 Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis by Shankar A. S. Akademi. The displayed articles have been chosen for today's analysis from Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad and Tiruvananthapuram Editions. Now let us start our discussion. This news article is about the financial stability on development council meeting. The discussion can be linked to the syllabus that is given here for your reference. The news article mentions that recently our finance minister held a review meeting with the Financial Stability and Development Council, that is FSDC, during which the state of the economy of India was discussed in detail. The council reviewed the current global and domestic macroeconomic situation and then the financial stability and issues of vulnerabilities also discussed. The council also took note of the activities undertaken by the FSDC subcommittee and the initiatives taken by the various regulators in the financial sector. Now in this article what we have to focus from the examination point of view is that the Financial Stability and Development Council and its subcommittee. This topic is important as already there was prelims question on FSDC in 2016 prelims examination. So let us discuss about FSDC. Note that the financial stability and development council was set up by the government as the apex level forum in December 2010. It was set up as a body to strengthen and institutionalize the mechanism for maintaining financial stability to enhance the inter-regulatory coordination and also to promote the financial sector development. Now let us look at the composition of this council. The council has a chairman and members. The chairman of the council is the union finance minister. Its members include ministry of state in charge of department of economic affairs then heads of all financial sector regulators such as governor of reserve bank of India chairperson of securities and exchange board of India that is SEBI then chairperson of pension fund regulatory and development authority then chairperson of insurance regulatory and development authority of India and chairperson of insolvency and bankruptcy board of India then the finance secretary or secretary of the department of economic affairs are also members then secretary of department of revenue secretary of department of financial services secretary of ministry of corporate affairs then secretary of ministry of electronics and information technology and chief economic advisor are the members of the council. The council also can invite experts to its meeting if required. Now let us see the responsibility of the council. The council deals with the issues relating to financial stability, financial sector development, inter-regulatory coordination, financial literacy and financial inclusion. The council also deals with the macro-prudential supervision of the economy. Note that macro-prudential policy is a novel way of looking into financial regulation and these policies aim to prevent the excessive build-up of risk which is a result of external factors on market failures. Then the council also has a subcommittee. The FSDC subcommittee has been set up under the chairmanship of governor of RBI. This subcommittee meets more often than the full council. Note that all the members of FSDC are also members of this subcommittee. In addition, all four deputy governors of RBI and additional secretary of department of external affairs who is in charge of FSDC are also the members of this subcommittee. Note that the financial stability unit of RBI is the secretariat for the FSDC subcommittee. So these are the relevant information that you should know with respect to FSDC and its subcommittee. The displayed practice question will be discussed at the end of the session. Now let us move on to the next news article. This news article is with reference to the proposal of the union home ministry to merge the Assam rifles into the Indo-Tibetan border police. The proposal by merging aims to bring Assam rifles under the operational control of Ministry of Home Affairs. The syllabus relevant for the analysis of this open editorial article has been highlighted here for your reference. Now note that at present there are seven central armed police forces. They are Assam rifles, border security force that is BSF, central industrial security force, central reserve police force, Indo-Tibetan border police, national security guard, then Sushasra seamable that is SSB. In this news article we will be discussing two of these central armed police forces. They are Assam rifles and Indo-Tibetan border police. The purpose of Assam rifles at present is to guard the Indo-Mainmar border and conducting counter-insentancy operations in the north-eastern region. Among the central armed police forces except Assam rifles, all forces have their chiefs from the IPS offices. In case of Assam rifles, the chief of Assam rifles that is the Director General of Assam rifles is not from the IPS offices but from the Indian Army. Officers in the rank of Lieutenant General in Indian Army are appointed as the Director General in the Assam rifles. This is because though Assam rifles come under the administrative control of the Union Home Ministry, the operational control of Assam rifles is with the Indian Army. In terms of ministry, the operational control is with the Ministry of Defense. The author mentions that this dual control or the concept of having two masters for an organization is not only absurd but also it leads to various problems in terms of coordination. Also there have been several litigations in various courts of law that are filed by Retail Personnel of Assam rifles saying that they are facing difficulties in getting their pension because of this dual control. Therefore because of these issues and some other issues, the Ministry of Home Affairs in the last five-year National Democratic Alliance rule took up this matter with the Cabinet Committee of Security. At the time, Mr. Rajnath Singh was the Union Home Minister and interestingly now he is the Union Defense Minister. See that the Union Home Ministry proposes two things. One is that the operational control of Assam rifles to be given to the Home Ministry from the Defense Ministry. Second, the Assam rifles has to be merged with the Indo-Tibetan border police force. If you see about Indo-Tibetan border police, initially its purpose was getting border intelligence and security along the Indo-Tibetan border from Ladakh to Kuman Hills in Uttarakhand. Since the government recommendation of One Border One Force in 2004, ITBP has been assigned to guard the entire Indo-China border. Therefore, the ITBP has replaced Assam rifles in the borders of Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh. Earlier, Assam rifles used to guard along the Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh borders. Know that the government recommendation of One Border One Force was also recommended by the group of ministers in 2001. This group of ministers was set up by the then Prime Minister and to review the national security system in the country and to consider the recommendations of the Kargil Review Committee. Know that the ministers of four ministries were part of this group of ministers. They are Minister of Home Affairs, Minister of Defense, Minister of External Affairs and Minister of Finance. In this article, the author discusses the history of Assam rifles. Now, let us see the history of Assam rifles in brief. The Assam rifles date back to 1835. This is because it was formed in 1835 in the name of Kachar Levy. At that time, its purpose was to assist the British rulers in maintaining peace in the northeast. From the colonial lens, their purpose was to primarily protect British tea estates and British settlements against tribal raids. This force was later expanded and in 1870 it was converted into the Assam Military Police Battalion. And during the First World War, they served assisting the British forces in Europe and West Asia. The British recognized their support by fighting soldiers shoulder to shoulder with rifle regiments of the regular British army. As an honor, the name of the force was changed to Assam rifles. This force is fondly called as the Friends of the Northeast People. The author states that the Assam rifles was placed under the operational control of the army after the Chinese aggression in 1962 in Arnauchal Pradesh. One of the reasons is that the personnel of Assam rifles were adjusted to the northeastern region and therefore they were better suited for operations at those times. You may think that why such a decision was taken after 1962 Sino-Indian War. This is because during the Chinese aggression in 1962, the regular units of Indian army could not unleash terror on Chinese forces in Arnauchal Pradesh. This is because at that time the regular army units were not easy to extreme weather in Arnauchal Pradesh and other northeastern regions. And this is also one of the reasons for India's retreat or defeat in 1962 Sino-Indian War. So after the war the Assam rifles came under the operational control of the Indian army. Now let us come to our discussion on the proposals of home ministry and who are opposing these proposals. The opposition is from the Indian army and also the defense ministry. One of the reasons is that the Indian army feels that if the operational control goes to home of ice and if Assam rifles is measured with ITBP it may weaken the national security. It even asked to match the Assam rifles completely with Indian army and ministry of defense. Another reason for opposition is that at present in Assam rifles around 80% of officers from the rank of major and above are from Indian army. If a major happens these officers have to be repatriated or sent back to the Indian army. Next the author discusses the way forward. If the operational control is also given to home of ice for timing an IPS officer could be appointed as a chief but here is a tussle. This is the tussle between IPS officers and officers of central armed police forces. This tussle is with respect to the matters of enjoying pay benefits under organized group a service category. These matters are about the extinction of benefit of non-functional financial upgradation and non-functional selection grade to the officers of CAPF. These benefits are with respect to getting pay benefits when a person has to be promoted but not promoted because of lack of vacancies. Earlier in February month of 2019 the Supreme Court has granted the organized group a service status to the CAPF officers and thus the CAPF officers are at par with the officials from IIS, IPS, IRS and other central services after the Supreme Court verdict. But the government initially was not supporting this move to bring IPS officers and senior CAPF officers at par in these matters. As a result of these developments if an IPS officer is appointed as chief there could be lack of cooperation among the battalions of ASAM rifles. So the author suggests that only for the initial period an IPS officer could be a chief. Later the top post in ASAM rifles shall be given to the directly recruited officers in ASAM rifles. Then the author asks the cabinet committee of security to take the major issue on priority basis so that the doubts related to major operational control will be cleared. Then the author is also suggesting to work out the modalities of absorbing officers into the ASAM rifles or matched ITBP once the deputed Indian Army officials are repatriated back to the Indian Army from ASAM rifles. This is required to avoid any situation of vacuum in ASAM rifles once the Army officials leave the force. Note that if there is a vacuum the anti-Indian or enemy forces could take advantage and carry out operations against India. That is why the author is asking to work out the modalities of observing officers. Therefore with reference to this news article we saw about ASAM rifles and Indo-Tibetan border police and also we have discussed the proposals of Home Ministry and we discussed the points supporting the proposal and also suggesting the proposals against of Home Ministry and also some way forward suggested by the author. So with this we come to the end of the analysis of this news article. The displayed practice question will be discussed at the end of the session. Now let us move on to the next news article. This article is with respect to internet connection in the state of Kerala with respect to India Internet 2019 report and a report by Troy. The syllabus linking of this news article is given here for your reference. The news article mentions about the Kerala fiber optic network project. This project once it is completed will provide internet to every household in the state of Kerala. The project is expected to provide free internet for about 20 lakh below poverty line households that is known as BPL households. This project is to be completed by December 2020. So we can see how Kerala is going to perform well in providing internet connections to the households in the future. Now this inference on Kerala is also proved by other two reports. One report is that India Internet 2019 report. The report gives data on the number of internet users in India and it also provides the basic profile of the internet users in India. Note that the report is released jointly by internet and mobile association of India that is IAMAI and Nielsen company. Note that IAMAI is a not per profit industry body that is resisted under the Societies Act of 1896. Its mandate is to expand and enhance the online and mobile value added services sectors and the Nielsen company is a global measurement and data analytics company. Now with respect to this report you should understand one terminology that is internet penetration. It is the relationship between the number of internet users in a country and its demographic data. This means the portion of the population that has access to the internet. The term defines a portion of the digital divide in the country. Digital divide is between those who have ready access to computers and the internet and those who don't have the access to computers and the internet. So simply we can say that internet penetration indicates the percentage of internet users in any country. Next let us see some of the facts mentioned in the report with respect to internet penetration in our country. According to the report India has about 451 million active internet users in the first quarter of this year. More interestingly around 6.6 crore users are in the age group of 5 years to 11 years. These children access internet through devices of the family members. So from this we can see how much data protection is important in our country. As children are gaining more access to internet services and their data is also available on internet which can be easily exploited. Then two-thirds of internet users in India are in the age group of about 12 years to 29 years. Then the report notes that internet penetration is higher in urban India. This is due to better internet connectivity and there is an on-the-go consumption in urban areas as many are accessing internet while traveling through their mobile phones. Then with respect to internet penetration in rural India, a sizable portion of population in rural areas is divided of internet. That is they lack internet connection. So the report notes that there is an immense space for growth in rural areas which will contribute to an increase in overall internet penetration in the country. The report also mentions that the penetration of internet goes down as we descend to lower town classes. This means that the metropolitan cities have high level of internet penetration as compared to the villages and the rural areas. At the state level, the national capital territory of Delhi or NCT of Delhi has registered highest internet penetration that is about 69%. It is followed by the state of Kerala with 54% internet penetration. That is why the article mentions that Kerala is already off-way to its goal of 100% coverage of internet. That is to be achieved by the Kerala Fiber Optic Network project. Then low internet penetration is seen in the states of Odisha, Jharkhand, Bihar, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Madhya Pradesh. The report also notes that even though there is an increase in internet population, there is a visible gender divide. This means that there are fewer female internet users in India as compared to males. As compared to males, females internet population is only half of the male internet population. This disparity or inequality is more clear in rural areas. The report also found that the states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Delhi have higher female internet users. Let us see the second report. The report is the Indian Telecom Services Performance Indicators for April to June of 2019. This report is released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, that is TROY. The report provides data on the number of internet subscribers per 100 people, among many other things. As per the report, Delhi has a high number of internet subscribers per 100 people. It is followed by Punjab and Himachal. Then Kerala is at the fourth position. In Kerala, there are about 70 internet subscriptions per 100 people across service areas. So this data also shows that Kerala is performing well in providing internet connections to the households. Then Bihar is at the lowest position with respect to the number of internet subscribers per 100 population. Note that only there are 29 subscriptions per 100 people in Bihar. Now you may think that what is the importance of having internet connectivity? Firstly, you can watch our videos. That is, it provides access to information that is available across worldwide. Sitting at a single place, we can access information. It is helpful in every sector from education to deploying nuclear weapons. This is also true in our context as with the help of internet only, we are able to provide this analysis and you are also able to get information for free. So more the internet connection, more is the accessibility to information. It not only provides access to information, but it also helps in instant exchange of information through the modes of messaging, images, voice texting and so forth and so on. Next, internet helps to stay connected always. Then along with getting information on the internet, you can also shop online. So it promotes e-commerce. Note that our government is working hard to provide e-governance and to provide paperless governance also. So to have access to the services on e-governance platforms, we need internet connections. So like this, we can keep on listing the uses and advantages of internet connection. With this, we finish this analysis of this topic. The displayed practice question will be discussed at the end of the session. Now let us move on to the next news article. This news article is about the recently released India Justice Report of 2019 by Tata Trust in collaboration with the various NGOs. The report ranks the states based on their score out of 10 in their capacity to deliver justice. The syllabus linking of the news article is given here for your reference. The report measures capacity of the states to justice delivery based on the four pillars that is police, judiciary, prisons and legal aid. As we know that access to justice is a public good which is important to all of us. Note that the Supreme Court has mentioned in several times that access to justice is a fundamental right guaranteed by the Article 14 and the Article 21. Note that Article 14 says that equality before law and equal protection of law and the Article 21 says that the right to life and the personal liberty. Now the report says that it is the first initiative to rank the Indian states in relation to their capacity to deliver access to justice. Now let us look at the news article. The report classifies Indian states into two categories that is into 18 large medium states and seven small states. Note that the report has not covered the Indian Territory of Jamun Kashmir, the Indian Territory of Ladakh, Assam, Manipur and the Nagaland. Among the large medium states, Maharashtra topped the list with a score of about 5.92 out of 10 and the other best performing states are Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Punjab. But here we have to note that even the best performing state is not scoring above 60 percent which is a worrying factor. In this category, Uttar Pradesh is at the bottom with a score of about 3.32 and the other states in the bottom category are Bihar and the Jharkhand. See in case of the smaller states, Goa is the best performer with a score of about 4.85 and Tripura with a score of 3.42 is at the bottom in the overall ranking. Now let us compare the top and the bottom performing states with reference to the four pillars that is prison, police, judiciary and legal aid. The ranking of the states in the category of prison is based on like overcrowding, number of women's staff, correctional staff and budget utilization. Here note that Kerala with a score of 7.18 is at the top and the Jharkhand with a score of 3.46 is at the bottom. Now the ranking on police is based on the resources like human resources, modernization, filling vacancies and the percentage of women in the police. Here Tamil Nadu with a score of 6.49 is at the top and Uttar Pradesh with a score of 2.48 is at the bottom category. Now the data on judiciary is based on vacancies in high courts and subordinate courts, then the clearance rate and the budget allocation. In this list, Tamil Nadu with a score of 6.99 is at the top and Bihar with a score of 2.41 is at the bottom. The ranking on legal aid is based on central and state budgets, the percentage of human liars, rural coverage of legal services. In this list, Kerala with a score of 6.58 is on top and Uttar Pradesh with a score of 2.50 is at the bottom. According to the news article, the findings of the report exposes the very serious lack in our justice delivery system. So we can say that the report covers a wide range of data on justice delivery. But when we compare the top and bottom performing states in each pillar, we can see a big difference in score. This shows that the people across India are far away from getting equal access to justice. This needs to be addressed, otherwise access to justice will remain as a fundamental right on the paper but not in reality. Now let us compare the overall summary of the report, which would be helpful for your mains preparation. That is when it comes to police force training, only about 6.4% of the police force have been provided in service training over the last five years. This means that about 90% of the police deal with the public without any up to date training. In addition, the representation of women is even worrying. Women account for just about 7% of the 2.4 million police persons in the country. Similarly, they account for 28% in the lowest judiciary and about 12% at the high court level. These figures are far from the equality in the representation. Even the judiciary, which had to upload the right to equal opportunity, itself is underrepresented. Now we will look at the statistics of under trial prisons in Indian prisons. In 2016, about 67.7% of India's prison population were under trial prisoners. This percentage is higher than what it was a decade ago, that is about 66%. This means that a large part of the prisoners are suffering in the jail terms even before they are convicted. This is one of the reason for over occupation of Indian prisons. At present, that is that about 114% of the Indian prisons capacity. Now, when it comes to the diversity in police staff, the report says that the representation of SS, STs, OBCs and women in the police is poor with huge vacancies in the reserved positions. This means that the vulnerable sections of Indian population are underrepresented even in the seats reserved for them. Now let us come to the most important data on pending court cases. The report says that there are about 2.8 crore cases pending in Indian subordinate courts and about 24% have been pending for more than five years. In addition, about 23 lakh cases are pending for more than 10 years. This long pendency shows the inefficiency of the Indian justice system. Therefore, one can rightly say that justice delayed is justice denied. Note that this delay in justice delivery is despite the fact that the poor Indians have to struggle to take their issues to the judiciary. This is proven by the fact that the per capita public spending on legal aid is only about 0.75 rupees per annum. This is proven by the fact that the per capita public spending on legal aid is only about less than 1 rupee per annum. This shows that the poor in India are still unable to reach the court to protect their rights when violated. If the government spending on free legal aid is not increased drastically, the Indian judiciary will remain accessible only to the allied sections of the population. With this, we have come to the end of this analysis of this news article. With reference to this news article, we have discussed India justice report of 2019, which was released by the Tata Trust in collaboration with various NGOs. The displayed practice question will be discussed at the end of the session. Now, let us start our practice prelims question section. Now, look at this question. This question is with reference to financial stability and development council, and it is a reference question which was asked in 2016 UPSC prelims examination. The three statements are given, and we have to choose the correct option. The first statement is that the FSDC is an organ of Neetayok. Note that FSDC is established by the government of India, not as an organ of Neetayok. Therefore, the statement one is incorrect. Note that FSDC was set up by the government as the apex level forum in December 2010, and it was set up as a body to strengthen and institutionalize the mechanism for maintaining the financial stability to enhance the interregulated coordination and also to promote the financial sector development. And the second statement is that it is saying that it is headed by the union finance minister. Note that the chairman of the council is also the union finance minister, and the council is having so large composition of the members. And these members include minister of state in charge of the department of economic affairs, then the heads of all important financial sector regulators such as governor of RBI, chairperson of SEBI, chairperson of pension fund regulatory and development authority, chairperson of insurance regulatory and development authority of India, then also the chairperson of insolvency on bankruptcy board of India. And these are the important persons also being the members of this council. Note that the chief economic advisor is also member of this council. Therefore, the second statement is correct. Now look at the third statement. It says that it monitors macro prudential supervision of the economy. Note that the council also deals with the macro prudential supervision of the economy. And this policy is a novel way of looking into financial regulation. And these policies aim to prevent the excessive buildup of risk, which is a result of external factors and market failures. Therefore, the given statement is also correct. So, out of the given statements, first statement is incorrect. And the second and third statements are correct. And the correct option for this question is option C2 and 3 only. Now look at this practice problems question. This question is with reference to again financial stability and development council. This is a two statement question. The first statement says that the council and its subcommittee are headed by union finance minister. Note that the council chairperson is the union finance minister, but the subcommittee is headed by the governor of reserve bank of India. Therefore, the first statement is incorrect. The second statement is about the composition of the subcommittee. It says that the governor of RBI and the chief economic advisor are the members of subcommittee. Note that all members of FSDC are also members of subcommittee. In addition, all four deputy governors of RBI and additional secretary of department of external affairs who is in charge of FSDC are also members of this subcommittee. Note that the financial stability unit of RBI is the secretariat for the FSDC subcommittee. Therefore, the second statement is correct, but you have to choose the incorrect statements. Thus statement one that is option A one only is correct for this question. Now look at this question. This question is based on India internet 2019 report and they are asking who releases this report and they have given the options like telecom regulatory authority of India, international telecommunication union, internet corporation for assigned names and members and internet and mobile association of India. Note that this India internet report is jointly released by internet and mobile association of India and Nielsen company and this IAMAI is a not for profit industry body that is resisted under society's act of 1896 and its mandate is to expand and enhance the online and mobile value added services. Then Nielsen company is a global measurement and data analytics company. Therefore, for this question option D is correct option. Note that try that is telecom regulatory authority of India also releases one of the important report that is the Indian telecom services performance indicators and this international telecommunication union is the United Nations specialized agency for information and communication technologies and in case of ICANN that is internet corporation for assigned names and members is also a not for profit public benefit corporation and it has participants from all over the world who are dedicated to keeping the internet secure stable and interoperable. Now answer this question. So this question is about who releases the India justice report. See that they have given four options that is Nithya Yoke and option B ministry of law and justice then taught at trust then the ministry of social justice and empowerment. Note that this India justice report is released by taught at trust in partnership with certain NGOs and here these NGOs are not important but for your understanding important NGOs mentioned here are Center for Social Justice Common Cause Common Wealth Human Rights Initiative that is in short CHRI. So for this question option C is correct option. Note that this India justice report classifies the states of India into two categories that is into 18 large and medium sized states and the seven small states according to their capacity to deliver justice and this report is based on data and to assess the budgets infrastructure human resources workload and diversity and also presence judiciary and legal aid in each state and these are very important to make the Indian judiciary system or the Indian justice system to be effective and efficient. Note that in the large and medium sized states category state of Maharashtra is in the top category and in case of smaller states Goa has performed better in terms of Indian justice report given by the taught at trust. So with this we'll proceed to next question. Now look at this practice mains question. The question says that the administrative and operational coordination among the different CAPF that is central armed police forces is the need of the hour. That is the suitable measures to increase the administrative and operational efficiency of the CAPF in the light of the above statement. Now for this practice mains question you are requested to write and post your answer in the comments section and your posted answer would be reviewed and suitable guidance will be given. So note that for this question first you have to justify why the coordination is required in terms of administrative and operational matters. Then you should justify with the suitable measures how this measures would improve the overall efficiency of central armed police force. Then you can also give the example of avoiding the dual control taking the case of assault rifles. Also you can mention the policy of one border and one force and how it is going to increase the overall efficiency of the CAPF and these are the certain points you can mention for this question. Now with this we have come to the end of the analysis of today's session. Please do share like comment our Shankara IS Academy YouTube channel. Thank you.