 Good evening aspirants, welcome to the hindu news analysis by Shankar IS Academy for the date 21st of September 2022. Displayed here are the list of news articles we will be discussing today. Now let's start our discussion. Look at this beautiful image. This image portrays a scene from the celebration of Lancon festival. This festival is a crop festival celebrated by the Tiwa trades. During the annual festival, farmers pray for a good harvest. So, in this context let us learn few facts about the Tiwa trade. See Tiwa, who are also known as Lalung, is an indigenous community living in the states of Assam and Mahalaya. They are also found in some parts of Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nahalan. In terms of language, they belong to the Tibato-Burman linguistic group with inclination towards the Bodo-Nahar trades. They are recognized as a scheduled trade within the state of Assam. One important fact about the trade that you have to note here is that they are divided into two subgroups. They are the Hill Tiwa trades and the Plains Tiwa trades. Both have contrasting cultural features. First let us take the Hill Tiwa trade and see some of their important features. See the Hill Tiwa trade live in the western Morsi areas of the Karbi Anglang district in Assam. Look at this map here. This map shows the location in which the Karbi Anglang district is located. Now coming to the language. See the Hill Tiwa trade speak the Tibato-Burman language. See in case of their descent system, they follow ambillennial descent system that is the children they have the choice to be associated with their mothers or their fathers group. They also follow matri locality. Here matri locality mean a pattern of marriage in which the groom resides with the bride's parents. This is opposite to patri local marriage. In case of patri local marriage, the bride goes to live with the groom's parents. See in case of the Hill Tiwa trade, in most cases the husband goes to live with her wife's family settlement and their children are included in their mother's clan. This is a unique feature about the Hill Tiwa trade. No coming to the religion. See almost 50% of the Hill Tiwa tribes, they follow their traditional religion and their traditional religion is based on the worship of local deities. The other half of the Hill Tiwa tribe, they are converted to Christianity due to the missionary activities that started since the 1950s. So these are some of the unique features of the Hill Tiwa trade. Now moving on to the Plain Tiwas. They live in the flatlands on the southern banks of Brahmaputra valley. The vast majority of the Plain Tiwas, they speak asamis as their mother tongue. And their descent system is patrinial unlike the ambillennial descent system that is followed by the Hill Tiwa tribes. In case of religion, the Plain Tiwas, they follow a religion that is similar to the Asamis Hinduism. Although it is similar to the Asamis Hinduism, most of its features are quite distinct. So these are the two subtypes of the Hill Tiwa tribes. Now let us move on to the livelihood of the Hill Tiwa tribes. See they practice Jhummar shifting agriculture. See we know about Jhummar shifting cultivation rate. What happens here? First, a forest land is cleared and the debris are burnt and in that place agriculture is carried out. After the fertility in that area is exhausted, the people move to the other place and they clear the forest. See this method, although it is very exhaustive, the land that is freshly cleared has high fertility. Why? Because the ash that remains in the soil after the forest trip is burnt off has high potash content and potash is an important nutrient for agriculture. So the Jhum cultivation or the shifting cultivation followed by the Tiwa tribe results in soil having good fertility in the short run but over the time it has disastrous effect. This is about their livelihood. Finally before concluding, let us see some of the major festivals of the Tiwa tribes. See this is important for your prelims examination. This is because sometimes in the prelims examination they can ask match based question and ask us to match the tribe and their associated festival. So I am going to list out all the major festivals that are celebrated by the Tiwa tribes here. The festivals are Tri Pisu, Borod Utsav, Sogra Pooja, Vanchua, John Belmela, Kabla, Lankang Pooja and Yangli Pooja. See these are the major festivals of the Tiwa tribes. So that is all regarding this discussion. In this discussion we saw who are the Tiwa people and we saw the two sub types in the Tiwa tribes. The sub types are Hill Tiwas and the Plain Tiwas and we saw the unique distinctive features about these tribes. Then we saw about their livelihood and their festivals. That is all regarding this discussion. Now let us conclude this and take up the next news article. Take a look at this editorial article. Today the lead editorial is again about India's Diplomatic Policy. See in this week itself there were many editorials regarding India's changing foreign policy or India's changing diplomatic policy. So this is of very much importance. If you guys remember few days back on our 14th September news analysis, Radha Mam discussed about a new concept called All Alignment in India's Diplomatic Policy. Today's editorial is also about that only. We will see what the editorial has to say us and we will also see some of the basics as and when required. Before getting into the discussion I have highlighted here the syllabus in regards to this discussion. You can have it as a reference. Now let us start the discussion with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit in Uzbekistan. See this summit is a major turning point. Why is that? It is because the summit is like a trail run for the governments to deal with the current conflicts and create new guidelines for the future. All the Shanghai Cooperation Organization members were there in the summit. And we all know Iran recently signed a memorandum to become the permanent member of SEO. Now who are all the members of SEO? The members of SEO include China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, India, Pakistan and Iran. They are all permanent members of Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Now coming back. See as far as India is concerned our Prime Minister's presence in the meeting symbolizes India is decided to be part of both the blocks. What are all the blocks referred here? It is the western block led by USA and the eastern block led by China and Russia. See we all know India is part of the Quad and Quad includes USA, Japan, Australia and India. This group that is the Quad is formed to counter the dominated presence of China in the Indo-Pacific region. So it is safe to say India is part of both the rival groups. India is part of both the Quad which is led by the United States and it is also a part of Shanghai Cooperation Organization which is led by Russia and China. See this is how India is trying to be engaging with both the rival blocks at the same time it is not trying to offend both the blocks also. Now you may have a question why can't India choose a side? Take a moment here and think about whether India will choose a side or not. No, India will definitely not choose a side. Why is this? Because India is a propagator of non-alignment. Since independence India has been a supporter of non-alignment. But what has recently changed is during the non-alignment period what India did is it safely distanced itself from both the rival blocks. But currently India is trying to engage with both the blocks. But what it is doing is while engaging it is not openly supporting and openly offending both the blocks. It just want to engage and connect with both the rival blocks that is the west and the east. This is the new version of non-alignment and this is what the author in this editorial is discussing as multiple engagement concept. And this is what we saw in our 14th September analysis also under the head of all alignment policy. The idea behind the new policy is that India will steer its independent course despite open association with the rival blocks. This is the bedrock on which the new policy is that is multiple engagement and all alignment policy is built on. See if you have clearly noticed the SEO summit you can actually see this all alignment policy or the multiple engagement policy in its implementation stage. We all know that India refused to take a stand regarding the Russia-Ukraine conflict right? But in the summit our prime minister said this is not an era of war rather it is an era of democracy dialogue and diplomacy. So what does this imply? It implies that India has not offended Russia by condemning its action in Ukraine. At the same time it has not offended the United States and the West by not entirely ignoring Russian actions in Ukraine. See how diplomatically India handled the situation. This is what multi engagement or all alignment policy is about. India expressed mild disapproval which didn't often both the sides. At the same time as a soothing factor our prime minister also thanked both Russia and Ukraine for the safe evacuation of Indian students from Ukraine. Here also India is playing its diplomatic card. This act in the SEO summit highlights India's current posture of equidistance from both the rival blocks. Now think about this. Why should India go through all this? Why should it walk on eggshells around the rival blocks? See we had been following non-alignment in the past but the larger opinion is that the non-alignment concept did not succeed. So a way has to be found for the multiple engagements of the future and India's presence in the SEO summit is like a test run for the multiple engagement or the all alignment strategy. See we don't know whether this strategy will succeed or not but it will definitely help India play a much bigger role in managing future conflicts that will arise. And this strategy is a work in progress. Here the author is of the opinion that this multiple engagement policy is rather a passive one. Here also the author highlights the example of Russia-Ukrain conflict. As I already said India abstained from voting the resolutions against Russia in the United Nations. What the author feels is that India's act of abstaining from voting hardly does anything in reality. This is what the author of this editorial highlights as a issue with India's all alignment policy or multiple engagement policy. The other issue with the all alignment or the multiple engagement policy is that this may look better on paper than in reality. See what India is trying to do with this policy? India is trying to engage with both the countries that is the United States and the eastern block led by China and Russia and India is trying to stay neutral between the both countries. See what happens when we stay neutral when we stay neutral sometimes both the countries that is both the United States and Russia will view us in a suspicious way. At least if we choose a particular side that side we will have a strong ally. But if we stay neutral what happens is we will sometimes we may lose both the allies. So this is also an issue with the all alignment or multiple engagement policy of India. See having seen the issues with the India's foreign policy now let us see what India has to do to address the issues. First of all India should look into the relationship with Iran. See going through in fear of the threat of US sanctions India stopped the imports of crude oil from Iran. Financially this measure of stopping crude oil import from Iran has caused our country very dearly and we lost the accessibility of the Chabar port also and we know the importance of Chabar port right only through Chabar port India planned to create an alternative route for accessing Afghanistan without having go through Pakistan. But an improvement happened in the SEO summit. In the SEO summit Iran's president suggested a summit with India. So the ball is on India's court now India can either engage with Iran or India can side with US and stop its engagement with Iran. Okay so what is definitely happening here India should choose a side. India should either choose the United States or stay with Iran. This is the first thing moving on the second thing is regarding the relationship with China and the author is of the opinion that our relationship with China should be reviewed. See China poses a near threat problem for India we are near term problem this is because of the standoff at the line of actual control. So what should be done here India's foreign policy should be creative enough to leave an opening for an improvement in India-China relationship over a long term. The author of the article is saying that India should look for opportunities. According to the author the best time to improve the relationship with China is when Chinese economy is beginning to slow and Indian economy is beginning to rise. Why is this a best time according to the author? See the current aggressive behavior of China is partly due to the dominating role China plays in the global trade. So when the Chinese economy is stalling China will not act very aggressively in its foreign policy. See what is happening currently after post pandemic by and large Chinese economy has slowed down and Indian economy is moving. So according to the author this is the right window for engaging with China and bringing about a smooth resolution of dispute between India and China. This is the second important step that India has to take to address its issue in the foreign policy. Now moving on the last thing is regarding nuclear angle. See in the South Asian region three nuclear superpowers are there. There is India, there is Pakistan and there is China. India firmly adheres to the policy of no first use doctrine that is India will not use its nuclear power at the first inputs. But China and Pakistan has not officially stated this as their doctrine. So the author is of the opinion that even though India can be defensive at times India must increase its nuclear power to stay aggressive and match with the Chinese and the Pakistani situation. This is the third step that India has to take to address its issue in its foreign policy. So these are the some of the major points highlighted by the author in the editorial. Now let us say a question is asked in the mains regarding the evolving diplomatic policy or the evolving foreign policy of India. Then what you can do is you can very well write all the points that we discussed in the first part of the discussion in your answer. We discussed about India's desire, India's past foreign policy that is the non alignment, the need for change and what are the advantages and disadvantages of the all alignment and the multiple engagement policy right. All these points can be used in your mains answer when the question is regarding India's evolving diplomatic or foreign policy. Now coming to the second part of the discussion. See in the second part we saw some of the issues with the India's foreign policy and what steps India can take to address it. These points can also be utilized in your mains answer when the question is asked to critically analyze the changing diplomatic policy of India. This is how you have to be innovative and use the points that we discuss in our discussion in your mains answer. I hope this discussion was helpful. So that's all regarding this discussion. In this discussion we saw about the all alignment or the multiple engagement policy of India. We also saw two issues with the current foreign policy of India. Finally we saw three suggestions that India must incorporate in its foreign policy to address the current diplomatic issues of India. So with this let us conclude this discussion and take up the next news article. Take a look at this editorial page article. It reports about the recent spat between the governor and the chief minister of Kerala. The article says that the reason for the tussle is regarding the appointment of the wife of chief minister's personal secretary as an assistant professor in the Kannur university. Here note that the governor is the chancellor of all universities in the state of Kerala and the governor of Kerala has raised objections to this particular appointment. This is the crux of the article given here. Let us take this opportunity to revise about the governor. Through this discussion we will see about the constitutional powers of the governor and we will also see some of the discretionary powers tied to the office of governor. Before getting into the discussion I have highlighted here the syllabus regarding this discussion you can go through it. First let us compare the constitutional powers of both the governor and the president to get a comparative understanding. Here we are going to look at two different articles with respect to the governor and the president. Let us take article 74 and article 163. What does article 74 say? It says that the president should act in accordance with the advice of the prime minister and his council of ministers. Now let us look at the article 163. Article 163 says that the governor should act in accordance with the advice of the chief minister and his or her council of ministers except in certain cases where he or she can use his discretion. Through this comparison we can see that governor has some extra discretionary power accorded to him by the constitution itself. Now let us see the other constitutional discretionary powers of governor. First the governor has the discretionary power to reserve a bill passed by the legislature of the state for the consideration of president. For example recently the need exception bill passed by the Tamil Nadu legislature was reserved for the consent of president by the governor of the state. This is the first constitutional discretionary power of the governor. The second is that the governor acts in his or her discretion in case of recommendation of president's rule in the state under article 356. The third discretionary power is that the governor can exercise discretion by asking for specific information regarding administrative and legislative matters of the state. See these are some cases of discretionary powers of governor according to the Indian constitution. In addition to these constitutional discretionary powers the governor also has some situational discretionary power like that of the president. Let us see some of the situational discretionary power of governor. The first one is regarding the appointment of chief minister in case of a hung assembly. Here hung assembly means an assembly where there is no clear majority. In such case the governor can appoint a person as chief minister and then later ask him to prove majority in the assembly. This is the first situational discretionary power of governor. The second is dismissal of the council of ministers when they cannot prove majority in the assembly. This is also a situational discretionary power of governor. Having seen the situational discretionary powers of the office of governor finally let us see the few recommendations of some center state commissions with respect to the relationship between the governor and the state government. See this Kerala issue between the governor and the chief minister is not a one-off issue. In addition to this in various cases there has been issues between the governor and the state government. The recent examples include tussle between the governor and chief minister in West Bengal, in Maharashtra and even in Tamil Nadu. So to address this tussle between the governor and the chief minister some recommendations by sarkarya commission and punji commissioner given. Now let us see the recommendations. First let us take sarkarya commission. One of the major recommendation of this commission is that the chief minister of the state should be consulted before the appointment of the governor. Okay see this will avoid most of the tussle between the governor and the chief minister because when the governor is appointed after consulting with the chief minister the future tussle will be avoided. The second major recommendation is that the tenure of the governor should not be disturbed except for some compelling reasons. See in most of the cases what happens is that in the center when new government is formed what happens is the new government dismisses or removes the governors appointed by the previous government. So to keep their position stable the governors will become puppets to the central government. So to avoid this the sarkarya commission said that the tenure of the governor should not be disturbed except for some compelling reason. These are the two main recommendations of sarkarya commission. Now moving on to the punji commission. The punji commission gave recommendation regarding article 163. We just now discussed about article 163 right. Punji commission said that article 163 doesn't give the governor the general discretionary power to act against the advice of council of minister. It noted that the area of excess of discretion is limited and even in this limited area the governor should not be arbitrary or fanciful. See in all cases that is in Kerala in Tamil Nadu in Maharashtra and in West Bengal the tussle between the governor and the state government happened because using this provision that is using article 163 the governor were using their discretionary power. So if the discretionary power of the governor is limited the tussle would not be happening. This is why punji commission recommended this. They recommended the discretionary power should be used in a limited area and that too in the limited area it should not be used in an arbitrary or fanciful manner. Another important recommendation or the suggestion of the punji commission was the person who is to be chosen as a governor should not have taken part in politics generally and particularly in recent past. See this recommendation is also very important if a person from a political background that too in the recent part is appointed as a governor he will reflect his political ideologies while acting as the governor. When this appointment is avoided the tussle and the reflection of political ideology while acting as the governor can be avoided. So we saw some of the recommendations by the Sarkarya and the punji commission to avoid the tussle between the state government and the state governor. See this topic that we just discussed is very important because no matter what there will be a constant tussle between the governor and the state government and this will always be in use. So we can always expect a question from this in our means examination. So note down all the points we discussed today it will be very helpful for you. So that's all regarding this discussion. In this discussion we saw the constitutional discretionary power and the situational discretionary power of the governor and we also saw some of the recommendations by the Sarkarya and punji commission to avoid the conflict between the governor and the state government. With this let us conclude this discussion and move on to the next news article. Look at this image. What do you see in this image? A dead whale right? The article mentions that 14 young sperm whales were found beached off the coast of Australia. So in this discussion we are going to see about whale beaching and its causes. See whale beaching or standing is nothing but a phenomenon in which whales and dolphins strand themselves on land usually on a beach. This phenomenon is also called as catechian standing. This is because catechians are an entirely aquatic order of mammals and whales belong to this catechians order. Now we know what is whale beaching. So we shall move on to see the causes of whale beaching. See several reasons have been proposed for whale beaching but none have been universally accepted as a definitive reason for this behavior. See whales are guided by their own sonar. What is sonar? Sonar is a technology in which sound waves are emitted and based on the reflection of the sound waves the position of the object can be found. And whales use this technology to find whether they are in the shoreline or in the open seas. Sometimes what happens is when the shoreline is very gently sloping the beach cannot differentiate it from the open sea and due to this defect they can beach themselves. This is what happened in the golden beach in username. Okay moving on. The whales when they get sick they beach themselves. So illness is also a reason for whale beaching. And as we all know whales are a social animal. They travel in pods and pod is a group of whale. What happens is most of the time when there is a sick whale the leader of the pod will guide the whale and in some cases when they are not able to guide the sick whale gets lost and beach themselves. The third is due to orcas. Orcas are killer whales and these orcas work in teams to attack other type of whales. When there is a orca attack the other whales can panic and there can be confusion in the pod. Due to this sometimes whales beach themselves. A example for this is there was a massive whale beaching or whale standing in Golden Bay in New Zealand in 1993. And when this was observed little inside the coast a group of orcas were spotted. So this theory evolved. Okay the other reason for whale beaching includes bad weather or bad sea conditions presence of strong offshore winds. Then when there is a change in water temperature and whale beaching can also due to geomagnetic disturbances. In addition to this anthropogenic use of sonars in shipping vessels can also disturb the sonar of the whales. And this can also results in whale beaching. Having seen the causes of whale beaching now let us see why whale beaching is a bad thing. First is a beached whale often dies. The whale dies due to dehydration collapsing under its own weight or drowning when there is a high tide. Okay the other issue is see a whale is a very huge mammal. When whale is beached and it eventually dies it becomes a huge sanitary issue to dispose the whale very safely. So these are the bad things that happens when a whale is beached. So that's all regarding this discussion. In this discussion we saw what is whale beaching the causes of whale beaching and finally why whale beaching is a bad thing. With this let us conclude the news article discussion session and take up the practice problems questions. See today we have three practice problems questions. Let us see them one by one. Let us take up the first question. See here traditions are given and here the states are listed. We have to find which of the given pairs are correct. Let us take up the first pair. Thangadar dance and the state is Sikkim. See this pair is incorrect because the Thangadar dance is a martial dance of Manipur. So first pair is wrong. Moving on to the second pair. Langkong festival Assam. See this we saw in the discussion itself. This pair is actually correct. Langkong festival is a crop festival celebrated by the Tiwa people. During this festival Tiwa worship bamboo for a period of four days between October and December. It happens in two parts. First one is Saka Langkong Puja which is observed in the Katti season between October and November. And the second one is Thara Langkong Puja observed a week before the farmer. So second pair is correct. Moving on to the third pair. Kapchur Kut festival and the state here is Mizoram. See this pair is correct because Kapchur Kut festival belongs to Mizoram and it is celebrated in March after the completion of Jum operation. Jum as we saw in the discussion is the practice of shifting cultivation. And Kapchur Kut festival is celebrated during the spring season. So the second and the third pairs are correctly matched. So the correct answer here is option B only two pairs. Moving on to the second question. Two statements are given. We have to find the correct statements. Look at the first statement. Currently six languages enjoy the classical status. See this statement is correct. There are six languages in the classical language list. The languages are Tamil which was declared in 2004. Sanskrit which was declared in 2005. Kannada which was declared in 2008. Then Telugu which was declared in 2008. In 2013 Malayalam was declared. And finally in 2014 Odia was declared as classical language. So statement one is correct. Moving on to the second statement. Union Ministry of Culture is authorized for the work of granting of classical language status. See this statement is also correct. Since both the statements are correct. The correct answer here is option C both one and two. See here I have provided the criteria for declaring a languages classical language. So you might wonder why I have asked this question. This is because of this news article. Look at this news article. The article says that there has been reports about blocking of railway tracks by people belonging to the Kourmik community. See these people are demanding the inclusion of the Kourmik community in the list of schedule trips. They are also demanding the inclusion of Kourmali language in the 8th schedule of the constitution. See here Kourmik is a non-elite tiller cast in the lower Gangetic plains of India. This community is mainly located in the southern regions of Awadh, eastern UP and parts of Bihar. Now coming to the 8th schedule of constitution. See there are 22 languages in the 8th schedule of constitution. I have displayed all the 22 languages here. The major difference between the classical language list and the scheduled language list is that there is a criteria for including a language in the classical language list. But in case of the scheduled language list there is no official or constitutional criteria for including the language. The other fact about this list is that initially there was only 14 languages in the list. After that in 1967 Sindhi was added. Then in 1992 Konkani, Manipuri and Nepali were added. And finally in 2003 according to the 92nd constitutional amendment Bodo, Dogri, Maithili and Santali were added. So that's all regarding this. Moving on to the last question. See this question is in regards to our whale beaching discussion. Two statements are given. You have to find the correct statement. See this is a very simple question and this is the quiz question for you today. Interested aspirants can post the answers for this question in the comment section. The main questions based on today's discussion are displayed here. Interested aspirants can write the answers and post it in the comment section. If you like today's discussion you can like, comment and share it with your friends. For more updates regarding UPSC preparation you can subscribe to Shankar A. Sakalami's YouTube channel. Thank you for listening.