 A very good evening everyone. Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis brought to you by Shankara Ayesa Academy for the date 2nd of September 2021. Now here are the list of news articles. I'll give a small heads up. It's going to be a lengthy discussion of 12 articles but the good news is a lot of articles are more of a revision for your preliminary exam. For those who don't want revision who thinks that they are very thorough with some concepts they can actually skip that part of the video and go to the next but anyways I would suggest you to revise, revise and revise and that's the key to the success. So let's look at the articles briefly. So the first three articles will be based on the state of India's economy and the Hindu has released about three articles on that. We'll be looking at it and in that context we'll be looking at the Purchasing Managers Index and how the numbers of Purchasing Managers Index have gone down and why has it gone down and we'll also look into the GDP figures as well as the GST figures. And the next two articles will be based on the new topic that is the breakthrough infections in the COVID-19 and we have an editorial on that and we have a first page article discussion on that. Alright and next we'll be talking about the microfinancial institutions and importance of microfinances. What is a microfinance all in relevance to your exam? It is more relevant for a mains exam. Alright so just pay attention there and the next topic will be based on the Ladakh State Animal and Board. See this is very important because the IUCN status is the level of threat they face, the amount of conservation efforts that we take. All these are important for the preliminary exam as well as main exam. So pay attention there and the next will be a quick take away discussion that is a loan scheme for the minorities implemented by the Kerala State Government. So pay attention there. Just a very brief discussion over there and the next is an editorial discussion for those who are wondering if they move to reopen school is right or wrong. So I guess you will get the answer here. This is based on a statistical model based on the vaccines and the amount of infection that is prevalent and the Sriraprevalence. So this particular editorial is based on that but this will be a brief discussion because the relevance for the exam is slightly lower here. Alright and next. Next discussion will be on the scheme called potion mark. This will be a slightly brief discussion on this particular scheme and next will be a case study discussion and this case study will be relevant for the anthropology optional students, the sociology optional students as well as those students who are looking to ramp up their marks in GS1 paper. Okay and the next and the last article for today is a two wheeler, electric two wheeler scheme alright and under that we will be discussing three topics. One is EESL which is kind of implementing this particular scheme. Then we will be talking about the FAME scheme which we will which also covers this and also a new app that is myEV app or the website is also launched in that regard. So these three things are important for the preliminary exam so we will be talking about this and finally we will be going through some preliminary questions as well as some main questions. Okay during the preliminary question we will have a slightly lengthy discussion on the potion mark again and with that we will be wrapping up our discussion for today. Now with that information let's move on to the discussion today. Now let us take up this news article. This article talks about the Purchasing Managers Index. See we have already discussed Purchasing Managers Index but I'm going to discuss it again as a brush up for the preliminary exam. See according to this article India's manufacturing lost its recovery momentum in August 2021. This is because the Purchasing Managers Index declined from 55.3 in July to 52.3 in August. So let us understand this very briefly. First I'll tell you what is PMI and then we can go into why there was a decline in the PMI. See PMI is a survey based economic indicator. So what is a survey based economic indicator? The entity that makes the data goes to the industries, collects the data and based on that it conducts a survey and gives out the particular data of growth and that is exactly what is called a survey based economic indicator and PMI is one and it provides a timely insight into the business condition and PMI is widely used to anticipate changing economic trends in the official data such as GDP and it is also used as an alternative measure to official data about the economic performances and business conditions. See official data is released by our government. If you recollect the index of industrial production is one such official data that is released by the government or for that matter the GDP data is released by the government and this particular PMI is an alternative to the official data and so PMI data are used by the financial and the corporate professionals to better understand where the economy and the markets are headed and it also helps them to look at the opportunities presented by the economy and if you see it is compiled and produced globally by a company called IHS market and the index is produced for more than 40 economies worldwide and India is once among the 40 and remember that PMI initially and all was compiled only for manufacturing and later it was extended to include other sectors such as services, construction, retail as well and let me tell you one important thing about PMI about how to read the PMI. See PMI is numbered from 0 to 100 okay and in the scale of 0 to 150 is one important mark in the PMI okay follow as I talk when the value of PMI goes beyond 50 it means that the economy is witnessing growth but when the value falls below 50 it means that the economy is witnessing negative growth that is the economy is dwindling that is the manufacturing is not happening or negative manufacturing is happening and when the value is at 50 it means that there has been no change compared to the same period before so this is how you read PMI and any value farther away from 50 it means that greater is the change say the value is 70 it means that the economy is witnessing tremendous growth say the value is close to 20 then it means that compared to the previous year or previous month the value of growth has gone down so this is how you read PMI now coming back to the news let us see why was there a decline in the PMI see according to this article the demand for products showed signs of weakness due to the pandemic that is people did not have enough money or people were not interested in buying so the demand went down in addition to that input price pressures also was present in the manufacturing sector let us understand this as to what is an input price pressure say you are manufacturing chips okay so for manufacturing chips you will need potatoes you will need covers you will need oil all these are the input for this particular chips so the price of the chips say is 10 at present but when the oil prices grow up or when the potatoes prices go up or when the covers prices go up when any of these prices go up the price of the chips can escalate from 10 to 20 so the inputs that is oil potatoes and covers have affected the final prices of the goods and this is exactly what the PMI tells us also apparently there has been an input price pressure that is increased prices of inputs and this has been present in the manufacturing sector so growth in the new orders softened which pushed the expansion below the long-term average that is because the chips prices went up to 20 people did not want to buy the chips so the growth in new orders that is the demand for the chips went down and thereby the production expansion of the chips company also went down so this led to the weakening of the optimism in the August that is the businesses did not feel very confident about their own businesses and so the industries also put a pause on the hiring in the manufacturing sector see already there is no demand because the prices went up from 10 to 20 okay and because not many people are buying the chips the people who make the chips they also stopped hiring people for producing more chips so this is how it functioned and all these factors led to a decline in the purchasing managers index okay so this is the reason why there has been a decline in the PMI from 55.3 in July to 52.3 in August see this is a slightly a significant change we need to be worried about the economy in this particular scenario with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion see the PMI is important for preliminary exam now look at this front page article so we already saw about the purchasing managers index and that saw a slight dip so this is another economics article so we have like about three articles in this particular newspaper reflecting the state of India's economy right now so in PMI we saw about the dip in the production now this is a another article that says the GST collection has seen a dip in the month of August but on the contrary the finance ministry sees a growth prospect let us see how see basically the finance ministry has seen a 30% increase in the GST collection so this is in comparison to the same month last year that is 2020 but when you compare it with July 2021 the amount of revenue that has been collected from the GST has seen a slight fall so how much is the fall in the previous month it was 1.16 lakh crore and now it is 1.12 lakh crore so that has been a slight dip see the government is seeing it very optimistically see it sees that there is a 30 percentage increase from the previous year of the same month and even if we compare it with the 2019-2020 so 2019-2020 is before the pandemic if you recollect so at that time the revenue collection was about 98,000 crore and compared to that the 1.12 lakh crore is a 14 percentage increase and that is exactly why the finance ministry is very optimistic about the growth because the collection of for GST had fallen below the 1 lakh crore mark in June due to the second wave of covid and that has seen an improvement in July and compared to July it's only a marginal dip and that is the stand by the central government but other economists are a little skeptical because they see this kind of dip is not supposed to happen and thereby the recovery of the economy is not as robust as the government projects so this when we see in the backdrop of the declining PMI that we just saw can be an alarm bell that is to put in more efforts to fuel the economy much better way so this is the essence of this particular front page article and adding to that the GST collection has been highest in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka and it has seen about 35 percentage jump the GST revenue and this is closely followed by Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra as well and overall the GST revenues from the transactions that happened within India were about 27 percentage higher compared to the last year of August so this is the essence so this particular analysis has been taken up in the editorial as well so look at this particular editorial this editorial title the fleeting cheer has analyzed the GST revenues the GDP figures as well as the PMI to give an overall picture so according to this particular editorial the GDP estimates is no longer going through a contraction rather it is seeing a growth but the growth is not as robust as it was expected so let us look into the figures say in the pre-pandemic first quarter of the fiscal 2019-2020 that is the same period of 2019 and 2020 that time the GDP at constant prices was estimated at about 35.66 lakh crore and right now the GDP at constant prices is estimated at 32.38 lakh crore so as you can see there is a 9 percentage decline and this is a sign of contraction of the economy and the article says that this is largely due to the second wave of COVID-19 that extracted a significant toll as well as required a lot of lockdowns as well again so this is the reason that this particular article says for the contraction of the economy and apart from that the article also throws light on the decline in the private consumption spending as well so that saw a shrinking of about 17.4 percentage compared to the preceding three months see decline in the consumption expenditure or the private expenditure is something to be worried about let us understand that say there is an industry or a group of industries so they produce different items say one produces clothing and another produces packaged food so when the consumer has good amount of income okay they will want to go for the clothing they will want to go for these packaged items and they will also want to go for some other expensive luxuries as well okay but when the consumer does not have money the consumer will not buy from the industries the consumer will only want to save the money in that case there will be a fall in demand so when there is a fall in demand it is an indicator that the consumer does not have money so consequently what will happen because there is a muted demand because the demand is less the industries will also not want to produce because when they produce they spend some money for that particular production and when there is no sales they will not want to spend that money on the production so the production will also go down and when the production goes down the economic activity goes down and thereby the GDP is impacted so this is how it works so a falling private consumption spending is something to be worried about and the data's show that there has been a fall compared to the preceding three months and most disconcertingly the government consumption expenditure has also fallen and that has contracted about 4.8 percentage from the year earlier and from 7.6 percentage from the previous quarter so why is this important say because of COVID the consumers are sad or they don't have money and they're not spending so in that case what the government will do is the government will start spending in place of the consumer because the government has our tax monies and government is much richer or in a much position of authority so it can spend where will it spend generally it will spend on creating infrastructure or it will spend on giving money to the consumers or it will spend money on giving loans to the industries so that they can increase their production or they can offset their losses so this is how the government spends and this government expenditure generally compensates for the lack of private expenditures so that is exactly why government expenditure is important but when the government also stops spending it becomes a problem okay and that is what the article also reflects so however the article says that because of the eased out restrictions because of the opening up of the economy the effects caused by the second wave is receding and there is a possibility that the economy will revive much sooner so this is the essence of the article and the article concludes by saying that there is a needs to expedite the vaccination coverage and this in turn will result in better economic activity how when someone is vaccinated the person will be ready to go out and buy the things that he or she wants and this will push up the demand and thereby the economy all right so this is the essence of the article so these three articles gave a broad picture of the economy right now in our country so with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now look at this front page article recently there is an increase in the number of breakthrough infections in India so in this article we'll be seeing what is a breakthrough infection and what are the reasons for the breakthrough infections as well and the India SARS-CoV-2 genome consortium that is INSACOG in a weekly report stated that these numbers were in line with the expectations only and they did not formally quantify the extent of such infections also so this is not transparent governance they're supposed to disclose but note that the INSACOG is a consortium of laboratories coordinated by Department of Biotechnology we know this so just reminding you again because the preliminary exam is around the corner so in this context let us proceed on to know what is a breakthrough infection see a breakthrough infection is a case of illness in which a vaccinated individual becomes sick from the same illness that the vaccine is meant to prevent simply they occur when the vaccines fail to provide the immunity against the pathogen they are designed to target see this is not something new because breakthrough infections have been identified in individuals immunized against other infections as well like mums or chickenpox and influenza and few days ago we were looking about the BCG vaccines that is administered to provide immunity against the tuberculosis even there we have breakthrough infections because BCG is considered one of the most successful vaccines in the history and it's about 100 years of BCG so even then we have breakthrough infections so the character of a breakthrough infection is dependent on the pathogen itself often the infection in the vaccinated individual results in milder symptoms and is of a shorter duration than if the infection was contracted naturally now coming to the causes of the breakthrough infection see no vaccine provides 100 percentage protection for any disease we just saw that even the published efficacy of covaxin and cove shield from phase three clinical trials has shown that they range from 70 percentage to 90 percentage so it doesn't mean that there is something wrong with the vaccines what it means is that not everybody who receives vaccine has 100 percentage protection so there can be various causes some say it can be genetic some say it can be lifestyle but there is no proven research for this but this is the case so vaccine it can be said that they work in two ways first they are preventing people from getting disease at all that is what we say as 100 percentage protection and second even when the disease occur the severity of the disease is less so these are the two main ways and if you see the reason for the rise in the breakthrough crisis is because the people are stopping their other interventions as well because they are not wearing masks they are not maintaining social distancing so the virus starts to transmit at a greater and a greater pace and with greater frequency and so there will be a lot more exposure even to the people who are vaccinated and third reason is the mutation in the virus this is the most scientific reason most proven reason see the news article mentions that ay 12 which is one of these delta plus categories have caused several cases of breakthrough infections in israel and delta plus category is the variant with slight variation in the mutation of the delta variant but this ay 12 variant is not yet seen in india and understand this okay virus is having some form like this okay and this kind of engages with the lung and it causes the infection so we say this is the covid virus and what happens is a mutation occurs and the virus that has receptors like this okay mutates and say this receptor undergoes a slight change and still causes the disease it still engages with the lung tissue and everything but it is not in compatibility with the antibodies that have been produced in response to the vaccine so the antibodies they cannot act on this mutated version that is they take time to recognize this mutated version and they act and this results in disease manifestation so that is exactly why where the mutation in the viruses result in the disease manifestation all right so this is the most scientific reason for the breakthrough infections and apart from that there are other reasons like genetic causes that does not provide hundred percent immunity for one particular person but it does for another person okay so very relevant to that there is another editorial also published in today's newspaper it is called the effectiveness of the vaccines see this particular article is based on one particular study that is held in the Israel so this is based on a pre-print see pre-print is nothing but a paper that has not been peer reviewed okay so it has not hit the scientific journals yet but we still have the data and the author has analyzed it see we know in Israel a lot of people were vaccinated early by Pfizer vaccine and the research was conducted on the Israel population what they found was the amount of immunity conferred by the vaccine was much lesser compared to those people who have been already infected understand this the possibility of reinfection is much lesser whereas a possibility of a breakthrough infection is higher so this is the essence of this particular study and they've given data also apparently on studying the people they found that there were instances of 238 breakthrough infections in a fully vaccinated individual whereas there were only 19 reinfections among those who were previously infected but not vaccinated so this is the essence of this particular article so this particular article was discussed mainly to you know understand the difference between the breakthrough infection and a reinfection okay so keep that in mind that is important for the preliminary exam all right so with that information in mind let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now let us take up this article see recently in June 2021 the RBI released a consultative document on regulation of micro finances so if you ask me what is a consultative document it is nothing but a report resulting from a consultation process that is it invites public comments on the draft here the comments observations suggestions on the consultative documents are invited from banks nbfcs industry associations and other stakeholders so in yesterday's class kirtna mam spoke about democracy and the importance of deliberative process so a consultative document is a result of such a deliberative process and it reflects the democracy it's just a simple call back from yesterday's discussion so coming back to the article the current document released by RBI is looking to reassess the priorities of the sector and this particular article is written in this particular backdrop let us look at it here is this syllabus relevant for this discussion first let us begin by knowing what is a micro finance see micro finance is an economic tool designed to promote financial inclusion so few days ago we also saw about micro finance so it is a form of financial service which provides small loans and other financial services to poor and the low-income households so what does it do it covers a range of services which includes the provision of credit savings insurance money transfers counseling etc so it enables the poor and the low-income households to come out of poverty and increase their income levels and improve the overall living standards see understand this okay say there is a farmer household say they earn a monthly income of 2000 rupees hypothetically let's assume okay and in this 2000 they will have to buy food they will have to invest they will have to spend on education and if at all hospital expenses if any they will have to spend on that as well okay and when they're trying to invest in their land say they have a good harvest in one particular season say in 2020 they had a good harvest and they sold it for good money as well they'll have some good income but in 2021 they had a good harvest but the market had a surplus so they couldn't sell it for profit so in that case what they will do is they will eat up into the savings from the previous year and say it continues for another year also 2022 in 2022 they really don't have the savings from the previous year so what they will have to do is they will have to resort to borrowing and when they start borrowing they will have to spend this 2000 on interests as well so what happens is the quality of living goes down that is because of this particular interest the spending on the food goes down the spending on education goes down the spending on the health expenditures goes down so just to support this particular household the concept of microfinance came up that is a agricultural household is not going to take a loan of one crore or something see a bank will find it profitable only to lend to big investors because they will also have more interests from this particular high investments so banks will not have the incentive to lend to these particular households and that is exactly why the concept of microfinance came up all right so keep that in mind and this particular microfinance facilitates achievement of national policies as well that target poverty reduction or women empowerment and assistance to vulnerable group and others understand this again so when this particular household who spends about 2000 per month they get the support of the microfinance okay when they get the support of the microfinance they are able to invest in the land better and they are able to get the returns also better and therefore their poverty also gets reduced and thereby they end up spending more on food education and health and apart from that there are vulnerable sections in the society for example women women really don't have access to finances especially if the women is not educated or if the women is dependent on the husband's family in that case a woman or a self-help group of women they can take these microcredits and invest in a business and they can improve their livelihood so this is one particular aspect and the same goes to the vulnerable groups as well and this takes us to the question of who is eligible for a microfinance so as per the definition a microfinance borrower is identified by annual household income not exceeding 125,000 for rural area and not exceeding 2 lakh rupees for urban and semi urban area see generally speaking the household income in urban areas is much higher and also the cost of living is also proportionately higher and it is the opposite for the rural areas and that is exactly why the income ceiling is different now coming to the article see some of the key regulatory changes proposed in the document takes household income as a variable for loan assessment that is we already saw that to be eligible for microfinance the income limit for a rural household is 1.25 lakh and for urban household or semi urban household is 2 lakh and as you can see the definition itself of microfinance primarily hinges on the income of the borrower that is a person earning more than 2 lakhs will never get their hands on the microfinance so the document requires all regulated entities to have a broad approved policy for household income assessment see the regulated entities are those that are sanctioned to give out the microfinance credits and apart from this it sets a limit for loan repayment for all the existing loans of the household at 50 percentage of the household income so as a result the payment of interest and principle for all the outstanding loan of the households at any given moment shall be limited to 50 percentage of the household income hence measuring household income accurately is very important for effective implementation of these norms this is all well and good which is a good policy right but there is one small problem here see the author here mentions that the household income is an elusive figure that is that is it is not easy to capture the figure this is because our economy has a high level of informality in the income streams so understand this see in India if you see the economy itself is highly informal that is about 92 percentage of the industries and everything are not registered they do not come under the formal economic stream so a person may be promised for about 10,000 rupees as a monthly income but because they are informal because they do not have a robust employee policy the person may be paid about 5,000 or 6,000 say in a difficult time like COVID so the income of that particular person has high level of variability because of the high level of informality okay and especially when it comes to non-salaried workers so this example is about salaried workers some people work as freelance or some people work as gig workers and the non-salaried workers are employees whose pay is not at a monthly or annual rate so the measurement of the income of such households is very difficult and thereby the dispersal of the loans also gets difficult and apart from this the customer base of the micro finance institution is formed by low income households so this also cites a problem because the low income households have seasonal and volatile income flows very often for example think about an agricultural worker he earns the most during the harvest season when compared to the other ones and a household of a migrant worker so he or she who migrates to the city for certain months of the year see an income peak and think about a flower vendor near a temple so they see an increase in income during festivals and as their income is volatile that is they're not certain about their income it is very difficult to validate their income measure now you may have a question why can't we measure the expenditure and calculate the household income that is it is based on the assumption that people spend only based on how much they earn here is also a problem see expenditure also does not truly reflect the household's income it is very difficult to differentiate personal expenses and their expenditure on the income related activity see understand this in an example that we saw before also in a household some investment some expense goes towards the livelihood generation for example in an agriculture household the farmer may spend on seeds or on land on water so these are income generating expenses and we have other expenses like education or health or for the matter the farmer is actually going to buy some clothes so these are all not income generating expenses these are called as a personal expenses and the ones that he spends on sowing seeds or on water or on land is an income related activity so generally a microfinance is sanctioned to support an income related activity only because it is difficult to differentiate between the expenses on personal level from the income related activity an expenditure based assessment is also difficult so the author suggests some of the measures to overcome these problems see the first suggestion is that the financial service providers can design a structured survey based approach so what is this this approach should rely on a survey that is conducted to differentiate between the various expenses and this approach should help them to assess households expenses debt position and income from various sources of occupation and the approach should be designed in a way that it captures the seasonal variations and as well as the volatile clash for nature of the households as well so this is the first suggestion given by the author the second suggestion is to create a template based approach see the financial service providers can also create various templates for different categories of households these templates can be based on location or occupation or it can be based on the family characteristics and others so the FSPs can use publicly available data sets to create these templates and these templates might then be used to estimate a client's household income so this is the second suggestion let's move on to the third suggestion the third suggestion is to collect and maintain household income data through a centralized database this will help us to ensure uniformity in data collection across all the FSPs so these are the three suggestions given by the author so basically to conclude there must be an accurate assessment of the household level incomes to avoid the instances of over liability and these steps should ensure long-term stability of the economy okay so basically the author says that the income assessment to sanction a micro finance credit should be much more accurate so that people are not left out that is the purpose is not defeated so in essence let me tell you this particular discussion is very relevant for a main exam perspective but at a preliminary level you should know what is a micro financial institution so that is the takeaway so with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now look at this article see recently Ladakh has adopted two species snow leopard and black-negged crepe as the state animal and state bird respectively so let us use this article as an opportunity to learn about snow leopards and black-negged cranes I think we have discussed snow leopards already before so this will be more like a recap for snow leopards and for black-negged cranes let us look at it briefly from the exam point of view only first is snow leopards see the snow leopard lives at high altitudes because the name itself says snow leopards and snow is found in high altitudes and so it lives at high altitudes in the steep mountains of the central and the southern asia so this you'll have to remember and they live in extremely cold climates and when it comes to India the snow leopard inhabits the higher Himalayan and trans-Himalayan landscape of Jammu and Kashmir Himachal Pradesh Uttarakhand Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh going over it again it inhabits the higher Himalayan and the trans-Himalayan landscape of JNK Himachal Pradesh next we have Uttarakhand and straight away we have Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh okay see the snow leopard are few in number we face a lot of threat like any other species so they given the highest conservation status both globally and in India for example the snow leopards are categorized as vulnerable by the IUCN and they are placed in schedule one of the Indian Wildlife Protection Act of 1972 they're also listed in appendix one of the convention on the international trade in endangered species that is sites and they're also listed in appendix one of the CMS and in addition to the above India also launched various conservation efforts to protect snow leopards let us see about them in brief first one is the project snow leopard see the project snow leopard promotes an inclusive and participatory approach for the conservation of snow leopard that is participatory approach is nothing but they'll take the efforts of the community as well so it fully involves the local communities in the conservation efforts so that makes this project very unique the project snow leopard next let us see about secure Himalayas see secure Himalaya is a project launched for the conservation of high altitude biodiversity and thereby reducing the dependency of the local communities on the natural ecosystem so this particular secure Himalayas as you can see is not launched specifically for the snow leopards but for the conservation of high altitude biodiversity so going more deeper into secure Himalayas the global environment facility commonly called as GEF of the United Nations Development Program funds this particular project remember the GEF funds the secure Himalaya and further the secure Himalaya is now operational in the snow leopard range namely the JNK Himachal Pradesh Uttarakhand and Sikkim and if you recollect again in the project snow leopard we also had Arunachal Pradesh but secure Himalaya does not have Arunachal Pradesh next let us see about Himalas and Rakshak see Himalas and Rakshak is a community volunteer program it was launched by India to protect the snow leopards specifically so these are the conservation efforts taken for snow leopard quickly if you recollect what is the conservation status of snow leopard it is vulnerable by the IOCN all right now let's move on to the black naked crane first let us know about the habitat and distribution and all see the high altitude wetlands of the Tibetan Plateau Sichuan and the eastern Ladakh that is in India are the main breeding grounds of the black naked crane and if you see they can also be found in Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh during the winters now let us look into the protection status of black naked crane so according to the IOCN website it is near threatened so various sources have reported differently but when we refer to the IOCN it reports it as near threatened and if you look at the sites they are included in appendix one and if you look at the conservation status in India it belongs to schedule one of the wildlife protection act of 1972 so this is all about black naked crane just know about their conservation status they are habited that is more than enough and apart from that remember about snow leopard it is one of the very important species that you'll have to remember so with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion so this article is a quick takeaway article we are not going to go into the details of this particular loan scheme that is mentioned in the article for a UPSC aspirant just knowing the name of the scheme and the state will be more than enough all right so consider a question like this Sumitram is a loan disbursement scheme for minorities it was launched by which particular state so this is the question so Kerala government has launched a loan disbursement scheme for the minorities and this has one unique component where loans of up to five lakh at six percentage interest will be provided for minority communities marriage of their daughters that is one thing and there is also a component for medical treatment also there also a loan of about five lakh will be provided at five percentage interest rates and this also has a component for covid 19 survivors and all this together will form the Sumitram scheme and this has been launched by the state of Kerala so this is all you have to remember in this particular article moving on to the next article now now look at this particular editorial see the takeaway from our exam point of view is very little so i'm not going to discuss this particular editorial in detail i'll just give you the essence of the article in a nutshell for those who are curious about the covid spurt following these schools reopening all right so that will be the level of discussion for this particular article see according to the author the number of cases following the school reopening will definitely increase but author also says that the number of cases will not increase so much that it will contribute to another wave it will increase but it will not contribute to another wave so opening the schools is a good move according to this particular editorial and further in conclusion the author also says that vaccinations should be ramped up and until we reach a zero positivity rate of about 80 percentage or at least about 75 percentage these efforts should be maintained say vaccination or non-formatutical interventions like wearing masks social distancing these should be maintained and apart from that the author also suggests a state specific approach that is the central government should not resort to a straight-jacket one-size-fits-all approach for some states like say Kerala and Maharashtra the zero positivity rate is much lesser that is the number of people who have been exposed to the covid or the vaccine is much lesser so until they cross about 75 to 80 percentage mark we'll have to remain careful but the reopening of schools will not be a problem so this is the entire essence of the article with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now look at this article this article mentions that potion ma has begun see again pay attention this is an important scheme very vital for your preliminary exam all right so you are aware that the government of india launched potion abhiyan so the purpose is to bring nutrition to the center stage of the national development agenda so in this potion means nutrition abhiyan means campaign so keep that in mind and potion abhiyan is the prime minister's overarching scheme for holistic nutrition or national nutrition mission and the nodal ministry for its implementation is ministry of women and child development see in preliminary they might confuse you switching the ministries they may say the ministry associated with potion abhiyan is ministry of health no that is not the case it is ministry of women and child development why because the nutritional issues are much more common in women and children and that is exactly why potion abhiyan is placed under ministry of women and child development and potion abhiyan functions as a multi ministerial convergence mission with the vision to address malnutrition in a targeted approach so what is this multi ministerial convergence mission see this fancy phrase can be broken down multi ministerial means this particular abhiyan or the campaign is governed by many ministries so like we just discussed ministry of health also plays a role under nutrition so the input from the ministry of health will also be taken for potion abhiyan all right and apart from that a role will also be played by ministry of social justice and empowerment as well so this is what we mean by multi ministerial convergence so basically it aims to improve the national nutritional outcomes for children pregnant women and lactating mother so such a far-sighted campaign also needs community mobilization and people participation and for this purpose the rastriya potion ma is celebrated across the country since 2018 itself here rastriya means national ma means month in hindi so under this the month of september is dedicated during which activities related to nutritional awareness will be carried out and these activities will be carried out by all these states and union territories up to the grass root level see this particular sentence could be a potential preliminary exam statement as well okay so it will be carried out in all these states pay attention all these states and union territories up to the grass root level and remember its purpose is to ensure community mobilization and to bolster people's participation so what is community mobilization see community mobilization is a phrase that we come across very often in policy domain so community mobilization is nothing but involving the community so that the policy that is being implemented is a success say for example the government is trying to educate a village but the villages are worse to education they say that women should not be educated probably that is the consummate of mentality that the village has in that case without the support of the community educating the women of that particular village will be difficult despite government having policies to educate the village all right so garnering the support from the community is what we called as community mobilization understand this so coming back to the topic so this portion ma addresses the malnutrition among the young children and women and it aims to ensure healthy nutrition for everyone so what is malnutrition malnutrition is when a child does not have enough amount of protein or the vitamins or the minerals that is needed for the healthy development of a child and portion ma tries to address malnutrition among young children as well as women now the activities under the portion ma are focused on social behavioral changes and communication so what is social behavioral change say for example in a community they really don't have the habit of eating spinach it's hypothetically speaking and they have some socially tabooed restriction keeping them from eating spinach and we all know spinach is a very good source of iron and vitamins especially vitamin b12 and stuff so in order to give them the required nutrition this particular social taboo has to be broken and that is what we call as social behavioral change and this can be brought about by communication and some of the broad themes under which the activities are undertaken are antenatal care optimal breastfeeding anemia growth monitoring then themes focused on girls that is their education diet the right age of marriage hygiene and sanitation eating healthy and all these and the activities are carried out through various implementing departments or agencies for example women and child development department carries out these activities and spreads the message through Anganwadi workers so it is also worth mentioning that under these activities around 30.6 crore people were reached in 30 days so far and in this way potion ma has given a major impetus to the habian so you don't have to remember the statistics this is just to interest you in the topic and if you are wondering why is 30.6 crore people significant see India's population is close to 120 crore and 30.6 crore means a huge chunk of the population and they have been reached in 30 days which is a commendable achievement and for the current potion ma 2021 the entire month of september has been subdivided into weekly themes and this is to ensure speedy and intensive outreach and for focused and assimilated approach towards improving holistic nutrition so you don't have to remember the entire thing just remember that the entire month is divided into themes so that the project reaches better that's all right so a wide gammo of activity will be undertaken this year also for example the first theme focuses on plantation drive for potion vatika see potion vatika is nothing but the kitchen garden which is meant for producing fresh vegetables fruits herbs for personal as well as community consumption so this is the theme for the first week and apart from that the following activities will also be undertaken just go through it just just for the interest of the students you don't really have to invest your time so much you can just casually go through all these things just for your information all right so in this particular discussion we saw about this particular scheme called potion ma this is important from the preliminary point of view so keep that in mind with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now look at this article so this particular article we are taking up for discussion because this can be an important value addition for your main's answers see remember like i always say analysis everyone will be able to do anyone who has cleared problems will be able to do some kind of analysis of the facts given the exposure of the current affairs and everything but only when you quote the facts only when you quote case studies only when you quote the committees your paper will stand out so this is not only the case with gs paper this is also the case with optional paper as well all right so with that in mind i'm going to narrate this particular news article as an incident so that you can remember and quote it in your exams just remember some keywords like the name of the place and what is the learning center that i'm going to quote and what are the facilities and what are the changes it made see these four points you'll have to remember for any case study and that is how i'm going to narrate this particular case study as well all right look at this there is a tribal settlement called kallupara in kerala so the education of the children in the settlement got affected due to the first lockdown and schools were closed they were cut off from the nearby cities and towns so what they did was they requested the government authorities and the volunteers for some facility in which their children can study and to their delight it was arranged immediately and a study room for 12 children was arranged by the authorities and they named the study center as palikudam see in southern languages palikudam means learning center so they arranged a palikudam and this study room was a temporary structure only and was made of bamboo and reed by the local communities themselves so what is very unique about this it had some important facilities like television dth connection that is direct to home connections whiteboard it had markers it had and it also had furnitures for online education so it was a temporary structure built by the local settlers with advanced features and the authorities also provided study kits for the tribal students so it is also important to know that the local people were involved in the construction of this structure so it basically also gave them some kind of short-term employment as well so it provided a temporary structure where the tribal students can study it had advanced features to educate the students and it also provided some short-term employment for the local people so these are the three areas this particular case study covers see the story does not end there what happens is this initiative inspired other tribal settlements as well for example take konga marathin moodu tribal settlement it's a long name just remember that konga marathin moodu so this tribal settlement demanded a similar study center due to vehicular access see generally tribal settlements are remote so getting access to an urban area is very difficult for them so a study center with a capacity to accommodate 17 students was set up by the authorities similarly take eleventh moodu tribal settlement this settlement is also receiving a study center so see schools across our country are closed due to COVID-19 pandemic they are gradually reopening but in spite of the restrictions these learning centers for students are up and running so they make sure that the education of the vulnerable tribal communities is carried on without the hurdles so such initiatives can lead to empowerment of the tribals so inmates when you have a question regarding tribal issues or social empowerment or people-centric governance you can use this case study as a value addition and of course students with anthropology optional can also make use of this case study in paper too all right so just remember where was this done at least like two village names in kerala and what were the facilities that were provided and what was the difference it made so in case if you're wondering what is a case study see it is some kind of unique incident that is capable of inspiring similar growth trajectories or similar development trajectories in the future all right so that is exactly what is case study in our scenario all right so keep that in mind with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now look at this article from Trivandrum edition so in kerala the central government agency that is convergence energy services limited has launched a electric two-wheeler sales scheme in kerala all right so in this context we'll be dealing with three preliminary oriented topics the first is we'll know about convergence energy services limited so this comes under energy efficiency services limited so we'll be looking into these two and apart from that we will also be knowing what is my ev app and apart from that we will also be briefly looking into fame scheme that is faster adoption and manufacturing of electric vehicles in india phase two scheme so these three preliminary topics from this particular editorial see first let us know what is convergence energy services limited so this particular entity is a wholly owned subsidiary of the central government entity which is energy efficiency services limited okay so this takes us to the question as to what is energy efficiency services limited so those who are preparing for prelims for this year you might have come across this particular entity multiple times when you're reading your current affairs so this particular entity is coming under the ministry of power so what is this entity exactly see this is a hundred percent central government owned but it is a joint venture of ntpc limited power finance corporation rc limited and the power grid okay and like i already said e asl was formed under ministry of power and why was it formed it was formed to facilitate the energy efficiency products so what is energy efficiency projects say for running one particular mission hundred liters of diesel is consumed but in that place we make the machine more efficient and we make the machine consume only 50 liters then the machine becomes energy efficient so this is what is called as energy efficiency and e asl strives to ensure this particular aspect now moving on it implements many important programs and these programs are important from the preliminary point of view so first is ujhala this is a very famous scheme unnat jyoti by affordable LEDs for all so this is implemented by e asl then we have the smart meters scheme this is also being implemented under e asl and next we have healthy and energy efficient buildings so this particular project is also implemented under e asl so these are the stuff that you'll have to remember under e asl now let us look into another scheme that is faster adoption and manufacturing of electric vehicles in India and now phase two of the scheme is in motion so it is commonly called as fame two scheme okay so it has one basic objective that is it has to support the hybrid vehicles or the electric vehicles production and manufacturing and marketing of these particular vehicles see electric vehicles you understand as the name goes so you may ask what is a hybrid vehicle see hybrid vehicle is something that has the conventional engine in addition to something that can also process the electric source of energy so it'll have a dual system of processing and that is exactly why we call it as hybrid vehicles all right see hybrid vehicles are generally fit into two wheelers three wheelers autos passengers and basically light commercial vehicles and sometimes in buses as well but if you'd see they're not fit into heavy vehicles why like i said hybrid engines are bulky because it has dual system unlike electric vehicle or exclusively a conventional vehicle combustion system so since it has a dual system it is much more heavier so it cannot be fuel efficient and that is exactly why the hybrid vehicles are not fit into heavy vehicles but they are fit into two wheelers three wheelers and all sometimes even in buses all right so this is all about the fame scheme and another thing that you'll have to remember about fame scheme is it is under department of heavy industries all right now moving on remember there is something called myev app or my electric vehicle app or it is also a website so this particular website is launched by the central government to create a marketplace for the electric vehicles buying and sales basically look here at a website or an app where you can buy if at all you want an electric vehicle and you can sell an electric vehicle if at all you are making electric vehicles so basically it was launched just to give a push for the electric vehicles especially during the covid times when we are not stepping out of our houses so this is another thing that you'll have to remember so coming back to the news so the converges energy services limited which is under EESL is planning to sell electric two wheelers in the state of kerala and in the first phase the buyers will be potentially these government employees who are in need of two wheelers so this is all about the scheme so in this particular discussion we saw what is CESL what is EESL what is myev app and we also saw in brief about the fame two scheme all right so this particular discussion is completely important for your preliminary exam so pay attention it's more like a revision also for you especially with respect to fame scheme so keep that in mind with that let's move on to the next segment of today's discussion now here we are at the last segment of today's discussion practice preliminary questions so in that direction we have three questions for discussion today let's go over it one by one the first question is about the IUCN status of two species that we discussed today so let's recollect quickly the first statement says the black naked cranes are categorized as endangered by the IUCN see this statement is incorrect because we saw according to the IUCN website the black naked cranes are categorized as near threatened so this statement is incorrect next is snow leopards they are categorized as near threatened by IUCN but we also saw this in the discussion they're categorized as vulnerable by the IUCN so the answer is D neither one nor two going on to the next question this statement is in reference to the purchasing managers index so it's a three statement question let's go over it one by one which of the following statements are correct with reference to PMI often seen in news the first is it is an indicator of the economic health of the manufacturing sector see the first statement is correct see this is the basic about the purchasing managers index second statement it is compiled by nithya yog see we saw this in the discussion the PMI is not compiled by a government source unlike the index of industrial production or core industries this is compiled by a private entity called IHS market and they compile similar data for 40 other countries so statement two is incorrect going to statement three it is calculated only for the manufacturing sector see this statement is also incorrect like we saw in the discussion initially it was designed for manufacturing sector but later when the services sector grew and it went on to occupy an importance pays in the economy it was extended to the services sectors as well so statement three is also incorrect so with that we can say the right answer is option a one only see let me also go through the elimination technique for this particular question see first statement is correct so anyone looking at our analysis regularly will know PMI is an indicator of the economic health of the manufacturing sector so with that we can eliminate option c and d because it doesn't have statement one now a and b are there we don't even have to go through statement two we can directly skip to statement three and it says it is calculated only for the manufacturing sector see the common jugard that people say is that any statement having the extreme words say only they tend to be wrong if we apply this particular jugard yes we'll arrive at option a but let me tell you this jugard does not always work this is not full proof yes you will have to know some basic knowledge this can help you in achieving an informed guess when you're attempting the questions for the preliminary commonly it is said that we'll have to go for three rounds right the first round you will attempt all the sure shot questions that is the questions for which you know the answers hundred percentage and the second round you will be going for these answers which are sure about 75 percentage and the third round will be for those questions for which you are 50 50 unsure so this jugard should be applied only in the third round when you want to increase your attempts so this is a small trick just keep it in mind so this trick is not full proof as well so this is a warning that i'll give you so with that let's move on to the next question this question is about the portion abyan that we saw in the news so factual question that you will have to remember and this particular question discussion is going to be slightly lengthy so be prepared see the new scheme of sakshan angan vadi in portion 2.0 has been launched for financial year 2021 2022 by regrouping which of the following schemes so we have five schemes see the tabular column here is for your reference only first understand that for effective implementation of various schemes and programs of the ministry of women and child development in this financial year all major screams have been classified into three first is mission portion next is mission vatsalya third is mission shakti so in this the full name of the mission portion 2.0 scheme is saksham angan vadi and portion 2.0 and under the scheme some already existing schemes under the umbrella integrated child development services scheme has been regrouped here don't get confused with the icds see the old scheme was launched in 1975 the integrated child development scheme it is the core icds scheme it is one of the flagship programs of the government of india and that particular scheme represents one of the world's largest and the unique programs for the early childhood care and development but later the ministry started implementing this angan vadi services scheme along with several schemes under the umbrella scheme called the umbrella icds and this umbrella icds includes and covers six schemes that is angan vadi services scheme portion abhiyan that is national nutrition mission pradhan mantri matru vandhanayojana the scheme for adolescent girls national creche scheme and the child protection services scheme so the umbrella of icds covers all these now for the financial year 2021 2022 the ministry has regrouped these schemes along with the other schemes now under saksham angan vadi and portion 2.0 four schemes under the umbrella icds has been clubbed they are angan vadi services portion abhiyan the scheme for adolescent girls and the national creche scheme and the remaining two schemes of the umbrella icds they are included in the mission vatsalya and mission shakti so the child protection services scheme is included in the mission vatsalya pradhan mantri matru vandhanayojana is included in the mission shakti so child protection services scheme should not be in the answer so if you eliminate two from the option you can arrive at the correct answer that is option c all right this is a lengthy discussion factual discussion but very relevant discussion so you will have to keep it in mind you don't have a choice here so with that let's wrap up our practice preliminary question session so that is all for our discussion today here are some of the main questions inspired from our discussion today write the answers and post it in the comments section see writing answers is very important for your gs preparation see this will also help you in the essay paper all right so write the answers and post it in the comments section let's wrap up our discussion for today wear mask get vaccinated stay safe good day