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The Supreme Court directed Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar to decide disqualification petitions filed under the Tenth Schedule (anti-defection law) of the Constitution against the Chief Minister Eknath Shinde camp in the Shiv Sena dispute by December 31, 2023.
A three-judge Bench led by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud ordered the Speaker, in his capacity as a tribunal under the Tenth Schedule, to decide the disqualification petitions against the breakaway faction headed by Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar in the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) dispute by January 31, 2024.
Keeping the Lambadi art of embroidery alive (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 1, Art and Culture)
Though the people of two Lambadi thandas (settlements) and one street in Sittilingi in Dharmapuri have long ago taken to wearing outfits common in Tamil Nadu, the elderly women of this tribal community continue to wear the Petia, their traditional five-piece dress, to remind the younger generations of their past.
Neela and Gammi, who are now in their 70s, two members of the community, along with gynaecologist Lalitha Regi have been working to keep alive the art of traditional Tamil Lambadi embroidery that was revived 15 years ago.
Their organisation, Porgai Artisan Association Society, with 60 plus women, has been making and selling embroidered clothes to ensure that there is awareness about the art form and that it is passed onto the next generation.
Editorial
The Israel-Palestine conflict is at bend point (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
As I watch the television and see Gaza being pulverised, I am informed that the apartment building I had lived in for two years in Gaza, between 1996-98, was bombed and brought down two weeks earlier.
It was one of the taller buildings and I knew it did not stand a chance anyway. I keep wondering what has happened to my friends in Gaza, especially my landlord, Abu Zakary, and his lovely family and children, who made my life so much easier in a non-family posting.
What Hamas did to Israel on October 7, 2023, was unacceptable. It was a brutal terror act. When I chaired the Counterterrorism Committee in the United Nations Security Council in 2022, one thing we all agreed on is that there can be no justification for terror. So, nothing should justify October 7 as well.
But does this make the Palestinian cause or the Palestinian fight against occupation by Israel for several decades any less justified? No, it does not.
The UN Security Council’s resolutions 242 and 338 embodied the principle of “Land For Peace”. Israel should have ideally withdrawn from occupied land in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem in return for peace, which is security, recognition, normalcy and peace for the peoples of the two States of Israel and Palestine.
Interestingly, the revised 2017 Charter of Hamas too accepted a two-State solution based on the 1967 borders. Let us face it. The two-State solution alone can bring peace. A one State solution is a no-State non-solution.
The COVID-19 death toll in India, getting it right (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
The COVID-19 pandemic extracted a heavy mortality toll across the world during 2020 and 2021, and this has been a huge global public health concern.
Given the challenges in direct causal attribution of deaths to COVID-19 infection, the international public health community emphasised the need to measure pandemic impact in terms of excess mortality, derived by comparing observed mortality during the pandemic with expected mortality based on pre-pandemic trends.
Ideally, excess mortality estimation requires robust population-based mortality data from death registration systems.
India faced a big challenge in estimating excess deaths directly due to COVID-19 as death registration in India is still about 70%, which further varies widely across States and districts.
Pandemic severity was particularly observed in India during the second wave in April-June 2021. India’s death registration data also does not give weekly or monthly mortality data which is essential for excess death calculation.
To assess the mortality toll, independent investigators compiled mortality records from local offices of the government Civil Registration System (CRS) in 14 States and nine cities across India from January 2018 to May 2021.
These were published in the media reports compiled in a data series published in The Hindu. Various scientific teams utilised these and other available mortality data from the Sample Registration System (SRS) and household surveys to develop modelled excess mortality estimates for India.
Opinion
Towards stabilisation of U.S.-China ties (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
In this time of war, the quiet U.S.-China dialogue is a significant factor for peace. From a situation where they were virtually not talking to each other, the two global powers appear to have reached a point where a presidential summit may be on the cards at the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco in November.
It may be too soon to use words like “détente”, but what we could perhaps hope for is a tactical stabilisation of the ties between two of the world’s leading powers.
At the immediate level, Washington’s ability to talk to China could promote restraint in West Asia. China has undoubted influence on Iran, which virtually controls the Hezbollah in Lebanon. The Hezbollah’s entry into the war in Gaza could really complicate the situation in the region.
Last week, Wang Yi visited the U.S., the first by a Chinese foreign minister since the pandemic, and met with President Joe Biden and senior U.S. officials.
He is reported to have told the U.S. strategic community that “the road to San Francisco “will not be a smooth one.” Mr. Wang’s visit came in the wake of visits by the U.S. Secretaries of State, Treasury, and Commerce to China in the last few months.
Till May, the Chinese military was refusing to take calls from the Pentagon. With the sacking of Chinese defence minister Li Shangfu, the issue has become moot.
In the latest issue of Foreign Affairs, U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan wrote, “High level and repeated interaction is crucial to clear up misperception, avoid miscommunication, send unambiguous signals, and arrest downward spirals that could erupt into a major crisis.
Text & Context
Easing the transport of cargo by Railways (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Infrastructure)
The Railways has been one of the more cheaper modes of transportation for moving bulk cargo. The government has therefore realised that it needs to be supported with reduced overall logistics costs and schemes to improve green mobility.
Identifying infrastructure investment in the sector as a key thrust area, the Government of India has formulated two policies — the PM GatiShakti (PMGS) policy for a National Master Plan (NMP) and the National Logistics Policy (NLP).
The PMGS aims to bring synergy to create a seamless multi-modal transport network in India, with the NMP employing technology and IT tools for coordinated planning of infrastructure. The NLP focuses on building a national logistics portal and integrating platforms of various ministries.
Not many major policy components and details are available in governmental websites on PMGS. In reference to the Indian Railways (IR), the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade’s website mentions three things:
integration of postal and railway networks, one station – one product and the introduction of 400 Vande Bharat trains without anything about increasing the IR share in moving cargo.
The expansion of settlements into flood-prone areas (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
India’s urban areas have been flooding more and more often, destroying lives and livelihoods. Yet, according to a study led by the World Bank and published in Nature on October 4, flood risk in many cities is rising because they are expanding into flood-prone areas.
According to the paper, since 1985, human settlements in flood-prone areas have more than doubled. Experts say the findings spotlight the risk of unsustainable urbanisation in India.
The study also found that middle-income countries like India have more urban settlements in flood-prone zones than low- and high-income countries.
India isn’t among the 20 countries whose settlements are most exposed to flood hazards, but it was the third highest contributor to global settlements, after China and the U.S., and also third — after China and Vietnam — among countries with new settlements expanding into flood-prone areas, all from 1985 to 2015.
Gautam Bhan, a researcher at the Indian Institute of Human Settlements (IIHS), Bengaluru, said this means India is at significant risk of flood-related problems that could worsen in the coming years if the country wasn’t careful.
News
Indefinite suspension from House a matter of concern, says CJI (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Constitution)
Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud on Monday commented on the “death of sense of humour” in public life while questioning the “indefinite suspension” slapped on Raghav Chadha, Rajya Sabha member from the AAP, for his quip to the media.
He was suspended for breach of privilege for his remark that he had sent “birthday invitation cards” to other members to join a select committee for the GNCTD (Amendment) Bill, 2023. He was accused of inviting these members without taking their consent.
Exclusion of members of the Opposition from the House is a very serious matter. He is a representative of a viewpoint which may not be consistent with the views of the government.
Care must be taken not to exclude such voices,” the Chief Justice said. “Parliament must have voices from across the spectrum, and that is why this indefinite suspension is a matter of concern.”
World
Biden signs order to regulate AI in U.S., days before Sunak’s AI safety summit (Page no. 16)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
U.S. President Joe Biden, signed an executive order to enable wide-ranging regulation of artificial intelligence (AI). Mr Biden’s order comes days before U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s AI Safety Summit in Bletchley Park, as countries race to keep up with rapidly evolving AI technology.
Mr. Biden’s order invokes the Defence Production Act, last used to give the U.S. federal government powers to direct production during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Using this law, companies developing AI systems will be required to notify the U.S. federal government of technologies that have implications for U.S. national security, national economic security, or national public health and share results of certain safety tests. Monday’s action establishes an AI safety body and orders the instituting of safety testing.
This follows the White House announcement in July that seven AI companies — Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft, and OpenAI — had agreed to voluntarily comply with safety standards for AI.
Chinese vessel begins research off the coast of Sri Lanka amid India’s concerns (Page no. 16)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
Chinese research vessel Shiyan 6, which arrived in Colombo last week amid concerns raised by India and the U.S., is set to begin its two-day research off the Sri Lankan coast.
The research will be pursued off Sri Lanka’s western coast, and in collaboration with Sri Lanka’s National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency (NARA) and the University of Ruhuna, according to a spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Colombo. Asked about the nature of research, the spokesperson told.
Research ship Shiyan 6 was added to China’s fleet of marine research vessels in December 2020. Said to be the country’s first scientific research vessel focusing on geophysical exploration, it is scheduled to operate at sea for about 80 days, with 13 research teams onboard pursuing 28 scientific research projects across 12,000 nautical miles, the state-run China Global Television Network reported in September.
Both, India and the U.S. raised concern over the vessel’s visit, as the two countries had done in the past, around earlier visits of Chinese vessels.
Science
IIT team finds carbon ‘flowers’ excelling at turning light to heat (Page no. 20)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
To synthesise a carbon nanostructure that was “blacker than black”, Ananya Sah and C. Subramaniam started with a material that was white.
In Prof. Subramaniam’s laboratory in IIT Bombay, Dr. Sah heated a special form of silicon dust called DFNS (for dendritic fibrous nanosilica) in a furnace. Once heated, she introduced acetylene gas into the chamber. The white powder turned black – a sign that carbon had been deposited on the DFNS.
Then she collected the black powder and treated it with a strong chemical that dissolved the DFNS away, leaving carbon particles behind.
The structure of the silicon particles – 50-1,200 nanometers in size – resembled spikes arranged around a sphere. With the silicon filling taken away, what was left behind were little carbon beads whose surfaces were pocked with cone-shaped pits. In effect, the beads were spherical nanostructures composed of carbon cones.
When Dr. Sah and Prof. Subramaniam examined some of these spheres under a microscope, they were struck by the particles’ appearance: like tiny marigold flowers, made only of carbon. They called the material carbon nanoflorets.