 Good evening aspirants. Welcome to the hindi news analysis by Shankarayase academy. These are the list of articles chosen for today's analysis It has been provided along with the page numbers of different editions of hindi newspaper The link for the handwritten notes in the PDF format and the time stamping for the displayed articles is provided in the description box below and for The benefit of smartphone users the time stamping is also provided in the comments section Now, let us start the first news article analysis for today Our first discussion for today is based on the environment and biodiversity area for syllabus This news article mentions that the organization such as greens aligns for conservation of eastern guards and the council for Green Revolution has released a report titled eastern guards environment outlook So in this discussion, let us see the key points mentioned in this report And we'll also see some facts related to eastern guards from the examination point of view The syllabus that is relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference first Know that the council for green revolution is a non-profit environmental organization, which is based at Hyderabad and the greens aligns for Conservation of eastern guards that is in short grace is a conservation Organization that was initiated by this CGR now these organizations have released a report titled eastern guards environment outlook Now according to this report the degradation of eastern guards is happening and it began a century ago According to this report the degradation has accelerated since the 1970s and the ecosystem of the hills had lost their natural species composition They have lost the forest structure size scale and character So there are threats and challenges to the floral and faunal elements of the eastern guards and also the biogeographic Significance of the eastern guards is declining first even if you see the tribes in the region are under threat Their lands have become sites for secret dumping of toxic waste their lands are used for illegal mining Then poaching and hunting including human trafficking is also done in this region So to conserve the existing biodiversity of the region the organization has demanded to declare the Historically and culturally significant mountains of the eastern guards as uniscope cultural heritage site For this the organizations have asked the states that encompass the eastern guards to prepare an action plan The action plan is to protect and conserve the ecology and natural resources of eastern guards They have also demanded the central government to form a regional coordination committee of states on eastern guards this committee should have a mandate for linking and Coordinating activities relating to eastern guards in addition to these the organizations have also sought the appointment of a Nature ombudsman for the eastern guards then the publication of environmental atlas of the eastern guards is also demanded by them and this Atlas should incorporate various ecological, social and cultural information of the eastern guards region So these were some of the points from the report released by CGR now in this context It becomes important to know about eastern guards from examination point of view since the prelims examination is not far away Now first know that the eastern guards is also known as Kriyayakthodarchi Maligal in Tamil it is also known as Purva Ghat or Turpukannumalu and it is also known as Mahendra Parvatham The eastern guards are a discontinuous range of mountains along India's eastern coast The eastern guards stretch from the Mahanadi valley to the Nilgiris in the south So the eastern guards run from the north of Odisha through Andhra Pradesh to Tamil Nadu in the south by passing some of the parts of Telangana and Karnataka also so eastern guards is spread across five states that is Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu And the eastern guards are eroded and cut through by the four major rivers of Pennsylvania India They are Godavari, Mahanadi, Krishna river and Kaveri river and the mountain ranges run parallel to the Bay of Bengal If you see the Deccan Plateau lies to the west of the range and it is between the eastern guards and western guards Then the coastal plains including the Coromandel Coast region they lie between the eastern guards and the Bay of Bengal If you compare the western guards and eastern guards know that eastern guards are not as high as the western guards Because western guards average elevation is 900 to 1600 meters but the average elevation of eastern guards is 600 meters only Here keep in mind that we are here talking about average elevation Even though western guards are high in elevation than eastern guards the eastern guards are older than the western guards It is because eastern guards have a complex geologic history that is related to the assembly and breakup of the ancient Supercontinent of Rodinia and the assembly of Gondwana Supercontinent Now let us see the hill ranges of eastern guards at the southern end the eastern guards form several ranges of low hills The southern most of the eastern guards are the low Sirumalai Hills and the Karandamalai Hills of Southern Tamil Nadu then the north of the Kaveri river are the higher hills they are Kulli Malai, Pachchai Malai, Chevroy Hills, Kalrayan Hills, Chittiri Hills, Palamalai and Maitur Hills They are in the northern parts of Tamil Nadu state if you see the climate of the higher Hill ranges it is generally cooler and wetter than the surrounding plains and the hills are home to coffee plantations and these hills are enclaves of dry forest and you would have heard about the Chevroy Hills with respect to air card which is a hill station the next important hill is the Biligiri Ranga Hills which is commonly known as BR Hills it is a hill range that is situated in the southeastern Karnataka and this hill range form a forested ecological corridor that connects the eastern and western guards that is it is at the confluence of the western guards and the eastern guards so this hill range allows the second largest wild Asian elephant population in India to range between the southeastern guards the Biligiri Ranga Hills and Nilgiri Hills and the southwestern guards and also know that the eastern and the western guards meet each other at the Nilgiri Hills then if you come to the central portion of eastern guards it lies to the north of Palar river in the Andhra Pradesh it consists of two parallel ranges running approximately north to south these ranges are the Velikonda range and the Palikonda, Lankamalla and Nalla Mali ranges in this the Velikonda range lies to the east and it is also a lower range and the Palikonda, Lankamalla, Nalla Mali range is a higher range which lies to the west and these ranges run in a nearly north south alignment and it is parallel to the Coromandel coast and they run between the Krishna and Bennar rivers if you remember the Tirumala Hills are located along the Sesachalam and Velikonda range of eastern guards only and the Palar river cuts through these ranges then the highest mountain peak of eastern guards is in the state of Odisha it is the Diomali peak which is situated in the Koraput district of southern Odisha this peak is 1672 meters high it is a part of Chandragiri Puttangi mountain system the region covers about three fourths of the entire Odisha state and geologically it is a part of the Indian Peninsula which was a part of the ancient land mass of Gondwana land but if you see according to NCRT the highest peak in eastern guards is the Mahindra Giri which is in the Gajapati district of eastern Odisha but if you see the height of this peak it is 1501 meters above the sea level according to government sources the highest peak is Diomali Hills but according to NCRT Mahindra Giri is the highest peak but logically if you see Diomali is the highest peak because it is higher than Mahindra Giri next let us see the resources and biodiversity of the eastern guards if you see the natural resources such as limestone bauxite and iron ore are found in the eastern guards hill ranges then if you come to the biodiversity of the region one of the biggest characteristics of eastern guards is that it is extremely fertile in fact the guards said to be the watershed of many rivers as the guard gets higher average rainfall and due to the higher rainfall the fertile land results in better crops so often it is referred to as estuaries of India and if you see India's largest tiger reserve which is the Nagarjuna Sagarshi Salem tiger sanctuary is located in the Nallamala range of eastern guards only then in addition to this the eastern guards consist of different eco regions along its range from the south to north the important eco regions consist of eastern high lands moist deciduous forests then east deccan dry evergreen forests then deccan thorn scrub forests then shrub lands and south deccan plateau dry deciduous forests and eastern guards is also home to some endemic fauna such as jerdon's cursor and gray slender lores and even some rare geckos are also found here like indian golden gecko rock gecko etc then eastern guards is also occupied by quite a few tribes such as gond tribes santhal tribes chenchu tribes etc these indigenous people have their own unique cultural heritage these people follow the age old customs and traditions they are still dependent on the forest produce and they practice hunting for their livelihood these tribes have a good knowledge about the region and its produce and thereby they make good use of its medicinal plants also but today if you see unfortunately these prominent mountain ranges are under tremendous stress as you saw in the beginning the eastern guards is undergoing degradation and damage and this is caused due to human greed population pressure unsustainable development negligence by public servants etc and there are also other threats to this region like haphazard mining logging poaching forest fires unsustainable harvest of forest produce stealing of rare species then smuggling and export of rare flora and fauna then encroachment of forest land then infrastructure development in the forest land etc etc now because of these threats degradation and damage the forest area in the eastern guards has shrunk to half of what it was in the beginning so this is a very worrisome fact that even though eastern guards is such a rich and diverse eco geographic unit it has not caught the attention for conservation and it is not protected as national heritage so there is a need of concerted and macro level conservation movement by the involvement of all stakeholders especially the involvement of public for the conservation of eastern guards region and today's news article is a step in the right direction as the organizations have called for some conservation measures by the government and various stakeholders let us hope that the state government and the central government pay attention to the demands by council for green revolution so that is all about this discussion in this discussion we saw about some key points from the report eastern guards environment outlook that was released by council for green revolution then we saw some facts about eastern guards from examination point of view you can take this discussion as a wholesome discussion of eastern guards before examination as we have also covered the threats that is leading to the degradation and damage of eastern guards with this we come to the end of this discussion but a split practice question will be discussed in the last session moving on to the next discussion which is based on this editorial article this editorial is with reference to the none of the above option in elections that is the nota option the syllabus that is relevant for this analysis is given here for your reference now before discussing the editorial let us first understand few basic information about this nota option as we already saw nota stands for none of the above this option will be available as the last button in the electronic voting machine after the names of all the contesting candidates and this nota was introduced in india because of supreme court direction that was given in the year 2013 this direction was given in the case law of people's union for civil liberties versus union of india in the judgment of this case law the supreme court directed the election commission of india to provide necessary provision for the voters in the ballot papers or in the evm's that is electronic voting machines to exercise the right not to vote to contesting candidates while maintaining secrecy supreme court even ordered to provide a specific button called none of the above in the evm's for this purpose now this concept of exercising right not to vote to any of the candidate is also called as negative voting according to the supreme court this right comes under the definition of electoral right which is given under section 79 clause d of representation of people act of 1951 here you should note that this section 79 clause d and section 171 capital A clause b in the indian penal code they both state that refraining from voting in an election is also an electoral right of an individual so now what this nota button in evm's does is that it provides democratic means to express resentment with secrecy rather than boycotting the polls if you see in the 2019 general elections more than 64 lakh voters in india have pressed the nota option which is the last button in the evm they have pressed this button to express their resentment with secrecy among the available candidates in 2019 general elections the number of voters who have pulled their votes as you notice is around 1.06 percentage so overall if you see that is by adding the votes polled through evm's and postal ballots around 1.06 percentage electors have polled nota in the 2019 general elections and even in the recently concluded delhi assembly elections around 0.46 percentage electors have polled nota see one of the understanding with respect to this scenario is that these are the electors who usually do not vote because of resentment over the available candidates but now because this nota option is available they come and take part in elections therefore this nota option also has the potential to increase voter participation then after this if you see in 2017 gujarat assembly elections 1.8 percentage of nota was polled in this context the author of this editorial mentions that in this election nota has got more votes than any political party other than the two major parties and this is visible if you compare parties performance with the performance of nota and more surprisingly in the 2019 maharashtra assembly elections nota even became a runner-up in two constituencies that is nota finished the elections in the second place in two constituencies in the maharashtra assembly elections and you would have also heard about the circumstances when the national level political parties received votes even below the level of nota so this is a small overview of how nota was used by few electors to express their resentment through democratic means now the idea behind nota is that over a period of time after seeing the number of nota polled the political parties will field best available individuals who are having high moral and ethical values but there is no visibility at the major level that political parties are attempting to field ethically and morally sound candidates because of nota so we will see why nota has made no significant impact as expected this is because nota is a toothless option here toothless refers to being powerless we are saying nota is powerless because whatever be the number of nota that is polled in an election this number of nota has no effect on declaring the winner this is because in the general elections to the state legislative assembly and the Lok Sabha without considering the number of nota whoever gets higher number of votes in her or his constituency that person becomes a winner now to highlight this the author has cited the statements made by former chief election commissioner in this regard the former chief election commissioner Mr. Kureshi has observed that even if there are 99 nota votes out of the total 100 votes and if the candidate X just gets one vote then also Mr. X is the winner and the rest 99 number of nota will be treated as invalid or no votes only so even though nota has increased voter participation it has no actual effect so what can be done in this context that is what can be done to give teeth to nota now here giving teeth to nota means empowerment of voters or electors one way in which nota can be given teeth is that if nota gets a certain percentage share of total votes that is polled then reelection should take place and the most important thing here is that in the reelection the previously contested candidates should not be allowed to contest or there is also one another way it is that if share of nota votes in the total votes that is polled is more than the victory margin then reelection should be conducted here victory margin is the number of votes expressed as percentage and this is the difference between the votes received by the top candidate and the second candidate that is the runner-up so this way simply means that if nota becomes runner-up in a constituency then reelection should happen in that constituency and none of the previously contested candidates should be allowed to contest the reelection then author also gives an idea that candidates and parties who are securing votes lesser than nota they should be barred from contesting in the next election from the constituency where they have secured lesser votes so if you ask whether any interventions have been done with respect to nota like these what we have suggested there have been some promising interventions recently which were made by state election commissions with reference to the local body elections if you see in June 2018 the Maharashtra state election commission issued an order the order stated that if nota has received the highest number of valid votes then the election conducted for that particular seat shall be countermandered or cancelled and a fresh election shall be held for such a post now this order was made applicable to all general and by elections to the urban local body elections in Maharashtra then after this in November 2018 the state election commission of Haryana also issued an order as per this order nota is to be treated like a fictional candidate in municipal polls from December 2018 this means if nota gets maximum vote then none of the real candidates will be declared elected in that particular election and the elections will be cancelled and they will be held once again and the candidates who are securing votes less than nota they would be barred from contesting in that reelection also so these are some of the interventions made by state election commissions with reference to the local body elections and these interventions are in line with what we have suggested in addition to this the author has given a last suggestion that is to modify the nota option as not be that is right now nota is the last button in evm machine so the author feels that the better response to nota can be studied and understood only if it is given as a very first option in the electronic voting machine so the first button shall mention none of the below or not be in addition to this as we know there is either less awareness about nota or there is no awareness about nota among majority of the population so if nota is modified as not be and it is placed as the first button then we can expect that people will know more about this option so these are some of the suggestions given by the author regarding nota option and giving power to this nota options in the elections to come if these suggestions are implemented then the political parties will at least try and make attempt to field morally and ethically sound candidates for elections and this in turn will also period of time will clean the various blots in the electoral democracy in india that is all about this discussion with this we come to the end of this editorial analysis the displayed practice question will be discussed in the last session moving on to the next discussion this news article is about the launch of three new advance warning systems these warning systems have been launched by indian national center for ocean information services which is in short known as incoise so in this context in this discussion we will see about incoise and also about the new advance warning systems launched by incoise the syllabus that is relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference first know that incoise is one of the centers under s o s o stands for earth system science organization this s o is an executive arm of the union ministry of earth sciences this s o is an umbrella organization that coordinates all meteorological and ocean development activities and one of the centers under s o is incoise and this incoise was established as an autonomous body in 1999 and it was established under the ministry of earth sciences now the mandate of incoise is to provide ocean information and advisory services to society industry government agencies and the scientific community this is provided based on continuous ocean observations and research and incoise provides a number of free services for users in the marine domain such as it provides free services for fishermen's and if you remember we saw news about incoise in 10th october 2019 analysis the news which we saw was incoise and airports authority of india have together developed gagan satellite system enabled mariners instrument for navigation and information which is in short known as gemini so like this incoise develops new user friendly products and services so one such recent development is the launch of three new advance warning systems which is the news today so let us see about these warning systems in detail now the three new warning systems are small advisory and forecast services system second swell surge forecast system and third is algal bloom information service now all these three products are available for free these systems will help the users and the authorities like for the users it will reduce the damage and losses related to fishing and activities and for authorities it will help them to make contingency plans for reducing such damage now the small advisory and forecast services system which is in short known as svas this warning system will provide warnings in 10 days advance it will provide warnings about the potential sites in the indian coastal waters where possible overturning of fishing vessels especially the small vessels can take place so this system will benefit these small fishing vessels that are used in all the coastal states and union territories now this svas is based on boat safety index this boat safety index or bsi is derived from wave model forecast outputs like wave height steepness directional speed and rapid development of wind at sea all these indicators are boat specific so based on this boat safety index the svas system has been developed now the next warning system is swell surge forecast system or ssfs this system has been designed for forecasting swell surges that are occurring in the west coast of india and it will forecast 2 to 3 days in advance so here what do we mean by swells see according to the world meteorological organization swells are any system of water waves which has left the area where it was generated so swells travel a long distance in the oceans they are self-sustaining and they are generated by energy below the earth's surface if you see this picture it will give you an idea of swell waves versus wind waves now since these swells travel from a far away distance the fishermen in open seas and the fishermen even in coastal areas will have no idea about when they will be affected by the swells so these swells generally catch the local people by surprise only and these swell events happen intermittently throughout the year and colloquially this swell is also called as kalla kadal in kerala it is used by the local fishermen in this word kalla kadal kallan means thief kadal means sea so this word kalla kadal refers to the freak flooding that happens along the coastlines when the sea water creeps in during good weather the sea surges into the land and it inundates vast areas that is it floods the vast areas since it happens all of a sudden like how a thief arrives unannounced that is where it is called as kalla kadal and this word is not only a regional word because this word has been accepted formally by UNESCO to explain the freak occurrence it has been accepted in February 2012 so even the world meteorological organization and the intergovernmental oceanographic commission both have recognized this terminology now don't confuse kalla kadals with tsunamis because both floods vast areas but both are different since both involves two different kinds of waves if you see in case of swells waves surge happens due to specific meteorological conditions in the southern Indian ocean they support the generation of long period swells these swells travel northward and they reach the Indian coast in three to five days time but whereas if you consider tsunamis waves are generated due to quakes on the ocean bed so both tsunamis and kalla kadals or swells are different now this newly developed swell surge forecast system will help forecasting swell surges that are occurring in the Indian coasts especially that are occurring in the west coast of India and it will forecast in two to three days at once next the third warning system is the algal bloom information service or in short abyss now in this algal bloom means the rapid out of control growth of algae these algal blooms have the potential to kill marine animals or they have the potential to disturb the marine ecology so it affects the marine food chain and this in turn affects the fishing activities as well so now this new technology abyss will help fishermen fishery resource managers and ecologists to get real-time information about the spread of these algal blooms across the northeastern arabian sea across coastal waters of kerala gulf of mannar of the coast of tamarind and coastal waters of gopalpur in odisha by the help of this technology they will get the details of species and size of algal blooms so when fishermen get this detail they can know where there is algal bloom and they can avoid those places for fishing so these are the three new advanced warning systems that have been recently launched by incoise which will definitely help the fisherman community with this we come to the end of this discussion that is split practice question will be discussed in the last session moving on to the next discussion this news article falls on the Indian economy part of our syllabus this news article is related to the listing of masala bonds so in this context we'll be discussing in detail about what do we mean by masala bonds and what are the criterias for issuing such bonds the syllabus that is relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference now to understand the concept of masala bonds first you should know what are bonds bond is a debt instrument in which an investor invests or loans money to an entity here the entity can be a corporate or even government the entity borrows the funds for a defined period of time at a variable interest rate or at fixed interest rate and in this know that the owners of bonds are known as debt holders or creditors of the bond issuer and this masala bond is one type of bond see as we know the Indian companies have been raising debt from overseas markets for decades through bond offerings but these borrowings have been denominated in dollar or in other currencies only so in this kind of bond there is one risk which is the currency risk to understand this let us take one example assume that there is an Indian company and it has issued bonds in London stock exchange in US dollars and assume that that Indian company got 1 lakh dollars by issuing dollar bonds in 2020 now in the scenario assume that the dollar rupee exchange rate be at 70 that is one dollar is equal to 70 rupees so we can say that the company has raised 70 lakh rupees and also assume that this bond has a maturity of three years so that means the company has to repay the amount in 2023 now let us think that in the year 2023 the dollar rupee exchange rate will be 75 that means one dollar is equal to rupees 75 so the company needs to pay back 1 lakh dollars in 2023 now since the bond which were issued was dollar denominated while paying back the Indian company needs to pay rupees 75 lakhs in 2023 because at that time the dollar rupee exchange rate is at 75 so this is the currency risk that we are talking about because while issuing the bonds it was 70 lakh rupees only but now repaying it is 75 lakhs so the company is paying back 5 lakh rupees extra so here the bond issuer or the company takes the currency risk now one solution to such currency risk is issuing country specific currency bonds and masala bonds are one such bonds these masala bonds are rupee denominated bonds it means the funds would be raised from overseas market in Indian rupees so we can define masala bonds as rupee denominated borrowings issued by Indian entities in overseas markets so now how does masala bonds solve the issue of currency risk now let us take the same example but now instead of dollar denominated bond it is rupee denominated masala bonds and the company has raised 1 lakh dollars now at the time of issuing the exchange rate is 70 that means 1 dollar is equal to 70 rupees hence the bond raised will be considered as rupees 70 lakhs only so at the time of maturity the company will have to pay only 70 lakh rupees and not 1 lakh dollars because if the company pays in 1 lakh dollars then again it has to pay according to the exchange rate during the maturity period but since it is masala bond which is rupee denominated the company only have to pay rupees 70 lakhs and that is why it is called as rupee denominated and these bonds are free from the variation in exchange rates so here the currency risk is borne by the investor and not the issuer because instead of getting rupees 75 lakh the investor will only get rupees 70 lakhs so this is how masala bonds solve the issue of currency risk now you may be wondering that how this name masala bond came into existence see when the international finance corporation which is an investment arm of world bank group when they raised money for investment in infrastructure in India they popularized this masala bonds term as we know masala means spices and India is famous for spices so the term masala bond popularizes the culture and cuisine of India on foreign platforms now let us discuss some of the features of masala bonds according to RBI any corporate and Indian bank is eligible to issue rupee denominated bonds overseas but there are certain limitations RBI says that the rupee denominated bond can only be issued in a country and it can be subscribed by a resident of such country that is a member of FATF that is financial action task force and whose security market regulator is a member of international organization of security commission so this is the condition put by RBI this condition is to avoid illegal activities such as money laundering and terror financing etc in addition to this there are also limitations on the ways in which the money raised through rupee denominated bonds can be spent RBI says that the money raised cannot be used for real estate activities other than for development of integrated township or affordable housing projects it also cannot be used for investing in capital markets for purchase of land or for lending to other entities for the activities which we have just stated so for these purposes the rupee denominated bonds cannot be spent so we can say that masala bonds save the bond issuer from the burden of currency risks it diversifies the source of capital for Indian companies so with a stable rupee denominated bond market we can expect more money to come in and this will help to fund infrastructure projects in India it will help to fuel internal growth and it will internationalize the Indian currency and know that at present these masala bonds are listed on the London stock exchange so so far if you see in 2017 the national highway authority of India that is NH AI had issued masala bonds in LSE it attracted bits worth 3000 crore rupees then after in 2018 HDFC has raised money by issuing masala bonds then in 2019 the Kerala infrastructure investment fund board has issued masala bonds in LSE so so far in these instances masala bonds have been issued and now today's news is that the Asian Development Bank has listed its 10 year masala bonds worth 850 crore rupees now in this listing bonds simply means trading of bonds the bonds were listed on India INX and according to the news article the proceeds from the bond would be used to support local currency lending and for investment in India so in this context let us also see some facts about this India INX the India INX stands for India international exchange limited it is India's first international stock exchange it is located in international financial services center which is situated at the Gujarat international finance tech city that is the Gujarat's gift city and this India INX commenced its operations in 2017 and it is a subsidiary of Bombay stock exchange limited so that is all about this discussion in this discussion we saw about masala bonds how it solves the issue of currency risk then we also saw some facts about India international exchange limited with this we come to the end of this discussion that split practice question will be discussed in the last session moving on to the next discussion this news article is related to the 2019 world air quality report so in this context we will be discussing brief about this report and also its findings related to India the syllabus that is relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference now before discussing the news article in the report let us first understand the severity of air pollution air pollution constitutes the most pressing environmental health risk for the global population it is estimated to contribute towards 7 million premature deaths per year and it is said that around 92 percentage of world's population are estimated to breathe toxic air and the scenario is even worse in less developed countries because in less developed countries 98 percentage of children who are under the age of five years they breathe toxic air so as a result of this inhaling of toxic air air pollution is the main cause of death for children under the age of 15 it is said that air pollution kills around six lakh children every year and if you see in financial terms or economic terms the premature deaths due to air pollution cost about five trillion dollars in welfare losses worldwide so calculating the severity of air pollution is very important in this way the 2019 world air quality report is very important for us and this report is released by IQ air this IQ air is a Swiss and US based company that specializes in technology solutions which help to protect people from airborne pollutants and you should note that this report is based only on one pollutant which is particulate matter 2.5 or pm 2.5 and the data for this particular pollutant has been acquired from ground based air quality monitoring stations now let us discuss the findings of this report if you look at this map it presents the average pm 2.5 exposure by country by country basis and the countries which are represented in gray colors indicate that these locations had insufficient pm 2.5 data for the year 2019 and also remember that the pm 2.5 exposure is calculated from the available pm 2.5 data which is weighted by population now in this map you can see that regionally the south asia southeast asia and the western asia carry the highest burden of fine particulate matter that is pm 2.5 pollution overall and according to this 2019 report out of the world's top 30 most polluted cities during the year 2019 21 cities are located in india and 27 cities are located in south asia and all the top cities are within greater asia itself now since this report is based on average pm 2.5 concentration and weighted population countries that have more population and pollution will have more burden so based on this rankings have been given to the countries and according to the global rankings if you see the most polluted countries in the world are bangladesh pakistan and bangolia and among these two are our neighbors and globally the least polluted countries are bahamas the us virgin islands and iceland so what is the position in which india has been ranked india has been ranked at the fifth position which means india is the fifth most polluted country out of the 98 countries that has been ranked by this report not only that even if you see the ranking given for the capitals of the countries our capital that is new delhi has been ranked at the first position which means among the capitals delhi is the most polluted capital it is because it has an average pm 2.5 concentration of 98.6 microgram per meter cube and this is a very high level because if you see the who prescribed level of exposure to pm 2.5 pollutant so as to have minimum health impact then the concentration should be 10 microgram per meter cube or less so we can see that the concentration of pm 2.5 in delhi is nearly 10 times the who target and this is the second year and that two second consecutive year in which delhi has been ranked as the most polluted capital then if we compare with the briggs nations even then also india is the most polluted country so this was the comparison between india and the world now if we see within india the most polluted city in our country is gazaabad in utha pradesh gazaabad has a mean pm 2.5 concentration of 110.2 microgram per meter cube and this is almost 11 times the who target then other than that as we already saw delhi is one of the polluted cities then noida and grugram which are neighbors of delhi they are also in the most polluted cities list and from india as we already saw 21 cities are in the top 30 most polluted cities list so if you ask if any city has less number of concentration of pm 2.5 yes there is one city which is the cleanest city in india according to this report it is satna in madhya pradesh this city has a mean pm 2.5 concentration of 15.5 microgram per meter cube but if you see this is still higher than the who target so even the cleanest city of india according to this report has a higher concentration of pm 2.5 polluted so this was with respect to the rankings of the cities and countries at the global and at the national level now this report has also mentioned some specific challenges to india with respect to air quality as we have already saw india is the fifth most polluted country in the world and india's capital is the most polluted capital in the world and apart from that almost half of the 50 most polluted cities are in india also no indian cities that are included in this report has met the who target for annual pollution exposure during the year 2019 and one of the challenges mentioned in this report is that still our country has a limited air quality monitoring network due to the population size so now there arises a question that whether a government has taken any initiative to curb air pollution or not yes our government has taken some initiative like in 2019 a government has launched the national clean air program with a commitment to tackle air pollution and this ncap aims to reduce pm 2.5 air pollution and pm 10 air pollution in 102 cities by 22 30 percentage by the year 2024 compared to the 2017 levels and this will be achieved by working directly with the local governments to create more customized regulations and targets that means the regulations and targets will be based on what the states could achieve or what suits them better in addition to this in 2019 itself india also joined the un's climate and clean air coalition and india joined as the 65th member so this will help india to collaborate with global leaders on air pollution solutions so that we can implement those solutions in our country to reduce the air pollution the next initiative as you know is the Bharat 6 norms in the auto sector and this norm aims to introduce a cleaner fuel and cleaner technology so it is expected to reduce the air pollution caused by automobiles so far we have discussed the rankings of india indian cities and the challenges faced by india and also some of the initiatives made by the government now beyond these challenges also there are some achievements made by india with respect to air quality according to this report every city in india except for nakpur every other city saw a decrease in pm 2.5 levels in the year 2019 the report even says that the average national air pollution has decreased by a remarkable 20 percentage from 2018 to 2019 but according to this report this success cannot be completely attributed to national clean air program this reduction in pm 2.5 is mainly because of the present economic slowdown and favorable meteorological conditions now in this economic slowdown plays a role because when there is economic slowdown it indicates less industrial activities which results in less emissions and less air pollution so we can conclude by saying that by initiating the end cap and by joining un's climate and clean air coalition the government is moving in the right direction and the introduction of bs 6 norms is also an important step to curb air pollution but all these are long term measures so as short term measures we need to expand the air quality monitoring networks in india so that it will help us to understand the ground reality so let us hope that the government will continue its dedicated efforts towards cleaning the air and the results of those efforts will be visible in the near future for this we come to the end of this discussion the split practice question will be discussed in the last session moving on to the last discussion for the day which is based on these news articles these news articles are with reference to an announcement made by the election commission of india the announcement is that around 55 members in rajasabha are retiring in the month of april 2020 and these members are representing 17 states in our country so to fill these seats elections are to be conducted in appropriate state legislative assemblies so in the context of these news articles we will see few important information pertaining to rajasabha which are important from film examination point of view the syllabus that is relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference now as you know in indian parliament we have two houses one is loksabha and the other is rajasabha rajasabha is called as the council of states and rajasabha is a permanent house and it is not subject to dissolution so the term dissolution is associated with loksabha and not with rajasabha next the article 80 of indian constitution deals with the composition of rajasabha according to this article 80 the maximum strength of rajasabha is 250 and out of these 250 12 members are nominated by president and the nominated persons are those who have special knowledge or practical experience in literature science art and social service and remember that the present seats of rajasabha is 245 where 12 seats are nominated and 8 seats represent union territories and the remaining 225 seats represent the states now this is as per the fourth schedule of indian constitution this fourth schedule deals with the allocation of seats in the council of states that is rajasabha now in rajasabha a member who is elected for a full term serves for a period of six years and in the case of loksabha as we know it is five years then to be elected in rajasabha the election is held as per the system of proportional representation by means of single transferable vote now we will explain what this means in the coming videos today just know that the election is held as per the system and the non-nominated members of rajasabha are not elected directly by the people as we saw in rajasabha three union territories are also represented they are national capital territory of delhi buddhicherry and jamuen keshmir so the members of rajasabha who represent states are elected by the elected members of state legislative assemblies and the members of rajasabha representing union territories they will be elected by elected members of concerned legislative assembly of the union territory now with reference to the union territory of jamuen keshmir four seats are allotted and this is ensured by section eight and nine of jamuen keshmir the organization act of 2019 but however if you see there are no sitting members in the legislative assembly of union territory of jamuen keshmir it is because elections were not held since the reorganization of the erstwhile state of jamuen keshmir into two union territories so after this only fresh elections are to be held in the union territory of jamuen keshmir but one interesting fact in the scenario is that four members from the jamuen keshmir are set to retire next year that is in 2021 so if elections to rajasabha is to take place for representing union territory of jamuen keshmir so first elections to the legislative assembly of union territory of jamuen keshmir should take place because as we saw already the members of rajasabha who are representing union territories will be elected by elected members of concerned legislative assembly of the union territory so now with respect to the elections to the legislative assembly of ut of j nk the government of india had earlier said that it will be conducted in march 2020 but going by the trend in jamuen keshmir we can say that elections may not take place in jamuen keshmir in the next two months so as per the announcement of election commission elections for 55 seats in rajasabha are to be held in 17 state legislative assemblies on 26th march 2020 so that is all about this news article with this we come to the end of this discussion the split practice question will be discussed in the next session with this we have come to the end of news article discussion session next we are moving to the practice question discussion session this question is based on western guards and eastern guards the first statement is the western guards are higher than the eastern guards now this statement is correct because if you see the average elevation of western guards it is from 900 meters to 1600 meters but the average elevation of eastern guards is 600 meters only so this statement is correct here the question asks for the incorrect statement so that means first statement should not be in the answer so you can eliminate option b now the second statement is the western guard are more continuous than the eastern guards now this statement is also correct you can find the same sentence in the ncrt also western guards are more continuous than eastern guards even when you describe about eastern guards you first to say they are discontinuous range of mountains along indias eastern coast so this statement is also correct but here question asks for the incorrect statement so both one and two should not be in the answer so you can eliminate c also now the next statement the eastern guards and the western guards meet each other at the nilgiri hills now this is a fact and this fact is correct so here all the statements are correct but the question asks for incorrect statement so the correct answer to this question is none of the above because none of the above statements are incorrect now this next question is based on inquis the question asks with reference to so inquis which of the statements are correct the first statement is it is an autonomous body under the ministry of jalshakti now inquis is an autonomous body but it is an autonomous body under the ministry of earth sciences and not under ministry of jalshakti so this statement is incorrect now the second statement is swell surge forecast system recently launched by so inquis provides information about algal blooms in select coastal waters of india now this statement is also wrong because swell surge forecast system provides forecasting for swell surges that are occurring in the west coast of india and this forecasting will be available in two to three days in advance so it is not for algal blooms for information regarding algal blooms another forecasting system was launched by inquis which is known as abyss or algal bloom information service and this swell surge forecast system it will provide warnings in 10 days in advance and it will warn about the potential sites in indian coastal waters where possible overturning of fishing vessels especially the small vessels can take place so here both the statements are wrong and the question asks for the correct statements so the correct answer to this question is neither one nor two this question is with reference to the world air quality report of 2019 two statements are given and we have to choose the correct statement first one is it is released annually by the united nations environment program now this statement is incorrect because this report is released by a swiss and u.s based company known as iq air this company specializes in technology solutions that help to protect people from airborne pollutants and it is not a un body so this statement is incorrect the second statement is as per the report delhi is the most polluted capital city in the world for the second consecutive year now know that as per this report india is at the fifth position which means india is the fifth most polluted country out of the 98 countries that has been ranked by this report and among the capitals in the year 2019 delhi was the most polluted capital it had an average pm 2.5 concentration of 98.6 microgram per meter cube and india was also the most polluted capital in the last year also that is in the 2018 also so this statement is correct and also know that this concentration of pm 2.5 is 10 times more than the WHO target WHO target is 10 microgram per meter cube to have minimum health impacts so the correct answer to this question is option b 2 only now this next question is based on masala bonds we have to choose the correct statement the first statement is it is a rupee denominated bond issued to raise funds from overseas markets in indian rupees now this statement is correct masala bonds is a rupee denominated bond it means the funds would be raised from overseas market in indian rupees and according to rba corporates and indian banks are eligible to issue rupee denominated bonds overseas so the statement is correct the second statement is in rupee denominated bonds the issue of currency risk is shared equally by the issuer and investor now this statement is incorrect because in a dollar denominated bond the currency risk is borne by the issuer but in the masala bond or a rupee denominated bond the currency risk is borne by the investor it is because the masala bonds are free from the variation in the exchange rates for example if a company issues rupee denominated masala bonds and raised 1 lakh dollars and the exchange rate at the time of issuing bonds is 70 that means 1 dollar is equal to 70 rupees so 1 lakh dollars will be equal to 70 lakh rupees now in case of masala bonds which are rupee denominated bonds while repaying the company has to pay rupees 70 lakh only because it is rupee denominated but instead if it would have been dollar denominated then the company has to pay dollar 1 lakh that means if during the maturity period 1 dollar is equal to 75 rupees then the company has to pay the equivalent of 1 lakh dollars at that time which will be rupees 75 lakhs so in a dollar denominated bond here the risk is borne by the issuer but in a rupee denominated bond the risk is borne by the investor because instead of getting 75 lakhs now due to the reason that it is a rupee denominated bond the investor will get only 70 lakh rupees so in a rupee denominated bonds the risk is not shared equally rather it is borne by the investor so this statement is incorrect so the correct answer to this question is option a one only now this question is with reference to Indian parliament the first statement is both the houses of Indian parliament are subject to dissolution now this statement is wrong because rajya sabha is a permanent house and it is not subject to dissolution dissolution is a term which is associated with loksabha so this statement is wrong now the next statement is the membership of those who represented erstwhile state of jammu and keshmir in rajya sabha was terminated with the reorganization of erstwhile state of jammu and keshmir now this statement is incorrect because according to the section 9 of jammu and keshmir reorganization act of 2019 the term of office of the sitting members of council of states from the erstwhile state of jammu and keshmir was to be unaltered the section even mentioned that the sitting members who are representing the existing state of jammu and keshmir shall be deemed to have been elected to fill the seats allotted to the union territory of jammu and keshmir so there were four sitting members from the state of jammu and keshmir and their term of office was not terminated it was left unaltered and today they continue to be members of rajya sabha representing the union territory of jammu and keshmir here the question asks for the incorrect statement so the correct answer to this question is both one and two now let us take one main question based on gs paper 2 notor option at present though a tool to increase voter participation is toothless discuss now you can write the answer for this question and post it in the comment section we will review your answer and appropriate suggestion will be given in a reasonable time period with this we come to the end of today's hindi news analysis if you like the video don't forget to like comment and share and do subscribe to shankar ice academy youtube channel for more updates related to civil service examination preparation