 So, with this good news, let us move on to today's news article discussion. The list of articles chosen for today's discussion is mentioned here. Let us start our first discussion by discussing about an article regarding fiscal deficit. Followed by that we will be discussing about an editorial article regarding portion up and followed by that we will be discussing about spent fuels and we will be seeing about what is spent fuel, why is it important to protect the spent fuel and followed by that we will be discussing about an editorial regarding Swach Bharat and we will also see an article regarding the speaker. We will discuss about the office of speaker in legislative assembly in this discussion and followed by that we will be discussing about Ethiopia in the map perspective. So without wasting much time, let us move on to the first news article discussion. Now look at this news article. See this news article reports about the government's fiscal deficit. So in this context first let us learn about fiscal deficit and then we will move on to see the information given in the news article. First of all know that deficit will occur when the expenses that is spending is higher than the revenue that is income. So, when expenses is higher than the income then this scenario is called as a deficit or you can say that it is a shortfall or loss. See it generally occurs when a government spends more than it receives in a given period. An important point to note here is this given period will usually be a year and when you take fiscal deficit it can be described as a shortfall in the government's income compared with its spending. So when a government is facing a fiscal deficit it means that it is spending beyond its means. That is government is spending more than what it is receiving as a revenue. Therefore the fiscal deficit is calculated by subtracting the total income of the government from the total expenditure of the government. So this is the formula for the fiscal deficit. It is calculated by reducing the total income of the government from the total expenditure of the government. Remember we already saw about the components of government's income and expenditure. So by subtracting these components we can calculate fiscal deficit. So now what is the reason for this deficit? See a fiscal deficit is more likely to occur when the government spends on financial aid or it provides such other assistance to the weak and vulnerable section of the society. Say like that of the farmers and the poor. So when government spend money on providing assistance to the weak and vulnerable section of the society that is when the fiscal deficit is likely to occur. But however we cannot always say that a fiscal deficit is bad for a country because at times a high fiscal deficit can also be good for the economy. For example the money spent on the creation of productive assets like highways, roads, ports and airports can actually boost economic growth and will also result in job creation. And very important point to note here is that the government meets fiscal deficit by borrowing money or in other words the total borrowing requirement of the government in a financial year will be equal to its fiscal deficit in that year. So to put it in simple words if you know the borrowing requirement of the government you can easily say what is the amount of fiscal deficit in that year. So these are some important points that you need to have in mind about fiscal deficit. Now coming to the news article it reports that the fiscal deficit of the government stood at 4.68 lakh crore rupees at the end of August. And this amount is about 31.1% of budget estimates and it also mentions that for the current financial year the government expects the deficit at 6.8% of GDP. So this is the news for today and we saw about what is fiscal deficit in this discussion. We saw how fiscal deficit is calculated and we also saw in what cases the fiscal deficit can occur. So with these points in mind let us find out this discussion and now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now look at this article. This article talks about the nutrition status in India as well as the importance of PEM portion scheme. So in this part of discussion we will talk about the scheme as well as some important points mentioned in the article. The syllabus relevant to this article is mentioned here. Interested aspirants can go through it. First let us start by knowing about PEM portion scheme. See this is different from portion abhyan. We saw portion abhyan on our second September discussion and now talking about PEM portion scheme see the midday meals scheme will now be known as PEM portion but one major change has been made with child nutrition in mind. That is center has announced that 24 lakh students receiving pre primary education at government and government aided schools will also be brought under the ambit of the scheme from next year. Remember that this decision is in conjunction with the recommendation given by the national education policy that is NEP and see generally under the midday meals scheme hot cooked food is provided currently to students from class 128 and this comes to around 11.80 crore children in all and under PEM portion Shakti nirman or PEM portion scheme 24 lakh more children in pre primary schools currently covered under the ICDS that is integrated child development scheme will also be brought in. Note that primary that is from class 1 to 5 and upper primary from class 6 to 8 school children or currently entitled to 100 grams and 150 grams of food crimes per working day each. So this will ensure a minimum of 700 calories but the new revamped scheme has a provision for supplementary nutrition for children. This provision will be applicable in aspirational districts and also those with high prevalence of anemia. Besides this annually of the budget allocation up to 80 percentage of the funds allocated for midday meals used to be spent and the unspent amount is surrendered. This is the scenario before but now with the restructuring of the program that amount will be used in the next year that is it won't lapse. So the center has announced that students receiving pre primary education at government and government aided schools will also be brought under the ambit of the scheme and apart from that when it comes to budget allocation previously the unspent amount is surrendered but now with this restructuring of the program that amount will be used in the next year which means the amount allocated for the scheme will not lapse. Another notable feature about PEM portion is the new tree gardens. See it will be developed in schools to give children first hand experience with nature and gardening and also under the scheme a social audit for the scheme is being made mandatory in all the districts. So what is a social audit? Social audit is a process of reviewing official records and determining whether the state reported expenditures reflect the actual money spent on the ground. So there will be a social audit also and besides this to promote vocal for local women self-help groups and farmer producer organization will be included in the ecosystem. This to be done in order to encourage locally grown traditional food items and farmers and note that the scheme also plans inspection by students of colleges and universities for ground level execution. So the children in pre primary classes will be included in the scheme and the budget allocated for the scheme will not lapse. Apart from this there will be a new tree garden in which the child can experience gardening. Apart from this there will be a social audit and even farmer producer organization and women self-help groups will be included in the ecosystem in order to promote the locally grown traditional food items. Apart from this the scheme is also planning to allow inspection by students of colleges and universities to check the ground level execution. Note that a concept of tithi bojan is also important under the scheme. It was introduced in 2018 under that child coming from affluent families will be urged to bring two lunch boxes so that nutritious food can be provided to needy kids. Although it is completely voluntary it has a social impact. Now let us look at the funding pattern. See center bears the entire cost of food grains and their transportation. Center also look after the management monitoring and evaluation under the scheme. But components such as cooking cost, payments to cooks and workers are split in a 60 to 40 ratio with states. Which means 60 percentage of the cost will be paid by the center and 40 percentage will be paid by the state. Specific amounts allocation have also been covered under the article but we are not going to get into the detail of that. See midday meal scheme is an important scheme with remarkable achievements. Several studies over the year have shown the critical role played by midday meal in increasing enrolment and preventing dropouts. Besides it has also played a role in eradicating hunger and improving the nutrition among the kids. So this revamp is a welcome step in furthering the agenda on nutrition in India. So with these important points we came to the end of the discussion. In this discussion we saw about PM Poshan and we saw about some of the changes made in this scheme. The first change is 24 lakh students receiving pre primary education at government and government aid schools will be brought under the ambit of the scheme from next year and importantly the budget allocation for the scheme will not lapse and under PM Poshan there are provisions for a nutrition garden and social audit. Apart from this women's self-help groups and former producer organization will be included in the ecosystem and the scheme also plans to allow inspection by students of colleges and universities to check the ground level execution and we also saw about the funding pattern of the scheme. So with this we came to the end of the discussion. Now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now let us take up this news article and the article here is about the spent fuel storage. So according to the news article the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board has granted its consent for the establishment of an away from reactor spent fuel storage. So this away from reactor spent fuel storage will be constructed for the units of Kudankulam nuclear power plant project and the nuclear power corporation of India limited is said to be responsible for safety of the facility. So in this context let us see some of the important facts about the spent fuel and we also learn how the nuclear reactor actually works and why is it important to protect the spent fuel. To begin with let us first discuss about how the nuclear power plants work. See nuclear power plants heat water to produce steam. The steam is used to spin large turbine that generate electricity. So you can see the turbine in this image. Here is the turbine and first of all how nuclear power plants produce heat. See nuclear power plants use heat produced during nuclear fission to heat water. See the nuclear reactor as you can see here in the image will be filled with water and in between there will be fuel rods. We generally use uranium as a fuel to the nuclear reactors and very important point to note here is that the uranium fuel is formed into ceramic pellets. As you can see them here in the image these energy rich pellets are stacked or arranged in 12-foot metal fuel rods. So here you can see the image of the metal fuel rods. So the metal fuel rods will be filled with ceramic pellets made of uranium. So this will act as a fuel rod and know that a bundle of fuel rod or a bundle with hundreds of rods is called a fuel assembly and a reactor core contains many fuel assembles. So what happens the nuclear power plants produce heat energy during nuclear fission. Now what is a nuclear fission? See to put it in simple words nuclear fission is nothing but it is a nuclear reaction in which a heavy nucleus splits into smaller atoms. During this process energy is released in form of heat and this process is called as nuclear fission and this fission takes place inside the reactor of a nuclear power plant and at the center of the reactor is the core which contains uranium fuel. So we saw how uranium fuel is formed and now moving on the heat produced during nuclear fission in the reactor core is used to boil water into steam. The steam will turn on the blades of a steam turbine and as the turbine blades turn on they drive generators that make electricity and there will be a separate structure called cooling tower where the nuclear plants cool the steam back into water and this cooled water is then reused to produce steam. So this is how the nuclear power plant works. See there are many ways to generate electricity and generating electricity by means of nuclear power plants does not cause any pollution but the problem is they actually radiate harmful radiations which will be very harmful to humans as well as animals. So even though it is sustainable it is very important to do it safe otherwise it will also cause an impact to the mankind and as well as to the ecosystem around him. If you have noted only specific amount of water is used to generate electricity and this is also very sustainable one because the water which is used inside the reactor it turns into steam and again in the cooling tower it condenses to water and this cooled water is again used in the reactor. So a specific amount of water is enough to run a nuclear reactor. It may seem to be sustainable but there are many problems in protecting the radiation emitted by the fuel rods. Now coming to spent nuclear fuel what is a spent fuel? See we saw before that uranium in pellets form is taken into 12-foot metal fuel rods right. So once these fuel bundles that can no longer sustain fission in a nuclear reactor or called spent fuel that is the spent nuclear fuels or nothing but nuclear fuel that has been removed after being used in a nuclear reactor. To understand this better take an example you refuel your vehicles right whatever vehicle you may have take a bike for an example you have to refuel it after the fuel inside the tank is done right. So similar thing happens with the nuclear power plant also. The fuel rods that is the uranium fuel used in the reactor after a period of time will not sustain the fission in a nuclear reactor that is when the nuclear fuel is removed from the nuclear reactor and this removed nuclear fuel is called spent nuclear fuel. Know that these spent nuclear fuel is thermally hot and very very radioactive. So it is placed into water cooling pools at the reactor site for at least five years. So in order to cool down the nuclear fuels that is the spent nuclear fuel it is placed into a water cooling pool at the reactor site itself for at least five years and very very important point to be noted here is that these water cooling pools as you can see in this image should have water circulation 24 by 7 because the water in which the spent fuel is stored may also get radiated or contaminated with radiation and it can even cause damage to the ecosystem into which it is released. So it is very very important to circulate the cooling water pools 24 by 7 and because of these reasons remote handling and heavy shielding becomes imperative while handling them. See one of the most worst nuclear accident in the history is the Chernobyl disaster it occurred in 1986 and know that Chernobyl is a nuclear power station in the town Pripyat in northern Ukraine. There is a short television series based on this story and it is telecasted in HBO channel. So if you have time just watch the series it will be very very informative and you will understand why protecting the nuclear power plant is most important and you will also know why India is producing a very lower percentage of electricity from nuclear power plants. Here you can see the exact damage caused to the nuclear reactor. You can see in the image that the roof of the reactor has itself damaged then think about the damage caused to the people living around them. Even though some scenes in the series is exaggerated but still the damage caused by the nuclear disasters is unavoidable. So with this we came to the end of this news article discussion. In this news article discussion we saw about the working of nuclear power plants and we saw about what is the spent fuel and why is it very important to secure a spent fuel. So with this information in mind now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now look at this article it is regarding Swach Bharat Abiyan. So now let us see some of the important points mentioned in this editorial. The syllabus relevant to this article is displayed on the screen interested aspirants can go through it. See on October 2nd 2014 our country launched a nationwide cleanliness campaign. The main name of this campaign is to tackle the issue of open defecation through behavioral change. We all know that the name of the campaign is Swach Bharat Abiyan or Clean India Mission. See this campaign aimed to provide every family with sanitation facility including toilets, solid and liquid waste disposal system. Now coming to the editorial see this editorial is written with regard to the campaign of Swach Bharat but remember this editorial is written by a member of the ruling party in Madhya Pradesh. So it is a political piece citing their achievements not all the points from the editorial are important will only filter the relevant information and remember this editorial is written in the context of Madhya Pradesh. So this editorial cites the achievement of ruling party in Madhya Pradesh regarding the campaign of Swach Bharat. So according to the author understanding the ground realities helped the government to successfully initiate this campaign. So this is the first important point mentioned in the editorial and they understood the ground realities by initiating a comprehensive exercise to identify the sanitation issues people faced through a series of interaction with all identified stakeholders. So the government initiated a comprehensive exercise and they identified the sanitation issues which is faced by the people through a series of interaction and the author states that this interaction helped them to understand the ground realities and it helped the government to successfully initiate this campaign. Apart from this this initiative to understand the ground realities helped the government of Madhya Pradesh to gather valuable insights. These valuable insights made the state of Madhya Pradesh 100% open defecation free by 2019. So first we understood the ground reality and as a second move the author states that bringing individual responsibility into the campaign of Swach Bharat was a significant move. By bringing an individual responsible both at a personal and public level the state of Madhya Pradesh has achieved the desired result. Janba Girdar which means people's participation was the driving force behind the success of Swach Bharat in Madhya Pradesh. So this is the second important move which helped the state to achieve open defecation free and remember behavioral change is a key component of this campaign. So we need long term solutions for behavioral change. Short term solution fails when it comes to behavioral change. So a multi-pronged long term strategy is required to bring the desired results and according to the author the state of Madhya Pradesh has followed a multi-pronged strategy which has provided tremendous success. The state used a combination of steps involving the construction of toilets implementing tough regulatory steps and encouraging behavioral change to achieve success. This approach guaranteed the sustenance of changed behaviors and the longevity of the impact of efforts. After stressing these points the author talks about the importance of good leadership. See good leadership can bring a sustained change of behavior. So right from the collector to a local level leader at the grand panchayat level should be strongly involved in this campaign. The more the leaders engage with the people the better will be the ability to open fresh lines of communication and build deeper bonds of trust. So according to the author these steps made the state of Madhya Pradesh to achieve the desired result. First the author states that understanding the ground realities helped the government and to understand the ground reality they initiated a comprehensive exercise to identify the sanitation issues faced by the people through series of interaction. So here the author states that this helped them in the initial stage and after understanding the ground realities they worked to bring individual responsibility into the campaign of Swach Bharat. Behavioral change is a key component of this campaign and for that we need long-term solution for behavioral change. Apart from this there was strict implementation of regulatory steps and there was construction of toilets and it encouraged behavioral change to achieve success. And after stressing these points the author also talked about the importance of good leadership. See urban Madhya Pradesh received its open defecation free certification on October 2nd 2017 and similarly rural Madhya Pradesh received its open defecation free certification the following year on October 2nd 2018 and as of today Madhya Pradesh ranks third in the country in the cleanliness survey 2020. Indoor which is an important city in Madhya Pradesh has been ranked the cleanest city in the country in Swach Survekshan that is cleanliness survey since 2017. Also Indoor has become India's first water plus city in Swach Survekshan 2021. So the discussed steps have provided results and it made the state of Madhya Pradesh a cleaner place. Finally the author concludes the article by citing the all hands on the deck approach and the integrated sanitation approach. And according to the author these steps were the key changes which brought tangible behavioral change at the grassroots. These steps brought transformation in sanitation right down to the grassroots giving credence to Gandhiji's words that sanitation is more important than independence. So these are some of the important points highlighted in this editorial. So in this discussion we saw about Swach Bharat Abhyan and we saw some of the important points mentioned in the editorial. The first point is knowing the ground reality is very important and regarding Swach Bharat Abhyan long term solutions for behavioral change is an important component and apart from this strict implementation of regulatory steps and good leadership has made the state of Madhya Pradesh a cleaner place. So with these points in mind now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now look at this article it mentions the post of speaker in the headlines. So in this context let us learn about the office of the speaker of a legislative assembly. This will be very helpful for your preliminary and main exam preparation. See the office of speaker of the legislative assembly is a constitutional one. Note that it is a constitutional one that is under article 178 of the Indian Constitution every legislative assembly of a state shall choose one of its members as speaker. Now moving on to the powers and duties. See the power and duties of the speaker of legislative assembly have been laid down in the rules of the legislative assembly and to some extent in the constitution. See the speaker is the principal spokesperson of the house and he represents the collective voice of the house and he is the sole representative of the house to the world that is communications from the governor to the house or made through the speaker and similarly communication to the governor from the house or made through the speaker in the form of a formal address after a motion has been made and carried by the house. So the office of the speaker of legislative assembly is a constitutional one and under article 178 of the Indian Constitution every legislative assembly of a state shall choose one of its members as speaker and note that the powers and duties of speaker of legislative assembly have been laid down in the rules of legislative assembly and in constitution to some extent and very important point to note here is that he is the principal spokesman of the house and he is the sole representative of the house to the world. Also as the representative of the house the speaker communicates the decision of the house to the authorities concerned requiring them to comply with the terms of such decisions. Similarly he communicates to the house letters and documents addressed to him and he also issues warrant to execute the orders of the house whenever necessary. In addition to all this the speaker regulates the debates and proceedings of the house this is very important thing the speaker regulates the debates and proceedings of the house. He determines the order of the government and other business in the house and he has the power to recognize parties and groups in the house as well. A important and special power given to speaker is that the speaker can decide the admissibility of questions as per the guiding principles laid down in the rules. So to admit a question for discussion is the discretion of the speaker. Apart from this the speaker decides on the admissibility of resolutions and motions also. The consent of speaker is necessary for the presentation of petition to the house. Apart from this see it is the speaker who determines what matters or money matters that is the speaker decides which subject belongs to money matter as these fall within the exclusive jurisdiction of the legislative assembly. So if the speaker certifies a bill as a money bill his decision is final. So under the constitution the speaker exercises only a casting vote in the case of equality of votes in any matter. So these are some of the powers and duties of the speaker of legislative assembly. He is the principal spokesman of the house. He is the sole representative of the house to the world that is he act as a bridge between the governor and the house and as the representative of the house the speaker also communicates the decision of the house to the authorities concerned and he should ensure that the concerned authority has complied with the term of such decision or not and very important role of speaker is that he regulates the debates and proceedings of the house. Very important power of speaker is that he decides the admissibility of questions and he decides on the admissibility of resolutions and motions and the consent of speaker is necessary for the presentation of petition to the house. Another important point to note here is that speaker decides on what subject or money matters and once the speaker certifies a bill as a money bill his decision is final. Finally moving on to the term of the speaker see the speaker holds the office from the date of his election till immediately before the first meeting of the legislative assembly after the dissolution of the one to which he was selected and remember one thing as specified in article 179 of the Indian constitution the speaker shall vacate his office if he ceases to be a member of the assembly that is once he ceases to be a member of the assembly he cannot hold the office anymore so these are some of the points that you have to remember with regarding to the office of speaker of legislative assembly this will be very helpful for your preliminary examination with this we came to the end of this article discussion now let us move on to the next news article now let us take up this news article about Ethiopia so the article here talks about the decision of Ethiopia to export seven senior UN officials since the country found them to be meddling in its affairs so this is the basic context of this news article now keeping the news aside let's focus on some of the facts about Ethiopia see knowing about geographical location of any country will be very helpful for you to eliminate options in the preliminary examination so let us see about Ethiopia see Ethiopia is a country that is situated in the horn of Africa which is the region of east in Africa as you can see here its capital is Addis Ababa and the country lies completely within the tropical latitudes now talking about its boundary remember Ethiopia is bounded by Eritrea to the north Jubbauti to the northeast Somalia to the east Kenya to the south and south Sudan and Sudan to the west see Ethiopia has got five main topographic features and they are the western highlands the western lowlands the eastern highlands the eastern lowlands and the drift valley remember Lake Tana is Ethiopia's largest inland lake and is also the main reservoir for the Blue Nile River now talking about the climate as I told earlier Ethiopia is located in the tropical latitudes and the areas of lower elevation in Ethiopia experience climatic conditions typical of tropical savannah or desert now coming to the wildlife lines leopards elephants giraffes rhinoceros and wild buffaloes are found especially in northern Ethiopia and smaller game varieties such as foxes jackals and wild dogs are found abundantly throughout the country as it has the tropical savannah type of climate now that in Ethiopia agriculture is mainly done for subsistence and cereals are the main crop to be cultivated here and livestock is also very important here remember coffee is the main export of Ethiopia followed by heights and skins and when you see their population Ethiopia's population is highly diverse and most of its people speak a Semitic or Cahetic language also note that Christianity was introduced to Ethiopia in the 4th century and the Ethiopian Orthodox church is one of the oldest organized Christian bodies in the world the church has enjoyed a dominant role in the culture and politics of Ethiopia and it also serves as the repository of Ethiopia's literacy tradition and its visual arts so these are some of the important facts that you have to remember about Ethiopia now let us move on to the next part of our news article discussion now let us see some of the practice questions which of the following accurately describes fiscal deficit option a surplus of the government's revenue expenditure over the revenue receipts option b shortfall in the government's income compared with its spending option c amount of government borrowing excluding interest payments option d none of the above as we saw in our discussion fiscal deficit can be described as a shortfall in the government's income compared with its spending so when a government is facing a fiscal deficit it means that it is spending beyond its means so the correct option for the question is option b shortfall in the government's income compared with its spending now moving on to the next question in the context of spent fuel consider the following first one spent fuel or the fuel bundles that can no longer sustain fission in a nuclear reactor and the second statement it is highly radioactive and it also generates a lot of heat which of the statement given above is or or correct see in our discussion itself we saw that spend fuel or the fuel bundles that can no longer sustain fission in a nuclear reactor and it is highly radioactive and it also generates a lot of heat so the correct answer for the question is option c both one and two now moving on to the next question this question is about the speaker of legislative assembly consider the following statement with reference to the speaker of legislative assembly first statement speaker determines the order of the government and other business in the house second statement speaker exercises only a casting vote in the case of equality of votes you have to select correct answer using the quotes given below option a one only option b two only option c both one and two and option d neither one nor two see from our discussion we know that speaker determines the order of the government and other business in the house and speaker exercises only a casting vote in case of equality of votes so both the statements are correct the correct answer for the question is option c both one and two now moving on to the next question this question is about Ethiopia which of the following are landlocked countries of Africa first one Ethiopia second one Rwanda third one South Sudan fourth one Niger you have to select correct answer using the code given below option a one three and four only option b one and three only option c one two and three only and option d one two three and four see now look at this map here you can see all the countries given here or landlocked and the correct answer for the question is option d one two three and four main questions are displayed here please write answers and post it in the comment section with this we came to the end of the news article discussion if you like the video like comment and share and do subscribe to shankar is academy youtube channel thank you