1^stFEBRUARY 2019 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS

‘Unemployment data based on draft report’

GS PAPER - 03 ECONOMY - Growth, development and employment.

Context:

★ In 2017-18, the country’s unemployment rate stood at a 45-year high of 6.1%, according to the National Sample Survey Office’s periodic labour force survey (PLFS).

Highlights of the NSSO - PLFS Data:

★ The data was collected by the NSSO between July 2017 and June 2018 – and is the first official survey that at the country’s employment situation after Prime Minister Modi announced the demonetisation of high-value currency notes in November 2016.

★ The report states that unemployment was last this high in 1972-73.

Data and facts:

★ The unemployment rate in the country had gone down to 2.2% in 2011-12, according to NSSO data.

★ Joblessness for rural male youth (aged 15-29) went from 5% in 2011-12 to 17.4% in 2017-18. For rural women in the same age group, joblessness went from 4.8% in 2011-12 to 13.6% in 2017-18

★ For educated rural females, the unemployment rate ranged from 9.7 per cent to 15.2 percent during 2004-05 to 2011-12 which rose to 17.3 per cent in 2017-18

Labour Force Participation Rate:

★ The labour force participation rate (number of people of working age actively seeking jobs) also went down

★ The LFPR, which has been decreasing from 2004-05 went from 39.5% in 2011-12 to 36.9% in 2017-18.

Government Response:

★ NITI Aayog VC Dr Rajiv Kumar claimed that confusion was being created by leaking a draft report and that it’s “not correct” to compare it to the 2011-12 NSSO data.

★ We have just received data for the July-September 2018 and October-December 2018 quarters which is still being processed,” Kumar said, adding that changing trends in employment (delta) can only be ascertained after the final data for the six quarters is out.

★ “The data from July-October 2017 can only be compared to data from July-October 2018,” he added.

★ Citing favourable figures from various reports (McKinsey, EPFO data, etc.,) they rubbished claims of rising unemployment and claimed that at least 7 to 7.7 million jobs were being created yearly.

★ “Various analysis shows that the country needs around 7 million jobs every year, we are creating enough for new entrants, but the challenge is to generate more employment for those exiting low-productivity jobs like agriculture,” Kant said.

★ Earlier, surveys conducted by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy had said that 1.5 million jobs were lost just in the first four months of 2017 – im mediately after demonetisation.

Source:- Business Standard

Govt. revises up GDP growth to 7.2%

GS PAPER - 03 ECONOMY - Growth, development and employment

Context:

★ The government revised the economic growth rate upwards to 7.2% for 2017-18 from the 6.7% estimated earlier.

Revised data:

★ Real GDP growth rate has been revised to 8.2 percent from 7.1 percent for 2016-17, while nominal GDP has been revised upwards to 11.5 percent from 10.8 percent.

★ The Indian economy grew at its fastest pace since 2011 to reach 8 percent growth during 2015-16.

★ However, many analysts attributed the dip in growth figures to a sudden currency recall exercise or demonetisation in November 2016 that forced a slide in household spending and corporate investment caused by the sudden flush out of high-value notes and restricted cash access.

★ The revised GDP data indicates that the impact of demonetisation on India’s growth wasn’t as severe as it was expected.

Source:- The Hindu

Only an interim Budget, says PM

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE -Parliament and State Legislatures – structure, functioning, conduct of business, powers & privileges and issues arising out of these..

Context:

★ Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured the Opposition that his government would be presenting an interim budget and not a full one.

Interim Budget and vote on account:

★ The budget presented during the election year is an interim budget which seeks a vote-on-account for four months to help the government machinery to run smoothly till a new government is selected.

★ An Interim Budget is not the same as a ‘Vote on Account’. While a ‘Vote on Account’ deals only with the expenditure side of the government’s budget, an Interim Budget is a complete set of accounts, including both expenditure and receipts. An Interim Budget gives the complete financial statement, very similar to a full Budget.

★ Full Budget deals with both expenditure and revenue side but Vote-on-account deals only with the expenditure side of the government’s budget.

★ The vote-on-account is normally valid for two months but full budget is valid for 12 months (a financial year).

★ As a convention, a vote-on-account is treated as a formal matter and passed by Lok Sabha without discussion. But passing for budget happens only after discussions and voting on demand for grants.

Source:- The Hindu; Indian Express

Centre firm on FDI rules deadline

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE - Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

Context:

★ The government has recently said it would not be extending the deadline (February 1, 2019) for implementation of the new rules governing FDI in e-commerce.

★ Large e-commerce firms such as Amazon and Flipkart have repeatedly approached the Centre seeking either dilution of the rules or extension of the deadline.

New e- commerce Rules:

★ On December 26, 2018, the Centre tightened norms for e-commerce firms and barred online retailers like Flipkart and Amazon from selling products of the companies in which they have stake.

★ Vendor who purchases 25% or more of its inventory from an e-commerce group company will be considered to be controlled by that e-commerce company, and thereby barred from selling on its portal.

★ This provision aims to ensure that vendors in which marketplaces, such as Amazon, have a stake do not sell the bulk of their items to a third-party vendor who then goes on to sell those items on the e-commerce marketplace.

★ The provision seeks to deny control by the marketplace entity over vendors.

★ e-commerce firm will not be allowed to influence the price of a product sold on its portal by giving incentives to particular vendors.

Source:- The Hindu

Giant cavity in Antarctic glacier signals rapid decay

GS PAPER - 03 ENVIRONMENT - Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment

Context:

★ Scientists from NASA have discovered a gigantic cavity, almost 300 metres tall, growing at the bottom of the Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica, indicating acceleration in rising global sea levels due to climate change.

More about the findings:

★ The size of the cavity, at Thwaites' bottom where ocean water could flow in and melt the glacier from below, is big enough to have contained 14 billion tonnes of ice.

★ The cavity was revealed by ice-penetrating radar in NASA’s Operation IceBridge, an airborne campaign beginning in 2010 that studies connections between the polar regions and the global climate.

★ Experts opinion that, The size of a cavity under a glacier plays an important role in melting. As more heat and water get under the glacier, it melts faster.

Thwaites Glacier:

★ Thwaites Glacier is currently responsible for about 4% of global sea level rise

★ It holds enough ice to raise the world ocean a little over 65 centimetres and backstops neighbouring glaciers that would raise sea levels an additional 2.4 metres if all the ice were lost.

ice-ocean interactions:

★ The huge cavity was under the main trunk of the glacier on its western side - the side farther from the West Antarctic Peninsula.

★ In this region, as the tide rises and falls, the grounding line retreats and advances across a zone of about 3 to 5 km.

★ The glacier has been coming unstuck from a ridge in the bedrock at a steady rate of about 0.6 to 0.8 km a year since 1992.

★ Despite this stable rate of grounding-line retreat, the melting rate on this side of the glacier is extremely high.

★These results highlighted that ice-ocean interactions were more complex than previously understood.

Source:- The Hindu

Govt to identify denotified, nomadic tribes not classified as SC, ST or OBC

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE - Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

Context:

★ The Union government is planning to institute an exercise to identify hundreds of Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (DNT/ NT/ SNT) who were never classified as either Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), or Other Backward Classes (OBC)

Idate Commission report:

★ As per the report prepared by the National Commission on DNT, NT, SNT headed by Bhiku Ramji Idate, over 260 extremely marginalised communities have never been identified or included in any of the reserved categories.

★ This accounts for 35 per cent of the DNT, 64 per cent of NT, and one per cent of SNT population.

★ According to the Idate Commission report, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have the largest number of DNT and NT communities respectively, that are not included in any list.

Initiatives Taken:

★ In accordance with Balkrishna Renke Commission report 2008, two schemes were implemented starting 2014-15, namely pre- and post-matric scholarships and construction of hostels for DNT students.

★ However, significant recommendations remained unimplemented.

★ These include extending 10 per cent reservation in jobs and education to these communities (Renke report)

De-Notified Tribes (DNTs):

★ DNTs are communities which were “notified” as “born criminal” by the British Government due to specific administrative as well as law and order reasons. This was done under a series of laws starting with the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871. After Independence, the Act was repealed in 1952, and the communities were “de-notified”, hence the name de-notified tribes.

Nomadic Tribes (NTs):

★ NTs are communities that do not have a fixed home and keep on moving from one place to another.

★ They may have a story of their origin, the place where they lived before journeying eternally, but they do not have a place to return after travelling for their livelihood.

Semi- Nomadic Tribes (SNTs):

★ SNTs are “partial nomads”. They have fixed habitations to which they return once in a year, or when their occupational activities are expected to cease for a while.

Source:- Indian Express

Number of women voters is surging across the country

GS PAPER - 02 POLITY - Salient features of the Representation of People's Act.

Context:

★ The latest enrolment data from two large states — Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu — shows the gap between the male and female voter base has narrowed considerably in one state, while in the other, the number of women voters has overtaken that of registered men.

Increase electoral participation of women:

★ Over the past decade, There is a broader national trend of improved voter sex ratios (number of women voters for every 1,000 male voters).

★ By 2014, all the southern sta s had voter parity or near parity between women and their male counterparts.

★ Kerala, had more women voters—a reflection of its overall sex ratio.

★ While TN, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka had nearly the same number of voters of both sexes.

★ In the 2014 polls, Kerala, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram & Puducherry already had more women in the electorate than men.

★Tamil Nadu has now joined the club - as per the final revised rolls released, 2.98 crore are women and 2.92 crore are men.

★ The number of women voters in the state has increased by 11% against a rise of 8.5% for men in the last five years.

★ Women voters in Maharashtra have increased by 13 lakh. Thus the voter sex ratio stands at 911 against 905 in 2014.

Source:- Times of India

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

UPSC CLASS PPT

UPSC 2020 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS

UPSC MAINS GENERAL STUDIES PREVIOUS YEAR QUESTION PAPERS

UPSC

1st FEBRUARY 2019 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS

‘Unemployment data based on draft report’

GS PAPER - 03 ECONOMY - Growth, development and employment.

Context:

★ In 2017-18, the country’s unemployment rate stood at a 45-year high of 6.1%, according to the National Sample Survey Office’s periodic labour force survey (PLFS).

Highlights of the NSSO - PLFS Data:

★ The data was collected by the NSSO between July 2017 and June 2018 – and is the first official survey that at the country’s employment situation after Prime Minister Modi announced the demonetisation of high-value currency notes in November 2016.

★ The report states that unemployment was last this high in 1972-73.

Data and facts:

★ The unemployment rate in the country had gone down to 2.2% in 2011-12, according to NSSO data.

★ Joblessness for rural male youth (aged 15-29) went from 5% in 2011-12 to 17.4% in 2017-18. For rural women in the same age group, joblessness went from 4.8% in 2011-12 to 13.6% in 2017-18

★ For educated rural females, the unemployment rate ranged from 9.7 per cent to 15.2 percent during 2004-05 to 2011-12 which rose to 17.3 per cent in 2017-18

Labour Force Participation Rate:

★ The labour force participation rate (number of people of working age actively seeking jobs) also went down

★ The LFPR, which has been decreasing from 2004-05 went from 39.5% in 2011-12 to 36.9% in 2017-18.

Government Response:

★ NITI Aayog VC Dr Rajiv Kumar claimed that confusion was being created by leaking a draft report and that it’s “not correct” to compare it to the 2011-12 NSSO data.

★ We have just received data for the July-September 2018 and October-December 2018 quarters which is still being processed,” Kumar said, adding that changing trends in employment (delta) can only be ascertained after the final data for the six quarters is out.

★ “The data from July-October 2017 can only be compared to data from July-October 2018,” he added.

​ ★ Citing favourable figures from various reports (McKinsey, EPFO data, etc.,) they rubbished claims of rising unemployment and claimed that at least 7 to 7.7 million jobs were being created yearly.

★ “Various analysis shows that the country needs around 7 million jobs every year, we are creating enough for new entrants, but the challenge is to generate more employment for those exiting low-productivity jobs like agriculture,” Kant said.

★ Earlier, surveys conducted by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy had said that 1.5 million jobs were lost just in the first four months of 2017 – im mediately after demonetisation.

Source:- Business Standard

GS PAPER - 03 ECONOMY - Growth, development and employment

Context:

★ The government revised the economic growth rate upwards to 7.2% for 2017-18 from the 6.7% estimated earlier.

Revised data:

★ Real GDP growth rate has been revised to 8.2 percent from 7.1 percent for 2016-17, while nominal GDP has been revised upwards to 11.5 percent from 10.8 percent.

★ The Indian economy grew at its fastest pace since 2011 to reach 8 percent growth during 2015-16.

★ However, many analysts attributed the dip in growth figures to a sudden currency recall exercise or demonetisation in November 2016 that forced a slide in household spending and corporate investment caused by the sudden flush out of high-value notes and restricted cash access.

★ The revised GDP data indicates that the impact of demonetisation on India’s growth wasn’t as severe as it was expected.

Source:- The Hindu

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE -Parliament and State Legislatures – structure, functioning, conduct of business, powers & privileges and issues arising out of these..

Context:

★ Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured the Opposition that his government would be presenting an interim budget and not a full one.

Interim Budget and vote on account:

★ The budget presented during the election year is an interim budget which seeks a vote-on-account for four months to help the government machinery to run smoothly till a new government is selected.

★ Full Budget deals with both expenditure and revenue side but Vote-on-account deals only with the expenditure side of the government’s budget.

★ The vote-on-account is normally valid for two months but full budget is valid for 12 months (a financial year).

★ As a convention, a vote-on-account is treated as a formal matter and passed by Lok Sabha without discussion. But passing for budget happens only after discussions and voting on demand for grants.

Source:- The Hindu; Indian Express

Context:

★ The government has recently said it would not be extending the deadline (February 1, 2019) for implementation of the new rules governing FDI in e-commerce.

★ Large e-commerce firms such as Amazon and Flipkart have repeatedly approached the Centre seeking either dilution of the rules or extension of the deadline.

New e- commerce Rules:

★ On December 26, 2018, the Centre tightened norms for e-commerce firms and barred online retailers like Flipkart and Amazon from selling products of the companies in which they have stake.

★ Vendor who purchases 25% or more of its inventory from an e-commerce group company will be considered to be controlled by that e-commerce company, and thereby barred from selling on its portal.

★ This provision aims to ensure that vendors in which marketplaces, such as Amazon, have a stake do not sell the bulk of their items to a third-party vendor who then goes on to sell those items on the e-commerce marketplace.

★ The provision seeks to deny control by the marketplace entity over vendors.

★ e-commerce firm will not be allowed to influence the price of a product sold on its portal by giving incentives to particular vendors.

Source:- The Hindu

GS PAPER - 03 ENVIRONMENT - Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment

Context:

★ Scientists from NASA have discovered a gigantic cavity, almost 300 metres tall, growing at the bottom of the Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica, indicating acceleration in rising global sea levels due to climate change.

More about the findings:

★ The size of the cavity, at Thwaites' bottom where ocean water could flow in and melt the glacier from below, is big enough to have contained 14 billion tonnes of ice.

★ The cavity was revealed by ice-penetrating radar in NASA’s Operation IceBridge, an airborne campaign beginning in 2010 that studies connections between the polar regions and the global climate.

★ Experts opinion that, The size of a cavity under a glacier plays an important role in melting. As more heat and water get under the glacier, it melts faster.

Thwaites Glacier:

★ Thwaites Glacier is currently responsible for about 4% of global sea level rise

★ It holds enough ice to raise the world ocean a little over 65 centimetres and backstops neighbouring glaciers that would raise sea levels an additional 2.4 metres if all the ice were lost.

ice-ocean interactions:

★ The huge cavity was under the main trunk of the glacier on its western side - the side farther from the West Antarctic Peninsula.

★ In this region, as the tide rises and falls, the grounding line retreats and advances across a zone of about 3 to 5 km.

★ The glacier has been coming unstuck from a ridge in the bedrock at a steady rate of about 0.6 to 0.8 km a year since 1992.

★ Despite this stable rate of grounding-line retreat, the melting rate on this side of the glacier is extremely high.

★These results highlighted that ice-ocean interactions were more complex than previously understood.

Source:- The Hindu

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE - Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

Context:

★ The Union government is planning to institute an exercise to identify hundreds of Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (DNT/ NT/ SNT) who were never classified as either Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), or Other Backward Classes (OBC)

Idate Commission report:

★ As per the report prepared by the National Commission on DNT, NT, SNT headed by Bhiku Ramji Idate, over 260 extremely marginalised communities have never been identified or included in any of the reserved categories.

★ This accounts for 35 per cent of the DNT, 64 per cent of NT, and one per cent of SNT population.

★ According to the Idate Commission report, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have the largest number of DNT and NT communities respectively, that are not included in any list.

Initiatives Taken:

★ In accordance with Balkrishna Renke Commission report 2008, two schemes were implemented starting 2014-15, namely pre- and post-matric scholarships and construction of hostels for DNT students.

★ However, significant recommendations remained unimplemented.

★ These include extending 10 per cent reservation in jobs and education to these communities (Renke report)

De-Notified Tribes (DNTs):

1^stFEBRUARY 2019 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS

★ Citing favourable figures from various reports (McKinsey, EPFO data, etc.,) they rubbished claims of rising unemployment and claimed that at least 7 to 7.7 million jobs were being created yearly.