 A very good evening everyone. Welcome to the Hindi News Analysis by Shankaray's Academy dated 21st May 2020. These are the list of the articles chosen for today's analysis along with the page numbers in different editions of today's newspaper. The link for the handwritten notes in the period format and the timestamping of the articles is available in the description box below and it is also made available in the comments section for the benefit of the smartphone users. This discussion is based on the editorial which discusses about how India and China are prepared for the post-COVID world. The editorial is written by MK Narayanan who is the former national security adviser and a former governor of West Bengal. The syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference. As we all know the worst effect of this COVID-19 pandemic is the economic impact. We can clearly see this in case of India as we have been witnessing massive job losses, decline in exports, etc. And also even before the pandemic itself, India has witnessed a persistent economic downward slide. At this time the announcement of Prime Minister for about a 20 lakh crore stimulus package came. For the past week we have been discussing the measures announced as a part of it like providing the stimulus to the MSME sector through 3 lakh crore loan scheme, then providing free food grains to the migrant workers for the next two months, opening public sector to the private, etc. etc. According to the author, finding resources for this package will not be easy because Centres Finances are not at its best. Even India has already resorted to the second rancher of $1 billion loan from the World Bank to support the COVID-19 relief measures. So whether adequate funds would be raised for the relief is a big question. The critics of this package also worry whether this package would be able to provide the needed stimulus to the economy. Further, announcing reforms in different sectors every other day is just like a patchwork without a clear set of idea. That is why many are calling the package as a panic reaction rather than a deliberate plan of action. So here the author worries that since there is an absence of a well-designed plan, how is it going to enable India to return to the growth rates of 7 to 8 percent? Here is where the comparison to China comes and there is definitely a gap that currently exists between India and China. If you see China, it is tackling the pandemic really well. The spread of the infection has been contained and thus China has already been seeing early recovery. Therefore, since its early recovery, China has followed a calibrated approach to revive its economy. According to the author, this approach originates from a policy of strategic progression that has been conceived over many years and not like a panic reaction in case of India. The approach with the author is mentioning is the idea of a community of common destiny of mankind. This idea was suggested by the Chinese President during his address to the United Nations General Assembly in 2015. The idea describes a world defined by mutual cooperation. It also describes a new approach to the international relation that is going to supersede an outdated model which is associated with the Cold War mentality of the West, that is associated with the United States and the Western powers. This holistic concept rests on five pillars. They are the political, security, economic, cultural and the environmental pillars. A community of common destiny is achieved through creating both a community of shared interests and a community of shared responsibilities. Here the community of shared interests roughly responds to a situation of economic interdependence or we can say that completing each other economically. Then the community of responsibility refers to the political and the security realms or a situation of complete political mutual trust. So while suggesting the idea, the Chinese President outlined the Chinese viewpoint on the aspects like the economic globalization, information technology revolution and as a part of it they've also had the idea of the Belt and Road Initiative. As we know that the BRA encompasses the policy, infrastructure, trade, financial and people-to-people connectivity, it also implicitly encompasses the security ties. Since then, according to the author, China has started to attain the economic and the technological progress. Along with this, China is also defining how power would be determined in a globalized era. So this is done through devising new international norms in many emerging domains, such as cyber, pace, artificial intelligence, etc. But here we must note that China is not only on the process of devising new international norms, but it is also rewriting the international rules and setting standards. As you know, standards are technical requirements or the guidelines which are going to ensure compatibility, interoperability, quality and safety for a product. These standards by China are for defining the production, exchange and the consumption of the products. So China is not worried about where the global goods are going to be made, but it is focusing on setting the standards in making and trading such goods. In this sense, China is set to release a new plan this year called China Standards 2035. It is an ambitious 15-year blueprint that will lay out China's plans to set the global standards for the next generation technologies. The plan includes firstly to push and improve the standards domestically in China across various industries from agriculture to manufacturing. Then it aims to internationalize the Chinese standards and thus influence how the next generation technologies starting from telecommunications to artificial intelligence are going to work. Here experts are of the opinion that this move of China can have wide-ranging implications for the power China already holds on the global stage. This is because as the author correctly notes, China is hoping to reap the early bird advantage. So when other nations are struggling to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, China is preparing well to take the advantage of the situation by internationalization of Chinese standards. So this can happen as China will set these standards in emerging industries such as high-end equipment manufacturing, unmanned vehicles, cyber security and similar other industries. Thus this move would enable China to gain a dominant position in the global economy. But in the current scenario, many are saying that the pandemic is likely to end the China's ambitious power outreach and the countries like India would be beneficiary out of this. But the opposite can also happen as we have discussed in the news article. And the article finally highlights that India must take advantage of the situation but without clearly giving any points of action. Here we can add few points like India needs to improve its current infrastructure in order to support the manufacturers and the potential firms that are planning to set up their plans in the country. For this we have to improve the roads, highways and also provide stable power and electric supply. Secondly, we can also add that India can reap several benefits from its edtech ecosystem that is the education technology ecosystem which is booming currently in the covid-19 lockdown. So that's all about this news article. Let's move ahead with the next article. This news article is with reference to the cyclone Amphan which has made landfall over West Bengal coast yesterday at his 28th May. In this context in the news article analysis we will be focusing on the formation of a tropical cyclone along with the news article. The syllabus relevant for this analysis is highlighted here for your reference. The Amphan cyclone has made the landfall over the southern parts of West Bengal. So what is a landfall? It is in the event of a tropical cyclone coming onto the land after being over water. So it is when the center of the storm that is the eye of the storm moves over to the land. And landfall is associated with the most damaging aspects such as storm surges and heavy flooding rains. However a landfall should not be confused with a direct hit. A direct hit is different because it refers to the eye wall coming onto land or onshore but at that time the center of the storm that is the eye may still remain offshore or in other words it might be in the water or the sea. The news report highlights that as a result of cyclone five persons have lost their lives and thousands of houses were damaged and in many places trees and electric poles were uprooted by the strong winds that accompanied the cyclone. And it also said that heavy rainfall was reported across all the districts of south Bengal. Now let us see the formation of cyclone. When we say cyclone it refers to an intense whirl or vortex in the atmosphere. This whirl can be across 150 kilometer to 1000 kilometers and its height can vary from 10 kilometers to 15 kilometers. Around this whirl very strong winds will be circulating in the anticlockwise direction in the northern hemisphere and the clockwise direction in the southern hemisphere. This is because of the Coriolis force. In simple terms we can say that cyclones are intense low pressure areas. The wind circulation around such a low pressure is called as a cyclonic circulation. From the center of such intense low pressure areas the pressure increases outwards. And to determine the intensity of the cyclone and the strength of the wind we have to measure the magnitude of the drop in the pressure in the center and the rate at which the pressure increases outwards. One of the important point that we must remember about a tropical cyclone is that it originates only over the seas and they intensify mainly over the warm tropical oceans. So now let us see what causes the low pressure for the tropical cyclone to form. Initially the water takes up heat from the atmosphere and changes that into vapor. In this stage there is abundant and turbulent transfer of water vapor to the overlying atmosphere by the process of evaporation. When water vapor changes back to liquid form as rain drops, heat is released to the atmosphere. The heat released to the atmosphere warms the surrounding air and the air tends to rise and cause a drop in the pressure. As a result atmospheric instability is observed which encourages the formation of massive vertical cumulus clouds due to the convection of the air. As more and air tends to rise, more air rushes to the center of the tomb. This cycle of convection, formation of clouds and condensation is repeated again and again and this chain of events ends with the formation of an intense low pressure system with high wind speeds revolving around it and this weather condition will be called as the cyclone. Now let us see the structure of the cyclone. There is a center of the cyclone which is the calm area called the eye of the tomb and the diameter of the eye varies from 10 to 30 kilometers as you can see in the diagram here. The eye is a region free of clouds as already said and it only has light winds. Around this eye there is a cloud region to the extent of around 50 kilometers. You can see in this diagram it is called as the warm wall cloud region of the tomb and it is in this region that we see high wind speeds of about 150 to 250 kilometer per hour which also cause the heavy destruction. Away from this cloud region the wind speed gradually decreases. Once the cyclone is formed the cyclone moves with about 300 kilometers to 500 kilometers in a day to hit the coast which we have seen already as the landfall. Sometimes the cyclones can also lead to rainfall deeper in inlands up to 30 kilometers. Finally the news article also highlighted that by tomorrow morning the cyclone is going to reach the Assam and the Meghalaya coast with a reduced intensity. So now let us move on to the analysis of the next news article. This editorial talks about the recent measures announced by the finance minister to promote self-reliance in defence production. If you see for most part of the past decade India had remained the world's largest arms importer accounting for about 12 percent of the global arms imports. Saudi Arabia jumped to the first place in 2018 and 2019 but India still takes over 9 percent of the global imports. This external dependence for weapons, payers and ammunition is going to create vulnerability during military crisis. Considering India's security environment, its power ambitions and its technological capacity, India should have a robust defence manufacturing capacity. The new defence procurement procedure that is the DPP 2020 aims to boost India's defence manufacturing capacity. DPP 2020 is currently under the formulation by a review committee which is headed by director general based on the recommendations of various stakeholders including the private industry and when DPP 2020 comes into effect it is going to replace the existing DPP 2016. So what is DPP? It gives a roadmap for the procurement of the defence equipment in the future and the core objective of the DPP is to increase indigenous defence manufacturing and make India self-reliant by strengthening make in India. It also emphasizes on reducing the timelines for procurement of defence equipment. Now let us discuss the major changes proposed in the new DPP. So the first thing is it proposes hike in the indigenous content to the extent of about 10 percent in various categories of procurement. So this is going to definitely give a boost to the make in India. The second change is simple and realistic methodology for verification of the indigenous content for the first time. So we must note here that DPP 2016 has got two wide categories make and buy which is further classified into subcategories like buy Indian, buy global, make Indian, etc. These things were clearly explained on the 12th October Hindu news analysis and the new DPP introduces a new category called the buy global manufacture in India. So what is this category? It should have a minimum 50% indigenous content on the cost basis of total contract value. Only the minimum necessary will be brought from abroad while the balance quantities will be manufactured within India itself. So this is considered as the buy global category. Next move is to corporatize the Ordnance Factory Board which is under the Ministry of Defence and which has been a long-overdured reform. The Ordnance factories have been the backbone of the indigenous supplies to our armed forces from weapons systems to pays but it needs to be responsive to the demands of the modern armed forces. So corporatization including public listing of some of the units of the Ordnance Board is going to ensure a more efficient interface of the manufacturer with the designer and the end user. Another welcome measure is the liberalization of the foreign direct investment in defence manufacturing and it raised the limit under the automatic route from 49% to 74%. Thus aiming to increase more joint ventures of foreign and Indian companies for defence manufacturing in India. It also enables the Indian companies which have long been subcontractors to the prominent defence manufacturer abroad. Now they are going to get the opportunity to directly contribute to the Indian defence manufacturing which in turn is going to improve the objective of the make in India. The editorial also mentions that BPP 2020 should incorporate the guidelines to promote the strategic partnerships between Indian and foreign companies. So what is a strategic partnership? It is a model that is mainly aimed at revitalizing the defence industrial ecosystem and which progressively builds the indigenous capabilities in the private sector. Right? So the SP model or the strategic partnership model has got four segments. One is the submarine, the other is the fighter aircraft, the other is the helicopters and the last one is the main battle tanks. So these are the four segments which will be opened up for the private sector and under this policy there will be one Indian private company which would be selected in each segment and which would then tie up with the shortlisted global equipment to manufacture the platforms in India through the technology transfer. So this is about the strategic partnership. Then the editorial also mentions that the CDS or the Chief of the Defence Staff could examine the BPP 2020 from a trade service angle so that redundancy of capacities across the services can be avoided. So what is Chief of Defence Staff? The Chief of Defence Staff is meant to be a single point military advisor to the government on important defence and strategic issues for the Prime Minister, right? And the Chief of Defence Staff will integrate the operations of the three forces that is the Indian Army, Indian Air Force and the Indian Navy. So thereby it's going to improve the coordination among the three army wings. Note that former General Dipin Rawat has been appointed as the first Chief of Defence Staff in India and how are his views going to take into account? So because he is a member of Defence Acquisition Council and also a member of Defence Planning Committee, so since CDS is also a member of both of these councils, his views can be integrated into the Defence Procurement Procedure, right? So with this we come to the end of this discussion. Let's move towards the next article. This question was framed based on the article that appeared in today's newspaper. Let us look at the question. Consider the following statements with reference to the Pradhan Mantri Jan Narogey Yojana. The first statement says, the scheme will cover the expenses for comprehensive primary health care, almost all the secondary care and most of the treasury care procedures. This is an incorrect statement because Jan Narogey Yojana does not include primary health care part. So if we know that the first statement is incorrect, we are left with no option other than option C. So even without knowing whether the statements two and three are correct, we can get to the right answer for this question. But let us also look at these statements for understanding about the scheme. Second statement says, for wider coverage of the scheme, there is no limit on the family size and the age of the family member. This is correct. And third, it is implemented by the National Health Authority which is correct. Now, coming to the news article, it highlights that testing and treatment of COVID-19 is free for 53 crore beneficiaries of poor and vulnerable families under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Narogey Yojana. But the recent data released by the insurance authorities highlight that only 2,132 people have made use of the Jan Narogey Yojana for the COVID-19 treatment out of the 1 lakh cases that has been reported in the country. So in this context, we need to know about the Aishman Bharat scheme and also about the National Health Authority. So Aishman Bharat or Healthy India is a national initiative that was launched as a part of the National Health Policy 2017. This was introduced in order to achieve the vision of the universal health coverage and Aishman Bharat comprises of two interrelated components which are one, establishment of the health and the wellness centers and two, Pradhan Mantri Jan Narogey Yojana. The first component that is the establishment of the health and the wellness centers will provide comprehensive primary health care covering both the maternal and child health services and non-communicable diseases where it includes free essential drugs and free diagnostic services. So as we have already seen in the question, the primary health care part does not fall under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Narogey Yojana but it falls under the overall Aishman Bharat scheme. Now coming back to the second component of the Aishman Bharat that is the Pradhan Mantri Jan Narogey Yojana. So it is one of the significant steps as we have already seen for achieving the universal health coverage and it aims to provide financial protection to 10 crore of the population who are vulnerable and poor families across the country and these families will be identified based on the latest SECC data that is the socio-economic cash census. The most important aspect of the scheme is that it will offer an insurance benefit of 5 lakh per family every year. This insurance will cover medical and hospitalization expenses, almost all the secondary care and most of the tertiary care procedures and to ensure that nobody is left out of the scheme especially the girl, child, women and the elderly, there will be no cap on the family size and the age in the mission. So national health authority is the apex body responsible for implementing the Aishman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Narogey Yojana. So if you see NHA is a successor of the national health agency which was earlier functioning as a registered society under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Now national health authority is an attached office of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare with full functional autonomy and NHA is governed by a governing board shared by the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare. So as already discussed in the question, the second and the third statements are correct here. So with this we come to the end of the discussion of this article. Let's move ahead with the next article. The next discussion is based on this news article which mentions the comments by the US official regarding India and Taliban. On 18 May Hindu news analysis, when we discussed about the recent developments in Afghanistan's politics, we saw that India does not want to engage with Taliban and thus we are not part of intra-Afghan negotiations. So based on this the US official notes that India should consider talks with Taliban as a part of India's traditional ties with Afghanistan. The official also stressed that USA is seeking to have a political settlement to have the Taliban as a part of the political government structure of the Afghanistan. So India's relationship with such a government must be close. This is because healthy Afghanistan will need a healthy relationship with India. The US official also noted that the US Taliban deal which was signed in February is in line with the US President's South Asia strategy. So what is the South Asia strategy of USA? It is an expansive new strategy of USA mainly for South Asia that was devised in 2017. It aims at strengthening the American security and the new strategy encompasses Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Central Asia and also extends into Southeast Asia. It has got four important pillars. The first pillar is a shift from the time-based approach to an approach based on the conditions. So now it will no more be based on the arbitrary time tables rather it will be based on the conditions on the ground. Hence USA will no more talk about the number of troops or its military plans so that USA's enemies will never know about its plans. Another fundamentally pillar of the strategy is the integration of all the instruments of the American power such as the diplomacy, economy and the military powers towards a successful outcome. So this was mainly to push for a solution in Afghanistan via a political dialogue after an effective military effort and possibly also to have a political settlement that includes Taliban. The next pillar is to change the US approach towards dealing with Pakistan. It is because Pakistan has been a safe haven for terrorist organizations including Taliban. And the final and the important pillar is to develop its strategic partnership with India as India is the key security and the economic partner of the United States. Additionally, it also includes India helping USA with Afghanistan especially in the area of economic assistance and development. Let us now look at the question that was framed based on the above article. The South Asia strategy often seen in news in the context of political settlement in Afghanistan is formulated by the correct answer here is see USA. That's all about this article. Let's move ahead with the next article. This question was framed based on the article that appeared in the business section of today's newspaper. Which of the following is an activity of non banking finance company? So the correct option for this question is D acquisition of securities issued by the government. We can get to the answer through the following discussion coming to the news article. It states that in order to improve the financial position of non banking financial companies and housing finance companies recently the union cabinet has approved a 30,000 crore special equity scheme. So under the scheme a special purpose vehicle would be set up by a public sector bank. This special purpose vehicle would acquire the short term debts of NBFCs and the housing finance companies that have a residual maturity of up to three months. This support extended by the government is remarked as a non starter as it extends support only for the short term debts while most of the lending done by NBFCs are for a period of two to three years. So this was the response of the co-chairman of the financial industry development council if you see is a representative body of asset and loan financing of the NBFCs that are registered with the RBA. So in this context let us briefly see about the non banking financial companies. These companies are engaged primarily in the business of loans and advances. Then they are also engaged in the acquisition of shares or stocks or bonds or debentures or securities that are issued by the government or the local authority. Then they are engaged in leasing higher purchase and they are also engaged in insurance business and cheat fund business. Note that NBFCs do not include any institution whose principal business is that of an agricultural activity, industrial activity, purchase or sale of goods other than the securities or whose principal business is in providing services and sale or purchase or construction of a immovable property. This means that the principal business of NBFCs is mainly financial activity. In this case a company's financial assets that is the NBFCs financial assets constitute more than 50% of the total assets and income from the financial assets constitute more than the 50% of the gross income. NBFCs lend and make investments and therefore their activities are similar to that of banks. However there are few differences while banks can accept the demand deposits NBFCs cannot while banks form part of the payment and the settlement system NBFCs do not form a part of the payment and the settlement system and they cannot issue the checks drawn on itself. Another difference is that deposit insurance facility of the deposit insurance and the credit guarantee corporation is available for the depositors of the bank. Such facility is not available for the depositors of the NBFCs. Now we can easily answer the question that we saw at the beginning of the discussion. If you look at the question again the first statement says that having industrial activity as a principal business this is not an NBFC and an NBFC cannot issue checks drawn on itself and it cannot accept the demand deposits so the correct answer here is the acquisition of securities issued by the government. With this we have come to the end of the discussion and we will be looking at the prelims and the main questions. Let us look at this prelims question. Consider the following statements with reference to the tropical cyclones. First statement says it is an intense vortex or a whirl in the atmosphere with very strong winds circulating around in a clockwise direction in the northern hemisphere and the anti-clockwise direction in the southern hemisphere. It is incorrect. We have already seen the discussion that the circulation is anti-clockwise in the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern hemisphere so this is an incorrect statement. Then let us look at the statement to the west coast of India is less vulnerable to the storm surges than the east coast of India both in terms of the height of the storm surge as well as the frequency. Yes this is a correct statement. This is because of few reasons because if you see Bay of Bengal is hotter when compared to the Arabian Sea and since hot water is the basic criteria for the development of the cyclones it is mostly found on the east coast and secondly even if you see the case of the salinity it is the Bay of Bengal which has got lesser salinity when compared to the Arabian Sea so it is easier to heat a low saline liquid and that is the reason Bay of Bengal becomes more hotter easily and the third thing is with respect to the location the typhoons which originate from the pacific ocean they have an influence only till the Bay of Bengal and they don't move towards the Arabian Sea and that is the reason it is the east coast which has the higher impact when compared to the west coast of India with respect to the cyclones. So the second statement is correct here and the answer for this question is B only. This question is based on the editorial that we have discussed today the worst effect of the COVID-19 pandemic is the economic impact in the light of the statement compare the preparedness of India and China for a post COVID world also suggests the measures for the revival of the Indian economy so we can divide this question into three parts the first part is the introduction one so you can base your introduction based on the statement itself that is the worst effect of the COVID-19 pandemic is the economic impact for this you can use the data the GDP data given by the World Bank or the IMF with respect to the global economy and the Indian economy next in the second part we have to compare the preparedness of India and China so with respect to India we can mention points like the stimulus package of the government in various sectors the relaxation of the labor laws by the central government for attracting the FDI and we can also add our own viewpoints here and coming to the points for the China we can mention the points like a community of common destiny of mankind that we have seen in the editorial and we can also mention about the China standards 2035 and how China is trying to reap the early bird advantage as we have already discussed in the editorial then coming to the last part that is the measures for reviving the Indian economy we can add points like improving the India's infrastructure and reaping the economic benefits by using the education technology companies in India let us look at another main question based on today's editorial discussion do you think privatizing the defense manufacturing would address India's security environment its greater power ambitions and its technological capacities how the new defense procurement procedures 2020 will boost India's indigenous defense manufacturing so there are clearly two parts in this question the first part we should talk about privatizing of the defense manufacturing we can mention here about the changed policy with respect to the FDI the FDI limits and also we can talk about the strategic partnership between Indian and the foreign companies and the technological transfer and how it is definitely going to give boost to our power ambitions and the technological capacities then moving to the next part of the question about the DPP 2020 so we can compare it with the existing DPP 2016 and the changes that the DPP 2020 is proposing like with respect to the bi-global that is a new category that has been introduced and the indigenous component is given a hike in the given policy so you can mention some of the changes that have been proposed and we have discussed in the editorial here to give a full-fledged answer for this question with this we have come to the end of today's hindu news analysis if you like the video don't forget to like share and comment and for more updates on civil services exam preparation do subscribe to the Shankara Aizakarami YouTube channel thank you