1)India’s Defense Sector – Snapshot :-
Download – India’s Defense Sector Snapshot
News 1 – Defence Minister Launches Army Cloud, Data Centre & Digi-Locker for the Indian Army :-
- The facility under the Army Cloud includes a Central Data Centre, a Near Line Data Centre, both in Delhi and a Disaster Recovery site for replication of its critical data along with virtualised servers and storage in an environmentally controlled complex. This is similar to the Meghraj; the Cloud of National Informatics Centre (NIC) and will provide all Information Technology Infrastructure including servers for computing, storage, network and network security equipment centrally, for automation of Indian Army. The latest technologies in the field have been incorporated in the implementation of the first ever Software Defined Data Centre, wherein all the resources could be provisioned to different applications on the Cloud, on click of a button. It has already started providing Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) to the pan Army users as the first Cloud service and will soon provide Software as a Service (SaaS).
- With the launching of Digi-Locker, it will provide a secure and exclusive data storage space to all the units and formation headquarters of the Army over its dedicated data network. The Digi-Locker of Indian Army is similar to e-Locker of Digital India program and has all the advanced features like digital signatures and watermarking. This is an important step towards implementation of cyber security as it precludes carriage of soft copies of data on CDs/DVDs and removable media. Users can store, share and access the data from anywhere any time on the Army Data Network. The infrastructure and platforms being made available for automation and digitisation will catalyse the pace of digitisation in all branches of Army and is a landmark towards transforming Indian Army from platform centric to a Network Centric Force, which would leverage the technology as a force multiplier.
- Digital Army:-
- In keeping with the national vision of Digital India, the Indian Army has launched a program for Digital Army with nine pillars for digitisation. Three of the nine pillars of this umbrella program, namely Broadband highways, Universal access to telephones and Army Data Network stress upon Information Technology Infrastructure development. Another three namely e-Governance, Electronic delivery of services and Online information for all, focus on delivery of services to all units and formation headquarters. For any modern army, the Network Centric Operations are essential for meeting enhanced challenges of asymmetry, lethality, fluidity and non-linearity in the present day battlefield. The Indian Army is addressing this key area comprehensively.
News 2 – Nuclear capable, long-range Agni-IV missile sucessfully test-fired. The details of Agni IV is in the PDF , mentioned above.
2) SAADMEx – South Asian Annual Disaster Management Exercise
- The main focus of this exercise will be to test the inter-governmental coordination, create synergy and synchronize efforts to institutionalize regional cooperation on disaster response among the member countries of SAARC region.
- This will be the first-ever joint exercise to be conducted by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) of India.
- Through the exercise, the important aspects of responding to disasters by pooling of resources/expertise will be addressed and also the imperative of presenting a well coordinated response within the SAARC region will be emphasised.
3) “Heart of Asia” – Istanbul Process:- (India, Pakistan ,Afghanistan and others )
- News –Pakistan recently extended invitation to India for Heart of Asia conference.
- About :- The Istanbul Process provides a new agenda for regional cooperation in the ‘Heart of Asia’ by placing Afghanistan at its center and engaging the ‘Heart of Asia’ countries in sincere and result‐oriented cooperation for a peaceful and stable Afghanistan, as well as a secure and prosperous region as a whole.
- Areas of Engagement:-
- The countries participating in the Istanbul process have agreed on the following three elements for the follow-up to the Istanbul Process:
- A) Political consultation involving Afghanistan and its near and extended neighbours.
- B) A sustained incremental approach to implementation of the Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) identified in the Istanbul Process document; and
- C) Seeking to contribute and bring greater coherence to the work of various regional processes and organisations, particularly as they relate to Afghanistan.
- The countries participating in the Istanbul process have agreed on the following three elements for the follow-up to the Istanbul Process:
- ‘Heart of Asia’ participating countries:
1. Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
2. Republic of Azerbaijan
3. People’s Republic of China
4. Republic of India
5. Islamic Republic of Iran
6. Republic of Kazakhstan
7. Kyrgyz Republic
8. Islamic Republic of Pakistan
9. Russian Federation
10. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
11. Republic of Tajikistan
12. Republic of Turkey
13. Republic of Turkmenistan
14. United Arab Emirates
4)Saving Asian vulture from fatal drugs :-
- After successfully campaigning for the ban on multi-dose vials of painkiller drug diclofenac in veterinary use, conservationists have stepped up pressure for withdrawing two more drugs – Ketoprofen & Aceclofenac, which they say, are fatal for Asian vultures.
- The “three species of Gyps vultures endemic to South and Southeast Asia, oriental white-backed vulture (Gyps bengalensis), long-billed vulture (G. indicus) and slender-billed vulture (G. tenuirostris), are the worst affected and are threatened with global extinction after rapid population declines, which began in the mid-1990s
- IUCN lists Vultures as Critically Endangered
- Why do we need to save Vultures:-
- Environmental:-
- The disappearance of vultures has allowed other species, such as rats and wild dogs, to take their place. These newly abundant scavengers, however, are not as efficient as vultures. A vulture’s metabolism is a true “dead-end” for pathogens, but dogs and rats become carriers of the pathogens.
- Wild dogs, carrying diseases from rotting carcasses (rabies, anthrax, plague, etc.),are directly or indirectly responsible for thousands of human deaths. Today in India, 30,000 people die from rabies each year, more than half the world’s total.Hence Wild Dogs are inefficient scavengers.
- Treating these diseases is extremely costly for the Indian government and people. Around half a million Indians are treated for rabies each year, at a cost of 1500 rupees per person,
- Cultural :-
- While the sanitary, ecological, and economic consequences are considerable, the cultural impact is also notable.
- According to Parsi beliefs, Earth, Fire, and Water are sacred elements, and both cremation and burial are sacrilegious. For the deceased Parsi to reach heaven, vultures serve as intermediaries between earth and sky. The dead body is placed on a Tower of Silence where vultures, by consuming the body, liberate the soul.
- The 82,000 Parsi Indians, deprived of their celestial emissaries, have been obliged to drop these ancient customs for reasons of hygiene, since now bodies take six months to disappear.
- Environmental:-
5) H1N1 threat looming large as Winter sets in India:-
- The Swine flu virus is an Influenza virus , it is spherical RNA virus
- They are usually 3 types:
- Type A –
- Type A has multiple sub-types – H1N1,H1N2,H2N2,H5N1 and may more, among them H1N1 is known to cause deadly Swine Flu
- Infect multiple species; Human, Avian, Swine (Human , Bird and Pig)
- Type B –
- No Sub Type
- Infects Humans
- Type C-
- No Sub type
- Infects Humans and Pigs
- Type A –
- Note :- the H stands for hemagglutinin and N stands for neuraminidase
- Notorious Type A :-
- It undergoes mutation that can take place within the genome (Antigenic drift) / or re-assortment among the genetic materials of subtypes (Antigenci Shift ) resulting in a new virus thus making the existing incapable of handling it.
- Antigenic Drift is responsible for new seasonal strains that makes necessary surveillance to detect these strains and to prepare new seasonal influenza vaccine (yearly basis)
- Antigenic Shift may result in a new virus easily transmissible from man to man for which the population has no immunity : Results in Pandemics
- Public Health Importance :-
- Causes Pandemics – the outbreak , virus and years-
1)Spanish Flu [A (H1N1)] 1918-19;
2)Asian Flu [A (H2N2)] 1957-59;
3) Hongkong Flu [A (H3N2)] 1968-68;
4) “Swine Flu” [A (H1N1)] 2009-10
Causes Epidemics, seasonal Influenza outbreaks and sporadic cases.
- Causes Pandemics – the outbreak , virus and years-
- High Risk Groups :- young children with pre disposing risk factors, old age; Pregnant mothers, Health workers, Co-morbid conditions (Lung disease, heart disease, liver disease, kidney disease, blood disorders, Diabetes); Immuno-compromised; long term steroid treatment
- Seasonality :-
- Temperate zones: epidemics occur in winter
Tropics/ Sub tropics: epidemics occur in rainy season
Sporadic cases: round the year
- Temperate zones: epidemics occur in winter
- Overcrowding – Mostly affect urban and peri-urban areas.High attach rates may be witnessed in Army Barracks, College hostels, Schools, Residential hostels of schools, aircrafts, ships etc
- Government and Medicinal responses :-
- Health being a State subject, the State Governments is expected to take prompt measures for preventing the spread of H1N1 virus and for diagnosis, case management and treatment of the patients. However, the Central Government has been pro-active in assisting the State Governments
- Oseltamivir is the drug recommended by WHO. The drug is made available through the Public Health System free of cost. The drug is also sold through Schedule X Chemists. The States have been asked to review the geographic locations of Schedule X Chemists and issue fresh license for unrepresented areas and to ensure availability of Osetamivir with them.
- NCDC – National Center for Disease control does round-the-clock monitoring.
-
Symptoms:
People who have swine flu can be contagious one day before they have any symptoms, and as many as 7 days after they get sick. Kids can be contagious for as long as 10 days.Most symptoms are the same as seasonal flu, they can include:
- cough
- fever
- sore throat
- stuffy or runny nose
- body aches
- headache
- chills
- fatigue
6)India-Russia Joint Army Exercise Indra-2015 in Bikaner to Focus on Counter Terrorism :-
- Indian and Russian Armies would be conducting a joint military exercise as a part of a continuing series of annual joint exercises under the banner ‘Exercise INDRA-2015’
- The joint exercise this year would focus on ‘Counter Terrorism Operations in Desert Terrain under a United Nations Mandate’.
- To achieve inter operability in joint operations in the future, troops from an Independent Russian Motorised Brigade and Indian Army’s Infantry Battalion would initially acquaint themselves with the approach to such operations, Command and Control systems as well as arms and equipment of each other
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Steve Ovett, the famous British middle-distance athlete, won the 800-metres gold medal at the Moscow Olympics of 1980. Just a few days later, he was about to win a 5,000-metres race at London’s Crystal Palace. Known for his burst of acceleration on the home stretch, he had supreme confidence in his ability to out-sprint rivals. With the final 100 metres remaining,
[wptelegram-join-channel link=”https://t.me/s/upsctree” text=”Join @upsctree on Telegram”]Ovett waved to the crowd and raised a hand in triumph. But he had celebrated a bit too early. At the finishing line, Ireland’s John Treacy edged past Ovett. For those few moments, Ovett had lost his sense of reality and ignored the possibility of a negative event.
This analogy works well for the India story and our policy failures , including during the ongoing covid pandemic. While we have never been as well prepared or had significant successes in terms of growth stability as Ovett did in his illustrious running career, we tend to celebrate too early. Indeed, we have done so many times before.
It is as if we’re convinced that India is destined for greater heights, come what may, and so we never run through the finish line. Do we and our policymakers suffer from a collective optimism bias, which, as the Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman once wrote, “may well be the most significant of the cognitive biases”? The optimism bias arises from mistaken beliefs which form expectations that are better than the reality. It makes us underestimate chances of a negative outcome and ignore warnings repeatedly.
The Indian economy had a dream run for five years from 2003-04 to 2007-08, with an average annual growth rate of around 9%. Many believed that India was on its way to clocking consistent double-digit growth and comparisons with China were rife. It was conveniently overlooked that this output expansion had come mainly came from a few sectors: automobiles, telecom and business services.
Indians were made to believe that we could sprint without high-quality education, healthcare, infrastructure or banking sectors, which form the backbone of any stable economy. The plan was to build them as we went along, but then in the euphoria of short-term success, it got lost.
India’s exports of goods grew from $20 billion in 1990-91 to over $310 billion in 2019-20. Looking at these absolute figures it would seem as if India has arrived on the world stage. However, India’s share of global trade has moved up only marginally. Even now, the country accounts for less than 2% of the world’s goods exports.
More importantly, hidden behind this performance was the role played by one sector that should have never made it to India’s list of exports—refined petroleum. The share of refined petroleum exports in India’s goods exports increased from 1.4% in 1996-97 to over 18% in 2011-12.
An import-intensive sector with low labour intensity, exports of refined petroleum zoomed because of the then policy regime of a retail price ceiling on petroleum products in the domestic market. While we have done well in the export of services, our share is still less than 4% of world exports.
India seemed to emerge from the 2008 global financial crisis relatively unscathed. But, a temporary demand push had played a role in the revival—the incomes of many households, both rural and urban, had shot up. Fiscal stimulus to the rural economy and implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission scales had led to the salaries of around 20% of organized-sector employees jumping up. We celebrated, but once again, neither did we resolve the crisis brewing elsewhere in India’s banking sector, nor did we improve our capacity for healthcare or quality education.
Employment saw little economy-wide growth in our boom years. Manufacturing jobs, if anything, shrank. But we continued to celebrate. Youth flocked to low-productivity service-sector jobs, such as those in hotels and restaurants, security and other services. The dependence on such jobs on one hand and high-skilled services on the other was bound to make Indian society more unequal.
And then, there is agriculture, an elephant in the room. If and when farm-sector reforms get implemented, celebrations would once again be premature. The vast majority of India’s farmers have small plots of land, and though these farms are at least as productive as larger ones, net absolute incomes from small plots can only be meagre.
A further rise in farm productivity and consequent increase in supply, if not matched by a demand rise, especially with access to export markets, would result in downward pressure on market prices for farm produce and a further decline in the net incomes of small farmers.
We should learn from what John Treacy did right. He didn’t give up, and pushed for the finish line like it was his only chance at winning. Treacy had years of long-distance practice. The same goes for our economy. A long grind is required to build up its base before we can win and celebrate. And Ovett did not blame anyone for his loss. We play the blame game. Everyone else, right from China and the US to ‘greedy corporates’, seems to be responsible for our failures.
We have lowered absolute poverty levels and had technology-based successes like Aadhaar and digital access to public services. But there are no short cuts to good quality and adequate healthcare and education services. We must remain optimistic but stay firmly away from the optimism bias.
In the end, it is not about how we start, but how we finish. The disastrous second wave of covid and our inability to manage it is a ghastly reminder of this fact.