 A very good evening aspirants welcome to the Hindu newspaper analysis brought to you by Shankar IAS Academy for the date 15th May 2022 displayed here are the list of news articles that I have chosen for today's discussion see as I assured you there are so many economic topics in my today's discussion which is very very relevant for your preliminary examination and as prelims is fast approaching each and every topic that I have discussed today is chosen in such a way that it is very much useful for your preliminary preparation okay also today in our prelims practice question discussion I have two questions which is from the previous year preliminary question and with that no I had discussed several topics which are very much useful for your upcoming preliminary examination so now without wasting much time let's get into the first news article discussion now look at this news article the news is that USA has appointed the first to full US ambassador to the asian that is association of southeast asian nations this move was taken to ensure a long term commitment by USA to southeast asia and since prelims is nearby let us revise the facts about this asian or association of southeast asian nations see as the name suggests asian is an association for regional cooperation among the countries of southeast asia therefore asian is a regional intergovernmental organization it was born in the year 1967 with the signing of a declaration in Bangkok Thailand hence the declaration is called Bangkok declaration or asian declaration see as per the declaration the aims and purposes of asian are cooperation in the economic social cultural technical educational and other fields then it has an aim or purpose of cooperation the promotion of regional peace and stability through abiding respect for justice and the rule of law then promoting southeast asian studies is also one of its aims see other aims and purposes you can see here just go through everything and have an idea about it so that when a statement type question is asked you will be able to easily eliminate if it is not an aim or purpose now know that the declaration was signed by the foreign ministers of five countries who are those five countries they are indonesia malaysia philippine singapore and thailand so these five states are called the founding fathers of asian but today asian has 10 member states see in addition to these five you know there are five others who are added who are they the other five includes brunay darussalam vietnam lavo pdr myanmar and kambodia the last one to join was kambodia in the year 1999 see in addition to these asian also has dialogue partners in this way india is a dialogue partner to asian see here i had displayed over all the dialogue partners of asian and that india is also one of it okay see this is a very important point in terms of problems because the member states are different and the dialogue partners are different and note that india is only a dialogue partner okay in the meantime asian charter came into force in 2008 it provides a legal status and institutional framework for asian it also codifies asian norms rules and values it sets clear targets for asian point to note is this charter is a legally binding agreement among the 10 asian member states okay plus the charter provides space to appoint and accredit ambassadors to asian by the non-asian member states plus the charter provides space to appoint and accredit ambassadors to asian by the non-asian member states and relevant intergovernmental organizations as a part of this only now usa has appointed an ambassador okay also note that the asian secretariat is situated in jakatha and if we talk about championship it rotates annually according to the alphabetical order of the english names of the member states currently in the year 2022 Cambodia holds the asian championship okay see you should also know about asian summit it is the highest policy making body in asian it comprises of the head of the states or government of the member states this summit is held twice annually and the summit is hosted by the member state holding the asian championship the first asian summit was held in 1976 at bali in indonesia so that's all about this news article see this is very much relevant to your preliminary examination this kind of question can be straight away asked in your preliminary examination the asian member states or what are all the aims and purposes of asian then regarding the asian submit all these can be put into a preliminary question okay if you don't believe me just wait for the prelims practice question discussion in that itself i had made a proof with the previous year question which is a direct question regarding this asian topic okay not only that many other questions were also asked regarding this asian in the previous years but i had taken one question from the year 2015 prelims okay so with these key points in mind let's move on to the next news article discussion take a look at this faq article we all know that recently india's exchange rate against the u.s. dollar has fallen to an all-time low of 77.63 many analysts believe that the exchange rate might fall even lower this is an alarming situation right this is the reason for this article through this article the author discusses various aspects like the present scenario how the rupees value is determined why the rupee is losing value and what lies ahead for the indian rupee so in this discussion let us discuss all these points in detail but in a different order first let us start with forex reserves then we will explain the reason for the current crisis and finally let us see the steps that can be taken to address this issue this is the overall plan for this discussion okay so now let us start our discussion with what is forex reserve forex reserve is nothing but the total foreign currency assets maintained by the central bank does rba have only foreign currency in its forex reserve no rba as a part of the forex reserve maintains gold special drawing rights that is sdr and reserve tranche position in addition to the foreign currency assets okay here as also does rba maintain only the u.s. dollar as a part of its foreign currency assets no the rba maintains euro japanese and australian dollar pound sterling in addition to the u.s. dollar okay see the point that i have discussed now is very very important for your problems kindly make note of each and every word that i mentioned now okay so the total forex reserve that we often see in news is nothing but a sum of foreign currency assets maintained by the rbi gold the sdr and the reserve tranche position held by the rba okay see the article mentions that india's forex reserve it stood at 642 billion on september 3 2021 has now fallen to 595 billion dollar this is a steep fall in forex reserves right so now let us see why india's forex reserves are falling the author of the article believes that the drop in forex reserve is largely due to steps taken by the reserve bank of india to support the rupee see initially we saw the rupee's value against the dollar is falling right and we all know that india is following a managed exchange rate policy here managed exchange rate is nothing but an exchange rate system in which most of the time the exchange rate is determined by the market but in some extraordinary cases the central banks intervene and provide a buffer to the rapid change in exchange rates okay for example in the currency scenario as the rupee is losing value what rga will do is it will sell some u s dollar that it has held in its reserve in the market this increased dollar supply in the market and it will provide a buffer to the falling value of the rupee so according to the author the drop in forex reserve is mainly due to steps taken by the reserve bank of india to counter the falling value of the rupee okay so this is one reason for the fall in forex reserves the next reason according to the rba officials is that the drop in forex reserve is due to a fall in the dollar value of assets held as a reserve by the rba we already saw that in addition to the u s dollar rba maintains other currencies as a part of its foreign currency reserves right so in the present scenario as the euro is also losing its value against the u s dollar and since rba is having euro as a part of its foreign reserve asset the value of indian forex reserve is falling the important reason for the fall in the forex reserve is the trade deficit if we import more than we export we will have a trade deficit even though india exported about 420 billion dollar in the last fiscal year india also imported a lot india's import bill is increasing due to global rise in crude oil prices see normally this trade deficit is bridged by investments brought to india by foreign investors but currently the us federal reserve has been raising its benchmark interest rate so what is happening is the foreign investors are taking their capital invested in the indian market to invest back in the us to enjoy higher returns this results in rba using its forex reserve to bridge the trade deficit this is the next reason for the fall in the forex reserves see these are the three main reasons for the fall in the forex reserves in india now before seeing the steps that can be taken to address the forex reserve let us first see some points about exchange rate mentioned in the article see we already saw that india follows a managed exchange rate policy we also know that in case of managed exchange rate policy except for the extraordinary times the value of exchange rate is determined by the market here what is determined by market mean see it simply means that if there is more supply of rupee and less supply of dollar in the market then rupee will lose value due to demand supply mismatch when the converse happens the rupee value will increase see we already saw that as the us federal reserve has raised its benchmark interest rate the foreign investors have pulled out their capital invested in the indian market this has resulted in a short supply of the us dollars in addition to the increasing import bills is also reducing the us dollar supply so as the us dollar is in short supply the value of the indian rupee is falling rapidly this is the immediate reason for the current exchange rate crisis that india is facing the author in addition to this mentions long-term measures of the rba is also causing the indian rupee to lose value the author of the article mentions that indian rupee has consistently lost value against the us dollar for several decades a major reason for this is higher domestic price inflation in india what does higher inflation indicate india's higher inflation compared to the us consistently means that the rba has been creating rupees at a faster rate than the us federal reserve has been creating dollars so while capital and trade flows gain a lot of attention in discussion on the rupee's value the difference in the rates at which the us federal reserve and the rba regulate the supply of their currencies may play a much larger role in the termining the value of the rupee over the long run this is a long-term crisis in the in fact the international monetary fund that is IMF expects the rupee to weaken past the 94 rupees to a dollar mark by financial year 2029 these are some points about inflation mentioned in the article now coming to the conclusion part what can be done to address the fall in forex reserves first exports must be boosted to address the trade deficit secondly india's imported oil dependency must be reduced these can either be done by increasing domestic production by increasing oil exploration or we can shift to renewable energy and reduce the use of fossil fuels in the economy altogether third measure is a better investment climate must be created to attract fdi that is foreign direct investment see unlike the foreign portfolio investment which are volatile fdi is little permanent in nature attracting more fdi will increase india's forex reserves okay the fourth measure is remittance can be encouraged and attractive investment opportunities can be provided for the nri z is non-resident indians so that they can bring dollars to the indian economy finally the long term as author mentioned in the article indian inflation must be better managed so that's all about this news article see this topic is very much important for your problems as well as means because nowadays these kind of questions are put into statements and asked like what are all the measures that can be taken to address the falling forex exchange reserve rate and to show you how relevant is this topic is for problems i have taken a previous year preliminary question see not only once many a times these kind of questions has been asked so kindly make note of each and every point that we have discussed because the reason for the forex reserve decline or the exchange rate decline is very much important for your preliminary examination nowadays the conceptual questions in economics are getting highlighted in prelims so kindly make note of all these points and with these points in mind now let's move on to the next news article discussion take a look at this news article see this news article talks about blood groups see many cities across india have blood banks blood banks are places where blood gathered by donation from the blood donors is saved and preserved for later use in blood transfusion for transfusion a matching of the blood type of the donor with that of the receiver is necessary and for that determining the blood group type is very much important so in this discussion let us understand how different blood groups are determined and let's see what are all the different blood groups you may think why we chose this topic see nowadays in preliminary examination general science based questions are being asked this topic is one such thing okay that is why we chose this topic today for discussion just a small understanding or general awareness of what it is is enough for your preliminary preparation okay so don't worry we are not going to analyze the depth of this topic we are just going to know what it is okay firstly what are these blood types as you know blood is made up of red blood cells white blood cells and platelets in a liquid called plasma a blood type is nothing but a classification of blood based on the presence or absence of certain antibodies and inherited antigenic substances on the surface of the red blood cells here antibodies are proteins found in plasma they are part of your body's natural defenses they recognize foreign substances such as germs and alert your immune system which destroys them and antigens are protein molecules found on the surface of the red blood cells the antigens can be classified into antigen a and antigen b and remember there are four major blood groups determined by the presence or absence of these two antigens that is antigen a and antigen b on the surface of the red blood cells you can see in the image given here see blood group a has a antigen on the red blood cells with antibody b in the plasma and that group b has b antigen with anti a antibodies in the plasma when you take blood group o it has no antigens but it has both anti a and anti b antibodies in the plasma then when you take blood group ab it has both a and b antigens but it has no antibodies at all see if you know this itself you can understand who can receive whose blood am I right see take for example a person who is having blood group A he cannot receive blood from a person whose blood group is B because he is having anti B antibodies that is it will destroy the incoming blood group okay that is the person may die so if you had understood the concept you can understand whose blood group will be matched and who can enable transfusion for which person okay and coming to one more part in addition to the antigen A and antigen B there is a protein called as RH factor which can be either present or absent when it is present no we denote it with a symbol plus and when it is absent we denote it with a symbol negative so this RH factor only creates 8 most common blood types you would have heard no A positive A negative then B positive B negative O positive O negative then AB positive and AB negative okay so whenever the RH factor is present we put a plus symbol in addition to the blood group type okay so that's all about this news article see just make note of all the important points that we discussed in this discussion it is very much relevant only for your preliminary examination okay with these key points in mind now let's move on to the next news article discussion have a look at this news article see this news article talks about an important issue which is the child marriage the news article reports about an all-girl group in Siligree see this all-girl group which is led by a 19-year-old girl named Koyal Sarkar has a motto of ending the child marriages in their community so far this group has stopped eight such unions from materializing in just the past two years despite facing rape threads and stone throwing this all-girl group is still striving hard to end the child marriage in their community so this is the crux of the news article given here in this context let us quickly go through some of the important facts about child marriage which will be very helpful for your problems as well as your means examination in this I have covered about what is child marriage and what are all the acts or laws that are preventing child marriage then finally and in this itself I had covered the reasons for the child marriage and cruelty behind the child marriage all these points can be used for both your prelims and means preparation in terms how it will be useful see this child marriage act to know regarding that all preliminary questions can be asked okay before getting into the discussion the syllabus relevant to this news article is given here for your reference please go through it now let's start our discussion firstly what is this term child marriage actually mean child marriage usually refers to a social phenomena practiced in some societies in India here what do they do a young child is married to an adult member okay here as per the prohibition of child marriage act 2006 a child means a person who is 21 years of age if that child is a male child and 18 years of age if that child is a female child okay remember an amendment was proposed to this act that is the prohibition of child marriage act 2006 which is named as the prohibition of child marriage amendment bill 2021 the bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha in December 21 2021 on the very same day the bill was referred to a standing committee for detailed scrutiny this amendment bill actually proposed to increase the age of marriage for the females from 18 years to 21 years so this amendment is still in the bill format and is it to become an act and if this bill passes the definition will be altered okay kindly make a note of this now the current age is at 18 years only for female child okay now coming back here you can see that the definition of child marriage is gender neutral yes child marriage means a marriage to which either of the contracting parties is a child it can be either male or female okay now there is a second form of practice of child marriage that you may have to make a note of it is a case in which the parents of the two children the girl and boy arrange a future marriage in this practice the individuals the boy and girl do not meet one another until they reach the marriageable age when the wedding ceremony is performed okay so far we saw about what is child marriage now let us see the origin or the reasons for child marriage see the practice of early child marriage is not confined to India but it is a global problem the practice of child marriage in India made it back to the ancient period so now you will be able to understand that the child marriage is not a current scenario but it is from the ancient period itself okay the main reason for early marriage is associated with a lot of things like cultural traditions and customs then economic hardships poverty educational backwardness and most importantly social pressure from within the community to marry daughters before attending puberty see these were all the reasons from the ancient time itself now the current trend you know in that it is because of gender inequality or social norms or perceived lower status of girls so here girl children in rural areas know are more affected than their urban counterparts see when we talk about the cruelty that is going to be faced after the child marriage there are a lot of things that can be said as a proof see for example if you get a girl child married at the age of 10 or 9 or something under the age prescribed that is 18 years okay they may lose the chance of going to school that is they lose the opportunity to gain knowledge or education then they may get a lot of health issues like they may face a trauma during their early childbirths and the childbirth injuries may be very vigorous so these kind of cruelty will be faced by the girl child not only girl child but also boy child will also be affected because both are going to lose their decision-making capacity in their early childhood itself because they are restricted in choosing their life partners at the very early stage itself they are being committed to a particular person whom they do not even know so understanding the cruelty of child marriage lots of steps were taken by the government to eradicate child marriage once a chapter was passed before independence itself it is called the child marriage restraint this act was passed in the year 1929 the goal of this act is to eradicate a particular evil that posed a risk to the life and health of a female child who could not survive the stress and strains of married life also to prevent the early deaths of such minor moms okay see this act fixed 14 and 18 as the marriageable age for girls and boys respectively for all the communities later in 1949 that is after independence it was amended to 15 for girls and in the year 1978 it was amended to 18 for girls and 21 for boys it is popularly known as the Sardha Act after its sponsor Haribullah Sardha okay it came into effect six months later on the date 1st April 1930 and applied to all of British India but this act no had certain shortcoming and just to upgrade the act to address the current scenario the government of India enacted the prevention of child marriage act 2006 so this replays the earlier legislation of the child marriage restraint act 1929 okay the object of the act is to prohibit solmonization of child marriage and connected and incidental matters also this act is to ensure that child marriage is eradicated completely from within the society see this law allows anyone who has a child at the time of getting married to legally undo it okay and secondly it provides for maintenance for the girl in a child marriage thirdly it treats children born out of child marriage to be legitimate and makes provisions for their custody and maintenance fourthly it considered certain kinds of child marriages where there was force or trafficking as marriages which never happened legally okay apart from all this the NGOs also strive to eradicate child marriage some of their actions includes increasing access to girls education changing harmful cultural norms supporting community programs maximizing foreign assistance then providing young women with economic opportunities then addressing the unique needs of child brides then evaluating programs to determine what works so that's all about this news article see in this news article we have covered what is a child marriage and who is called a child all those age limits those things can be put in a preliminary based question so kindly make note of all those factual information that is provided in this discussion other than that whatever we discussed you can use it in your means answer writing okay so with these key points in mind now let's move on to the next part of the news article discussion which is the preliminary practice question discussion see today I have taken two previous year preliminary question along with two problems practice questions okay now look at this first question it is taken from 2015 prelims exam this is regarding our Asian discussion now read the question India is a member of which among the following Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Association of Southeast Asian nation that is Asian then East Asia Summit now select the correct answer using the code given below okay so now in this question if you know that India is not a member of ASEAN you can eliminate option A and B am I right so you have the remaining as option B 3 1 Lee or option D India is a member of none of them now coming back to the question see the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation is a regional economic forum that is established in the year 1989 this is to leverage the growing interdependence of the Asia Pacific this Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation has 21 members I have displayed the 21 members just go through it in this itself you can see India is not a member okay so you can eliminate one this Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation no it aims to create greater prosperity for the people of the region by promoting balanced inclusive sustainable innovative and secure growth and also by accelerating regional economic integration okay so now we have studied about Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation by using this question itself okay now coming to the third one which is the East Asia Summit it refers to the meeting of heads of states or governments of the East Asia Summit those who are the participating countries which is convened annually okay see the East Asia Summit has identified six priority areas of cooperation namely environment and energy education finance global health issues and pandemic diseases then natural disaster management and asian connectivity see the plans of action have been developed to promote cooperation on these priority areas now coming to the important point the East Asia Summit was initiated in 2005 with the convening of the first East Asia Summit in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia at its inception the East Asia Summit comprised 16 participating countries namely the Asian member states were the Asian member states I had displayed the 10 Asian member states please do recollect by looking at this okay then in addition to this Asian member states who are all the rest of the six Australia China India Japan New Zealand and Republic of Korea then you have to remember one more thing the United States and Russian Federation joined at the 6th East Asia Summit in Bali in the Asia in the year 2011 only US and Russian Federation is getting joined in the East Asia Summit okay so totally now there are 18 participating countries so now what is the answer for this question the answer is option B three only so India is a member of East Asia Summit only in Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation and in the Asian India is not a member in Asian India is a dialogue partner okay see I took this question in order to brush up three important cooperation or organization or whatever it is these three are very much important for your preliminary examination okay and also note that if you are just aware of these topics you will be able to handle this kind of questions okay now look at this prelims practice question which is regarding our Asian discussion it is a two statement question now look at the first statement it is incorrect see the APT includes Asian plus China Japan and Republic of Korea that is South Korea this cooperation process began in the year 1997 in December but India is a part of Asian plus six what is Asian plus six it is a grouping of 16 countries comprising the 10 Asian member countries and other six countries outside Asian this includes China Japan South Korea Australia New Zealand and India okay so statement one which says the Asian plus three that is APT cooperation includes India is incorrect now look at the second statement it is correct see the RCEP idea was announced by Asian that is the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in the year 2012 the concept of the RCEP was promoted by Asian countries in 2011 but an RCEP declaration came at the Asians are met in the year 2012 and negotiators met for the first time in the year 2013 see the RCEP of the regional comprehensive economic partnership is considered as the world's biggest free trade agreement it entered into force in the year 2022 in January it is proposed to free trade agreement between 10 Asian countries with its six free trade agreement partners that is among Asian plus six but as of now only Australia Brunei there's no Cambodia China Japan Lavo PDR New Zealand Singapore Thailand Vietnam South Korea are part of it see remember the six free trade agreement partners no with that also there was a previous year preliminary question so here I think I can give you a homework see who are these six free trade agreement partners find them and post your answers in the comment section and the right answer I'll post it in 24 hours okay see this is a homework for you so try doing it this will be very much useful for your prelims this takes just two or three minutes I'm right so just try to do it now coming back to the question the second statement is correct and read the full question the question is demanding for correct statement so your answer here will be option B to unleash the correct statement okay now take this third question it is taken from 2013 prelims see this is regarding our foreign exchange reserve discussion which one of the following groups of items is included in India's foreign exchange resource see this is very very easy if you are clearly listen to the discussion you can easily answer this question so what is the answer for this question yes you're right the answer is option B foreign currency assets gold holdings of the RBI then SDR all this comes under India's foreign exchange resource then what else will be there in the foreign exchange reserves apart from these three yes there is also reserve transposition in the IMF which is also included in the India's foreign exchange reserve okay see in the discussion itself I said right this topic is very much relevant for your problems as a proof of this only I took this question that's why I said whatever we are choosing for discussion will be very much relevant to your preliminary perspective because prelims is fast approaching that's why preliminary based topics are chosen as a priority okay now let's move on to the last question it is also regarding our exchange rate discussion only okay it is a two statement question see with this I'm going to discuss with you another concept which is also an economic concept which is very much relevant for your problems now reading the question what you can understand both these statements are correct why since this REER that is real effective exchange rate is a weighted average of exchange rate of six currencies in which India mostly trades say it is a better measure than the nominal exchange rate that we often see in news today we saw about this nominal exchange rate only okay see when you take this real effective exchange rate it is released by the RBI that is real effective exchange rate six is released by the RBI in addition to this real six RBI also releases REER 36 this REER 36 is a weighted average of exchange rate of 36 currency in which India mostly trades so now coming back to the question look at the first statement the real effective exchange rate or REER is a weighted average of a country's currency in relation to a basket of other major currencies is absolutely correct now look at the second statement REER 6 released by RBI measures the weighted average of exchange rate of six currencies this is right okay now who are all the six countries US dollar and Hong Kong euro, Founsterling, Japanese and Chinese renminbi so all these are correct okay now look at the question it is asking for correct statement so your answer here will be option C both 1 and 2 are correct see I chose this so that we can discuss our topic today with this question and also make note of the six countries that are chosen for the real effective exchange rate calculation all these know is very much relevant for your problems so make note of all the points that I have discussed with this question okay and today there is a quiz question for you see go through the question and post your answers in the comment section and now here is a main's question for you just go through the question try writing the answer and post it in the comment section so if you like this video do like share and comment and don't forget to subscribe to the Shankar Ayes Academy's YouTube channel thank you for listening