a string of government-friendly verdicts, and then went to the Rajya Sabha as an MP. More names included Rahul Gandhi, Prashant Kishore, Ashok Lavasa (Election Commissioner), Ranjan Gogoi, and Gagandeep Kang (epidemiologist)!
• Official schemes: Indian government runs programmes on cyber-security.

1. Cyber Surakshit Bharat Initiative - Launched in 2018 with an aim to spread awareness about cybercrime and building capacity for safety measures for Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) and frontline IT staff across all government departments.
2. National Cyber security Coordination Centre (NCCC) - In 2017, the NCCC was developed to scan internet traffic and communication metadata (which are little snippets of information hidden inside each communication) coming into the country to detect real-time cyber threats.
3. Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) - I4C was recently inaugurated by the government. The National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal has also been launched pan India.
4. Computer Emergency Response Team - India (CERT-IN) - It is the nodal agency which deals with cybersecurity threats like hacking and phishing.

• International mechanisms: The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) is a specialized agency within the United Nations which plays a leading role in the standardization and development of telecommunications and cyber security issues. The Budapest Convention on Cybercrime is an international treaty that seeks to address Internet and computer crime (cybercrime) by harmonizing national laws, improving investigative techniques, and increasing cooperation among nations. It came into force on 1st July 2004. India is not a signatory to this convention.
• Summary: Clearly, there are hundreds of Indian under active surveillance using Pegasus, as reports have indicated. This is a breach of their right to privacy, and carries serious consequences for the individuals. Time will tell how the story evolves.

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• 7. SOCIAL ISSUES (Prelims, GS Paper 2)

Demographics versus population growth

• The UP pooulation policy: When Uttar Pradesh (UP) unveiled a population policy seeking to lower the state’s total fertility rate (TFR), and maternal and infant mortality rates, the state also unwrapped a draft population control bill.
• Promises: The state is now promising incentives for households with only two children and punitive exclusionary measures for those with more than two. Assam’s CM also made statements about adopting a two-child policy in his state. Both states are administered by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) governments, spurring some other BJP-ruled states to echo similar plans (e.g. Gujarat). A BJP member of Parliament has also promised to move a private member’s bill along similar lines (he has four young children, the youngest being a daughter).
• Irony in this approach: More than 50% of UP’s elected legislators have more than two children. Not surprisingly, the draft population control bill, proposes to exclude those already in public office!
• The facts: If we look at the National Family Health Survey (NFHS), a large-scale government survey conducted among households through multiple rounds. NHFS-V, 2019-20, completed in 17 states and five Union territories so far, it shows Assam’s TFR at 1.9 children per woman. This is below the 2.1 replacement rate at which a state’s population remains constant. The NFHS-V data for UP is not yet available, but NFHS-IV data shows UP’s TFR in 2015-16 at 2.7, down from 4.1 during 1998-99.
• No boom at all: So there is no population boom forcing these states to frame two-child policies. India’s large population is seen as a drag on development, but that is because myopic economic policy ensures limited resources are distributed unevenly and unfairly. Sudden and undemocratic laws can not remedy that. Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has already said that laws alone cannot achieve population control.
• Politics: The politics of these proposed laws is important: BJP supporters have long believed that minorities with a higher TFR will soon outnumber the majority, thereby ignoring not only its mathematical improbability but also real data of India, that shows fertility rates declining across communities. BJP leaders do not at all clarify this position as it's a vote-catcher!
• Real time bomb: India’s population boom gave it a collateral benefit: a demographic dividend. The ‘dependency ratio’ — or the ratio of people not working/earning to the working/earning population — is good, and a demographic dividend promises to keep lowering this ratio as more people join the workforce. A dropping TFR over the years has been reducing the dependency ratio, as there are fewer children below working age dependent on the working population. A lower dependency ratio should ideally result in higher economic growth, as a larger percentage of the population is expected to be working/earning and thereby consuming and saving. But this demographic dividend has no value if at least 60-70% of the population in the 20-60 age group is not gainfully employed. A large section of Indian working population is dependent on the informal economy, where income streams are patchy and unpredictable. Given the economic stagnation and rising unemployment rates over the past decade, India’s demographic dividend looks like a missed opportunity.
• Summary: Improving living standards and medical advances over the past 40-50 years have prolonged life spans, thereby threatening to skew the dependency ratio at the other end of the age spectrum. The United Nation’s 2015 World Population Ageing report indicates that the number of people over 60 years in India is expected to increase from 116.55 million in 2015 to over 330 million by 2050. If there are fewer people saving currently, they will have fewer resources to support their golden years, or non-working years. With dropping fertility rates, there will be fewer people joining the workforce over the next few decades, thereby providing fewer resources to the government to finance rising social expenditure. The agenda for governments hence ought to be clear - urgently create employment opportunities, rather than hollow populist sentiments.

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• 8. MISCELLANEOUS (Prelims, GS Paper 1, GS Paper 2)

Lewis Hamilton wins Formula One British Grand Prix

• The story: On 18th July, 2021, Lewis Hamilton of United Kingdom won the Formula One British Grand Prix at Silverstone for a record eighth time. This was the 99th win of Hamilton’s career who has also won the world championship seven times.
• Result of the race: Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes), Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) and Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes).
• Points to learn: On the opening lap of the British Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen were involved in a high speed collision as Hamilton tried to overtake the Verstappen. Hamilton’s front-left wheel touched Verstappen’s back-right tire. Due to this Verstappen spun off the track and crashed into the barriers. Later, Verstappen was seen walking away from his crashed car. Due to the collision, Hamilton was given a time penalty but in a dramatic conclusion to the race he overtook Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc to secure his eighth British GP victory.
• British Grand Prix: It is a motor race organised in the UK, by the Royal Automobile Club, and first held in the year 1926. Since the year 1948 the British Grand Prix has been held annually and every year since 1950 it has been a round of the FIA Formula One World Championship.

A.I. tool developed by IIT-M to study cancer causing mutations

• The story: The "NBDriver" (neighbourhood driver) is an artificial intelligence (AI) tool which can be used in analyzing the cancer-causing mutations in cells. This AI tool has been developed by researchers working at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-M)
• Details: The researchers of Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-M) created a mathematical model based on artificial intelligence. This AI algorithm will spot changes in cell that can cause cancer. It studies the DNA structures and characterizes the genetic changes which are responsible for causing cancer. Using simple AI techniques, the researchers from this institute have developed a new prediction algorithm called NBDriver (NEIGHBOURHOOD Driver), and then tested its performance on various open-source datasets of cancers. The NBDriver is used to differentiate between passenger and driver mutations using the features derived from the neighbourhood sequences of somatic mutations.
• IIT-M: The Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT- M) is situated in Chennai, founded in the year 1959 with financial and technical assistance from the former government of West Germany. It was the third IIT to be established by the Government of India.
• Cancer: Cancer is a disease due to abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade other parts of the human body. There are benign tumors too, which do not spread. The major types of cancer are carcinoma, sarcoma, melanoma, lymphoma, and leukemia.

Two Indian bodies win the UNDP Equator Prize 2021

• The story: Two Indian communities bagged 2021's UNDP Equator Prize. They won this prestigious prize for their exceptional achievement in exhibiting innovative, local and various nature-based solutions for tackling climate change and biodiversity loss and also achieving their local development goals. The winners of this prize were selected from a pool of over 600 nominations from 126 countries by an independent Technical Advisory Committee consisting of experts who are internationally renowned.
• Winners from India: Out of the ten winners globally, the two Indian winners are the Snehakunja Trust and Aadhimalai Pazhangudiyinar Producer Company Limited.

1. These two communities will win a prize amount of 10,000 USD. They will also get the opportunity to join a series of virtual events associated with the Nature for Life Hub, UN General Assembly and the UN Food Systems Summit later in 2021.
2. The winners from India will join a network of 255 communities that have received the Equator Prize from over 80 countries. The virtual award ceremony is scheduled to be held on the month of October, 2021. The UNDP Equator Prize was started from 2002.

• Aadhimalai Pazhangudiyinar Producer Company Limited: It is a cooperative with 1700 members, run and managed entirely by the indigenous people from the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve, Tamil Nadu. The work done by this community, in the past eight years, has improved the livelihood across 147 villages by marketing and processing a diverse range of crops and forest produce. Harvesting and agricultural practices are regularly monitored so as to ensure the product quality and also to prevent resource overuse.
• Snehakunja Trust: For 45 years, the Snehakunja Trust has protected the coastal ecosystems and sensitive wetlands in the Karnataka coast and the Western Ghats with a focus on community-based conservation and restoration. This organization has supported and helped hundreds of village forest committees and self-help groups to manage resources sustainably based on implementation of various natural farming techniques, traditional knowledge, usage of clean energy, promoting entrepreneurship, and also by providing community health services. Currently, this trust is piloting India’s first blue carbon project.

From Jaynagar India to Kurtha Nepal - Train commences

• The story: On July 18, 2021, a successful trial of movement of train was undertaken between Jaynagar in India and Kurtha in Nepal. The length of the rail section is 34.50 and this is the first section of the rail line links between the two countries which connects Kurtha in the Mahottari district of Nepal to Jaynagar in the Madhubani district of Bihar.
• Details: The total cost for this rail section is Rs. 619 crores. IRCON has set up the The Jayanagar – Kurtha Railway under the India – Nepal friendship rail project which was financed by the Indian government.
• Announcement: After fulfilling some technical and other formalities between the two countries, the train movement on this section will start soon. The 34 km rail line which is remaining will be built in two phases, and the second section which is 17 km long will link Kurtha and Bhangaha. The 17 km long third phase will extend from Bhangaha to Bardibas. Two modern DEMU trains have been delivered by the Indian Railways to Nepal for the Jayanagar-Kurtha railway link.
• IRCON: The Ircon International or Indian Railway Construction Limited (IRCON) is a subsidiary of the Indian Railways and a construction & engineering corporation which specializes in infrastructure used for transport. The subsidiary was established in the year 1976 with the primary aim of construction of various railway projects in India as well as abroad. At present, Ircon has successfully completed over 1650 major infrastructure projects in India and over 900 major projects around the world in 31 countries.

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• SECTION 3 - MCQs (Multiple Choice Questions)

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