EDITORIALS & ARTICLES
20th March 2021
Applications to predict Weather Phenomena
Recently, the National Weather Forecasting Centre of the India Meteorological Department (IMD) has provided that the Western Himalayan Region will witness light to moderate scattered to widespread rainfall under the influence of Western Disturbances.
Applications to predict Weather Phenomena
Mausam App
- It has been designed and developed jointly by the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune and the India Meteorological Department (IMD).
- It will provide city-wise weather forecasts, nowcasts and other warnings.
- It will provide current weather information, including temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction, for 200 cities.
- It will also issue nowcasts, three-hourly warnings, for local weather phenomena and their intensity for about 800 stations and districts.
- It has a system which will issue colour-coded alerts (red, yellow, orange) for all districts twice a day for up to five days to warn people ahead of dangerous weather.
Meghdoot App
- It gives out weather forecast-based agro advisories to farmers in different regions in their own languages.
- The advisories include wind speed, its direction, humidity and rainfall every three hours.
- It provides crop and livestock advisories for selected locations every Tuesday and Friday.
- It is developed by the India Meteorological Department, Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology and Indian Council of Agricultural Research
- The advisories come in 10 languages, including Marathi, Bengali, Gujarati, Odia and Hindi.
- It also advises farmers on how to keep the livestock healthy, detailing the preferable amount of fodder that can be given.
- Another feature is ‘Past weather’ using which one can track weather patterns in the selected region of the past seven days.
Damini App
- It is a Mobile App on Lightning Location Network.
- It has been developed by Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology.
- It gives exact location of current lightning strikes, probable locations of impending lightning around area of 40 sq.km and movement and direction of thunderstorm.
- It also lists precautionary steps to be taken during lightning and some general information on lightning.
GRAM UJALA Programme
Recently, the Ministry of Power has launched the GRAM UJALA programme in Arrah, Bihar.
Need of GRAM UJALA Programme
- The rural population of India is still unable to afford discounted LEDs.
- The programme will have a significant impact on India’s climate change action.
- If all 300 million lights in India were replaced, the total energy savings would be 40,743 million kWh/year, avoided peak demand of 22,743MW/year and CO2 reductions of 37 million tons per year.
- It will not only give a fillip to our fight against climate change by increasing energy efficiency, but also usher in a better standard of life, financial savings, and better safety for the citizens in rural areas.
About GRAM UJALA Programme
- It is a customized program for rural India, based uniquely and innovatively on carbon finance.
- Under the programme, the LEDs will be available for only Rs 10 each for each household, in exchange for working condition old incandescent lamps.
- Under the programme, 7 watt and 12-Watt LED bulbs with 3 years warranty will be given to rural consumers against submission of working Incandescent bulbs.
- It will be implemented in villages of the 5 districts only and consumers can exchange a maximum of 5 LED bulbs.
- Under the GRAM UJALA programme, CESL will distribute high quality LED bulbs, at an affordable cost of 10 rupees per bulb in rural areas.
- The Convergence Energy Services Limited (CESL) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL), a PSU under Ministry of Power.
- In the first phase of this programme, 15 million (1.5 crore) LED bulbs will be distributed across villages of Aarah (Bihar), Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh), Vijaywada (Andhra Pradesh), Nagpur (Maharashtra), and village in western Gujarat.
Significance of GRAM UJALA Programme
- Under the programme, the carbon credit documentation will be sent to UN accredited validators for inclusion into the Shine Program of activities.
- It will provide clean energy access and make a significant contribution towards mitigating climate change and achieving a sustainable future.
- It will have a significant impact on India’s climate change action energy savings of 2025 million KWh/year and CO2 reductions of 1.65 million T CO2/year.
- It will enable better illumination, at an affordable price of INR 10/bulb.
- It will usher in a better standard of life, financial savings, more economic activity, better safety for rural citizens and help in achieving a sustainable future.
Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2021
Recently, the Lok Sabha has passed a Bill to amend the Mines and Mineral (Development and Regulation) Act (MMDR Act) through a voice vote.
- India produces 95 minerals and has same potential like South Africa and Australia but the mining sector was under-explored and India still had to import minerals like gold and coal.
- The operators are currently only allowed to use coal and minerals extracted from captive mines for their own industrial use.
Key Changes under MMDR (Amendment) Bill 2021
- It removes the distinction between captive and non-captive mines and seeks to introduce an index-based mechanism by developing a National Mineral Index (NMI) for statutory payments.
- The National Mineral Exploration Trust (NMET) which is entrusted with responsibility of looking after the functioning of the mining sector will be made an autonomous body.
- Sale of minerals by captive mines: It proposes to allow captive miners of both coal and other minerals to sell up to 50 per cent of their production after meeting the requirements of the end-use plant and on paying additional royalty to the state government.
- It proposes to fix additional royalty payments to states for the extension of mining leases for central public sector enterprises.
- Auction by the central government in certain cases: It proposes to empower the central government to conduct auctions or re-auction processes for the grant of a mining lease if a state government fails to complete the auction process.
- Conditions for lapse of mining lease: The Act provides that a mining lease will lapse if the lessee:
- is not able to start mining operations within two years of the grant of a lease, or
- has discontinued mining operations for a period of two years.
- The Bill adds that the threshold period for lapse of the lease may be extended by the state government only once and up to one year.
Significance of MMDR (Amendment) Bill 2021
- The government has highlighted that the amendments will create jobs and allows private players with enhanced technology into the mining sector.
- The mining sector right now contributes 1.75% to the country’s GDP but the proposed reforms will raise the contribution to 2.5%.
- It aims to streamline the renewal of the auction process for minerals and coal mining rights.
- The increased flexibility would allow miners to maximise output from captive mines as they would be able to sell output in excess of their own requirements.
- The empowerment of central government to conduct auctions would likely lead to greater transparency in the auction process as there is a perception that state governments may in some cases prefer some bidders.
Mission Gramodaya
Recently, the Union Agriculture Minister and Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh have launched Mission Gramodaya in the state.
- The Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana is being effectively implemented in Madhya Pradesh with houses are being rapidly constructed for the homeless.
- The facilities including insurance amount, relief amount, Samman Nidhi and other facilities will be provided to the farmers of the state.
About Mission Gramodaya
- Under the Gramodaya mission, the basic and fundamental infrastructure will be expanded alongwith housing facilities in rural areas.
- It has been started in the entire state of Madhya Pradesh.
- Under this mission, every village will have concrete roads, gram panchayat building, Muktidham and sports grounds in every gram panchayat.
- Under the mission, water will be supplied through taps in every house in every village and arrangements are being made to supply tap water to 26 lakh houses this year.
- The self-help groups in Mission Gramodaya will be empowered financially with loans at 2% interests.
- The self-help groups are being entrusted with the task of making school uniforms and nutritious food for anganwadis.
- Under the mission, an advanced school with state-of-the-art facilities will be built in every 20 to 25 km radius in the state.
Diatom Test
Recently, the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) has relied on a forensic test known as diatom tests for leads in the alleged murder case of Mansukh Hiran.
What is a Diatom Test?
- A number of tests have been developed to confirm the cause of such deaths (death by drowning) with the diatom test emerging as one of the most important tests.
- The test entails findings if there are diatoms in the body being tested.
What are Diatoms?
- Diatoms are photosynthesizing algae which are found in almost every aquatic environment including fresh and marine waters, soils and almost anywhere that is moist.
- They are unicellular, photosynthetic, autotrophic organisms that have a characteristic structure frustules, comprising two thecas i.e. silica cell walls.
- The diatoms are subdivided into two major orders i.e. Centrales and Pennales depending on the shape of the frustule.
- The Centrales are radially symmetric and the Pennales have bilateral symmetry.
Science behind Diatom Test
- A body recovered from a water body does not necessarily imply that the death was due to drowning.
- If the person is alive when he enters the water, the diatoms will enter the lungs when the person inhales water while drowning.
- These diatoms then get carried to various parts of the body, including the brain, kidneys, lungs and bone marrow by blood circulation.
- If a person is dead when is thrown in the water, then there is no circulation and there is no transport of diatom cells to various organs.
- The Diatom analysis is considered positive only when the number of diatoms recovered from the body is more than a minimal established limit.
- The result of a diatom test will be different if a person is thrown in the water after he is dead.
Reliability of Diatom Test
- It is reliable unless and until the deceased person has been drinking water from the same source of water before his death.
- The diatom test need not be done if classical signs of drowning like froth at mouth and nostrils, cadaveric spasm, presence of water from drowning medium is seen in stomach and oedema of lungs are present.
Restrain implementation of Whatsapp Privacy Policy
Recently, the Centre has told the Delhi High Court that the new privacy policy of WhatsApp violates the 2011 IT Rules and urged it to restrain the messaging app from implementing it.
- The PIL pending before the court has sought the framing of guidelines to protect the privacy and data of users from being collected by various social media sites and messaging apps.
- The petition has argued that the fissures in law with regard to the data are “quite conspicuous”, and a framework to regulate the same is the need of the hour.
Arguments of Centre on Whatsapp Privacy Policy
- The Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology told the court that the policy fails to:
- Specify which types of sensitive personal data were being collected;
- Notify the details of personal information collected to the user;
- Provide an option to review or amend information and withdraw consent retrospectively; and
- Guarantee further non-disclosure by third parties including other Facebook companies.
- It argued that WhatsApp has used “extremely general terms” to list the kinds of data collected, with no distinction between personal data or sensitive personal data being collected.
- The policy mentions the involvement of third-party service providers who may have access to the data, but does not provide the names and associated details of those service providers.
- The policy is completely silent on correction or amendment of the information for it to be compliant with the rules.
- The policy is a “clear failure” in complying with the requirement of deletion of data if the user withdraws the consent for collection of data given earlier.
Inflation Targeting
Recently, the experts have raised question on whether the inflation targeting has succeeded in its primary objective of reducing inflation.
- The Inflation Targeting (IT) policy began in 1991 in New Zealand and was subsequently adopted by 33 countries.
- The Inflation Targeting to adopt the IT arsenal were Argentina and India in 2016.
- The RBI has announced a formal review of the policy instrument now after six years of the Urjit Patel report (2014) on inflation and the use of inflation targeting.
What is Inflation Targeting?
- It is a central banking policy that revolves around adjusting monetary policy to achieve a specified annual rate of inflation.
- Its principle is based on the belief that long-term economic growth is best achieved by maintaining price stability, and price stability is achieved by controlling inflation.
Impact of Inflation Targeting
- The evidence suggests that the inflation targeting was not responsible for the decline in India’s inflation but it contributed to a decline in GDP growth.
- Behera and Patra (2020) explore trend inflation in India and find that trend inflation was falling even ahead of institution of FIT.
- They argue that adoption of flexible inflation targeting was responsible for further entrenching the tendency of a reduction in trend inflation.
- Blagrave and Lian (2020) evaluate India’s inflation process before and after inflation targeting.
- They find an important role for domestic factors in driving inflation in India and suggest that inflation expectations have become more anchored since 2015.
- Eichengreen, Gupta, and Choudhary (2020) suggest that the policy rates became lower after adjusting for inflation and output gaps in the post FIT regime.
Pros and Cons of Inflation Targeting
Pros
- It allows central banks to respond to shocks to the domestic economy and focus on domestic considerations.
- The stable inflation reduces investor uncertainty, allows investors to predict changes in interest rates, and anchors inflation expectations.
- If the target is published, inflation targeting also allows for greater transparency in monetary policy.
Cons
- The focus on inflation targeting for price stability creates an atmosphere in which unsustainable speculative bubbles and other distortions in the economy can thrive unchecked.
- It encourages inadequate responses to terms-of-trade shocks or supply shocks.
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