 Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis for the date 11th of March 2020. The list of news articles taken up for today's analysis along with the page numbers of five different editions is displayed here for your reference. The handwritten notes in PDF format and the time stamping of all the news articles taken up for today's analysis is available in the description section and also in the common section for the benefit of the smartphone users. Let us now start our analysis. Now let us see an editorial which is titled, A Progressive System of Taxation. See, in this Union Budget 2020-2021, the Finance Minister has announced that India will revert back to the classical system of taxing dividend. And the author of this editorial has welcomed this move of the government. So in this context, today let us see what do we mean by dividend. Then we shall see the three types of taxing this dividend. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this editorial is given here for your reference. First, let us understand what dividend means. We know that a shareholder is someone who owns shares in a company or a corporation. It simply means they own a stake in the company whose share they hold. So when the company is making profits, a part of this profit will be distributed to its shareholders. The regular payments that are made by the company to its shareholders is called as dividend. Normally if you see, there are three methods of taxing dividend which is prevalent globally. One is the classical system. The second one is the DDT that is the dividend distribution tax method which is also called as simplistic system. And the third one is the imputation system. Now in our analysis, we will be focusing more on this DDT system and the classical system because it is more relevant from the Indian scenario. First, let us look into the dividend distribution tax or the DDT method. See, DDT is the tax that is levied on the dividends paid by the company to its shareholders. DDT is usually taxed at source. That is the company which distributes the dividend has to pay DDT. Initially, if you see the DDT was at the rate of 15% plus surcharge and ses on the gross amount of dividend. And altogether it came around 20.3% and this 20.3% was taxed at source. That means the shareholders who receive the dividends were free from paying the DDT. And this is mentioned under section 115 of the Income Tax Act of 1961. You note that under DDT, the dividends are not subject to tax in the hands of the shareholders except for certain category of resident tax payers. If at all the dividend income is exceeding 10 lakh, then it attracts an additional tax at the rate of 10% and this is also as per the provisions of the Income Tax Act of 1961. So who are those resident shareholders who have to pay this extra 10%? It is given here for your reference. If you see, this DDT method was adopted in India since 1997-98. From this discussion, we can see that under DDT, there is no distinction between a small investor or a big investor. Everyone is taxed at the same rate since the companies pay the DDT on behalf of the investors beforehand. So since the company pays taxes, tracking of dividends and collecting the tax on dividend was much simpler and painless process. This is the reason why this method is also called as simplistic system of taxing dividend. But if you see before DDT, the dividends were taxed under classical system in India. After considering the advantages and disadvantages of the classical system, from 1997-98, India adopted the DDT regime. But if you see this Union Budget, that is Union Budget 2020-2021 has abolished the DDT and reverted back to the classical system. So what is this classical system? Here the dividend is taxable in the hands of the shareholder, that is the investor. That is the dividends from the companies will reach the investor in full. And then the shareholders are taxed as per their income tax lab. Here the concept is that the dividend that is received by the investor, that is the shareholder, is considered as a part of their income. And so it is taxed as per the appropriate income tax lab. So now the companies are free from paying taxes on dividend. The tax rate for the income tax labs is given here for your reference. Now what is the advantage of this classical system? The shareholders who are in the lower tax labs will have to pay lower tax. Also as the companies are now freed from paying the DDT, they will have more surplus money now. More surplus money means the companies can further invest in the business. And also more surplus money means the companies may pay higher dividends to its shareholders if at all they are willing. Now if there is more money in the hands of the shareholders who are none but the investors, they can be an Indian shareholder or a foreign shareholder. It will again boost the investments in the Indian capital market. So these are some of the major advantages of this classical system. But if you look at the disadvantage, the big investors and the big promoters have to pay higher rate of tax now under this classical system. So they will be at loss because they have to chunk a major portion of their earnings as tax. Also if you see majority of the shareholders in India are investing their hard earned money. Only few proportion of the shareholders are investing the money which they have inherited from their previous generations like their parents or grandparents. So for this large proportion of shareholders, any tax that they pay on the dividend is the hard earned money which they are foregoing. So to some extent this classical system discourages the new generation investors. If you see the next disadvantage, the foreign companies and the foreign investors in Indian companies are at advantages position than the Indian counterparts. This is because India has signed many tax treaties with most of the countries and these tax treaties limit the taxation on dividends to somewhere around 5 to 15% for the foreign companies and investors. And also in some case if you see the foreign investors can claim foreign tax credit in their home jurisdiction for the taxes that they are paying in India. It means that if a foreign investor has already paid the dividend tax in India, he or she need not pay tax again on his or her income in his or her own jurisdiction. So they can claim foreign tax credit in their countries. But if you see the Indian counterparts have to pay taxes as per the usual income tax slab. So you can see that the foreign investors are at an advantage here and the Indian shareholders that is the Indian investors are at a disadvantageous position. Now what the author tries to tell is that though this classical system of taxation has its own merits and demerits, it is a progressive system of taxation. This is the reason why the author tells that reverting back to the classical system of taxing dividend is a good move. So these are the two important types of taxation that you need to know and have clarity about. Now let us look at the third system of taxation which is the imputation system. See this system is adopted in countries like Australia. If you look at this imputation system, the dividend is taxed in the hands of the investors. They are also entitled to claim a tax credit for the tax that is paid by the company before the dividend distribution to the investors. Now what is the highlight of this concept is that it will reduce the income tax that is payable on the dividend that is received by the investors. So here both the company and the investors will pay the taxes but the investors can claim a tax credit for the tax that is paid by the company. But this system has its own complications. So it is adopted in fewer countries like Australia. This is all about the discussion of this editorial. To summarize this editorial we saw what do we mean by dividend. Then we saw three methods of taxing dividend. One is the simplistic or the DDT system. The second is the classical system and the third is the imputation system. We gave more focus on the first two systems because it is more relevant from the Indian scenario. Because at present as per the union budget of 2020-2021 the central government has abolished the DDT system. That is the simplistic taxation system and it has reverted back to the classical system. So try to have idea about both these taxation system with regards to dividend. This is all about the discussion of this editorial. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. Now let us look at an editorial which discusses about the difficulties that are faced by those persons who are excluded from the National Register of Citizens where they have to go to the Foreigner Tribunal and prove their citizenship. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this editorial is given here for your reference. See as we know India witnessed huge migration surrounding the 1971 Bangladeshi Liberation War following this Assam which received the largest number of Bangladeshi migrants have witnessed huge protests. So in 1985 Assam Accord was signed to ease the situations. See there are two things in this Assam Accord which you need to know for today's discussion. One is that those foreigners who came to Assam after the 1st of January 1966 including the 1st of January and upto 24th March 1971 shall be detected in accordance with the provisions of the Foreigners Act of 1946 and the Foreigners Tribunal's order of 1964 and the names of those detected foreigners will be expelled from the electoral roads. And those foreigners who came to Assam on or after 25th of March 1971 shall continue to be detected, deleted and expelled in accordance with the law. So in order to hear the claims regarding citizenship the Foreigners Tribunal was formed in Assam. Now let us look at in brief about the Foreigners Act of 1946 especially we need to know the definition of who is meant by a foreigner. See as per this act a foreigner is a person who is not a citizen of India. And if you see this act provides wide ranging powers to the central government to control the entry, exit and movement of foreigners to and within the territory of India. So under section 3 of this act the central government issued an order called the Foreigners Tribunal's order of 1964 and the tribunal's objective is to identify whether a person is a foreigner or not. So this is the purpose of the Foreigners Tribunals. Now coming back to the editorial the author tells that the Foreigners Tribunals in Assam have seen two types of cases. One is persons against whom the reference has been made by the border police and second is persons whose names has been marked as doubtful in the electoral rules. Now section 9 of this Foreigners Act says that the burden of proof that is proving that a person is not a foreigner lie upon that particular person. So they have to provide substantiating documents in the Foreigners Tribunal and the Foreigners Tribunal will take decision of the citizenship accordingly. Here the author tries to tell that this procedure is not so easy as we think. He tells that those persons who are going to the Foreigners Tribunal are under unreasonable burden of proving the citizenship beyond doubt. We know that what defines ourselves as the Indian citizens is certain documents like electoral IDs, voters list which is bearing our names, then land revenue receipts, then a permanent account number that is the PAN card and then the ration cards and so on. But those people who are coming to the Foreigners Tribunals have to provide documents proving that their ancestors were in India prior to 25th of March 1971. So this is an extra burden on those persons and the author tells that their burden does not end there because the individuals have to validate those documents on their own by securing testimony from the respective issuing authorities. So they are having unreasonable burden of proving their citizenship. See we have one more legislation in India under the Indian Evidence Act of 1872. The burden of proof in any court of law lies on the person who seeks to make a claim or a set of fact. This would mean that before the Foreigners Tribunals the burden of proof should have been on the government because it is the government which is seeking to make a claim or a set of fact that certain persons are Foreigners. But what we saw was the reverse because as per the Foreigners Act of 1946 the burden of proof is on the individual who is referred to a Foreigner Tribunal. So the government sense that it is not good to place the burden of proof on the individual. So for this the central government framed the Illegal Migrants Determination by Tribunal Act in 1983. And as per this act the burden of proof was shifted to the government from the individual. But if you see this particular legislation was struck down in the year 2005 by the Supreme Court when it heard the Sarbananda Sonowal v Union of India case. The Supreme Court struck this legislation as unconstitutional. It said that illegal migration into SM posed a threat to the security of the nation. And so this particular 1983 act was violating Article 355 of Indian Constitution. Now what does this article tell? It tells that it shall be the duty of the Union to protect every state against external aggression and internal disturbance. It means that the burden of proof should lie on the individuals that is the illegal immigrants. So based on this judgment the burden of proof again came back to the individual. Now based on this judgment only the Gauhati I court has ruled on various petitions confirming that majority of the petitioners are foreigners. You can see the statistic in the first pair of this editorial. So we know that now the burden of proof is on the individual. Now what the author tries to suggest is that a certain level of proof should be sufficient to discharge the burden. For example, a person accused as foreigner has to submit basic set of documents like voter ID, ration card, etc. Then the owner should be on the state that is the government to prove it wrong. So this is what the author suggests. Here if you see the author has quoted the words of political philosopher Hannah Arendt. This philosopher has said that to truly possess rights individuals often need to belong to a political community. It simply means that the right to possess rights is available only when the individuals become citizens or when they are citizens. Now why the author has quoted this because we often see rights as universal but it is actually not universal. This is the reason why the author tells that we must recognize a universal status of personhood of every human being independent of their nationality. And this is the reason why this editorial is titled as for a universal status of personhood. So to summarize what the author tries to emphasize is that those persons declared as foreigners shall be given an equal opportunity and a fair chance to prove their citizenship. So that it would significantly bring down the number of people who might otherwise have to go to detention camps or become stateless. For this he has suggested ways in the editorial which we saw now. So this is all about the discussion of this editorial. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. This news article is regarding the report given by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Petroleum and Natural Gas about the Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana. So in this context let us look in brief about this Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana. And then let us look at the concerns raised by the Standing Committee on Petroleum and Natural Gas. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this news article is given here for your reference. First let us look at Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana. See this scheme was launched in the year 2016 under the Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas. The objective of this scheme is to provide clean cooking fuel to poor households in the country. And this scheme aimed to provide 8 crore deposit free LPG connections to women belonging to the poor families by the year 2020. To know more regarding the details of the scheme, its target groups, we request our viewers to refer to the 13th December 2019 analysis. Now let us focus on this report that has been submitted by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Petroleum and Natural Gas. See this committee submitted its second report in Lok Sabha for the demands for grants made for the upcoming financial year 2020-2021. This report was presented to Lok Sabha and laid in Rajya Sabha on 6th March 2020. Now based on this report, this news article has appeared. Now as per this report, the target of 8 crore planned under this Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana has already been achieved on 7th September 2019. So this achievement is ahead of the target date. Now if you look at the maximum beneficiaries of the scheme, they are from the underprivileged sections of the society. Like schedule casts and schedule tribes, then the OBC communities and the minority communities. And this report has also said that implementation of the scheme that is the Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana has resulted in an increase of the national LPG coverage to 96.9% approximately 97%. Now let us look at the budget allocation made for this scheme. See the central government has allocated around 2724 crore for the present financial year which is 2019-2020. Later if you see the Ministry of Finance also made an allocation of an additional amount of 1000 crore against the demand of 2118 crore. So this remaining 1118 crore was allocated in the recently presented union budget. So we can see that there is a significant cut in the budget allocation for this scheme. This report also says that this Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana scheme is no longer in existence. So what we can incur from this data is that the present allocation will be used to meet the arrears of the amount sanctioned for the financial year 2019-2020. Now let us discuss the concerns raised in this report. See the committee has expressed its concerns over closing the scheme. We know that Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana and targeted women belonging to the poor state of the society like those belonging to the schedule cast or the schedule tribe households. Then those beneficiaries under Antyodhya Anna Yojana and then even the forest dwellers especially in the rural areas. But if you see there are many poor households among the general category who are living in the urban and the semi urban localities who also need to be covered under this scheme. Therefore this committee recommended that the scheme can be extended to cover the poor households in the urban and semi urban slum areas as well. So this will help to achieve higher LPG coverage of the population by providing connections to those households who do not have LPG access. The next concern which this committee has discussed is regarding the continued use of kerosene for cooking and household lighting purposes. The Standing Committee report says that till date only three states have become kerosene free. They are the states of Punjab, Haryana and Andhra Pradesh. So there are large segments of population in various states across the country who are still dependent upon kerosene for cooking and household lighting purposes. And we know that the use of kerosene poses more health risks. So this committee has stressed on the need for continuing this Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana scheme and then universalizing the LPG connections. So the central government and the state governments can work together to reduce the subsidy that is given to kerosene and promote LPG connections. So these are the concerns which have been raised by this Parliamentary Standing Committee on Petroleum and Natural Gas. And this is all about the discussion of this news article. To summarize we have seen in brief about this Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana and then we saw about the concerns raised by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Petroleum and Natural Gas on this Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana. Now apart from this also try to know about department related Standing Committees in the Parliament. If you remember we discussed in detail about department related Standing Committees in our 3rd March the Hindu News Analysis. So when you are reading such news articles also try to cover the related prelims aspect. So it will be some sort of revision for you as and when you see certain news articles. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. Now let us look at a news article which discusses about an emerging concept which is called as shared economy. Sometimes in other articles or in other newspapers you can see the term sharing economy or shared economy or shared economy. So it is interchangeably used. Now why we have chosen this topic for today's analysis is because UPSC is known for asking the emerging concepts. For example in the last year prelims you would have seen questions on wearable technology then on digital signature which are all slowly emerging concepts. So shared economy is one such emerging concept. Now this news article discusses about a report which is titled shared economy India story. This report has been released by the Maple Capital Advices which is a newly based investment bank. So in this context today let us see what do we mean by shared economy and what does India share in the shared economy as discussed in this report. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this news article is given here for your reference. See in the present busy world the preferences on asset ownership are changing rapidly. You can observe the changing mindsets of the present millennial generation and also the preferences of moving towards experiential consumption rather than owning the assets. So this shared economy is now emerging slowly. In the water shared economy as per this report the shared economy is defined as a peer to peer based activity of obtaining giving or sharing the access to goods and services. So basically you share either the goods or services or you can obtain the goods or services or you can give the goods or services that you have for a temporary period. Now if you see this activity is done through the community based platforms and mostly it is through the digital platforms nowadays. Now this report as categorized the shared economy into four major segments. One is the co-working. Second is the co-living. Third is shared mobility and fourth furniture rental. See if you are an IT employee who daily takes a Uber cab or an Ola cab to your office which is located inside an IT park from the place where you live which is a furnished apartment. Then already you are a part of shared economy with or without you knowing that you are a part of the shared economy. So if you see some examples first then we will get an idea of what do we mean by the shared economy. We normally see big, big IT parks and buildings that house biggest MNCs, domestic companies, BPO's, startups and freelancers who are working inside a single building or a single IT park. These arrangements in which several workers from different companies who are sharing common office space or any environment is known as co-working. Now why co-working? This is because there is a lack of affordable quality offices with flexible tenures. So co-working makes the quality offices cheaper than the traditional leases. Also if you see there is no capital investment that is required for the buildings. So this is profitable for the companies because this will cover only the operational costs with no capital investment. Now some of the examples which I mentioned in the news article for co-working are office, we work India etc. Next let us look at co-living. It means sharing of living spaces. See we all know about this co-living for example like the hostels, PG accommodations, then the guest houses which are all certain known examples. But if you see they are all highly fragmented and unorganized. Whereas at the other end if you see there are highly organized IN service apartments like OIO life, ZOLO stays, Nestaway which are all examples of co-living. Now why co-living? Because if you see there is a dynamic nature of the job market and there is an increasing migration pattern of the people. So this has increased the demand for co-living space. Now co-living creates a sense of shared community feeling for the individuals in order to get adjusted to a new place easily. So this is all about co-living. Next comes the shared mobility. Initially as we saw some simple examples are the cab aggregators like Uber and Ola. Also if you see metro shuttle services come under this shared mobility you can take the metro shuttle off the city you are living in. Now why shared mobility? Because there is a very high demand for hassle free at the same time and affordable and easy option to travel especially in the urban areas. So this is what is driving the shared mobility industry. So this industry mainly caters to the need of the consumers who prefer access to vehicles rather than owning the vehicles. And also if you see it is economical and a viable alternative for an individual because it reduces the operational costs of owning a vehicle for regular use. Apart from the capital investment that an individual is going to make in order to buy a vehicle. So this is about shared mobility. The final segment that is discussed in this report is furniture rental. Here the consumers can rent furniture on use basis from the furniture rental companies like Urban Ladder, Pepper Fry, Furlanco or Rento Mojo. So why furniture rental because it gives a platform for the consumers to select from thousands of options that are available online and the consumers can select them by sitting at their home rather than visiting the shops. So it reduces the time and also the effort on selecting the furniture altogether. Again if you see there is no need of capital investments on furniture because furniture's assets are a highly depreciable asset. So this is about furniture rental. So all these four segments that we saw constitute the shared economy. This report tells that the shared economy as an industry has grown by 60% from 1997 to 2014 at global level. And it is estimated to reach a value of $335 billion by the year 2025. In India if you see this industry is estimated to be over $1.5 billion in the year 2019. And it is estimated to be about $2 billion by the end of this year that is 2020. And this report also tells that the population in Asia has the highest willingness to use the shared assets. And India's trend is also in line with Asia's trend. Now if you see the market size of the different segments of this shared economy, shared mobility has the highest market size. It is followed by co-working, then co-living and finally furniture rental. So this is in brief about all these four segments and their market size. Now what are the major drivers behind this shared economy? Some drivers have been mentioned in this report. One is the urbanization. With urbanization we know there is a lack of space but people are in want of certain services and goods. So shared economy will benefit the urban population. Next is the mobile penetration, nothing but the digital economy. And as we just saw the consumer preferences are changing like pay as you use option rather than a long-term purchase. So this is one more driver behind the shared economy. And also if you see the consumer prefer to rent rather than buy. This trend is especially seen among the millennials. So this is yet another driver behind the shared economy. And finally there is a realization that resources can be best utilized in a shared economy. So this is one more driver behind the shared economy. So this report tells that this shared economy industry is in a nascent stage and it has a high growth prospect in the near future. So this is an emerging concept. This is all about the discussion of the shared economy. To summarize we have seen what do we mean by the emerging term called shared economy. The different segments of shared economy and their market size. And finally we saw the drivers of the shared economy that is expected to have a high growth prospect in the near future. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. Now let us take up this practice prelims question based on this news article. Which is about a dolphin that was found washed ashore the coastal waters of the state of Tamil Nadu. This dolphin was identified as an Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin. Now let us look about this dolphin in brief. See this dolphin species is found in the tropical to warm temperate regions of Indian and Pacific oceans. And they entered the rivers, mangroves and estuaries. These dolphins are at risk because of the usage of fishing nets. Then because of the increasing pollution and even because of the depletion of fish stocks worldwide. So this is about the distribution and the threat to this dolphin species. Now also know about the protection status under IUCN Red List of threatened species. It is categorized as vulnerable under the IUCN Red List. In this context also know about the Ganges River Dolphin. It is India's national aquatic animal. It is found in the northern river systems of India. Its IUCN status is also endangered. So just have an idea about the Ganges River Dolphin. Also know that this dolphin is blind. Now if you remember there was a question which was asked in UPSC 2019 prelims about Aira with the dolphins as well. So just have an idea about the dolphin species that are located in and around Indian waters. Now let us look at this question on Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin. Two statements are given and you need to choose the correct answer. Look at the first statement. It tells that it is naturally found in the Indian Ocean only. Know that this dolphin is found across Indian and Pacific oceans from tropical to warm temperate regions. So the first statement is wrong. Look at the second statement. It is listed as vulnerable in IUCN Red List of threatened species. This statement is correct. Now you need to choose the correct answer. The correct answer is option B2 only. Now let us look at this question which is based on Sir Creek which is discussed in this news article where the former Pakistan Foreign Minister has shared his opinion about the signing of Sir Creek PAC in the year 2006 where Pakistan actually proposed to the former Prime Minister of India to sign this PAC. Now in this context what you need to know is where this Sir Creek is located. So try to know the geographical aspect. Know that Sir Creek is a disputed area between India and Pakistan. If you see this map the green line represents the boundary that is claimed by Pakistan but disputed by India and the red line represents the boundary that is claimed by India but disputed by Pakistan. So this area that lies on the border between India and Pakistan is disputed by both the countries. Also you can see Corey Creek in this map. Know that Corey Creek lies entirely in India in the Kutch Peninsula. So this is all that you need to know about Sir Creek. Now look at this question. The question is Sir Creek often in news lies on the border between. This is a direct question. The correct answer here is option C India and Pakistan. Now let us move on to the practice questions discussion session. Look at the first question which is about Foreigners Act of 1946. Two statements are given and you need to choose the correct statements. Look at the first statement. It tells that under this act the power to make orders with respect to all foreigners regarding prohibiting, regulating or restricting the entry into India is vested with the Foreigners Tribunal. This statement is incorrect because under section 3 of this act the power to make any orders with respect to all foreigners regarding prohibiting, regulating or restricting their entry into India is vested with the central government. It is not the Foreigners Tribunal. As per the powers given to the central government under this section 3 the central government notified the Foreigners Tribunal order and as per the Foreigners Tribunal order the objective of Foreigners Tribunal is to tell whether a person is a foreigner or not. Based on the documents submitted by that person. So this is the function of the Foreigners Tribunal. The overall powers is actually with the central government. So the first statement is wrong. Now look at the second statement. It tells that under this act the burden of proof is upon the individual. See section 9 of this act says that the burden of proof that is proving that a person is not a foreigner lies upon the individual. So this statement is correct. The correct answer to this question is option B 2 only. Now look at the second question which is on dividend taxation. Again two statements are given. Here you need to choose the incorrect statements. Look at the first statement. It tells that it is the tax paid on the dividend distributed by a company to its shareholders. Yes, this statement is correct. Dividend taxation is the tax that is paid on the dividend which is distributed by a company to its shareholders numbered the investors. Now look at the second statement. It tells that in classical system of dividend taxation the owners to pay taxes on the companies. If you remember during our discussion we saw that in the classical system of dividend taxation the owners to pay tax is on the shareholders or the investors but not on the companies. Whereas under the dividend distribution taxation system the owners to pay taxes on the companies. So this statement is incorrect. The correct answer to this question is option B 2 only since it asks you to choose the incorrect statement or statements. Now look at the next question which is on Pradhan Mantri Ujwala Yojana. Two statements are given and you need to choose the correct statements. Now look at the first statement. It tells that the scheme was launched with an aim to provide clean cooking fuel LPG to poor households in the country. Yes, this statement is correct. Look at the second statement. It tells that it has been extended till 2021-2022 to achieve 100% LPG coverage in the country. Now this statement is incorrect because if you remember during our discussion we saw that in the second report that was submitted by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Petroleum and Natural Gas. It has been reported that the target of 8 crore has already been achieved on 7th of September 2019. If you see the aim of this scheme is to provide 8 crore deposit free LPG connections to women belonging to poor families by the year 2020 but it was already achieved on 7th of September 2019. Now what this Standing Committee suggested was that this scheme may be implemented in the urban and semi-urban areas as well. So it is just a proposal. There is no announcement by the government regarding the extension of this scheme. So the second statement goes wrong here. The correct answer to this question is option A 1 only. Know that this scheme was launched under the Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas. Now look at the next question which is on shared economy. The question is which of the following best describes the term shared economy sometimes seen in news. Now if you remember during our discussion we saw that shared economy may be defined as a peer-to-peer based activity of obtaining, giving or sharing the access to goods and services. Which is usually done through community based platforms especially the digital platforms. So here the correct answer is option C it refers to the sharing of goods and services through community based platforms. So the correct answer to this question is option C. With this we come to the end of the analysis of all the news articles taken up for today's discussion and also the practice questions discussion session. If you like the video press the like button, comment and share and do subscribe to Shankar IAS Academy YouTube channel for latest videos and updates. Stay focused and motivated friends. Thank you.