02 OCTOBER 2023

Topic 1: SASTRA Ramanujan Prize

Why in news: The 2023 SASTRA Ramanujan Prize will be awarded to Ruixiang Zhang of the University of California, Berkeley.

About the prize:

• The SASTRA Ramanujan Prize was founded by Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy (SASTRA).
• The prize was instituted in the year 2005.
• It is awarded every year to a young mathematician judged to have done outstanding work in Ramanujan’s fields of interest.
• The age limit for the prize has been set at 32 (the age at which Ramanujan died), and the current award is $10,000.

Contribution of Zhang:

• The prize will be awarded at an International Conference in Number Theory.
• His fundamental work spans analytic number theory, combinatorics, Euclidean harmonic analysis, and geometry.
• Building on his doctoral thesis, he and Shaoming Guo proved a generalisation of the main conjecture in Vinogradov’s mean value theorem, which is concerned with the sums of numbers raised to a certain power.

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Topic 2: The story of Mahatma Gandhi’s portrait on Indian banknotes

Why in news: The most widely circulated image of Gandhi, however, is his portrait on Indian official currency notes.

Key details:

• As the Father of the Nation, he might seem an obvious choice to have appeared on the national currency after the formation of independent India in 1947.
• But it was only in 1996, that he became a permanent feature on legal banknotes of every denomination issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

The origins of Gandhi’s image on Indian currency

• The portrait of Gandhi is cut-out of a photograph taken in 1946, where he is standing with British politician Lord Frederick William Pethick-Lawrence.
• The RBI’s Department of Currency Management is responsible for designing the rupee notes.
• It has to get approval for the designs from the central bank and the Union government.

When did Gandhi first appear on INR notes?

• Gandhi first featured on Indian currency in 1969, when a special series was issued to commemorate his 100th birth anniversary.
• Bearing the signature of the RBI governor LK Jha, it depicted Gandhi with the Sevagram Ashram in the backdrop.
• Then, in October 1987, a series of Rs 500 currency notes, featuring Gandhi, was launched.

The banknotes for independent India

• For a few months after the declaration of independent India on August 15, 1947, the RBI continued to issue notes from the colonial period featuring King George VI.
• The government of India brought out its new design of the 1-rupee note in 1949 — in the watermark window, King George was replaced with a symbol of the Lion Capital of Ashoka Pillar at Sarnath.
• The 1980s saw emphasis on symbols of scientific and technological advancements and Indian art forms — the Aryabhatta satellite featured on the Rs 2 note, farm mechanisation on Rs 5 and the Konark Wheel on Rs 20, among others.

When did Gandhi’s portrait become a permanent feature on banknotes?

• It was reportedly believed that inanimate objects would be relatively easier to forge compared to a human face.
• Gandhi was chosen because of his national appeal, and in 1996, a new ‘Mahatma Gandhi Series’ was launched by the RBI to replace the former Ashoka Pillar bank notes.
• Several security features were also introduced, including a windowed security thread, latent image and intaglio features for the visually impaired.
• In 2016, the ‘Mahatma Gandhi New Series’ of banknotes were announced by the RBI.
• The portrait of Gandhi continues, while the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan logo has been added on the back of the notes, apart from additional security features.

The demand to include others on banknotes

• Recent years have seen several suggestions on others who could feature on currency notes, apart from Gandhi such as that of:
  • Lord Ganesha and goddess Lakshmi on currency notes.
  • Noble Laureate Rabindranath Tagore
  • former President APJ Abdul Kalam.
• The RBI had rejected suggestions of replacing Gandhi’s portrait with any other leader on the bank notes.
• The Committee (constituted by RBI) decided that no other personality could better represent the ethos of India than Mahatma Gandhi.

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Topic 3: The Agamas

Why in news: The Supreme Court ordered status quo on the appointment of archakas (priests) in Agamic temples in Tamil Nadu.

Key details:

• The Srirangam Koil Miras Kainkaryaparagal Matrum Athanai Sarntha Koilgalin Miraskain-karyaparargalin Nalasangam, an association of archakas, had challenged reforms introduced by the Tamil Nadu government, which are seen as attempting to change the hereditary system of appointing archakas in Agama temples.
• The petitioners asked for the quashing of the state government’s order and letters which paved the way for individuals trained in Agama Sastra, irrespective of caste and gender, to assume priesthood.
• The petitioners alleged the state government was unlawfully attempting to appoint non-believers as archakas, infringing upon religious rights protected under the Constitution.
• They contended that knowledge of the Agamas, which are significant religious practices, could not be secured by completing the one-year certificate course run by the government, but required years of rigorous training under learned Gurus.
• The debate over the appointment of temple priests in Tamil Nadu stems from various government and judicial actions.
  • In 1971, the DMK government of Chief Minister M Karunanidhi amended the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowment (HR & CE) Act to abolish the hereditary appointment of priests, and to allow individuals from all castes to be priests.
  • In 2006, the government declared all qualified personseligible to be priests.
    • The Supreme Court struck this down in 2015.
    • It underlined the adherence to Agama Sastras, while ensuring that constitutional rights were not violated.
  • In 2009, Madras High Court ruled in favour of a woman priest from Usilampatti, Madurai, who was facing opposition from male priests regarding her inherited right to conduct puja at the Arulmigu Durgai Amman temple.
    • The court underlined the irony of objecting to puja by a woman in a temple with a female deity, emphasised historical precedents of women conducting rituals, and rejected the unwarranted application of Agama Sastras and norms of the Manusmriti in this context.
    • It stressed on the need to eliminate gender bias from temples to realise the constitutional mandates under Articles 15 (“prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth”) and 51A(e) (fundamental duty “to…renounce practices derogatory to the dignity of women”).
  • In the Guruvayoor Devaswom case (2004), the SC upheld the appointment of non-believers to the temple trust board.
  • In the N Adithayan (2002) case, the SC ruled that no custom pre-existing the Constitution could exclude non-Brahmins from performing puja in temples if they were otherwise trained and qualified.
• These judgments highlighted the judiciary’s commitment to ensuring equality and non-discrimination in the appointment of priests, asserting that neither caste nor family succession should dictate eligibility for performing temple rituals and the appointment of pujaris (archakas).

About Agamas:

• The Agamas are a collection of several Tantric literature and scriptures of Hindu schools.
• The term literally means tradition.
• The Agama texts describe cosmology, epistemology, philosophical doctrines, precepts on meditation and practices, four kinds of yoga, mantras, temple construction, deity worship and ways to attain sixfold desires.
• These canonical texts are in Tamil and Sanskrit.
• The three main branches of Agama texts are Shaiva, Vaishnava, and Shakta.
• The origin and chronology of Agamas is unclear.
  • Some are Vedic and others non-Vedic.

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Topic 4: Faulty policies on invasive exotics

Why in news: Concerns over the management of the invasive Conocarpus species of trees have recently led Gujarat and, last year, Telangana, to ban their use.

Problem areas:

• This has brought fresh attention to the process of selection of species in urban landscaping projects in particular, which favours the use of exotics for beautification and greening.
• It has been shown repeatedly that many species that were introduced to India previously for greening or ornamental projects eventually turned invasive.
• Native species that failed to compete for space and soil resources were driven to extinction, and significant costs were incurred to ensure the management of the invasive species.
• Among the notable species are those of Eucalyptus, Prosopis juliflora (vilayati kikar), Acacia mangium, and Lantana camara.
• They continue to be used until considerable focus is brought on to their invasive characteristics.
• There are two species of Conocarpus (buttonwood) trees, with several varieties and hybrids:
  • Conocarpus erectus, which is more widely used in India, is native to South America, and
  • C. lancifolius is native to East Africa.
• They are easily propagated and multiplied in nurseries through stem cuttings.
• Serious pollen allergies and respiratory problems have been reported in the vicinity of their plantations, which has led to civic agencies taking action to ban them.

What is being done to address the root cause of this kind of problem?

• Conocarpus can hopefully still be managed, but we have certainly lost the chance to manage Prosopis juliflora and Lantana camara on public lands and commons.
• We can also no longer manage Leucaena leucocephala, which is battling it out with vilayati kikar for dominance in the urban woodlands of Delhi.

Why do urban greening initiatives end up deploying these exotics in the first place?

• The non-native species, in a biogeographic sense, often face very few or no pests or pathogens in new habitats, which makes their proliferation easy.
• Some species like Conocarpus are not browsed by livestock, and are thus favoured for horticultural or landscaping projects.
• The problems surface only slowly and often much later.
• The human population gets familiar with the local pollen calendar and, to a large extent, their immune systems coevolve.
• People in cities are exposed to a spectrum of allergens in any case, and respiratory allergies are common.
• Into this already precarious landscape comes new and newer plantations of exotics, which are ironically brought in often to improve urban air quality and aesthetics.

Way forward:

• Using knowledge in appropriate way:
  • Almost all horticultural species are well studied, and propensities, including phytochemical volatiles and allergies, are well known.

• It is certainly possible for landscape managers to choose from among native species pools, species that are ecologically appropriate and also meet aesthetic needs.
  • Tragically, urban landscaping and agroforestry projects often do not even refer to existing information on these species before taking up their large-scale use.
• Using native species:
  • Based on available research, it is almost unanimously recommended by scientists that urban greening projects should use native species for long-term sustainability.
  • Doing so may marginally increase the costs and effort, but will add immense value in terms of ecosystem services in the medium to long term.
• Control on imports and usage:
  • The import and use of horticultural plants need to be monitored by maintaining a watch list of plants that are known to harm native species and ecosystems, and raise public health concerns.
• Proper guidelines:
  • The numbers of mega greening projects are likely to increase in the coming years in step with India’s climate commitments, and landscape planners and land managers need clear guidelines outlining these principle.
• Carbon sequestration:
  • The value of Carbon sequestration by urban greens has been highlighted by recent research to contribute significantly to mitigating Greenhouse gas emissions, thereby contributing significantly to the green GDP of a country.
  • India aspires to meet its global emission reduction commitments.
  • Greening projects need to be mindful about the consortium of species that are used.

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Topic 5: The concerns of using Aadhaar in welfare

Why in news: Recently, credit rating agency Moody’s Investor Service released a report, which states that the [Aadhaar] system faces hurdles, including the burden of establishing authorisation and concerns about biometric reliability.

How has India reacted?

• The government has strongly refuted these claims.
• The government termed Aadhaar as the most trusted digital ID in the world.
• The government stated that it is evident that the authors of the report are unaware that the seeding of Aadhaar in the MGNREGS database has been done without requiring the worker to authenticate using their biometrics.
• Even payment to workers under the scheme is made by directly crediting money in their account and does not require the worker to authenticate using their biometrics.

Rationale for Aadhaar

• Aadhaar is a unique identification number given to all Indian residents by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
• During enrolment for Aadhaar, demographic details of individuals along with their biometric fingerprints and iris scans are collected as they are considered to be unique identifiers of individuals.
• These details are stored in the Aadhaar database.
• The objectives of UIDAI were to ensure that all residents have a unique ID and to curb corruption in accessing welfare programmes by eliminating “ghost” and “fake” individuals.
• The government favours Aadhaar for several other government-to-citizen cash transfer programmes.
• By removing ghosts and duplicates, the government has claimed substantial savings in welfare schemes through the usage of Aadhaar.

Aadhaar’s role in cash withdrawals

• To direct a payment using Aadhaar for MGNREGA, there are at least three steps.
  • First, a worker’s Aadhaar number must be linked to her job card.
  • Second, her Aadhaar must be linked to her bank account.
  • Third, the Aadhaar number must be linked correctly through her bank branch with a mapper of the National Payments Corporation of India, which acts as a clearing house of Aadhaar-based payments.
• Aadhaar becomes the financial address of the individual and cash transferred by the government gets deposited to the last Aadhaar-linked bank account.
• Individuals can withdraw money from their Aadhaar-linked bank account from private banking kiosks or through private banking correspondents who use their point of sale (PoS) machines to authenticate individuals using their biometrics.
  • This platform is known as the Aadhaar-enabled Payment System (AePS).

Concerns of Aadhaar’s use:

• Quantity fraud:
  • In the case of rations, several organisations and researchers have provided evidence demonstrating that the main type of corruption is quantity fraud.
  • It happens when, say the entitlement for a ration card holder is 35 kg of rice but the dealer only gives 30 kg.
  • Aadhaar has no role in either detecting or preventing this fraud.
• Authentication not easy:
  • In many rural areas, people have to make multiple trips to ration shops, to authenticate with no guarantee that the authentication will work.
• Lack of conducive Infrastructure:
  • Lack of reliable internet, fading fingerprints among daily wage workers, lack of phone connectivity to get an OTP etc. lead to denials.
• No transparency:
  • The data on the number of attempts to authenticate and the extent of authentication failures are not public.
  • A report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) from 2022 states that UIDAI did not have a system to analyse the factors leading to authentication errors.
• Recurring payment failures:
  • In Aadhaar-based payments, error in any step results in payment failures.
  • Different spellings in the job card and in the Aadhaar database can result in authentication failures.
  • Most workers are unaware which account their Aadhaar was last linked to as financial institutions in rural areas tend to coerce workers to link their Aadhaar with bank accounts without consent.
  • This leads to wages getting diverted to some account without the worker’s knowledge.
  • A recent working paper using 31 million MGNREGA wage transactions demonstrates no statistical evidence of these claims and points to lack of sufficient funds as the reasons for delays.
• Security concerns:
  • Banking correspondents using the AePS operate without any accountability framework.
  • Some of them ask individuals to biometrically authenticate multiple times.
  • Each authentication gives access to the banking correspondents to operate the individual’s bank account.
  • Several studies and news reports have highlighted how using AePS, money from workers’ accounts have been withdrawn or that they have been signed up for government insurance programmes without consent.
  • The ₹10 crore scholarship scam in Jharkhand from 2020 exemplifies this.

Conclusion:

• The government’s push to make Aadhaar-based payments mandatory in MGNREGA has faced resistance from workers and field officials.
• A recent paper show that job cards of several active workers have been deleted on grounds of being “ghosts.”
• Based on such dilutions of accountability in welfare due to Aadhaar, critics are concerned about the government’s intentions of linking voter IDs with Aadhaar.

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Topic 6: Quote: To the hungry, God can only appear as bread

Why in news: Recently, renowned agricultural scientist MS Swaminathan (1925-2023) passed away. Swaminathan mentioned Gandhi, attributing the following quote to him: “To the millions who have to go without two meals a day… God can only appear as bread”.

Why Gandhi spoke about hunger

• Gandhi was an advocate of self-rule (swaraj) and self-sufficiency.
• His ideal economic and political models focused on equipping the smallest units, the villages of India, to be self-sufficient in terms of clothing and feeding themselves by spinning their own yarn and promoting agriculture locally.
• His larger ideology also focused on the concepts of sarvodaya (progress for all) and antodaya, or the upliftment of the last person in society, who is still untouched by the progress others have made.
• In this regard, the issue of hunger was associated with the need to produce enough and for the last person to be able to access and afford food.
• Even today, India has been recording decreasing Global Hunger Index scores over the years, ranking 107 out of 121 countries in 2022.

Why Swaminathan mentioned Gandhi’s quote on hunger 

• Apart from being inspired by Gandhi in his youth, Swaminathan also found his words relevant on a specific issue – achieving ‘zero hunger’.
• In a 2013 booklet published by the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, titled ‘Zero Hunger is Possible’, he wrote of Gandhi in the context of how India would achieve this goal.
  • It is a global movement to end hunger.
  • ‘Zero hunger’ is also one of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are aimed to be achieved by 2030.
• Gandhiji said, this God of bread must be available to every home and hut in an independent India.
• It is after a long time, after more than sixty years of independence, we have been able to redeem that pledge through Green Revolution.

How did the Green Revolution help in tackling food insecurity?

• Swaminathan spoke of the Green Revolution in India in the context of zero hunger – how until then, India had to import staple foods like rice and wheat from countries like the United States.
• He explained the three factors behind the scale of success it achieved:
  • First was Technology, allowing yields to increase through the development of new crop varieties, and helping in developing pesticides.
  • Second was Services.
    • The nationalisation of the banking system in 1969 led to banks being asked to focus on extending rural credit under the priority sector norms.
    • New programmes for agricultural extension were designed to enable diffusion of technology, particularly, in targeted areas and among small and marginal farmers.
  • Thirdly, he credited public policy.
    • The Agricultural Prices Commission and the Food Corporation of India were established
    • Remunerative floor prices for food grains were established and
    • An expanded public distribution system for food security and poverty alleviation came up.

The problem of hidden hunger and its solutions

• Hidden hunger is a form of undernutrition that occurs when intake and absorption of vitamins and minerals (such as zinc, iodine, and iron) are too low to sustain good health and development.
• Factors that contribute to micronutrient deficiencies include poor diet, increased micronutrient needs during certain life stages, such as pregnancy and lactation, and health problems such as diseases, infections, or parasites. 
• Chemical solution;
  • The earlier approach to eradication of hidden hunger was primarily based on chemical fortification.
• Even today, for example, salt can be fortified with iron, iodine, Vitamin A and many other micro-nutrients.
• Naturalsolution:
  • Nature provides a wide range of naturally bio-fortified foods.
  • A simple plant like moringa has almost all the micro-nutrients you need.
  • Sweet potato is very rich in Vitamin A.
  • There are varieties of pearl millet, commonly consumed in India, which are very rich in iron.

Conclusion:

• In this way, nutrition-sensitive farming systems should be promoted.
• One of the later criticisms of the Green Revolution has been the fact that a majority of its focus went to wheat and rice, and the emphasis on their cultivation has now led to ecological problems.
• Not all farmers should have to cultivate water-guzzling crops to support themselves, especially given the varied geographical diversity of India.
• Ultimately, Swaminathan advocated for providing adequate nutrition for all in a sustainable manner.

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Topic 7: The largest climate action lawsuit against 32 countries

Why in news: Six young people from Portugal, aged 11 to 24, are suing 32 European governments (including the U.K., Russia and Turkey) at the European Court of Human Rights arguing that their governments have failed to take sufficient action against the climate crisis, thus violating their human rights and discriminating against young people globally.

Key details:

• The recent spate of heatwaves and fires across Greece, Canada and other parts of Europe served as reminders that every increment beyond the 1.5°C temperature threshold would be catastrophic, intensifying “multiple and concurrent hazards,” as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states in its report.
• They claim that European nations have faltered in their climate emission goals, blowing past their global carbon budgets consistent with the Paris Agreement target of limiting global warming under 1.5°C.
• The nations have thus violated people’s fundamental rights protected under the European Convention on Human Rights, including:
  • the right to life,
  • the right to be free from inhuman or degrading treatment,
  • the right to privacy and family life and
  • the right to be free from discrimination.
• Since the 32 countries contributed to climate catastrophes and jeopardised the future of young people, it falls upon the nations to rapidly escalate their emissions reductions and aim higher in curtailing domestic emissions.
• Other measures include cutting the production of fossil fuels and cleaning up global supply chains.

How this can be achieved:

• The European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change (ESABCC), a body which provides scientific advice to EU countries, said countries will have to target an emissions reduction of 75% below 1990 levels (as opposed to the EU’s current 55%).
• Under some of these principles, the EU has already exhausted its fair share of the global emissions budget.
• The EU at present is the sixth largest emitter with 7.2 tonnes of CO2 per capita, while the world averages 6.3 tonnes per capita.

What UNICEF says:

• UNICEF is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide
• United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has dubbed the climate crisis as a “child rights crisis”.
• Unhindered carbon emissions and extreme weather threaten access to education, health, nutrition and the future.
• Air pollution is already linked to poor birth outcomes and increased risk of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.
• Heat waves are triggering mental health issues.

Conclusion:

• It comes down to cause and effect: countries so far have rejected any relationship between climate change and its impact on human health.
  • For instance, Greece, in its submissions, maintained that the effects of climate change do not seem to directly affect human life or human health.
  • This is even as the country witnessed devastating wildfires and torrential rain and flooding.
• The Portuguese and Irish governments have dismissed these concerns as ‘future fears’, arguing that there is no evidence to show climate change poses an immediate risk to their lives.

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Topic 8: Argentina, India sign social security agreement

Why in news: India and Argentina recently signed an agreement on social security.

Key details:

• It aims to ensure legal rights of professionals in each other’s domain that will assist in risk-free international mobility.
• The ‘Social Security Agreement’ is aimed at ensuring rights of the growing number of Indian nationals employed in various Indian and international concerns in Argentina as well as for Argentine nationals seeking employment in India.
• The Social Security Agreement (SSA) between India and Argentina has created a legal framework which will enable professionals on both sides to claim old age and survivor’s pensions.
• It also safeguards permanent and total disability pension for employed persons as well as to legislations in Argentina concerning contributory benefits of the Social Security System.
• It also takes care of factors like rent, subsidy and lump sum payments as per national laws of both countries.

India-Argentina Relations:

Topic 1: SASTRA Ramanujan Prize

Why in news: The 2023 SASTRA Ramanujan Prize will be awarded to Ruixiang Zhang of the University of California, Berkeley.

About the prize:

• The SASTRA Ramanujan Prize was founded by Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy (SASTRA).
• The prize was instituted in the year 2005.
• It is awarded every year to a young mathematician judged to have done outstanding work in Ramanujan’s fields of interest.
• The age limit for the prize has been set at 32 (the age at which Ramanujan died), and the current award is $10,000.

Contribution of Zhang:

• The prize will be awarded at an International Conference in Number Theory.
• His fundamental work spans analytic number theory, combinatorics, Euclidean harmonic analysis, and geometry.
• Building on his doctoral thesis, he and Shaoming Guo proved a generalisation of the main conjecture in Vinogradov’s mean value theorem, which is concerned with the sums of numbers raised to a certain power.

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Topic 2: The story of Mahatma Gandhi’s portrait on Indian banknotes

Why in news: The most widely circulated image of Gandhi, however, is his portrait on Indian official currency notes.

Key details:

• As the Father of the Nation, he might seem an obvious choice to have appeared on the national currency after the formation of independent India in 1947.
• But it was only in 1996, that he became a permanent feature on legal banknotes of every denomination issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

The origins of Gandhi’s image on Indian currency

• The portrait of Gandhi is cut-out of a photograph taken in 1946, where he is standing with British politician Lord Frederick William Pethick-Lawrence.
• The RBI’s Department of Currency Management is responsible for designing the rupee notes.
• It has to get approval for the designs from the central bank and the Union government.

When did Gandhi first appear on INR notes?

• Gandhi first featured on Indian currency in 1969, when a special series was issued to commemorate his 100th birth anniversary.
• Bearing the signature of the RBI governor LK Jha, it depicted Gandhi with the Sevagram Ashram in the backdrop.
• Then, in October 1987, a series of Rs 500 currency notes, featuring Gandhi, was launched.

The banknotes for independent India

• For a few months after the declaration of independent India on August 15, 1947, the RBI continued to issue notes from the colonial period featuring King George VI.
• The government of India brought out its new design of the 1-rupee note in 1949 — in the watermark window, King George was replaced with a symbol of the Lion Capital of Ashoka Pillar at Sarnath.
• The 1980s saw emphasis on symbols of scientific and technological advancements and Indian art forms — the Aryabhatta satellite featured on the Rs 2 note, farm mechanisation on Rs 5 and the Konark Wheel on Rs 20, among others.

When did Gandhi’s portrait become a permanent feature on banknotes?

• It was reportedly believed that inanimate objects would be relatively easier to forge compared to a human face.
• Gandhi was chosen because of his national appeal, and in 1996, a new ‘Mahatma Gandhi Series’ was launched by the RBI to replace the former Ashoka Pillar bank notes.
• Several security features were also introduced, including a windowed security thread, latent image and intaglio features for the visually impaired.
• In 2016, the ‘Mahatma Gandhi New Series’ of banknotes were announced by the RBI.
• The portrait of Gandhi continues, while the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan logo has been added on the back of the notes, apart from additional security features.

The demand to include others on banknotes

• Recent years have seen several suggestions on others who could feature on currency notes, apart from Gandhi such as that of:
  • Lord Ganesha and goddess Lakshmi on currency notes.
  • Noble Laureate Rabindranath Tagore
  • former President APJ Abdul Kalam.
• The RBI had rejected suggestions of replacing Gandhi’s portrait with any other leader on the bank notes.
• The Committee (constituted by RBI) decided that no other personality could better represent the ethos of India than Mahatma Gandhi.

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Topic 3: The Agamas

Why in news: The Supreme Court ordered status quo on the appointment of archakas (priests) in Agamic temples in Tamil Nadu.

Key details:

• The Srirangam Koil Miras Kainkaryaparagal Matrum Athanai Sarntha Koilgalin Miraskain-karyaparargalin Nalasangam, an association of archakas, had challenged reforms introduced by the Tamil Nadu government, which are seen as attempting to change the hereditary system of appointing archakas in Agama temples.
• The petitioners asked for the quashing of the state government’s order and letters which paved the way for individuals trained in Agama Sastra, irrespective of caste and gender, to assume priesthood.
• The petitioners alleged the state government was unlawfully attempting to appoint non-believers as archakas, infringing upon religious rights protected under the Constitution.
• They contended that knowledge of the Agamas, which are significant religious practices, could not be secured by completing the one-year certificate course run by the government, but required years of rigorous training under learned Gurus.
• The debate over the appointment of temple priests in Tamil Nadu stems from various government and judicial actions.
  • In 1971, the DMK government of Chief Minister M Karunanidhi amended the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowment (HR & CE) Act to abolish the hereditary appointment of priests, and to allow individuals from all castes to be priests.
  • In 2006, the government declared all qualified personseligible to be priests.
    • The Supreme Court struck this down in 2015.
    • It underlined the adherence to Agama Sastras, while ensuring that constitutional rights were not violated.
  • In 2009, Madras High Court ruled in favour of a woman priest from Usilampatti, Madurai, who was facing opposition from male priests regarding her inherited right to conduct puja at the Arulmigu Durgai Amman temple.
    • The court underlined the irony of objecting to puja by a woman in a temple with a female deity, emphasised historical precedents of women conducting rituals, and rejected the unwarranted application of Agama Sastras and norms of the Manusmriti in this context.
    • It stressed on the need to eliminate gender bias from temples to realise the constitutional mandates under Articles 15 (“prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth”) and 51A(e) (fundamental duty “to…renounce practices derogatory to the dignity of women”).
  • In the Guruvayoor Devaswom case (2004), the SC upheld the appointment of non-believers to the temple trust board.
  • In the N Adithayan (2002) case, the SC ruled that no custom pre-existing the Constitution could exclude non-Brahmins from performing puja in temples if they were otherwise trained and qualified.
• These judgments highlighted the judiciary’s commitment to ensuring equality and non-discrimination in the appointment of priests, asserting that neither caste nor family succession should dictate eligibility for performing temple rituals and the appointment of pujaris (archakas).

About Agamas:

• The Agamas are a collection of several Tantric literature and scriptures of Hindu schools.
• The term literally means tradition.
• The Agama texts describe cosmology, epistemology, philosophical doctrines, precepts on meditation and practices, four kinds of yoga, mantras, temple construction, deity worship and ways to attain sixfold desires.
• These canonical texts are in Tamil and Sanskrit.
• The three main branches of Agama texts are Shaiva, Vaishnava, and Shakta.
• The origin and chronology of Agamas is unclear.
  • Some are Vedic and others non-Vedic.

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Topic 4: Faulty policies on invasive exotics

Why in news: Concerns over the management of the invasive Conocarpus species of trees have recently led Gujarat and, last year, Telangana, to ban their use.

Problem areas:

• This has brought fresh attention to the process of selection of species in urban landscaping projects in particular, which favours the use of exotics for beautification and greening.
• It has been shown repeatedly that many species that were introduced to India previously for greening or ornamental projects eventually turned invasive.
• Native species that failed to compete for space and soil resources were driven to extinction, and significant costs were incurred to ensure the management of the invasive species.
• Among the notable species are those of Eucalyptus, Prosopis juliflora (vilayati kikar), Acacia mangium, and Lantana camara.
• They continue to be used until considerable focus is brought on to their invasive characteristics.
• There are two species of Conocarpus (buttonwood) trees, with several varieties and hybrids:
  • Conocarpus erectus, which is more widely used in India, is native to South America, and
  • C. lancifolius is native to East Africa.
• They are easily propagated and multiplied in nurseries through stem cuttings.
• Serious pollen allergies and respiratory problems have been reported in the vicinity of their plantations, which has led to civic agencies taking action to ban them.

What is being done to address the root cause of this kind of problem?

• Conocarpus can hopefully still be managed, but we have certainly lost the chance to manage Prosopis juliflora and Lantana camara on public lands and commons.
• We can also no longer manage Leucaena leucocephala, which is battling it out with vilayati kikar for dominance in the urban woodlands of Delhi.

Why do urban greening initiatives end up deploying these exotics in the first place?

• The non-native species, in a biogeographic sense, often face very few or no pests or pathogens in new habitats, which makes their proliferation easy.
• Some species like Conocarpus are not browsed by livestock, and are thus favoured for horticultural or landscaping projects.
• The problems surface only slowly and often much later.
• The human population gets familiar with the local pollen calendar and, to a large extent, their immune systems coevolve.
• People in cities are exposed to a spectrum of allergens in any case, and respiratory allergies are common.
• Into this already precarious landscape comes new and newer plantations of exotics, which are ironically brought in often to improve urban air quality and aesthetics.

Way forward:

• Using knowledge in appropriate way:
  • Almost all horticultural species are well studied, and propensities, including phytochemical volatiles and allergies, are well known.

• It is certainly possible for landscape managers to choose from among native species pools, species that are ecologically appropriate and also meet aesthetic needs.
  • Tragically, urban landscaping and agroforestry projects often do not even refer to existing information on these species before taking up their large-scale use.
• Using native species:
  • Based on available research, it is almost unanimously recommended by scientists that urban greening projects should use native species for long-term sustainability.
  • Doing so may marginally increase the costs and effort, but will add immense value in terms of ecosystem services in the medium to long term.
• Control on imports and usage:
  • The import and use of horticultural plants need to be monitored by maintaining a watch list of plants that are known to harm native species and ecosystems, and raise public health concerns.
• Proper guidelines:
  • The numbers of mega greening projects are likely to increase in the coming years in step with India’s climate commitments, and landscape planners and land managers need clear guidelines outlining these principle.
• Carbon sequestration:
  • The value of Carbon sequestration by urban greens has been highlighted by recent research to contribute significantly to mitigating Greenhouse gas emissions, thereby contributing significantly to the green GDP of a country.
  • India aspires to meet its global emission reduction commitments.
  • Greening projects need to be mindful about the consortium of species that are used.

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Topic 5: The concerns of using Aadhaar in welfare

Why in news: Recently, credit rating agency Moody’s Investor Service released a report, which states that the [Aadhaar] system faces hurdles, including the burden of establishing authorisation and concerns about biometric reliability.

How has India reacted?

• The government has strongly refuted these claims.
• The government termed Aadhaar as the most trusted digital ID in the world.
• The government stated that it is evident that the authors of the report are unaware that the seeding of Aadhaar in the MGNREGS database has been done without requiring the worker to authenticate using their biometrics.
• Even payment to workers under the scheme is made by directly crediting money in their account and does not require the worker to authenticate using their biometrics.

Rationale for Aadhaar

• Aadhaar is a unique identification number given to all Indian residents by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
• During enrolment for Aadhaar, demographic details of individuals along with their biometric fingerprints and iris scans are collected as they are considered to be unique identifiers of individuals.
• These details are stored in the Aadhaar database.
• The objectives of UIDAI were to ensure that all residents have a unique ID and to curb corruption in accessing welfare programmes by eliminating “ghost” and “fake” individuals.
• The government favours Aadhaar for several other government-to-citizen cash transfer programmes.
• By removing ghosts and duplicates, the government has claimed substantial savings in welfare schemes through the usage of Aadhaar.

Aadhaar’s role in cash withdrawals

• To direct a payment using Aadhaar for MGNREGA, there are at least three steps.
  • First, a worker’s Aadhaar number must be linked to her job card.
  • Second, her Aadhaar must be linked to her bank account.
  • Third, the Aadhaar number must be linked correctly through her bank branch with a mapper of the National Payments Corporation of India, which acts as a clearing house of Aadhaar-based payments.
• Aadhaar becomes the financial address of the individual and cash transferred by the government gets deposited to the last Aadhaar-linked bank account.
• Individuals can withdraw money from their Aadhaar-linked bank account from private banking kiosks or through private banking correspondents who use their point of sale (PoS) machines to authenticate individuals using their biometrics.
  • This platform is known as the Aadhaar-enabled Payment System (AePS).

Concerns of Aadhaar’s use:

• Quantity fraud:
  • In the case of rations, several organisations and researchers have provided evidence demonstrating that the main type of corruption is quantity fraud.
  • It happens when, say the entitlement for a ration card holder is 35 kg of rice but the dealer only gives 30 kg.
  • Aadhaar has no role in either detecting or preventing this fraud.
• Authentication not easy:
  • In many rural areas, people have to make multiple trips to ration shops, to authenticate with no guarantee that the authentication will work.
• Lack of conducive Infrastructure:
  • Lack of reliable internet, fading fingerprints among daily wage workers, lack of phone connectivity to get an OTP etc. lead to denials.
• No transparency:
  • The data on the number of attempts to authenticate and the extent of authentication failures are not public.
  • A report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) from 2022 states that UIDAI did not have a system to analyse the factors leading to authentication errors.
• Recurring payment failures:
  • In Aadhaar-based payments, error in any step results in payment failures.
  • Different spellings in the job card and in the Aadhaar database can result in authentication failures.
  • Most workers are unaware which account their Aadhaar was last linked to as financial institutions in rural areas tend to coerce workers to link their Aadhaar with bank accounts without consent.
  • This leads to wages getting diverted to some account without the worker’s knowledge.
  • A recent working paper using 31 million MGNREGA wage transactions demonstrates no statistical evidence of these claims and points to lack of sufficient funds as the reasons for delays.
• Security concerns:
  • Banking correspondents using the AePS operate without any accountability framework.
  • Some of them ask individuals to biometrically authenticate multiple times.
  • Each authentication gives access to the banking correspondents to operate the individual’s bank account.
  • Several studies and news reports have highlighted how using AePS, money from workers’ accounts have been withdrawn or that they have been signed up for government insurance programmes without consent.
  • The ₹10 crore scholarship scam in Jharkhand from 2020 exemplifies this.

Conclusion:

• The government’s push to make Aadhaar-based payments mandatory in MGNREGA has faced resistance from workers and field officials.
• A recent paper show that job cards of several active workers have been deleted on grounds of being “ghosts.”
• Based on such dilutions of accountability in welfare due to Aadhaar, critics are concerned about the government’s intentions of linking voter IDs with Aadhaar.

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Topic 6: Quote: To the hungry, God can only appear as bread

Why in news: Recently, renowned agricultural scientist MS Swaminathan (1925-2023) passed away. Swaminathan mentioned Gandhi, attributing the following quote to him: “To the millions who have to go without two meals a day… God can only appear as bread”.

Why Gandhi spoke about hunger

• Gandhi was an advocate of self-rule (swaraj) and self-sufficiency.
• His ideal economic and political models focused on equipping the smallest units, the villages of India, to be self-sufficient in terms of clothing and feeding themselves by spinning their own yarn and promoting agriculture locally.
• His larger ideology also focused on the concepts of sarvodaya (progress for all) and antodaya, or the upliftment of the last person in society, who is still untouched by the progress others have made.
• In this regard, the issue of hunger was associated with the need to produce enough and for the last person to be able to access and afford food.
• Even today, India has been recording decreasing Global Hunger Index scores over the years, ranking 107 out of 121 countries in 2022.

Why Swaminathan mentioned Gandhi’s quote on hunger 

• Apart from being inspired by Gandhi in his youth, Swaminathan also found his words relevant on a specific issue – achieving ‘zero hunger’.
• In a 2013 booklet published by the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, titled ‘Zero Hunger is Possible’, he wrote of Gandhi in the context of how India would achieve this goal.
  • It is a global movement to end hunger.
  • ‘Zero hunger’ is also one of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are aimed to be achieved by 2030.
• Gandhiji said, this God of bread must be available to every home and hut in an independent India.
• It is after a long time, after more than sixty years of independence, we have been able to redeem that pledge through Green Revolution.

How did the Green Revolution help in tackling food insecurity?

• Swaminathan spoke of the Green Revolution in India in the context of zero hunger – how until then, India had to import staple foods like rice and wheat from countries like the United States.
• He explained the three factors behind the scale of success it achieved:
  • First was Technology, allowing yields to increase through the development of new crop varieties, and helping in developing pesticides.
  • Second was Services.
    • The nationalisation of the banking system in 1969 led to banks being asked to focus on extending rural credit under the priority sector norms.
    • New programmes for agricultural extension were designed to enable diffusion of technology, particularly, in targeted areas and among small and marginal farmers.
  • Thirdly, he credited public policy.
    • The Agricultural Prices Commission and the Food Corporation of India were established
    • Remunerative floor prices for food grains were established and
    • An expanded public distribution system for food security and poverty alleviation came up.

The problem of hidden hunger and its solutions

• Hidden hunger is a form of undernutrition that occurs when intake and absorption of vitamins and minerals (such as zinc, iodine, and iron) are too low to sustain good health and development.
• Factors that contribute to micronutrient deficiencies include poor diet, increased micronutrient needs during certain life stages, such as pregnancy and lactation, and health problems such as diseases, infections, or parasites. 
• Chemical solution;
  • The earlier approach to eradication of hidden hunger was primarily based on chemical fortification.
• Even today, for example, salt can be fortified with iron, iodine, Vitamin A and many other micro-nutrients.
• Naturalsolution:
  • Nature provides a wide range of naturally bio-fortified foods.
  • A simple plant like moringa has almost all the micro-nutrients you need.
  • Sweet potato is very rich in Vitamin A.
  • There are varieties of pearl millet, commonly consumed in India, which are very rich in iron.

Conclusion:

• In this way, nutrition-sensitive farming systems should be promoted.
• One of the later criticisms of the Green Revolution has been the fact that a majority of its focus went to wheat and rice, and the emphasis on their cultivation has now led to ecological problems.
• Not all farmers should have to cultivate water-guzzling crops to support themselves, especially given the varied geographical diversity of India.
• Ultimately, Swaminathan advocated for providing adequate nutrition for all in a sustainable manner.

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Topic 7: The largest climate action lawsuit against 32 countries

Why in news: Six young people from Portugal, aged 11 to 24, are suing 32 European governments (including the U.K., Russia and Turkey) at the European Court of Human Rights arguing that their governments have failed to take sufficient action against the climate crisis, thus violating their human rights and discriminating against young people globally.

Key details:

• The recent spate of heatwaves and fires across Greece, Canada and other parts of Europe served as reminders that every increment beyond the 1.5°C temperature threshold would be catastrophic, intensifying “multiple and concurrent hazards,” as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states in its report.
• They claim that European nations have faltered in their climate emission goals, blowing past their global carbon budgets consistent with the Paris Agreement target of limiting global warming under 1.5°C.
• The nations have thus violated people’s fundamental rights protected under the European Convention on Human Rights, including:
  • the right to life,
  • the right to be free from inhuman or degrading treatment,
  • the right to privacy and family life and
  • the right to be free from discrimination.
• Since the 32 countries contributed to climate catastrophes and jeopardised the future of young people, it falls upon the nations to rapidly escalate their emissions reductions and aim higher in curtailing domestic emissions.
• Other measures include cutting the production of fossil fuels and cleaning up global supply chains.

How this can be achieved:

• The European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change (ESABCC), a body which provides scientific advice to EU countries, said countries will have to target an emissions reduction of 75% below 1990 levels (as opposed to the EU’s current 55%).
• Under some of these principles, the EU has already exhausted its fair share of the global emissions budget.
• The EU at present is the sixth largest emitter with 7.2 tonnes of CO2 per capita, while the world averages 6.3 tonnes per capita.

What UNICEF says:

• UNICEF is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide
• United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has dubbed the climate crisis as a “child rights crisis”.
• Unhindered carbon emissions and extreme weather threaten access to education, health, nutrition and the future.
• Air pollution is already linked to poor birth outcomes and increased risk of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.
• Heat waves are triggering mental health issues.

Conclusion:

• It comes down to cause and effect: countries so far have rejected any relationship between climate change and its impact on human health.
  • For instance, Greece, in its submissions, maintained that the effects of climate change do not seem to directly affect human life or human health.
  • This is even as the country witnessed devastating wildfires and torrential rain and flooding.
• The Portuguese and Irish governments have dismissed these concerns as ‘future fears’, arguing that there is no evidence to show climate change poses an immediate risk to their lives.

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Topic 8: Argentina, India sign social security agreement

Why in news: India and Argentina recently signed an agreement on social security.

Key details:

• It aims to ensure legal rights of professionals in each other’s domain that will assist in risk-free international mobility.
• The ‘Social Security Agreement’ is aimed at ensuring rights of the growing number of Indian nationals employed in various Indian and international concerns in Argentina as well as for Argentine nationals seeking employment in India.
• The Social Security Agreement (SSA) between India and Argentina has created a legal framework which will enable professionals on both sides to claim old age and survivor’s pensions.
• It also safeguards permanent and total disability pension for employed persons as well as to legislations in Argentina concerning contributory benefits of the Social Security System.
• It also takes care of factors like rent, subsidy and lump sum payments as per national laws of both countries.

India-Argentina Relations:

Topic 1: SASTRA Ramanujan Prize

Why in news: The 2023 SASTRA Ramanujan Prize will be awarded to Ruixiang Zhang of the University of California, Berkeley.

About the prize:

• The SASTRA Ramanujan Prize was founded by Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy (SASTRA).
• The prize was instituted in the year 2005.
• It is awarded every year to a young mathematician judged to have done outstanding work in Ramanujan’s fields of interest.
• The age limit for the prize has been set at 32 (the age at which Ramanujan died), and the current award is $10,000.

Contribution of Zhang:

• The prize will be awarded at an International Conference in Number Theory.
• His fundamental work spans analytic number theory, combinatorics, Euclidean harmonic analysis, and geometry.
• Building on his doctoral thesis, he and Shaoming Guo proved a generalisation of the main conjecture in Vinogradov’s mean value theorem, which is concerned with the sums of numbers raised to a certain power.

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Topic 2: The story of Mahatma Gandhi’s portrait on Indian banknotes

Why in news: The most widely circulated image of Gandhi, however, is his portrait on Indian official currency notes.

Key details:

• As the Father of the Nation, he might seem an obvious choice to have appeared on the national currency after the formation of independent India in 1947.
• But it was only in 1996, that he became a permanent feature on legal banknotes of every denomination issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

The origins of Gandhi’s image on Indian currency

• The portrait of Gandhi is cut-out of a photograph taken in 1946, where he is standing with British politician Lord Frederick William Pethick-Lawrence.
• The RBI’s Department of Currency Management is responsible for designing the rupee notes.
• It has to get approval for the designs from the central bank and the Union government.

When did Gandhi first appear on INR notes?

• Gandhi first featured on Indian currency in 1969, when a special series was issued to commemorate his 100th birth anniversary.
• Bearing the signature of the RBI governor LK Jha, it depicted Gandhi with the Sevagram Ashram in the backdrop.
• Then, in October 1987, a series of Rs 500 currency notes, featuring Gandhi, was launched.

The banknotes for independent India

• For a few months after the declaration of independent India on August 15, 1947, the RBI continued to issue notes from the colonial period featuring King George VI.
• The government of India brought out its new design of the 1-rupee note in 1949 — in the watermark window, King George was replaced with a symbol of the Lion Capital of Ashoka Pillar at Sarnath.
• The 1980s saw emphasis on symbols of scientific and technological advancements and Indian art forms — the Aryabhatta satellite featured on the Rs 2 note, farm mechanisation on Rs 5 and the Konark Wheel on Rs 20, among others.

When did Gandhi’s portrait become a permanent feature on banknotes?

• It was reportedly believed that inanimate objects would be relatively easier to forge compared to a human face.
• Gandhi was chosen because of his national appeal, and in 1996, a new ‘Mahatma Gandhi Series’ was launched by the RBI to replace the former Ashoka Pillar bank notes.
• Several security features were also introduced, including a windowed security thread, latent image and intaglio features for the visually impaired.
• In 2016, the ‘Mahatma Gandhi New Series’ of banknotes were announced by the RBI.
• The portrait of Gandhi continues, while the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan logo has been added on the back of the notes, apart from additional security features.

The demand to include others on banknotes

• Recent years have seen several suggestions on others who could feature on currency notes, apart from Gandhi such as that of:
  • Lord Ganesha and goddess Lakshmi on currency notes.
  • Noble Laureate Rabindranath Tagore
  • former President APJ Abdul Kalam.
• The RBI had rejected suggestions of replacing Gandhi’s portrait with any other leader on the bank notes.
• The Committee (constituted by RBI) decided that no other personality could better represent the ethos of India than Mahatma Gandhi.

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Topic 3: The Agamas

Why in news: The Supreme Court ordered status quo on the appointment of archakas (priests) in Agamic temples in Tamil Nadu.

Key details:

• The Srirangam Koil Miras Kainkaryaparagal Matrum Athanai Sarntha Koilgalin Miraskain-karyaparargalin Nalasangam, an association of archakas, had challenged reforms introduced by the Tamil Nadu government, which are seen as attempting to change the hereditary system of appointing archakas in Agama temples.
• The petitioners asked for the quashing of the state government’s order and letters which paved the way for individuals trained in Agama Sastra, irrespective of caste and gender, to assume priesthood.
• The petitioners alleged the state government was unlawfully attempting to appoint non-believers as archakas, infringing upon religious rights protected under the Constitution.
• They contended that knowledge of the Agamas, which are significant religious practices, could not be secured by completing the one-year certificate course run by the government, but required years of rigorous training under learned Gurus.
• The debate over the appointment of temple priests in Tamil Nadu stems from various government and judicial actions.
  • In 1971, the DMK government of Chief Minister M Karunanidhi amended the Tamil Nadu Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowment (HR & CE) Act to abolish the hereditary appointment of priests, and to allow individuals from all castes to be priests.
  • In 2006, the government declared all qualified personseligible to be priests.
    • The Supreme Court struck this down in 2015.
    • It underlined the adherence to Agama Sastras, while ensuring that constitutional rights were not violated.
  • In 2009, Madras High Court ruled in favour of a woman priest from Usilampatti, Madurai, who was facing opposition from male priests regarding her inherited right to conduct puja at the Arulmigu Durgai Amman temple.
    • The court underlined the irony of objecting to puja by a woman in a temple with a female deity, emphasised historical precedents of women conducting rituals, and rejected the unwarranted application of Agama Sastras and norms of the Manusmriti in this context.
    • It stressed on the need to eliminate gender bias from temples to realise the constitutional mandates under Articles 15 (“prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth”) and 51A(e) (fundamental duty “to…renounce practices derogatory to the dignity of women”).
  • In the Guruvayoor Devaswom case (2004), the SC upheld the appointment of non-believers to the temple trust board.
  • In the N Adithayan (2002) case, the SC ruled that no custom pre-existing the Constitution could exclude non-Brahmins from performing puja in temples if they were otherwise trained and qualified.
• These judgments highlighted the judiciary’s commitment to ensuring equality and non-discrimination in the appointment of priests, asserting that neither caste nor family succession should dictate eligibility for performing temple rituals and the appointment of pujaris (archakas).

About Agamas:

• The Agamas are a collection of several Tantric literature and scriptures of Hindu schools.
• The term literally means tradition.
• The Agama texts describe cosmology, epistemology, philosophical doctrines, precepts on meditation and practices, four kinds of yoga, mantras, temple construction, deity worship and ways to attain sixfold desires.
• These canonical texts are in Tamil and Sanskrit.
• The three main branches of Agama texts are Shaiva, Vaishnava, and Shakta.
• The origin and chronology of Agamas is unclear.
  • Some are Vedic and others non-Vedic.

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Topic 4: Faulty policies on invasive exotics

Why in news: Concerns over the management of the invasive Conocarpus species of trees have recently led Gujarat and, last year, Telangana, to ban their use.

Problem areas:

• This has brought fresh attention to the process of selection of species in urban landscaping projects in particular, which favours the use of exotics for beautification and greening.
• It has been shown repeatedly that many species that were introduced to India previously for greening or ornamental projects eventually turned invasive.
• Native species that failed to compete for space and soil resources were driven to extinction, and significant costs were incurred to ensure the management of the invasive species.
• Among the notable species are those of Eucalyptus, Prosopis juliflora (vilayati kikar), Acacia mangium, and Lantana camara.
• They continue to be used until considerable focus is brought on to their invasive characteristics.
• There are two species of Conocarpus (buttonwood) trees, with several varieties and hybrids:
  • Conocarpus erectus, which is more widely used in India, is native to South America, and
  • C. lancifolius is native to East Africa.
• They are easily propagated and multiplied in nurseries through stem cuttings.
• Serious pollen allergies and respiratory problems have been reported in the vicinity of their plantations, which has led to civic agencies taking action to ban them.

What is being done to address the root cause of this kind of problem?

• Conocarpus can hopefully still be managed, but we have certainly lost the chance to manage Prosopis juliflora and Lantana camara on public lands and commons.
• We can also no longer manage Leucaena leucocephala, which is battling it out with vilayati kikar for dominance in the urban woodlands of Delhi.

Why do urban greening initiatives end up deploying these exotics in the first place?

• The non-native species, in a biogeographic sense, often face very few or no pests or pathogens in new habitats, which makes their proliferation easy.
• Some species like Conocarpus are not browsed by livestock, and are thus favoured for horticultural or landscaping projects.
• The problems surface only slowly and often much later.
• The human population gets familiar with the local pollen calendar and, to a large extent, their immune systems coevolve.
• People in cities are exposed to a spectrum of allergens in any case, and respiratory allergies are common.
• Into this already precarious landscape comes new and newer plantations of exotics, which are ironically brought in often to improve urban air quality and aesthetics.

Way forward:

• Using knowledge in appropriate way:
  • Almost all horticultural species are well studied, and propensities, including phytochemical volatiles and allergies, are well known.

• It is certainly possible for landscape managers to choose from among native species pools, species that are ecologically appropriate and also meet aesthetic needs.
  • Tragically, urban landscaping and agroforestry projects often do not even refer to existing information on these species before taking up their large-scale use.
• Using native species:
  • Based on available research, it is almost unanimously recommended by scientists that urban greening projects should use native species for long-term sustainability.
  • Doing so may marginally increase the costs and effort, but will add immense value in terms of ecosystem services in the medium to long term.
• Control on imports and usage:
  • The import and use of horticultural plants need to be monitored by maintaining a watch list of plants that are known to harm native species and ecosystems, and raise public health concerns.
• Proper guidelines:
  • The numbers of mega greening projects are likely to increase in the coming years in step with India’s climate commitments, and landscape planners and land managers need clear guidelines outlining these principle.
• Carbon sequestration:
  • The value of Carbon sequestration by urban greens has been highlighted by recent research to contribute significantly to mitigating Greenhouse gas emissions, thereby contributing significantly to the green GDP of a country.
  • India aspires to meet its global emission reduction commitments.
  • Greening projects need to be mindful about the consortium of species that are used.

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Topic 5: The concerns of using Aadhaar in welfare

Why in news: Recently, credit rating agency Moody’s Investor Service released a report, which states that the [Aadhaar] system faces hurdles, including the burden of establishing authorisation and concerns about biometric reliability.

How has India reacted?

• The government has strongly refuted these claims.
• The government termed Aadhaar as the most trusted digital ID in the world.
• The government stated that it is evident that the authors of the report are unaware that the seeding of Aadhaar in the MGNREGS database has been done without requiring the worker to authenticate using their biometrics.
• Even payment to workers under the scheme is made by directly crediting money in their account and does not require the worker to authenticate using their biometrics.

Rationale for Aadhaar

• Aadhaar is a unique identification number given to all Indian residents by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
• During enrolment for Aadhaar, demographic details of individuals along with their biometric fingerprints and iris scans are collected as they are considered to be unique identifiers of individuals.
• These details are stored in the Aadhaar database.
• The objectives of UIDAI were to ensure that all residents have a unique ID and to curb corruption in accessing welfare programmes by eliminating “ghost” and “fake” individuals.
• The government favours Aadhaar for several other government-to-citizen cash transfer programmes.
• By removing ghosts and duplicates, the government has claimed substantial savings in welfare schemes through the usage of Aadhaar.

Aadhaar’s role in cash withdrawals

• To direct a payment using Aadhaar for MGNREGA, there are at least three steps.
  • First, a worker’s Aadhaar number must be linked to her job card.
  • Second, her Aadhaar must be linked to her bank account.
  • Third, the Aadhaar number must be linked correctly through her bank branch with a mapper of the National Payments Corporation of India, which acts as a clearing house of Aadhaar-based payments.
• Aadhaar becomes the financial address of the individual and cash transferred by the government gets deposited to the last Aadhaar-linked bank account.
• Individuals can withdraw money from their Aadhaar-linked bank account from private banking kiosks or through private banking correspondents who use their point of sale (PoS) machines to authenticate individuals using their biometrics.
  • This platform is known as the Aadhaar-enabled Payment System (AePS).

Concerns of Aadhaar’s use:

• Quantity fraud:
  • In the case of rations, several organisations and researchers have provided evidence demonstrating that the main type of corruption is quantity fraud.
  • It happens when, say the entitlement for a ration card holder is 35 kg of rice but the dealer only gives 30 kg.
  • Aadhaar has no role in either detecting or preventing this fraud.
• Authentication not easy:
  • In many rural areas, people have to make multiple trips to ration shops, to authenticate with no guarantee that the authentication will work.
• Lack of conducive Infrastructure:
  • Lack of reliable internet, fading fingerprints among daily wage workers, lack of phone connectivity to get an OTP etc. lead to denials.
• No transparency:
  • The data on the number of attempts to authenticate and the extent of authentication failures are not public.
  • A report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) from 2022 states that UIDAI did not have a system to analyse the factors leading to authentication errors.
• Recurring payment failures:
  • In Aadhaar-based payments, error in any step results in payment failures.
  • Different spellings in the job card and in the Aadhaar database can result in authentication failures.
  • Most workers are unaware which account their Aadhaar was last linked to as financial institutions in rural areas tend to coerce workers to link their Aadhaar with bank accounts without consent.
  • This leads to wages getting diverted to some account without the worker’s knowledge.
  • A recent working paper using 31 million MGNREGA wage transactions demonstrates no statistical evidence of these claims and points to lack of sufficient funds as the reasons for delays.
• Security concerns:
  • Banking correspondents using the AePS operate without any accountability framework.
  • Some of them ask individuals to biometrically authenticate multiple times.
  • Each authentication gives access to the banking correspondents to operate the individual’s bank account.
  • Several studies and news reports have highlighted how using AePS, money from workers’ accounts have been withdrawn or that they have been signed up for government insurance programmes without consent.
  • The ₹10 crore scholarship scam in Jharkhand from 2020 exemplifies this.

Conclusion:

• The government’s push to make Aadhaar-based payments mandatory in MGNREGA has faced resistance from workers and field officials.
• A recent paper show that job cards of several active workers have been deleted on grounds of being “ghosts.”
• Based on such dilutions of accountability in welfare due to Aadhaar, critics are concerned about the government’s intentions of linking voter IDs with Aadhaar.

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Topic 6: Quote: To the hungry, God can only appear as bread

Why in news: Recently, renowned agricultural scientist MS Swaminathan (1925-2023) passed away. Swaminathan mentioned Gandhi, attributing the following quote to him: “To the millions who have to go without two meals a day… God can only appear as bread”.

Why Gandhi spoke about hunger

• Gandhi was an advocate of self-rule (swaraj) and self-sufficiency.
• His ideal economic and political models focused on equipping the smallest units, the villages of India, to be self-sufficient in terms of clothing and feeding themselves by spinning their own yarn and promoting agriculture locally.
• His larger ideology also focused on the concepts of sarvodaya (progress for all) and antodaya, or the upliftment of the last person in society, who is still untouched by the progress others have made.
• In this regard, the issue of hunger was associated with the need to produce enough and for the last person to be able to access and afford food.
• Even today, India has been recording decreasing Global Hunger Index scores over the years, ranking 107 out of 121 countries in 2022.

Why Swaminathan mentioned Gandhi’s quote on hunger 

• Apart from being inspired by Gandhi in his youth, Swaminathan also found his words relevant on a specific issue – achieving ‘zero hunger’.
• In a 2013 booklet published by the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, titled ‘Zero Hunger is Possible’, he wrote of Gandhi in the context of how India would achieve this goal.
  • It is a global movement to end hunger.
  • ‘Zero hunger’ is also one of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are aimed to be achieved by 2030.
• Gandhiji said, this God of bread must be available to every home and hut in an independent India.
• It is after a long time, after more than sixty years of independence, we have been able to redeem that pledge through Green Revolution.

How did the Green Revolution help in tackling food insecurity?

• Swaminathan spoke of the Green Revolution in India in the context of zero hunger – how until then, India had to import staple foods like rice and wheat from countries like the United States.
• He explained the three factors behind the scale of success it achieved:
  • First was Technology, allowing yields to increase through the development of new crop varieties, and helping in developing pesticides.
  • Second was Services.
    • The nationalisation of the banking system in 1969 led to banks being asked to focus on extending rural credit under the priority sector norms.
    • New programmes for agricultural extension were designed to enable diffusion of technology, particularly, in targeted areas and among small and marginal farmers.
  • Thirdly, he credited public policy.
    • The Agricultural Prices Commission and the Food Corporation of India were established
    • Remunerative floor prices for food grains were established and
    • An expanded public distribution system for food security and poverty alleviation came up.

The problem of hidden hunger and its solutions

• Hidden hunger is a form of undernutrition that occurs when intake and absorption of vitamins and minerals (such as zinc, iodine, and iron) are too low to sustain good health and development.
• Factors that contribute to micronutrient deficiencies include poor diet, increased micronutrient needs during certain life stages, such as pregnancy and lactation, and health problems such as diseases, infections, or parasites. 
• Chemical solution;
  • The earlier approach to eradication of hidden hunger was primarily based on chemical fortification.
• Even today, for example, salt can be fortified with iron, iodine, Vitamin A and many other micro-nutrients.
• Naturalsolution:
  • Nature provides a wide range of naturally bio-fortified foods.
  • A simple plant like moringa has almost all the micro-nutrients you need.
  • Sweet potato is very rich in Vitamin A.
  • There are varieties of pearl millet, commonly consumed in India, which are very rich in iron.

Conclusion:

• In this way, nutrition-sensitive farming systems should be promoted.
• One of the later criticisms of the Green Revolution has been the fact that a majority of its focus went to wheat and rice, and the emphasis on their cultivation has now led to ecological problems.
• Not all farmers should have to cultivate water-guzzling crops to support themselves, especially given the varied geographical diversity of India.
• Ultimately, Swaminathan advocated for providing adequate nutrition for all in a sustainable manner.

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Topic 7: The largest climate action lawsuit against 32 countries

Why in news: Six young people from Portugal, aged 11 to 24, are suing 32 European governments (including the U.K., Russia and Turkey) at the European Court of Human Rights arguing that their governments have failed to take sufficient action against the climate crisis, thus violating their human rights and discriminating against young people globally.

Key details:

• The recent spate of heatwaves and fires across Greece, Canada and other parts of Europe served as reminders that every increment beyond the 1.5°C temperature threshold would be catastrophic, intensifying “multiple and concurrent hazards,” as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states in its report.
• They claim that European nations have faltered in their climate emission goals, blowing past their global carbon budgets consistent with the Paris Agreement target of limiting global warming under 1.5°C.
• The nations have thus violated people’s fundamental rights protected under the European Convention on Human Rights, including:
  • the right to life,
  • the right to be free from inhuman or degrading treatment,
  • the right to privacy and family life and
  • the right to be free from discrimination.
• Since the 32 countries contributed to climate catastrophes and jeopardised the future of young people, it falls upon the nations to rapidly escalate their emissions reductions and aim higher in curtailing domestic emissions.
• Other measures include cutting the production of fossil fuels and cleaning up global supply chains.

How this can be achieved:

• The European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change (ESABCC), a body which provides scientific advice to EU countries, said countries will have to target an emissions reduction of 75% below 1990 levels (as opposed to the EU’s current 55%).
• Under some of these principles, the EU has already exhausted its fair share of the global emissions budget.
• The EU at present is the sixth largest emitter with 7.2 tonnes of CO2 per capita, while the world averages 6.3 tonnes per capita.

What UNICEF says:

• UNICEF is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide
• United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has dubbed the climate crisis as a “child rights crisis”.
• Unhindered carbon emissions and extreme weather threaten access to education, health, nutrition and the future.
• Air pollution is already linked to poor birth outcomes and increased risk of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.
• Heat waves are triggering mental health issues.

Conclusion:

• It comes down to cause and effect: countries so far have rejected any relationship between climate change and its impact on human health.
  • For instance, Greece, in its submissions, maintained that the effects of climate change do not seem to directly affect human life or human health.
  • This is even as the country witnessed devastating wildfires and torrential rain and flooding.
• The Portuguese and Irish governments have dismissed these concerns as ‘future fears’, arguing that there is no evidence to show climate change poses an immediate risk to their lives.

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Topic 8: Argentina, India sign social security agreement

Why in news: India and Argentina recently signed an agreement on social security.

Key details:

• It aims to ensure legal rights of professionals in each other’s domain that will assist in risk-free international mobility.
• The ‘Social Security Agreement’ is aimed at ensuring rights of the growing number of Indian nationals employed in various Indian and international concerns in Argentina as well as for Argentine nationals seeking employment in India.
• The Social Security Agreement (SSA) between India and Argentina has created a legal framework which will enable professionals on both sides to claim old age and survivor’s pensions.
• It also safeguards permanent and total disability pension for employed persons as well as to legislations in Argentina concerning contributory benefits of the Social Security System.
• It also takes care of factors like rent, subsidy and lump sum payments as per national laws of both countries.

India-Argentina Relations:

• Bilateral Trade
  • The India-Argentina bilateral trade registered a historic peak of USD 6.4 billion in the year 2022, with a growth rate of 12% over 2021.
  • India continued to retain its status as 4th largest trading partner of Argentina
  • Major items of India’s exports to Argentina include:
    • petroleum oils,
    • agro chemicals,
    • yarn-fabric-madeups,
    • organic chemicals,
    • bulk drugs and two-wheelers.  
  • Major items of India’s imports from Argentina include:
    • vegetable oils (soya bean and sunflower),
    • finished leather,
    • cereals,
    • residual chemicals and
    • allied products and pulses. 
• India-Argentina Business Council 
  • A bilateral business chamber, India-Argentina Business Council (IABC), was formally launched in 2020.
  • The Council, conceptualized as a non-profit organization comprising leading investors, exporters and importers in Argentina, is currently composed of over 30 companies. 
• Technical and Development Co-operation 
  • India has extended 40-45 slots annually under Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) scholarships for capacity building courses to Argentina
  • An India-Argentina Center of Excellence in IT in Buenos Aires, which is a physical manifestation of bilateral cooperation in the IT sector, has been established and launched courses in April 2023.
• Indian Community 
  • There are around 2600 NRIs / PIOs in Argentina.