 A very good evening aspirants welcome to the hindi news analysis by Shankarase academy for the date 2nd december 2020 these are the list of news articles chosen for today's analysis it has been provided along with the page numbers of different editions of hindi newspaper let's move on to the first discussion this is an interesting discussion which is based on this data point the data point reflects the fall in democracy in india and in the world so let us try to see what are the important takeaways from the statistics given in this data point the syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference first note that the data point is with reference to the liberal democracy index here do not confuse the liberal democracy index with the democracy index which is compiled by the economic intelligence unit which is a uk-based company this liberal democracy index is compiled and released under the democracy report by varieties of democracy this varieties of democracy is in short known as vedem it is headquartered at the university of gotenberg in sweden vedem is a new approach to conceptualizing and measuring democracy it provides a multi-dimensional and disaggregated dataset that reflects the complexity of the concept of democracy it sees the concept of democracy as a system of rule that goes beyond the simple presence of elections thus the vedem project distinguishes between five high-level principles of democracy they are electoral democracy liberal democracy participatory democracy deliberative democracy and egalitarian democracy and it collects data to measure these principles and it also has separate index in the democracy report for all these principles now this liberal democracy index captures both liberal aspects and electoral aspects of democracy and it is based on 71 indicators which are included in the liberal component index and the electoral democracy index see the electoral democracy index reflects a relatively ambitious idea of electoral democracy where a number of institutional features guarantee free and fair elections such as freedom of association and freedom of expression thus the electoral democracy index not only captures the extent to which the regimes hold clean free and fair elections but it also captures their actual freedom of expression alternative sources of information and association it captures male and female suffrage and the degree to which government policy is vested in the elected political officials now here you should know about the egalitarian principle the egalitarian principle of democracy measures to what extent all the social groups enjoy equal capabilities to participate in the political arena egalitarian principle relies on the idea that democracy is a system of rule by the people where citizens participate in various ways the citizens participate by making informed voting decisions by expressing opinions by demonstrating etc and when you say participatory principle it emphasizes the active participation by citizens in all political processes including the electoral and non electoral processes this principle prefers direct rule by citizens as practicable so based on this the VDM participatory component index takes into account four important aspects of citizen participation which are civil society organizations mechanism of direct democracy participation and representation through local and regional governments and that is also a deliberative component index based on the deliberative principle this deliberative component index captures to what extent the deliberative principles of democracy is achieved it assesses the process by which decisions are reached in a polity so when you say a deliberative process it includes public reasoning it is focused on the common good and it motivates political decisions and then finally comes the liberal component index it captures the limits that is placed on the governments in terms of two key aspects first aspect is the protection of individual liberties and the second aspect is the checks and balances between institutions now based on these principles and based on these indices the liberal democracy index for the year 2020 is compiled so what are the findings of this index first if you see with respect to India LDI presents India in a very grim picture see according to LDI the quality of democracy in India is decreasing alarmingly in the last decade importantly the fall in democratic values in India is the sixth highest in the world over the past decade as you can see here the score of India fell from 0.55 in 2009 to 0.36 in 2019 and the country which witnessed the highest drop in democratic values in the last 10 years is Hungary so India is among the top 10 main autocratizing countries in the last decade see literally autocracy means a system of government by one person with absolute power it also means dictatorship or tyranny and it means the lack of democracy and according to BDM autocratization is the substantial decline in its liberal democracy index it is because as we saw liberal democracy index captures many indicators which reflects democracy in a country and when governments are autocratic then it reduces the scope for civil society it reduces the scope for protest and academia and in this situation the governmental and societal actors are more likely to become polarizing that is there will be completely two opposing groups and in this situation there will be use of political violence and the masses will be mobilized in favor of an illiberal agenda so autocratization is a threat to democracy and with respect to India majorly there has been a significant drop in four indicators these four indicators are academic freedom index civil liberties index rule of law index and freedom of expression index here academic freedom means the right of academics to freely teach discuss research publish and express opinions without construction by the prescribed doctrine and civil liberties refers to the absence of physical violence by the government agents and it refers to the absence of constraints on private and public liberties by the government then rule of law reflects to what extent the laws are transparent independent predictable impartial and they are equally enforced rule of law also means to what extent the actions of the government officials comply with the law and then comes the freedom of expression it means to what extent does the government respect the press and media freedom the freedom of ordinary people to discuss the political matters at home and in public sphere as well as the respect by government to the freedom of academic and cultural expression all these denotes the freedom of expression but unfortunately India has registered a low score in these indicators as you can see in this graph these four indicators have seen a critical decline and the levels of academic freedom and civil liberties even declined versus than in the emergency period so based on these findings the report states that india is moving towards autocratization the report also outlines that india is on the verge of losing its status as a democracy and this is due to the severely shrinking of space for the media civil society and also due to the opposition under the current prime minister of india so these are the findings with respect to india now let us see some other significant findings of the report according to the findings of this report for the first time since 2001 the autocracies are in majority in the world around 92 countries which are home to 54 percentage of global population are autocracies the next finding is that almost 35 percentage of the world's population live in autocratizing nations the next finding is that major g20 nations and all regions of the world are part of third wave of autocratization and on a whole autocratization is affecting the countries of brazil india usa and turkey and these are the major economies that have sizable populations and which have substantial global military economic and political influence and here you can see the ranking of india among the bricks countries the highest is the ranking the less is the ldi score so you can see that china is having the worst ldi score which has been ranked at 174th position but comparatively south africa has done well and with respect to india's neighbors it has been noted by the report that shilanka is one of the four countries that has achieved the greatest democratic gains so these are some of the important points that you should know with respect to this data point and the liberal democracy index now let's move on to the next discussion our next discussion is based on this editorial which is with reference to the rights of prisoners with disabilities in this editorial author talks about the rights of prisoners with disabilities from being subjected to torture cruel or inhuman degrading treatment the article mainly deals with prisoners such as remand accused and under trial prisoners who are not yet convicted by the court of law so in this analysis we will discuss the relevant domestic and international legal provisions in this regard the syllabus relevant for the analysis of this editorial is given here for your reference before discussing about the legal provisions let us first see the brief background as to why we are discussing the subject of right of prisoners with disabilities we are discussing this topic because recently on 8 october 2020 an 83-year-old individual named stan swamy was arrested by the national investigation agency nai reports that he was arrested for his involvement in the activities of a banned terrorist organization called as cpi mahouist if you remember yesterday we saw that the banned terrorist organizations are listed in the first schedule to the unlawful activities prevention act of 1967 and cpi m is one of the banned terrorist organizations he was arrested for the alleged furtherance of the agenda of cpi m by being one of the conspirators in the bima koregao elgar parisad case see this bima koregao case pertains to the widespread violence arson and stone pelting which resulted in loss of lives and property near the bima koregao in january 2018 according to nia this violence is a result of the provocative speeches during the organization of elgar parisad program at the shanwar vada in pune on 31st december 2017 and currently this matter is being dealt by the nai special court but till now the arrested individual has not been convicted by the court and he is kept in judicial custody at a central jail in maharashtra and it has been reported that stan swamy suffers from parkinson's disease and therefore is unable to hold a glass of liquid or water thus on 6 november 2020 a request was made to provide him sipper and straw to drink water now for a sipper and straw at the judicial custody the accused has to move to the mercy of the court and the court however scheduled the hearing of this matter after 20 days and recently on 26 november the court has issued necessary direction to the jail authorities to provide him straw and sipper so because of these issues there is large-scale discussion across our country regarding the rights of prisoners with disabilities so in this context now let us see how far the rights of prisoners with disabilities as remand accused or as under trial prisoners is adhered in india in this regard author also highlights few domestic and international legal provisions later to this matter first under the indian law we should know whether the alleged and arrested person in this issue is a person with disability now to know this we should understand the definition part of the rights of prisoners with disabilities act of 2016 which talks about specified disability according to this act specified disability means the disabilities as specified in the schedule to the act and as you can see here parkinson's disease is listed as a specified disability but note that under section 56 to 59 assessment and certification of such specified disabilities is needed now since parkinson's disease is a specified disability we can understand that stands for me is a person with disability under this act now here you should focus on the preamble to this act which talks about the convention adopted by the UN General Assembly this convention is the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities in short CRPD india is a signatory to this UN convention and india has also ratified it this convention under article 14 asks the states to ensure that if persons with disabilities are deprived of their liberty through any process then they are entitled to guarantees in accordance with the international human rights law and they shall be treated in compliance with the objectives and principles of the convention and these are the other relevant provisions in relation to the prisoners with disability additionally under article 4 the convention obligates the nations to provide accessible information to persons with disabilities about the mobility aids devices and assistive technologies as well as other forms of assistance support services and facilities so under these provisions stands for me whose liberty is curtailed due to the arrest must have been provided zipper and straw for the purpose of intake of drinking water but as we saw in the beginning before the intervention of the court such facility was not provided so in such case author of this editorial concludes that this may amount to a breach of states obligation under article 15 of the UN convention and that obligation is to prevent the persons with disabilities from being subjected to torture cruel or inhuman degree in treatment or punishment and these obligations under the CRPD are complemented by article 10 of international covenant on civil and political rights and by the Nelson Mandela rules this is the article 10 of ICCPR and I just know that the Nelson Mandela rules referred to revised standard minimum rules for the treatment of prisoners it was initially adopted by the first UN Congress on the prevention of crime and the treatment of offenders in the 1955 and these Nelson Mandela rules requires that the prison administration shall make all reasonable accommodation and adjustments to ensure that prisoners with physical disabilities mental or other disabilities have full and effective access to prison life on equitable basis and that is why author states that in the stands for me case the state has breached its obligation now what about the national law we have the rights of persons with disabilities act but this act does not specifically provide rights for persons with disabilities who are held in custody but as we saw in the beginning the object of this rights of persons with disabilities act is to give effect to the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities thus the 2016 Indian national law will encompass prisoners also so keeping all these facts and human rights standards in mind author concludes that the denial of aids such as sipper and straw to stand from in prison to deal with his neurological disability is arguably inconsistent with both domestic law and international law thus finally author calls the center and the state governments to stand up to the ideals of human rights standards which are enshrined in the legal texts at the national and international level so these are some of the important legislations and conventions that you should know with respect to this editorial now let's move on to the next discussion this discussion is based on this opiate article which is written by captain jr gopinath who is the founder of airlines the air decan in this opiate article he has discussed about the much talked about recommendations that were made by the internal working group of rbi and some of these recommendations have been widely criticized so in this discussion let us see the important recommendations of this internal working group and let us see why some of them are controversial the syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference first let us see for what purpose this internal working group was constituted rbi constituted this i w g in june 2020 for reviewing ownership guidelines and corporate structure for Indian private sector banks so under this i w g also reviewed the eligibility criteria for individuals and entities to apply for banking license it examined the preferred corporate structure for banks and it also reviewed the norms for long-term shareholding in banks by the promoters and other shareholders here remember that promoter is a person or a firm or a company that is involved in setting up and funding a new company so these were the terms of reference of this i w g now let us see some of the key recommendations put forward by the i w g based on these terms of references the first recommendation is to raise the cap on promoters stake in the banks in the long run that is in 15 years the shareholding of promoters have to be increased due to 26 percentage from the current level of 15 percent of the paid up voting equity share capital of the bank so when we say paid up capital it is the amount of money a company has been paid from the shareholders in exchange for the shares of the stock of that company so i w g has recommended for increasing the shareholding of promoters then it has given another recommendation with regards to non promoter shareholding i w g has recommended that a uniform cap of 15 percentage of the paid up voting equity share capital of the bank shall be applicable for all types of shareholders and this excludes obviously the promoters and in this the most important suggestion is that large corporate houses or large industrial houses may be allowed as promoters of banks and they can be allowed as promoters of bank by making necessary amendments to the banking regulation act of 1949 and this amendment will help to strengthen the supervisory mechanism for such large conglomerates or corporations the next recommendation is on the well-run large non banking financial companies that is nbfcs the recommendation is for the nbfcs with an asset size of 50 000 crore rupees and above and this includes even those nbfcs that are owned by corporate houses so regarding this i w g has recommended to consider nbfcs for their conversion into banks and this is subject to completion of 10 years of operations of nbfcs and also after meeting due diligence criteria and compliance of rba see when we say nbfc it is a company which is registered under the company's act of 1956 and an nbfc is engaged in the business of loans and advances which is engaged in acquisition of shares stocks debentures securities which are issued by government or local authority so in short nbfcs are entities that provide certain bank-like services and financial services but they do not hold a banking license thus if they are converted into bank they will be provided a banking license so if the nbfcs which are having this asset size and which have successfully completed 10 years of operations and if they meet the due diligence criteria and compliance of rba then they may be converted into banks then there is another recommendation for the payment banks which are intending to convert to a small finance bank see when we say payments bank they have specific licensing conditions that restricts its activities mainly to acceptance of demand deposits and provision of pavements and remittance services that is a payments bank is like any other bank but it is operating on a smaller scale without involving any credit risk it can carry out most banking operations but it cannot advance loans or it cannot issue credit cards but it can accept demand deposits up to one lakh rupees it can offer remittance services it can offer mobile payment services transfers or purchases and other banking services like atm cards debit cards net banking etc and a small finance bank is a specific segment of banking which is created by rba with an objective of furthering financial inclusion and this will be done by primarily undertaking the basic banking activities to unserved and underserved sections of the population and these sections include the small business units small and marginal farmers micro and small industries and unorganized entities etc so like any other commercial banks the small finance banks can undertake all basic banking activities including lending and taking deposits so now the recommendation of IWG is that if a payment bank has a track record of three years of experience then it can intend to convert to a small finance bank it also suggested that the small finance banks and payments banks may be listed in the stock exchange within six years from the date of reaching a net worth equivalent to the prevalent entry capital requirement which is prescribed for universal banks or they can be listed in stock exchange after 10 years from the date of commencement of their operations and the next recommendation is enhancing the minimum initial capital requirement for licensing new banks IWG has recommended that the minimum initial capital requirement for licensing new banks should be enhanced from the existing 500 crore rupees to 1000 crore rupees for universal banks and it has to be increased from 200 crore rupees to 300 crore for small finance banks so these are some of the important recommendations by IWG now let us see why one of its recommendations created a furor and the recommendation which was largely criticized was allowing the large corporate houses or large industrial houses to be promoters of banks and apply for banking license so in this regard author has noted that allowing large corporate houses as promoters of banks is similar to giving keys of a hen house to a fox see if a fox is given keys of a hen house then you can assume that the fox will kill and eat all the hen so similarly if large corporate houses become promoters of banks then they will utilize the money for their own benefit and because of this even the former rbi governor agram rajan has termed these recommendations as unpleasant and has asked to leave these recommendations on the shelf itself that is he has asked not to utilize these recommendations see the issue here is simple what if the business houses which are owning an in-house bank prefer self lending then it will lead to connected lending that is banks will be granting loans to some firms based on their special connections but the lending will not be on the firm characteristics so if the loans are given based on special connections then it will be disastrous see even though i wg recommendations says that enough measures shall be taken to prevent connected lending and exposures between the banks and other financial and non-financial group entities will be prevented author feels that this might not be practical this is because even an independent committed regulator with all the information finds it difficult to stop poor lending we have already seen many examples where many financial entities have collapsed like the island fs yes bank panjab national bank and maharasha cooperative bank dhfl etc all these banks were able to conceal their weak exposures for considerable periods which led to their collapse and we have also have a class example in which the kingfisher airlines took more than 6000 crores of loans from a consortium of 17 lenders so when banks are giving loans to non-connected entities itself there are many loan defaults so imagine what if they provide connected loans or they do self lending then the money may never come back and this is the reason why there are many criticism for allowing large corporate houses as promoters of banks so let us now just hope that these public debates and discussions on the recent recommendations of i wg will enable the government to take a conscious call and it will help to build a better banking sector so these are some of the information that you should know with respect to this opiate article now let's move on to the next discussion our next discussion is based on this news article which talks about the gst collections for the month of november the news is that the goods and services tax collections has crossed rupees one lakh crore for the second month in a row so the pickup in gst revenues over the last two months could reduce the shortfall in gst compensation that is due to the states see as you know goods and services tax or gst was brought into force on first july 2017 gst is an indirect tax which has replaced many indirect taxes in india and before the gst regime we had a different indirect tax structure in our country before the central government levied tax on manufacture which is known as central excise duty then central government levied tax on provisions of services that is service tax then there was tax on interstate sale of goods it was the central sales tax in addition to these taxes the state governments also levied tax on retail sales which was the value added tax then the state governments levied tax on entry of goods in the state which is the entry tax then there was luxury tax purchase tax etc so it is clearly visible that there are multiplicities of taxes which are being levied on same supply chain but the introduction of gst was a very significant step in the field of indirect tax reforms in india because it replaced these 17 indirect taxes these indirect taxes were consolidated into one gst this amalgamation of large number of central and state taxes into a single tax reduced the ill effects of cascading taxation that is the double taxation in a major way it also paved the way for a common national market if you see from the consumer's point of view the biggest advantage is the reduction in the overall tax burden on goods previously the tax burden on goods was estimated to be around 25 to 30 percentage now to understand this let us take one example for example a manufacturer makes pens and obtains the raw materials for rupees 100 this 100 rupees includes a 10 percentage tax this means that she pays 10 rupees in tax for 90 rupees worth of materials next in the process of manufacturing the pen she adds value to the original materials of rupees 50 so the total value of product is now rupees 100 plus rupees 50 which is rupees 150 then again 10 percentage tax is due on the finished good that tax is 10 percentage of 150 which is rupees 15 so now the final product which is the pen its rate is rupees 150 plus rupees 15 which is rupees 165 this was what happening in the pre-gst regime but now under the gst system this additional tax can be applied against the previous tax which was applied by the manufacturer this brings the effective tax rate on the final product to rupees 15 minus rupees 10 which is rupees 5 so the price of the final product is rupees 150 plus rupees 5 which is equal to rupees 155 and it will not be 165 rupees so this is how gst removes the cascading effect that is the tax on tax or the double taxation so remember that all the taxes which were mentioned earlier are subsumed in a single tax called as the gst that is levied on the supply of goods or services or both at each stage of supply chain starting from manufacture or import until the last retail level this gst further know that this gst is a dual levy that is the central government will levy and collect central gst and the state will levy and collect state gst on intra state supply of goods and services then the center will also levy and collect integrated gst that is i gst on the inter state supply of goods or services so we can say we have dual gst so this is the background of gst now since this was a new taxation system the states mainly the producer states had expressed their concerns over the loss of revenue so to address this loss of revenue the central government enacted the goods and services tax compensation to states act of 2017 it was enacted to levy the compensation sis for providing compensation to the states for this expected loss of revenue and we have discussed about this act and the compensation sis on our july 29 2020 in the news analysis you can refer that video to have a better understanding about these two now if you are following the news in recent days you might be aware of the gst compensation issue also this year due to covid 19 the economic activity has been very low and as a result of this compensation sis collections are also low there was a shortfall of around 2.35 lakh crores so center was unable to pay compensation due to the shortage of sis collections and thus center gave two options for states which are eligible for getting compensation we have discussed about these two options and the experts opinion in our September 1st news analysis and now today's news is that the increase in gst revenues over the last two months could reduce the shortfall in gst compensation that is due to the states and this rise in collections also reflect that economic activity is picking up and economic growth may also rebound soon so these are some of the points that you should know with respect to gst now let's move on to the next discussion our last news article discussion is based on this article which talks about the protests planned by the indian medical association see for a long time we have been hearing the modern medicine versus traditional medicine tussle and this article is another manifestation of this tussle as we know the central council of indian medicines has recently amended the indian medicine central council postgraduate ayurveda education regulations of 2016 this was done to include the regulation to allow the postgraduate students of ayurveda to practice general surgery in addition to this recently the nithya yog has also formed four committees for officially integrating the systems of medicine in medical education medical practice public health and administration as well as in research but these decisions were not taken lightly by the indian medical association which is a national voluntary organization of doctors of modern scientific system of medicine in this regard there is another important development pertaining to the national education policy of 2020 the nip 2020 speaks about medical pluralism and lateral entry the document says that considering that people exercise pluralistic choices in health care our health care education system must be integrative it means that all students of allopathic medical education must have a basic understanding of ayurveda yoga and naturopathy yunani siddha and homeopathy that is ayush and also vice versa that is students of ayush medical education should also have basic understanding about ayurvedic medical education but this is widely opposed by indian medical association it says that these kinds of policies lays the foundation for legitimizing mixopathy say mixopathy is mixing of patties here pati means a curative treatment of a specified kind so mixing of different curative treatment is known as mixopathy see all these changes are perceived by ima as a move to create one nation one system policy ima claims that this move will ring the death knell of modern medicine system as a whole and finally it will lead to mixopathy or chitrification or a confused mix of medical education and practice so this is the issue going on with respect to the modern versus traditional medicine see here know that in 2015 the supreme court had dismissed a petition filed by the punay unit of ima at that time ima seek to stay on non-allopathic practitioners prescribing allopathic medicines but this petition was dismissed and now as a protest ima gave a call to all doctors who are practicing modern medicine to withdraw the non-essential services and non-covid services on december 11th so the modern versus traditional medicines tussle is moving to a different dimension now let us wait and see what happens in this context let us see about indian medical association ima claims that they are the only representative and national voluntary organization of doctors of modern scientific system of medicine it was started in 1928 on the occasion of fifth all india medical conference at calcutta its objectives are to promote and advance medical and allied sciences in all their different branches and to promote the improvement of public health and medical education in india then it aims to maintain the honor and dignity and to uphold the interest of medical profession and to promote the cooperation among the members of medical profession it also aims to work for the abolition of compartmentalism in medical education medical services and medical registration in the country this is to achieve equality among all members of this profession so these are some of the information that you should know with respect to this news article now let's move on to the last discussion which is the practice questions discussion session this first question asks the nelson-mandela rules adopted by the un general assembly in december 2015 deals with tackling the menace of racial discrimination promotion of non-violence among all member nations common but differentiated responsibility in matters concerning climate change minimum standards with reference to treatment of prisoners and the correct answer is option d the united nations standard minimum rules for the treatment of prisoners is known as the nelson-mandela rules now this next question is also a direct question liberal democracy index is released by which of the following option a transparency international option b economic intelligence unit option c world justice project option d varieties of democracy correct answer is option d varieties of democracy or in short we them transparency international releases corruption perception index then eiu releases the democracy index and world justice project releases the rule of law index now this next question is based on indian medical association first statement is its objective is to promote and advance medical and allied sciences in all their different branches this statement is correct it is one of the objectives of ima second statement is it is a statutory body constituted under the indian medicine central council act 1970 now this statement is incorrect because ima is not a statutory body constituted under this act but it is a voluntary organization just here no one statutory body which is recently in use it is the central council of indian medicine it has been constituted under this 1970 act and here the question asks for the incorrect statements so the correct answer is option b 2 only now this next question is based on gst compensation to states act of 2017 first statement is gst compensation fund is funded through a compensation sis that is usually levied on demerit goods and services see gst compensation sis is levied on the supply of goods and services as recommended by the gst council the compensation sis is a sis that will be collected on the supply of select goods and or our services or both till first july 2022 it is imposed to compensate the states for any revenue laws on account of implementation of gst and these selected goods mostly belong to the luxury categories and demerit categories of goods like tobacco and its products pan masala aerated water motor etc so this statement is correct now the second statement is the total compensation payable to the states in any financial year is a difference between the projected revenue for any financial year and the actual revenue collected by a state and this statement is also correct and here the question asks for the correct statements so the correct answer is option see both 1 and 2 now let us take two main's question this question is based on gst paper 3 and this is based on gst paper 2 you can write the answers and post it in the comment 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