 A very good evening aspirants, welcome to the Hindu newspaper analysis brought to you by Shankar IAS Academy. Today's date is 13th of October 2022. The articles displayed here are the list of news articles that we are going to discuss today. Dear viewers, we are happy to bring to your attention that Shankar IAS Academy is launching two programs to guide and help you in your UPSC prylums and mains civil services examination. For prylums, a new batch in our test series is starting this month. Yes, the admission for this new pre-storming batch is open now. The test will commence on day after tomorrow that is on 15th October 2022. This batch will consist of 66 tests. These tests will be conducted in both online and offline mode. Test discussion classes will also be provided. Hurry and register to use the most reliable prylums test series. Don't worry for mains. We are launching the mains booster 2023 under which you will be provided 40 mains oriented test in 90 days. The booster is a quick plan drafter for you to boost your mains score. It starts on October 31st and it will include sectional test, half papers and civil service examination emulators. It is available in both online and offline modes for just 4500 rupees. So grab this chance to kick start your mains exam preparation. So now without much delay, let us get into the first news article discussion. Now take a look at this news article. See this news article talks about India's first slender laurus sanctuary. This sanctuary is notified by the government of Tamil Nadu and the news article also says that this sanctuary is located across two districts of Tamil Nadu covering nearly 118006 hectares. So this is the cracks of the news article given here. In this context, let us learn about slender laurus in preliminary perspective. See before getting into the discussion, make a note of this point. In recent months, the Tamil Nadu government had also announced to notify India's first dukong conservation reserve in the Park Bay. Here Park Bay is a narrow strip of sea that connects India's Tamil Nadu and the Indian Ocean littoral nation which is nothing but Sri Lanka. Okay now coming back, see slender laurus is a small nocturnal arboreal species found normally in the southern part of India and Sri Lanka. Here nocturnal means those species which are active at night. Also the term arboreal means the species which is generally living in the trees. So from this we can say that slender laurus is primarily active at night which also lives in tree. Now here you might have a doubt why the specific species is considered very significant and an entire sanctuary is notified for this species. See this is because of the only reason that slender laurus they act as a biological predator of pest which is helping farmer communities a lot. So that is why conservation of this species became very important. See just now we talked about conservation right? Then we have to know about the IUCN status of the species. So what is it? See the IUCN has listed them as endangered whereas they are listed under the scheduled one of the wildlife protection act of India 1972 which means they have highest level of legal protection and remember slender laurus they also find mention in the appendix two of the sites convention. So now moving on see the genus slender has two different species associated with it. They are gray slender laurus and red slender laurus. Let me give you the geographical extension of these two species. See this gray slender laurus it is found in both South India and Sri Lanka while red slender laurus is found in Sri Lanka alone and the sanctuary which article mentions is dedicated to the gray slender laurus. So now let us see some of the strange fact about this species. See this slender laurus they do urinate washing of their face and limbs. They are doing this with the thought to soothe or defend against the sting of the toxic insects, toxic insects which they prefer to eat. Okay and also remember the females give birth to normally one and rarely two infants at one time. The mother carries the infants constantly during the first few weeks after birth. The lifespan of the species varies between 12 to 15 years. See make note of all these points as this species is living only in South Asia. It becomes very important to know about this species with respect to exam perspective as well. So this is regarding slender laurus. So through this discussion we could briefly understand about the species slender laurus its geographical extent and we also saw some of the strange facts about this species. So these learned points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now take a look at this news article. See this news article says that Governor of Tamil Nadu has appreciated the postal circle of Tamil Nadu for their efforts in opening highest number of Suhanya Sambrithi Yojana accounts in the country. So this is the cracks of the news article given here. In this context let us quickly go through Suhanya Sambrithi Yojana. Now before that as you know a country's economic growth depends upon how productive its working age population is. Since the working age population involves both men and men it becomes important for a country to have both the genders of its population to contribute to the economic output of the country right. But when you take the participation of women in the labour force into consideration it varies across developing countries far more than in the case of men. See in the Middle East North Africa and even in South Asia there is only one third of women of working age participation in the economy. While the proportion reaches around two-third in East Asia and sub Sahara Africa. This variation is driven by a wide variety of economic and social factors including increasing educational attainment, falling fertility rates and social norms. And this disparity is highest in South Asian countries. Now pause the video and have a look at this image. Here dark colour indicates higher female labour force participation rate while a lighter colour indicates lower female participation rate. From this we can see that South Asia heavily lacks even behind the sub Sahara countries. Here sub Sahara means the countries located south of Sahara descent. So here in this context it becomes very important for India to increase its female labour force participation. Now coming to the other indicators. Let's see briefly about the term sex ratio and child sex ratio. See sex ratio is used to describe the number of females per thousand of males while the child sex ratio is defined as the number of females per thousand males in the age group of zero to six years in a country. Now coming to India's sex ratio and child sex ratio. See as per 2011 census sex ratio in India is 943 while the child sex ratio is 919. So these gaps in sex ratio indicates sex selective abortion and female infanticides occurring in our country. And that is exactly why Government of India under PM Modi introduced Beti Bachao Beti Padav in the year 2015. See this scheme was introduced to address concerns of gender discrimination and women empowerment in the country and the name Beti Bachao Beti Padav translates to save the girl child educate the girl child. See the scheme aims to educate citizens against gender bias and improve the efficacy of welfare services for girls. The other objectives include ensuring survival protection and education of the girl child and to know more about Beti Bachao Beti Padav I request you to go and visit December 11 2021 Hindu newspaper analysis of Sankarai's academy we have covered in detail about Beti Bachao Beti Padav. Now coming to Suganya Samrithi Yojana. See Suganya Samrithi Yojana is a small deposit scheme for girl child. It was launched as a part of Beti Bachao Beti Padav campaign and the objective of the scheme is to meet the education and marriage expenses of the girl child. As today's news article mentions about this scheme let us see few facts about the scheme. Firstly know that under this scheme an account can be opened in post office or branches of authorized banks. This account can be opened only in the name of the girl child by submitting the birth certificate till she attains the age of 10. Note that only one account can be opened in the name of a girl child and the account can be transferred anywhere in India from one post office or bank to another. Okay the account can be opened with a minimum of rupees 250 and thereon any amount in multiple of rupees 100 can be deposited. Here a minimum of rupees 250 and a maximum of 150,000 can be deposited in a financial year. See the interest for the amount will be on the basis of government notification of that period and it will be calculated on a yearly compounded basis and will be credited to that account. Also note that one premature withdrawal of up to 50% age will be allowed on attaining the age of 18 for meeting the educational expenses and the account will mature on the completion of 21 years from the date of opening of the account or on the marriage of account holder whichever is earlier. So this is with respect to Suhanya Samrati scheme. Now let's move on to see what will happen if women labour force participation rate in the economy increases. See in the year 2017 a study was conducted by McKinsey Global Institute where it was founded that the economic output of the country has been greatly affected or reduced because very few women work outside their homes. Apart from this, it was also said that if the participation of women in the economy becomes equal to that of the men, the GDP of India can be increased by 60% age in the year 2025. So that is why women participation in labour force is very very important and through the schemes like Beti Bachao and Beti Badal and Suhanya Samrati Yojana, the government is moving on the right direction. So that's all about this news article discussion. In this news article discussion we saw in detail about Suhanya Samrati Yojana. We saw why such a scheme is required and what will happen if women labour force participation rate increases. So with these learnt points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now take a look at this news article. This news article talks about a letter written by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. K. Stalin to his Delhi counterpart Aravind Kijriwal. In that letter he requested Kijriwal to allow firecrackers in Delhi and he mentioned that such relaxation will favour the rural women who depend on cracker industry for livelihood. As you know Diwali accounts for 70% of their annual business. So in today's news article discussion let us understand why crackers are banned in Delhi and not in other places and we shall also know the negative impacts of the ban and the way forward. So let's begin the discussion with the background of the issue. See in 2017 the Supreme Court banned the use and sale of toxic crackers during the celebration owing to Diwali, Christmas etc. This is on the basis of a petition filed by two infants. They pleaded for their right to life. So in response to that the court dismissed arguments that bursting crackers was a fundamental right and an essential practice during religious festivals like Diwali and it also held that the right to freedom of religion article 25 is subjected to right to life article 21. So the court said that if a particular religious practice is threatening the health and life of people such practice is not entitled to protect under article 25. So this happened in 2017 again in December 2020 the NGT that is the National Green Tribunal. They ordered that only green crackers which use less polluting raw materials would be permitted for Christmas and New Year in areas where the ambient air quality was in moderate or below category. However due to COVID-19 pandemic NGT again prohibited the sale and use of firecrackers and the one who is worried about this order is the firecrackers companies. They argued that the ban was an impediment to their livelihoods. So in reply to this argument the tribunal had reasoned that the right to business is not absolute under article 19 1 G and there is no right to violate air quality and noise level norms. So this is all about the background of the issue. So now let us see why Delhi is alone banning the burning of crackers. See the first reason is air pollution. See to make matters worse Delhi is cursed with poor geography as far as air pollution is concerned. See it has zero wins to carry away pollutants that is the problem here. As we know that the capital city lies to the northeast of the Tha desert to the northwest of the central plains and to the southwest of the Himalayas. Whenever winds arrive from the coast they bring pollutants picked up along with them and all that pollutants gets trapped right before the Himalayas. So here the air pressure pushes from one direction and with the inability to escape quickly in the other the particulate matter accumulates over the northern plains. See this accumulation and entrapment affects not only Delhi but the entire expanse between Punjab in the west to West Bengal in the east. Imagine this as a bowl that collects pollutants with only a narrow outlet for it to escape that is what is happening in Delhi. So whenever vehicles emit pollutants and whenever stubble is burned in the region nearby national capital region this natural phenomenon along with the additional pollutants deteriorate the air quality of Delhi. Now to that list burning crackers is also added especially firecrackers. They are making Delhi a gas chamber. The issue does not stops there. This in turn causes health issues with prominent effects on children. Then animals also get affected due to noise pollution. So because of all these reasons firecrackers are not allowed in Delhi. Now let us see the negative impacts of the ban. First in the list is the loss to economy. See the Indian firecracker industry is the second largest in the world. As Sivakasi region in Tamil Nadu alone holds 85 percentage of the manufacturing of firecrackers in the country Tamil Nadu has legitimate concern about the fate of the firecracker industry. This in turn is affecting the livelihood for workers. Now the third impact is some still argue that the ban of fire workers infringes religious rights. So this leads us to the question of what can be done. See firstly stricter implementation of environmental laws is a remedy. It is important for the government to organize anti-firecracker campaigns and discourage people from bursting firecrackers. Parents as well as children should be educated on the harmful effects of firecrackers and environmental laws should be implemented strictly. Secondly there should be promotion of research and product development of green crackers as well. So these are all some of the important points that you have to note about why firecrackers are banned in Delhi. So with these learned points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now take a look at this news article. It says that pigs in Trissure district were slaughtered. Around 200 pigs within a 1 kilometer radius of the African swine flu affected farm have been killed to avoid the spread of the disease. And along with that pigs within a 10 kilometer radius of the infected farm are being monitored. So this is the cracks of the news article given here. In this context let us understand about the African swine flu in prelims perspective. See from the news article itself you would have found out that the African swine flu affects pigs. And according to world organization for animal health African swine fever is a highly contagious viral disease of domestic and wild pigs. So what is the causative agent of the disease? See it is caused by a unique enveloped DNA virus placed in the family as far away. It is a large DNA virus that replicates in the cytoplasm and is the only member of the as far away family. See members of the pig family are susceptible to infection. And the symptoms of the infection is seen only in domestic pigs and the closely related European wild boar. Wild African pig species such as warthogs, bush pigs, gained forest hogs can become infected with the virus but they do not develop clinical signs of disease. So these animals together with pigs are the natural host of the virus. Now talking about its background. See the infection was first detected in Kenya East Africa in 1921. It was detected as a disease that killed shelters pigs. And in this case contact with warthogs was proved to be an important factor in transmission of the virus. Now the animal that is displayed here in the image is the warthog. So it was established that warthogs along with the species of soft ticks which live in warthog bungalows could be persistently infected with a sub virus without showing signs of disease. So we can say that the routes of transmission include direct contact and indirect contact. Direct contact is caused by contact with an infected wild pig which is dead or alive. And the indirect infection is by contact through intention of contaminated materials such as food waste, feed or garbage or through biological vectors like ticks. And according to the WHOA the virus is highly resistant in the environment. This means that it can survive on clothes, boots, wheels and other materials. It can also survive in various pork products such as ham, sausage or bacon. Therefore human behavior can play an important role in spreading this pig disease across borders if adequate measures are not taken. Now you may ask if the virus survives on pork products does this mean human will get affected with the virus? See according to WHOA for animal health ASF is not a danger to human health. This is because it is not a zoonotic disease that is it does not spread from animal to humans but it affects the farming community monetarily because the death of pigs is a loss of income for the farmers right? Now coming to the symptoms that the pigs develop after infection. See the symptoms of ASF in pigs are high grade fever, poor appetite, coughing, breathing problems, diarrhea, vomiting and red listens. And the disease has a case fatality rate CFR of about 100 percentage. Also know that there is currently no effective vaccine against ASF so precautionary measures are our only hope. And awareness also plays a vital role when it comes to battling ASF. So that's all about this news article discussion. In this news article discussion we saw in detail about African swine fever, how it gets transmitted then we saw whether it will be transmitted to human or not. We saw that it is not a zoonotic disease but it has high resistance in the environment. Then we saw about some of the symptoms of ASF and finally we saw that there is no effective vaccine against ASF so precautionary measures are the only way to prevent ASF. So with these learnt points now let us move on to the next news article discussion. Now let us take up this open article. See it is about the anthropogenic global warming and its consequences. As per the article a study from Science Journal says that Earth may have already passed through five dangerous tipping points due to the 1.1 degree Celsius of global heating caused by humanity to date. So this is the essence of the news article given here. In that line we will see some of the important points mentioned in the news article. Before that the syllabus relevant to this news article is highlighted here for your reference. Just go through it. First let us start our discussion with basics. First of all what is this global warming? See global warming is the long-term heating of Earth's surface. It is observed since the pre-industrial period that is between 1850 and 1900 due to human activities and the primary reason is the fossil fuel burning which increases heat trapping greenhouse gas levels in Earth's atmosphere. So here you might have a doubt how these greenhouse gases are trapping heat. Firstly know that greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and water vapor. See these gases occur naturally and are part of our atmosphere's makeup. Know that these gases are the reasons why Earth is neither too hot nor too cold. You may know how this is happening but then also we will see again. It will be like a revision for you. See greenhouse gases they trap heat within Earth's atmosphere and this process is called greenhouse effect. Now see this image to understand the effect. See during the day the sun shines through the atmosphere and because of this the Earth's surface warms up in the sunlight and during night Earth's surface cools releasing the heat back into the air but some of the heat is trapped by the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and that is what is keeping the Earth warm at night as well. If this is not happening then Earth will be an uninhabitable planet. So now think about it what happens if the level of greenhouse gases increases in the atmosphere. See if such a thing happens then the amount of heat trapped by the greenhouse gases will also increase and that is what is happening now. Now look at this image. See in the naturally occurring process more heat escapes into the space but in the anthropogenic enhanced process only less heat escapes out of the Earth. This is because of the increase in the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. As we already saw fossil fuel burning only has significantly increased the amount of greenhouse gases and that is why we are experiencing global warming now. And as you know so many conferences, agreements and even conventions are addressing this issue of global warming. This is because of the impacts created by the global warming and this article is also one such attempt to suggest measures to address the issue of global warming. See this article talks about what was discussed in COP26 and it also talks about what measures are needed to be taken in the future. Now the article says that development of technology and its implementation to support action on climate change has become crucial. See as we already know technology has become a survival strategy for our species. For example we have started using electronic vehicle to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. That is also another technique of iron fertilization in this method. Iron is introduced in the iron deficit areas which in turn induces plankton growth. And this will again will help in sequestering more carbon into the ocean. See all these technologies and techniques are there in practice now. But you should know that technology alone cannot deal with the challenge that we are facing right now. What we require is a societal overhaul and a zero emission strategy. See historically technology was only seen as a way out. To support this statement the author quotes the example of green revolution. It only helped to feed millions of people and also helped to attain food security. This support for technology was reiterated in COP26 also. See COP26 which happened at Glasgow fuelled technological optimism. Every technological solution discussed at COP26 depended on three resources. The first one is N electricity which is nothing but non-emitting electricity generated by hydropower, renovables or nuclear fission. The second one is carbon capture and storage. And the third one is biomass. See here the author is saying that the total demand for these resources that are required by the plants discussed at COP26 cannot be met by 2050. And for this the author provides evidence also. See currently we have 4 kilowatt hour per day of N electricity per person. But the COP26 plants require 32 kilowatt hour per day. And we currently have 6 kilogram of CCS per person per year. Here CCS is nothing but carbon capture and storage. But the COP26 plants require 3600. We eat 100 kilogram plant based food per person each year. But producing enough bio kerosene to fly at today's levels required 200 kilogram of additional harvest. And these are the reasons why the author is saying that there is no possibility that our resources will be near the levels required by the plants discussed at COP26. See the article also quotes other studies which states that our resources are scarce. In 2003 Ken Calderia at the Carnegie Institution found that the world needs a nuclear plant's worth of clean energy capacity every day between 2000 and 2050. And we can avoid the catastrophic climate change only if we can achieve this. And in 2018 MIT technology review reported that at the given rate the world will take nearly 400 years to transform the energy system. So what is the issue in this approach? That is the technology based approach. See tech-centric mitigation measures leave the forest economies and the subject related to it such as conservation of forestation etc. See these are the best carbon removal instruments. So the author is saying that climate action requires the same amount of investment in conservation as we see in shiny new technologies. Now don't think that we didn't take any measures at all regarding the forest economies. At COP26 there was a deforestation ending climate commitment. But the problem in this is the nature of the pledge was very weak. See countries may easily attempt to achieve their net zero deforestation goals through monoculture farming. But this will not help much. Why is that? It is because see the scientists have stated that naturally preserved forest or 40 percentage more effective than planted ones. And apart from this our climate crisis is intertwined with other complex issues. So we must insist on multi-pronged interconnected climate solutions. Here also forest becomes relevant. So conserving forest will take care about the biodiversity crisis also. This is because forest are home to 80 percentage of terrestrial wildlife. Apart from this forest offers other benefits also. For example forest observe a net 7.6 billion metric tons of CO2 a year. And a new study have found that their bio-physical aspects have a tendency to cool the earth by an additional 0.5 percentage. The conservation of forest along with other nature-based solutions can provide up to 37 percentage of the emissions reductions needed to tackle climate change. The Das Gupta's independent review on the economics of biodiversity reports that green infrastructure that is salt, marshes and mangroves are 2 to 5 times cheaper than grey infrastructure. Example of this is breakwaters. See a breakwater is nothing but a wooden or stone wall that extends from the shore into the sea. It is built in order to protect a harbor or beach from the force of the waves. Mangroos also do the same job with no cost. So here comes the question what should be done. See the IPCC land report estimates that land serves as the largest sea water sink. And there are evidences that a large proportion of the required removals of green hose gases could be achieved by conserving natural sinks, improving biodiversity protection and restoring ecosystems. And the need of the harbor is preserving the earth's cyclical processes. It can be done by protecting the terrestrial ecosystem and natural sinks and practicing transformative agricultural practices under the leadership of the indigenous people and the local communities. And the author is saying that these measures are a far more equitable and cost-effective way of tackling the climate crisis that it is being done now with technology. And finally author concludes the article by saying that climate crisis is just a symptom. Our real problem is human conception and activities that have exceeded the regenerative capacity of the planet. And he also says that technology can only assist us but it cannot lead us on the pathway to a sustainable regenerative and equitable world. So that's all about this news article discussion. In this news article discussion we saw in detail about green hose gases and how they impact the climate and how they contribute to global warming. Then we saw about COP26 and some of the corrections that have to be made for a sustainable future. So with this we came to the end of the news article discussion. With this news article discussion let us move on to the next part of the news article discussion that is the preliminary practice questions. See today we have two problems question. I'll solve one question and the other question is the quiz question for you today. Now look at this question about African swine flu. Statement one the infections of the African swine flu virus is confined to the African continent. Statement two African swine fever virus that is ASFV is the only known DNA arbo virus which of the statements given above are correct. Option A one only option B two only option C both one and two and option D neither one nor two. See the correct option for the question is option B two only. Statement one is incorrect because initially it was confined to African continent. But now ASF continues to spread worldwide threatening pick health and welfare. The disease has reached multiple countries across Asia, Caribbean, Europe and the Pacific. So this statement is incorrect. Second statement is actually correct. See this statement might be appearing to you as wrong but it is actually correct. See here arboreal disease is a general term used to describe infections caused by the bite of infected arthropods which is nothing but insects like mosquito and ticks. And ASF is the only DNA arbo virus. Except ASF all arbo viruses or RNA viruses. Okay. So the correct answer for the question is option B two only. Now the question displayed here is the quiz question for you today. It is a very easy question. Try to answer the correct answer in the comment section. Now moving on the questions displayed here or the main questions for you today. Try to answer the questions and post it in the comment section. So with this we came to the end of the news article discussion. 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