 Good evening aspirants, welcome to the Hindu news analysis by Shankara IS Academy for the date 21st July 2019. The list of articles that has been chosen for today's analysis along with the page numbers of Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi and Tiruvannantapuram editions are provided here. The link for the handwritten notes in the PDF format and the time stamping for the given articles is provided in the description box below and for the benefit of smartphone users the time stamping is also provided in the comment section. Let us move on to the first article analysis. This discussion is based on the parliamentary committees. The areas in the prelims and main syllabus that can be linked to the discussion is highlighted here. The news article states that 11 bills which have been introduced in the ongoing session of parliament have been passed. The author of this article calls this action as highly productive session after many years. But these bills have been passed without the scrutiny by parliamentary standing committees. When we say scrutiny, it means critical observation or examination. So the author is saying these bills were not critically observed or examined by a parliamentary committee. So what is this parliamentary committee? If we consider parliament, the work done by the parliament is varied or diverse and they are complex in nature. The major functions of the parliament are representation of citizens, lawmaking, oversight of the executive and scrutiny of the budget, etc. These works are also considerable in volume. That is the work is large in size, it is large in amount or it is large in extent also. But the time which is available to do this work is limited. Now here oversight of the executive means supervising the executives. Executives consist of the president, the vice president, the prime minister and the council of ministers. Now through its oversight function, the parliament holds the government accountable and ensures that policies are efficient and the policies are in line with the needs of the citizens. In addition, we can say that parliamentary oversight is essential to prevent arbitrary and unconventional action by the government. So the parliament has to give close consideration to all the legislative and other matters that come up before it. And because of lack of time, parliament alone cannot do it. Therefore, a good amount of parliament's business is transacted in the committees of the house. These committees are also known as parliamentary committees. These committees are an instrument of parliament which are present for its effective functioning. And also we can say parliamentary committee means a committee which is appointed or elected by the house or nominated by the speaker. The parliamentary committee works under the direction of the speaker and it presents its report to the house or to the speaker. Now both the houses of the parliament have a similar committee structure but just with few exceptions. The appointment of the committee and its terms of office, committee's functions and the procedure of conducting its business are also more or less similar in both the houses. The committees are regulated as per the rules made by the two houses under article 118 clause one of the constitution. Article 118 clause one states that each house of parliament may make rules for regulating its procedure and the conduct of its business. Also the parliamentary committees draw their authority from article 105 which is about the powers, privileges and immunities of parliament and its members. Now based on the nature of parliamentary committees, they can be divided into two kinds. One is standing committees and second is ad hoc committees. Standing committees are permanent and regular committees. They are constituted from time to time in persons or implementation of the provisions of an act of parliament or they are constituted based on rules of procedures and conduct of business in Lok Sabha. The work of these standing committees is of continuous nature. So we can say that these standing committees are elected or appointed every year or appointed periodically and their work goes on more or less on a continuous basis. Now also know that the financial committees, departmentally related standing committees or DRSCs and some other committees come under the category of standing committees. Among the standing committees there are three financial committees. They are committees on estimates, committees on public accounts and committees on public undertakings. These financial committees constitute a distinct group as they keep an unremitting or constant vigil over the government expenditure and government's performance. Now in this you should also know that the members of the Rajya Sabha are associated with the committees on public accounts and public undertakings. But the members of the committee on estimates are entirely from Lok Sabha. Now next kind is the ad hoc committees. The word ad hoc literally means when necessary or when needed. So in the same line the ad hoc committees are appointed when a need arises which means they are appointed for a specific purpose. They are constituted from time to time to inquire into specific subjects and to report on these specific subjects. Also note that the ad hoc committees cease to exist when they finish the task which was assigned to them. And they also cease to exist after submitting a report based on the assigned work. One another thing which you should know is about the principal ad hoc committees. The principal ad hoc committees are the select and joint committees on bills. They are appointed to consider and report on a particular bill. These select and joint committees on bills are distinguishable from the other ad hoc committees since they are concerned with bills and the procedure to be followed by them is laid down or is mentioned in the rules of procedure and conduct of business of Lok Sabha and it is also mentioned in the rules of procedure and conduct of business of Rajasabha. Further the procedure that is to be followed is also mentioned in the directions by the speaker of Lok Sabha or the directions by the chairman of Rajasabha. But if you see after the formation of the 17th Lok Sabha the parliamentary standing committees have not been constituted. So as a result of this the bills were passed without being scrutinized by the committee. Rather the bills were discussed in the parliament itself over durations ranging between 2 hours to 5 hours. So you may think without the parliamentary committees the bills were passed. So why do we need to have parliamentary committees? This is because the committees are platforms for small discussion on a proposed law. The assumption here is that the smaller group of lawmakers can have more open, intensive and better informed discussions. The smaller group of lawmakers is assembled on the basis of proportional strength of the individual parties and also on the basis of interests and expertise of individual lawmakers. These committee meetings are considered as closed door and members of these committees are not bound by party whips. So this allows them independence so that they can have more meaningful exchange of views. But this cannot be done in a discussion that happens in a full and open houses. That is when the discussion is carried out in the Lok Sabha or in the Rajasabha. And then if you note there is a disruptive change in technology and there is expansion of trade, commerce and there is expansion of economy which provides new policy challenges. These policy challenges require a constant reform of legal and institutional structures. So this means when lawmaking gets increasingly complex the lawmakers cannot infinitely expand their knowledge into ever expanding areas of human activities. To understand this let us take one example. We live in an era of digital connectivity. So the laws and regulations that are required to govern a digital society cannot be made without highly specialized knowledge and it cannot be made without political awareness. See we know that the members of parliament may have great awareness but they would require the assistance of experts in dealing with special situations like digital connectivity. Now through committees such expertise is drawn into lawmaking. Now if you see there are two key mechanisms of parliamentary oversight which we discussed earlier. One is questions and debates on the floor of the house and second one is the parliamentary committees which scrutinize government policies. So the executive accountability to the legislature is enforced through questions in parliament also but the department standing committees go one step further. This is because the committee is here from senior officials of the government in a closed setting. The closed setting allows for more detailed discussions and this mechanism also enables parliamentarians to understand the executive process closely. That is why a parliamentary committee is important. But without forming the committees bills were passed in the 17th Lok Sabha. Here the whole purpose of having a parliamentary committee is defeated. That is why the author has named the article as wither house panels. Here panel refers to the parliamentary committees. So the title means what is the likely future of parliamentary committees of the house. Now to know the likely future of parliamentary committees we have to just wait and see and we have to see what happens in the future. With this we have come to the end of this discussion moving on to the next article discussion which is about the role of reforestation. The areas in the prelims and main syllabus that can be linked to the discussion is highlighted here. This article gives insight into the role of reforestation in mitigating or reducing the effects of global warming. Now first know that global warming can be defined as the long term growth of average temperature of earth. It is largely caused by industrial development and consumer demands. Now this global warming has caused havoc across the world. Its manifestations or reflection can be seen in rising temperature. It can be seen in unseasonal rains and it can be seen in frequent floods that is ravaging and devastating the northeastern India and also the southern China now and also the global warming is causing unpredictable monsoon. Now the major solution to mitigate or reduce climate change is to reduce the levels of greenhouse gas especially the carbon dioxide which is one of the leading cause for warming of earth. Remember that the Paris climate change agreement which was signed in 2016 is a step in this direction. Now the most important and simplest way to mitigate climate change is by afforestation and by reforestation. Reforestation refers to planting trees on land that was previously forest whereas afforestation refers to planting trees on patches of land which were not previously covered in forest. So this reforestation and afforestation is planting plants and trees and increasing the forest coverage. We know that trees absorb carbon dioxide. They absorb carbon dioxide from air and they provide oxygen for us to breathe but still we kill them. This killing is done by deforestation which has been going on for decades and this contributes to global warming. The article states that the total surface area of earth is 52 billion hectares and 31% of it has been forest cover but the forest cover is reducing rapidly due to deforestation. The worst affected places are the Amazon rainforests in Peru and Bolivia and forests in Mexico and Russia. If you see the food and agriculture organization that is FAO defines forest as a land of at least 0.5 hectares that is covered by at least 10% tree cover and that land should be without any agricultural activity or human settlement. According to an ecological study if we exclude existing trees, agricultural lands and urban areas there is still room for an extra 0.9 billion hectares of forest. This shows a great potential to mitigate climate change through increasing global forest. It is said that more than 50% of this restoration is possible in Russia, USA, China, Canada, Australia and Brazil. If you see few of these countries such as USA, China etc are the largest producer of greenhouse gases. So they should first do this restoration. Even if you consider India, a report by the Forest Survey of India has also shown some positive data. First you know that Forest Survey of India is a national organization under the Union Ministry of Environment and Forest. It is responsible for assessment and monitoring of the forest resources of the country regularly. The Forest Survey of India releases the India State of Forest report. In one of its report it is stated that in India there is around 7.8273 square kilometer land area and among this 21.54% is tree cover. And between 2015 and 2018 further 6778 square kilometer has been added to it. Apart from the efforts of government efforts by certain NGOs and individuals also contributed to this increase. Now some other facts which has been mentioned in the report are Madhya Pradesh has the largest forest cover which is followed by Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Arunachal Pradesh. Then if we consider the least forest cover it is in the states of Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan. Then if we consider the states which has improved their forest cover these states include Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Kerala and Odisha. Now we are talking about reforestation and forestation so much. So what is the proof that this reforestation can happen? For this the article mentions one example. We can say it is one of the most outstanding example of reforestation. The example is of the country Philippines. In the country Philippines almost 65% of its land area was forest in the year 1900. But the large scale commercial reforestation resulted in forest cover dropping to 21% by the year 1987. But if you see in 2010 the forest cover has again increased to 26%. This was possible with a committed government effort and continuous reforestation. Along with the effort from the government the Philippine government also introduced a remarkable program which makes it mandatory for each elementary, high school and college students to plant 10 trees before graduating. The appropriate locations to plant trees were advised to these students by the government. This experience has shown that there is a need to utilize the educational system as an avenue for propagating ethical and sustainable use of natural resources among youth. This will ensure the civilization of the citizens who are socially responsible and conscious about environment. Now if you take India, in India we recently introduced the draft national educational policy of 2019. So we can also think about adding such environment friendly provisions in the draft education policy. This will help to build an environment conscious generation. With this we have come to the end of this article discussion. The displayed practice question will be discussed in the last. Moving on to the next article discussion which is about blockchain. Now let us first understand what is blockchain? In simple terms blockchain is a database which is shared across a network of computers. One can add data to it but they cannot change the previous data that is within it. It is a platform that allows to design a secure way to record transactions and to circulate those transactions among signatories or other target groups within the internet connection. Its core is a public ledger which cannot be arbitrarily manipulated. The public ledger is nothing but the storage system. Every block in the blockchain is linked to a unique digital signature of the participants who are carrying out the transactions. Blockchain aims to complete a secure transaction without the help of a central authority like bank in the case of financial transactions. When a transaction is initiated it must be validated that is it must be checked as genuine by the peer to peer network. Peer is a computer system on the network. Now each peer is considered equal and they are commonly referred to as nodes. A peer makes a portion of computing resources directly available to other participants without the need for any central coordination by servers or stable hosts. The computing resources mentioned here is disk storage, processing power or network bandwidth. These are made available to the participants. The blockchain uses complex algorithms to ensure the genuineness. This network runs after constant checks to ensure the authenticity of the database. This blockchain achieves consensus among the distributed nodes. This consensus allows the transfer of digital goods without the need for centralized authorization of the transactions as we saw earlier. Now if we compare blockchain to the early days of internet, internet was not a crying need that is it was not the most important need of humanity. But after its introduction internet completely changed the telecommunications industry and it almost changed every aspect of human life. This may be the case of blockchain also. So every block in a blockchain is a record of transactions. As transactions increases associated information increases and the length of blockchain also increases. So these blocks uses hashing technology to make the history of every transaction has unalterable. Here hashing is a form of cryptographic security that is very hard to be decrypted. Cryptography is nothing but it is a art of protecting information by encrypting it into an unreadable format which can be decrypted only by a person who is using a virtual key. Now let us see how this blockchain works. First a transaction is initiated. Then all the details of the transactions are recorded. After this a transaction request is sent to a peer to peer network of computers to ensure its validity. As we saw here every computer is in this network is called as node. The network of nodes verifies the transaction if it is genuine or not. After this verification the transaction is validated. And the smallest change made to the original data will generate a new hash in this. A hash in blockchain is a function that converts the input into an encrypted or unreadable form. If someone tries to manipulate the record in a block a new hash would be created and the chain would break. So this means we cannot change the data after the transaction is initiated. Then once the records are validated it gets add to a block which contains other records. Each block has a unique identifier which is known as a hash code. Here a hash code is a string of numbers and letters of digital information. Then the block becomes a part of a chain which has other blocks. A block along with its code has the hash code of the previous block. The blocks are ordered according to their hash codes. Now this is the end of the transaction and this is how the blockchain works. Now what is the application and the benefits of this blockchain? Blockchain claims to solve the problem of trust by eliminating the role of a central authority in transactions. The peer to peer network which verifies the transaction in a blockchain does not save personal data. So it says that we can trust the blockchain. Then the next application or benefit is that a blockchain has the aura or atmosphere of transparency. It is a public ledger system which records and validates each and every transaction that is made which makes it secure, reliable and transparent. Then each transaction is authorized by the network. So manipulation of data creates a new hash which causes the chain to break. Hence blockchain is claimed to be immutable that is it becomes unchangeable. Then if you see one of the application of blockchain is that in 2019 Facebook announced a blockchain backed digital currency called as Libra. Even other tech giants are testing blockchain technology as a replacement for paper based and manual transaction in the areas of trade, finance, foreign exchange etc. Then Ethereum which is a blockchain based startup focuses on decentralization of online information. They claim that the users will control their personal data instead of some servers. Then blockchain technology can provide an unhackable digital vote counting system which can secure polling booths from capturing and it will secure the voters interest. Then blockchain technology is used in digital cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum etc. So just now we saw the applications and benefits of this blockchain. So what are the challenges which are associated with it? The first challenge is blockchain technology is still not fully understood. So it will take some time to establish reliability in people's mind. Then the validation of all transactions which we saw earlier is really energy intensive. That means it requires more energy. So hence huge electricity is required. Then one another challenge is that if an individual loses the private key the funds secured and associated information are lost forever. And also huge number of transactions has to be validated. So transaction speed and time might become an issue. Then as we saw blockchain uses mathematical algorithms to validate transactions. But this mathematical algorithms is vulnerable to hacking. So this is also one of the challenge. Now finally let us see what is the standard of government of India with respect to blockchain. If you see in 2018 RBI has banned the transactions in cryptocurrencies in India. Then if you see the Ministry of Commerce has launched a blockchain based coffee e-market place in 2019. It is expected to integrate the coffee farmers with the market and realize a fair price by eliminating the intermediaries between coffee growers and buyers. Here you can see where once the government has banned cryptocurrencies and in the other the government is using blockchain technology. With this we have come to the end of this article discussion. The displayed practice question will be discussed in the last session. Moving on to the next article discussion which is based on conservation of tigers. The syllabus with which this news article can be linked has been highlighted here for your reference. The news article states that in 2012 an agreement was signed between the National Tiger Conservation Authority and the state of Madhya Pradesh to constitute a special tiger protection force. It has been seven years since the agreement was signed and till date the state government has not taken any initiative to constitute a special tiger protection force. According to an agreement which was signed between the National Tiger Conservation Authority and the Chief Wildlife Warden of Madhya Pradesh and Field Directors of Bandhavgarh, Kanha and Pench Tiger Reserves, on 2012 the State Forest Department of Madhya Pradesh was supposed to raise a special force and arm them with weapons and deploy them in their respective tiger reserves within two years of the agreement but it has not been done yet. The news article also mentions that Madhya Pradesh has registered the most number of tiger deaths due to poaching since 2012. Between the years 2012 and 2018 if you see a total number of 141 tiger have died due to natural and unnatural causes. Among these 30 tiger deaths have been reported due to poaching only and also in this year that is in 2019 14 tiger deaths have been reported till now in Madhya Pradesh and one case was due to poaching. The news article mentions that Madhya Pradesh was once famously called as a tiger state because it had the largest population of tigers but Karnataka overtook Madhya Pradesh in the year 2010 as the state with the largest tiger population. So at that time Madhya Pradesh became the second state having largest population of tiger. But if you see in 2014 Uttarakhand overtook Madhya Pradesh to become the second state with largest tiger population. So remember that now Karnataka is the first state to have the largest population of tigers and the second state is Uttarakhand. Then the chief wildlife warden of Madhya Pradesh has said that the forests of Madhya Pradesh is fragmented that is they are not continuous and they are separated from one another. So he mentions that it is a challenge to protect tigers and prevent man-animal conflict because 50% of tigers have died outside the reserve limits so they have been categorized under poaching. It is also mentioned that tigers have died due to electrocution that is the tigers come in contact with high tension wires that are laid by farmers in order to protect their fields from wild boars but tigers get electrocuted in this and they die. So for this the Madhya Pradesh minister for forests has said that Madhya Pradesh would try to emulate or use the same strategy that is used by Gujarat and this strategy is called as the Gujarat model of wildlife conservation. If you see this Gujarat model of wildlife conservation locals have also been engaged to conserve the wild animals so the poaching of wild animals has been successfully brought down by the state of Gujarat. Now let us see in brief about National Tiger Conservation Authority. The National Tiger Conservation Authority is a statutory body. Stratatory body means a body which is created or constituted as per a statute or law. If you see the National Tiger Conservation Authority was constituted under the provisions of Wildlife Protection Act of 1972. This National Tiger Conservation Authority comes under the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate. Its main purpose is to strengthen the Tiger Conservation in India. Now also know that the National Tiger Conservation Authority coordinates the Project Tiger. Now this Project Tiger is a centrally sponsored scheme of the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change. It provides central assistance in the way of a financial assistance to the states that have tiger population. This is for the conservation of tigers in designated tiger reserves. And one of the tasks under this Project Tiger is the creation of Special Tiger Protection Force. Now this is what the news article is about. This Special Tiger Protection Force is for the better protection and security of tigers and protection and security of tiger reserves and for the forest infrastructure and for the forests and forest produce and wildlife inside the tiger reserves. With this we have come to the end of this article discussion. Moving on to the next article discussion which is about gravitational waves. Before seeing what is meant by gravitational waves, let us see how these gravitational waves were first detected. On 14th September 2015, two legal detectors in the US registered a disturbance. These legal detectors are situated at Livingston in Louisiana State and other is situated in Hanford in Washington State. It was found that this disturbance was due to gravitational waves which were travelling outwards from a point in a space which is 1.3 billion light years away from Earth. Here know that light year is a unit of astronomical distance. One light year is equivalent to the distance that light travels in one year which is equal to 9.46 into 10 to the power 12 km. Now if we say Earth is located in this corner and at this particular point which is 1.3 billion light years away from Earth, two massive black holes had merged. That is both the black holes have joined to form one big black hole. Because of this merger, gravitational waves have been formed. We have explained how black holes are formed in our 11th April Hindu analysis. The link has been provided in the description box. Please have a look at it. Now one thing which you should know about black holes is that they have a huge gravitational pull effect and because of this effect, even the fastest object in the world that is light gets pulled by this black hole. So if two black holes with such huge gravitational pull merge together, then the disturbance can be felt in the space time and this disturbance will travel outward from the merger as you can see in this picture. So gravitational waves are described as ripples in the fabric of space time. The existence of gravitational waves has been predicted by Albert Einstein in his general theory of relativity. If you see the gravitational waves were detected for the first time by humans in the year 2015 in US as we saw during the start of this news article. There is one gravitational wave detector facility in Europe which is called as Virgo detector which started working in the year 2017. Next there is one more gravitational wave detector which is being developed in Japan. It is called as K-A-G-R-A or Kamioka gravitational wave detector. Also in a collaboration with LIGO, a gravitational wave detector is being set up in India. We will see about this setup later in this discussion. Now you may get confused what is this LIGO which I have been mentioning from the beginning of this article. LIGO is the acronym for Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory. Now as the name suggests, it works by the interference principle. So now to understand what is the interference principle, let us take one example. When you throw two or more stones in a pool of water at different places, they generate concentric waves and they interfere each other like the one depicted in this picture. This pattern is called as interference pattern. This is how water waves behave. If you see the light waves also behave in the same way. When two beam of laser light merges, they also generate an interference pattern. This pattern depends on how well the light waves are aligned when they combine together. Now in this, there are two types of interference. One is constructive interference and the other is destructive interference. When the peak of one wave merges with the peak of another wave, then they add together and they construct a larger wave. This is called as constructive interference. But if you see in the case of a destructive interference, the peak of one wave meets the value of the identical wave and they totally cancel each other, that is, they destroy each other. So, when you consider light waves, in the case of constructive interference, you get the bright light and in case of a destructive interference, you get the dimmer light or the light just disappears. Because of this, a flicker or an unsteady light appears in a photo detector, which is an instrument that detects the light pattern. Now this LIGO consists of two huge interferometers, each having two arms which are 4 km long. Now these arms should be exactly 4 km long so that they can detect the gravitational wave signals. Because the gravitational waves are too weak to be detected, as even a random noise could give out a signal and it can be misled as a gravitational wave by the researchers. So the two LIGO detectors work as one unit to ensure that the gravitational waves can be detected. Then all the optical components such as mirrors would be placed in a vacuum chamber. Here you have to know that vacuum environment prevents the sound waves from causing vibrations on the mirrors. This is because sound cannot travel through a vacuum. So if LIGO did not operate in a vacuum, then there will be temperature variations from the air that is inside the beam tubes. And this would affect the quality of the laser beam as well. So remember that vacuum chamber is essential. Now if you see in this picture, this is how the LIGO interferometer setup will be. This is the beam splitter and these two are the mirrors. When a beam of light emits from the laser, the beam is split into two. And these are reflected by the mirrors and the reflected light wave merge and the reflected light waves merge and an interference pattern is detected by the photo detector which is placed here. Now if you see, both the arms are placed at perpendicular to each other. This is because of one fact. That is gravitational waves cause space to stretch itself in one direction and simultaneously it compress in a perpendicular direction. And that is why both these arms are kept at perpendicular to each other. In LIGO, the presence of gravitational waves makes one arm of the interferometer get longer while the other gets shorter as long as the wave is passing. When the lengths of the arms change, the distance travelled by each laser beam also changes. So the interference pattern also changes. This is nothing but the destructive interference. We saw that when there is a destructive interference, there is a flicker that appears in a photo detector. Based on this, the scientists tell that the gravitational waves have been detected. If many detectors are constructed across the world, it will help the scientists to get more accurate data on these gravitational waves. So as a part of this only, a new LIGO is coming up in India. And this is called as LIGO India. It is planned to be constructed in Hingoli district of Maharashtra. This LIGO India would be operational by the year 2023. Now this LIGO India observatory will be set up as a joint scientific collaboration between LIGO laboratories of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and California Institute of Technology of the USA. And there will be also three lead Indian institutions in this, which are the Inter University Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, which is situated in Pune. And then next is Institute for Plasma Research, which is situated in Gandhinagar. And then next is Raja Ramana Center for Advanced Technology, which is situated in Indore. Now this LIGO India will be a nationally coordinated project and a number of other Indian institutions will also be participating. Next in the newspaper, they have mentioned some possible sources of gravitational waves or what are the events that happen in the universe that causes gravitational waves. We saw that merger of black holes will form gravitational waves. Then merger of neutron stars will also form gravitational waves. Then rapid rotating neutron stars and supernova explosions will also form gravitational waves. Here know that the star which has reached the end of its life and explores is called as supernova. And the remnants or the leftover portions of the star is called as neutron star. There are many other sources as well which will cause gravitational waves, but this would be too weak to be detected. With this we have come to the end of this discussion. The displayed practice question will be discussed in the last session. Moving on to the next article discussion, which is about an antibiotic called as colestine. The syllabus with which this news article can be linked has been highlighted here for your reference. This news article mentions that the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare of the Government of India has issued an order. As per this order, manufacturing, sale and distribution of colestine and its formulations for food producing animals, poultry, aquafarming and animal feed supplements are prohibited or they are banned. So now, let us know what is this colestine? Colestine is an antibiotic. Antibiotics are those drugs that are used to treat bacterial infections. Hence, colestine is used to treat infection which is caused by gram-negative bacteria which are multi-drug resistant. This colestine is also called as an old antibiotic as it was used since 1959. But scientists have found that the intake of colestine has side effects on human body. So, they limited the use of colestine discovering new antibiotics which were safe to humans. But if you see, the bacteria started developing resistance against these newly developed antibiotics also. Developing these resistance is called as antimicrobial resistance. Now, the scientists are again using colestine to treat these multi-drug resistant gram-negative bacteria as a last resort. So, we can call colestine as an antibiotic of last resort. Now, the concern is that colestine is used in poultry aqua forming where they are used as animal feed supplements. Now, if we keep feeding the poultry with colestine, it will develop antimicrobial resistance. Also, when humans eat the animals which are fed with colestine, they will also intake colestine. And this colestine will affect the natural bacteria that are present in the gut of humans. So, this affects the entire food chain. Now, the humans are slowly becoming resistant to this last resort antibiotic also. The news article mentions that the medical professionals have been alarmed by the number of patients who have been exhibited resistance to colestine. Now, as we know, this colestine has been banned. And the intensivists across India are happy about the colestine ban. Intensivists mean those physicians who specialize in the care of critically ill patients. These intensivists have kept on stressing that banning the arbitrary use of colestine in the food industry, particularly as growing supplements which are used in animals, poultry, aqua forms would likely reduce the antimicrobial resistance within the country. One of the subject experts has told that the use of colestine should be restricted to only therapeutic purposes and not as feed supplements. If they are restricted to only therapeutic purposes, then the chances of developing antimicrobial resistance in humans will reduce. The subject expert has also said that there will be challenges in implementing the ban order. In the news article, subject expert has been mentioned as infectious disease expert. So, don't get confused. The news article tells that in the last year, researchers from Apollo Cancer Hospital in Chennai and the Christian Medical College in Vellore which are both located in the state of Tamil Nadu have researched and concluded that samples of raw food collected from across Chennai has been tested positive for colestine resistant bacteria. So, we can see that human guts have the presence of colestine resistant bacteria. This confirms that colestine has entered the food chain of humans as well. One of the authors of the research paper has said that awareness programs need to be conducted for farmers by telling them about the danger of using colestine animal feed. He also mentions that most of the farmers are not aware of the presence of colestine since it comes as mixed with the animal feed that the farmers buy. So, the problem lies in the feed supply itself. He mentions that the association of poultry farmers is ready to remove the use of colestine in animal feeds. Then the author has also told that bulk of colestine that is nearly 95 percentage of colestine is imported from China. So, it is easily possible to stop the imports of colestine in a short time since the bulk imports are from China. The news article also mentions that the order issued by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has directed the manufacturers of colestine and its formulations to affix a label on the container. The label should contain the following statement that is not to be used in food producing animals, poultry, aquafarming and animal feed supplements. The label should be on the package or it can be inserted as a paper in the tablet pack or also in the promotional literature. Here promotional literature means the pamphlets or the brochures that the manufacturing companies use to promote their products. So, the order has mandated that the promotional literature should also contain the label. With this we have come to the end of our article discussions. The displayed practice question will be discussed in the next session. Moving on to the last session for the day that is the practice questions discussion session. If you look at the first question it is based on blockchain technology. Three statements have been given we have to choose the correct statement. If you look at the first statement it states a blockchain is a database which is shared across the network of computers. Now this statement is correct and we also saw that one can add data to it but we cannot change the previous data which is already there in the database. So, this statement is correct and if you even look at the options given below you can easily say that statement one is correct because statement one has been repeated in all the four options. Now if you look at the next statement it states there is a central authority to validate these transactions happening in a blockchain. Now if you remember our discussion we said that blockchain claims to solve the problem of trust and this problem will be solved by eliminating the role of a central authority in transactions. So, which means there is no central authority. So, this makes statement two as the wrong statement. So, from this we can eliminate option B and option C. Now if you look at the last statement which states Ministry of Commerce has used blockchain technology to develop a e-marketplace for coffee growers in India. Yes this statement is correct. In 2019, Ministry of Commerce has launched a blockchain based coffee e-marketplace. It is expected to integrate the coffee farmers with the market and to realize a fair price by eliminating the intermediaries between coffee growers and buyers. As statements one and three are correct the final answer to this question is option D, one and three. Now this next question is based on LIGO. The question states which of the following statements is correct with respect to LIGO which is often seen in news. Four options have been given. First option is first government backed cryptocurrency. Just now we saw about blockchain technology. So, do not confuse that LIGO is also a cryptocurrency. No this option is wrong. If you look at the next option it says it is an observatory to detect the gravitational wave. Yes this statement is correct because LIGO stands for laser interferometer gravitational wave observatory. If you know the full form you can easily say that it is related to option B. So, the correct answer is option B only. And also remember that a LIGO observatory is under construction in India and it is called as LIGO India project. It will come up in Hingoli district in the state of Maharashtra. It is expected to become operational by the year 2023. Now if you look at the next question it is based on colestine. The question says the term colestine which is often seen in news is used as which of the following. Four options have been given. So, we have to say which of these is related to colestine. First antibiotic drug growth supplement in poultry. Preparation of toxic free paints. Fourth inorganic manure. Now today's discussion was based on the antibiotic drug colestine only. So, we can easily say that option one should be included in the final code. So, we can eliminate option B and D because it does not have option one. Which means option four that is inorganic manure is also eliminated. So, we have to choose whether two is correct or three is correct. Two states growth supplement in poultry. Yes, we know that colestine is has been used as a growth supplement in poultry and this has been banned in India. We saw during our discussion that colestine is excessively used in animal feed as a growth supplements. So, here two is correct. So, the final answer to this question is option C one and two only. Now, let us see one main question. The question says global warming has been creating havoc all over the world. How can reforestation be an effective method to mitigate the adverse impacts of global warming? Now, for answering this question, first you can say what is reforestation? Reforestation refers to planting trees on land that was previously forest. Then you can mention the definition of forest which is given by food and agriculture organization. That is forest is a land of at least 0.5 hectares that is covered by at least 10% tree cover and that land should be without any agricultural activity or human settlement. After this, you can directly quote the example of Philippines which achieved 26% of forest cover by the year 2010. And you can also state the method which was used by this country of Philippines like the Philippine government introduced a program which makes it mandatory for each elementary, high school and college students to plant 10 trees before graduation. So, they have imbibed the conserving of nature in the educational system itself. So, you can say this can be followed by India also as we are formulating our national educational policy. With this, we have come to the end of today's sessions. If you like the video, don't forget to like, comment and share and do subscribe to Shankar IAS Academy YouTube channel for more updates on civil service examination preparation.