 Good evening, aspirants. Welcome to the Hindi news analysis by Shankar A.C academy. These are the articles that has been chosen for today's analysis. The link for the handwritten notes in the PDF format and the timestamping for the displayed articles is given in the description box below. And for the benefit of smartphone users, it is also provided in the comments section. Let's move on to the first article analysis. Our first discussion for today is based on this picture. Every day we are seeing many topics based on quality, international relations, economics etc. But we are not giving much focus to history of India. So, today we will be discussing this topic which comes under the cultural history of India and Indian art forms. This picture is depicting the art form of Kalari Payattu. This Kalari Payattu is a traditional martial art form of Kerala. In Malayalam, Kalari means open space or gymnasium or battleground. And Payattu means exercise in arms to practice to become trained or to be accustomed. This martial art form is a scientific heritage of Kerala. It is considered among the oldest and most scientific martial arts in the world. It is lauded as the pride of Kerala. It is acknowledged and respected across the world also. Even according to Japanese experts, Kalari Payattu is the mother of all martial arts like Karate, Judo, Kung Fu and even Thai leg boxing. And they say these martial arts have roots from Kalari Payattu. Some historians trace the history of Kalari Payattu to the 11th century when there was a major war between the Cholas and Cheras. Some historians say it is practiced for more than 500 years and it traces its divine origin to Parashurama. Here Parashurama is the sixth avatar of Lord Vishnu as per Hindu mythology and Puranas. Historians say that Parashurama created this dynamic art of offense and defense for all the people. Actually there are northern and southern styles in Kalari Payattu but the Kalari Payattu tradition of north Malabar in Kerala is the most renowned one. According to the government sources, Kalari Payattu is mainly practiced by the members of Nair and the other castes in Kerala. The primary aim of this martial art is the ultimate coordination between mind and body. Another focus of Kalari Payattu is specialization in indigenous medicinal practices. It is said that the Kalari Payattu warriors long ago had amazing control over their bodies and they were skilled in armed and unarmed combat as well as they were skilled in traditional health care. It is because all Kalari Payattu students have to go through rigorous physical training in order to master these skills of the art. Along with this medicinal oil massage is also an integral part of Kalari Payattu and its system of treatment has close links with Ayurveda and this treatment is known as Kalari treatment. Actually the training of Kalari Payattu begins with an oil massage of entire body until the body is agile and supple. Here agile means able to move quickly and supple means flexible and this art form includes feats or stunts like chattom that is jumping then otom means running and then marichil which means somersault. These are integral parts of this art form and then it also includes the lessons on using weapons like swords, daggers, spears, mesas, bows and arrows. Based on this there are different techniques of Kalari Payattu like May Payattu which means physical body exercise then Vadi Payattu which means fighting using sticks and then Val Payattu which means fighting using swords and then Virum Kai Prayoga which means bare hand exercise. Now since Virum Kai Prayoga is a bare hand exercise it is a technique in which weapons are not used. Through this exercise the person gets the willpower and physique to deal with armed opponents and through this technique concentration and flexibility are developed in the training. Then there is also a stage in Kalari Payattu which is known as Vaithari. It means oral commands. It is the most important stage in Kalari Payattu training. The Kalari Aasan or the Kalari Teacher controls the movements of the performers through Vaithari and this Vaithari has a rhythm of its own. Now just now we saw that there is a Kalari treatment. It is actually known as Kalari Chikitsa and according to historians and researchers this treatment is based on Ayurveda and yoga and this treatment includes different branches such as Marma Chikitsa, Chauti Tirumal and then Vyayama Chikitsa. Here Marma Chikitsa means the treatment of vital parts of the body and then Chauti Tirumal means massage by food pressure and Vyayama Chikitsa means physical exercise. Actually if you see this art form is practiced by both boys and girls without any gender discrimination. The boys and girls in their childhood itself would be sent to the Kalaris for practicing but since there is lot of changes in the social life nowadays the position of Kalaris and their influence has changed over time. So today Kalari Payattu is staged during festivals and on other occasions as a showpiece only and even today people are more interested in the Kalari treatment and Marma Chikitsa rather than on the martial art form. So these are the points that you should know from the examination point of view based on Indian culture and further you should also remember that Kalari Payattu is chosen as one of the disciplines to provide regular training to the talented sports persons under the indigenous games and martial arts scheme. As the name suggests it aims to preserve and promote the indigenous sports in the country. So in order to revive the indigenous games and to promote them among the masses the sports authority of India has adopted some indigenous games disciplines for their promotion and among them is Kalari Payattu from Kerala and then there is also Silambam from Tamil Nadu then Kabaddi from Telangana then Archery from Jharkhand then Malkhamb from Maharashtra then Mukna from Impal then Tangta from Impal then Komlainai from Assam and then Ghatka from Punjab and also know that this scheme is a sub-scheme of national sports talent contest. This national sports talent contest scheme is being implemented to search sports talent in the age group of 8 to 14 years from schools and also to nurture them into future medal hopes and this will be done by providing scientific training to the selected children. Under this scheme schools having good sports infrastructure and record of incredible sports performance are adopted by the sports authority of India. The scheme enables the budding sports persons that is the young sports person to study and play in the same school. Under this scheme some distinct sub-schemes were also launched and one of the sub-schemes is the indigenous games and martial arts and then you should also know that Kalari Payattu as a discipline is supported under the promotion of rural and indigenous or tribal games. This promotion of rural and indigenous or tribal games comes under the Kelo India scheme and it has been implemented by the government of India for promoting rural and indigenous or tribal sports through identification of talent and by provision of grant to those sports and these grants will enable them to meet the expenditure on equipment, apparel, coaches training program, then infrastructure development. It will also help to meet the salary requirements of national sports federation appointed coaches and it will also help to provide scholarships for meritorious trainees who are recommended by national sports federation and presently under this scheme Kalari Payattu has also been identified as a discipline for support by the government. So these are the information that you should know about Kalari Payattu from examination point of view. With this we come to the end of this discussion. Moving on to the next news article discussion which is about the recent RBA notification on large cooperative banks. The syllabus that can be linked to this discussion is given here for your reference. The news article mentions that the Reserve Bank of India has directed large cooperative banks that is the primary urban cooperative banks to report all the exposures of rupees five crore and more to the central repository of information on large credits or in short CRILC. If you see currently the urban cooperative banks are not a part of the CRILC reporting framework but now it has been decided by the RBA that the UCBs which have total assets of rupees 500 crore and above and the UCBs which have an aggregate exposure of rupees five crore and above should be included under the CRILC reporting framework. This decision was taken by the RBA during the bimonthly monetary policy committee meeting that was held this month. Here we have also given the RBA notification for your reference. So now in the context of this news article we need to understand what do we mean by large cooperative banks then what is meant by exposure and then what is this central repository CRILC. First let us see about large cooperative banks. The large cooperative banks come under the urban cooperative banks. The urban cooperative banks refer to primary cooperative banks which are located in urban and semi urban areas. These urban cooperative banks were allowed to lend money only for non-agricultural purposes till 1996 but today their scope of operation has widened considerably and as you know apart from the cooperative banks we have commercial banks non-banking financial companies and then all India financial institutions. Now these urban cooperative banks are registered as cooperative societies under the provisions of either the state cooperative societies act of the state that is concerned or under the provisions of multi-state cooperative societies act of 2002. Now these urban cooperative banks are regulated and supervised by the registrar of cooperative societies in case of the state which is concerned and at the central level they are regulated and supervised by the central register of cooperative societies. Now here you should note one point initially the banking laws were not applicable to the urban cooperative banks. The banking laws have been applicable to the urban cooperative banks since March 1, 1966 only. So this has led to duality of control of the urban cooperative banks. Here duality of control means both the RBA and the registrar of cooperative societies control the functions of urban cooperative banks. So in this scenario the RBA regulates and supervises the banking functions of UCBs under the Banking Regulation Act of 1949. In addition to this RBA has been vested with powers to issue license to the UCBs to carry on banking business and also to open new places of businesses such as opening new branches etc. And this Banking Regulation Act of 1949 also mentions that the periodical returns of these urban cooperative banks have to be submitted to the RBA. And further RBA also issues directions and operational instructions to these UCBs. And this is done whenever there is a necessity to streamline the functioning of UCBs and also to protect the interests of depositors. Now based on this only now the RBA has directed the urban cooperative banks to report all exposures of rupees 5 crore and more to the CRILC that is Central Repository of Information on Large Credits. So this was about the urban cooperative banks. Now let us see what do we mean by aggregate exposure. See in banking terms exposure means risk that is exposure is the maximum amount of money that will be lost if the borrower defaults on a loan. For example if a bank has made short-term loan of 2 crores and long-term loan of 7 crores to an entity then its exposure to that transaction is rupees 9 crores. Now in this context aggregate exposure includes all fund-based exposure and non-fund-based exposure. And this non-fund-based exposure includes investment exposure on the borrower. See here the fund-based exposure involves the credit that is offered by the banks in the form of loans, overdrafts and other cash transactions. But the non-fund-based exposure does not involve funds or cash transactions rather it involves bonds, letters of guarantee, letters of credits and so on. And we saw that investment exposure comes under non-fund-based exposure. This investment exposure represents the amount of money that the investor could lose on an investment. For example a particular asset like stock. So this was about the aggregate exposure and from now onwards the urban cooperative banks which have aggregate exposure of rupees 5 crore and above will also come under the CRILC reporting framework. So now what do we mean by this CRILC reporting framework? As we know it stands for central repository of information on large credits. It was set up by RBI in 2014 to 15. It is a database which contains credit information from all scheduled commercial banks and it excludes the regional rural banks that is RRBs and then it includes four all India financial institutions that is NABARD, Exim Bank that is Export-Import Bank, then National Housing Bank and then Small Industrial Development Bank of India and then it also includes NBFCs that is Non-Banking Financial Companies. Now under this CRILC reporting framework lenders need to report credit information including classification of an account as special mention account and it has to be reported on all borrowers having an aggregate exposure of rupees 5 crore and above. Now here a special mention account is a form of stressed asset and there are three special mention accounts. They are special mention account 0 or SMA0 then SMA1 and SMA2. If the payment is overdue for a period of 1 to 30 days then the asset comes under SMA0 category. If the payment is overdue for a period of 31 to 60 days then the asset comes under SMA1 category and if the payment is overdue for a period of 61 to 90 days then the asset comes under the SMA2 category. Now also know that this CRILC is maintained by the RBI so it facilitates a regulatory oversight of the system by giving a birds eye view that is by giving a overall view of the system wide credit risk. In simple words we can say that it provides for an overall view of the credit risk in the system and hence by this the health of the large and systemically important financial institutions is effectively monitored by the central bank that is RBI. And further the CRILC has two main objectives. First is to strengthen the off-site supervision. Here off-site supervision simply means that the reports and statistical data of the entities are collected monitored and evaluated of the site that is they will be collected monitored and evaluated in a centralized database of the financial entities as a whole. And the other objective is that it provides for an early recognition of financial distress. So now how this CRILC data helps the lenders? See currently the credit information is available across multiple systems in bits and pieces and it is not available in one single window. So many a times the lenders are dependent upon the borrower for providing key information because there is a lack of credit registry. And even after that a complete debt snapshot or a debt picture of the borrower is not currently available to the lenders. Now this problem is removed by CRILC because as we saw CRILC is simply a database which includes details of SMA0, SMA1 and SMA2 and it includes the details of defaulters along with the borrower details. So this gives a larger picture of the borrower's liabilities across the banking system. So this facilitates early identification of stress in the account and hence it enables the banks to take pre-emptive steps to safeguard their interests. Now suddenly why this framework was extended to the urban cooperative banks? It is because of the irregularities at Punjab and Maharashtra cooperative bank. Recently it was alleged that the Punjab and Maharashtra cooperative bank has been hiding bad loans for a long time. It was said that around 2500 crore of exposure to the housing development and infrastructure limited group was left unnoticed in the annual audit of RBI. So to curb these kinds of issues in the future and to ensure the health of the banking system RBI has announced this move. So based on this the UCBs will be required to submit the CRILC report on a quarterly basis and this will be effective from December 31st 2019. So that is all about this news article. So in this news article we discussed about urban cooperative banks then about the credit reporting framework CRILC and we also saw how it is useful for the lenders. With this we come to the end of this news article discussion. The split practice question will be discussed in the last session. Moving on to the next news article discussion. This news article mentions that Indian income tax department has exchanged information with seven countries. The exchanged information is with respect to the alleged undisclosed foreign income and assets by the members of family of Mukesh Ambani. In the news article we can find the mention of double tax avoidance agreements and antimony laundering and countering the financing of terrorism pact. Then we can also see the mention of automatic exchange of information pact. Then the article also mentions the black money undisclosed foreign income and assets and imposition of tax act of 2015. Then we can also find the mention of Cayman Islands. Now all these terms and packs are important from the examination point of view. So we will discuss about these terms and packs in this discussion. Before that the syllabus that can be linked to this discussion is given here for your reference. So first let us see about the double taxation and what do we mean by double taxation avoidance settlement. Now imagine that an Indian company has its operations in a foreign country. Based on the Indian tax provisions and rules the company is required to pay taxes to the Indian government for the income that is generated in the foreign country. But at the same time the company will also be required to pay taxes in the foreign country where the company is carrying out its operations and this tax is to be paid according to the tax laws of that particular country. Now this means that the company has to pay income tax to Indian government and also to the government of another country for the income earned in that country. Now this is called as double taxation. This double taxation is seen as a harassment among those companies that are carrying out operations in the foreign countries. It is because for single income they have to pay taxes for two nations. So there was a demand to avoid double taxation in order to accommodate this demand for these two countries can sign an agreement so that this double taxation can be modified or removed. Now such an agreement is called as double taxation avoidance agreement. So how India is able to carry out such agreements with other countries? Do we have any law that talks about double taxation relief? Actually if you see we do have a law under the chapter nine of income tax act of 1961 this chapter deals with double taxation relief and section 90 clause one of this income tax act mentions that the central government may enter into an agreement with the government of any country outside India for grant of relief with respect to double taxation and the section 90 also states that India can sign an agreement to deal with the exchange of information for the prevention of evasion or avoidance of income tax that is chargeable under the income tax act and such agreement may also deal with the exchange of information for the investigation of cases of such income tax evasion or avoidance and that agreement can also deal with the recovery of income tax for Indian government from the Indian company that is holding operations in the foreign country. And here you should note that India has double taxation avoidance agreements with many countries. Now let us see why this agreement is mentioned in the news article. There are allegations that members of Mukesh Ambani family have undisclosed foreign income and assets in some of the countries. Now if this is true then it means that there is tax evasion from the side of the family members of Mukesh Ambani. If the allegations are true then what could be the reasons that someone is hiding their assets and income to their home government. Actually there could be many reasons and one of such reason is to evade tax paying to the Indian government and if there is an undisclosed income to the Indian government this means they are having unaccounted unrecorded and unreported or undisclosed income and assets. Now such incomes and assets are known as black money. Now if you see the preamble of black money undisclosed foreign income and assets and imposition of tax act of 2015 it mentions that undisclosed foreign income and assets as black money. That is why we are saying it is a black money. And this particular act actually deals with the procedure for dealing with such incomes and assets and it also provides for the imposition of tax on any undisclosed foreign income and asset that is held outside India. So this was about the double taxation, double taxation, avoidance, agreement and then the black money act of 2015. Now if you look at the news article, the article also mentions about the agreement with respect to anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism. Now this can be done in two ways. One way is that the provisions of anti-money laundering can be added with the existing double taxation avoidance agreements with other countries. The provisions for countering terrorist financing could be brought up in these same double taxation avoidance agreements or they could be brought up in a separate agreement or also in a separate memorandum of understanding under counter terror cooperation. Now here chances are there that once assets and income become unaccounted and unreported then these assets and income could be later shown as legitimate income as earned by a person or a company. Now this way of showing illegitimately earned money as legitimately earned money is called as money laundering and also such unaccounted or undisclosed assets and income could be diverted for various illegal and underground operations and one such example for underground financial operations is the financing of terrorist activities. Then after this the news article mentions about another pact which is called as automatic exchange of information pact. Here actually the pact refers to two things. One is the bilateral agreement on automatic exchange of financial information and the other one is the multilateral competent authority agreement on automatic exchange of financial account information. These agreements were brought into action to combat the problem of offshore tax evasion and avoidance and the agreements were also brought to combat the problem of stashing or hoarding of unaccounted money abroad. Now here offshore tax evasion with respect to our country refers to the tax evasion done by Indians in a foreign country. Now in this discussion let us mainly focus on the multilateral competent authority agreement on automatic exchanges of financial account information. See for countering challenges such as countering offshore tax evasion and countering hiding of assets and income in foreign country requires cooperation amongst tax authorities of different countries. So the G20 and OECD countries have worked together to develop a common reporting standard on automatic exchange of information. This common reporting standard on automatic exchange of information was presented to G20 leaders in Brisbane in November 2014. Now as per this common reporting standard the financial institutions of the source jurisdiction has to collect and report information about the residents of other countries. This information has to be sent to the source tax authorities. Such information reported to the tax authorities in the source country has to be transmitted to the destination countries automatically on a yearly basis. So here what do we mean by source destination resident of other countries etc. Here source refers to the place where the income is generated. For example if a US citizen starts a business in India then the source country is India. So Indian financial institutions will report financial information regarding this person and company to Indian tax authorities and then the Indian government will forward such financial details about this US citizen and the company to the United States automatically on a yearly basis. Here the US citizen is not a resident or citizen of India but he or she is the resident or citizen of other country which is the United States in this case. Now similarly US will also share information about the financial information of Indians and their companies to the Indian government on yearly basis automatically that is without any request from Indian side. So if we ask is there any commitment to implement common reporting standards on automatic exchange of information actually yes there is a commitment that is ensured by the international agreement which is called as multilateral competent authority agreement on automatic exchange of financial account information. According to this agreement two or more parties can mutually agree to exchange information automatically and such exchange of information will be on a bilateral basis between the competent authorities of the government. Now with respect to this agreement know that India is a signatory to this agreement and India is one of the early adopters of this common reporting standards and India has also committed to exchange information automatically by 2017. So this was about the agreements mentioned in the news article. Now the news article also mentions about an island known as Cayman Islands. Now whenever such islands or name of countries is mentioned in a news article you should immediately refer to your at least to know where that country is or where that island is on which ocean like that that is you should know about the geographical aspects of such territory. Now in this case the territory of Cayman Islands consists of free islands Grand Cayman, Cayman Braque and Little Cayman all the three islands are located below the United States as you can see in this picture and these Cayman Islands are located in the Caribbean Sea and also know that this territory is located above the equator and this Cayman Islands territory is a British overseas territory and one interesting fact that you can note with respect to this Cayman Island is that there is no river in any of these islands. So these are the geographical aspects that you should know with respect to Cayman Islands. So in this discussion we discussed about double taxation, double taxation relief, double taxation, avoidance agreement and we also discussed about the Black Many Act of 2015 and also about multilateral competent authority agreement on automatic exchange of financial account information and finally we saw about the Cayman Islands. With this we come to the end of this news article discussion that is a quick practice question will be discussed in the last session. Moving on to the next news article discussion which is about the recently released 20th edition of financial stability report of RBI. The syllabus that can be linked to this discussion is given here for your reference. In the context of this news article let us first see about the financial stability report. Now this report is released by the Reserve Bank of India and it is released once in every six months that is it is released in the months of June and December every year. This report is based on the collective assessment of the members of subcommittee of financial stability and development council. Now this subcommittee comes under the financial stability and development council and the subcommittee is headed by the governor of RBI. Now this financial stability report can be divided into four parts. First the overall assessment of the systemic risks then global and domestic macro financial risks and then the performance and risks of the financial institutions and then regulations and developments in financial sector. So before discussing about this report let us first understand few banking terms to understand the news article. Now one search term is the non-performing assets or NPA. Now we know that the loans or advances that are made by banks are called as assets because they generate income for the banks in the form of interests but what if the loan turns bad or what if the banks are not getting interest or principal amount from the borrower after the due date then the loans are no more assets for the banks and according to the RBI all advances where interests or principal remains due for more than 90 days such advances will be classified as non-performing assets or NPAs. Now the sum of all such assets which are classified as non-performing assets is known as gross NPA and the ratio of this gross NPA to the gross loans or advances made by the bank is known as the gross NPA ratio. So keep these terms in mind. The news article mentions that the GNPA ratio or the gross NPA ratio of the scheduled commercial banks may increase to 9.9% by September 2020. Now as per September 2019 the GNPA ratio of scheduled commercial banks is 9.3% only. So this means the non-performing assets will increase and eventually that means more loans would turn bad in the future. Now if we consider the public sector banks according to the financial stability report the GNPA ratio may increase to 13.2% by September 2020 and according to September 2019 for public sector banks the GNPA ratio was 12.7% only and such kind of increase is also seen in private banks foreign banks etc. For private banks it may increase to 4.2% from 3.9% and for foreign banks it may increase to 3.1% from 2.9%. So all these indicates that all types of banks will be under stress from rising NPAs in the coming period. So what are the reasons for the worsening GNPA ratio? For this the report gives few reasons. Firstly this is due to the changing macroeconomic situation. We know that generally the global economy and in particular our economy is facing a slow down and it has an adverse effect on the profitability of the firms and thus it increases the non-performing assets. And the second reason is the impact of declining credit growth. Here credit growth means providing loans for private sector individuals organizations etc. So when there is a decline in credit growth it means not much loans are provided for the private sector or to the individuals or organizations. So when the overall credit flow has not picked up it affects the overall investment in the economy and hence it affects the production and profitability of the firms. So this further leads to increase in non-performing assets. Then the third reason is the marginal increase in slippage. Here by slippage we mean the slippage ratio. Slippage ratio is the rate at which good loans are turning bad. See when the economy is stable and growing the borrowers are able to pay back the loans. But when the economy is volatile or unstable it affects their business which in turn results in non-payment of loans. Hence the increase in slippage ratio could be because of the present volatility in the economy. So these were the few reasons given by the report for the worsening of GNPA ratio. Then after this the report mentions about the provision coverage ratio. It mentions that the provision coverage ratio or PCR of all scheduled commercial banks rose to 61.5 percentage in September 2019. It has increased from 60.5 percentage in March 2019. Now this PCR gives an indication of the provision made by the banks against bad loans from its funds and it is made mostly from the profit that is generated by the banks. So when there is high PCR there is lesser unexposed part of the bad debts. So hence the increase in PCR implies an increased resilience of the banking sector. Here resilience means the ability to manage and come out if loans are defaulted. So an increase in PCR means more money is provided to cover possible default. Then after this if you look at the news article it mentions about the capital to risk weighted assets ratio or the capital adequacy ratio. This capital to risk weighted assets ratio that is CRAR is the capital that is needed for a bank which is measured in terms of assets or loans dispersed by the banks. So higher the assets higher should be the capital of the banks. Now as the name indicates CRAR measures the capital adequacy in terms of the riskiness of the loans that is given. For example the riskiness of giving loans to government is zero. Hence banks need not keep any capital while giving loans to the government but there is a risk when the loans are given to the real estate sector. Hence there is a capital to risk weighted assets ratio or CRAR for such loans. Now according to the financial stability report the CRAR of scheduled commercial banks has improved to 15.1 percentage in September 2019 and it was 14.3 percentage in March 2019. Now for the public sector banks again this CRAR it has improved to 13.5 percentage from 12.2 percentage during the same period. Now according to the report this improvement in capital is mainly because of the recent recapitalization of banks by the government. Then the news article also mentions about the asset quality of agriculture and service sectors of the economy. See the asset quality measures the quality of an asset in terms of the credit risk associated with it. According to the report the asset quality of agriculture and services sectors as measured by the GNP ratios has deteriorated from March 2019 to September 2019. This means that the loans given to these sectors have more risk of becoming bad loans. Then after this news article also mentions about the credit quality of large borrowers. According to the financial stability report the share of large borrowers in banks total loan portfolios was 51.8 percentage and dear share in the GNPAs was 79.3 percentage in September 2019. Actually this has lowered when we compare this value with March 2019 and here you should also note one point the top 100 large borrowers accounted for 16.4 percentage of banks gross advances and they also accounted for 16.3 percentage of GNPAs. Then in the last part the news article talks about some of the measures that is needed to revive the falling economy and first and foremost is the need for good corporate governance including banks. Now in the recent past we have heard several news of corporate misgovernance. The latest example for this corporate misgovernance is the misgovernance reported in the crisis hit ILN FS. According to certain reports the board of management of the company did not even meet to discuss the issues faced by the company and also in addition to this several credit rating agencies had given a rate of good credit worthiness to this company. When there is a rate of good credit worthiness it means they have the ability to pay back loans but actually what happened was they were not able to pay back the loans. So this is also an example of misgovernance. Then another example of misgovernance is the Punjab National Bank fraud in which a businessman was given thousands of crores of rupees as loan without proper documents. So to revive the economy to its full potential these issues need to be resolved quickly. In addition to this consumption and investment should also be increased for ensuring sustainable growth of the economy. So that is what mentioned in this news article. With this we have come to the end of this discussion. Moving on to the next discussion this discussion is also a continuation with the first article with respect to financial stability report. According to this news article India's GDP growth has slowed to a 6 year low. In the second quarter of financial year 2019-20 the GDP growth has been recorded as 4.5 percentage and even recently the RBI has slashed or reduced its growth forecast regarding GDP to 5 percentage for the financial year 2019-20. But despite this in the financial stability report RBI has mentioned that even though there is a slow economic growth India's financial system remains stable. This is because the stability of the financial system got a boost as the resilience of the banking sector has improved due to the recapitalization of public sector banks by the center. This we discussed in the last news article. But still arising out of the global or domestic economic uncertainties and the geopolitical developments is a persisting issue in this regard. Now here by global economic uncertainty we mean the delay in Brexit deal then trade tensions between US and China then oil market disruptions etc. Now these have led to the significant deceleration in growth. These uncertainties have diminished the overall investment and growth. And even the financial stability report states that if these uncertainties are not properly addressed then they are likely to remain a key drag on global growth that is it will slow the global growth. These uncertainties were reflected in the Indian economy as well due to which the aggregate demand has come down. So that is what mentioned in this news article. With this we have come to the end of this discussion. Moving on to the next news article discussion. This article is also related to the financial stability report released by RBI. This news article mentions about the other aspects of the financial stability report. In the report it has been stated that the shortfall in government revenue is a cause of concern. So in this context the news article also mentions that the tax revenues and the non-tax revenues are way behind targets. And along with this we already have a weaker private consumption and investment. So both these issues could prove to be a challenge for the economy. And the news article also mentions that the budgeted expenditure of the government has crossed 107 percentage as of November 2019. So this means that the expenditure is more than the revenue that was generated. So this amounts to more fiscal deficit. We know that fiscal deficit is the shortfall in government's income compared with its pending. That is why the financial stability report also states that the shortfall in the government revenue is a cause of concern. And you would remember that in the budget 2019 to 2020 our government has set a target of 3.3 percentage for fiscal deficit. So if this present trend continues then it will be difficult for the government to achieve this 3.3 percentage target of fiscal deficit. In addition to this we know that GST is one of the main sources of revenue for the government. And according to this news article the GST collections have grown just 2.5 percent so far this year against an expected 14 percentage. So this means here also there is a loss of revenue for the government. And then in addition to this recently our government announced a massive corporate tax cut. And at that time itself it was estimated that this corporate tax cut will result in the loss of almost 1.45 lakh crore for the government. So as a whole tax and non tax revenues then weaker private consumption and investment increase in government's expenditure then less GST collections and then the loss caused due to corporate tax cut all these have resulted in the shortfall in government revenue altogether. So this means that the government has to be prudent or careful in spending. It is because a big part of its revenue is not getting generated. So to tackle this situation the government has to be careful in its spending. So that is what mentioned in this news article. With this we have come to the end of this discussion that is split practice question will be discussed in the last session. Moving on to the next discussion this news article talks about the extension of Barath stage 6 norms for quadricycles. The syllabus that is relevant for this discussion is given here for your reference. Before discussing about the news article let us first understand what do we mean by quadricycles. According to the government of India a quadricycle is a vehicle of the size of a three wheeler but with four tires and it is fully covered like a car and it has an engine like that of a three wheeler. Now because of these features a quadricycle is cheaper and safer mode of transport when it comes for last mile connectivity. So this is the simple definition about quadricycle but there are also other requirements to call a vehicle as a quadricycle such as the unmanned weight of the quadricycle has to be less than 475 kilograms etc. Now we also know that the government has announced that the fuel and emission standards will switch from BS4 standards to BS6 standards and this will come into effect from April 1, 2020. Now here BS stands for Barath stage. These Barath stage are the standards which are instituted by the government to regulate emission of smoke and air pollutants from motor vehicles. Now as these stages go up the control on emissions becomes stricter. So in the present case we can understand that the BS6 norms is stricter and environment friendly than the BS4 standards and also know that these standards are applicable for most of the vehicles except for few vehicles and one of the vehicles for which the government has not announced BS6 standards is the quadricycles. So this was the case until now but the present news or today's news is that the government is now proposing to bring the quadricycles under the ambit of BS6 standards and this will also be effective from April 1, 2020. For this the government has released draft rules to invite comments and suggestions. These draft rules aim to amend the rule 115 of the Central Motor Vehicles Rules of 1989. The proposed amendment prescribes the Barath stage 6 emission standards norms for quadricycle vehicles that are to be manufactured on or after 1st April 2020. So these are the information with reference to the draft rules. Now let us see how the fuel and emission standards are getting legal backing in our country. Now the legal backing is derived from the Motor Vehicles Act of 1988. Now in particular the section 110 of this act mentions that the central government may make rules for regulating the construction, equipment and maintenance of motor vehicles and trailers with respect to the emissions of smoke, the standards for emissions of air pollutants among other such standards. So based on this statutory provision the central government has made the central motor vehicle rules of 1989 and in these rules central government has prescribed the emission standards. Now under these rules the rule number 115 deals with the emission of smoke, vapor etc from motor vehicles. Actually the government has already amended this rule in 2016 to bring BS6 standards to various vehicles with effect from April 1, 2020. Now as we saw today's news is about the proposed amendment in the central motor vehicles rules to prescribe the emission standards for quadricycles. Now if after seeing the comments and suggestions from the public if the government decides to proceed with the amendment then it will make an amendment in rule 115 of the central motor vehicles rules and after that this rule will prescribe the emission standards for quadricycles also. So that was all about this news article. With this we have come to the end of news article discussion sessions. The displayed practice question will be discussed in the next session which is the practice questions discussion session. Look at this first question it is based on central repository of information on large credits reporting framework. First statement states it was set up by the central government in 2014 to 15. Now this statement is wrong because this reporting framework was set up by Reserve Bank of India and not by central government but it was set up in 2014 to 15 only. So since one half of the statement is wrong this whole statement is wrong. Now here question asks for the correct statement so you can eliminate option A and B because it contains statement 1 and you can also eliminate option D because it states all the above that means 1 2 and 3 and this also includes statement 1. So here the correct answer is option C 2 and 3 only that is C Y. The second statement states it is a database which contains credit information from the financial institutions across the country yes it is correct. This database contains credit information from all the scheduled commercial banks excluding the regional rural banks then it contains credit information of four all India financial institutions such as NABAR XM Bank NHB and SIDB and then it also includes credit information of systemically important NBFCs and our today's discussion was based on including the urban cooperative banks into this reporting framework so that is why statement 2 and 3 are correct. So now the primary cooperative banks or the urban cooperative banks which are having total assets of rupees 500 crore and above and which are having aggregate exposures of rupees 5 crore are mandated to report the credit information to the CRILC. Now look at this question three statements are given we have to choose the correct statement the first statement states the Cayman Islands territory is a British overseas territory yes this is a correct statement the second statement states the Cayman Islands consist of five islands see this Cayman Islands are located below the United States of America but it does not contain five islands it contains three islands it contains Grand Cayman Little Cayman and Cayman-Brack and in this the largest island is the Grand Cayman Island so the statement is wrong statement if you can find out that this statement is wrong then you can easily arrive at the option C1 only because all the other options contain statement 2. Now statement 3 is wrong because the equator does not pass through the largest island in Cayman Islands which is the Grand Cayman. Now this next question is based on multilateral competent authority agreement on automatic exchange of financial account information the first statement states the agreement helps the signatories to tackle tax avoidance and evasion and improve tax compliance this statement is correct because this agreement helps in tackling the income tax evasion or avoidance here the tax evasion refers to the offshore tax evasion as the signatories agree for automatic reporting of financial activities of citizens or their company of other signatories so there will be more tax compliance here tax compliance will be with respect to the income and assets that is generated in a foreign country now as signatories to this agreement countries need not have a separate bilateral agreement for automatic exchange of financial information of their respective residents or citizens so this statement is correct the second statement states India is not a signatory to this agreement this statement is incorrect because India is a signatory and according to the press information bureau India joined this international legal framework in 2015 here the question asks for the correct statement so the correct answer to this question is option a one only now this next question is based on financial stability and development council the first statement states it monitors macro potential supervision of the economy including functioning of large financial conglomerates and addresses inter-regulatory coordination and financial sector development issues yes this statement is correct it is the objective of this fsdc now the second statement states the governor of rba is the chairman of fsdc now this statement is wrong because the financial stability and development council is chaired by the minister of finance whereas the subcommittee of this fsdc is chaired by the governor of rba so don't confuse now here since the statement two is wrong you can eliminate option a b and d so the final correct answer to this question is option c one and three only now the third statement is correct because as we know financial stability report is released by annually that is two times in a year once in june and once in december and it is released by the subcommittee of fsdc now in this next question two statements are given and we have to choose the correct statement the first statement states the central mota vehicle rules 1989 prescribe standards with respect to the emission of smoke from the motor vehicles now this statement is correct because the rule 115 of these 1989 rules deals with the emission standards for smoke and air pollutants from motor vehicles and these rules were framed based on the power of central government to frame rules for such emission standards which is provided under section 110 of motor vehicles act of 1988 so this statement is correct the second statement mentions that the emission standards barat stage 6 for motor vehicles are a stricter and environment friendly than emission standards barat states 4 now this statement is also correct because with respect to the barat stage emission standards norms as we move from bs 4 to bs 6 the standards are stricter and they are environment friendly so here the question asks for the correct statement and here both the statements are correct so the final correct answer to this question is option c both 1 and 2 with this we have come to the end of today's hindi news analysis if you like the video don't forget to like comment and share and do subscribe to shankar ias academy youtube channel for more updates related to civil service examination preparation