Prime Minister Modi’s Iran Visit: Chabahar and Beyond
The visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Iran, 22 May to 23 May 2016 has generated a good amount of enthusiasm in India. Simultaneously, it is also aimed at sending a clear signal to the international community that India is serious and means business about its intentions to play its legitimate role in the region while balancing out its friends across all spectrums of Islamic world.
Ostensibly the underlying aim of the visit is to boost Indian connectivity with the region by signing the India-Iran-Afghanistan Trilateral Agreement on Transport and Transit Corridors to facilitate trade with Afghanistan, Central Asia, Russia and Europe for utilizing Chabahar port as a hub, giving boost to Indian access to Afghanistan and creating the International North South Transport Corridor (INSTC). Presence of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani during the signing of the agreement in Tehran signifies the importance Afghanistan attaches to the Development of Chabahar so as to end its isolation and total reliance on Pakistan for sea connectivity.
Series of events beginning with the conclusion of US-Iran Nuclear agreement in 2015 have provided a window of opportunity to re engage on economic issues and explore new avenues for cooperation for the three countries. India looking for an opportunity to establish its foothold moved at a considerable pace through high level bilateral visits involving three prominent Cabinet Ministers and sealing bilateral agreements for stake in Iranian gas field Farzad B, committing US $ 150 million for development of Phase I of Chabahar port and explore laying of rail network from Chabahar to Zahedan and onward connectivity to Zeranj-Delaram road. India also committed to clearing the Iranian dues for oil imports totalling US $ 6.5 billion.
The significance of visit has to be seen beyond connectivity to Afghanistan, setting up of International North–South Transport Corridor (INSTC) and enhancing Indo-Iran bilateral relations.
There are a few immediate takeaways from establishing Indian footprints in the region; most significant being India getting a foothold into the Strait of Hormuz and onwards to Persian Gulf and check the expanding Chinese designs in the region which it is aiming to achieve through development of Gwadar port and setting up of China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CEPC) besides expanding its economic relations with Iran. As per Pakistan’s Commerce Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan it envisages Gwadar as a bridge between Central Asia, Middle East and South East Asia. However development of Chabahar with shorter and more reliable links to Central Asia, Iran and Afghanistan will facilitate faster trade to South East Asia in comparison to Gwadar.
Iran has been waiting for an opportunity to play a significant role in the region and specially in Afghanistan, which is its immediate neighbour to the East and shares approximately 930 kilometres long border with considerable influence on Afghanistan’s Shia population. Earlier Iran could not play an active role in the region due to US direct influence on Afghanistan and imposition of sanctions for trade and transit. Iran was also kept out of all peace negotiations with Taliban, last one being the Quadrilateral Coordination Group (QGC) Forum – comprised of USA, China, Pakistan and Afghanistan, although China with just 76 kilometres of border through Wakhan Corridor with Afghanistan and with hardly any leverage with Taliban was included at the behest of Pakistan.
Near failure of talks due to Pakistan’s unwillingness to apply pressure on Taliban and Haqqani network and bring about any apparent change in ground situation in Afghanistan forced President Ghani to show his frustration with Pakistan and look for suitable options for a peaceful solution to its problems. Similar opinion was also expressed by USA State Department which stated, “We have consistently expressed our concerns at the highest level of the government of Pakistan about their continued tolerance for Afghan Taliban groups such as the Haqqani Network operating from Pakistani soil.” US frustration with Pakistan has become more profound with its Congress voting to increase restrictions on Pakistan and blocking immediate US $ 450 million in aid unless it meets certain conditions.
Iran therefore is a suitable and willing player to take an active role in bringing about stability in Afghanistan keeping in view its expanding ambitions to play a hands-on role in geo politics of the region, post removal of sanctions. With USA having expressed frustration with Pakistan due to its promoting proxies in Taliban and Haqqani network, it is likely to encourage an engagement between Iran and Afghanistan to the advantage of India. Afghan President looking for relevance in his country is likely to encourage Iran’s participation so as to bring a semblance of peace in the region.
Beyond expanding its footprints in its immediate neighbourhood, Iran is also looking for economic renaissance having been isolated for close to a decade. Chabahar provides it an opportunity to expand southwards since the development of the port will ease its reliance on exporting oil through Strait of Hormuz which has seen continued tensions due to changing dynamics of intra religious conflicts and hostilities with its immediate neighbours in the Gulf.
India during Iran’s years of isolation continued to engage with it deftly through trade and diplomatic engagement. In fact, Iran has been India’s second largest supplier of oil and gas. India did not miss the opportunity to consolidate this relationship with Iran as soon as sanctions were lifted so as to secure its interests in Afghanistan and Central Asia. Alongside India has also maintained a very mature engagement with other countries of Islamic world notably Saudi Arabia and UAE. It would be in India’s continued interest to maintain the momentum with respect to development of Chabahar and secure its strategic interests.
Draft ‘Trafficking of Persons (Prevention, Protection and Rehabilitation) Bill, 2016
- It seeks to establish DISTRICT ANTI- TRAFFICKING COMMITTEE
- The appropriate Government shall, by notification, constitute for every district, a District Anti Trafficking Committee, for exercising the powers and performing such functions and duties in relation to prevention, rescue, protection, medical care, psychological assistance, skill development, need based rehabilitation of victims as may be prescribed.
- The District Anti Trafficking Committee shall consist of the following members, namely:- (i) the District Magistrate or District Collector- Chairperson; (ii) two social workers out of which one shall be a woman to be nominated by the District Judge – Member; (iii) one representative from the District Legal Services Authority nominated by the District Judge- Member; (iv) District Officer of the Social Justice or Women and Child Development Department of the concerned States/UTs- Member Secretary
- It Seeks to establish STATE ANTI-TRAFFICKING COMMITTEE
- State Anti–Trafficking Committee constituted for a State/UT, shall consist of the following members, namely:- (i) the Chief Secretary- Chairperson; (ii) Secretary to the Department of the State dealing with Women and Child-Member; (iii) Secretary of the State Home Department – Member; (iv) Secretary of the State Labour Department- Member; (v) Secretary from State Health Department- Member; (vi) Director General of Police of the concerned State- Member; (vii) Secretary of the State Legal Services Authority – Member;
(viii) two social workers out of which one shall be a woman and to be nominated by the Chief Justice of the High Court – Member.
- State Anti–Trafficking Committee constituted for a State/UT, shall consist of the following members, namely:- (i) the Chief Secretary- Chairperson; (ii) Secretary to the Department of the State dealing with Women and Child-Member; (iii) Secretary of the State Home Department – Member; (iv) Secretary of the State Labour Department- Member; (v) Secretary from State Health Department- Member; (vi) Director General of Police of the concerned State- Member; (vii) Secretary of the State Legal Services Authority – Member;
- It seeks to establish Central Anti- Trafficking Advisory Board
- The Central Government shall constitute a Central Anti–Trafficking Advisory Board headed by the Secretary, Ministry of Women and Child Development and representatives from the concerned Ministries, State/UTs and members from civil society organisations as may be prescribed
- It seeks to establish Special Agency,for investigation of offences under the provisions of the Act.
- Support Services:-
- Protection Homes:-Protection Homes shall provide for shelter, food, clothing, counselling and medical care that is necessary for the rescued victims and such other services in the manner, as may be prescribed.
- Special Homes:-One or more Special Homes in each district for the purpose of providing long- term institutional support for the rehabilitation of victims, in the manner as may be prescribed.
- Other facets of the bills:-
- Rehabilitation and social integration
- Employment opportunities and placement agencies
- Penal Provisions:-
- Punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to 3 years or with fine which may extend to fifty thousand rupees, or with both.
- It also has provision of confiscation,forfeiture and attachment of property of the offender
- It also aims to provide Special Courts, anti-trafficking fund etc.
Facts:-
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his recent visit to Meghalaya tried his hand in beating Khasi traditional drum ‘Ka Bom.’
Receive Daily Updates
Recent Posts
Petrol in India is cheaper than in countries like Hong Kong, Germany and the UK but costlier than in China, Brazil, Japan, the US, Russia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report showed.
Rising fuel prices in India have led to considerable debate on which government, state or central, should be lowering their taxes to keep prices under control.
The rise in fuel prices is mainly due to the global price of crude oil (raw material for making petrol and diesel) going up. Further, a stronger dollar has added to the cost of crude oil.
Amongst comparable countries (per capita wise), prices in India are higher than those in Vietnam, Kenya, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Venezuela. Countries that are major oil producers have much lower prices.
In the report, the Philippines has a comparable petrol price but has a per capita income higher than India by over 50 per cent.
Countries which have a lower per capita income like Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Venezuela have much lower prices of petrol and hence are impacted less than India.
“Therefore there is still a strong case for the government to consider lowering the taxes on fuel to protect the interest of the people,” the report argued.
India is the world’s third-biggest oil consuming and importing nation. It imports 85 per cent of its oil needs and so prices retail fuel at import parity rates.
With the global surge in energy prices, the cost of producing petrol, diesel and other petroleum products also went up for oil companies in India.
They raised petrol and diesel prices by Rs 10 a litre in just over a fortnight beginning March 22 but hit a pause button soon after as the move faced criticism and the opposition parties asked the government to cut taxes instead.
India imports most of its oil from a group of countries called the ‘OPEC +’ (i.e, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Russia, etc), which produces 40% of the world’s crude oil.
As they have the power to dictate fuel supply and prices, their decision of limiting the global supply reduces supply in India, thus raising prices
The government charges about 167% tax (excise) on petrol and 129% on diesel as compared to US (20%), UK (62%), Italy and Germany (65%).
The abominable excise duty is 2/3rd of the cost, and the base price, dealer commission and freight form the rest.
Here is an approximate break-up (in Rs):
a)Base Price | 39 |
b)Freight | 0.34 |
c) Price Charged to Dealers = (a+b) | 39.34 |
d) Excise Duty | 40.17 |
e) Dealer Commission | 4.68 |
f) VAT | 25.35 |
g) Retail Selling Price | 109.54 |
Looked closely, much of the cost of petrol and diesel is due to higher tax rate by govt, specifically excise duty.
So the question is why government is not reducing the prices ?
India, being a developing country, it does require gigantic amount of funding for its infrastructure projects as well as welfare schemes.
However, we as a society is yet to be tax-compliant. Many people evade the direct tax and that’s the reason why govt’s hands are tied. Govt. needs the money to fund various programs and at the same time it is not generating enough revenue from direct taxes.
That’s the reason why, govt is bumping up its revenue through higher indirect taxes such as GST or excise duty as in the case of petrol and diesel.
Direct taxes are progressive as it taxes according to an individuals’ income however indirect tax such as excise duty or GST are regressive in the sense that the poorest of the poor and richest of the rich have to pay the same amount.
Does not matter, if you are an auto-driver or owner of a Mercedes, end of the day both pay the same price for petrol/diesel-that’s why it is regressive in nature.
But unlike direct tax where tax evasion is rampant, indirect tax can not be evaded due to their very nature and as long as huge no of Indians keep evading direct taxes, indirect tax such as excise duty will be difficult for the govt to reduce, because it may reduce the revenue and hamper may programs of the govt.
Globally, around 80% of wastewater flows back into the ecosystem without being treated or reused, according to the United Nations.
This can pose a significant environmental and health threat.
In the absence of cost-effective, sustainable, disruptive water management solutions, about 70% of sewage is discharged untreated into India’s water bodies.
A staggering 21% of diseases are caused by contaminated water in India, according to the World Bank, and one in five children die before their fifth birthday because of poor sanitation and hygiene conditions, according to Startup India.
As we confront these public health challenges emerging out of environmental concerns, expanding the scope of public health/environmental engineering science becomes pivotal.
For India to achieve its sustainable development goals of clean water and sanitation and to address the growing demands for water consumption and preservation of both surface water bodies and groundwater resources, it is essential to find and implement innovative ways of treating wastewater.
It is in this context why the specialised cadre of public health engineers, also known as sanitation engineers or environmental engineers, is best suited to provide the growing urban and rural water supply and to manage solid waste and wastewater.
Traditionally, engineering and public health have been understood as different fields.
Currently in India, civil engineering incorporates a course or two on environmental engineering for students to learn about wastewater management as a part of their pre-service and in-service training.
Most often, civil engineers do not have adequate skills to address public health problems. And public health professionals do not have adequate engineering skills.
India aims to supply 55 litres of water per person per day by 2024 under its Jal Jeevan Mission to install functional household tap connections.
The goal of reaching every rural household with functional tap water can be achieved in a sustainable and resilient manner only if the cadre of public health engineers is expanded and strengthened.
In India, public health engineering is executed by the Public Works Department or by health officials.
This differs from international trends. To manage a wastewater treatment plant in Europe, for example, a candidate must specialise in wastewater engineering.
Furthermore, public health engineering should be developed as an interdisciplinary field. Engineers can significantly contribute to public health in defining what is possible, identifying limitations, and shaping workable solutions with a problem-solving approach.
Similarly, public health professionals can contribute to engineering through well-researched understanding of health issues, measured risks and how course correction can be initiated.
Once both meet, a public health engineer can identify a health risk, work on developing concrete solutions such as new health and safety practices or specialised equipment, in order to correct the safety concern..
There is no doubt that the majority of diseases are water-related, transmitted through consumption of contaminated water, vectors breeding in stagnated water, or lack of adequate quantity of good quality water for proper personal hygiene.
Diseases cannot be contained unless we provide good quality and adequate quantity of water. Most of the world’s diseases can be prevented by considering this.
Training our young minds towards creating sustainable water management systems would be the first step.
Currently, institutions like the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M) are considering initiating public health engineering as a separate discipline.
To leverage this opportunity even further, India needs to scale up in the same direction.
Consider this hypothetical situation: Rajalakshmi, from a remote Karnataka village spots a business opportunity.
She knows that flowers, discarded in the thousands by temples can be handcrafted into incense sticks.
She wants to find a market for the product and hopefully, employ some people to help her. Soon enough though, she discovers that starting a business is a herculean task for a person like her.
There is a laborious process of rules and regulations to go through, bribes to pay on the way and no actual means to transport her product to its market.
After making her first batch of agarbathis and taking it to Bengaluru by bus, she decides the venture is not easy and gives up.
On the flipside of this is a young entrepreneur in Bengaluru. Let’s call him Deepak. He wants to start an internet-based business selling sustainably made agarbathis.
He has no trouble getting investors and to mobilise supply chains. His paperwork is over in a matter of days and his business is set up quickly and ready to grow.
Never mind that the business is built on aggregation of small sellers who will not see half the profit .
Is this scenario really all that hypothetical or emblematic of how we think about entrepreneurship in India?
Between our national obsession with unicorns on one side and glorifying the person running a pakora stall for survival as an example of viable entrepreneurship on the other, is the middle ground in entrepreneurship—a space that should have seen millions of thriving small and medium businesses, but remains so sparsely occupied that you could almost miss it.
If we are to achieve meaningful economic growth in our country, we need to incorporate, in our national conversation on entrepreneurship, ways of addressing the missing middle.
Spread out across India’s small towns and cities, this is a class of entrepreneurs that have been hit by a triple wave over the last five years, buffeted first by the inadvertent fallout of demonetization, being unprepared for GST, and then by the endless pain of the covid-19 pandemic.
As we finally appear to be reaching some level of normality, now is the opportune time to identify the kind of industries that make up this layer, the opportunities they should be afforded, and the best ways to scale up their functioning in the shortest time frame.
But, why pay so much attention to these industries when we should be celebrating, as we do, our booming startup space?
It is indeed true that India has the third largest number of unicorns in the world now, adding 42 in 2021 alone. Braving all the disruptions of the pandemic, it was a year in which Indian startups raised $24.1 billion in equity investments, according to a NASSCOM-Zinnov report last year.
However, this is a story of lopsided growth.
The cities of Bengaluru, Delhi/NCR, and Mumbai together claim three-fourths of these startup deals while emerging hubs like Ahmedabad, Coimbatore, and Jaipur account for the rest.
This leap in the startup space has created 6.6 lakh direct jobs and a few million indirect jobs. Is that good enough for a country that sends 12 million fresh graduates to its workforce every year?
It doesn’t even make a dent on arguably our biggest unemployment in recent history—in April 2020 when the country shutdown to battle covid-19.
Technology-intensive start-ups are constrained in their ability to create jobs—and hybrid work models and artificial intelligence (AI) have further accelerated unemployment.
What we need to focus on, therefore, is the labour-intensive micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME). Here, we begin to get to a definitional notion of what we called the mundane middle and the problems it currently faces.
India has an estimated 63 million enterprises. But, out of 100 companies, 95 are micro enterprises—employing less than five people, four are small to medium and barely one is large.
The questions to ask are: why are Indian MSMEs failing to grow from micro to small and medium and then be spurred on to make the leap into large companies?
At the Global Alliance for Mass Entrepreneurship (GAME), we have advocated for a National Mission for Mass Entrepreneurship, the need for which is more pronounced now than ever before.
Whenever India has worked to achieve a significant economic milestone in a limited span of time, it has worked best in mission mode. Think of the Green Revolution or Operation Flood.
From across various states, there are enough examples of approaches that work to catalyse mass entrepreneurship.
The introduction of entrepreneurship mindset curriculum (EMC) in schools through alliance mode of working by a number of agencies has shown significant improvement in academic and life outcomes.
Through creative teaching methods, students are encouraged to inculcate 21st century skills like creativity, problem solving, critical thinking and leadership which are not only foundational for entrepreneurship but essential to thrive in our complex world.
Udhyam Learning Foundation has been involved with the Government of Delhi since 2018 to help young people across over 1,000 schools to develop an entrepreneurial mindset.
One pilot programme introduced the concept of ‘seed money’ and saw 41 students turn their ideas into profit-making ventures. Other programmes teach qualities like grit and resourcefulness.
If you think these are isolated examples, consider some larger data trends.
The Observer Research Foundation and The World Economic Forum released the Young India and Work: A Survey of Youth Aspirations in 2018.
When asked which type of work arrangement they prefer, 49% of the youth surveyed said they prefer a job in the public sector.
However, 38% selected self-employment as an entrepreneur as their ideal type of job. The spirit of entrepreneurship is latent and waiting to be unleashed.
The same can be said for building networks of successful women entrepreneurs—so crucial when the participation of women in the Indian economy has declined to an abysmal 20%.
The majority of India’s 63 million firms are informal —fewer than 20% are registered for GST.
Research shows that companies that start out as formal enterprises become two-three times more productive than a similar informal business.
So why do firms prefer to be informal? In most cases, it’s because of the sheer cost and difficulty of complying with the different regulations.
We have academia and non-profits working as ecosystem enablers providing insights and evidence-based models for growth. We have large private corporations and philanthropic and funding agencies ready to invest.
It should be in the scope of a National Mass Entrepreneurship Mission to bring all of them together to work in mission mode so that the gap between thought leadership and action can finally be bridged.