[Mission 2023] INSIGHTS DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS + PIB SUMMARY 01 November 2022

GS Paper 1

Syllabus: Salient features of Indian Society; Women empowerment

Source: The Hindu, Outlook India

Context:  In the aftermath of the alleged human sacrifice of two women in Kerala, the ruling CPI (M) in the state has stressed the need for new legislation to curb such superstitious practices.

Prevalence of superstitious killings in India:

• NCRB Data: According to NCRB data for 2021, six deaths were linked to human sacrifices, while witchcraft was the motive for 68 killings.
  • In 2020, India saw 88 deaths due to witchcraft and 11 died as part of ‘human sacrifices.
• Maximum prevalence: Chhattisgarh (20), followed by Madhya Pradesh (18) and Telangana (11) recorded the maximum number of witchcraft cases.

Legal provisions against superstitions in India:

• There are no nationwide legislations to deal with superstitious practices, black magic, or human sacrifice, in particular, certain sections of the Indian Penal Code enlist penalties applicable for such incidents.
• IPC: Section 302 (punishment for murder) takes cognisance of human sacrifice, but only after the murder is committed.
  • Likewise, Section 295A (Deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage the religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) works to discourage such practices.
• Article 51A (h) of the Indian Constitution makes it a fundamental duty for Indian citizens to develop a scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform.
• Drugs and Magic Remedies Act of 1954 also aims to tackle the debilitating impact of various superstitious activities prevalent in India.

State-specific laws:

• Bihar: The Prevention of Witch Practices Act 1999 of Bihar was amongst the first in India to address witchcraft and inhumane rituals.
  • A similar law was passed in Jharkhand in 2001 the Prevention of Witch (Daain) Practices Act.
• Maharastra: The state of Maharashtra followed in 2013 to enact the Maharashtra Prevention and Eradication of Human Sacrifice and Other Inhuman, Evil and Aghori Practices and Black Magic Act, which banned the practice of human sacrifice in the state.
  • A section in the legislation specifically deals with claims made by ‘godmen’ who say they have supernatural powers.
• Karnataka: too effected a controversial anti-superstition law in 2017 known as the Karnataka Prevention and Eradication of Inhuman Evil Practices and Black Magic Act, which comprehensively counters “inhumane” practices linked to religious rituals.

Judicial precedence:

• In 2019, a district court in Chandigarh sentenced a man to life imprisonment till his natural death for brutally slitting the throat of a four-year-old girl in the name of human sacrifice.

Need for a country-wide Anti-superstition/ Black Magic Act:

• Violates fundamental rights: Allowing the unhindered continuance of such practices violates an individual’s fundamental right to equality and right to life under Articles 14 and 21 of the Indian Constitution respectively.
• Negative effects on public order and health of citizens: In the absence of measures to tackle superstitions, unscientific and irrational practices such as faith healing, quackery, and misinformation regarding medical procedures can also balloon up, which can have severe detrimental effects on public order and health of citizens.

Reasons for such practices:

• Superstitious cultural beliefs and religious practices
• Unscientific practices such as quackery and faith healing
• Patriarchal norms
• Disputes: Attempts to take land and property or when women refuse sexual advances.

Conclusion:

Bringing legislation to deal with this social issue shall only mean half the battle won, wherein meaningful reform will need to increase awareness among the masses through information campaigns, and by roping in community/religious leaders to debunk the myths surrounding such practices. Bringin in the community leaders to make people aware.

Insta Links

Prelims link

• Article 51
• Fundamental rights
• Seventh Schedule

Mains Links:

Q.Critically analyse the causes and consequences of the continuing practice of superstitions in India. (10M)

GS paper 2

Syllabus: Parliament-Structure, functioning and conduct of business, Indian Constitution-features, amendments, significant provisions and basic structure etc

Source: The Hindu

Context: The Supreme Court will hear petitions challenging the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA). The hearing could have an impact on the unresolved status of Indian-origin Tamils who repatriated from Sri Lanka

Background of the Issue:

For over four decades, nearly 30,000 Indian-origin Tamils have been classified as stateless persons, based on technicalities. The recent Citizenship act will need to be amended to include them under it.

After the Civil-War steps by India for Indian-Origin Tamils:

• Welfare: Refugee welfare and rehabilitation
• Refugee status: To both Indian-origin Tamils and Sri Lankan Tamil refugees
• Illegal migrants’ as per the CAA 2003: Indian-origin Tamils who arrived after 1983 without authorized channels or proper documentation were declared illegal migrants.

Judicial stand:

• Ulaganathan vs Government of India (2019):
  • Continuous period of statelessness of Indian-origin Tamils affects their fundamental right under Article 21.
  • The Union Government has the power to grant relaxation in conferring citizenship.
• Abirami S. vs The Union of India(2022):
  • Principles of the CAA, 2019, would also apply to Sri Lankan Tamil refugees.

Global practices:

• The United States: Immigration and the Nationality Technical Corrections Act retroactively grant citizenship to all children born to an alien father and citizen mother.
• Brazil: Through Constitutional Amendment of 2007 retroactively granted citizenship to children under jus sanguinis.
  • Jus sanguinis: It is a principle of nationality law by which citizenship is determined or acquired by the nationality or ethnicity of one or both parents.

Way forward:

Given their genealogical link to India, the Government of India needs to consider extending citizenship benefits to them in accordance with Indian bilateral obligations and international humanitarian principles and international conventions.

Insta Links:

CAA 2019

Citizenship (Amendment) Act Rules

Mains Links:

Q. Though the Human Rights Commissions have contributed immensely to the protection of human rights in India, yet they have failed to assert themselves against the mighty and powerful. Analyzing their structural and practical limitations, suggest remedial measures.(UPSC 2021)

Prelims links:

GS Paper 3

Syllabus: DM+ Governance

Sources: Indian Express

 Context: The century-old cable suspension bridge in Gujarat’s Morbi, collapsed into the river, sending hundreds plunging into the water. The bridge was a tourist attraction and had long been hailed as a magnificent engineering marvel.

Technical reasons for the collapse of the 19th Century pedestrian bridge are:

1. Overcrowding
2. Crowd-induced vibrations
3. End of the ‘service life’

Probable cause of such disasters: Coming out of the long restrictions on travel necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic, people all over the world appear to be binging on travel and outings.

• A stampede in Seoul in South Korea killed 154 people last week.
• In India also, record numbers of people are thronging tourism and pilgrimage spots.

How to mitigate such kinds of disasters:

While tourism and travel are powerful engines of the economy, there must be more attention paid to ensure that they are safe and sustainable.

• Tourist and pilgrimage centres around the country should carry out safety and environmental audits to ensure that crowd management and safety protocols are in place to avoid tragedies such as this.
• Development of new centres where large numbers of people are expected should account for such contingencies.
• The rapid pace of road and infrastructure development in ecologically sensitive areas such as the Himalayas should be in accordance with topographic limitations.
• Tourism promotion campaigns must include creating safety awareness among visitors and local officials.
• More must be done to regulate the flow of travellers according to the infrastructure capacity of particular destinations.

What is a suspension bridge?

As the name implies, suspension bridges suspend the roadway by cables, ropes or chains from two tall towers. In simple words, it is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders.

How does it work?

Suspension bridges depend on the balance of the forces of compression and tension.

• The design ensures that the load on the suspension cables is transferred to the towers at the two ends, which transfer them further by vertical compression to the ground by way of the anchorage cables.
• All of this balancing has to happen within the permissible weight restrictions for the bridge.

Way forward:

A mechanism should be put in place to ensure that any bridge opened for public transport should conform to prescribed standards and specifications and is safe in all respects to be carrying passenger traffic.

• There should be a mechanism to audit the development work of bridges across the country.
• There should be proper guidelines detailing the dos and don’ts.

Insta facts:

World’s longest suspension bridge: Akashi Kaikyo Bridge (Japan)  – 1,991m

Insta link:

Indian Bridge Management System

Mains Ques:

Q. Discuss the recent measures initiated in disaster management by the Government of India departing from the earlier reactive approach. (CSE 2020)

GS Paper 3:

Syllabus: Science & Technology

Source: Down to Earth

Direction: In this article, it is important to know about the capacity potential and challenges to generating wind energy in India.

Context: Globally, India has the fourth-highest installed capacity to generate wind energy. However, the potential is higher and can be accelerated with changes to the bidding system and policies.

Key facts:

• The country’s total installed capacity was 41.67 GW as on September 30, 2022.
• The Indian government set a target for 175 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy capacity by 2022.
• The goal included achieving 60 GW of onshore and 5 GW of offshore capacity for wind energy.

What is Wind Energy?

• Wind energy is the kinetic energy associated with the movement of atmospheric air.
• Wind turbines transform the energy in the wind into mechanical power, further converting it to electric power to generate electricity.

India’s Potential for wind energy:

According to estimates by the National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE) and the World Bank Group- The country has the potential for more than 602 GW of onshore wind energy at 120-metre hub height and 100 GW of fixed and floating offshore.

The state of Gujarat has the highest Wind Energy potential, followed by Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh

Two types of Wind energy: Onshore wind farms (located on land) and Offshore wind farms ( located in bodies of water)

Challenges in meeting targets:

1. Failing in to meet targets: With 37.5 GW of onshore wind power installed at the end of 2019, India may fall short of its 2022 targets due to pricing, payment risk mitigation, transmission capacity and land use challenges.
2. Issues with the Bidding process: Current bidding is based on tariffs derived from the site plant load factor (PLF).
   • PLF: Plant load factor (PLF) is the ratio of average power generated by the plant to the maximum power that could have been generated in a given time.
3. Policy issues: Gujarat and Tamil Nadu are the highest PLF states and to realise better tariffs, most projects are being planned in these states only (60 per cent in Gujarat and 30 per cent in TN).
4. The issue of land availability: In Gujarat, this issue may have been covered, but the greater issue of grid planning persists.
5. Infrastructure Issues: Apart from the concentration of projects that create severe pressure on land, the creation of infrastructure for power evacuation leads to a choking situation, as seen in Gujarat.
6. Investors’ unwillingness: In spite of the availability of land and infrastructure in other states, investors do not prefer Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Maharashtra as the proposed projects cannot compete with projects in Gujarat and Tamil Nadu due to PLF and economic constraints.

What is the feed-in tariff?

• The procurement model was changed from state procurement based on the feed-in tariff (FiT) to central procurement through an e-reverse auction in 2017.
• A feed-in tariff is an energy policy focused on supporting the development and dissemination of renewable power generation.
• A reverse auction is a type of auction in which the traditional roles of buyer and seller are reversed. Thus, there is one buyer and many potential sellers.

Steps have been taken to promote the installation of wind capacity in the country:

• Technical support including wind resource assessment and identification of potential sites through the National Institute of Wind Energy, Chennai.
• In order to facilitate the inter-state sale of wind power, the inter-state transmission charges and losses have been waived off for wind and solar projects to be commissioned by March 2022.
• Issued Guidelines for Tariff-Based Competitive Bidding Process for Procurement of Power from Grid Connected Wind Power Projects.
• National Wind-Solar Hybrid Policy (2018): To provide a framework for the promotion of large grid-connected wind-solar PV hybrid systems.
• National Offshore Wind Energy Policy (2015): To develop offshore wind energy in the Indian Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) along the Indian coastline.

Way forward:

Under the circumstances, major original equipment manufacturers have resorted to exporting turbines and components as the domestic market is going down south.

• While FiT is the answer, closed bidding will perhaps see viable tariffs.
• Encouragement of captive and group captives with annual banking and interstate trading under Green Open Access will accelerate capacity addition.

Mains lInk:

Q. What do you understand by ‘curtailment of power’ in the energy sector? How is it affecting the generation of renewable energy in India? (250 words)

GS Paper 3

Syllabus GS Paper III: Various Security forces and agencies and their mandate.

Source : Indian Express

Directions: This Article has been taken from the Indian Express Editorial. Go through it once, you can use it for value addition.

Context:  Contrary to popular impression, the appointment of a CDS did not call for the immediate creation of theatre commands.

What is CDS?

• He is the single-point military adviser to the government as suggested by the Kargil Review Committee in 1999.
• CDS oversees and coordinates the working of the three Services.
• Age limit: upper age limit for the CDS has been fixed at 65 years.
• He will function as the Principal Military Adviser to the Defence Minister and also as the Permanent Chairman of, the Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC).
• The CDS will be a member of the Defence Acquisition Council and Defence Planning Committee.

Challenges before India’s newly appointed CDS:

• Management of two live borders, force-modernisation, competing budgetary claims and new personnel policies, and pressure to expedite the creation of new joint command structures.

What is integrated theatre command?

• An integrated theatre command envisages a unified command of the three Services, under a single commander, for geographical areas that are of strategic and security concern.
• The commander of such a force will be able to bear all resources at his disposal — from the Army, the Indian Air Force, and the Navy — with seamless efficacy.
• The integrated theatre commander will not be answerable to individual Services.

What are joint commands?

• It is a unified command in which the resources of all the services are unified under a single commander looking at a geographical theatre.
• Functions of joint command:
  • The commander of a joint command will have the freedom to train and equip his command.
  • He will have the logistics of all the services at his beckoning.
  • However, the three services will retain their independent identities as well.

(Fig: General Bipin Rawat is no more)

Why the new CDS must move with caution?

• The threat of china: Any conflict with China will demand forces/resources from 4-6 of India’s 14 single-service, and two tri-service commands (none of them co-located), as well the space and cyber agencies and the Special Forces division.
• Inter-service rivalry: there exists inter-service rivalry among the forces which is delaying the establishment of joint commands.
• Operational guidance issue: while the component commanders may retain a linkage with their chiefs, the question of who will provide operational guidance to the theatre commanders still remains open.
• Air power: the indivisibility of air power has been a bone of contention among the officials of defence forces.

What needs to be done?

• Integrating the service command: into 4-5 geographic or threat-based theatres and placing necessary forces under a single commander charged with the conduct of operations.
• Reconciling service rivalry: the service chiefs have to reconcile themselves to the reality that once theatre commanders assume the “warfighter” role,
  • they will be divested of operational responsibilities, and
  • assume the “raise-train-sustain” functions, involving recruitment and training of personnel as well as the acquisition of combat wherewithal.
• Nudging IAF: The IAF’s reluctance to share assets must be tempered by the fact that the theatre air assets will be deployed on the advice of and by the IAF component commanders.
• Recasting of present staff colleges: as a “Joint Services Staff College” with changes in its curriculum to produce “joint staff officers,” ready to serve in sister-service HQs, learning in the process to function as future component commanders and theatre commanders.

Insta Links

Prelims link

• About the tri-service command of India
• Kargil review committee.
• Shekatkar committee
• Power and functions of CDS

Mains Links:

Q. The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) is responsible not only for the integration of the armed forces but also for solving issues in planning, budgeting and force structuring for a military based on a coherent strategic vision. Analyse.

Q. What are Integrated Theatre Commands? Discuss the prospects and challenges faced in the implementation of integrated theatre commands for India.