 Good evening aspirants, now before getting into the news article discussion I have an important announcement for you to know. Shankar IAS Academy's pre-fit batch 2 is going to start on February 16th. The first test will be on the same day. The number of tests that will be covered under this batch will be 71 tests. You can write the test in all the centres of Shankar IAS Academy on both online and offline mode. For the convenience of the aspirants, we have both morning and evening batch. So what are you waiting for? So just enroll in our pre-fit test series and check your fitness for preliminary examination. So with this note, let us move on to the news article discussion. Today's date is 11th of February 2023. Display it here or the list of news articles that we are going to discuss today. So without much delay, let us get into the first news article discussion. According to the news article, day before yesterday, the Union Ministry of Mines announced that 5.9 million tons of lithium reserves have been found in the Rasi district of Jammu and Kashmir. See this is the first significant discovery of lithium reserves in the country. Government officials said that the discovery of lithium would reduce the need for imports and it would improve employment opportunities. The officials also said that this finding will give a major boost to the manufacture of rechargeable batteries for smartphones, laptops and electronic cars in India. So in this context, let us learn a few facts about lithium, where they are majorly produced, their applications and issues with the lithium and finally we'll see the alternatives to lithium. Before that, the syllabus relevant to this news article is highlighted here for a reference. You can pause the video and go through it. Let's start with lithium. Lithium is a chemical element of the alkali metal group. It is an element with the atomic symbol Li and atomic number 3. Know that alkali metals include all of the elements in column 1a of the periodic table. They include hydrogen, lithium, sodium, potassium, rubidium, cesium and francium. Now specifically talking about lithium, lithium was discovered in 1817 and the name lithium is derived from the Greek word lithos meaning stone. Lithium appears as a soft silvery metal that is normally grayish white in color due to oxide formation. Lithium can be easily cut with a butter knife and the standard conditions lithium is the lightest metal and it has the lowest density of all metals. Talking about the lithium reserves in the world, the data I am going to give here is based on the most recent information from the US Geological Survey 2022. According to the US Geological Survey, Chile has the most lithium reserves in the world by quantity. The country reportedly holds most of the world's economically extractable lithium reserves. Despite Chile holding the largest lithium reserves in the world, it was only the second biggest producer of lithium in 2022. In the next country is Australia. Australia comes second in terms of reserves. Know that Australia was only the largest lithium producer country in the world in 2022. So we can say that in 2022, Australia was the largest producer of lithium in the world. Next comes Argentina. It ranks third in terms of world lithium reserves. Despite Argentina ranking third in terms of reserves, it is only the fourth largest lithium producer in the world in 2022. Then comes China. China ranks fourth in terms of world lithium resource, but it is the third largest producer of lithium in the world in 2022. So we can say that while Chile, Australia, Argentina and China are home of the world's highest lithium reserves, other countries also hold significant amount of the metal. They include the United States, Canada, Zimbabwe, Brazil and Portugal. So if we include newly found reserves of India, then India comes second in terms of the lithium reserves. So while talking about lithium reserves, you should not forget to revise about lithium triangle. South African nations like Chile, Argentina and Bolivia together are referred to as the lithium triangle. Some sources are saying that these three countries are having close to 60 percentage of global lithium resource. So this is how the lithium is distributed in the world. So what are the uses of lithium? Firstly, lithium is used in manufacturing of batteries for cell phones, laptops and electric and hybrid vehicles. Since they can charge faster, last longer and have a higher power density for more battery life, in a lighter package, lithium ion is preferred for manufacturing of batteries. Secondly, lithium is added to glasses and ceramics for strength and resistance to the temperature change. Thirdly, lithium is used in heat resistant greases and lubricants. Apart from this, lithium is alloyed with aluminum and copper to save weight in aircraft components. Lithium is also used in certain psychiatric medications and in dental ceramics. Apart from this, lithium is used as a means of storing hydrogen for use as a fuel. And finally, the lithium isotope namely 6 Li was once used in the production of lithium for nuclear weapons. So these are all some of the uses of lithium. Now moving on to see about the issues associated with lithium from the Indian context. See, while discussing the uses of lithium, we saw that lithium is used in manufacturing of batteries for electric vehicles, right? We all know that India has pledged to reduce the intensity of greenhouse gas emissions by 33% to 35% below 2005 levels by 2030. So that option of electric vehicle is consistent with India's pledge to lower carbon emissions. As we all know, lithium is a crucial element to make lithium ion rechargeable batteries that power electric vehicles. Now only India has found the lithium resources inside India and we don't know how viable it will be to extract lithium from these resources. Currently for lithium and lithium ion batteries, India is heavily dependent on import only. Most of the lithium are imported from Australia and Argentina. Apart from this, India also imports lithium ion batteries from China, Japan and South Korea. Due to the import, the price of their electronic vehicles would be higher than the conventional diesel or petrol vehicles. So this would discourage people from buying electronic vehicles. So the first issue here is the India's import dependence for lithium. The another issue is associated with recharge of lithium ion batteries. See, we all know that India is mostly relying on coal based electricity production that is relying on electricity from thermal power plants. If we need more electricity to recharge the lithium ion batteries, we need to burn more coal right. Now this might result in even more greenhouse gas emissions and this ultimately defeats the Indian government's pledge to reduce the intensity of greenhouse gas emissions. So recharging lithium ion batteries is another issue. So if you're asking me about the solution for these problems, see one of the most promising alternatives to the lithium ion batteries is the use of sodium ion batteries. Sodium ion batteries have several advantages over the traditional lithium ion batteries. As we saw earlier, lithium and sodium are both alkali metals and they share a lot of similarities. Now coming to the advantages of sodium ion batteries, sodium ion batteries are significantly cheaper than lithium ion batteries. This is due to the fact that sodium is much more easily harvestable than lithium. Sodium can easily be extracted from salt which itself is found in extremely high quantities in seawater. So this can be an alternative to the lithium ion batteries. Apart from sodium ion batteries, the hydrogen fuel cells, then graphene batteries, fluoride batteries, sand batteries and solid state batteries are also seen as an alternative to lithium ion batteries. So to conclude if the lithium resources found in India are economically viable to extract, then the government should side by side need to increase the greener energy production to fully utilize the applications of the lithium. So that's all regarding this news article discussion. In this news article discussion, we saw in detail about lithium, its distribution in the world, some of the users and issues surrounding it and we saw about the solutions or alternatives to lithium. So with these learned points, now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now take a look at this news article. According to the news article, the water resources department plans to carry out digital survey of Kuvam and Araya rivers to understand and monitor the land use change along the waterways. Since the manual demarcation of the river boundaries or time consuming, water resources department is planning to employ differential global positioning system to provide better accuracy of the river boundaries. Now if you're asking me why river boundaries should be demarcated, it is because of the encroachments. See according to the article, the department had already cleared most of the encroachments within the city limits along the Kuvam river. However nearly 1000 encroachments still remain due to pending court cases. So this is the current condition of encroachments along the Kuvam river. So to stop these illegal encroachments from taking place again, various initiatives like differential GPS and geofencing are to be carried out as a deterrent. So this is the crux of the news article given here. We have heard about GPS. What is this differential GPS? That is what we are going to see in this news article discussion. So to understand how differential GPS works, you should know about GPS. So what is a GPS? Global Positioning System is a network of satellites and receiving devices used to determine the location of an object on earth. As part of GPS, there are 31 satellites placed on the medium earth orbits which transmit signals to nearly all parts of the earth. These signals are captured by the GPS tracker devices which are present on the surface of the earth. So this is how the exact location of an object on the ground is found out. Now the issue with GPS is that, as I said already, GPS operates based on the signals emitted by satellite constellation which are placed on the medium earth orbits. Since there is more than 15,000 kilometer distance between the object on earth and the satellite, there emerges some changes of GPS providing inaccurate location. This inaccuracy can be caused due to a variety of reasons like ionospheric disturbances, satellite signal blockage due to presence of big structures like buildings, bridges, trees and etc. So to overcome this accuracy concerns only differential GPS was developed. So this differential global positioning systems actually supplement and enhances the positional data available from the GPS. Here note that DGPS has the potential to increase the accuracy of data provided by GPS by about a thousand fold from approximately 15 meters to 1, 2, 3 centimeters. Look at that accuracy. Now talking about the working of DGPS, see they consist of networks of fixed position ground based reference stations. This reference station actually calculates the difference between its highly accurate known position and its less accurate satellite derived position. Then this reference station broadcast this data locally by using ground based transmitters of short range. Mobile GPS receivers use this data from the local reference station transmitters to correct their position by the same amount. This will ultimately help them increase their accuracy. If you cannot get what I'm saying let me explain it to you again. See normally GPS works based on the data collected from the satellite constellations placed in orbits above the ground. The location derived from this data is not so accurate. In some cases location of an object can even vary to an extent of 15 meters. Now coming to DGPS, this positioning system uses an additional stationary reference station which uses some calculation method and reduces the inaccurate data provided by the GPS. This reference station then transmits the data locally to help other mobile GPS trackers to reduce their inaccuracy. So this is how the DGPS actually works. So using this DGPS we can find the exact location of a particular set of objects and never forget this there is an additional reference station which is part of the functioning of DGPS. Their work is to neutralize the error okay. Now these DGPS will be employed in the digital survey of Coom and Adair River to have better accuracy of the river boundaries. So that's all you have to note from this news article discussion. You can note this point and use it in your main censor as well okay. So these learnt points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now take a look at this article. It says that Prabhat Patnayak, former professor of Jawaharlal Nehru University, received the Malcom Aadishisha Award 2022 at Asian College of Journalism. And during the event he said that the Indian constitution is a wonderful document but there is an anomaly at the heart of the constitution. The anomaly is that the entire agenda with regard to the economic well-being of the people is put into the directive principles of state policy which is not just desiable. So this is the crux of the news article given here. In this context let us understand few facts about DPSB and the important points mentioned in the news article. Before that the syllabus relevant to this news article is highlighted here for your reference you can go through it. So let's start with DPSB. See DPSB is expanded as directive principles of state policy. It is part five of the Indian constitution consisting of articles from 36 to 51. Now that DPSB resembles the instrument of instructions enumerated in the Government of India Act of 1935. So it denotes the ideals that the government should keep in mind while formulating policies and enacting laws. Very important point or in other words we can say that DPSB or the constitutional instructions are recommendations to the state in legislative, executive and administrative matters. DPSB mostly concentrates on economic and social rights of the people and as we all know DPSB can be divided into three principles. First one is socialistic principle. Second one is Gandhian principle and the third one is liberal intellectual principles. Some of the socialistic principles include minimizing inequalities in income, status, facilities and opportunities. Then right to adequate means of livelihood for all citizens, equitable distribution of material resources, improving public health and nutrition, improving standard of living and so many. As you can see some of the principles overlap with the economic rights as well like the right to work an equitable distribution of resources. Some of the Gandhian principles include organization of village panchayats, promotion of cottage industries, then promotion of cooperative societies, then promotion of educational and economic interests of SC, ST and other weaker sections and so many. And thirdly some of the liberal intellectual principles are given here for your reference you can go through it. See the idea here is that all these should be considered by the government while making laws and principles. The makers of the constitution felt that all cannot be provided as fundamental rights. We know that fundamental rights are guaranteed rights for people right? At the same time they are very essential right as well. So they placed certain rights as moral applications on the government and we all know that DPSB are not legally enforceable. Here only the professor has a problem. He is saying that all the principles that are required for the development of the country is placed in DPSB but they are made non-justiciable. According to the professor this move disempowers citizenship because a citizen of the country should be empowered to a certain material standard of life, standard education, standard working condition, pay etc. And the professor is saying that just because DPSB is made non-justiciable we are having acute poverty in the country even after 75 years of independence. So what can be done to improve the conditions of the country? Here the professor in the article recommends to spend on the five fundamental universal justiciable economic rights. These rights include the right to food, right to employment, right to universal health care, right to free quality universal education and right to old age and disability pensions. So to spend on these five economic rights an additional amount of 10% of GDP is required and the professor suggests to raise fund by bringing in tax reforms. He is saying that we can put additional tax for making only 7% in this 10% of GDP. The remaining 3% will come automatically. Now if you are asking me how if we are providing right to employment these employed people will pay tax right. So that will amount to the remaining 3% and for making 7% also he is not suggesting to increase tax for all people according to him. The additional tax should be raised by imposing 2% wealth tax of the top 1% of the population and one third inheritance tax on top 1% of the population. So these are all some of the suggestions of the professor. Know that professor Patanayak is the former chairman of the state planning commission of Kerala. So making note of these points can help you in writing your main censor. So that is why we chose this news article discussion. So in this news article discussion we saw in detail about the DPSP its divisions then we saw some of the suggestions given by the professor. So with these learnt points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now for our next discussion let us take up this news article. It says that India's industrial output growth moderated to 4.3% in December 2022 from 7.3% in November. This is a spare index of industrial production IAP. So in this news article discussion let us see few facts about index of industrial production IAP. See this IAP is an index that tracks manufacturing activity in different sectors of an economy. It maps the change in the volume of production in Indian industries and to do that it chooses a basket of industrial products then creates an index by giving different weightage to each sector and then tracks the production every month. Finally the index value is compared to the same month last year to figure out the economy's industrial health. So it is a key economic indicator of the manufacturing sector. Remember the index is released by NSO under the Ministry of Statistics and Program Implementation MOPSP. The index data once released will also be available on the PIB website. Apart from this the base year for the index is taken as 2011 to 12. The base year was changed to 2011 to 12 from 2004 to 5 in the year 2017. Apart from this know that there are two ways in which IAP data can be viewed. The first is to look at sectoral performance. In this the whole industrial economy is divided into three sectors. The broad classification of sectors include manufacturing, mining and industry. The weightage of each sector are 77.6%, 14.4% and 8% respectively. So this is the one way of looking at it. The other way is to look at the way such industrial products are used. This is only called use based classification. This category includes primary goods, capital goods, intermediate goods, infrastructure and construction goods, consumer durables and finally consumer non-durables. And finally know that there are many industries whose manufacturing activities is tracked by the index. But eight industries comprises about 40% of the weight of the items included in the index of industrial production. For this reason these industries are called as core industries. Now these eight core industries include electricity, crude oil, coal, cement, steel, refinery products, natural gas and fertilizers. So all these industries fall under one of the three broad sectors which include manufacturing, mining and electricity. That's all you have to know about IAP. So with these learnt points I'll let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now take a look at this news article. Yesterday our Union Sports Minister presided over an inaugural show of third edition of Kelo India Winter Games in Gulmag, Jammu and Kashmir. The inaugural show has highlighted Jammu and Kashmir's culture with a larger message of plurality and diversity. The third edition of Kelo India Winter Games is scheduled to be held from 10th to 14th February at Gulmag, Jammu and Kashmir and around 1500 players from across the country are going to take part in this Winter Games. This is the cracks of the news article given here. In this context let us learn about Kelo India Winter Games from Exam Perspective. See these games are the national level multidisciplinary Winter Games which are being organised by the Union Sports Ministry in collaboration with other sports institutions. Games like figure skating, snowshoe running, Nordic Skying, ice hockey, speed skating, mountaineering, snow rugby etc will take place in the event. Remember in 2020 the first edition of Kelo India Winter Games was held at two places which includes Ladakh and Gulmag in Jammu and Kashmir. The second edition in 2021 was held at Leh and this year it is the third edition of such game which is taking place in Gulmag. So what is the reason behind organising Kelo India Winter Games? See the scheme was actually launched in 2017. It was launched to increase the sports skills of the youth in the country and also to increase the sports infrastructure. So to achieve the objective of Kelo India scheme the Kelo India Committee has been organising several games like Kelo India Youth Games, Kelo India Winter Games and etc. Know that Kelo India Committee is working under the Union Sports Ministry. To say simply Kelo India Winter Games is being organised to increase the sports skills of the youth in the country. Now let us conclude this discussion by seeing few facts about Kelo India scheme. The Kelo India scheme is the flagship scheme of the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports. It is the central sector scheme. This means that the scheme is fully funded by the central government. Now the revamped Kelo India scheme was introduced during the 2017-18 fiscal year. The scheme was formed by merging three schemes like Rajiv Gandhi, Kail Abhiyar, Urban Sports Infrastructure scheme and National Sports Talent Search scheme. So what was the objective of the scheme? See this scheme is a national level programme which aims to develop grass root level talent by providing a national level platform to the potential players. Apart from this the Kelo India scheme also aims to develop the sports skills of the youth by providing adequate training. Apart from this it aims to improve the sports infrastructure across the country by incorporating modern technologies. So that's all you have to know about this news article discussion. So with these learnt points now let us move on to the next part of the news article discussion which is the preliminary practice question discussion. Now look at this first question. This is the previous year question. In India in the overall index of industrial production the indices of eight core industries have a combined weightage of 37.9% which is of the following or among those eight core industries. First one is cement, then fertilizers, natural gas, refinery products, textiles. So you have to choose the correct answer. Option A 1 and 5 only, option B 2, 3 and 4 only, option C 1, 2, 3 and 4 only and option D 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. See the correct answer for the question is option C 1, 2, 3 and 4 only. As we saw in the discussion eight core industries comprises of electricity, crude oil, coal, cement, steel, refinery products, natural gas and fertilizers or the eight natural gases and fertilizers. It does not include textiles. So the correct answer for the question is option C 1, 2, 3 and 4 only. Now moving on to the second question. This question is about Kailo India scheme. First statement it is the flagship scheme of the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports. This statement is correct. We saw in the discussion it's a statement two. It is the centrally sponsored scheme where the funds are shared between the center and the states. This statement is incorrect because it is central sector scheme. The scheme is fully funded by the central government. Now the third statement it aims to revive the sports culture at the grass root level by building a strong framework for all sports played in India. See this statement is actually correct. It is the aim of the scheme actually. So the correct answer for the question is option C 1 and 3 only. Since the question asked for only the correct statements. Now moving on the questions displayed here are the main practice questions for you today. Just go through the question, try to write an answer and post it in the comment section. So with this we came to the end of the news article discussion. If you like the video, hit like, do comment and don't forget to subscribe to Shankara IS Academy YouTube channel. Now thank you for listening.