 A very good evening aspirants. Welcome to the Hindu newspaper analysis brought to you by Shankarae's Academy for the date 27th of March 2022. So these are the list of news articles chosen for today's discussion. We have five different news articles. In the first discussion we will be seeing about India's export reaching 400 billion US dollars. We will be seeing some of the significance of this event and we shall also discuss about the factors that aided India in achieving this milestone. Like that we will see some of the important facts that are mentioned in the article. Next we will be seeing about POSCO Act in prelims perspective followed by that we will be seeing about a phenomenon called Aribada. Then we will be exclusively seeing about Supreme Court in the next article and finally we will end our discussion by discussing about hornbill species. So now without any delay let us move on to the first news article discussion. Today let us start our first discussion with this FAQ news article. See recently in our 24th March discussion we saw that India's exports for the financial year 2021-22 crossed 400 billion US dollars. This article is the extension of that news article. Today this news article mainly focuses on how significant the achievement is. Then it talks about our country's import and trade deficit situations and finally it talks about the factors that might risk Indian exports in the coming years. The author of this article has also suggested some of the solutions to aid in the sustained growth of India's exports. So this is the crux of the news article given here. In this discussion we will see all the points mentioned in the news article in detail. Before getting into the discussion I have highlighted the syllabus relevant to the article. You can just go through it. First let us start our discussion by looking at the significance of attainment of India's 400 billion US dollars export target. See only by understanding the significance of this achievement we can grasp the enormity of this achievement. Look at this table here. The data is from the RBI. From this table you can understand that even before the start of the pandemic India's exports was hovering around 300 billion US dollars to 330 billion US dollars. The situation further worsened during the pandemic year. See exports from India reached the lowly 313 billion US dollars. Compare this to the present scenario. On March 21, 2022 the value of India's export in the financial year 2021-22 hit 400 billion US dollars. In addition to this another 10 billion dollars worth of goods is planned to be shipped out by the end of the year on Thursday. So compared to the pandemic hit financial year 2020-2021 this is a 41 percentage growth. This 41 percentage growth in exports is a huge achievement even during normal times. But is the world normal now? No. The world has not recovered fully from the pandemic. The pandemic caused supply side disruption. Despite this disruption India's export grew. The next is the Ukraine-Russia war. See the war resulted in a shortage of shipping containers. This resulted in increasing freight rates. Even this did not affect India's export growth. And remember even in such testing times India not only achieved its target of 400 billion dollars exports. But also it is expected that India's export will grow to 410 billion US dollars by the end of the financial year. Now I hope you understand the significance of this enormous achievement. Knowing this now what are the factors that aided India in achieving this milestone? Actually there are numerous factors that helped India achieve this target. First is that globally post pandemic the prices of commodities mainly oil grew at a faster pace. This price rise resulted in India's export of petroleum products grow by 141 percentage compared to last year. See in India's export basket petroleum products accounted for 8.8 percentage share. And this 8.8 percentage share is the largest contributor in India's export basket. So as the global price of petrol increased India's earning from export of petroleum products also increased. This is the first reason that helped India achieve its export targets. Second factor that helped India achieve this incredible feat is the performance of various sectors like engineering sector, chemicals, cotton yarn, hand-kneum products and apparel industry. See in this to be specific the engineering sector performed extremely well. Engineering exports from India crossed 100 billion US dollars for the first time. This is a 46.5 percentage increase. See along with these factors even the pandemic to some extent helped Indian exports. In the pre-pandemic period the world economy was extremely dependent on China. During the pandemic the China based supply chain got disrupted. So the countries all over the world were looking to diversify their supply chain and were planning to reduce their dependence on China. India fitted the profile to replace China. This also helped India's exports. For example shipments to the US from India increased by 47 percentage. See China and Australia have been locking horns for sometimes. This resulted in Australia planning to move away from China. This also helped Indian exports. For example Indian exports to Australia increased by 94 percentage this year. So these are the factors that helped India's exports. Now let us see the present scenario of India's import and trade deficit. See India's import bill is expected to grow. In the last financial year India imported 393 billion US dollars worth of goods. It is expected that this year's import figures will be 200 billion US dollars above last year's figures. That is for this year India's import figure is expected to breach 593 billion US dollars. This is the present import scenario. Now let us look at the trade deficit figures. See in the financial year 2020 and 2021 India's trade deficit lowered to 1 or 2 billion US dollars. But this year India's trade deficit despite the export growth is expected to reach 190 billion US dollars. With an increasing trade deficit our current account deficit is also expected to increase. Although this is a cause for concern. Our RBI governor Mr. Shakti Kanta Das is of the opinion that there is no need to panic. He said that India has surplus forex reserves. India presently has 619 billion US dollars in reserves. Our RBI governor said our forex reserves can cover 12 months of imports. Compare this to the year 1991 when India faced the balance of payments crisis. In 1991 India had forex totaling just 1.3 billion US dollars. This could cover only the essential imports for just 3 weeks. So the increasing trade deficit is not a cause of worry due to enormous forest reserves. So this is all about India's current import and trade deficit scenario. Now let us see some risk factors that the Indian economy might face moving forward. First is increasing energy imports for India. See as you all know Ukraine Russia has pushed up the price of crude oil. As India imports around 80% of its petroleum needs it is cause of worry. See along with this as the pandemic is nearing its end so our economy is fast recovering. With economic recovery our energy needs will increase. This will further increase our import bill and in turn our trade deficit. Second is in terms of edible oil. See India imports most of its edible oil also and sunflower oil is one of the major edible oils. The countries presently at war that is Ukraine and Russia accounts for 80% of world sunflower oil production. So the war will push the price of sunflower oil also. Since India imports sunflower oil the price rise will affect India's import bill. Finally post pandemic the central banks of developing countries are slowly tightening their monetary stance. This might result in foreign investors moving away from emerging markets like India. This in turn will reduce the supply of dollars in the Indian economy. This will result in the rupee losing its value that is the rupee will depreciate. In addition to this the increasing trade deficit and current account deficit will put further pressure on the rupee. So as the rupee depreciates India's import bill will increase further. But there is some positive to this as the rupee depreciates India's exports will receive some boost. So these are some risk factors that the Indian economy might face moving forward. Having seen this now let us see some solutions mentioned by the author of this article. See first is the fast conclusion of FTA negotiations. See currently India is negotiating a free trade agreement with countries like US, Australia and Canada. When the FTAs are concluded faster India will have access to the market of these large developed countries. This will help India's export to these countries as well. Second is the foreign trade policy for 2015-20 need to be revised. See presently this policy has been given an extension up to first few months of financial year 2022-23. The revision of this policy is long overdue according to the author. If the policy is revised reflecting our present times it will be greatly helpful for our exports. See these measures can help India shield itself from the current European crisis and continue its growth path. So these are all the important points that you have to make note of from the news article discussion. Firstly we discussed about the significance of attainment of India's 4 billion US dollars export target. Then we saw about the factors that aided India in achieving this milestone. Thirdly we saw about the factors that helped India's exports and finally we saw some of the suggestions. Then we saw about some risk factors that Indian economy might face moving forward. And finally we ended our discussion by discussing about some of the points or solutions mentioned by the author of this article. So these learnt points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Look at this news article. This news article mentions 4% were held under the POCSO Act for assaulting a girl. That is all about the news article. Let us take this news article as an opportunity and revise some of the important provisions about POCSO Act. See this act has been enacted to protect the children from offenses of sexual assault, sexual harassment and pornography. And it also provides for the establishment of special codes for trial of such offenses and related matters and incidences. Note that the act is gender neutral and it aims to ensure the healthy physical, emotional, intellectual and social development of the child or any person below 18 years of age. Note that the act defines different forms of sexual abuse including penetrative and non-penetrative assault as well as sexual harassment and pornography. The act further deems sexual assault to be aggravated under certain circumstances such as when the abused child is mentally ill or when the abuse is committed by a person in a position of trust or authority. Now coming to the punishment under this act. See penetrative sexual assault on a child can lead to an imprisonment for not less than 10 years and may exceed even up to life imprisonment and fine. As you can see in the image, whoever commits penetrative sexual assault on a child below 16 years of age shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than 20 years and may extend to life imprisonment or the imprisonment for the reminder of natural life of that person and shall also be liable to fine. Similarly look here the act says that use of child for pornographic purposes can lead to imprisonment for not less than 5 years and fine and in case of subsequent conviction the person may be imprisoned up to 7 years along with fine. See in order to prevent the misuse of the law punishment has been provided for making false complaints or providing false information with malicious intent. Usually such punishment has been kept relatively light like 6 months so as to encourage reporting but in case the complaint is made against a child the punishment is higher up to 1 year. Note that the act provides for the establishment of special courts for the trial of offenses under the act and it incorporates child friendly procedures for reporting, recording of evidence, investigation and trial of offenses. For instances the statement of the child can be recorded at the residence of the child or at the place of his or her choice preferably by a woman police officer not below the rank of sub inspector. Likewise the police officer should not be in uniform while recording the statement of the child. So these are all some of the important points about POXO Act. So in this discussion we saw about some of the important provisions of POXO Act. With these details in memory let us move on to the next news article discussion. Take a look at this news article. It states that Gahirmata's beach witnessed an aribada about 2.45 lakh olive readily sea turtles they crawled ashore on the Nasi to beach of the Gahirmata marine sanctuary along the Odisha coast for laying eggs. It marked one of the largest opening day arrivals of turtles at the site. So this is the crux of the news article given here. So in this context let us discuss about aribada in prelims perspective. Since it is frequently appearing in news we might expect a question from UPSC in this topic. So just pay attention to the news article discussion. See as you know olive readily turtles are the smallest and most abundant of all sea turtles found in the world. It inhibits warm waters of Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans. See one of the notable feature of this creature is that these turtles along with their cousins. Here I am talking about the Kims readily turtle. They are best known for their unique mass nesting called aribada. So what is aribada? It is nothing but a unique mass nesting. What actually happens is thousands of females they come together on the same beach to lay eggs. So it is a unique phenomenon where the philagic species of olive readily turtles they try to increase the chance of survival of their offspring. Now why do they do this? See the turtle they lay more eggs at one place at the same time. That is at a single time thousands of female turtles they come together on the same beach to lay eggs on the same time. Now this is done to supersede the conception of predators and increase the chances of survival of their offspring. And this in turn increases the survival rate of offspring. Now just for your information aribada is predominantly concentrated at Rushikulia by the mouth of the river Devi and Kahirmata beaches of Odisha. Note that a single turtle can lay over 1010 to 1040 eggs and reports suggest that out of every 1000 hatchlings that enter the sea only one manage to reach full adulthood. So this is the reason why they mass nest also. And this extreme low rate of survival has therefore put them under the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List. Here you can see that the olive readily dick pits on the beaches using their hind flaps to lay eggs which are then covered with sand. Now after laying eggs hatchlings they crawl out of these eggs after an incubation period of 52 to 58 days and head straight for the sea with the raising sun as their lead. Now having seen about aribada now we will discuss few points about olive readily turtles. See knowing about these pieces is also very important. It might help you in eliminating one or two options in the preliminary examination. As I already said the olive readily turtles are the smallest and most abundant of all sea turtles seen in the world. These turtles are carnivores and they get their name from their olive coloured carapace. So because of the colour of their body they got their name. As they are carnivores they mainly feed on jellyfish, shrimp, snails, crab and a variety of fishes and their eggs. See these turtles they spend their entire lives in the ocean and migrate thousands of kilometres between feeding and mating grounds in the course of a year. Now specifically talking about the threats faced by this species, olive readily's are threatened by an ever increasing debris of plastic, fishing nets, discarded nets, polythene and other garbage dumped by fishing workers. Apart from this other threats includes harvesting for skin and meat, accidental capture and marine pollution. And also make note of this, olive readily turtles they are protected under schedule 1 of wildlife protection act 1972. It is listed as vulnerable in IUCN Red List. It is also protected under appendix 1 of sites. So in this news article discussion we saw what is this aribada phenomenon. We saw why this phenomenon is adopted by the species. Then we saw some of the facts about olive readily turtles. So with these learnt points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Take a look at this news article. This news article discusses about short tenures of women judges in Supreme Court. It states that 11 women judges have adorned the Supreme Court so far but a majority of them have a tenure of less than 5 years. Only Justice Roma Pal has completed a tenure of a little over 6 years between January 2000 and June 2006. So citing this, Steve Justice of India, N.V. Ramana said that the appointment of women judges should not be reduced to mere symbolic gesture. He further said that the court would definitely benefit from the rich experience and the nuanced understanding of the law women judges bring to the table. Short tenure of office as judge in the Supreme Court will reduce the chance of being part of a constitution bench which decide important questions of law. And short tenures also mean not being part of or less time as member of the powerful Supreme Court Collegium. In high courts women judges constitute 11.5% in the Supreme Court. There are 4 women justices out of the sitting 33 making it just 12% and out of 1.7 million advocates only 15% or women. So there is a huge absence of women professionals in law and justice. So this is the cracks of the news article given here. In the background we will discuss about some of the important facts about Supreme Court in prelims perspective. See note that article 124 to 147 in part 5 of constitution deal with organization, independence, jurisdiction, power and procedure and so on of the Supreme Court. Here you have to make note of this point. The judges of the Supreme Court are appointed by the President. The Chief Justice is appointed by the President after consultation with such judges of the Supreme Court and high courts as he deems necessary. Similarly the other judges are appointed by President after consultation with the Chief Justice and such other judges of the Supreme Court and high court as he deems necessary. The consultation with the Chief Justice is obligatory in the case of appointment of a judge other than Chief Justice. Now we will see about the qualification of the judges. See a person to be appointed as a judge of Supreme Court should have the following qualifications which I am going to mention. Firstly he should be citizen of India. Secondly he should have been a judge of high court in session for 5 years. Thirdly he should have been an advocate of high court or high court in session for 10 years. Or the person should be a distinguished jurist in the opinion of the President. So from what all I said it is clear that the constitution has not prescribed a minimum age for appointment as a judge of the Supreme Court. Also the constitution has not fixed the tenure of a judge of the Supreme Court as well. However it makes the following three provisions in this regard. Firstly a Supreme Court judge holds office until he attains the age of 65 years and any question regarding his age is to be determined by such authority and in such manner as provided by parliament. Secondly he can resign his office by writing to the President. And thirdly he can be removed from his office by the President on the recommendation of the parliament. Make note of all these points very very important. Now with respect to Supreme Court you have to know about the appointments of the acting judge and the ad hoc judges. See the President can appoint a judge of the Supreme Court as the acting Chief Justice of India. When the office of Chief Justice of India is vacant or the Chief Justice of India is temporarily absent or the Chief Justice of India is unable to perform the duties of his office. And regarding ad hoc judges see when there is a lack of quorum of permanent judges to hold or continue initiation of the Supreme Court the Chief Justice of India can appoint a judge of a high court as an ad hoc judge of the Supreme Court for a temporary period. He can do so only after consulting with the Chief Justice of the High Court concerned and with the previous consent of the President. So that's all about the news article. Now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now look at this article and the pictures given here. As you can see this article is regarding the Hornbill nest adoption program of Arnachal Pradesh. See the program was led by hunter turned protectors from the Nishi tribe and they celebrate a decade of successful conservation. And today we are not going to discuss in detail about this adaptation program but instead we will cover the Hornbill and Great Indian Hornbill in prelims perspective. First let us see some of the important facts about Hornbills. See Hornbills are tropical and subtropical birds named for their unusual large curved builds. They belong to the family Bikyurod today. This family consists of approximately 60 species of old world tropical birds. Note that India is home to 9 species of Hornbill. The North Eastern region has the highest diversity of Hornbill species within India and the 9 species of Hornbills which has India's their home includes the Great Hornbill, Rufus Nect Hornbill, Wrethad Hornbill, Narkodam Hornbill, Malabar Pied Hornbill, Oriental Pied Hornbill, White Throated Brown Hornbill, Malabar Grey Hornbill and the Indian Grey Hornbill. See UPAC might ask a species name and they might ask whether they belong to India or not. So if such a question rises you can answer those question with these facts. Now out of these the Great Hornbill is the largest species in the country. Note that the Hornbill festival celebrated in Naha land is named after this bird. It is the most admired bird for the Naha's. Also note that the Great Hornbill is the state bird of a natural predation Kerala. Now having a brief idea about Hornbills now we shall discuss some of the important points about Great Hornbill. See as I said the Great Hornbill also known as Greater Indian Hornbill is the largest member of the Hornbill family. It is found in the Evergreen forest of Kerala. Also they are distributed in a range from western India through Indochina, south of Malaya and through Sumatra. See these Hornbills are found on sea level up to 5000 feet above ground. They grow to a length of 4.5 feet. As you can see in the images the body is covered with black feathers and the wing tips have a ban of white feathers. Now one distinct mark of the Hornbill is their bright yellow and black cask on top of its massive bill. Looks like a helmet like head and a solid ivory. See the cask is hollow with little functions although they are believed to be the result of sexual selection. Male Hornbills have been known to indulge in aerial cask, butting flights. Female are smaller than the males and have blue instead of red eyes. They usually have short legs but have broad feet. Now talking about the conception pattern of Indian Hornbills. See Indian Hornbills are mainly fruit eaters but also actively hunt and eat insects, lizards, snakes and even nestling birds. They also like to eat various types of berries. Hornbills swallow most of their food whole instead of breaking it down first. After they consume the food they will regurgitate what they cannot digest such as bones and pits. See Indian Hornbills they are rare and threatened with extinction. These birds are hunted in India for food and medicine. In Kerala the main threat is the destruction of their habitat. Hornbills are hunted for their cask which is nothing but the upper beak and feathers for adorning head gear. See due to ongoing habitat loss and hunting in some areas the great hornbill is evaluated as vulnerable in the IUCN threat list of threat and species. It is listed on appendix 1 of sites and remember it is protected at the highest level under schedule 1 of wildlife protection act 1972. So that's all about the news article. In this news article discussion we specifically saw about hornbills then we saw some of the important points about Indian hornbills. So with this we came to the end of the news article discussion. Now let us move on to the next part of the news article discussion which is nothing but the preliminary practice questions. Now look at this first question. This question is about POSCO Act. Consider the following statements with respect to POSCO Act. In statement 1 the POSCO Act 2012 defines a child as any person below the age of 16 years. Statement 2 the POSCO Act does not provide for any period of limitation for reporting the child sexual offenses. And statement 3 any person in charge of an institution who fails to report commission of a sexual offense relating to a coordinate is liable to be punished. Which of the statements given above is or or correct? So you have to choose the correct statement in this question. Option A 1 only option B 2 and 3 option C 1 and 3 and option D none of these. See statement 1 is incorrect because POSCO Act defines a child as any person below the age of 18 years. It defines different forms of sexual offenses including penetrative and non-penetrative assault and even sexual harassment and pornography. We saw this in the news article discussion itself right. So the first statement is incorrect. Now moving on to the second statement. Second statement is correct because typically the trauma that child sexual abuse victims endure prevents them from voicing their complaints immediately. So recognizing this in 2008 the union ministry of law and justice clarified that there is no time or age bar for reporting sexual offenses under the POSCO Act. Consequently a victim can report an offense at any time even a number of years after the abuse has been committed. So statement 2 is also correct. Now coming to statement 3 statement 3 is also correct. See that not only punishes the perpetrator of sexual abuse but also penalizes those who have failed to report the offense with either imprisonment or fine or both. Any person in charge of a company or institution who failed to report the commission of sexual offense relating to subordinate under their control is liable to be punished with imprisonment under fine under section 21 of the Act. So the correct answer for the question is option B2131 because the question has for correct statement. Now moving on to the second question. This question is about Aribada. Statement 1 unique mass listing called Aribada is exclusive to olive redly turtles. Statement 2 the IUCN status of olive redly turtle is endangered. Which of the statements given above is or or correct? Option A1 only, option B2 only, option C both 1 and 2 and option D neither 1 nor 2. See the correct answer for the question is option D neither 1 nor 2 because both statements are incorrect. See both olive redly turtle and Kim's redly turtle are best known for their unique mass listing called Aribada. It is not exclusive to olive redly turtles. So the first statement is incorrect. Now moving on to the second statement. Second statement is also incorrect because this turtle is listed as vulnerable in IUCN red list. Now moving on to the third question. This question is about the judges of Supreme Court. Consider the following statements with reference to judges of Supreme Court. Statement 1 Chief Justice of India can appoint a judge of High Court as an ad hoc judge of the Supreme Court. Statement 2 President can appoint a judge of the Supreme Court as an acting Chief Justice of India. Which of the above statements is or or correct? Option A1 only, option B2 only, option C both 1 and 2 and option D neither 1 nor 2. See the correct answer for this question is option C both 1 and 2 because both statements given here are correct. See in our discussion itself, we saw that the President can appoint a judge of the Supreme Court as an acting Chief Justice of India. Right? This can be done when the Office of Chief Justice of India is vacant or temporarily absent or unable to perform the duties of his office. And regarding ad hoc judges, when there is a lack of quorum of the permanent judges to hold or continue initiation of the Supreme Court, the Chief Justice of India can appoint a judge of a High Court as an ad hoc judge of the Supreme Court for a temporary period. So the correct answer for the question is option C both 1 and 2. Now moving on to the last question of this news article discussion. This question is about Great Indian Hornbill. Consider the following statements with reference to Great Indian Hornbill. Statement 1 Great Hornbill is the largest species of hornbill in the country. Statement 2 It is a state bird of Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. Which of the statements given above is or are correct? Option A 1 1 Lee, option B 2 1 Lee, option C both 1 and 2 and option D neither 1 nor 2. See the correct answer for the question is option A 1 1 Lee. See India is home to 9 species of hornbill. We saw the names of those 9 species in the news article discussion. Right? The North, East and region has the highest diversity of hornbill species within India. Out of these 9 species, the Great Hornbill is the largest species in the country. So statement 1 is correct here. And moving on to the second statement. Statement 2 is incorrect because Great Hornbill is the state bird of Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. It is not Andhra Pradesh. So the correct answer for the question is option A 1 1 Lee. Today we have one practice mains question. Just go through the question, collect the points and make sure you write an answer for this question. You can even type the answer and post it in the comment section for peer review. With this we came to the end of the news article discussion. If you like the video, like, comment and share. And do subscribe to Shankara IS Academy YouTube channel. Thank you.