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Apr 02, 2022
ASSAM-MEGHALAYA BORDER: THE DISPUTE, AND WHAT’S BEEN SETTLED
The chief ministers of Assam and Meghalaya signed a pact in the presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah to resolve part of their five-decade-old boundary dispute. Over the years, the 884-km border between the two states has witnessed frequent flare-ups.
What is the root of the conflict?
What kind of sanctions were imposed in Russia?
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What is the root of the conflict?
- During British rule, undivided Assam included present-day Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Mizoram. Meghalaya was carved out in 1972, its boundaries demarcated as per the Assam Reorganisation (Meghalaya) Act of 1969, but has held a different interpretation of the border since.
- In 2011, the Meghalaya government had identified 12 areas of difference with Assam, spread over approximately 2,700 sq km.
- Some of these dispute’s stem from recommendations made by a 1951 committee headed by then Assam chief minister Gopinath Bordoloi.
- For example, a 2008 research paper from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses refers to the Bordoloi Committee’s recommendation that Blocks I and II of Jaintia Hills (Meghalaya) be transferred to the Mikir Hill (Karbi Anglong) district of Assam, besides some areas from Meghalaya’s Garo Hills to Goalpara district of Assam.
- The 1969 Act is based on these recommendations, which Meghalaya rejects, claiming that these areas originally belong to the Khasi–Jaintia Hills.
- On the other hand, Assam says Meghalaya does not have the requisite documents to prove these areas historically belonged to Meghalaya. A number of attempts had been made in the past to resolve the boundary dispute.
- In 1985, under then Assam chief minister Hiteswar Saikia and Meghalaya chief minister Captain W A Sangma, an official committee to resolve the issue was constituted under the former Chief Justice of India Y V Chandrachud. However, a solution was not found.
- Meghalaya was carved out of Assam in 1972, and has held a different interpretation of the border since. The resolution at six of the 12 areas under dispute is significant, but the remaining points of friction are more complex and may prove to be a bigger challenge.
- What is the current pact?
- Since July last year, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his Meghalaya counterpart Conrad Sangma have been in talks to solve the long-standing dispute.
- Both state governments identified six out of 12 disputed areas for resolution in the first phase: 3 areas contested between West Khasi Hills district in Meghalaya and Kamrup in Assam, 2 between RiBhoi in Meghalaya and Kamrup-Metro, and 1 between East Jaintia Hills in Meghalaya and Cachar in Assam.
- After a series of meetings and visits by teams to the disputed areas, both sides submitted reports based on five mutually agreed principles:
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- Historical perspective.
- Ethnicity of local population.
- Contiguity with boundary.
- Peoples’ will.
- Administrative convenience.
- A final set of recommendations were made jointly: out of 36.79 sq km of disputed area taken up for settlement in the first phase, Assam would get full control of 18.46 sq km and Meghalaya of 18.33 sq km. The MoU signed on Tuesday was based on these recommendations.
- From the 2011 claims made by Meghalaya government, an area of roughly 36.79 sq km was taken up for resolution in the first phase.
- According to presentations by both states, the area has been roughly divided into equal parts, and a total of 30 sq km is being recommended to be within Meghalaya.
- The next step will involve delineation and demarcation of the boundary by Survey of India in the presence of representatives of both governments. It will then be put up in Parliament for approval. The process may take a few months.
- Officials said six areas taken for study did not have large differences and were easier to resolve, and were hence taken up in the first phase. “The remaining six areas are more complex and may take longer to resolve,” said an Assam government official.
- Since July last year, Sarma and Sangma have been in talks to solve the long-standing dispute.
- Former Meghalaya CM Mukul Sangma, who is now part of the Trinamool Congress that is the principal opposition party in Meghalaya, criticised the government’s approach. “This is a piecemeal resolution. They have taken up only 36 sq km for resolution. The larger, more complex areas are yet to be resolved and it will not be so easy,”.
- “The reality on ground zero is different as far as I know, many people have not accepted the settlement and the agreement is almost like an imposition,”.
- In Assam, too, Opposition leaders criticised the state government for rushing through the issues, and not consulting stakeholders. In January, Leader of Opposition Debabrata Saikia of the Congress had alleged that CM Sarma had gone ahead and submitted a proposal to the union home minister “without even a discussion in the State Assembly.” “This is irresponsible and unconstitutional,” asking that the recommendations be rescinded and demanding a special session in the Assembly.
- The currency has recovered almost all of the losses it incurred following the invasion and has thus surprised many who had predicted a further fall in its value.
What kind of sanctions were imposed in Russia?
- Sanctions were imposed on the Russian economy by Western governments right after Russia invaded Ukraine in late February.
- These sanctions included cutting off many Russian banks from the SWIFT payments signalling system and also freezing the Russian central bank’s foreign reserves held abroad.
- Many western companies including oil majors such as British Petroleum and Shell also pulled out of Russia amid pressure from Western governments.
- Impact: Sanctions basically made it harder for Russian businesses to sell their goods abroad and also made it harder for ordinary Russians to purchase goods from abroad.
- The freezing of the Bank of Russia’s forex reserves held abroad also made it harder for the Russian central bank to use its foreign reserves to prop up the value of the Russian currency.
- Naturally, the rouble experienced a sharp hit right after these sanctions, thus leading many to believe that the Russian economy had been brought to its knees.
- Surprisingly, however, the Russian currency has staged a remarkable recovery in the last three weeks. It took about 81 roubles to purchase a US dollar one day before Russian forces invaded Ukraine on February 24.
- A couple of weeks later, it took 151 roubles to purchase a US dollar, marking the rouble’s low since the beginning of the war.
- This week, thanks to a significant rally from the lows of early March, it takes about 83 Russian roubles to buy a US dollar. The rouble has, thus, recovered pretty much all of the losses that it incurred in the aftermath of the war.
- It should first be noted that the price or exchange value of any currency is determined by the supply and demand for the currency.
- When Western governments-imposed sanctions, it made it harder for dollars to flow into Russia, either in the form of investments or by the purchase of Russian goods.
- Sanctions on the Russian central bank also made sure that the Bank of Russia could not flood the currency market with US dollars to prop up the value of the rouble.
- The demand for foreign goods and assets, however, remained stable and when combined with a drop in the inflow of dollars, it caused the value of the rouble to fall precipitously in the initial weeks of the war and the ensuing economic sanctions.
- The Russian central bank, it seems, was able to counter this negative trend in the forex market that had caused the rouble’s value to plunge against the US dollar.
- It managed to do this primarily through capital controls that aim to increase demand for roubles and reduce the demand for dollars. For example, the Bank of Russia ordered Russian energy exporters, who still had access to US dollars, thanks to exceptions in Western sanctions to Russian energy exports, to use 80% of their forex holdings to purchase roubles.
- It has also ordered Russian brokers to not allow foreigners to sell their assets in Russia; this is to prevent the outflow of capital which would further depreciate the rouble as investors sell their roubles to purchase dollars.
- The Russian central bank’s decision to raise its benchmark interest rate to 20% could have also helped draw some foreign investment that propped up the exchange value of the rouble.
- Peace talks between Russia and Ukraine have also perhaps helped in the rouble’s recovery to some extent by raising hopes of a return to economic normalcy. Some analysts, however, see the bounce-back of the rouble as a temporary rally in what could be a far deeper correction over the long-run.
- The remarkable recovery of the rouble should not be taken as a sign that the Russian economy is hale and hearty. Capital controls imposed by the Russian central bank, including the use of dollars earned by selling Russia’s huge energy reserves to prop up the rouble, may help in shoring up the rouble but this respite for the rouble may be temporary.
- It should be noted that capital controls affect the free flow of capital and could have serious implications for Russia’s future economic growth since investors are generally wary of investing in economies that do not allow the free exit of capital.
- It should also be remembered that the Russian economy is poorer due to the exit of foreign businesses and the boycott of the Russian economy by the West.
- There are limits to how long the Russian state can prop up the value of the rouble against the US dollar, even with the help of various capital controls.
- A significant drop in crude oil prices or a European boycott of Russian energy, for instance, could significantly reduce the flow of dollars into Russia and thus, the ability of the Russian central bank to prop up the rouble.
- The Centre had earlier tweaked rules for appointments to the Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) recruitments can now be done from anywhere in India, instead of just Punjab and Haryana.
- Punjab Assembly in a special session passed a unanimous resolution reiterating the state’s claim on Chandigarh.
- After Partition, Shimla was made the temporary capital of Indian Punjab.
- Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru wanted a modern city to replace Lahore as Punjab’s capital, and the idea of Chandigarh was conceived.
- In March 1948, the Punjab government, in consultation with the Centre, chose the picturesque foothills of the Shivalik’s as the site of the new capital.
- Twenty-two villages in Kharar were acquired for the city, and the government compensated their displaced residents.
- The capital was officially moved from Shimla to Chandigarh on September 21, 1953. President Rajendra Prasad inaugurated the new capital on October 7, 1953. Until Haryana was born, Chandigarh remained the capital of Punjab.
- The Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966 carved out the new state of Haryana from undivided Punjab, created the new Union Territory of Chandigarh under the direct control of the Centre, and transferred the hill territories of Punjab to Himachal Pradesh.
- Chandigarh, identified as the capital of Punjab in The Capital of Punjab (Development and Regulation) Act, 1952, became the common capital of both Punjab and Haryana, and properties were divided between the states in the ratio 60:40.
- The States Reorganisation Act, 1966, did not make changes in the arrangement arrived in 1952. The city was to remain a Union Territory for a period “not exceeding five years”.
- During the reorganisation of Punjab, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had announced that Haryana would get its own capital.
- And on January 29, 1970, the Centre announced that “the capital project area of Chandigarh should, as a whole, go to Punjab”.
- Indira’s government took this decision after Fateh Singh, leader of the Punjabi Suba movement, threatened self-immolation if Chandigarh was not transferred to Punjab.
- The Centre had considered dividing Chandigarh into two parts, but ultimately decided against it.
- Haryana was told to use the office and residential accommodation in Chandigarh for five years until it built its own capital.
- The Centre offered a Rs 10 crore grant to Haryana and a loan of an equal amount to build the new capital.
- “The government explained why it had decided against dividing the city (Chandigarh), of which a communique said its ‘layout, architecture and beauty have evoked wide admiration and the city has acquired an international reputation’.
- In August 1982, the Akali Dal, having expressed dissatisfaction over the Punjab Reorganisation Act, launched the Dharam Yudh Morcha along with Jarnail Singh Bhindrawale with the object of realising the goals of the Anandpur Sahib Resolution of 1973.
- Among the issues in contention were the inclusion of Punjabi speaking areas in Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, and the fact that Chandigarh had not been given to Punjab, and instead made a UT.
- On July 24, 1985, the Rajiv-Longowal Accord was signed between then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Akali leader Harchand Singh Longowal.
- Among other things, the Centre agreed to give Chandigarh to Punjab, and January 26, 1986 was fixed as the date for the actual transfer. However, less than a month after the signing of the accord, Longowal was assassinated by militants.
- Friday’s resolution in the Punjab Assembly staking claim to Chandigarh was the seventh of its kind.
- The first resolution was brought on May 18, 1967 by Acharya Prithvi Singh Azad, and the second by Chaudhary Balbir Singh on January 19, 1970, both during Gurnam Singh’s government.
- Sukhdev Singh Dhillon brought a resolution on September 7, 1978 when Parkash Singh Badal was Chief Minister, and Baldev Singh Mann brought a similar resolution on October 31, 1985 during Surjit Singh Barnala’s government. Another resolution, also during Barnala’s government, was brought by Om Parkash Gupta on March 6, 1986.
- On December 23, 2014, Gurdev Singh Jhoondan brought a resolution during Badal’s government. The seventh resolution was brought by the government of Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Friday.
- AAP has argued that whenever a new state has been carved out of a parent state in the country, the capital city has stayed with the parent state.
- When Maharashtra was reorganised and Gujarat was born on January 1, 1960, Maharashtra retained Mumbai as its capital.
- When Uttarakhand was carved out of UP on November 9, 2000, Lucknow remained the capital of UP. When Chhattisgarh was created on November 1, 2000, Bhopal remained the capital of Madhya Pradesh. When Jharkhand was created on November 15, 2000, Patna remained the capital of Bihar.
- In the case of Telangana, which was created in 2014, the reorganisation period is 10 years, until 2024. But in Punjab, the reorganisation period continues even after five decades, it is argued.
- In 2018, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar suggested that a special body should be set up for the development of Chandigarh.
- But the idea was rejected by then Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh, who said Chandigarh indisputably belonged to Punjab.
- Haryana has been demanding a separate High Court, and has passed a resolution in the Assembly demanding 20 rooms in the Vidhan Sabha complex that have been in Punjab’s possession.
- It is to wield the hammer of state power cautiously, treading softly on peoples’ lives.
- India’s lockdown was the world’s harshest, perhaps too severe. At a stroke, millions lost their jobs. For a daily wage earner, this meant poverty.
- Giving migrants time to go home would have spared much pain – South Africa gave a week’s notice, Bangladesh four days.
- A selective, targeted lockdown would have protected the infected few without bringing misery to a quarter of a billion workers.
- Trump and Johnson faced massive criticism for not declaring national lockdowns. Desperate governments faced tragic choices of life vs livelihood in the fog of war.
- In the end, our GDP fell 6. 6% while we lost 38 lives per lakh population to Covid.
- Our neighbour, Bangladesh’s GDP grew 3. 5% while losing only 18 lives per lakh people. Among low and low-middle-income countries, India ranked 62nd of 74 in GDP growth and 56th in saving lives.
- India’s failure to reform healthcare delivery. It still functions as a rigid, inept, departmentally-run system. Smaller countries have gone far ahead.
- With limited resources, Thailand has achieved the dream of universal healthcare by linking its public and private systems.
- It has split its health ministry into two: one is an agency that buys healthcare for all citizens based on outcomes (from competing public and private hospitals) and the other runs government hospitals.
- It focuses on rural, community-based primary care networks, which are manned by local, well-trained doctors.
- Most of India’s rural primary health centres don’t function well.
- Routinely, a third of the nurses and 40% of doctors are absent and medicines are often stolen.
- Covid has taught us that healthcare is not just a cost but an investment. It is time to reform, and Thailand’s famous 30-Baht Health Reform, 2002 offers one model.
- Accurate data has dogged the response to Covid, pointing to a serious governance weakness. An app based on an authentic geo-tagged database, providing detailed testing, infections, and deaths data at a neighbourhood level would have resulted in better decisions.
- It would have spotted mismatches in local tallies and given epidemiologists a chance to predict the epidemic’s evolution. Some of the damage in the second wave could have been avoided.
- Today, there is suspicion in peoples’ minds about the number of infections and deaths. Proxy data by sero surveys and civil registration systems indicate eight times more deaths than official figures.
- When data quality is poor, its unquestioning use in policymaking is fraught with danger. It is ironic that India’s technology firms are providing the world the means to make such data-based decisions.
- Even in India, IT professional volunteers have designed Corona safe network, a war-room capability for emergency response, which allowed Kerala’s government to monitor its hospitals’ parameters in real time – from oxygen supply to capacity utilisation of ICU beds, oxygen, ventilators, status of patient recoveries.
- The crux of India’s problem is that district administrations don’t have the data to make good managerial decisions.
- Niti Aayog has rightly identified this problem, and in partnership with NGOs, it is leading a programme in 112 ‘aspirational districts’ providing decision-makers a dashboard of real-time data on outcomes such as school learning, children’s nutrition etc.
- While India’s vaccination drive has been impressive and low-cost, it could have even done better had the government pre-ordered vaccines early.
- Around 80% of adults have received two doses because of good coordination and an online portal. Indians were surprised to get vaccine certificates instantly, digitally, whereas their friends abroad had to wait for handwritten papers.
- It is on the government’s fiscal response, which was largely correct. Free rations and the rural job guarantee scheme prevented tragedy.
- Credit easing was the right strategy because it retained jobs. It was bizarre to watch opposition leaders fall over themselves to give away 1% more of GDP. When they screamed, ‘Look, how much America is spending,’ it was time to remind them that India has less than one-twentieth of America’s average income. Nevertheless, more could have been done for small enterprises and contact-intensive sectors.
- It is on the failings in our educational system. The rapid shift to virtual classrooms was a saviour for privileged children with internet access. Poor kids without smartphones or connectivity lost out.
- But there is a silver lining. The policymaker is now aware of technology’s power. With modest investment, it is possible to upgrade the technological infrastructure in India’s classrooms, both in private and public schools, to deliver world quality teaching to the poorest child.
- It is on our ideological beliefs. The licence raj made us question central planning.
- After 1991, the nation’s needle moved to the Right as market-based reforms brought widespread prosperity, creating a middle class.
- Covid reminded us that we need the Left to protect the weak. We also need the classical Right to highlight the importance of freedom.
- The answer is neither unfettered free markets, nor central planning. We need both individualist and collectivist solutions to solve our problems.
- The Sackler’s, art philanthropists and multibillionaires, were the manufacturers of controversial drug OxyContin, which sparked off America’s opioid addiction crisis, linked to 500,000 deaths.
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- Last week, the British Museum announced it would drop the Sackler family name, which is tainted due to its association to opioid addiction, from its galleries.
- The Raymond and Beverly Sackler Rooms in the British Museum are now called Rooms A and B. The museum’s announcement follows in the footsteps of other major international institutions.
- Known as founders of pharmaceutical companies Prude Pharma and Mundipharma, the Sacklers are one of America’s richest families.
- According to Forbes, they are worth $10.8 billion, and are one of the 30 wealthiest families in the US. Most of their wealth was made from painkiller medication, especially the controversial drug OxyContin, linked to severe opioid addiction.
- Family members are also art collectors and known for their donations to several art and cultural institutions and universities on both sides of the Atlantic.
- These include the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, the Louvre, the Tate, Harvard University, Yale University and Oxford University.
- The Sackler legacy is not shared evenly between relatives of the three deceased brothers Arthur, Mortimer and Raymond who trained as psychiatrists and worked as pharmaceutical researchers, turning the tiny company that Arthur bought in 1952 into a pharmaceutical empire, the report states.
- Arthur’s family has said he had allegedly not benefited from OxyContin as he died in 1987, before the painkiller was manufactured.
- In 2021, Purdue Pharma was dissolved following thousands of lawsuits against the company over the US’s opioid crisis.
- In March, the Sackler family owners of Purdue Pharma reached a deal to pay up to $6 billion, Reuters reported.
- OxyContin is the brand name of the extended-release form of the drug Oxycodone.
- It is used for treatment for moderate to severe pain, it has a high addiction rate and is a common form of drug abuse.
- Oxycodone, a semi-synthetic opiate, was first made in Germany in 1916. Purdue Pharma introduced OxyContin in 1996, by which time the company was calling itself “a pioneer in developing medications for reducing pain, a principal cause of human suffering.
- Mortimer, Raymond, and Raymond’s son Richard, did extensive promotions for the drug. But the harm appeared greater than its benefit.
- As Dr Art Van Zee, a physician in rural Virginia would observe in the late 1990s, many healthy youngsters reported addiction to OxyContin.
- OxyContin is stronger than morphine, and sparked off the opioid epidemic in the US. Even after the drug was modified in the wake of rising addiction cases, people shifted to other opioids.
- It has been linked to at least 500,000 deaths. In 2011, it was the number one cause of overdose deaths in the country. In 2019, deaths from opioid overdoses surpassed car crashes.
- The deaths of celebrities such as Prince and Tom Petty have been linked to oxycodone use.
- Like other business dynasties, many members of the Sackler family have made major contributions to the global art world, which means that significant art collections and museum galleries are named after them.
- For instance, the Smithsonian had a Sackler gallery after Arthur M Sackler donated $50 million worth of Asian art and artefacts to the museum in 1987.
- In 2019, the Louvre removed the name from the Sackler wing that contained 12 rooms of near eastern antiquities and significant pieces from the museum’s Persian collection.
- The move came after a protest by American art photographer Nan Goldin, who had been addicted to OxyContin after she was prescribed the drug for tendonitis pain.
- Goldin and her fellow-protesters ran a campaign called Prescription Addiction Intervention Now (PAIN), in which they went into Louvre’s pyramid with banners demanding that the Sackler name be taken down.
- The same year, a Sackler donation of $1.3 million to UK’s Portrait Gallery was cancelled after both parties thought the opioid crisis allegations would surpass the donation, according to reports.
- In December 2021, the Metropolitan Museum of Art said it removed the Sackler name from seven of its exhibition spaces—a big step from its earlier announcement that it wouldn’t receive funding but would keep the name.
- On March 25, British Museum’s chair George Osborne tweeted: “we’ve reached agreement with the Raymond & Beverly Sackler Foundation. The Sackler name will be removed from the galleries, rooms & endowments they supported. We’re moving into a new era, presenting our great collection in different ways for new audiences”.
- Museums such as the Tate and Guggenheim have announced they will stop accepting donations from the Sacklers.
- The Smithsonian didn’t remove the Sackler name from its famous Asian art gallery, but has added the tag “National Museum of Asian Art” in a rebranding exercise a move that has been criticised as insufficient.
- Institutions that have not yet decided to confront the Sackler name in their buildings include the Victoria and Albert Museum (which has the Sackler Courtyard), the American Museum of Natural History (which has the Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics) and the Guggenheim (which has the Sackler Center for Arts Education).
- According to reports, the Sacklers have agreed to have their name removed from US institutions without penalties.
- The allegations and evidence against the Sackler family business have forced art institutions to consider the ethics and morals associated with the businesses of donors.
- The cultural sector across the world relies heavily on patronage, and sometimes, institutions don’t scrutinise enough on how the donations were acquired in the first place.
- According to The Art Newspaper, the Sackler story is a cautionary tale, forcing institutions to consider naming rights and morals clauses in their contracts with donors.
- “Support and integrate Indigenous, traditional, and contemporary fire management practices into policy” is one of the recommendations of the report titled Spreading like wildfire: The rising threat of extraordinary landscape fires. The report was released by the United Nations Environment Programme recently.
- Indigenous and traditional knowledge of land management in many regions particularly the use of fire to manage fuel, including for wildfire mitigation can be an effective way of reducing hazard.
- It can also ensure that biodiversity and cultural (including understanding traditional gender roles that can govern burning activities) and ecological values are respected, as well as create livelihood opportunities.
- The report gave various examples of how indigenous communities globally used burning to control wildfires
- Australian Aborigines’ use of fire to create mosaic landscapes for hunting and gathering purposes also broke up the continuity of fuels and so inhibited the extensive spread of wildfires.
- Canadian First Nations used fire as a way of managing their territory.
- Indigenous peoples from the Venezuelan, Brazilian and Guyanese Amazon as well as the Brazilian Cerrado have used fire for subsistence activities and the control of savanna plant fuel levels to prevent the spread of wildfires into adjacent forests.
- The report noted that support for indigenous burning practices to control wildfires in various countries and continents differed in terms of support offered by the governments.
- Brazil’s Xavante Amerindians, for instance, are trained in total fire suppression. The Pemón in south-east Venezuela use patch mosaic burning to protect and sustain forests in Canaima National Park, which helps reduce the impacts of wildfires in the region.
- In South America, indigenous knowledge is combined with science to protect indigenous territories from wildfire incidents.
- This is done through the indigenous cultural burning for wildfire prevention, mitigation, and response Network or PARUPA. The body is endorsed by indigenous peoples, academics and civil servants from Brazil, Guyana and Venezuela.
- A number of key initiatives have developed in the United States to promote indigenous burning activities to prevent and mitigate wildfires at the landscape level, according to the report.
- However, it added that in some countries, “some indigenous leaders remain sceptical about how recognition of cultural fire management will influence centralised decision-making.”
- There were “growing opportunities for indigenous peoples and their fire knowledge to be recognised within government policies, practices, and programmes, with such opportunities likely resulting in multiple benefits for indigenous fire managers, their communities, and their land,”.
- There have never been heard a case of somebody’s house in tribal areas catching fire. The handling of the fire part is very efficient.
- This means they are able to manage fires very efficiently because unexpected spread of fire depends on the wind direction. Tribals are extremely good at sensing the change in the wind direction.
- Their perception of nature and sense of change is very sophisticated. It is there that they manage to control fire and cope with it more efficiently.
- But a dispassionate look at the grouping, composed of five South Asian countries and two Southeast Asian countries, is needed, especially as it celebrates its 25th anniversary in June this year. The member-states are: Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar and Thailand.
- BIMSTEC is no longer a mere initiative or programme. The question to address is whether it is now capable of tackling the challenges facing the region. Representing a fifth of the world’s population that contributes only 4% of the global GDP, can this multilateral grouping trigger economic development.
- It was clear that BIMSTEC first needed to strengthen itself by re-defining its purpose and rejuvenating its organs and institutions.
- The much-needed process was launched at the Leaders’ Retreat convened by India in 2016. It gathered momentum, thanks to the outcome of a forward-looking summit held in Kathmandu in 2018.
- First the grouping’s charter. Adopted formally, it presents BIMSTEC as “an inter-governmental organization” with “legal personality.”
- Defining BIMSTEC’s purposes, it lists 11 items in the first article. Among them is acceleration of “the economic growth and social progress in the Bay of Bengal region”, and promotion of “multidimensional connectivity”.
- The grouping now views itself not as a sub-regional organisation but as a regional organisation whose destiny is linked with the area around the Bay of Bengal.
- Second is the decision to re-constitute and reduce the number of sectors of cooperation from the unwieldy 14 to a more manageable seven.
- Each member-state will serve as a lead for a sector:
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- Trade, investment and development (Bangladesh);
- Environment and climate change (Bhutan);
- Security, including energy (India);
- Agriculture and food security (Myanmar);
- People-to-people contacts (Nepal);
- Science, technology and innovation (Sri Lanka),
- Connectivity (Thailand).
- Third, the summit participants adopted the Master Plan for Transport Connectivity applicable for 2018-2028.
- This approval was delayed, but its importance lies in the highest-level political support accorded to this ambitious plan.
- It was devised and backed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB). It lists 264 projects entailing a total investment of $126 billion.
- Projects worth $55 billion are under implementation. BIMSTEC needs to generate additional funding and push for timely implementation of the projects.
- Finally, the package also includes three new agreements signed by member states, relating to mutual legal assistance in criminal matters, cooperation between diplomatic academies, and the establishment of a technology transfer facility in Colombo.
- Post Colombo, a quick look at the unfinished tasks and new challenges gives an idea of the burden of responsibilities on the grouping.
- The pillar of trade, economic and investment cooperation needs greater strengthening and at a faster pace.
- Despite signing a framework agreement for a comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in 2004, BIMSTEC stands far away from this goal.
- Of the seven constituent agreements needed for the FTA, only two are in place as of now. The general formulations of the Colombo Declaration instil little confidence about prospects of early progress.
- The need for expansion of connectivity was stressed by one and all, but when it comes to finalising legal instruments for coastal shipping, road transport and intra-regional energy grid connection, much work remains unfinished.
- On the positive side, however, there needs to be mention of the speedy success achieved in deepening cooperation in security matters and management of Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR).
- As security and economic development are interrelated, it is essential to ensure an equitable balance between the two pillars.
- India was the only country to offer additional funding to the Secretariat and also to support the Secretary General’s proposal to establish an Eminent Persons Group (EPG) for producing a vision document. Other countries need to emulate this sincere matching of words with action.
- Governments showed considerable creativity by agreeing to restrict Myanmar’s participation in the summit to the Foreign Minister’s level. This obviated diplomatic controversy.
- Thailand and India will need to be astute in managing Myanmar’s engagement until the political situation there becomes normal.
- BIMSTEC should focus more in the future on new areas such as the blue economy, the digital economy, and promotion of exchanges and links among start-ups and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs). Besides, three more suggestions deserve consideration.
- The personal engagement of the political leadership should be stepped up. The decision taken in Colombo to host a summit every two years is welcome if implemented.
- But in the medium term, an annual summit should be the goal, with an informal retreat built into its programme.
- BIMSTEC needs greater visibility. India’s turn to host the G20 leaders’ summit in 2023 presents a golden opportunity, which can be leveraged optimally. Perhaps all its members should be invited to the G20 summit as the chair’s special guests.
- The suggestion to simplify the grouping’s name needs urgent attention. The present name running into 12 words should be changed to four words only the Bay of Bengal Community (BOBC). It will help the institution immensely.
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- A sharp uptick in both international and domestic coal prices due to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict is set to increase input prices for independent power producers and power distribution companies.
- Higher coal prices have also pushed up spot power tariffs on the India Energy Exchange.
- Indian power producers and discoms are facing high international coal prices, while domestic coal supply has already been struggling to meet demand in the past six months, according to experts.
- High demand for domestic coal amid high international prices had led to rolling power cuts in a number of states in October 2021 as several thermal power plants ran out of coal stock.
- Given the continued tight domestic coal supply position over the last six-month period, coal import dependency for the power sector is expected to increase moderately in the near term.
- Higher dependence on expensive imported coal would increase costs for independent power producers and discoms that are not able to pass on the increased cost of fuel to consumers.
- The average market clearing price of power on the Day Ahead Market at the India Energy Exchange (IEX) hit Rs 13.76 per unit (kilowatt-hour), up from an average clearing price of Rs 3.86 in the beginning of March.
- ICRA projected that spot power tariffs are likely to remain elevated at about Rs. 4.0 per unit in FY2023 due to higher coal prices, compared to average spot tariffs of Rs 2.8 per unit in FY2021.
- The incremental impact on cost of power supply for the discoms on all India basis is thus estimated at about 18 paise/unit reflecting a retail tariff impact of 2.6 per cent.
- The war has led to a disruption in the supply of coal by Russia, which is unlikely to be fully replaced by other suppliers.
- ICRA has estimated that imported coal prices are set to rise 45-55 per cent in the first quarter of FY23.
- ICRA also noted that a coal shortage was likely unless Coal India is able to ramp up domestic coal production to 700 million tonnes in the next fiscal, up from about 601 MT in FY21.
- The price of Australian coal for March delivery had hit an all-time high of about $330 per tonne. Australia and Indonesia are key sources of coal import for Indian thermal power generation companies using imported coal.
- The price of domestic coal has also risen sharply in spot e-auctions conducted by Coal India Limited, with premiums over baseline prices set by Coal India reaching an all-time high of 270 per cent in February 2022, which have reportedly increased further to about 300 per cent in March 2022.
POSTED ON 02-04-2022 BY ADMIN
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