Important topics and their relevance in UPSC CSE exam for March 21, 2024. If you missed the March 20, 2024 UPSC CSE exam key from the Indian Express, read it here

FRONT PAGE Centre asks Punjab how Moosewala’s mother used IVF at age 58

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Indian Polity and Governance-Constitution, Political System, Panchayati Raj, Public Policy, Rights Issues, etc.

Mains Examination: General Studies II: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- After wishes poured in for the parents of late Punjabi singer Sidhu Moosewala for conceiving and having a baby with the help of in-vitro fertilisation (IVF), the Union Health Ministry took notice, raising concerns to the Punjab government about the couple’s advanced age, which defied the age limits outlined in the assisted reproductive technologies (ART) Act.

• What is IVF?

• Why did the Centre intervene in this case?

• Why do these age restrictions exist in the first place?

• Do You Know-The age restrictions stem from several crucial health factors concerning the mother. As women age, the quality of their eggs declines, impacting the effectiveness of IVF. Moreover, without donor eggs, there’s a heightened risk of chromosomal abnormalities in embryos, posing risks to both mother and child. This underscores why many women choose to freeze their eggs when they’re younger, for later use. Additionally, aging affects how the body responds to fertility drugs, complicating the IVF process.

Dr Anjali Malpani, one of the pioneers of IVF in India, said: “Other than that, older women are more likely to have lifestyle conditions such as diabetes and hypertension that can complicate the course of their pregnancy. If they do not have it, they are also at an increased risk of developing gestational diabetes (diabetes that develops due to hormonal changes during pregnancy) and preeclampsia (high blood pressure developed during pregnancy).”

She added: “They are also at a higher risk of pre-term labour, premature rupture of membrane, and a higher likelihood of miscarriage in older women.” In addition, there is a social factor at play, according to experts. Elderly parents may not be able to keep up with a toddler, they might be able to keep up with the parents of the other children in the same class, and there is a likelihood of the parents passing away when the child is young in such cases.

• Can Indian parents opt for the therapy abroad as Moosewala’s parents did?

• What are the provisions of the ART Act & Surrogacy Act?

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

????India’s egg-freezing boom: How competitive cost and success rate are drawing foreigners to secure their parenthood

Centre notifies its fact check unit to red-flag news it considers false

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Main Examination: 

• General Studies II: Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

• General Studies III: Awareness in the fields of IT

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- A DAY BEFORE the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a challenge to the Bombay High Court’s interim order refusing to stay the setting up of a Fact Checking Unit (FCU), the Union Electronics and IT Ministry Wednesday notified the FCU under the Press Information Bureau as a statutory body with powers to flag what it believes is false information related to the Central government and its agencies on social media sites.

• What is fact-checking unit?

• For Your Information-The Ministry of Electronics and IT notified amendments to the Information Technology Rules, 2021, which allows the Ministry to appoint a fact-check body which will take a call on whether online information related to the Central Government is accurate. The final rules come months after the Ministry, in January, had first proposed that any piece of news that has been identified as “fake” by the fact-checking unit of the Press Information Bureau (PIB) – the Centre’s nodal agency to share news updates – will not be allowed on online intermediaries. However, the final draft has removed the reference to PIB.

• The proposal drawn a lot of criticism-Why?

• What do the final rules say?

• The Final Rules- On paper, what the final rules now say is that an online intermediary – including social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and internet service providers like Airtel, Jio and Vodafone Idea – should make “reasonable efforts” to not host content related to the Central Government that is “identified as fake or misleading” by a “fact check unit” that may be notified by the IT Ministry. In essence, if any piece of information is marked as fake by the upcoming fact check unit, intermediaries will be required to take it down, failing which they would risk losing their safe harbour, which protects them from litigation against third-party content. Social media sites will have to take down such posts, and internet service providers will have to block URLs of such content.

• What has the Centre said on concerns around censorship?

• What do you understand by ‘Significant Social Media Intermediaries (SSMIs)’?

• Digital media regulation in India-Know in detail

• Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2023-Know the Key Highlights

• Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021 and Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2023-Compare and Contrast

• What are the proposed amendments in Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2023?

• Fake news vs online censorship-where to draw the line?

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????Govt-appointed fact-check body: What it will do, concerns around it

????Ministry of Truth

????PIB’s fact-checking unit makes a comeback: Lack of time trumps credibility concerns

NREGS wages set to be hiked, Govt gets EC nod after poll conduct code

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Economic and Social Development

Main Examination: General Studies II: Important aspects of Governance and Welfare schemes for vulnerable sections of the population by the Centre and States and the performance of these schemes

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- The Election Commission of India has given the Ministry of Rural Development the go-ahead to notify revised wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act for the next financial year, effective April 1.

• How are wage rates for MGNREGS workers fixed?

• Do You Know-The Centre fixes state-wise wage rates for MGNREGS workers under sub-section (1) of section 6 of the MGNREGA, 2005. The wage rates are fixed according to changes in the CPI-AL (Consumer Price Index-Agriculture Labourer) which reflects the increase in inflation in rural areas.

It is learnt that all states have seen a hike in the MGNREGS wages for the financial year, with the overall increase being in the range of 5-6 per cent. Last year, the government had notified the MGNREGS wage rates for the financial year 2023-24 on March 25. Last month, a Parliamentary standing committee had recommended that the Centre should take a “considered view” on the issue of suitable increase in the wage rates under MGNREGA.

“The need for suitable increase in the wages under MGNREGA has been felt and echoed from various quarters and also highlighted by this Committee in its earlier reports. Therefore, the Committee once again recommend that DoRD (Department of Rural Development) should take a considered view on the pertinent issue of suitable increase in the wage rates under MGNREGA and increase the wage rates at the earliest for benefitting MGNREGA beneficiaries in a befitting manner,” the committee, headed by DMK member Kanimozhi Karunanidhi, stated in its report on ‘Rural Employment Through Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) – An Insight into Wage Rates and other matters relating thereto’.

Under MGNREGA, every rural household, whose adult member volunteers for unskilled manual work, is entitled to get at least 100 days of wage employment in a financial year. However, in some cases, the government allows additional 50 days of wage employment (beyond the stipulated 100 days). In the current financial year, about six crore rural households have availed the MGNREGS until March 20. Of these, 35.5 lakh households have completed 100 days of work.

• Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA)-Mandate, Goals

• What are the core objectives of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS)?

• When was Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act passed by the Indian Parliament?

• What is the relationship between the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (Mahatma Gandhi NREGA) and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (Mahatma Gandhi NREGS)?

• In what way paradigm shift has taken place with the implementation of MGNREGA?

• Who are the key stakeholders of MGNREGS?

• What is the role of Gram Sabha and Gram Panchayat in MGNREGS?

• How is Household defined in MGNREGA?

• Issues with MGNREGA?

• What are the eligibility criteria for receiving the benefits under MGNREGA scheme?

• Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA)-Nodal Ministry

• Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and Social Audit

• How schemes such as MGNREGA can help alleviate distress migration?

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????Budget 2023 cuts MGNREGS funds: The debate around the rural employment scheme

EXPLAINED

Intermittent fasting and heart health: concerns a study flags

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Main Examination: General Studies II: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-While intermittent fasting has grown in popularity, especially with its promise of improved insulin sensitivity among diabetics, a recent study has made an alarming claim — it increases the risk of death due to cardiovascular death by 91%. Experts said while the study’s data are not conclusive, they do flag the risks of intermittent fasting, and such diets should not be followed without consulting a doctor.

• What did the study look at?

• Do You Know-Intermittent fasting is essentially a time-restricted diet, where the day’s calorie requirements are consumed over a period of eight to twelve hours, with participants fasting for the rest of the day. Studies that tracked participants on such diets for short periods — three months to a year — have shown benefits such as weight-loss, increased insulin sensitivity, and better control of diabetes. The data presented recently tried to look at the long-term impact of intermittent fasting, following 20,000 adults from a US database for eight to 17 years.

It found that people who ate all of their food in less than 8 hours per day had a 91% higher risk of death due to cardiovascular disease. Among people already living with heart diseases, intermittent fasting increased the risk of death due to heart disease and stroke by 66%.

• Why can intermittent fasting be harmful?

• What do experts say about the study?

• What do existing studies say about intermittent fasting?

• For Your Information-There have been studies over the years that show intermittent fasting helps in burning fat, triggers essential cellular functions that can improve metabolism, improves insulin sensitivity, reduces blood glucose levels, and improves gut health.

A study published last year said that intermittent fasting improves autophagy — a process by which the body removes damaged cell components — helping with conditions such as cancer. Another early animal study pointed to the benefit of intermittent fasting for dementias and Alzheimer’s disease.

On the other hand, a Cochrane review of studies on the diet found that people may lose more weight by intermittent fasting when compared with normal eating over three months, but not when compared with energy restriction diets. The diet also did not lead to more weight loss over longer periods of up to 12 months.

Also, the Harvard review said the dropout rate for those following intermittent fasting was similar to those on calorie-restrictive diets, showing that intermittent fasting was not easier to follow than regular diets. There are no long-term studies to show the impact of intermittent fasting on ailments like diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases.

• Who should do it and how?

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

????Why intermittent fasting became the super diet of the year and came closest to managing your blood sugar and cholesterol

Small-scale LNG, a big idea

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Economic and Social Development

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Infrastructure: Energy, Ports, Roads, Airports, Railways etc.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri this month dedicated to the nation India’s first small-scale liquefied natural gas (SSLNG) unit at GAIL (India) Ltd’s Vijaipur complex in Madhya Pradesh.

• Why small-scale LNG?

• For Your Information-The government has been pushing for the adoption and use of natural gas across sectors, and aims to increase the share of natural gas in its primary energy mix to 15% by 2030 from a little more than 6% at present. This is because natural gas is far less polluting than conventional hydrocarbons like coal and oil; it is also cheaper than oil, more than 85% of India’s requirement for which is met through costly imports. Natural gas is seen as a key transition fuel in India’s journey towards green energy and future fuels.

However, a major challenge in scaling up gas consumption lies in the transportation of gas to places that are not connected by the country’s natural gas pipeline grid — a problem that also hinders the use of LNG directly as fuel for long-haul trucks and inter-city buses.

Large-scale pipeline projects that are in the works will take years to be completed; even so, last-mile delivery challenges may persist in many parts of the country. In this scenario, new-age solutions with fast turnaround times can help expand the reach, access, and consumption of natural gas.

SSLNG is one such promising solution. At the commissioning ceremony of the SSLNG unit at GAIL’s Vijaipur complex, Minister Puri said many such plants were expected to come up in the coming years, which could potentially change the country’s natural gas landscape. GAIL also plans to invest Rs 650 crore to develop dispensing stations along the Golden Quadrilateral and other major highways to provide LNG as an automotive fuel.

Compared with diesel, which is the dominant fuel in these segments, LNG is significantly cleaner — with reduced carbon dioxide emissions and negligible amounts of particulate matter, nitrogen oxide, and sulphur dioxide emissions. LNG offers a slightly longer range to vehicles than diesel with similar-sized fuel tanks, and is usually cheaper than crude oil, from which diesel is derived. Although India imports around half of its natural gas requirement, this dependency level is much lower than in the case of crude oil. Replacing a major chunk of India’s diesel consumption by LNG could lead to substantial foreign exchange savings. LNG has been used successfully and aggressively in medium and heavy commercial vehicles in many countries, most notably in China. The challenges in India include a lack of easy availability of LNG-powered vehicles, the higher initial cost of these vehicles compared with diesel and the absence of an LNG vehicle financing ecosystem, and the virtually non-existent LNG retail network. Companies such as GAIL and Petronet are working to build a viable ecosystem for transporters to move from diesel vehicles to LNG.

Petronet has collaborated with commercial vehicle manufacturers and other public sector oil and gas companies for trials and pilot projects for LNG-fuelled trucks and buses, is in discussions with state roadways corporations and truck fleet operators, and has established a few LNG dispensing stations along highways. IOC, like GAIL, is looking to build LNG dispensing stations along major highways.

• What exactly is SSLNG?

• How does the Vijaipur facility work?

• What is the business case for SSLNG?

• Why is the use of LNG in long-haul trucks and buses attractive?

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

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INDIA TO PRODUCE 600KT OF SOLAR WASTE BY 2030, NEW RESEARCH SAYS

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Economic and Social Development

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Infrastructure: Energy, Ports, Roads, Airports, Railways etc.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-India generated about 100 kilotonnes (kt) of solar waste in the financial year (FY) 2022-2023, according to a new study published on Wednesday (March 20). The amount of solar waste produced by the country is expected to reach 600 kt by 2030, the study said.

• What is solar waste?

• What are the findings of the study?

• How to deal with solar waste?

• Do You Know-Solar waste refers to the waste generated during the manufacturing of solar modules and waste from the field (project lifetime), according to the study. Manufacturing involves two streams of waste, including the scrap that’s produced and the waste generated from PV modules failing quality tests. Meanwhile, waste from the field involves three streams of waste. One, waste generated during transporting and handling — the damaged modules are considered as waste. Two, waste produced due to the damage incurred by solar modules during their lifetime. Three, when the modules reach their end-of-life and are not usable anymore.

The study only focused on waste from the field (project lifetime) category and excluded waste generated during manufacturing. By 2030, India’s current installed solar capacity will generate about 340 kt — three times more than the present. Around 67 per cent of this waste is expected to be produced by five states, including Rajasthan, Gujarat, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, and Andhra Pradesh. This is because these five states currently have more solar capacity than other states and therefore, will produce more solar waste.

The aforementioned states also plan to expand their solar capacity extensively in the following years. Speaking to The Indian Express, Neeraj Kuldeep, one of the authors of the study, said “If you look at India’s 500 GW renewable energy target, the majority of the GWs will come from these five renewable energy-rich states. As a result, the rate of quantum (of producing solar waste) will be higher in these states”.

The cumulative waste from existing and new capacity (deployed between FY24 and FY30) will reach about 600 kt by 2030, according to the report. By 2050, it will increase to about 19,000 kt and 77 per cent of which will be generated from new capacities.

As the discarded modules contain minerals such as silicon, copper, tellurium, and cadmium — which have been classified as critical minerals for the country’s economic development and national security by the Indian government — the study focused on them also. The 340 kt waste expected to be produced by 2030 would consist of 10 kt of silicon, 12-18 tonnes of silver, and 16 tonnes of cadmium and tellurium.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

????India’s solar waste could reach 600 kilotonnes by 2030: Study

‘Most polluted’ Begusarai flags a trend, but data may be inadequate

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-A new report on air quality in cities around the world has ranked Begusarai in Bihar as the most polluted — not just in India but in the whole world. According to the report, Delhi was the worst polluted capital city in 2023 — with its average PM2.5 concentration being more than double every other capital city in the world except Dhaka.

• Map Work-Begusarai

• Why Begusarai?

• World air quality Report 2023-know Key takeaways

• Who releases the World air quality Report 2023?

• What are the reasons for Air pollution in Begusarai?

• Do You Know-There is nothing very special about Begusarai, located in eastern Bihar, though. It is not an industrial town, and it does not have any obvious source of local generation of pollutants. This is also true of the other Bihar towns in the most-polluted list. So what makes Begusarai the most polluted of all?

“We do not have very good data on sources of pollution in these towns. These are not heavily industrialised areas, and I would suspect they would not have very heavy vehicular emissions as well. So, if I have to make an intelligent guess, I would say that the bulk of these pollutants might be coming from solid fuel burning,” Sachchida Nand Tripathi, Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering and Department of Sustainable Energy at IIT Kanpur, said. “Solid waste burning could also be a major contributor,” he said.

Dr Tripathi, one of India’s most eminent experts on air pollution, said that despite the success of schemes such as Ujjwala in many parts of the country, a significant number of rural households may be still burning solid fuels for cooking. Also, “Towns in Bihar are affected by pollutants that are transported from the northern region — Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh — during some seasons because of atmospheric conditions,” he said. The general trend in these rankings is not very different from what has emerged in similar assessments in the past by the World

Health Organisation (WHO) or academic and research institutions. Several locations in Bihar have figured in previous lists of towns with the worst air quality in India. However, zeroing in on a particular city or town as the worst polluted may not be accurate. The data that is publicly available comes from relatively few monitoring stations. The most dense network of air quality sensors and monitors in Bihar has been set up by Dr Tripathi’s team at IIT Kanpur in association with the state and central governments, with at least one monitoring station in every block of the state.

More than 500 monitors have been collecting air quality data from Bihar for the past one year, but this data is not yet in the public domain. The network, called AMRIT, or Ambient Air Quality Monitoring over Rural Areas using Indigenous Technology, was formally inaugurated only this month by Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Annual and seasonal averages from this dataset show that several districts in Bihar were considerably more polluted than Begusarai.

“The differences in the pollution levels in various towns of Bihar are not that much. No one town seems to be significantly more polluted than the other. It is only now that this area is being monitored properly, and it will take some time for a good assessment to be made about the causes and reasons for bad air quality in this area,” Dr Tripathi said.

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THE IDEAS PAGE

A border runs through it

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies II: India and its neighbourhood- relations

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-On February 8, the Union Home Ministry suspended the Free Movement Regime (FMR) between India and Myanmar with immediate effect. It has also urged the Ministry of External Affairs to terminate the FMR in consultation with its Myanmarese counterpart.

• What is Free Movement Regime?

• What is a Smart Fencing System?

• Why Smart Fencing System along the India-Myanmar Border?

• Do You Know-The border between India and Myanmar runs for 1,643 km in the four states of Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland, and Arunachal Pradesh. The FMR is a mutually agreed arrangement between the two countries that allows tribes living along the border to travel up to 16 km inside the other country without a visa. Under the FMR, every member of the hill tribes, who is either a citizen of India or a citizen of Myanmar and who is resident of any area within 16 km on either side of the border can cross over on production of a border pass with one-year validity and can stay up to two weeks. The FMR was implemented in 2018 as part of the Narendra Modi government’s Act East policy at a time when diplomatic relations between India and Myanmar were on the upswing. In fact, the FMR was to be put in place in 2017 itself, but was deferred due to the Rohingya refugee crisis that erupted that August.

The border between India and Myanmar was demarcated by the British in 1826, without seeking the opinion of the people living in the region. The border effectively divided people of the same ethnicity and culture into two nations without their consent. The current IMB reflects the line the British drew. People in the region have strong ethnic and familial ties across the border. In Manipur’s Moreh region, there are villages where some homes are in Myanmar. In Nagaland’s Mon district, the border actually passes through the house of the chief of Longwa village, splitting his home into two.

Apart from facilitating people-to-people contact, the FMR was supposed to provide impetus to local trade and business. The region has a long history of trans-border commerce through customs and border haats. Given the low-income economy, such exchanges are vital for the sustenance of local livelihoods. For border people in Myanmar too, Indian towns are closer for business, education, and healthcare than those in their own country.

• Why is the FMR being discussed critically?

• Is there a problem of drug trafficking or terrorism related to the FMR?

• So should the FMR be removed?

• Know India-Myanmar bilateral relations in detail

• Why is Myanmar important for India?

• Since coup in Myanmar, How India has taken diplomatic approach on Myanmar?

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THE WORLD

Biden impeachment: House panel to quiz Hunter ex-associates

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies II: Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests, Indian diaspora.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-The House impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden has hit a crossroads, lacking the political appetite from within Republican ranks to go forward with an actual impeachment, but facing political pressure to deliver after months of work.

• What is the case against Biden?

• What is an impeachment inquiry, and what does it lead to?

• First of all, what is Impeachment?

• Do You Know-Impeachment is a provision that allows Congress to remove the President of the United States. Under the US Constitution, the House of Representatives (Lower House) has the “the sole power of impeachment” while the Senate (Upper House) has “the sole power to try all impeachments”. The Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court has the duty of presiding over impeachment trials in the Senate.

The President can be removed from office for “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors”. What constitutes these “high crimes” and “misdemeanors” (misdemeanors), however, is not clearly spelt out. The New York Times explained that the expression “high crimes and misdemeanors” came out of the British common law tradition. “Essentially, it means an abuse of power by a high-level public official. This does not necessarily have to be a violation of an ordinary criminal statute,” The NYT said. Historically, in the US, it has encompassed corruption and other abuses, including trying to obstruct judicial proceedings. No US President has ever been removed as a direct result of impeachment. The House did impeach two Presidents — Andrew Johnson (1968) and Bill Clinton (1998) — but the Senate did not convict them. In between, President Richard Nixon (1974) resigned before he could be removed.

• Impeachment-What is the process?

• For Your Information-HOUSE VOTE: It begins with an investigation by a House committee. In the Nixon and Clinton cases, the House Judiciary Committee held that investigation and recommended articles of impeachment to the full House. In Trump’s case, six committees are investigating him on impeachable offences. If they find that there is enough evidence of wrongdoing, it will refer the matter to the full House

HOUSE VOTE: When the full House votes, if one or more of the articles of impeachment gets a majority vote, the President is impeached. Next, the proceedings move to the Senate.

SENATE TRIAL & VOTE: The Senate holds a trial, overseen by the chief justice of the Supreme Court. A team of lawmakers from the House, known as managers, play the role of prosecutors, The NYT explained. The President has defence lawyers, and the Senate serves as the jury. If at least two-thirds of the Senators present find the President guilty, he is removed and the Vice President takes over as President.

• What has Biden said on the inquiry? What do the Democrats say?

• Impeachment of President in India-Know in detail

• Impeachment of President in India and Impeachment of President in USA-Compare and Contrast

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ECONOMY

Income, wealth share of India’s top 1% among highest globally: World Inequality Lab paper

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Economic and Social Development

Main Examination: General Studies III: Inclusive growth and issues arising from it.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story-India’s top 1 per cent income and wealth shares have reached historical highs and are among the very highest in the world, according to a paper released by World Inequality Lab.

• What is the World Inequality Lab report for India?

• Where is the World Inequality Lab?

• What exactly paper released by World Inequality Lab says?

• For Your Information-Co-authored by economists Nitin Kumar Bharti, Lucas Chancel, Thomas Piketty, and Anmol Somanchi, the paper stated that the “Billionaire Raj” headed by “India’s modern bourgeoisie” is now more unequal than the British Raj headed by the colonialist forces.

The paper said there is evidence to suggest the Indian tax system might be “regressive when viewed from the lens of net wealth”. A restructuring of the tax code is needed, the paper said, adding that a levy of a “super tax” of 2 per cent on the net wealth of 167 wealthiest families would yield 0.5 per cent of national income in revenues and create space for investments.

“A restructuring of the tax code to account for both income and wealth, and broad-based public investments in health, education and nutrition are needed to enable the average Indian, and not just the elites, to meaningfully benefit from the ongoing wave of globalisation. Besides serving as a tool to fight inequality, a “super tax” of 2% on the net wealth of the 167 wealthiest families in 2022-23 would yield 0.5% of national income in revenues and create valuable fiscal space to facilitate such investments,” the paper said. The paper has analysed data based on the annual tax tabulations published by the Indian income tax authorities to extract the distribution of top income earners between 1922-2020.

The share of national income going to the top 10 per cent fell from 37 per cent in 1951 to 30 per cent by 1982 after which it began steadily rising. From the early 1990s onwards, the top 10 per cent share increased substantially over the next three decades, nearly touching 60 per cent in the most recent years, the paper said. This compares with the bottom 50 per cent getting only 15 per cent of India’s national income in 2022-23.

The top 1 per cent earn on average Rs 5.3 million, 23 times the average Indian (Rs 0.23 million). Average incomes for the bottom 50 per cent and the middle 40 per cent stood at Rs 71,000 (0.3 times national average) and Rs 1,65,000 (0.7 times national average), respectively. The richest, nearly 10,000 individuals (of 92 million Indian adults) earn on average Rs 480 million (2,069 times the average Indian). “To get a sense of just how skewed the distribution is, one would have to be at nearly the 90th percentile to earn the average income in India,” the paper said.

In 2022, just the top 0.1 per cent in India earned nearly 10 per cent of the national income, while the top 0.01 per cent earned 4.3 per cent share of the national income and top 0.001 per cent earned 2.1 per cent of the national income. Enlisting the probable reasons for sharp rise in top 1 per cent income shares, the paper said public and private sector wage growth could have played a part till the late 1990s, adding that there are good reasons to believe capital incomes likely played a role in subsequent years. For the shares of the bottom 50 per cent and middle 40 per cent remaining depressed, the paper said, the primary reason has been the lack of quality broad-based education, focused on the masses and not just the elites.

• What are the reasons for Inequality?

• “One reason to be concerned with such high levels of inequality is that extreme concentration of incomes and wealth is likely to facilitate disproportionate influence on society and government”-Discuss

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