 Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis by Shankariya's Academy dated 6 May 2021. The list of articles covered for today's discussion is given for your reference along with the page numbers in different editions. But before discussing the news article, let us discuss few important preliminary questions asked for the year 2020. Now let us move to the first question. Which one of the following protected areas is well known for the conservation of subspecies of Indian swamp deer, Bharasinga, that thrives well in hard ground and is exclusively graminivorous? The options given are option A, Kanha National Park, option B, Manas National Park, option C, Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary and option D, Talchapur Wildlife Sanctuary. Now look at this question. The question itself says, Bharasinga thrives well in hard ground and is exclusively graminivorous. Graminivorous means an animal that thrives on grass. And it asks about the habitat of Indian Spam deer commonly called Bharasinga. If you know the topography and climatic conditions of India, you could eliminate certain options. See some animal species or of special interest to UPSC. This is one such species that is protected. Now let us see the protection status of Spam deer. Under the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972, this species is placed under Schedule I. The International Organization IUCN's Red List calls it as a vulnerable species. And as sites list, it comes under the Appendix I. All these three facts mention that it is a highly protected animal. In 1967, the number of Spam deer decreased to 66 highly due to rampant hunting, habitat loss and diseases. But later on, with the successful breeding programs and conservation practices at Kanha National Park, the deer was brought back from the verge of extinction. And note that the Bharasinga is the state animal of Madhya Pradesh. If you know this fact and if you know the location of Kanha National Park, you could come to the conclusion that option A, Kanha National Park is the right answer. See Kanha National Park is located in Maikala ranges of Sarpuras in Madhya Pradesh. The national park is being popularized as Tiger Reserve. And it is spread across two revenue districts namely Mandala and Kalaghat. Also, note that Kanha National Park was declared as a reserve forest in 1879. And later on, in 1933, it was upgraded to wildlife sanctuary. In 1955, however, this position was further upgraded to National Park. The Kanha National Park is spread around the area of 940 square kilometers in Maikala chain of fields. And by adding the buffer and the core zones altogether, the Kanha Tiger Reserve has the total area of around 2000 square kilometers. So, the answer for this question is option A, Kanha National Park. Let us move to the next question. Question 2. With reference to Indian elephants, consider the following statements. Statement 1. The leader of an elephant group is a female. Statement 2. The maximum gestation period can be 22 months. Statement 3. An elephant can normally go on curving till the age of 40 years only. Statement 4. Among the states in India, the highest population is in Kerala. Which of the following statements given above is or or correct? Option A. 1 and 2 only. Option B. 2 and 4 only. Option C. 3 only. Option D. 1, 3 and 4 only. Look at the fourth option. Among the states in India, the highest population is in Kerala. This is a factual question. If you know that this statement is wrong, you can eliminate the fourth option. As per the 2017 elephant census data, Karnataka has the highest number of elephants at around 6000. This is followed by Assam and Kerala. Kerala stands at around 3054 elephants. So, the fourth option is wrong and option B and D are eliminated. Now, the answer is left with option A and C. Look at the first option. Leader of an elephant group is a female. Yes, statement is correct. In majority of cases, elephant groups is headed by a female elephant named Matriak. This is a factual statement. So, statement 1 is correct. Answer is option A. Besides this, various reports show elephants curving age can be around as much as 22 months. So, statement 2 is also right. The answer for this question is option A, 1 and 2 only. Let us move to the third question. This is a agriculture-based question and it is a statement based one. If you know the facts related to the given crops, you could easily answer this question. The question is, the crop is subtropical in nature. A hard frost is injurious to it. It requires at least 210 frost-free days and 50 to 100 centimeters of rainfall for its growth. Light well-drained soil capable of retaining moisture is ideally suited for the cultivation of the crop. Which one of the following is the crop? The options given are option A, cotton, option B, jute, option C, sugarcane, option D, tea. The correct option for this agriculture-based question is option A. This is NCRT-based question. Now, let us discuss the answer. See, the sugarcane requires an annual rainfall between 75 to 100 centimeters. In case of a low rainfall region, irrigation is required for this crop. Further, upon checking the NCRT, jute requires high-temperature heavy rainfall and a humid climate. Whereas, in case of tea, it requires a cool climate and well-distributed rainfall throughout the year. Now, consider the crop cotton. This crop requires high temperature and light rainfall or irrigation. 210 frost-free days is very much important for its sustainable growth. So, the answer for this question is option A, cotton. Now, let us move to the question number four. Consider the following pairs. Here, the names of the rivers are given in left-hand side and in the other side, the sea and ocean in which the river flows are given. So, we are asked to see whether the given pair is right or wrong. Now, consider the following pairs. Statement one, Mekong, Andaman Sea. Statement two, Thames, Ayurish Sea. Statement three, Volga, Caspian Sea. Statement four, Zambezi, Indian Ocean. Which of the statement given above is or are correct? Option A, one and two only. Option B, three only. Option C, three and four only. Option D, one, two and four only. This is a straight up factual question based on geography map. Now, consider the statement one, Mekong. As you see from the map, Mekong river flows into the South China Sea. See, the Mekong river forms the border between Thailand and Laos and it also has a long course that originates in Himalayan Tibet and traverses across five countries before it enters the ocean in Vietnam. So, statement one is wrong since Mekong flows into South China Sea. So, the option A and D can be eliminated. Now, consider the statement three, Volga. As you see from the map, the major lifeline of Russia is the Volga river. It has a unique drainage destination where it flows into the Caspian Sea while its origin is from eastern Alps. So, the statement three is right. The Volga flows into Caspian Sea only. Next, considering the statement four, Zambezi river. Zambezi river flows in Africa. As you see from the map, the Zambezi river flows through various countries in Africa and its destination is in Indian Ocean. So, the statement four is also right. Hence, the answer for this question is option C, three and four only. Now, let us focus on the today's article discussion. First topic for the day's discussion, Cabinet clears IDBI Bank Strategic Disinvestment. The news article mentions that the Union Cabinet has given in principle approval for strategic disinvestment of IDBI Bank. In this context, let us understand about disinvestment and then we shall discuss the article. The syllabus relevant to the discussion is given here for your reference. C, disinvestment means sale or liquidation of assets by the government. Usually, the sale of central public sector enterprises and state public sector enterprises or other fixed assets of the government falls under disinvestments. But, note that the words privatization and disinvestments are often used interchangeably. You have to know that disinvestment only leads to privatization. C, privatization implies shedding or removal of the ownership or management of a government owned company and the government companies are converted into private companies in two ways. First way is by withdrawal of the government from ownership and management of PSE. Second way is the outright sale of public sector companies. But when the PSEs are sold to the public by way of selling a part of equity of PSE, it is known as disinvestments. So, in case of disinvestments, only the part of ownership is sold whereas the management control is retained by the government itself. But in case of privatization, the government held equity is reduced to a level that the company no longer remains a government company. What do you mean by a government company? Under the Companies Act, government company is a company in which government holds more than 51 percentage of its paid up share capital. So, a PSU will no longer have a character of a government company when the transfer of shares involves bringing down the government's shareholding below 51 percentage. Now, from the side of government, the purpose or objective of disinvestment is to put the national resources and assets to optimal use, particularly to release the productive potential of PSEs. Also, it has the aim to improve the financial discipline and to facilitate modernization. Another important objective of privatization is to effectively utilize the private capital and managerial capabilities of private to improve the performance of PSUs. It will also reduce the fiscal burden on the X checker and also paying of the public debt because disinvestments helps to raise budgetary resources for the government. So, what is today's news? It is regarding disinvestments of IDBA Bank Ltd as already announced the union budget in the year 2021. The union cabinet has given in-principle approval for the strategic sale along with the transfer of management control in IDBA Bank. That means, cabinet has approved the strategic disinvestments of IDBA. Here, the strategic disinvestment implies the sale of substantial portion of government shareholding of a central PSE of up to 50 percentage along with the transfer of management control. It is the competent authority that is to determine whether it could raise the sale of shareholding above 50 percent or not. Here, the one who will buy the sold portions is called as strategic partner. A point to be noted is that in a strategic sale after the transaction, the strategic partner may hold less percentage of share than the government, but still the control of management will be with the strategic partner only. Now, with respect to IDBA, currently more than 94 percentage equity of IDBA is owned together by the central government, that is the government of India and the LIC. Government of India holds 45.48 percentage and the LIC holds 49.2 percentage of shares. Also, LIC is currently the promoter of IDBA with management control and government of India is the co-promoter. But how much of these shareholdings by the government of India and LIC will be divested is not yet decided. So, it is expected that the strategic buyer or partner will infuse funds, will introduce technology and best management practices for the optimal development of business potential and growth of IDBI. It is also expected that the buyer will generate more business without any dependence on LIC and government assistant funds. This is all about IDBI's disinvestments. Now, let us take up the next article. The second article for today's discussion is regarding RBI. The RBI steps into East COVID-19 burden. Look at this article now. We know that Indian economy is going through a difficult phase. When India is aiming at a reshaped recovery, the second wave is cruelly demanding a lockdown. This may hamper the economic recovery of our nation and in this right situation, the RBI has stepped into a healthy economy to guide its recovery. With respect to this article, RBI has made two announcements to help the economy. So, let us go one by one. See, we know that the health care services and related services are the ones that is fighting the pandemic from the frontline. To support them, the RBI has eased the credit access to them. The governor of RBI announced a scheme named term liquidity facility of 50,000 crores with a maturity up to three years. The interest rates will be at the report rate, which is 4% currently. Simply put, the RBI will buy 50,000 crore worth of government securities, which has the maturity of three years to inject liquidity to the system. When the liquidity is injected to the system, note that the banks will have poor money at their hands and by which it will help the businesses to get loans from the bank. While the businesses are, this is expected to help the businesses to invest in raw material and ensure growth. So, under the scheme, the banks will provide fresh lending support to wide range of entities. This will include vaccine manufacturers, importers and supplies of vaccines, priority medical devices, hospitals, dispensaries, manufacturer and supply of oxygen and ventilators and logistic firms. These loans will continue to be classified under priority sector till repayment or maturity. For that, banks are expected to create a COVID loan book under the scheme largely to maintain records. You have to know what is priority sector lending, as it is very much important in film's perspective. Now, let us see about the priority sector lending. See, as the name says, it is a way to provide a higher priority to certain economic sectors in our country. The aim is to provide institutional credit and equitable economic growth so that sectors and segments whom which find it difficult to get the loans will be assured credit priority sector lending. For example, the banks may find it unprofitable to lend it to a farmer. Hence, under the priority sector lending, the banks are mandated to ensure that the farmer is given loan till a particular limit. So, the government forces the financial institutions to lend to these vulnerable sections through this policy tool. The RBI frequently updates as to what constitutes a priority sector lending. For instance, priority sector includes the following categories such as agriculture, MSME, export credit, education, housing, social infrastructure, renewable energy, etc. Thus, it is legally sanctioned under section 21 and 35A of Banking Regulation Act of 1949. All the scheduled commercial banks and even the foreign banks are mandated to set aside 40 percentage of their adjusted net bank credit for lending to these sectors. And when you take the RRBs and small financial banks, they have to allocate nearly 75 percentage of credit to PSL. The banks can transfer the PSL certificates along them to meet the limit as well. See the idea behind the simple, this is to ensure the equitable financial growth and the institutional credits are reached to each and every sector irrespective of the profit that the banks gain while lending. Now, coming back to the news article, the RBI also focuses on MSME sector. The RBI has also announced measures to cushion MSME sectors through a resolution framework 2.0 for COVID related stressed assets for individuals, small business and MSMEs. See, the scheme does not abandon those who have availed the benefits in the first framework. For individual borrowers and small businesses who have already availed restructuring under resolution framework 1.0, the lenders have been permitted to use this window to modify such plans. The lenders can modify it at two levels, one by increasing the period of moratorium, two by extending the residual payment period to two years. And in case of small businesses and MSME, the working capital can be restructured again. Additionally, the RBI decided to conduct special three-year term repo operation of 10,000 crores at the repo rate for small finance bank. Yet again, this is another mechanism where RBI will inject money to specific institutions in exchange of government security paper for a specific period. Here, in this case, the small finance bank borrows money from the RBI for a period of three years. The small finance bank can lend up to Rs. 10 lakh per borrower of MSME, and this facility would be available till October 31. Besides this, the RBI has also made provisions for augmenting the state's finances. It has made some changes to overdraft. First, before discussing this, let us know what do you mean by overdraft? See, an overdraft allows an account holder to continue withdrawing money even when the account has no funds in it. So, basically, an overdraft means that the bank allows customers to borrow a set amount of money in spite of not having considerable balance in their account. There is interest on the loan and there is typically a fee per overdraft. Simply in this context, it means that the state can avail from the RBI beyond the account limit. And limits are set for overdraft borrowing and time intervals are also put in place to regulate the overdraft. This facility is frequently altered by RBI and the maximum number of days of overdraft in a quarter is being increased from 36 to 50 days. This is to help states to borrow from the RBI. That brings us to the end of the discussion on RBI measures. Let us move to the next topic. Let us move to the next article. Government to allot additional food grains. This news article talks about the ex post facto approval given for the allocation of additional food grains to beneficiaries under Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana for the month of May and June. And according to the government statement, cabinet has approved additionally five kilograms of food grains per person a month for nearly 80 crore beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act. So, in this context, let us see about Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana and also discuss about the National Food Security Act. See, as a part of economic response to COVID-19 in the month of March 2020, the Government of India announced Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan package. And this was initiated to help those who faced hardship due to the economic disruptions caused by the pandemic and the lockdown. This package comprises the implementation of Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana scheme. Under this scheme, additional food grains including rice and wheat are allotted from the central pool. See, these food grains are provided free of cost to all beneficiaries who have been covered under the targeted public distribution system. You have to note that the targeted public distribution system comprises of beneficiaries under Antyodhya Anna Yojana and priority households. Coming to the National Food Security Act of 2013. See, this act provides for food and nutritional security in the country by ensuring access to adequate quantity of quality foods at affordable prices. Under this act, you must know that 75% of rural population and 50% of urban population have been categorized as eligible households for food security. This is the area where UPSC mainly asks questions, kindly focus on knowing about the eligibility criteria for such schemes. Now, let us move to the article. So, about two-third of the population, therefore, is covered under the National Food Security Act received highly subsidized food grains. Note that one of the guiding principles of the act is its life cycle approach and additional to all such benefits. The National Food Security Act has special provisions for pregnant women and lactating mothers and in case of children, they are entitled to receive nutritious meal free of cost through a widespread network of integrated child development services center, which is also called as Anganwadi centers and also through schools under the mid-day meal scheme. Note that the act defines the joint responsibility of both central and the state governments. So, according to this, the center is responsible for allocating, transporting and providing central assistance to states or union territories in the delivery of food grains. Whereas, the states are responsible for effective implementation of the act, which includes identifying eligibility households, issuing ration cards to them and distribution of food grains to eligible households through fair-price shops, etc. Hence, these are the few welfare measures that are undertaken by the government of India at the time of pandemic in order to reduce the adverse impact it has on people especially living below the poverty line. Now, let us move to the next topic. Biden undecided on COVID related trips waiver. Our next discussion is going to be based on this news article. It talks about the United States stand on COVID related trips waiver. So, in the light, let us see what the article has got to tell us. The syllabus relevant for this news article is given below for your reference. In October 2020, India and South Africa submitted a proposal suggesting a waiver for all WTO members on certain provisions of the trips agreement. This is in relation to the prevention, containment or treatment of the COVID-19. Know that, trips is one of the most important comprehensive and multilateral agreement of WTO. This trips agreement addresses a wide range of intellectual property rights. See, IPR are the rights that are given to the people over the creation of their minds and these rights are given by society through the state as an incentive to produce and disseminate ideas and expression that will benefit society. So, this is an honor for innovation and creativity of an individual. Remember, the IPR are statutory rights that are enacted by the lawmaking authority in a country. See, this trips agreement plays a major role in resolving trade disputes over intellectual property and in assuring WTO members the freedom to achieve their domestic policy objectives. It also frames that the intellectual property system in terms of innovation, technology transfer and public welfare. The rights covered under the agreement includes copyrights, related rights, trademarks, geographical indicators, industrial layout decides, patents and also undisclosed information including trade secrets and test data. Now, let us see what is WTO? WTO is a trade organization and it is the only global international organization that deals with the rules of trade between nation. This organization came into being in 1995 and it is established in Geneva. Note that the WTO ensures smooth, predictable and free flow of trade. At present, there are around 160 members accounting for 98 percentage of the world's trade. Note that the top level decision making body of WTO is the ministerial conference which means usually every two years. Some of the important functions of WTO are given here for your reference. You can just have a glance of it. Coming back to the news article, India along with South Africa made a proposal to WTO to waive some provisions of the trips to facilitate the production of COVID-19 vaccine and therapeutics around the world. Though over 100 WTO member countries are supporting the proposals, some rich countries, some developed nations like US, European Union, UK, Japan and Switzerland are yet to show their approval in this regard and the move have been opposed by the drug makers. According to them, only a few countries have got the capacity to produce more vaccines even if they knew the formulas. Also, building new factories with the necessary technology to produce the vaccine may consume a longer period of time and as per the news article, United States have not yet decided whether to support this initiative or not. And the move is both favored and opposed within the United States. That is, though some people support temporary IP waiver, other view to be an extraordinarily broad and unnecessary initiative that will hamper American innovation and technology. So, the current status is that a fixed decision over the proposal is yet to be taken. This is because it is a complex issue and also WTO is a member driven organization that can only make decisions based on consensus. Now, let us see India's stat. When you take India, it argues in favor of the wave since it is the most efficient and equitable way to address vaccine shortages in poor countries and also India is expecting some rapid action as time play a crucial role in the regard because if the right measures aren't done on time, then it may lead to even larger damage. Let us see what India gains through this waiver. So, hopefully if the proposal is passed, it will be of a great help to India as it ensures equitable and speedy access to vaccine and will also help in slowing down and mutating the virus ability to infect new people. Remember that apart from saving human lives, the move will also give a comforting signal to boost the consumer confidence and will accelerate the recovery of global trade and world GDP. With this, we have come to the end of this discussion. So, in this article, we saw about TRIPS WTO and also India's proposal for a waiver and the issue related to it. With this information, let us move on to the next part of the news discussion. This article is based on the apex code verdict that called Maratha Reservation granted by Maharashtra State Government as unconstitutional. The article has covered two facets of the issue in which our discussion will cover the reservation issue comprehensively. The syllabus covered under this discussion given for your reference. To understand the case, you have to know that historically Indian society have been divided into various social groups. In such a scenario, some politically powerful social groups have been vociferously pushing for using the affirmative action that our constitution guarantees. On those lines, Maratha community predominantly located in Maharashtra has been demanding reservations for years. The State Government then granted the reservation at 16% in the year 2018. However, this decision was challenged with the High Court which upholded the law in June 2019 and however, this 16% reservation was not justifiable. However, it found that this 16% reservation was not justifiable. Hence, the High Court laid that the quota should not exceed 12% in terms of employment and percentage in terms of admissions. In either case, the cumulative reservation crossed 50% set mark set by the Indra Sauni case. Let us first know what is this case? See, the Indra Sauni versus Union of India and others is a landmark case also referred to as famously known Mandal case. The case said that the total reservation in education or public employment should not cross 50%. This is to ensure that the equity is balanced with merit. This is all the reservation for SC, ST and OBCs and it shall not cross the number of seats or vacancies above 50%. See, besides this, this case made many sweeping changes in reservation. For instance, it even ruled out reservation in promotions. It accepted caste as a reliable factor of backwardness and the judgment laid down the concept of creamy layer for qualitative exclusion. But our discussion today will only focus on ceiling limit laid by the judgment. Since the judgment in 1992, this case has been a yardstick for reservation limits. Going back to the article, the reservation given for Marathas seems to breach the limit that was set by the Indra Sauni case. The Apex Court heard a clutch of pleas challenging the Bombay High Court verdict, which had upheld the grant of quota to Marathas in admissions and government jobs in the state. Supreme Court had on September 9 last year stayed the implementation of legislation and referred to a larger branch, the batch of pleas challenging the validity of the law. Now the Apex Court has stuck down the Maratha law for two reasons. One, the reservation cannot be given over and above what was recommended by the Gaikwad Committee. The court has placed the merit on the fact that the committee would have evaluated the socio-economic backwardness as mandated under article 16. So, the Supreme Court has not found merit in the argument that the Maratha community is that backward which is required for reservation. Second, the Apex Court found it violative of article 14 and article 16 as it breached the 50 percentage limit as mandated by the Indra Sauni case. In saying so, the Supreme Court has refused to revisit the 50 percentage ceiling laid down in 1992. See the article has also discussed the other facet of the judgment. This is the state control over the reservation. Firstly, the courts refused to reconsider the 50 percent ceiling as repercussions on other state reservation policies that breach the 50 percentage limit. You must note that previously the states can include the communities as backward classes. But however, after the passing of 102nd Constitutional Amendment Act and the creation of National Commission of backward classes, this state power on the reservation list has been taken away. The center however gave reassurance that it can also include communities as backward classes. But if you see this judgment has ruled that there will only be a single list of socially and educationally backward classes with respect to each state and union territories. And this list will be notified by the President of India who is the head of the state. The states can only make recommendations for inclusion or exclusion with any substantial change to be made only by the parliament. As you can see, the powers have been taken away from the states as feared before. This should be set right because the first and the foremost merit of federalism is to take policy making closer to people and to be able to absorb the policy needs better. Taking away such a policy tool that have been the potential to correct the historic injustice needs exclusive intervention at the central level. Now, let us practice few questions. Question. Consider the following statement. Statement one, government companies are converted into private companies only through the outright sale of public sector companies. Statement two, privatization of PSEs by selling of part of equity of PSE to the public is known as disinvestments. Which of the statement given above is or are correct? Option A, one only. Option B, two only. Option C, both one and two. Option D, neither one nor two. Consider the first statement. It says the government companies are converted into private companies only through outright sale of PSE. You have to know that the government companies are converted not only by outright sale of public sector companies, but also by the withdrawal of the government from ownership and management of public sector companies. So, the statement one is incorrect. Now, going to the second statement, it says privatization of the PSE by selling of part of equity of PSE to the public is known as disinvestments. Yes, it is the right statement and note the point that disinvestment only leads to privatization. As said earlier, privatization is a transfer of management control from the government to the strategic partner. Hence, the answer for this question is option B, two only. Next question. Consider the following about the National Food Security Act NSFA 2013. Statement one, the eldest women of the household of age 18 years or above is mandated to be the head of household for the purpose of issuing of ration cards under the Act. Statement two, one of the guiding principle of the Act is its life cycle approach under which special provisions have been made for pregnant women and lactating mothers. Which of these statements given above is or are correct? Option A, one only. Option B, two only. Option C, both one and two. Option D, neither one nor two. With respect to the first statement, you have to know that as a step towards women empowerment, there is a provision in the Act which mandates that the eldest women of the household of age 18 or above is to be the head of household for the purpose of issuing ration cards. Therefore, the first statement is right. Now, let us move to the second statement. Coming to the second statement as seen earlier in the discussion, life cycle approach is one of the key guiding principles of the Act and under this special provisions, pregnant women and under this special provisions were made to the pregnant women and lactating mothers. Hence, the second statement is also right. The answer for this question is option C, both one and two. Now, let us discuss the previous year question asked in prelims 2011. Question, why is the government of India disinvesting its equity in the central public sector enterprises? Statement one, the government intends to use the revenue earned from the disinvestments mainly to pay back the external debt. Statement two, the government no longer intends to retain the management control of the central public sector enterprises. Which of the statements given above is or are correct? Option A, one only. Option B, two only. Option C, both one and two. Option D, neither one nor two. Now, consider the first statement. It says that the government intends to use the revenue earned from the disinvestments mainly to pay back the external debt. No, paying back external debt is not the main objective of disinvestments. The main objective is to put the national resources and assets to optimal use, particularly to release the productive potential of public sector enterprises. So, here the term mainly makes the statement as incorrect. Now, consider the second statement. The government no longer intends to retain the management control of the CPSEs. Statement two is also incorrect because not all disinvestments result in transfer of management control. You have to be clear that only privatization when more than 50 percent share of the organization is divested, it will lead to transfer of management control. Cases like strategic disinvestments only lead to that. So, the answer for this question is option D, either one nor two. These are few main questions that are given for your practice. You may write and post them in the comment section for peer review. With this, we have come to the end of today's news analysis session. And, if you like the video, kindly press like button, comment, share and subscribe to Shankariya's Academy's YouTube channel for daily updates.