 Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis by Shankarayesh Academy for the date 27th April 2019. Displayed are the list of news articles selected for today's analysis and their page numbers in Chennai, Delhi, Bengaluru and Thiruvananthapuram editions of the newspaper. The handwritten notes in the form of PDF and the time stamping of news articles are provided in the description box below. For the benefit of mobile phone viewers, time stamping is also provided in the comment section. This news article appears on page number 14 in Chennai and Bengaluru edition and page 12 in Thiruvananthapuram edition and page 10 in Delhi edition of the newspaper. The article talks about what the Chinese President has articulated in the keynote address of the second Belt and Road Initiative forum meeting. The given information in this news article is important in prelims perspective in current events of national and international importance and in mains perspective in India and its neighborhood relations, bilateral, regional and global groupings and agreements affecting India's interests, effect of policies and politics of developing countries on India's interests in General Studies paper 2. Coming to the Belt and Road Initiative, see the initiative is proposed by China in the year 2013. It is a combination of Silk Road Economic Belt and a new maritime Silk Road. Silk Road Economic Belt proposes to link China to Central Asia and South Asia and onward to Europe by land. And the new maritime Silk Road is proposed to connect Chinese coastline with Southeast Asia, Gulf countries and North Africa and onward to Europe. The article is in news because of the second Belt and Road forum which is being conducted from 25th of April and to be concluded on 27th April in the theme of Belt and Road cooperation shaping a brighter, shared future. Recently on 25th April, there was an editorial in the Hindu newspaper titled us taking advantage of BRA which we have covered on that day. The link is also provided in the description box. We shall know that the first Belt and Road forum was conducted in China in Beijing in May 2017. India has boycotted both the meetings citing concerns over China-Pakistan Economic Corridor which is a part of BRA initiative as it passes through Pakistan occupied Kashmir. Pakistan occupied Kashmir is an Indian territory as India claims and CPEC of BRA initiative passing through POK is an act against sovereignty and territorial integrity of India. India has articulated its stand clearly as connectivity initiatives must be pursued in a manner that respects sovereignty, equality and territorial integrity of nations. No country can participate in an initiative that ignores India's core concerns on sovereignty and territorial integrity. Coming to the news article, see China has been facing criticism that the BRA initiative is opening depth traps for many participating countries of this initiative. When countries are unable to repay the debt under a loan or a loan-like agreement with China, China takes control of the installation of the country and thus showing its political influence in the region. We know that recently in 2017 the Sri Lankan government has handed over its southern port of Hambanthota to China on a 99-year lease. This port was opened by getting debt from Chinese government control companies. Due to heavy losses in the port, Sri Lankan government could not repay this debt. Therefore, China negotiated a deal with Sri Lankan government so that Chinese government-controlled company will hold a 70% stake in a joint venture with Sri Lanka port's authority of the Sri Lankan government. This deal was accepted and by giving to China the 99-year lease of the port and thousands of acres of land around the port and also the 70% stake in the port. This is how Sri Lanka is made to repay its debt to China and China has helped financing at least 35 ports around the world in the last 10 years. And thus China is accused of extending its political influence in geopolitically sensitive countries. In the keynote address of the forum, the Belt and Road Forum, the Chinese President stated that the BRA initiative has revamped the financial model of funding projects in participating countries and this revamping include making the good use of BRA special lending scheme, the Silk Road fund, special investment funds and Silk Road themed bonds and by having a debt sustainability framework. The keynote address states that BRA encourages joint ventures with multilateral and national financial institutions in participating countries that BRA pursues people-centered approach focusing on job creation and countering poverty. The Chinese President also stated that everything in BRA will be done in a transparent way and with zero tolerance of corruption and the processes will be of international quality standards that cover the procurement, tendering and bidding processes. He added that with BRA, China will work with the participating countries to write new rules of international trade within the framework of Geneva headquartered World Trade Organization. Now let us move on to the analysis of next news article. Now this picture about March Crocodile in Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary has appeared in page 8 of Chennai edition. Let us see in detail about Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary and also crocodile species in India in our analysis. The content of this analysis will be helpful in your problems preparation under current affairs of national importance, Indian physical geography and can be linked with general issues on environmental ecology and biodiversity. Let us start our analysis with Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary. See the Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is located in Madak district of Telangana between the river barrages of Manjira and Singur. The sanctuary is located on the river coast of Manjira. If you see the uniqueness of the sanctuary, it has a man-made reservoir built to preserve March crocodiles which are also called as mugger crocodiles. In the long run this sanctuary has also become a haven for birds as well. The forest type in this Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is riverine ecosystem with nine islands in between. The indicator species of Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary are March crocodiles, freshwater terrapins and pheasant-tailed jakanas. Terrapins are turtles that live on freshwater or brackish water and jakanas are birds. See we should know what do we mean by indicator species. Indicator species means a species, a plant or animal that is very sensitive to environmental changes in its ecosystem. These indicator species gets affected almost immediately by damage from external influences such as pollution such as water pollution, air pollution or climate change to the ecosystem. Therefore an indicator species indicate the overall environmental health of the ecosystem. These indicator species also give early warning about damages that are bound to happen in an ecosystem. Next, due to the presence of many varieties of native and migratory birds, Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is designated as an important bird area by Birdlife International. Some of the other animals that are present in this sanctuary include jackal, black-napped hare and jungle cats. But the crocodile is the main species that lives in this sanctuary. Let us now know about crocodiles in India. See they are reptile species and are carnivorous in nature. Crocodiles are generally located in tropical climates across the world. Crocodiles belong to the scientific order Crocodilia. There are 13 species of crocodile present worldwide. Out of these 13 species only 3 species are present in India. They are saltwater crocodile, garyl crocodile and marsh crocodile. The marsh crocodile is also called as mugger crocodile. Let us now see some facts about these 3 different species of crocodiles in India. The red list of IUCN, the International Union for Conservation of Nature, categorizes saltwater crocodiles as least concern because their population is numerous in numbers. Garyls are categorized as critically endangered species under the list. Their population ranges roughly only around 300 to 900 throughout the world. Marsh crocodiles are listed under a vulnerable category. Their population range between 5700 to 8700 throughout the world. All these 3 species of crocodiles are listed in Schedule 1 of Wildlife Protection Act 1972. Coming to the habitat, saltwater crocodiles live in inland swamp and marshes and in coastal brackish waters and in tidal section of the rivers. Garyl crocodiles are river dwelling inland freshwater crocodiles. Marsh crocodiles live in inland freshwater habitats and also in coastal saltwater lagoons as well. So have a look at the prelims question we shall discuss at the end of the session. Let us now move on to the next article. This news article appears on page number 8 in Chennai and Bangalore editions of the newspaper. The news article is about the first vessel of the class of 5 fast patrol vessels. This first vessel is named as ICGS Priyadarshini. This vessel is built by Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited, shortly called as GRSE from Kolkata and this vessel was commissioned at Kakinada of Andhra Pradesh. This fast patrol vessel is indigenously developed which means ICGS Priyadarshini the vessel is indigenously developed that means built with the resources, technology from our own country. The aspects of this article are important in prelims under current events of national importance and in general science and it means in GS paper 3 under science and technology and indigenization of technology. While writing in mains you can highlight this ICGS Priyadarshini as an example for indigenization of technology. The ship ICGS Priyadarshini is the first in the series. The remaining four ships are in advanced stages of construction. The fast patrol vessel is a medium range surface vessel capable of operations in the maritime zones of India. They are powerful fuel-efficient platforms which are designed to perform multi-purpose operations such as patrolling, anti-smuggling, anti-poaching and rescue operations. They are equipped with advanced control systems, water jet units and an integrated bridge system which integrates all communication and navigation systems. The design of fast patrol vessel is an improvisation over the insured patrol vessels built by the company for the Indian Coast Guard few years ago. Note that the insured patrol vessels are cost-effective platforms suited for marine surveillance and rescue operation. These vessels allow its users to equip the vessels with armaments for use in combat and this is suited for interception of fast-moving surface craft and performs anti-smuggling, fishery protection and search and rescue operations. Just note that the design of fast patrol vessel is an improvisation over the insured patrol vessels. Now we saw about Priyadarshani class fast patrol vessel. Let us see the names of other class of fast patrol vessels of Indian Coast Guard. We have a Sarojini Naidu class, Rani Abhaka class, Rajshree class and Aadesh class. The displayed Priyadarshani question will be discussed in the last session. Let us now move on to the next article. This news article appears on page number 16 in Chennai and Bangalore edition and in page 12 in Delhi edition and page 14 in Thiruvananthapuram edition. This news article and our analysis will be helpful in your Priyadarshani preparation under current events of national and international importance and under general science and for your mains preparation it is relevant in GS paper in the field of intellectual property rights. The news article analyzes the increase in share of technology patents of Indian companies in the IPR, Intellectual Property Filings in USA with the help of NASCOM report titled as emerging technologies leading the next wave of IP creation for India. Let us see the statistics mentioned in the news article. Out of the total patents filed, the share of technology patents from India domiciled companies has increased from 51% in 2015 to 64.8% in 2017-18. Under the technology patents, the patent share of emerging technologies of Indian companies has highly increased. Under these emerging technologies artificial intelligence has filed the highest number of patents with 330 patents. It is followed by cyber security which has filed 193 and then patent filings under Internet of Things IOT 107 and cloud computing are 88. The report says that the computer and communication technology share of patent filing has decreased compared to the previous years. Also an increase in patent filings in new application areas is seen. These new application areas include digital payments with 31 patent filings e-commerce with 87 patent filings and finally navigation with 58 patent filings. The huge numbers of patent filings by companies in India denote that innovations in technology are on the increasing trend and the transformational growth of technological sector is visible in India. Let us now see in brief about NASCOM and Intellectual Property regime in India. NASCOM stands for National Association of Software and Services Companies. It is a trade association that promotes the welfare of Indian IT sector and business process outsourcing industry. NASCOM is a non-profit organization. Let us move on to Intellectual Property regime in India now. For regulating intellectual property we have Intellectual Property India office in our country. It is administered by the office of Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks. This office comes under Department of Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade also called as DP IIT which functions under Ministry of Commerce and Industries. Intellectual Property India has four offices and one institution. The four offices are Patent Office, Designs Registry, Trademark Registry and Geographical Indications Registry. The one institute is named as Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Intellectual Property Management. Our office of focus is Patent Office. It is formed as per Indian Patents Act of 1970. The Patents that are approved or applicable only to the Territory of India. Generally each country has their own patent regimes in order to regulate that trade. And the Patents so awarded in India will be valid for 20 years from the date of application. The Patent owner will have the exclusive rights for making, selling or using his inventions for the valid period within the Territory of India only. The Patent can be renewed after 20 years. The displayed Prelims will be discussed at the end of the session. Let us now move on to the next news article. The next news article of the day is the editorial competing for the best. The essence of this editorial is that the authors have explained about brain drain, the reasons for brain drain and about the present status of higher education sector in India in brief. The authors have finally concluded with some suggestions with to reverse the brain drain. The authors are equally appreciating the government's initiatives and also critical of the present system that are plaguing the higher education in India. This editorial appears in page 6 in Delhi edition, page 8 in Thiruvananthapuram edition and page 10 in Chennai and Bangalore edition. The content of this article will be helpful for your Prelims preparation under economic and social development, social sector initiatives. It will also be helpful in your minds preparation in general studies paper too under issues relating development and management of social sector services relating to education and also under government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation. This editorial explains the reasons for brain drain and the necessity of hiring foreign faculties in India. The authors have mentioned few schemes of the ministry of human resource and development as well. Brain drain refers to the flow of highly qualified academics that include research faculty and teaching faculty from our country to the foreign nations. The authors have mentioned some reasons for this brain drain. The first reason is the unattractive salaries offered in Indian institutions including premier institutions such as IIT. The salaries provided by these institutions are not competitive when compared to what is being provided in western nations. The authors have given a small comparison here. An average salary for full-time academic in USA is approximately 50 lakh per year. Full-time academic means those involving in full-time teaching or in full-time research. Even China which is luring high-profile academics is offering a competitive salary of 69 lakh rupees per annum every year or even more along with additional research funding. But the total emulments offered to a professor in a premier institution of Indian Institute of Technology in India is only about 26.4 lakh rupees per year. Thus one can see that the salaries are not competitive to attract the Indian talents who are working in foreign universities or the foreign talents. The authors also mentioned that the higher education environment is not competitive due to a complex bureaucratic and legal framework. The appointments of international faculty are not guaranteed for a long term in India. Only a 5-year contract is available as of now. This leads to insecurity in jobs hence the foreign faculties are not interested in working in India. Also obtaining the fund for doing research is very difficult in Indian scenario. Only limited resources are available for conducting research in India. All these combinations of factors are reasons for brain drain and reasons why India is not referred as a research destination in higher education sector. The biggest impact of this brain drain is the non-availability of highly qualified academics in Indian universities. The authors have appreciated some of the initiatives taken by the present government to mobilize the foreign academics and the academics of Indian origin who are non-resident Indians working in foreign universities. Let us see the initiatives one by one. First Jian. Jian is global initiative for academic networks. Its main objective is to increase the presence of reputed international faculty in Indian academic institutes. The authors comment that this Jian initiative has been successful in attracting many academics of Indian origin from different countries but only for shorter durations. Next is Vajra which is visiting advanced joint research faculty scheme by the department of science and technology which enables NRIs and overseas scientific community to participate and contribute to research and development in India. The science and engineering research board which is a statutory body of department of science and technology coming under ministry of science and technology is implementing this scheme. The board was established by the science and engineering research board act of 2008 hence a statutory body. Next is PARC the scheme for promotion of academic and research collaboration this scheme aims at improving the research ecosystem of India's higher educational institutions by facilitating academic and research collaborations between Indian institutes and the best institutes in the world from 28 selected nations to jointly solve problems of national and international relevance. The authors have also mentioned about institutions of Eminence program of Indian government which aims to internationalize the Indian institutions by appointing the foreign staffs in India for teaching and research says the editorial. The authors also highlighted the graded autonomy regulations of UGC the university grants commission. These regulations allow the highest performing universities in India to hire up to 20% foreign faculty on tenure basis. Similarly IIT council has also recommended the recruitment of foreign faculty on tenure basis. If you see all these programs they are mostly short tenured programs. They do not ensure job security. This is one of the reasons why the foreign faculty's proportion is very less in Indian institutions. The authors share about a recent report which tells that there are only 40 foreign teachers at all the IIT's in India which is less than 1% of the total faculty strength in IIT's. The government's goal is to attract 20% international faculty at higher education institutes such as the IIT's. The authors have given some suggestions to reverse the brain drain in India and to attract the foreign faculty to the higher education institutions in India. The authors have strongly advocated for a change in governance structure of the higher education institutions in India. Also the funding of promoting higher education in India must be drastically increased. The salaries of the academicians should be too attractive to lure foreign as well as non-resident Indian faculties. The authors have tried to explain that it is difficult to attract and hire the accomplished senior professors from foreign countries who are of high reputation. Instead, the young foreign scholars and non-resident Indian scholars working in abroad can be focused by the government to hire them. Hiring young scholars from abroad would provide an international perspective to the subject as well as the research. Also hiring young scholars and non-resident Indians working abroad would ensure quality teaching and research in the higher education institutes of India. They are also more mobile. See young scholars are also more mobile which is a character that favors the Indian government to harness them. The authors have noted in the editorial that the private universities of India are following some of these suggestions mentioned above such as offering higher salaries so as to secure position in global ranking and to increase the international competitiveness. The displayed problems and main questions will be discussed at the end of the session. Let us now move on to the next news article. This news article appears on page number 22 in Chennai edition, 24 in Bangalore, 18 in Delhi and 20 in Thiruvananthapuram edition. The information in this article could come under general issues on environmental ecology, biodiversity and climate change in problems and in conservation environment pollution and degradation in GS3 paper. It is about a draft event report that has recorded how humanity has undermined the natural resources upon which its very survival depends. The draft report warns about imminent rapid acceleration that is immediate rapid acceleration in the global rate of species extinction. The pace of loss of species is already tends to hundreds of times higher than it has been over the last 10 million years on an average. Many experts think a so called mass extinction event is already in process because the record, the report alarmingly adds that 5 to 10 lakh species are projected to be threatened with extinction and this may happen in some decades. We have to note that the most recent extinction was the end of Cretaceous period which happened some 66 million years ago when a 10 kilometer wide asteroid stroked earth and wiped out most life forms. The draft report notes some of the causes for extinction of species and other devastating effects on biodiversity. The accelerating loss in the services rendered by nature such as clean air, drinkable water, carbon dioxide absorbing forests, loss of pollinating insects, protein rich fish and storm blocking mangroves etc and these services of nature are diminishing gradually. The report notes that these are not small losses rather these losses are huge that are equal to the devastating loss caused by the climate change. And also the report significantly points out that biodiversity loss and global warming are closely linked. Deforestation and agriculture including livestock protection account for about 1 fourth of greenhouse gas emissions and they have also created a severely damaging widespread destruction on the natural ecosystems as well. Scientists estimate that earth is today home to some 8 million distinct species and the majority of them are insects and humans and livestock account for more than 95% of mammal biomass. But already a quarter of catalogued animal and plant species are being crowded out of existence. This is happening along with the surprising decline in the wild mammal biomass that is the collective weight that has gone down by 82%. The report finds that the direct causes of species loss in the order of importance are shrinking habitat and land use change, hunting for food or illicit trade in body parts, climate change, pollution and others in the order of importance. Initially global warming was seen as the only threat to plant and animal life. But the report notes that the indirect drivers such as number of people in the world and their growing ability to consume are also the reasons for loss of biodiversity and climate change. And another cause for extinction is the shift in distribution of species or shifting species distribution. And this shift may increase owing to global temperature increase. And thus it may lead to extinction. Now let us move on to the next session. Coming to the first question Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is located in which of the following state? We saw that the Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary is located in the state of Telangana. Therefore option C is the correct answer. Now coming to the second question the second question is with reference to ICGS Priyadarshani. They have given two statements and are asking which of the statements are correct. The first statement it is an indigenously developed fast patrol vessel of India. Now this statement is correct as we have already seen in our analysis that ICGS Priyadarshani is a fast patrol vessel of India that was indigenously developed. Now the second statement it performs operations such as patrolling anti-smuggling, anti-poaching and rescue operations. Now the second statement is also correct because we saw that this ICGS Priyadarshani was designed to perform multi-purpose tasks such as patrolling, anti-smuggling etc. Therefore the correct answer for this question is option C both one and two. Now coming to the third question they have given three statements and are asking which of the statements are correct. The first statement the patent office that comes under property India office is the nodal office for granting patents in India. We saw that this statement is correct during our analysis. The second statement the patents granted by the patent office is applicable throughout the world under which the patent owner can enjoy exclusive rights for making using or selling this invention. This statement is incorrect because the patents that are granted by patent office is applicable only within the territory of India and not outside the Indian territory. The third statement the validity of patents issued by patent office is 20 years. Now this statement is correct and it can be renewed on expiry after 20 years. So the correct answer for this question is option C one and three only. The next question they have given three schemes and are asking which of the above schemes come under Ministry of Human Resources and Development. They have given Vajra, Indian and Spark scheme. See they are saying whether Vajra is coming under asking whether Vajra is coming under Ministry of Human Resources and Development. We know that Vajra is a scheme being implemented by the Science and Engineering Research Board which is a statutory body under Department of Science and Technology which works under Ministry of Science and Technology not under Ministry of Human Resources and Development. So the first option first scheme or the first point is wrong. See in options we can easily eliminate those options that has the number one. So if you go by elimination method we can easily arrive at the answer which is option B two and three only. And Gyan and Spark are both schemes which are being implemented by Ministry of HRD or Human Resources and Development. The next question is a practice question in mains under GS2. They are asking what do you understand by the term brain drain? What are the reasons for brain drain in the higher education sector of India and suggest some measures to reverse the brain drain. See this is the first part is a direct question. The first part asks the definition of brain drain as discussed in our editorial. Briefly write about the definition of brain drain. The second part is specifically asking about the brain drain in higher education sector only. So as discussed explain the reasons leading to brain drain. The present status and challenges of the higher education sector are also covered under the reasons for brain drain in our today's discussion. Now coming to the third part it asks to suggest some measures to reverse the brain drain. Now here you can enlist the suggestions mentioned in the editorial. You can also enrich your answer with your views your own views for the second and third part of the question. With this we come to the end of today's the Hindu news analysis. If you like the video press the like button comment and share it with your friends. Subscribe to Shankara AIS Academy YouTube channel for more updates and content on the Hindu news analysis.