UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 covers important current affairs of the day, their backward linkages, their relevance for Prelims exam and MCQs on main articles

 

InstaLinks :  Insta Links help you think beyond the  current affairs issue and help you think multidimensionally to develop depth in your understanding of these issues. These linkages provided in this ‘hint’ format help you frame possible questions in your mind that might arise(or an examiner might imagine) from each current event. InstaLinks also connect every issue to their static or theoretical background.

Table of Contents 

GS Paper 2: (UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024)

1. Agenda for the 16th Finance Commission

 

GS Paper 3: 

2. PM Lauds 9 Years of Digital India Initiative

3. Legalising Minimum Support Price in India

 

Content for Mains Enrichment (CME)

4. ‘Jadui Pitara’

 

Facts for Prelims (FFP) 

1. Colombo Process

2. Project Nexus

3. Megafauna 

4. Snowblind malware

5. Zinc’s role in making legumes resilient to climate change

 

Mapping 

6. Minami-Torishima island (Japan)

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 03 July 2024

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GS Paper 2:

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Agenda for the 16th Finance Commission

Syllabus: Constitutional Bodies: Finance Commission

 Source: TH

 Context: The 16th Finance Commission (FC) focuses on the devolution of the consolidated fund, with a mandate to support panchayats and municipalities as per Article 280 and the 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments.

 

What is a Finance Commission?

The Finance Commission in India is a constitutional body established under Article 280 of the Indian Constitution. Its primary function is to recommend the distribution of financial resources between the central government and the state governments. The Fifteenth Finance Commission constituted on 27th November 2017, made recommendations covering six years from 1st April 2020 through its Interim and Final Reports. These recommendations are valid up to the financial year 2025-26.

 

Composition of the Finance Commission of India (FCI):

• Structure: Consists of a Chairman and four members appointed by the President.
• Term: Duration specified by the President; members can be reappointed.
• Qualifications:
  • Chairman: Experience in Public Affairs.
  • Members: Must include a High Court judge or qualified individual, a finance/accounting expert, an experienced financial administrator, and an economist.

Functions:

• Tax Distribution: Recommends distribution of tax proceeds between the Centre and States.
• Grants-in-Aid: Advises on principles for grants from Centre to States.
• State Funds: Suggest measures to augment State funds for Panchayats and Municipalities.
• Other Matters: Addresses any additional issues referred by the President.

 

Report:

• Submitted to the President, who presents it to Parliament with an explanatory memorandum on actions taken.

  

About 16th FC: 

The Government of India, under Article 280(1) of the Constitution, established the Sixteenth Finance Commission, with Dr. Arvind Panagariya, former Vice-Chairman of NITI Aayog and Professor at Columbia University, as its Chairman.

  

Major Terms of Reference for the 16th Finance Commission:

• Division of Tax Proceeds: Recommend tax distribution between Union and States, including State shares.
• Principles for Grants-in-Aid: Establish principles for grants from the Consolidated Fund of India to States, particularly under Article 275.
• Enhancing State Funds for Local Bodies: Suggest measures to boost State funds for Panchayats and Municipalities, based on State Finance Commission recommendations.
• Evaluation of Disaster Management Financing: Review and recommend improvements for disaster management funding under the Disaster Management Act, 2005.

  

Recommendations that can be made by the 16th Finance Commission for Local bodies:

1. Revisit 15th FC’s Principles:

1. • Enhance property tax collection linked to state GST.
   • Improve maintenance of accounts.
   • Allocate resources for pollution mitigation.
   • Focus on primary health care, solid waste management, and drinking water.

2. Recognize Urbanization Dynamics:

1. • Acknowledge India’s dynamic urbanization.
   • Ensure intergovernmental transfers to urban areas are at least doubled.

 

Insta Links:

• 16th Finance Commission

  

Mains Link:

Discuss the recommendations of the 13th Finance Commission which have been a departure from the previous commissions for strengthening the local government finances. (UPSC 2013)

 

Prelims Link:

 

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UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 GS Paper 3:

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PM Lauds 9 Years of Digital India Initiative

Syllabus: Financial Inclusion

Source: PM India

Context: The Prime Minister praised the successful completion of 9 years of the Digital India initiative, highlighting its role in enhancing ‘Ease of Living’ and transparency.

 

What is the Digital India Initiative? 

Launched in 2015, the Digital India Initiative (DII) aims to transform India into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy. It covers various projects from Central Ministries, Departments, and States/UTs.

 

Key focus areas include:

1. Digital infrastructure
2. Governance
3. Services on demand
4. Digital empowerment of citizens

 

The initiative encompasses nine pillars of growth, with the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) as the main coordination agency, along with other ministries and a monitoring committee led by the Prime Minister.

 

Role of the Digital India programme in bridging the digital divide and foster a digitally empowered society in India 

1. Bridging the rural-urban divide: Digital India focuses strongly on expanding digital infrastructure and access to rural areas through initiatives like BharatNet for internet This helps bridge the technology access gap.
2. Financial inclusion: Mobile and Aadhaar-linked payment systems, DBT schemes under Digital India are enabling cashless transactions, direct benefit transfers and preventing leakage. This is expanding digital financial inclusion.
   1. g. more than 40% of all payments done in India are digital.
3. Accessible digital services: Digital locker, eSign frameworks, and online registration platforms make government services more easily accessible for citizens by simplifying processes.
4. Universal digital literacy: Digital Saksharta Abhiyan initiatives under Digital India aim to make at least one person e-literate in every household and help promote adoption at the grassroots.
   1. g. initiatives like “SWAYAM,” offering online courses, and the “National Digital Library,” providing access to a vast collection of academic resources.
5. Job opportunities: Digital infrastructure enhancement and digital skill development are helping create employment and entrepreneurship opportunities including in smaller towns.
6. Mobile Connectivity and Mobile Apps: The initiative has promoted the development of mobile apps for various government services, enhancing accessibility and convenience for citizens. g. UMANG app.

 

Limitations of the Digital India programme:

1. Digital Divide: Despite progress, the digital divide persists, with rural areas having limited access to the internet and technology. Around 50% of the population is still not online.
2. Lack of customization: High diversity in adoption readiness and pace across different parts of the country demands flexibility in implementation design rather than one size fits all.
3. Variable success of digital skilling: Digital literacy-focused initiatives are not uniformly successful due to a lack of qualified trainers, customized vernacular content and monitoring mechanisms.
4. Affordability barriers: High costs of devices, and data plans restrict sustainable adoption for economically weaker segments even if infrastructure exists.
5. Rural infrastructure gaps: Issues like inadequate electricity, and broadband connectivity obstruct rural adoption even as urban pivots to 5G and fiberization.

 

Way forward:

1. Infrastructure Development: Invest in comprehensive rural broadband infrastructure. e.g. BharatNet project aims to connect over 250,000 village panchayats with high-speed broadband.
2. Launch targeted digital literacy programs, especially in rural and marginalized communities. E.g. The National Digital Literacy Mission (NDLM) and Pradhan Mantri Gramin Digital Saksharta Abhiyan (PMGDISHA)
3. Public-Private Partnerships: Encourage collaborations between government and private sectors for digital inclusion.g. Initiatives like ‘Digital Village’ projects
4. Subsidized schemes or partnerships with private companies can provide cost-effective smartphones and data plans to economically disadvantaged populations.
5. Impact assessment: Regular surveys and feedback mechanisms can gauge the impact of digital initiatives on different segments of the population.
6. Multilingual Digital Initiatives: Develop and promote digital content in regional languages.

  

Conclusion

While Digital India has laid the foundations, achieving holistic digital empowerment needs patient stakeholders addressing demographic and regional realities via sustainable models rather than rushing purely for numbers.

  

Insta Links:

• Digital transformation

 

Mains Link

Implementation of Information Technology-based projects/programmes usually suffers in terms of certain vital factors. Identify these factors, and suggest measures for their effective implementation. (UPSC 2019)

 

Prelims Link:

 

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UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 GS Paper 3:

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Legalising Minimum Support Price in India

Syllabus: Agriculture: MSP

Source: The Hindu BL

Context: The recent increases in Minimum Support Prices (MSP) for 14 kharif crops have disappointed farmers, as they do not adequately reflect the rising input costs.

 

What is MSP?

The Minimum Support Price (MSP) is a minimum price for any crop at which the government purchases it from farmers, and is based on a calculation of at least one-and-a-half times the cost of production incurred by the farmers.

 

MSP does not have any legal basis but has been implemented since the 1960s with the following objectives:

1. Ensuring food security in the country.
2. Protection from price drop for farmers
3. Incentivise desirable crop production.

 

Importance of MSP:

• Safeguard against Price volatility: The system of MSP acts as a tool for the government to control sharp falls and rises in the prices of any crops
• Surety of minimum prices: The MSP is announced before the sowing season so that farmers can make an informed decision. Hence, supporting farmers from distress sales.
• Control crops short in supply: by offering more price support for these crops so that more and more farmers are tempted to grow these crops.
• Crop Diversification: MSP for crops promotes their diversification and curbs import-dependence and food inflation (e.g., there was a notable increase in the MSP of pulses and oilseeds in 2021 in order to incentivise its domestic production)
• Food security: The government can use these crops to be sold at government fair price shops at a price lower than the market rate to the below poverty line people at a lower price.
  • Developmental schemes like PM-POSHAN, ICDS, Anganwadi Services Scheme, and TPDS rely on grains procured by FCI at MSP.

 

Limitations of MSP:

• Lack of legal guarantee: Farmers cannot demand MSP as a matter of right. The only crop where MSP payment has some statutory element is sugarcane.
• Issues with the cost of production: Farm activists say that the 1.5-times MSP formula — originally recommended by the National Commission for Farmers headed by agricultural scientist M S Swaminathan should have been applied to the C2 costs.
• Lack of effective data: The CACP does not do any field-based cost estimates itself.
• Ineffective coverage: Though government announces MSP for 23 crops only.
• Highly unequal across states: In 2019-20 roughly 90% of the rice produced in Punjab, and Haryana was procured by the government whereas roughly 1% was procured in Karnataka and Gujarat.
• Ineffectively Implemented: The Shanta Kumar Committee, in its report in 2015, stated that only 6% of farmers receive MSP, which directly means that 94% of the farmers in the country are deprived of the benefit of the MSP.
• Lack of awareness: NITI Aayog on the MSP revealed that only 10 per cent of the farmers were aware of MSP prices right price before the sowing season.

 

Therefore, the legalization of MSP is needed:

1. Legalizing MSP enables farmers to claim MSP rights, enforceable through courts.
2. Improved price realization from the private sector could boost the rural economy.
3. Diversification of any of the MSP crops helps farmers avoid the high input costs of select crops.
4. Increased production of pulses and millets promotes climate-smart agriculture.

 

However, there are major impediments to legalizing it:

• It would lead to a heavy subsidy burden on the government.
• Ineffective grain management: Legalising MSP will further aggravate the issues related to grain management in India.
• Market distortion as the natural cycle of demand-supply would be disturbed.
• It is more of a “One size fits all’ approach; as the ultimate solution for agricultural stagnation in the country is not MSP.

 

Recommendation by various committees:

 

Conclusion:

Legalizing MSP alone doesn’t ensure financial sustainability in farming. Income-support schemes like PM-KISAN and price deficiency systems like PM-AASHA offer more progressive solutions.

As suggested by the Swaminathan Commission the methods of calculation need to be restructured to make it more profitable for farmers and encourage crop diversification. But at the same time, other aspects such as irrigation, soil, irrigation, knowledge input, etc. also need to be considered to impart holistic development in the agricultural sector of the country.

 

Mains Links:

What do you mean by Minimum Support Price (MSP)? How will MSP rescue the farmers from the low-income trap? (UPSC 2019)

 

Prelims Links:

 

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UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 Content for Mains Enrichment (CME)

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‘Jadui Pitara’

Source: IE

‘Jadui Pitara’ -a play-based learning-teaching material tailored for children between the age group of 3-8 years

1. Developed under the National Curriculum Framework for Foundational Stage (part of the implementation of the New Education Policy 2020)
2. Available in 13 Indian languages
3. Includes playbooks, toys, puzzles, posters, flashcards, storybooks, and worksheets that reflect local culture and social contexts.

 

Aim:

1. Accommodate the diverse needs of learners and pique curiosity
2. Making the learning-teaching environment more child-centric, lively, and joyful

 

Usage: This example can be used in Governance, Social justice, and Ethics (case study) as a unique example of a child-centric foundational literacy initiative

 

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UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 Facts for Prelims (FFP)

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Colombo Process

 Source: The Print

Context: India chaired the first meeting of the Colombo Process in Geneva, marking its first time at the helm.

 

About the Colombo Process:

It is a regional consultative forum comprising 12 Asian member states and aims to share best practices related to overseas employment for South and Southeast Asian countries that send migrant workers abroad. The member states include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam. The forum, founded by 10 of these states, makes non-binding decisions by consensus.

 

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) and the Colombo Process Technical Support Unit (CPTSU) provide technical and administrative support.

  

 

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Project Nexus

 Source: IE 

Context: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has joined Project Nexus, an international initiative aimed at enabling instant cross-border retail payments by linking domestic Fast Payments Systems (FPSs) of multiple countries.

• India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) will be connected with the FPSs of Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand, with potential expansion to more countries.
• Project Nexus, conceptualized by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub, aims to standardize the connectivity between various instant payment systems (IPS) globally.
• This will streamline cross-border payments, allowing transactions to be completed within 60 seconds.
• The platform simplifies the process by allowing a single connection to Nexus to link to all other countries in the network, accelerating the growth of instant cross-border payments.

 

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Megafauna

 Source: IE 

Context: A 41,000-year-old ostrich nest was discovered by archaeologists in Andhra Pradesh, providing significant insights into the extinction of megafauna in India.

• Megafauna, generally animals weighing over 50 kg, includes the mega omnivorous ostrich.
• The discovery supports research on the reasons behind megafauna extinction in India, such as the arrival of humans around 30,000 years ago and the co-evolution hypothesis, which suggests that geographic isolation and abiotic factors accelerated their extinction.

 

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Snowblind malware

 Source: IE 

Context: Snowblind is a new Android malware that targets banking credentials by exploiting a built-in Android security feature called ‘seccomp’ (secure computing), part of the Linux kernel and Android OS.

• Discovered by security firm Promon, Snowblind repacks apps to evade detection of accessibility features, allowing it to extract sensitive information and gain remote access.
• This malware injects code that activates before seccomp’s anti-tampering measures, bypassing security mechanisms and disabling biometric and two-factor authentication.

It mainly affects users who download apps from untrusted sources and is most active in Southeast Asia. Google confirmed that no apps on the Play Store are infected, suggesting users are safe if they stick to Play Store apps.

 About Malware:

• Malware, short for malicious software, refers to any intrusive software developed by cybercriminals (often called hackers) to steal data and damage or destroy computers and computer systems.
• Examples of common malware include viruses, worms, Trojan viruses, spyware, adware, and ransomware.

 

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Zinc’s role in making legumes resilient to climate change

 Source: DTE 

Context: Researchers have discovered that zinc plays a crucial role in enhancing the health and climate resilience of legume crops.

• The study reveals zinc’s importance in nitrogen fixation, where atmospheric nitrogen is converted into ammonia, essential for plant growth.
• Legumes form a symbiotic relationship with rhizobia bacteria, which fix atmospheric nitrogen in root nodules sensitive to environmental factors like temperature, drought, and soil salinity.
• The study also identified a transcription factor called Fixation Under Nitrate (FUN) that controls nodule breakdown when soil nitrogen levels are high.

Zinc acts as a secondary signal to regulate nitrogen fixation efficiency, with the zinc sensor FUN playing a key role.

Understanding how zinc and FUN regulate nitrogen fixation can help optimize this process in legume crops, leading to increased nitrogen availability, improved yields, and reduced reliance on synthetic fertilizers.

 

 

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UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 Mapping

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Minami-Torishima island (Japan)

 Source: Yahoo news

 Context: Researchers discovered 230 million tons of minerals, including cobalt and nickel, off a remote island 1,200 miles from Tokyo.

This find could supply Japan’s EV battery needs for over a decade. The seabed near Minami-Torishima island contains 610,000 metric tons of cobalt and 740,000 metric tons of nickel.

Mining is set to begin in 2025, with commercial extraction expected by 2026. The discovery is significant as global demand for these minerals is projected to rise sharply, though deep-sea mining poses technical and environmental challenges.

 

 

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 3 July 2024 [PDF]

 

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