In news

• The government’s flagship financial inclusion program Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) has recently completed its eight years of successful functioning.
• The success of the PMJDY since 2014 is reflected in terms of the opening of over 46 crore bank accounts with a deposit balance of Rs 1.74 lakh crore.

Understanding PMJDY:

• The National Mission for Financial Inclusion is known by its acronym PMJDY or Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana.

• • The process of ensuring vulnerable groups, such as weaker parts and low-income groups, have inexpensive access to financial services and timely and adequate financing when needed is known as financial inclusion.
• It ensures that financial services such as banking, savings, and deposit accounts, remittance, credit, insurance, and pension are accessible and affordable.
• It gives the poor a way to transfer their savings into the formal financial system, a way to send money to their families in the villages, and frees them from the control of predatory money lenders.

Pillars of the Scheme

• Universal access to banking services: Branch and BC
• Providing Overdraft Facility: Eligible adults are provided with basic savings bank accounts with an overdraft facility of Rs. 10,000.
• Financial Literacy Programme: Promoting savings, use of ATMs, getting ready for credit, availing insurance and pensions, using basic mobile phones for banking
• Creation of Credit Guarantee Fund: Providing banks with some guarantee against defaults
• Insurance: Those who opened their account between 15 August 2014 to 31 January 2015 to get an accident cover of up to Rs. 1,00,000 and a life cover of Rs. 30,000.
• Pension scheme: Available for the Unorganized sector

Key Achievements of the Scheme

• Digital Approaches
  • Accounts are opened online in the bank’s core banking systems rather than the previous procedure, which involved opening offline accounts with vendor interoperability via a RuPay debit card or an Aadhaar-enabled payment system (AePS)
  • Business correspondents with a fixed point
  • e-KYC and/or simplified KYC procedures in place of onerous KYC requirements
• New Features
  • The emphasis is now on "Every Unbanked Adult," rather than "Every Household."
  • For PMJDY accounts opened after August 28, 2018, the free accidental insurance coverage on RuPay cards rose from Rs. 1 lakh to Rs. 2 lakh.
  • Improvements to overdraft services
    • OD up to Rs 2,000; OD limit enhanced from Rs 5,000 to Rs 10,000 (without conditions).
    • OD's upper age limit will rise from 60 to 65 years old.
  • In order to give citizens a platform for finding banking contact points such as bank branches, ATMs, Bank Mitras, Post Offices, etc. around the nation, the Jan Dhan Darshak App was launched.

• The extent of Financial Inclusion
  • The number of total PMJDY Accounts as of August 2022 stands at 59%.
  • 79% of Jan-Dhan account holders are women.
• Deposits under PMJDY Accounts
  • With a 2.58x growth in accounts, deposits have climbed by nearly 7.60 times (Aug’22/Aug’15).
• Institutionalization of the Financial System
  • It gives the poor a way to transfer their savings into the formal financial system, a way to send money to their families in the villages, and it frees them from the control of predatory money lenders.
• Elimination of Leaks
  • DBTs via PM Jan Dhan Accounts have guaranteed that every rupee will reach its designated recipient, which also prevents systemic leakage.
• Simple DBT exchanges
  • In coordination with the DBT Mission, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), banks, and other Ministries, close monitoring to prevent DBT failures makes sure that the eligible recipients receive their DBT on schedule.
• Online transactions
  • The overall volume of digital transactions increased in 2016–17 to 7,195 crore in the fiscal year 2021–22 from the 2016 figures.

Content Source link: 

• https://newsonair.com/2022/08/29/pmjdy-completes-eight-yearsaccounts-grew-three-fold-from-14-72-crore-in-march-2015-to-46-25-crore-in-aug-2022/,
• https://www.financialexpress.com/money/pmjdy-bank-account-news-rs-10000-overdraft-facility-and-other-details-to-know/2647249/

Image Link:

• https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/immersive-story/2018/05/18/gains-in-financial-inclusion-gains-for-a-sustainable-world,

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

In News

The Government has recently planned to implement the "Nitipath" programme, which would be similar to Agnipath and the short-service commission for military officers.

What is Nitipath?

• After 10, 25, and 30 years of service, officers might be removed from the pool.
• This would eliminate the top-heavy structure and foster a spirit of excellence and public service.
• The amount of apex-level positions and career routes does not limit the government's ability to hire four times as many applicants at the entry-level.
• Only 25% of them will be maintained following a performance evaluation after the fourth year, replacing the 600-1,000 candidates currently appointed to the AIS with 4,000 officers.

Significance of the Scheme

• Those who quit government work after four years will have bright economic prospects. It is very possible that many people may willingly decide to leave and pursue further education or independent work.
  • The larger economy will gain from the inclusion of such a young, skilled, and experienced managerial cadre.

• Implementing exit filters and performance reviews every five years will pave the way for India's administrative infrastructure to undergo a semi-structural overhaul.
• A lateral entrance strategy can allow for the re-admission of individuals who may have been rejected at junior levels but who have since distinguished themselves.
• This will recruit many junior-level officers who are young and enthusiastic, provide them with strong incentives to perform, and give them experience working for the government.
• The top 4,000 all-India rank holders' average quality won't change noticeably from that of the top 1,000.
• Therefore, a four-year review period will give the government access to more information than just test and interview results.

Government Initiatives to reform Civil Services

• Lateral Entry Reform
• Mission Karmayogi
• Citizen Charters
• CPGRAMS
• National Programme for Civil Service Capacity Building
• e-Samiksha

Way Forward

• The emphasis must be on external accountability mechanisms like citizen charters, social audits, and encouraging outcome orientation among civil officials because civil servants are accountable to political executives, and this causes the politicization of civil services.
• Governmental capability generally lags behind socioeconomic progress everywhere in the world.
  • In India, there is a severe and expanding governance gap. It will take enough talent, with the right incentives and training, to bridge it.
  • The Indian state must do its duties effectively for India@100 to be a success story. The best option is Nitipath.

Content Source link:

• https://www.pehalnews.in/after-agnipath-india-is-in-need-of-a-nitipath-for-its-civil-services/2366144/
• https://newsusaweb.com/after-agnipath-india-is-in-want-of-a-nitipath-for-its-civil-providers/
• https://www.livemint.com/opinion/columns/after-agnipath-india-is-in-need-of-a-nitipath-for-its-civil-services-11661702562888.html

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

In News:

A recent and unusual La Nina event, the third in a row, is said to impact agriculture to a considerable extent.

About the News:

• Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) has recently predicted that a third consecutive event of La Nina could be underway, leading to additional rainfall along its east coast this summer.
• During normal conditions in the Pacific Ocean, trade winds blow west along the equator, taking warm water from South America towards Asia and to replace that warm water, cold water rises from the depths — a process called upwelling. 

• El Niño and La Niña are two opposing climate patterns that break these normal conditions and scientists call these phenomena the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO)
• These events occur every two to seven years, on average, but they don’t occur on a regular schedule, although El Niño occurs more frequently than La Niña.
• Episodes of El Niño and La Niña typically last nine to 12 months, but can sometimes last for years impacting weather, wildfires, ecosystems, and economies.
• Scientists have predicted that La Nina occurring in 2022, after having taken place in 2020 and 2021, would be a rare event.
• Since the southwest monsoon is likely to extend till October, it will have detrimental impacts on Indian agriculture with farmers expected to suffer a double whammy if untimely rains coincide with the Kharif harvest.

Major highlights:

• About: An extended period of La Nina this year is happening for the first time since the 1950s when the event started to be recorded. Previously, the years 1973-76 and 1998-2001 were consecutive La Nina years.
• Phenomenon: La Nina is a climate event that takes place due to the cooling of surface ocean water on the tropical west coast of South America. It can be described as a counterpart to El Nino, which involves the warming of ocean currents in the equatorial Pacific Ocean.
• Impact on countries: The combined phases of La Nina and El Nino are termed as El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) affects rainfall patterns, global atmospheric circulation and atmospheric pressure across the planet.
  • India: Monsoon will be surplus and extend up to October due to La Nina and the monsoon withdrawal may begin in the first week of September with some parts of India may be witnessing heavy rains.
  • Australia: Sea temperatures in the eastern Pacific Ocean becomes colder and Australia mostly see the peak of La Nina in December, January and February.
  • US: The US east and west coasts usually experience hurricanes during August but no such event in the La Nina year.

Impact of La Nina on India:

• About: Unlike El Niño, which usually means deficit monsoon and drought, La Niña has typically meant wetter year Its early onset this year coincides well with the monsoon season in India when the Kharif crop is sowed.
• Agriculture: La Nina could have negative impacts on Indian agriculture with farmers at risk of losing their standing Kharif crops if it rains during this period.
• Reduced sown area: Overall area sown under Kharif this season lags by 2.5 million hectares (mha) compared to the corresponding period in 2021.
• Reduced paddy area: Area under paddy — the main Kharif crop — is short by 3.09 mha (8.2 per cent less), compared to 2021.
• Mismatch: The gap between ‘normal’ paddy sown during this time (calculated as an average of the sown area between 2017-18 and 2021-22 during the corresponding week) and the current sowing is much more at 13.4 per cent as the ‘normal’ sown area for this time of the season is 39.7 mha.
• Cascading effect: Farmers will suffer a double whammy if untimely rains coincide with the harvest. They have already been impacted due to deficient rain in the monsoon months in the important paddy-growing states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.

Source:

• https://www.downtoearth.org.in/news/world/rare-3rd-consecutive-la-nina-event-underway-could-impact-agriculture-84572
• https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/why-la-nia-is-good-news-for-india/infographicshow/52447068.cms?from=mdr

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

• Context: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has considered setting up a fraud registry to create a database of fraudulent websites, phones and various methods used by fraudsters.
• A fraud registry mechanism would entail identifying and collecting IP addresses, email IDs and mobile numbers that are routinely used to commit online frauds and blacklist them.

• The Registry’s database will help prevent fraudsters from repeating the fraud as the websites or phone numbers would be blacklisted.
• The Payment system participants will beprovided access to this registry for near-real-time fraud monitoring.
• Payment system participants will be provided access to this registry for near-real-time fraud monitoring. It will ensure that perpetrators are not able to open accounts in multiple banks to park ill-gotten money
• Among the various schemes launched to prevent banking-related frauds, the Ombudsman scheme is a significant one under which around18 lakh complaints were received during 2021-22 as against 3.82 lakh in the previous year.
• About 39% of the complaints received by the RBI during the last financial year were related to digital transactions.

Source:

• https://indianexpress.com/article/business/banking-and-finance/rbi-in-talks-to-set-up-registry-to-check-banking-frauds-8119680/

Image source:

• https://www.businesstoday.in/industry/banks/story/bank-frauds-rise-over-72pc-to-rs-41167-crore-in-2017-18-says-rbi-report-124284-2018-12-31

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

• Context: The Chief Justice of India has called a meeting of the ‘full court’ where the judges discussed how to deal with issues relating to listing and backlog of cases.
• A full court meeting literally means one which is attended by all the judges of the court.
• There are no written rules dealing with full-court meetings.
• As per convention, full-court meetings are called by the Chief Justice of India to discuss issues of importance to the judiciary.

• The senior designations of practising advocates in the Supreme Court and high courts are also decided during the full court meetings.
• The basic idea is to take everyone along. Full court meetings are an ideal occasion to arrive at common solutions to deal with problems that beset the country’s legal system and to make any amendments, if necessary, to the administrative practices of the court.
• As a full court meeting is convened at the discretion of the Chief Justice of India, it does not follow any particular calendar.
• Full court meetings have been held many times in the past. In March 2020, it was convened to discuss demands by associations of lawyers to close the court till further notice following the Covid-19 outbreak and its subsequent spread among court staff and to decide the further steps to be taken.

Source:

• https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/cji-full-court-meeting-u-u-lalit-sc-8117155/

Image source:

• https://www.takeonedigitalnetwork.com/post/j-k-high-court-observes-full-court-reference-to-pay-homage-to-senior-advocate-kawoosa

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

• Context: India has recently extended support to Argentina's campaign to restart international negotiation on the Falklands territorial issue.
• The Falkland Islands also called Malvinas Islands or Spanish Islas Malvinas, are an internally self-governing overseas territory of the United Kingdom in the South Atlantic Ocean.

• They do not require financial support from the UK, except for defence.
• The islands are located 400 miles (650 km) off the southeast coast of South America and consist of approximately 740 islands.
• The Argentines lay stakes to the Falkland Islands, which they call Malvinas Islands or Islas Malvinas in Spanish -a claim that dates back to 1800. But the British insist that the islands are British.
• The UK held a referendum in the Falklands in 2013 in which an overwhelming majority 99.8% of the voters wanted to maintain their current status as an Overseas Territory of the United Kingdom.
• Lately, Argentina issued a statement reaffirming China's “support for Argentina’s demand for the full exercise of sovereignty over the Islands.”
• India has chosen to stick to its stand of resolution in accordance with the UNGA and the Special Commission for Decolonisation.
• Argentina has expressed interest in the made-in-India Tejas fighter aircraft for Argentine Air Forces. There has also been strong support for India to become a member of the Nuclear Supplier Group.

Source:

• No doubt over U.K.’s sovereignty over the Falkland Islands: British official - The Hindu

Image Source:

• Brittanica

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

• Context: Silver Jubilee celebration of the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has taken place recently.
• The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority was set up under the Department of Pharmaceuticals, on 29th August 1997.

• an attached office of the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP), Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers, NPPA ensures to -
  • implement and enforce the provisions of the Drugs Price Control Order (DPCO),
  • to undertake and/or sponsor relevant studies in respect of pricing of drugs/formulations,
  • to monitor the availability of drugs, identify shortages, if any, and take remedial steps and
  • to collect/maintain data on production, exports and imports, market share of individual companies, the profitability of companies etc. for bulk drugs and formulations.
• The following initiatives were also launched as a part of the occasion
  1. Integrated Pharmaceutical Database Management System 2.0 to provide a single window for submissions of various forms as mandated under DPCO,2013.
  2. Pharma Sahi Daam 2.0 App with updated features like speech recognition, facility for launching complaints etc.

Source:

• https://theprint.in/india/national-pharmaceutical-pricing-authority-to-celebrate-its-silver-jubilee-tomorrow/1104622/?amp

Image source:

• https://mohfw.wordpress.com/2016/11/06/government-may-disband-national-pharmaceutical-pricing-authority/

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

Essence - The article discusses the causes and factors that are behind the depreciation of the Indian Rupee again the UPS dollar. It highlights the role of factors such as CAD (Current Account Deficit), Capital flow, and FPI (foreign portfolio investment) in deciding the value of the Indian Rupee.

The RBI used to calculate the exchange rate on daily basis till 1993 when it saw a complete transition to a market-determined exchange rate regime. Since then, the exchange rate has been subject to market fluctuations, especially in the external sector. It is worth noting that any change of sentiment in the International market can lead to fluctuations in the exchange rate.

The present depreciation of the value of the Indian Rupee is similar to previous instances like the ‘taper tantrum of 2013’. It is thus important that India keeps an eye on the external sector in the wake of the present Russia Ukraine Crisis and declining economies in its neighbourhood, and take steps to boost the confidence of the external sector in the Indian economy.

Why should you read this editorial?

• The article is a good analysis of factors behind the current depreciation of the Indian Rupee.
• The article highlights how various forces in the globalized world act together and impact an economy.

Source:

• https://www.livemint.com/opinion/online-views/what-causes-depreciation-of-the-rupee-holds-policy-cues-for-india/amp-11661877767583.html

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

Essence – The editorial discusses the changing nature of consumerism over time. It elaborates on the nature of present-day consumerism which is also the driver of the e-commerce revolution. It highlights the rising importance of split-second delivery as the core competency of e-commerce firms which is leading to ‘Hyperlapse consumerism’. It also presents the analysis of associated risks with this superfast delivery.

It refers to the NITI Aayog report to discuss the benefit of the boom provided to the Gig economy by these e-commerce businesses. Towards the end, it cites the works of a few authors to explain the reason for this drive and suggests both consumers and businesses be wise while using the technology.

Why should you read this editorial?

• To know the impact of hyperlapse consumerism
• To know about the benefit arising from that.

Source:

• https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/the-age-of-hyper-lapse-consumerism/article65829668.ece/amp/

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.

Background

Over the last six decades, the Indian states have had varying levels of success in health outcomes. Among these, Kerala has consistently been a prominent outlier with better health outcomes in a number of areas.

Learning from Kerala

• In 2011, Kerala attained the highest Human Development Index of all Indian states based on its performance in key measures of Lower infant mortality rate, Lower maternal mortality ratio, and Higher literacy among both males & Females.
• The health gains made in Kerala can be attributed to strong emphasis from the state government on public health and primary health care (PHC), health infrastructure, decentralized governance, financial planning, girls’ education, community participation and a willingness to improve systems in response to identified gaps.
• Tracing the efforts, after it achieved statehood, Kerala invested in infrastructure to create a multi-layered health system designed to provide first-contact access for basic services at the community level and expanded integrated primary health care coverage to achieve access to a range of preventive and curative services.

• • Later, Kerala rapidly expanded the number of medical facilities, hospital beds, and doctors.
  • This increase in the number of primary health care centres and doctors allowed for the provision of the right care in the right place, reduced patient care costs, and lowered the burden on secondary and tertiary care facilities.
  • Further, public health and social development initiatives began such as the push for safe drinking water in the state’s capital, and primary education for men and women
• In 1996, recognizing the eroding trust in the public system, with expensive and often unaffordable private facilities, Kerala underwent a major overhaul when the state government implemented the People’s Campaign for Decentralized Planning movement.
  • Within the campaign, a three-tier system of self-governance was established.
  • The current PHC system consists of sub-centres, primary health centres that support five to six sub-centres and serve a village, and community health centres.
  • This decentralization resulted in physicians and community members working together and many facilities undergoing significant renovations to address community priorities.
• Thus, other states should take a cue from Kerala, to make Primary Health care accessible, affordable, and responsive.

Quote: The goal of real healthcare reform must be high-quality, universal coverage in a cost-effective way - Bernie Sanders

Source:

• Kerala, India: Decentralized governance and community engagement strengthen primary care

Image source:

• https://www.niti.gov.in/sites/default/files/2021-12/NITI-WB_Health_Index_Report_24-12-21.pdf

Click the link below to attempt the daily MCQs and the Mains based questions.