In News

The seventh edition of the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) was recently released.

Key Highlights of National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2022

• Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras, has yet again achieved the top ranking in higher educational institute in the country followed by Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, and IIT Bombay.
• Among Indian universities, IISc, Jawahar Lal Nehru University , Jamia Milia Islamia, Jadavpur University and Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham were among the top five.
• Among the top five colleges in the country are Miranda House, Hindu College, Presidency College, Loyola College and Lady Shri Ram College for Women.
• The top five medical institutes are All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, Christian Medical College, Vellore, National Institute of Mental Health & Neuro Sciences, Bangalore and Banaras Hindu University.
• The top five management institutes are Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, IIM Bengaluru, IIM Kolkata, IIT Delhi and IIM Kozhikode.
• Faculty with Doctoral Qualifications: Only 88 per cent of the faculty in engineering institutes outside the top 100 have doctoral qualifications, while only 32.9 per cent of these institutes meet the AICTE-prescribed criteria of 20 students per teacher.
  • The lack of PhD-qualified teachers in higher educational institutions is a serious handicap since mentorship received during doctoral training plays a “vital role in preparing the faculty for a teaching career” at the college and university level.
• The average number of faculty per institution (top 100) ranges between 645 in universities to 330 in engineering colleges. The corresponding numbers are 232 and 111 in the case of institutes falling outside the top 100 category.
• Most of the research is being conducted within the top 100 institutions in every category. Thus, The data seems to follow the famous Pareto’s principle.
  • The principle, based on the works of Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, refers to the fact that in most areas, 80 per cent of the results are an outcome of efforts put in by 20 per cent of the players.
• As much as 06 per cent of the high quality papers (HCPs) come from the top 100 engineering institutions, with the remaining 1,081 participating and eligible engineering institutions contributing only 28.94 per cent.
• The average salary of engineering graduates also did not rise as much as it did in the previous years. Between 2019-19 and 2019-20, median salary of placed students rose from Rs 3.40 lakh to Rs 3.75 lakh, showing a rise of 10.33 per cent. But in 2020-21, the median salary was Rs 3.98 lakh, a rise of 6.62 per cent.

About National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF)

• The NIRF rankings were launched in the year 2015.
• It ranks colleges, universities and research institutions and also provides an overall ranking of all of them combined.
• Institutes are also ranked across seven subject domains, namely engineering, management, pharmacy, law, medical, architecture and dental.
• A total of 4,786 institutions were evaluated on five parameters, which include teaching, learning and resources (TLR), research and professional practice, graduation outcome, outreach and inclusivity and perception.
• While participation in the NIRF was voluntary in the initial years, it was made compulsory for all government-run educational institutions in 2018.
• The government plans to merge two accreditation systems - National Assessment and Accreditation Council for institutional accreditation (NAAC) and National Board of Accreditation for programmes (NBA) - and institutes will have to have either NAAC accreditation or NIRF rank to be able to receive government funds.

Sources:

• IIT-M ranked India’s top higher education institute:
• NIRF Rankings 2022: From research output to faculty with PhD, report flags lag in engineering institutes:

In News

NASA recently released five images from the early work of the James Webb Space Telescope.

Major Learnings from the images

• The image of a distant star cluster called SMACS 0723 revealed the presence of still more-distant galaxies spilled across the sky. The light from those galaxies, magnified into visibility by the gravitational field of the cluster, originated more than 13 billion years ago.
  • Astronomers theorize that the most distant, earliest stars may be unlike the stars we see today. The first stars were composed of pure hydrogen and helium left over from the Big Bang, and they could grow far more massive than the sun — and then collapse quickly and violently into supermassive black holes of the kind that now populate the centers of most galaxies.
• The spectra for the Jupiter-size exoplanet WASP-96b by the Webb telescope picked up evidence of water vapor, hazes and some previously unseen clouds, too.
  • While WASP-96b is highly unlikely to be home to anything living, using the same techniques could reveal whether smaller, rocky worlds orbiting other stars are habitable.
  • The relatively small size of these exoplanets has made them extremely difficult to study, until now. The Webb telescope will let astronomers look more closely at these worlds.
• The Webb presentation gave us gasp-inducing images of the Southern Ring Nebula, a sphere of gas and dust belched by a dying star, and Stephan’s Quintet, a grouping of galaxies millions of light-years away.
  • But the most striking image was of the Carina Nebula, a vast, swirling cloud of dust that is both a star nursery and home to some of the most luminous and explosive stars in the Milky Way. Seen in infrared, the nebula resembled a looming, eroded coastal cliff dotted with hundreds of stars that astronomers had never seen before.
  • Thus, the scientists expect many more such discoveries from the Webb — things never before seen, and in need of an explanation.
• The Telescope Remains Fragile: One of the telescope’s mirrors had been damaged by a micrometeoroid strike in late May and that the hit was larger than had been expected. The biggest concern is just the micrometeorite environment.

Know more about the James Webb Telescope

 Sources:

• Explained: 5 things learned from the Webb Telescope’s first images:

In News

Recently, the Supreme Court has directed the Juvenile Justice Board and the children’s court to re-examine the legal standing of the accused, and whether he should undergo trial as an adult or as a child.

About the News

• The Supreme Court on recently asked the central government, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) and the State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (SCPCR) to consider issuing guidelines or directions to assist and facilitate the Juvenile Justice Boards (JJBs) in making the preliminary assessment for determining whether a child of 16 years of age and above can be tried as an adult for a heinous offence.
• While there is no specific data available on how many children between 16-18 have been tried as adults in India, the NCRB report of 2020 shows that 2% of the juveniles in conflict with the law (26,954 out of 35,352) arrested during 2020 were between the ages of 16-18. In 2019, the percentage was 74%.
• According to the NCRB data, the rate at which juveniles are held guilty is much higher than the conviction rate for adults. In 2020, 91.4% of the juveniles accused were held guilty.
• Most of them (16,482 out of 35,352) were sent home after advice or admonition by the Juvenile Justice Board.

What does the law say on trying a juvenile as an adult?

• According to Section 15 of The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act (JJ Act), where a child of 16 years of age or above has committed a heinous offence — a crime for which the minimum punishment is seven years imprisonment — the JJB is required to test the following before taking a decision whether the child needs to be tried as an adult :
  • Conduct a preliminary assessment with regard to his mental and physical capacity to commit such offence
  • The ability to understand the consequences of the offence
  • The circumstances in which he allegedly committed the offence
• The assessment is required to be done within three months from the date of first production of the child before the JJB.
  • As pe the Supreme Court, when the JJB does not comprise a practising professional with a degree in child psychology or child psychiatry, it would have to mandatorily seek the assistance of experts.
• Prior to the 2015 amendment in the original JJ Act, all children below the age of 18 years were treated as juveniles. The JJB is composed of a judicial officer and two social workers.

What happens when a juvenile is ordered to be treated as an adult?

• The case is transferred before the children’s court. As per Section 19 of the amended Act, the court can pass a decision on whether there is a need for trial of the child as an adult, or otherwise.
  • A children’s court has to ensure that the child in conflict with the law is sent to a “place of safety” until he reaches the age of 21 years and is only then transferred to jail.
• The court can also order the conditional release of the child after he attains the age of 21 years.
  • Two important protections — protection from disqualification, and erasure of conviction record after a reasonable period — do not extend to a child who has been tried as an adult.
• If the child is tried as an adult, the sentence can go up to life imprisonment, but if the child is tried by the board as a juvenile, the maximum sentence can only be three years in a special home.

Sources:

• Explained: How should JJBs decide on whether to try a child of 16 years as an ‘adult’?
• Why Supreme Court called for guidelines to put juveniles under trial as adults:

On the 18th of July 1947 the Indian Independence Act received Royal Assent. The Act resulted in the partition of British India into the two new independent dominions of India and Pakistan. As per the Act, complete legislative authority was given to the Constituent Assemblies of the new countries. The Act decided to grant independence to India and Pakistan with effect from 15th August 1947.

The new boundaries of the dominions were. demarcated by the Boundary Commission. The British emperor would cease to use the title ‘Emperor of India’.

Source:

• On This Day:

• Context: Eleven districts of Bengal reported at least 65 cases of black fever or ‘Kala-Azar disease in the last couple of weeks.
• Kala-azar or Visceral Leishmaniasis is a protozoan parasitic disease, spread by sandfly bites. Sandflies are brown in colour and have hairs on their bodies. The flies are infected with the parasite called ‘leishmania donovani’.

• The vector sandfly is known to live in cracks and crevices of muddy houses, especially in dark and humid corners. According to the WHO, there are 3 main forms of leishmaniases of which kala-azar is the most serious form.
• The disease affects some of the poorest people and is linked to malnutrition, population displacement, poor housing, a weak immune system and a lack of financial resources. Leishmaniasis is also linked to environmental changes such as deforestation, and urbanisation, according to WHO.
• Symptoms: Irregular bouts of fever over many days, weight loss, enlargement of the spleen and liver, and anaemia are known symptoms. The skin may become dry, thin and scaly in patches and hair may be lost. In people with a light skin tone, greyish discolouration of the skin of hands, feet, abdomen and face may be seen, that is why the disease is also called “Black fever”.
• Leishmaniasis is a treatable and curable disease, which requires an immunocompetent system and thus those having a weak immune system are prone to get severely affected. All patients diagnosed require prompt and complete treatment.
• In India, it was found that the disease was mostly prevalent in people who have spent a considerable amount of time in Bihar, Jharkhand and in Uttar Pradesh.
• In 2020, more than 90 per cent of new cases reported to WHO occurred in 10 countries: Brazil, China, Ethiopia, Eritrea, India, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Yemen.

Sources:

• WHO weighs in on India’s Kala-Azar situation:
• Explained: Kala Azar or Black fever disease detected in West Bengal:

• Context: The 296-km-long Bundelkhand Expressway was recently inaugurated.
• It will connect Chitrakoot in the underdeveloped Bundelkhand region with the Lucknow-Agra Expressway near Etawah.

• The Bundelkhand Expressway has been completed within 28 months, which is eight months before its deadline.
• The Bundelkhand Expressway is a four-lane expressway which has been built as such that it can be expanded to six lanes.
• Taking recommendations from the Ground Water Department, provision for rainwater harvesting has been placed every 500 meters, and 7 lakh trees will be planted along the expressway.
• The project is significant as the government has ambitious plans to boost the economic activity of the Bundelkhand region with this expressway project. In the next step, the government plans to develop industrial hubs along the expressway in Banda and Jalaun districts.
• The cost of building the Bundelkhand Expressway was Rs 14,850 crore.

Source:

• PM Modi inaugurates Buldelkhand Expressway today: All you need to know:

• Context: Indonesia has recently announced “Digital Nomad Visas” for travellers, to attract more foreign tourists.
• Digital Nomads are people who work remotely while travelling to different places and spending their earned income in the country they are travelling to.
• Unlike regular remote workers, who tend to stay in one geographic area, digital nomads travel and explore while working.

• The Digital Nomad Visa would allow remote workers to stay in Indonesia, including Bali, tax-free.
• The visa will be applicable for five years which makes Indonesia’s visa one of the longest digital nomad visas compared to other countries.
• Through the visa, Indonesia aims to bring in over 3.6 million overseas travellers into the country over the next year to explore spiritual retreats as well as the eco-tourism of Indonesia.
• Some other countries that provide nomad visas include Italy, Antigua, Barbuda, Barbados, Croatia, Costa Rica, Georgia, Hungary, Iceland, Mauritius, Norway, and Spain.

Source:

• Indonesia’s New Digital Nomad Visa allows travellers to live tax-free – details here
• Explained: Indonesia’s new visa policy, which allows travellers to live tax-free

Image source:

• Indonesia’s Digital Nomad Visa

• Context: A plant species, Brachystelma attenuatum, which scientists had presumed extinct has been rediscovered in Hamirpur and Mandi districts of Himachal Pradesh after 188 years.

• The last record of the rare plant dates back to 1835 in Doongie village of Himachal Pradesh. Since its first collection, the species was never recorded again, and therefore was presumed extinct.
• As per research, the species is endemic and threatened, and the geographical distribution of Brachystelma attenuatum is limited.
• Brachystelma is a genus of more than 100 species in the Apocynaceae family found in Africa, Asia, and Australia, with the majority found in South Africa.
• In India, the genus is represented by 40 species, primarily distributed in the Western Ghats, with only four species reported from northern India.

Source:

• Plant presumed extinct rediscovered after 188 years in Himachal:

Essence: India's population is expected to surpass China's by 2027, according to the UN Population Prospects (2019). However, new research predict that India's population will overtake China's by 2023 and reach 1.5 billion by 2030. Today, China has reduced poverty at the quickest rate and is a powerhouse that may be second only to the US because of economic reforms with a strong emphasis on agriculture, and one-child policy which is most significant. China's overall economic story has been more impressive than India's overall one, especially when it comes to agriculture and India should learn from it for its future directions, including effective education, particularly for girls, open discussion and dialogue about family planning methods and conversations about the social benefits of small families, biofortification of staples, the provision of clean, safe drinking water to every household, and midday meals, all of which are positive steps toward enhancing people's well-being.

Why should you read this article?

To comprehend how China got to where it is now.

To be aware of India's weaknesses and the various actions India should take to rectify them.

Source:

• With India set to become most populous nation, a prosperity lesson:

Essence: Energy prices have surged since the Ukraine-Russia war and coal price is no exception.  Since the wholesale price index (WPI) for coal has no component of imported coal, to track increasing prices of imported coal, the National coal index (NCI) has been introduced. To deal with the increasing price of imported coal (NCI jumped from 165 to 238 over the last 6 months) the domestic coal industry has increased its production to reduce inflationary pressure.

This should make Indian policy makers recognize the importance of the private sector in coal mining. Financial community should be sensitized about the need to invest more in domestic coal production. Government should also appoint a coal regulator to deal with increasing private participation.

Why should you read this article?

• To understand, we need to make an orderly transition to renewable sources since coal is unavoidable in the near future.

Source:

• We need an orderly transition from coal to renewables

Background

• One of India’s Greatest Architects, 94-YO has built 6500 Sustainable Homes for the Poor.
• Balkrishna Vithaldas Doshi—the first Indian to win the Pritzker Prize—has found the ways to find symphony and sustainability in architecture.

About Balkrishna Vithaldas Doshi’s work

• From his experiences of his childhood, he was prompted to plan the acclaimed — Aranya, a low-cost housing project in Indore, Madhya Pradesh.
• Built for economically weaker sections (EVS), each house was planned with the possibility of finding new alternatives for a growing family in the allotted space for comfortable living.
  • This project won the Aga Khan Architecture Award in 1995 and was mentioned in the UK government’s latest award.
• One of his works is Amdavad ni Gufa. It is an underground egg-shaped art gallery in Ahmedabad and is considered a marvel in the world of architecture.
  • The design comprises circles and ellipses. Illumination is through snouts created on the outside walls, so sunlight comes in, forming spots of light which move around as the day progresses.
• Doshi believes in a sustainable and economical approach while planning a project and, most of the time, uses only locally sourced materials. Maximum usage of natural light is planned, and the cavity walls help trap and minimise heat.
• Doshi advises to look around every object around us, nature itself, the lights, sky, water, and the stone. Everything is in symphony. And this symphony is what architecture is all about.

Source:

• One of India’s Greatest Architects, 94-YO Built 6500 Sustainable Homes for the Poor: