Comprehensive Current affairs 5 September 2020

 RTI reveals no earnings to CSIR labs from technology transfer

Some labs of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) — India’s premier laboratory research network — have earned no money from technology transfer since at least 2015, according to data by the Council accessed by The Hindu via the Right to Information Act.

Of the 38 labs of the CSIR, 11 responded with information to The Hindu’s queries, posed in February, on the number of technologies developed, numbers licensed and the money earned from technology transfer since 2015. Some said they were unable to respond because of COVID-19 restrictions.

Five of the labs that responded said they had received “no royalty from technologies commercialised 2015-2020”. These were the CSIR-IMTECH (Institute of Microbial Technology), Chandigarh; CSIR-AMPRI (Advanced Materials and Processes Research Institute), Bhopal;

 CSIR-IIP (Indian Institute of Petroleum), Dehradun; CSIR-Fourth Paradigm, Bengaluru; CSIR-CBRI (Central Building Research Institute), Roorkee.

The CSIR’s revenue isn’t from technology transfer alone but also from providing consultancy services and the RTI response didn’t include such revenues.

Not all research labs of the CSIR are for technology development and several have a mandate of developing technologies for poorer sections of society, according to a CSIR official.

UN experts flag concern on EIA notification.

A group of Special Rapporteurs to the United Nations has written to the Centre expressing concern over the proposed Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) notification 2020 and sought the government’s response on how the provisions of the notification were consonant with India’s “obligations under international law”.

In their letter, the five experts say the proposed notification appeared to have clauses that obstructed people’s rights to a safe, clean and healthy environment.

These were the clauses that exempted several large industries and projects from public consultation — as part of the environment impact assessment process — and the rapporteurs argued that the exemptions were unwarranted, particularly when there was a serious gas leak from (LG Polymers) chemical plant in Visakhapatnam on May 12.

India calls for protection of foreign students and stranded seafarers at G20 meet.

India has called upon Governments around the world to ensure that interests of foreign students are protected and movement of stranded seafarers back to their home country facilitated.

Participating in the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Extraordinary virtual Meeting, External Affairs Minister Dr. S. Jaishankar also proposed development of voluntary ‘G20 Principles on Coordinated Cross-Border Movement of People’ in the backdrop of Covid-19.

 These principles are based on three elements. Standardisation of testing procedures and universal acceptability of test results, Standardisation of ‘Quarantine procedures’ and Standardisation of ‘movement and transit’ protocols.

He also highlighted the steps taken by India in the wake of the pandemic. This virtual meeting was convened in the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis.

Dr.Jaishankar apprised the G20 Foreign Ministers about the steps taken by India including Vande Bharat Mission and creation of ‘travel bubbles’ for the welfare and protection of foreign citizens stranded here as well as its own citizens abroad. The meeting was convened by the current G20 Chair, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Minister of Foreign Affairs of Saudi Arabia, Prince Faisal Bin Farhan Al-Saud, chaired the meeting.

The discussions centred on strengthening international cooperation across borders in the wake of COVID-19 crisis. The Ministers also exchanged national experiences and lessons learned from the cross-border management measures taken in response to the COVID-19 pandemics.

4). MEA asserts digital companies should abide by government rules.

India has said it remains open and continues to welcome FDI in the country including in the area of internet technology but companies must operate in accordance with the regulatory framework of government.

Responding to a query on banning of mobile apps, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson AnuragSrivastava said India has one of the most open regimes for FDI in the world and this includes for internet companies as well as digital technology companies.

He said digital technology companies while operating in India have the responsibility to abide by the rules and regulations issued by the concerned Ministries and departments of the government.

 Supreme court asks banks to maintain status quo interms of declaration of NPA’s

The Supreme Court on Thursday directed banks that loan accounts in the clear till the expiry of the moratorium on August 31 should not be declared as non-performing assets (NPAs) till further orders.

The order was passed amid apprehensions raised by individual borrowers and representatives of various commercial sectors on whether their loans would be declared NPAs on September 1, the day after the expiry of the moratorium.

The court is examining the question whether compound interest (interest on interest) should be charged on loans deferred during the moratorium period. The Bench is also examining the powers of the Centre and the National Disaster Management Authority to provide relief to borrowers, reeling under the financial effects of the pandemic.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, for the Centre and RBI, submitted that the impact of the pandemic was varied for each sector. Some like pharma have fared well during the lockdown.

“The idea of moratorium was to defer repayment to ease the burden caused by COVID-19 and lockdown so that businesses can manage working capital. The idea was not to waive interest,” Mr. Mehta said.

Moratorium was to help those in distress and not meant as an opportunity for those already defaulting in their loan payments.

Instead of loan waiver, steps were being taken to revive the various sectors, he submitted. Loan accounts became NPAs only if payments were not made for 90 days. The moratorium period was excluded from 90 days. “Accounts do not become NPAs on September 1,” he assured the court.

Govt launches immunity boosting products under PMBJP

Chemicals and Fertilizers Minister D V SadanandaGowda today launched eight immunity boosting products under PradhanMantriBhartiyaJanaushadhiPriyojana for sale through JanaushadhiKendras across country.

 Speaking on the occasion, Mr Gowda informed that the launch of new nutraceuticals is significant in view of the Corona-19 pandemic. These products will help in boosting immunity of the people. He said that products are comparable in quality and are cheaper by over 26 per cent than the market price.

Center of Excellence on Use of Artificial Intelligence in NHAI.

National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) signed a MoU with the IIT, Delhi to set up a Centre of Excellence (CoE) for Use of Artificial Intelligence in Data Driven decision making and Advance Data Management System for Highways.

About:

Under the partnership, IIT Delhi will work with NHAI on developing advance analytics based on AI and ML, prepare simulation models, enhance data storage and retrieval capacities to further strengthen NHAI’s capabilities in data-driven decision making.

The collaboration will be undertaken on the identified thrust areas like the Project Management and Data Management, Highway Network Traffic Demand and Incident Management, Highway safety, Highway Work-zone Management, Highway Pavement Management System.

Under it, a Co-ordination Committee will be constituted for overall coordination and timely progress. It will be chaired by the Dean R&D, IIT Delhi

Researchers at IISC develops low cost printing technique

The researchers at the Centre for Nano Science and Engineering in the Bengaluru based Indian Institute of Science have developed a low cost, on demand printing technique. This new technique replaces the nozzles of an inkjet printer with a mesh covered chemically treated nano wires that repel water.

Because of the short contact time of the impacting droplet with the mesh, the chances of clogging the pore are minimised. The mesh can also be easily cleaned and reused.

 This is useful for 3D printing of living cells, ceramic materials, electronic circuits and machine components.The Associate Professor in the Centre for Nano Science, ProsenjitSen says that the new technique reduces the operational cost of the printer.

P.Iniyan wins the 48th annual world open chess tournament

India’s GM P. Iniyan won the 48th annual world open chess tournament (online) recently. Usually held in Philadelphia, the USA, the tournament was conducted online following classical time control.

In a strong field that had 31 GMs, Iniyan scored 7.5 points from nine games. Iniyan and SananSjugirov (Russia) were tied on points but the former won on better tie-break.

Special focus on mains.

Q.) Concerning points made in the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report regarding Food security of India, what are the challenges and hurdles that India is facing to achieve full food security despite having many schemes. Critically Analyse.

Context:

Data from the latest edition of the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report show that India retains the dubious distinction of being the country with the largest population of food insecure people.

Estimates presented in the report which was released by several United Nations organisations show that the prevalence of food insecurity increased by 3.8 percentage points in India between 2014 and 2019, the first term of the Narendra Modi government.

By 2019, 6.2 crore more people were living with food insecurity than the number in 2014.

 Authoritative indicators:

The SOFI report, which is published annually, presents the most authoritative evaluation of hunger and food insecurity in the world.

Since 2017, SOFI presents two key measures of food insecurity: the conventional measure called the Prevalence of Undernourishment (PoU) and a new measure called the Prevalence of Moderate and Severe Food Insecurity (PMSFI).

Both of these are globally-accepted indicators of progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Target 2.1 to end hunger and food insecurity.

While PoU is focused on estimating the proportion of population facing chronic deficiency of calories, the PMSFI is a more comprehensive measure of the lack of access to adequate and nutritious food.

Estimates of PoU are based on food balance sheets and national surveys of consumption. Given that consumption surveys are done infrequently in most countries, these estimates are often based on outdated data and are revised when better data become available.

The PMSFI is based on annual surveys that collect information on experiences of food insecurity (such as food shortages, skipping meals, and changing diet diversity because of a lack of resources).

The PMSFI uses the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES), a gold standard in food security measurement developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), for estimating globally-comparable prevalence rates.

Given the solid conceptual foundations of this methodology and the ease of collection of data, FIES and the PMFSI have been widely adopted by countries across the world.

 FIES surveys:

The FAO commissions Gallup to include FIES questions in the Gallup®World Poll (FAO-GWP) survey conducted in more than 140 countries across the world. Many countries have also started conducting their own FIES surveys.

Unlike most other countries, the government of India neither conducts official FIES surveys nor accepts estimates based on FAO-GWP surveys.

Although FAO-GWP surveys are conducted in India, India is among the few countries that do not allow publication of estimates based on these surveys.

Consequently, as in the past years, estimates of PMSFI for India are not published in SOFI.

Country data:

The report provides three-year average estimates of the number of food insecure people for South Asia as a whole and for South Asia (excluding India). By taking a difference between the two, one can derive the estimates for India.

These estimates show that while 27.8% of India’s population suffered from moderate or severe food insecurity in 2014-16, the proportion rose to 31.6% in 2017-19.

The number of food insecure people grew from 42.65 crore in 2014-16 to 48.86 crore in 2017-19. India accounted for 22% of the global burden of food insecurity, the highest for any country, in 2017-19.

It is also noteworthy that while the PMSFI increased in India by 3.7 percentage points during this period, it fell by 0.5 percentage points in the rest of South Asia.

Availability of data and significance to PMSFI:

India has not released the latest National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) consumption expenditure survey data for 2017-18.

 As a result, conventional measures of poverty and food consumption are not available for recent years.

Lack of availability of data from this consumption survey also has implications for the FAO’s PoU estimates for India.

Because of a lack of regular availability of consumption survey data from most countries, the FAO uses supply-wise data on per capita food availability to measure changes in average per capita calorie intake.

While this is a reasonable approach, it has become untenable for India because of a large and growing disparity between the supply-side data and data from the consumption surveys.

Not only do the supply-side data show a much higher level of per capita availability of food than the amount of food that is captured to have been consumed in the surveys, even the direction of change between the two does not seem to be consistent.

While the per capita dietary energy supply in India increased by 3.8% between 2011-13 and 2015-17, the consumption survey data that became available through a media leak showed that the average consumption expenditure (covering food and other expenses) fell by 3.7% between 2011-12 and 2017-18.

On the whole, withholding of consumption survey data by the government has meant that SOFI continues to use outdated data for variability of food intake, making PoU estimates for India untenable.

Given this, estimates of the PMSFI for India have become particularly valuable.

Causes of suffering:

The significant rise in food insecurity, as shown by these data, is a clear manifestation of the overall economic distress during this period marked by a deepening agrarian crisis, falling investments across sectors and shrinking employment opportunities.

 The latest PLFS data have shown that the unemployment rates in the recent years have been higher than in the last four decades.

It is widely believed that demonetisation and introduction of the Goods and Services Tax were two prime causes of economic distress during this period.

A sudden imposition of an unprecedented and prolonged lockdown in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic has brought renewed focus on the problems of hunger and food insecurity.

With a sudden loss of livelihoods, a vast majority of India’s poor are faced with increased food insecurity, hunger and starvation. A number of starvation deaths have also been reported in the media.

Conclusion:

These estimates of the PMSFI provide an important baseline estimate for the situation before the COVID-19 pandemic.

It is critical for India to conduct a national survey on food insecurity to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on food security of different sections of the population.

Comprehensive Current affairs 4 September 2020

 Central government blocks another set of Chinese mobile apps in India.

The Government has blocked 118 mobile apps including PUBG which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, Defence of India, Security of State and Public Order. The move will safeguard the interests of crores of Indian mobile and internet users.This decision is a targeted move to ensure safety, security and sovereignty of Indian cyberspace. The decision to ban such Apps was taken by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology as it has received many complaints from various sources including several reports about misuse of some mobile apps available on Android and iOS platforms for stealing and surreptitiously transmitting users’ data in an unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India.

The Ministry in a statement said, the compilation of these data, its mining and profiling by elements hostile to national security and defence of India, which ultimately impinges upon the sovereigntyand integrity of India, is a matter of very deep and immediate concern which requires emergency measures.

It said, the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre, of Home Ministry has also sent an exhaustive recommendation for blocking these malicious apps. It said, there have been similar bipartisan concerns, flagged by various public representatives, both outside and inside the Parliament of India.

The Ministry said, there has been a strong chorus in the public space to take strict action against Apps that harm India’s sovereignty as well as the privacy of citizens.

Government launches mission Karmayodha to promote capacity building of civil servants.

The Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister NarendraModi has given its nod to Mission Karmayogi - National Programme for Civil Services Capacity Building. The scheme will lay the foundation for capacity building for Civil Servants so that they remain entrenched in Indian culture while they learn from best practices across the world.

Mission Karmayogi aims to prepare the Indian Civil Servants for future by making them more creative, constructive, imaginative, innovative, proactive, professional, progressive, energetic, enabling, transparent and technology-enabled. Briefing media yesterday, Union Minister PrakashJavadekar said, the Karmayogi scheme will be the biggest Human Resource development programme of the government.

The institutional framework will consist of Prime Minister's Public Human Resources (HR) Council, Capacity Building Commission, Special Purpose Vehicle for owning and operating the digital assets and the technological platform for online training, and Coordination Unit headed by the Cabinet Secretary.

 Defence minister to attend SCO minister’s meet at Russia.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has reached Russia to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Defence Ministers’ Meet. The Defence Ministers of all eight SCO member nations are expected to deliberate on regional security challenges like terrorism and extremism and ways to deal with them collectively in Moscow tomorrow.

➡Mr. Singh is visiting Moscow at the invitation of Russian Defence Minister General ShergeiShoigu. During his three day visit, Mr Singh will also take part in the meeting of Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

➡The Defence Minister said in a tweet that he will be meeting his Russian counterpart General Shoigu to discuss bilateral cooperation and issues of mutual interest. He said, India and Russia are privileged Strategic Partners and he is looking forward to further this partnership during the visit.

➡AIR correspondent reports that it is Mr Singh's second visit to Moscow since June. He had represented India at the Victory Day Parade in Moscow on 24th of June that commemorated the 75th anniversary of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World War.

➡Russia has also invited External Affairs Minister Dr S. Jaishankar to attend the SCO Foreign Ministers' meeting on the 10th of this month.

Saudi Arabia allows UAE flights to overfly its Kingdom

Saudi Arabia has agreed to allow UAE flights to “all countries” to overfly the kingdom, state media reported on Wednesday, days after allowing an Israeli aircraft to pass over en route to Abu Dhabi.

Saudi Arabia has accepted an Emirati request to allow “crossing the kingdom’s airspace for flights heading to the UAE and departing from it to all countries”, the official Saudi Press Agency said, citing a source from the civil aviation authority. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that Monday’s historic first commercial flight of an Israeli aircraft direct to the UAE across Saudi Arabia would not be the last.

“Israeli planes and those from all countries will be able to fly directly from Israel to Abu Dhabi and Dubai, and back,” Mr. Netanyahu said, without giving any timeline.

The announcements come after a U.S.-Israeli delegation visited Abu Dhabi on Monday, on the first direct commercial flight from Tel Aviv.

India ranks in top 50 in latest Global Innovation Index rankings.

India ranked in the top 50 countries for the first time in the Global Innovation Index, which was released today. India jumped four positions to rank at 48th since 2019.

The index compiled by World Intellectual Property Index (WIPO) presented the latest global trends and annual innovation ranking for 131 countries.

Moving up four positions since last year, India became the third most innovative lower middle economy in the world. According to the report jump can be attributed to newly available indicators and improvements in various areas of the GII.

India ranks in the top 15 in indicators such as ICT services exports, government online services, graduates in science and engineering and R&D-intensive global companies.

The report added that due to universities like IIT Delhi and Bombay, IIS Bengaluru and other top scientific publications, India is the lower middle-income economy with the highest innovation.

JalShakti ministry issues advisory for assuring safe water service to homes.

The Ministry of Jal Shakti has issued supplementary advisory for assured safe water service delivery to every home with focus on various aspects. The Ministry said, hand-washing arrangements with soap and water at the entrance of every water supply establishment may be made to allow everyone to practice it before entering and when leaving.

It said, potable water arrangements are to be ensured at all camp sites, schools, hostels that have been turned into quarantine and isolation centres. The arrangements may include tanker water

 supply, providing temporary stand-posts from near-by potable water sources, and repairing existing functional infrastructure wherever required.

It also advised to undertake a quick gap assessment on potable water facilities in health care centres and immediate arrangements should be made to ensure safe and clean water in all health care facilities.

It also suggested promoting physical distancing of communities while fetching water. It said, wherever community members fetch water from stand posts, efforts should be made to widely communicate the importance of physical distance by maintaining a 6 feet gap, covering their mouth and nose. It said, all persons must wash hands thoroughly before fetching water.

INDRA-2020 military exercise to be held at Andaman sea.

India and Russia are to hold bilateral naval exercise INDRA 2020 in Andaman Sea, close to strategic Strait of Malacca. The exercise is being conducted while the Indian Navy is on high operational alert due to the standoff with China in Ladakh.

➡ Three Russian Naval ships are to take part in the exercise on September 4 and 5. The exercise comes just after India withdrew from Kavkaz-2020 multinational exercise that is to be held in Russia. Also, it coincides with Defence Minister Raj Nath Singh’s visit to Russia for Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

➡Over 60,000 commercial vessels traverse each year through the Andaman waters. China is increasing its presence in the region. Chinese Naval vessels camouflaged as fishing boats have been sighted in the region.

JK govt set up a 10-member council for the conservation of biological diversity.

➡The Jammu & Kashmir government has set up a 10-member council for conservation of biological diversity and sustainable use of its components in the Union territory, officials said. As

per an order issued by the General Administrative Department (GAD), sanction has been accorded to constitute the Jammu and Kashmir Biodiversity Council.

The Council will be headed by the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests as chairman of the 10-member panel.

The council will include five non-official members.

The director of the Forest Research Institute, J&K, will serve as the member secretary of the council.

Other members are the chief wildlife warden, a representative of the Department of Forest, and others. Non-official members include former IFS officers Dr C M Seth, Dr Om Prakash Sharma, professor Geeta Sumbli, Dr Anzar Khuroo and Dr.Sushi Verma.

The term of office of the non-official members of the council will be for a period of three years.

The council will constitute a fund known as "Jammu and Kashmir Biodiversity Council Fund".

All the charges, fees, and benefit sharing amount that are received by the council will be credited to the fund.

The council will perform the functions within the jurisdiction of the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir.

The council will function upon the consultation with the National Biodiversity Authority, notify the format and procedures for seeking approvals with regard to biodiversity issues.

World University Rankings realised.

Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings 2021 has been released and under the overall category, University of Oxford, United Kingdom, has topped the list. From India, the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, has been placed in the 301-350 category in overall global rankings.

Highlights:

The IISc Bengaluru has slightly improved its overall score, from 45.6 to 47.9.

The seven older IITs did not participate in the THE-World University Rankings 2020.

The THE World University Rankings 2021 includes more than 1,500 universities across 93 countries and regions in 2020.

The participating universities are ranked based on their performance in knowledge transfer, teaching, research, and international outlook.

THE World University Rankings analyzed more than 80 million citations across over 13 million research publications and included survey responses from 22,000 scholars globally.

EVIN.

Electronic vaccine intelligence network ensured essential immunisation services

Electronic vaccine intelligence network (eVIN) is an indigenously developed technological solution aimed at strengthening universal immunization by providing real-time information on vaccine stocks and flows.

It combines:

Technology: to facilitate evidence-based decision-making.

Governance: to ensure efficient vaccine logistics management.

Human Resources: to empower state cold chain network by capacity building of government cold chain handlers;

eVIN helps to create a big data architecture that generates actionable analytics encouraging data-driven decision-making and consumption-based planning leading to cost savings.

It also provides the potential to be leveraged for any new vaccine.

At present, eVIN has reached 32 States and UTs (Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chandigarh, Ladakh and Sikkim are remaining).

At present, 23,507 cold chain points across 22 States and 2 UTs routinely use eVIN Vaccine availability at all times has increased to 99% in most health centres.

Presently, many states are using the eVIN application with 100% adherence rate to track State-specific Covid-19 material supplies, ensure availability and raise alerts in case of shortage of 81 essential drugs and equipment.

Special focus on mains..

Q.)Discuss the significance of Institutions of Eminence scheme as under National institutional tanking framework.

Context:

The best indicators of a university’s performance are the learning outcomes and how its education has impacted the students and society.

The hype surrounding the announcement of world university rankings by international ranking organisations is unfortunate.

Regardless of whether the rankings are beneficial or not, more universities than ever before want to get into these rankings.

The obsession to be within the top 100 universities in the world is exasperating.

Since there is a potential danger of creating elitism among universities through this ranking, lower-ranked universities may lose out on many counts.

Some top-ranked universities want to collaborate only with other top-ranked universities, impairingthe less fortunate ones to further sink.

 Perception:

International ranking organisations also force universities to alter their core missions.

This has happened with JNU. Although JNU ranks between 100 and 200 in certain disciplines, it does not find a place in world university rankings. The reason is JNU does not offer many undergraduate programmes.

We were indirectly told to start more undergraduate programmes in order to scale the ranking order while our university is predominantly a research-oriented institution.

First, let me state the obvious. Indian institutions lose out on perception, which carries almost 50 per cent weightage in many world university ranking schemes.

Psychologists know that perception is a result of different stimuli such as knowledge, memories, and expectancies of people.

While one can quantitatively measure the correlation between stimuli and perception, perception cannot be a quantifiable standalone parameter.

Therefore, perception as a major component in the ranking process can easily lead to inaccurate or unreasonable conclusions.

Citations:

Rightly or wrongly, international ranking organisations use citations as a primary indicator of productivity and scientific impact a discipline makes.

However, studies show that the number of citations per paper is highest in multidisciplinary sciences, general internal medicine, and biochemistry.

It is the lowest in subjects such as visual and performing arts, literature and architecture.

It is nobody’s case that the latter subjects are of any less importance.

 By making citations of published papers from a university as a strong parameter for rankings, we seem to have developed an inexplicable blind spot when it comes to the differences among subject disciplines.

It is no wonder that universities such as JNU, whose student intake in science research programmes is less as compared to the other disciplines, will loose out in world university rankings although it has been rated as the second-best university in India.

Rigidity and lack of transparency:

International ranking organisations are too rigid in their methodology and are not willing to add either additional parameters or change the weightage of current parameters.

They are disinclined to employ meaningful and universally fair benchmarks of quality and performance.

This is an absolute requisite to take into account the diversity that prevails among the universities.

Some Indian higher education institutions even decided not to participate in the world university rankings alleging a lack of transparency in the parameters that are used in the ranking process.

Since universities are complex organisations with multiple objectives, comparing universities using a single numerical value is as ineffectual as comparing a civil engineer with a biologist or a linguist and a dancer.

Hence, the danger that such skewed world rankings will downgrade the university education to a mere commodity is a realistic trepidation.

This inelastic stance of ranking organisations has forced more than 70 countries to have their own national ranking systems for higher educational institutions.

National institutional tanking framework:

NIRF will stimulate healthy competition among Indian educational institutes, which should eventually lead to a world-class Indian educational system.

This system will act as a catalyst for the transformation of local universities to world-class institutions.

The MHRD established the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) in 2016.

The parameters used by NIRF for ranking Indian institutions are also most suited for many other countries — among the parameters are teaching, learning & resources, research and professional practice, graduation outcomes, outreach and inclusivity and peer perception.

Unlike international ranking organisations, NIRF gives only 10 per cent weightage for perception.

In 2016, the NIRF rankings were given in four categories — University, Engineering, Management and Pharmacy. College, Medical, Law, Architecture and Dental were added in 2020.

This shows how NIRF is refining its ranking methodology by taking inputs from the stakeholders, which the international ranking organisations seldom do.

No right-minded person can plausibly argue against such a ranking system, which recognises and promotes the diversity and intrinsic strengths of Indian educational institutes.

Conclusion:

International ranking organisations are often sightless about what it takes to build a world-class educational system as compared to a world-class university.

If a country has a world-class educational system with a focus on innovation, best teaching-learning processes, research-oriented towards social good, affirmative action plans for inclusive and accessible education, it will have a more visible social and economic impact.

Indian higher educational institutes need to ask themselves: What positive role can they play in improving the quality of higher education?

What can we do to adopt innovative approaches to become future ready? And they need to act on those questions to make a change and plan beyond what is obvious.

New appointments August 2020

 

Comprehensive Current affairs 3 September 2020

 Cabinet approved Mission Karmayogi.

Indian Cabinet has approved the launch of "Mission Karmayogi", a National Programme for Civil Services Capacity Building (NPCSCB). The programmes include institutional framework namely Prime Minister's Public Human Resources (HR) Council, Capacity Building Commission, Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for owning and operating the digital assets

And the technological platform for the online training and Coordination Unit headed by the Cabinet Secretary. Teh commission will suggest policy interventions required in the areas of HR Management and Capacity Building to the Government.

Mission Karmayogi is aimed to prepare the Indian Civil Servant for the future by making them more constructive, imaginative, creative, innovative, proactive, progressive, professional, energetic, transparent, and technology-enabled. When the civil servants are empowered with

specific role-competencies, they will be able to ensure efficient service delivery of the highest quality standards.

➡ The Capacity Building Commission was aimed to ensure a uniform approach in regulating and managing the capacity building ecosystem on a collaborative and co-sharing basis.

➡ The commission will assist the PM Public Human Resources Council in approving the Annual Capacity Building Plans.

➡ The commission will also coordinate and supervise the implementation of the Capacity Building Plans with the stakeholder Departments.

➡ It will also exercise functional supervision over all Central Training Institutions dealing with civil services capacity building.

➡ It will make recommendations on the standardization of training and capacity building, pedagogy, and methodology.

➡The Capacity Building Commission will set norms for common mid-career training programs across all civil services.

➡ The Capacity Building Commission suggests policy interventions required in the areas of HR Management and Capacity Building to the Government.

iGOT-Karmayogi platform:

Mission Karmayogi will be delivered by setting up an (Integrated Government Online Training) iGOTKarmayogiPlatform. The platform will evolve into a world-class market place for content were carefully curated and vetted digital e-learning material will be made available. Apart from capacity building, the platform will help to integrate service matters like confirmation after probation period, deployment, work assignment, and notification of vacancies, etc. with the proposed competency framework.

India ranks 48 on 2020 Global Innovation Index.

India has ranked 48th position in the Global Innovation Index (GII) 2020. India has jumped to four places since 2019. The index was compiled by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) along with Cornell University and the INSEAD business school, presents the latest global innovation trends and annual innovation ranking of 131 economies.

➡ Switzerland topped the GII ranking. It is followed by Sweden, the United States of America, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands.

➡ As per the Index, India became the third most innovative lower-middle-income economy in the world. It is attributed to newly available indicators and improvements in various areas of the GII.

➡ China is the only middle-income economy that ranked among the top 30 and currently holds the 14th place.

India:

➡ India ranked in the top 15 in indicators such as ICT services exports, graduates in science and engineering, government online services, and R&D intensive global companies.

➡ As per the report, India increased the most in Institutions (61st), business sophistication (55th), and creative outputs (64th).

➡ The report also stated that India, China, the Philippines, and Vietnam have made the most progress on the index in recent years.

India asks facebook to come up with country specific community guidelines.

Indian Communications and IT Minister has asked the founder and head of the social media platform, Facebook, to come up with country specific community guidelines for better representation of diverse views.

In a letter written to Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, the minister raised serious concerns regarding the approach of Facebook India management in the 2019 General Elections.

Said minister added that there was a concerted effort by the facebook management in the country during the last General Elections to pages and substantially reduce outreach of posts which were supportive of the right-of-centre ideology. Referring to the instances of bias by the social media platform, he said that the management did not even respond to the messages seeking remedial measures over the issue.

Minister also said that the collusion of a group of facebook employees with International media is giving a free run to malevolent vested interests to cast aspersions on the democratic process of the country. He also emphatically pointed out the usage of the social media platform on multiple instances by anarchic and radical elements with a sole aim to destroy the social order.

The IT Minister also stressed the need to do away with the practice of outsourcing the job of fact checking by the social media platform to unverified and incredulous agencies.

GOI gives nod to cold chain project development under PM KISAN SAMPADA yojana.

Government gave its nod to 27 projects today under the PradhanMantriKisan SAMPADA Yojana for development of integrated cold chains and value addition infrastructure in the country.

➡The new integrated cold chain projects will generate direct and indirect employment for over 16,000 people and benefit nearly 2,57,000 farmers.

➡Union Minister of Food Processing Industries HarsimratKaurBadal said, saving the perishable produce, by provisioning adequate infrastructure, will help in augmenting farmers’ incomes and will also act towards making India self-reliant in the fruits and vegetables sector.

➡She added that the projects will help in streamlining the agricultural supply chain and generate direct and indirect employment opportunities in rural areas.

➡These 27 new projects will leverage a total investment of Rs 743 crore for the creation of modern, innovative infrastructure and effective cold chain facilities for the food processing sector across various states including Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh

India holds bilateral discussion with Nigeria.

Indias External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and his Nigerian counterpart Geoffrey Onyeama held wide ranging discussions on the entire gamut of bilateral relations in virtual mode yesterday. During the interaction which lasted for 75 minutes, the two Ministers recognized and acknowledged the excellent long standing, multifaceted and strategic bilateral ties between the two countries, based on mutual friendship and cooperation.

India being the largest democracy in the world and Nigeria the largest democracy in Africa, share the values of pluralism, inclusiveness and sustainable development for all. The discussions covered a wide spectrum of cooperation on political, economic and trade, defense and security, developmental assistance and cultural cooperation.

Both sides recalled their extensive cooperation in the field of defense training and capacity building. They expressed satisfaction that it was expanding to newer areas such as defense equipment support, medical and maintenance services, sharing of R&D expertise for counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency, and regular exchange of information and views.

The two Ministers noted that the next meeting of the Joint Defense Cooperation Committee will be held later this year in Abuja. The Nigerian side expressed appreciation to India for the recent donation of medical supplies in support of the on-going fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

India endorses reliable supply chain in Indo-pacific region.

Indian Commerce and Industry Minister has said that India wholeheartedly endorses the broad concept of working towards ensuring a trustworthy, dependable, and reliable supply chain in the Indo-Pacific region.

He said, the diversification of the supply chain is critical for managing the risks associated with the supply of inputs including disciplining price volatility. Mr Goyal was addressing the ministerial-level meeting on Supply Chains in the Indo-Pacific region.

Trade and Commerce ministers of India, Australia, and Japan have underscored the necessity and potential to enhance the resiliency of supply chains in the Indo-Pacific region.

The ministerial-level meeting on Supply Chains was attended Mr Goyal, Australia’s Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment, Simon Birmingham, and Japan’s Minister of Economy, Trade, and Industry, Kajiyama Hiroshi through video conference.

Recognizing the pressing need for regional cooperation on supply chain resilience in the Indo- Pacific, the Ministers shared their intention to work toward the launch of a new initiative to achieve the objective through cooperation.

Addressing the Trilateral meeting, PiyushGoyal said that the initiative could not have come at a more opportune time in the post COVID scenario when there is a likelihood of rechurning of supply chains in the Indo-Pacific region and it is incumbent upon us to take the initiative.

Referring to Prime Minister Modi’s remarks, he said it is the need of the hour that India should play a big role in the supply chains.

Indo-French space agencies discuss collaboration in Gaganyaan mission

Space agencies of India and France are in an advanced stage of discussions for providing necessary equipment to ‘Gaganyaan' astronauts, similar to the one to be used by French astronaut Thomas Pesquet for Mission Alpha next year, officials said.

A senior official of the National Centre for Space Studies (CNES), the space agency of France, said work on the equipment for Mission Alpha is on.

French astronaut Thomas Pesquet, as part of the European Space Agency (ESA), will be returning to the International Space Station (ISS) while flying on Crew Dragon spacecraft early next year.

India and France share a robust collaboration in the area of space. Space agencies of the two countries are also collaborating on nearly Rs 10,000 croreGaganyaan mission that aims to send three Indians to space by 2022.

To give Europe's scientists an opportunity to gain access to ISS and to coordinate activities on the station, the ESA has established User Support and Operations Centres (USOC), of which the CADMOS centre for the development of microgravity applications and space operations at CNES's Toulouse Space Centre is one, according to an official statement on Mission Alpha.

For human space flights, CADMOS is the point of contact between the ground segments in Europe, the United States and Russia and the science teams supporting astronauts, as they perform experiments in real time, it added

MoD developed Healthy Air, a Herbal-based Immunity Boosting Room Freshener.

Defence Institute of Advanced Technology (DIAT), a Deemed to be University, Pune, under Ministry of Defence has developed "Healthy Air", herbal-based immunity to boost room freshener product. The product was developed with an aim to contain the spread of the COVID-19.

Highlights:

➡ Healthy Air has been developed by the Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering.

➡ The product consists of various extracts of herbal oils like Neem, Neelgiri, Camphor, Daalcheeni, Tulsi, Lemon, Turmeric, Laung, Ajwain, Lavender, Elaichi, Turmeric, Natural Vetiveru, Raimuniya, and Pine Oil.

➡ The product consists of a blended solution of the natural herbal oils, which instinctively acts as an immunity booster for the body, and exhibits Anti-cancerous, Anti-microbial, Anti-viral and Anti-fungal properties.

➡ The product is herbal-based product is non-mutagenic, non-carcinogenic, non-toxic.

➡ The product purifies the air and makes it breathable.

➡The product is used in any room, conference halls, at public places, hospitals, malls, cinema halls, waiting for lounges, rooms of Airports, Railway Station etc. The product is packed in a container with a wick also will be loaded in a dispenser.

9). SAI opens facilities for Developmental group athletes.

Sports Authority of India (SAI) has been opening up its facilities for sporting activities in a phased manner after the Government announced Unlock 1. In the first phase, Olympic and Paralympic-bound athletes began sporting activities at SAI's sporting facilities.

As country enters Unlock 4, SAI has decided to open up its facilities for Developmental Group athletes. In the first leg, SAI has geared up to open up sporting activities for shooters of the Target Olympic Podium Developmental Group and athletes of National Centre of Excellence (NCOE) at the Karni Singh Shooting Range (KSSR) from September 2nd.

RBI comes out with steps to ease pressure on liquidity.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) today announced a host of steps, including term repo operations totalingRs. 1 lakh crore in mid-September to ease pressure on the liquidity and maintain congenial financial conditions with a view to ensuring sustainable recovery of economic growth.

In a statement, the central bank said the RBI stands ready to conduct market operations as required through a variety of instruments so as to ensure orderly market functioning. It added that recently

market sentiment has been impacted by concerns relating to the inflation outlook and the fiscal situation amidst global developments that have firmed up yields abroad. 

The RBI said that in order to reduce the cost of funds, banks that had availed of funds under long-term repo operations (LTROs) may exercise an option of reversing these transactions before maturity. It thus further added that the banks may reduce their interest liability by returning funds taken at the repo rate prevailing at that time (5.15 per cent) and availing funds at the current repo rate of 4 per cent.

The central bank added that the last date for paying the second installment of advance tax is September 15. Further, RBI said that it will conduct additional special open market operations involving the simultaneous purchase and sale of government securities for an aggregate amount of Rs 20,000 crore in two tranches of Rs 10,000 crore each. The auctions would be conducted on September 10, 2020, and September 17, 2020.

RBI said that it remains committed to conducting further such operations as warranted by market conditions. It said that as part of the measures, the RBI has also decided to allow banks to hold fresh acquisitions of statutory liquidity ratio (SLR) securities acquired from September 1, 2020, under Held-To-Maturity (HTM) up to an overall limit of 22 per cent of net demand and time liabilities (NDTL) up to March 31, 2021 which shall be reviewed thereafter.

Indian power market goes green with GTAM in electricity.

Indian power market has gone green.

With the launch of pan-India Green Term Ahead Market (GTAM) in electricity.

Speaking at the launch, New and Renewable Energy Minister R K Singh said the introduction of GTAM platform would lessen the burden on Renewable Energy-rich States.

He added that the GTAM platform will lead to an increase in the number of participants in the renewable energy sector.

It will benefit buyers of renewable energy through competitive prices and transparent and flexible procurement. It will also benefit renewable energy sellers by providing access to the pan-India

market. GTAM contracts will allow additional avenues to the renewable energy generators for sale of energy.