 Good evening aspirants welcome to the hindi news analysis by shankara ace academy for the date 30th october 2020. The list of news articles along with the page numbers of different editions of hindu newspaper is provided here for your reference. Let's move on to the first article discussion. Our first discussion for today is based on these news articles which are with reference to ensuring social justice in undergraduate admission to courses in medicine dentistry indian medicine and homeopathy. So in this regard the news articles mention about articles 162 200 and 361 of indian constitution. So in this discussion we'll see about these articles and also the related issues. The syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference. First let us see the background of this issue. See in september 2020 the Tamil Nadu state legislative assembly passed a bill. This bill is called as the Tamil Nadu admission to undergraduate courses in medicine on a provincial basis to students of government schools bill 2020. So after the bill was passed by the state legislative assembly it was forwarded for the assent of the governor but however even after two months till now the governor has not taken a decision on this bill. But here we know that this is an important matter because it deals with the clarity on undergraduate medical admissions and reservation and also on the future of students who pursue substantial school education from government schools. So because of this there were large number of public interest litigations at the Madras High Court in this regard. But at the end of the day at present the issue comes to the matter of assent that is to be given by the governor. So in this context only there were questions like how long can governor take to arrive at a decision related to a bill on such an important matter. And in this context only article 200 and article 361 were mentioned in these news articles. So here know that article 200 deals with assent to be given by governor for bills passed by the state legislature. According to this article after the presentation of the passed the bill to the governor the governor shall declare either that she assents to the bill or that she withholds assent or that she reserves the bill for the consideration of the president. And if you notice this article in one place it also uses the term as soon as possible in relation to the decision of the governor on a bill which is not a money bill. But however it is unclear how the governor's side is going to explain in the Tamil Nadu issue that the more than two month period which they have taken for governor's decision is quicker than the as soon as possible that is mentioned in this article 200. Additionally for this PILs in the court it was stated that under article 361 the protection has been given to the governor and the governor is not answerable to any court for the exercise of powers and duties. See here you should note the clause one of article 361 it states that the governor of a state shall not be answerable to any court for the exercise and performance of the powers and duties of her or his office or for any act done or purporting to be done by her or him in the exercise and performance of those powers and duties which simply means that the governor is not answerable to any court for the exercise of the powers and duties. But however to this clause the high court has replied in the PIL cases that the protection has been given by the framers of the constitution with the hope and trust in the governors that they would perform their constitutional functioning promptly and there would not be any situation wherein they would be called to give an explanation. When public interest requires this court has to do its constitutional duties and address the situation however this court is of the opinion that such a situation would not arise to pass any order in this matter that is why the court has hoped that quote unquote governor will decide soon but if the governor fails to decide soon then this may become a serious issue where constitutional courts have to intervene for public cause. So due to this conduct of the governor there have been demands to amend the constitution to prescribe a time limit for the governor to take a decision on the matters presented before her or his office. Now let us come to the next part. Now since the governor has delayed his decision for more than two months on this bill the state government of Tamil Nadu has taken executive route to settle this matter that is yesterday the Tamil Nadu government has issued a government order which has granted 7.5 percentage horizontal reservation for the neat qualified students of state government schools in the undergraduate medical admissions and this geo has stated that the horizontal reservation shall be provided in each category of vertical reservation followed in the state of Tamil Nadu within the 69 percentage reservation for the academic year 2020 to 2021. See here when we say 69 percentage reservation in Tamil Nadu this is for backward classes most backward classes or denotified communities then backward classes Muslims then schedule castes and schedule tribes in simple words there is 18 percentage reservation for schedule castes then one percentage for schedule tribes and then 50 percentage reservation for other backward classes and in total it is 69 percentage. Now this 69 percentage reservation is based on the Tamil Nadu backward classes schedule castes and schedule tribes reservation of seats in educational institutions and of appointments or posts in the services under the state act of 1993. See when this act was a bill in 1993-94 president's assent was received after discussion between the center and the political leaders in Tamil Nadu and soon the leaders in Tamil Nadu stepped up pressure on the center to bring in a constitutional amendment to include the act that is the 1993 act in the ninth schedule so that its validity could not be challenged in the courts of law in other words they wanted to get protection from judicial review this is because as you know the reservation should be maximum 50 percentage but in case of Tamil Nadu it is 69 percentage and that is why the leaders in Tamil Nadu pressure the center to bring it under the ninth schedule so accordingly the constitution 76th amendment act of 1994 was enacted and this kept the Tamil Nadu law in the ninth schedule as per article 31 b of Indian constitution so this is the history associated with the 69 percentage reservation in Tamil Nadu now let us see the meaning of 7.5 percentage horizontal reservation in each category of vertical reservation this means that for example say there are 100 seats reserved for neat cleared OBC candidates of Tamil Nadu out of these 7.5 percentage of the seats would go for students who have studied in state government schools from class 6th to 12th and in a similar manner 7.5 percentage reservation is available in other vertical categories such as among schedule cast and schedule tribes also so with respect to this horizontal reservation the news article mentions that the supreme court has held in the past that reservation can be provided through executive order and this seems to have supported the Tamil Nadu government's case for issuing the geo but however some are saying that the adoption of executive route may not stand the judicial scrutiny as already a bill via the legislative route is pending at the hands of unelected appointee of the central government that is the governor so this is where the state government is actually using article 162 of Indian constitution this article 162 deals with the extent of executive power of the state this article mentions that the executive power of a state shall extend to the matters with respect to which the legislator of the state has power to make laws and this is subject to the provisions of the constitution here in relation to the matters in concurrent list or in other words in relation to any matter to which the state legislature and parliament have power to make laws the executive power of the state shall be subjected to and limited by the executive power that is expressly conferred by the constitution or by any law made by the parliament upon the union or concerned authorities and that is why the state government has argued that under article 162 the executive power is co extensive with legislative power when a decision is pending before the governor so that means this current issue of Tamil Nadu poses more legal questions on how the entire event will eventually turn out here also note that the ruling party at the center is closely watching the scenario in regard to electoral prospects as in few months from now that is by May 2021 the elections are to be held for Tamil Nadu state legislative assembly so now the center has to be careful with respect to this issue and there is also another issue here that is after seeing Tamil Nadu even more states may follow the steps of Tamil Nadu to ensure justice for the neat clearing government school students so now let us wait and see what is the decision of the governor or if the governor still delays his decision whether the constitutional codes will interfere or not so these are some of the information with reference to the analysis of these news articles let's move on to the next discussion this discussion is based on this editorial in which the author talks comprehensively about the India US defense partnership so let us discuss the important milestones in this regard in brief the syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference and remember that this discussion is very important from the main's perspective see the India US defense cooperation is in news in the recent weeks because recently the two plus two dialogue between the US secretary of state and US defense secretary with their Indian counterparts that is external affairs minister and India's defense minister was concluded and if you remember in the next week the US elections are said to happen so based on this the author infers that the visit of two senior US officials just before the elections in the US indicates that the India US defense ties have reached prominence so in this regard author discusses about the evolution of India US defense partnerships in all these years now primarily this cooperation started in the year 1991 that is the India's engagement with the US on defense cooperation started with the 1991 kick lighter proposals say it is known as kick lighter proposals because at that time the army commander at the US specific command was lieutenant general Claude kick lighter and that is why it is known as the kick lighter proposals and under these proposals the US army commander suggested establishing the contacts between the three services that does army navy and air force to promote exchanges and explore the areas of cooperation between the countries then further in the year 1995 an agreement called an agreed minute on defense cooperation was concluded between the countries now this agreement expanded the defense cooperation between the US and the Indian defense departments and the service to service military exchanges that is army to army navy to navy and the air force to air force military exchanges but the relationship did not continue like this it came to a new low when India carried out a series of nuclear tests in the year 1998 because of this US got angry and it even imposed economic sanctions on India but eventually India came out of this soured relationship with USA due to its diplomacy and then the sanctions were also gradually lifted and as a result of this diplomacy only in the year 2005 the new framework for the US India defense relationship was signed now here just know that this framework was renewed in the year 2015 this framework covers an entire spectrum of defense cooperation its main constituents are the defense policy groups and its four subgroups these four subgroups are procurement and production group the joint technical group the military cooperation group and the senior technology group now after this 2005 framework the relationship between the countries reached the next level in 2008 when India and US signed the India-US civil nuclear deal so you can see that just in 1998 only US imposed economic sanctions on India for carrying out nuclear tests but within a decade itself India signed a deal with USA and according to the author over this period and after that also the India-US economic relationship also grew if you see the bilateral trade in goods and services it grew from 20 billion US dollars in 2000 to more than 140 billion US dollars in 2018 and even the value of defense acquisitions has also multiplied from less than 400 million dollars in 2005 to 18 billion dollars in the recent years now apart from all these agreements and frameworks the four million Indian diaspora in the USA has also been playing an influential role by assuming important positions in the political arena of USA and they also helped in strengthening the US-India relations as a result of all these came another development in the year 2015 when India and USA announced a joint strategic vision for the Asia-Pacific and Indian Ocean region and slowly the relationship strengthened and then in the year 2018 the India-US strategic and commercial dialogue which was launched in 2009 it was elevated to the two plus two dialogue which is happening in recent years and in the recent two plus two dialogue which happened last week both countries signed the basic exchange and cooperation agreement or BECA it is the last of four foundational agreements of USA and it provides for sharing of geospatial data now to know about all these foundational agreements you can refer to our 18 September 2020 in the news analysis we have explained these agreements in detail so from this discussion you can see that even among differences both countries focuses on building mutual respect and trust and because of this author calls this US-India relationship as unique it is so unique that as a major development even USA categorized India as a major defense partner in the year 2016 now this categorization helped India to join several export control regimes see these export control regimes are also known as the multilateral non-proliferation regimes these are voluntary and non-binding arrangement of major supplier countries they aim to prevent the proliferation or the growth of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery means related equipments and technology and there are four multilateral export control regimes they are the nuclear suppliers group then the australia group then the missiles technology control regime that is MTCR and then the vassanar arrangement now because of the categorization of India by USA as a major defense partner in 2016 India could join three of these export control regimes that is australia group missiles technology control regime and then vassanar arrangement but India is still not a part of nuclear supplies group but we may expect that India may join in the near future so here one can see that India's foreign policy is dynamic and accommodative according to the present day realities because the independent India's foreign policy was different and it was based on the principle of non-alignment but when the need arrived to change this foreign policy India even signed a treaty of peace friendship and cooperation with the former USSR in the year 1971 for our security but then after that also India came with the non-alignment 2.0 and this non-alignment 2.0 focuses on strategic autonomy but even then now we are close to us than ever before as you can see that it could be with respect to this 2 plus 2 dialogue or even the quad grouping India is getting closer and closer to USA so this proves that India's policies are not prisoners of labels or tags but India's policies are aimed at enhancing our strategic space and capability so these are some of the points that you should know with respect to India-USA defense partnership with this we come to the end of this discussion now this discussion is based on this news article which talks about a permanent body constituted by the government to tackle the air pollution in Delhi so in this discussion we'll see about the new body and its powers etc the syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference now know that this new body has been constituted through an ordinance and it is called as the commission for air quality management in national capital region and adjoining areas see now you may have a confusion that there is already a body for the same purpose that is to tackle the air pollution in Delhi and this body is the EPCA or the environmental pollution prevention and control authority so far EPCA was addressing the air pollution in national capital but now EPCA has been replaced by this new commission here just know that EPCA was constituted by the central government in the year 1998 and it was mandated by the supreme court now EPCA was constituted for protecting and improving the quality of the environment and also for preventing and controlling environmental pollution in the national capital region of Delhi EPCA also assisted the supreme court in various environment related matters in the national capital region and if you talk about the tenure of EPCA it was extended from time to time by the central government which means EPCA is a temporary body so accordingly it was reconstituted in october of 2018 and the authority as of now has 20 members including the chairperson but now this has been replaced by this permanent and more powerful commission for air quality management in national capital region and adjoining areas so let us discuss about this commission now see this commission will have at least six permanent members and it will be headed by a former or incumbent secretary to the central government or a chief secretary to a state government it will also have members from ministries as well as representatives from states see generally the central pollution control board and its state branches have the powers to implement provisions of the environment protection act regarding air water and land pollution but now we have this new commission especially for the NCR and adjoining areas so this is where you should note that in case of dispute or class of jurisdictions between the commission and the CPCB the commission's writ will prevail specific to the matters concerning to the air pollution so this new commission is an overarching body so now there might be a question that what is the need of this new body or what were the drawbacks of EPCA that new body was needed see the first reason for the new body is that EPCA is a temporary body so its powers are at the discretion of the government now the second reason is that EPCA does not have a proper legislative backing because it is the result of executive resolution of the government on the mandate of supreme court and thirdly EPCA failed in ground level implementation of pollution control measures and fourthly the pollution in NCR is not only due to the pollution caused in the NCR but also due to the multiple causes and reasons from adjoining states also for example the stubble burning in Punjab is also a reason for air pollution in NCR but here EPCA lacked powers or jurisdiction in this regard so it could not take actions and that is why even after 22 years of its existence EPCA failed to curb air pollution in Delhi and because of this Delhi became the fifth most polluted city in the world and the most polluted capital city in the world now this was according to the 2019 world air quality report it was released by IQ air IQ air is a Swiss and US based company that specializes in technology solutions that help people to protect from airborne pollutants and this world air quality report is based only on particulate matter 2.5 data as acquired from ground based air quality monitoring stations and according to this report only Delhi was the most polluted capital city in the world in 2019 and Delhi has topped this ranking for the second consecutive year and its annual PM 2.5 level was nearly 10 times than the WHO target. WHO target is less than 10 microgram per meter cube but in Delhi it was 10 times this target so this is the prevailing worst air pollution condition in Delhi so to overcome these issues only center has promulgated an ordinance to set up this commission but few groups have observed that this new body is just a bureaucratic vessel it is because this commission was practically created overnight without any discussion or inputs from other bodies so the critics observe that the creation of this new body does not inspire confidence that it will open doors to a more fruitful conversation and action across all interests regarding air pollution in the NCR and another criticism is that even EPCA had almost similar powers which has been provided to this commission but even then EPCA failed miserably in cleaning the air even after being in force for more than 20 years so here a question arises that whether the creation of this new commission is a positive move or it is just a wasteful exercise and the answer to this question will be known only when the ordinance changes the status quo that is the existing scenario in NCR when it comes to ground implementation of the policies so we have to just wait and see that how this new body is going to help to reduce air pollution in our national capital but here note that since this new commission tends to replace the Supreme Court mandated EPCA so the setting up of this body needs a formal approval from Supreme Court before it can start functioning as a conclusion here you should note that the scenario of Delhi being the most polluted capital city in the world can be changed and we can take the example of Beijing in this context because once upon a time Beijing was one of the most polluted cities on the planet but now it has dropped out of the top 200 most polluted cities that is it is not even in the top 200 and according to some sources the air pollution in Beijing has fallen sharply since it hosted the Olympic Games in the year 2008 because at that time the Chinese government exercised controls on coal fired boilers and implemented tighter rules on industries so because of this the particulate matter levels in Beijing have actually halved in the last decade and even the sulphur dioxide levels have also dropped by 83 percentage between the period 2013 and 2017 and because of this efforts only the United Nations environment program that is UNEP has hailed this Beijing model for clean air efforts and it has also asked other cities to follow the same so that means what China did with Beijing can be definitely replicated by India in Delhi if the measures are supported by all sections of the society so these are some of the points that you should know with respect to this discussion now this news article talks about the credit default swaps the article mentions that the reserve bank of India will soon issue fresh guidelines on credit default swaps as it is considered critical for deepening India's bond markets so in this context let us discuss in detail about the credit default swaps or in short CDS see according to IMF credit default swaps are financial instruments which the investors can use for hedging or safeguarding risks in bond investments that is it is a financial derivative that allows an investor to swap or offset his or her credit risk with that of another investor for example if a lender is worried that a borrower is going to default and a loan then the lender could use a CDS to offset that risk now to swap or change the risk of default the lender buys a CDS from another investor who agrees to reimburse the lender in case the borrower defaults here note that most CDS will require an ongoing premium payment to maintain the contract which is like an insurance policy now in case of government debt the investors use the swaps to express an opinion about the credit worthiness of the government and this will protect the investors in the event if a country defaults or it undertakes a debt restructuring so what are the benefits of credit default swaps see they enhance investment and borrowing opportunities they reduce transaction costs and they allow risk transfers so such products increases investors interest in corporate bonds and it would be beneficial to the development of the corporate bond market in India now in this regard you should know about the participants in the India's credit default swap market they're classified into two one is users and the other is market makers see users are the entities who are permitted to buy credit protection or CDS contracts only to safeguard their underlying credit risk on corporate bonds they are not permitted to hold credit protection without having eligible underlying as a hedged item or a safeguarded item here also know that users are not permitted to sell protection and they are not permitted to hold short positions in the CDS contracts however they are permitted to exit their bought CDS positions by unwinding them with the original counterparty or either by assigning them in favor of the buyer of the underlying bond now next type is the market makers they are entities who are permitted to quote both buy and or or sell CDS spreads they would be permitted to buy protection without having the underlying bond and here we have given for your reference the eligible entities under the market makers and user categories and here know that the insurance companies and mutual funds would be permitted as market makers if they have strong financials and risk management capabilities as prescribed by their respective regulators that is for insurance companies it is the IRDI insurance regulatory and development authority of India and then in case of mutual funds it is SEBI so now the government is working with the financial sector regulators such as SEBI, RBI, IRDI etc to build a robust and vibrant bond market so we can expect fresh guidelines for CDS in the coming days so these are some of the information that I should know with respect to credit default swaps our next discussion is based on this opiate article which is written in the context of stubble burning in an earlier discussion we saw that the center is setting up a new body to curb air pollution in Delhi and in adjoining areas we also said that stubble burning is one of the primary reasons for severe air pollution in India and also in Delhi and we have discussed in detail about stubble burning and its consequences on our 17th September 2020 in the news analysis please have a look at it for more understanding on stubble burning now because of the consequences of stubble burning government has been innovating many methods to reduce its effects and also to replace stubble burning with other technologies and according to this opiate article now the union government is testing an innovative method called as the PUSA decomposer this PUSA decomposer is developed at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute which is situated in PUSA of New Delhi and that is why it is named as PUSA decomposer now this PUSA decomposer is a set of four tablets these tablets are made by extracting fungi strains that help the paddy straw to decompose at a much faster rate than the usual so this gives the farmers an option to shred the straw then spray a solution containing the fungal strains and mix it with the soil for decomposition now the fungi strains assist in producing enzymes that are essential to quicken the decomposition of biomass now here note that this solution is prepared using other organic inputs also like jaggery and chickpea flour so after its preparation the solution is sprayed over the fields so thus this process reduces the decomposition time of shredded and watered paddy straw normally the time taken for this would be three months now it is reduced to just 25 days and further this decomposer is a microbial consortia of eight types of microorganisms or simply a decent combination of eight types of microorganisms so it is completely organic and chemical free and also it is economical because these four tablets cost just five rupees and they can be used for rapid decomposition of crop residue over a hectare of field that means if methods such as this become successful then it will be a new revolution in farming because this method completely eliminates the need for stubble burning because usually what the farmers do is rather than shredding and decomposing the straw they will burn it now when they burn this not only the air gets polluted but also the burning kills the microorganisms in the field which improve the productivity so that means this method has the potential to reduce air pollution and also increase the soil fertility and not just that it also works as the bio-menu and improves the fertility and productivity of the soil it is cheap and it is environment friendly so let us hope that this method becomes successful without any drawbacks and our farmers will get the benefit using a low-cost method so these are some of the information that you should know with respect to decomposer the displayed practice question will be discussed in the next session which is the practice questions discussion session now this first question asks consider the following statements first statement is the constitution prescribes a definite time period for deciding on the ascent of bills passed by a state legislature now this first statement is with respect to article 200 of indian constitution and according to this article there is no time limit prescribed for the governor to decide on ascent of bills so this statement is incorrect now the second statement is the governor of a state shall not be answerable to any court for the exercise and performance of the powers and duties of her or his office now this statement is correct this is as per article 361 of indian constitution this article 361 provides protection to the presidents and governors and here the question asks for the correct statements so the correct answer is option b2 only now this next question asks which of the following are the possible environment friendly options to curb the menace of stubble burning in indogangetic planes now four options are given first converting crops stubble into animal feed now this option is a possible option because if you see already in south india stubble is not burnt as there is an economic value for stubble as animal feed so because of this the stubble is feeded to the animal rather than being burnt and causing air pollution so one should be in the answer and obviously if you look at the options you can say that one should be definitely correct now second one is happy cedar see this happy cedar cuts and lifts rice straw then it sows wheat into the bare soil and it deposits the straw over the sown area as mulch see mulch is nothing but a material that consists of decaying leaves bugs or compost and it is spread around or over the plant to enrich or insulate the soil so here the rice straw or the stubble is used as mulch so this also prevents it being burnt and causing air pollution so two should also be in answer now three we discussed during analysis so three should also be in answer now here the doubt will come in the fourth option promoting shorter duration varieties of paddy so this is one of the long term options like replacing the long duration paddy varieties with shorter duration varieties like pusa basmati 1509 and pr126 and these varieties can be harvested in the third week of september itself but now if you see the paddies harvested in october only now the benefit is that if you use the shorter duration varieties of paddy it will widen the window between the end of rice season and the start of wheat season and thus this widened window will allow enough time for the paddies stubble to decompose and thus it will eliminate the need for stubble burning see here the third option that is pusa decomposer will quicken the decomposition but in the fourth option we are suggesting that providing enough time so that the paddies stubble can decompose by itself and it will eliminate the need for stubble burning so four should also be in answer and hence the correct answer to this question is option d one two three and four well let us take two main questions one question is based on gs paper three and it is about curbing air pollution in national capital region and the other question is based on gs paper two and it is about the defense ties between india and usa you can write the answer for both the questions and post it in the comment section we will review it and appropriate suggestion will be provided within a reasonable time frame with this we come to the end of today's indian analysis and practice questions discussion session if you like the video don't forget to like comment and share and to subscribe to chakras academy youtube channel for more updates related to civil service examination preparation