EDITORIALS & ARTICLES
9th March 2021
Cyber volunteer programme rolled out, MHA informs LS
- The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) informed the Lok Sabha that a “cyber volunteer” programme has been rolled out for “cyber hygiene promotion” and the services of volunteers would be utilised by the State police as per requirement.
- The MHA, through its cyber crime grievance portal- cybercrime.gov.in, aims to raise a group of “cyber crime volunteers” to flag “unlawful content” on the Internet.
- Various groups, including the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), have expressed concern that the programme enables a culture of surveillance and could create potential social distrust by encouraging civilians to report the online activities of other citizens.
PRIVACY MATTERS:
- There are “concerns of infringement of privacy due to surreptitious and malafide intrusion into an individual’s online activities.
- The challenges of cyber space are many which flow from its vastness and borderless character.
- Cyber Crime Volunteer Framework has been rolled out as an initiative as a part of cyber hygiene promotion to bring together citizens to contribute in the fight against cybercrime in the country and assist State/UT LEAs (law enforcement agencies) in their endeavour to curb cyber crimes.
- The volunteers will be enrolled and their services utilized by the respective State/UT Police Authorities, as per their requirement.
GOVERNMENT RESPONSE:
- The MHA had operationalised the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal to provide a centralised mechanism to the citizens for online reporting of all types of cyber crime incidents, with a special focus on cyber crimes against women and children.
- Since its inception, 3,17,439 cyber crime incidents and 5,771 FIRs have been registered up to February 28 in the country. The conversion of complaints received into FIRs stood at 1.81%.
- The government had approved the setting up of 1,023 Fast Track Special Courts (FTSCs), including 389 exclusive POCSO Courts, for expeditious trial and disposal of cases related to rape and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.
- The conviction rate for the POCSO cases in 2019 was 34.9%.
Delhi HC seeks response on petition against new IT Rules
- The Delhi High Court sought a response from the Centre on a petition challenging the new IT (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, claiming it seeks to regulate online news portals by imposing government oversight and a vaguely worded ‘Code of Ethics’.
- HC issued notices to the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) and Ministry Of Information & Broadcasting on the plea filed by Foundation for Independent Journalism.
PETITION:
- The petition argued that the new IT Rules issued on February 25, 2021, were “palpably illegal” in seeking to control and regulate digital news media when the parent statute nowhere provided for such a remit.
- It said the new IT Rules had “profound and serious harms for digital news media” and was destructive of their rights.
- The plea stated that the IT Rules, 2021, introduced two distinct sets of regulations — one, due diligence norms to be followed by ‘intermediaries’ and two, ‘Code of Ethics’ ought to be adhered to by ‘publishers’, along with a three-tier compliance mechanism.
- While ‘intermediaries’ were recognised and regulated by the IT Act, the plea said that the new IT Rules laid down a separate ‘Code of Ethics’ for the two kinds of publishers — publishers of news and current affairs content, and publishers of online curated content.
- The parent (IT) Act does not recognise digital news media as a separate category of entities and does not seek to subject them or their content to any set of special regulations
- The content to be regulated by the parent Act, as offences, was limited to sexually explicit material, child pornography, showing private parts of individuals, cyber terrorism, etc. to be prosecuted and tried by normal courts.
- The IT Rules, 2021, expand the scope of the Act even further by providing for a Code of Ethics and a three-tier regulatory system to administer a loose-ranging Code of Ethics, that contains wide and vague terms as ‘half-truths’, ‘good taste’, ‘decency’.
- The IT Rules, 2021, provide for an oversight mechanism, including the setting up of an Inter-Departmental Committee which has the power to hear grievances regarding compliance with the said Code of Ethics.
- They also have the power to recommend to the Ministry of I&B, draconian measures such as ordering the deletion, modification of content or blocking the same.
Govt. asks refiners to diversify oil imports after OPEC+ move
India has asked state refiners to speed up diversification of oil imports to gradually cut their dependence on West Asian suppliers after OPEC+ decided last week to largely continue production cuts in April.
DIVERSIFICATION:
- The world’s third biggest oil consumer imports about 84% of its crude needs with over 60% of that coming from West Asian countries, which are typically cheaper than those from the West.
- India, hit hard by rising oil prices, has urged producers to ease output cuts and help the global economic recovery.
- In response, the Saudi energy minister told India to dip into strategic reserves filled with cheaper oil bought last year.
- India has asked companies to aggressively look for diversification as it cannot be held hostage to the arbitrary decision of Middle East producers.
- India had not cancelled any shipment of West Asian crude when oil demand collapsed due to COVID-19, the source said.
- OPEC’s share in India’s oil imports declined to historic lows in the first 10 months of this fiscal year.
‘LONG-TERM PAY OFF’:
- While initial costs could be high, the strategy will pay off in the long term. One plan is to import oil from new producer Guyana.
- Indian Oil Corp. has also renewed its oil import contract with Russia.
- India’s oil ministry and IOC did not respond to requests for comment.
- Iraq and Saudi Arabia are the two biggest suppliers of crude oil to India.
‘Trust deficit’ hampering seamless movement of goods between India, Bangladesh: World Bank
- A World Bank report has said that a seamless movement of vehicles between the two neighbouring countries for trade could raise India’s national income by 8% and Bangladesh’s by 17%; provide faster and cheaper access to products from Northeast and boost real income in states such as West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra.
- The report said a “broad trust deficit throughout the region” was a major reason behind lack of seamless transport between the two countries.
- The report found that it is about 15-20 per cent less expensive for a company in India to trade with a company in Brazil or Germany, than with a company in Bangladesh, despite the two neighbours being party to an international motor vehicles agreement.
REPORT- “CONNECTING TO THRIVE: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES OF TRANSPORT INTEGRATION IN EASTERN SOUTH ASIA":
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bangladesh counterpart Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the Maitri Bridge on river Feni via video conferencing recently.
- The bridge significantly reduces the distance between the southern tip of Tripura and Ramgarh in Bangladesh.
- In 2015, both India and Bangladesh signed the Bangladesh-Bhutan-India-Nepal (BBIN) Motor Vehicles Agreement.
- For the first time, the World Bank has analysed the pact from the perspective of the two countries and said that a “trust deficit” between the two countries was a major reason why there was, despite the pact, no seamless movement of cargo between the two countries.
- In the case of Bangladesh and India, the low level of trust is reflected in the fact that vehicles from one country are banned from plying the roads of the other.
- Removing these constraints and integrating South Asia have the potential of delivering significant economic gains improving transport connectivity between the two countries.
- Among the major “gaps” that the two countries need to address in the MVA include inadequate transport infrastructure, protective tariffs and nontariff barriers, and a broad trust deficit throughout the region.
- Without these gaps, free movement of cargo between the two countries could yield a 297 percent increase in Bangladesh’s exports to India and a 172 percent increase in India’s exports to Bangladesh.
- The report found that along with Northeast states seeing overall benefits, other states like West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra could see the most rise in real come from free movement of cargo between India and Bangladesh.
- Currently, despite the agreement, trucks from one country are not allowed to enter the other. The cargo is transloaded, adding to transport and trade costs.
- On average, crossing the India–Bangladesh border at Petrapole–Benapole, the most important border post between the two countries, takes 138 hours, including 28 hours spent transloading cargo.
- In contrast, the time to cross borders handling similar volumes of traffic in other regions of the world, including East Africa, is less than six hours.
- Cargo by rail faces the same treatment while those on sea vessels have to undergo this process at ports in other neighbouring countries like Sri Lanka and Singapore.
- Free movement could also cause a significant modal shift of cargo from India to roadways from other modes and drive down transport costs.
- The study makes a case for a shorter route through Bangladesh, instead of through India, for products from Northeast states reaching a port.
- India’s northeast states are connected with the rest of India only through the Siliguri corridor, or the “chicken’s neck”.
- The transit restriction leads to long and costly routes between northeast India and the rest of India and the world.
- The report says that if free movement is allowed without restriction on which routes that cargo must take, shippers would prefer to take alternate, shorter routes through Bangladesh.
- Shippers in the region have a strong preference for road corridors through Bangladesh
- In the Northeast, the overall benefits from integration would be greatest in Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, and Tripura, largely because of their proximity to Bangladesh.
- The easternmost states experience greater competition from western states and Bangladesh, some of their economic activity would move to more competitive states.
- The Motor Vehicles Agreement (MVA) between Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, and Nepal (known as the BBIN countries), signed in 2015, seeks to facilitate the unrestricted cross-border movement of cargo, passenger, and personal vehicles between BBIN countries.
- Under the agreement, trucks carrying export-import or transit cargo can move inside the territories of other countries without transshipping to local trucks at border land ports.
- Implementation of the MVA has been delayed as the countries work to clarify some of the provisions that are supposed to be elaborated in protocols.
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