Month: December 2021

The sustainable development goals (Target 6.2) require India “by 2030, to achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation, paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations.” Swachh Bharat Mission 2 .0 speaks of sustained behavioral change while embarking on the … Read more

. One of the reasons for agrarian distress is the declining average size of farm holdings. The average farm size declined from 2.3 hectares (ha) in 1970-71 to 1.08 ha in 2015-16. The share of small and marginal farmers increased from 70 per cent in 1980-81 to 86 per cent in 2015-16. At the state … Read more

The thrust of the predominant explanations is that women are dropping out of paid work or the labour force either because of fear of sexual violence outside the home; or fear of being stigmatised by the community that might see their work as a marker of low status, i.e. the inability of the husband, the … Read more

The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (the “Intermediary Rules”) fundamentally change the way the internet will be experienced in India. While Part I of the Intermediary Rules mainly lays down the definitions of terms, Part II and Part III contain the actual compliances and requirements. Part II deals with … Read more

United States (US) President Joe Biden is credited with taking the initiative for the summit-level meeting of Quad that took place on March 12. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, too, thanked Biden for taking this initiative in his opening comments at the summit. This is the second high-profile foreign policy initiative taken by Biden in his … Read more

Seven decades after the UDHR, 58 million children are out of school globally and more than 100 million children get eliminated from the schooling system before completing primary education. India tops the list of countries with out-of-school children. The 2011 Census affirmed that 84 million children in the country do not go to school at … Read more

. The National Population Policy 2000 affirmed a commitment to achieve replacement levels of fertility (total fertility rate of 2.1) by 2010. Ten states — Karnataka, Punjab, Gujarat, Assam, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Kerala — and Jammu and Kashmir, have achieved this goal, albeit much delayed. The question that arises … Read more

Tech giants such as Alphabet, Amazon, Facebook, IBM and Microsoft – as well as individuals like Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk – believe that now is the right time to talk about the nearly boundless landscape of artificial intelligence. In many ways, this is just as much a new frontier for ethics and risk assessment … Read more

The lack of administrative reform in India has frustrated many stakeholders for a long time. Occasionally, it finds a voice at the highest levels, most recently when, during a speech in Parliament, Prime Minister Modi complained about the overreach of the elite IAS cadre. Unsurprisingly, one of the key focus areas of such reform is … Read more

. Women bear a disproportionately high burden of unpaid domestic work and care work in India. They carry a disproportionately higher burden of unpaid work, namely, unpaid domestic services as well as unpaid care of children, the old, and the disabled for their respective households. Women do this job not necessarily because they like it … Read more

. Indian banks were written off in the early days of the pandemic when there were expectations of an exponential jump in non-performing assets. This worry continued well into the third quarter of the year. It was, however, only after the banks, in their forward guidance, consistently talked about the lower number of restructuring requests, … Read more

Current proposals for a pledge of net-zero emissions by 2050, particularly if bound in law, would likely win India diplomatic credit, but risk our development future, and ironically, may not, in practice, accelerate our transition to a low-carbon future. India has an opportunity to claim leadership by being ambitious, by shifting the spotlight to concrete … Read more

In less than three years of their introduction, by virtue of the anonymity they offer to donors, electoral bonds have become the most popular route of political donation. However, many political experts are of the opinion that electoral bonds in their design and operation, allow for limitless and anonymous corporate donations to political parties. This … Read more

Parliament recently passed the National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill, 2021, which significantly increases the powers of the Lieutenant-Governor (L-G) of Delhi. Despite the nature of the sweeping changes this bill proposed, it was not sent to a parliamentary committee, and there was no formal consultation with stakeholders, civil society, or experts before it … Read more

The United States (US) secretary of defence, Lloyd Austin’s recent visit to India underlined the strategic importance of India in Washington’s Indo-Pacific engagements. Although the US and India did not sign any specific agreements during the visit, defence minister Rajnath Singh and Austin provided, with their brief statements, a glimpse into the areas of collaboration … Read more

. India endorsed the United Nations Guiding Principles (UNGP) on Business and Human Rights more than a decade ago. Accordingly, it has to evolve a National Action Plan on Business and Human Rights (NAP) detailing actions to ensure businesses do not violate human rights. There is a law that prevents companies from advertising tobacco near … Read more

While the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) has been a valuable employment tool and safety net, as seen in the migrant crisis, its role in building ecosystems resilient to the climate crisis is being increasingly recognised. There is now an urgent need to bring upfront the scheme’s potential in addressing matters of … Read more

During the Cold War, India’s refusal was premised on its non-alignment. That argument had little justification once the Cold War ended during 1989-91. Since then, NATO has built partnerships with many neutral and non-aligned states. NATO has regular consultations with both Russia and China, despite the gathering tensions with them in recent years. An India-NATO … Read more

The problem of food waste is a relatively modern one. India is an ancient civilisation and we have been prudent about food for millennia. Our parents and grandparents, too, once approached food and cooking with the same prudence. Yet, somewhere along the way, we lost sight of this “waste not, want not” mentality. Nearly 40 … Read more

Before the government concludes its discussions with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on privatising public sector banks (PSBs), it may want to study the history of Indira Gandhi’s bank nationalisation — for nationalisation did have its positive outcomes and privatisation can have negative outcomes. The pre-nationalised banks had a profit motive, and shared close … Read more

The pandemic has increased people’s participation in the digital economy. Unfortunately, the number of personal data breaches from major digital service providers has increased worryingly in the same period. The recent alleged data breach at MobiKwik could stand to be India’s biggest breach with the data of 9.9 crore users at risk. Given the significance … Read more

Recently, the foreign ministers of BIMSTEC (the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) met in a virtual conference. This is the first ministerial since the globe has been hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. BIMSTEC as a regional organization has achieved a lot in Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief and security, including … Read more

. Recently, the central government has repromulgated the Commission for Air Quality Management in the National Capital Region and Adjoining Areas Ordinance, 2020. The ordinance establishes a commission for air quality management in the National Capital Region. This raises questions about the practice of issuing ordinances to make law and that of re-issuing ordinances without … Read more

. Recently, the Government of India has announced to scale up the target of having 450 GW of renewable energy by 2030. In this context, the Union Budget 2021 has proposed the launch of the National Hydrogen Energy Mission. Hydrogen is one of the most abundant elements on earth for a cleaner alternative fuel option. … Read more

. For a long time, financial service providers have focused on high net-worth individuals, salaried individuals and business owners to increase their profitability. This is attributed mainly to two factors. One, a lot is known about these segments because they leave large financial footprints and rich data. This enables financial service providers to make accurate … Read more

Policy makers, climate negotiators, academicians, corporates and NGOs are currently fixated on the concept of “net zero carbon emissions” and the appropriate target year for achieving it. Supported by economic analysis and moral logic and drawing on the concept of “common but differentiated responsibility”, their arguments swirl around its meaning and whether the date should … Read more

. The father of modern pathology, Rudolf Virchow, emphasised in 1856 that there are essentially no dividing lines between animal and human medicine.This concept is ever more relevant as the world is facing a second wave of Covid-19 pandemic. This approach is referred to as “One Health”, focuses on acknowledging the interconnectedness of animals, humans, … Read more