22 April 2024, The Hindu
Net direct tax collections exceed 2023-24 target
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GS 3: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilization of resources, growth, development and employment
- India’s net direct tex collections grew 17.7% in 2023-24 to hit ₹19.58 lakh crore, marginally surpassing the revised estimates for the year, thanks to a surge in personal income taxes whose share of the tax kitty rose to 53.3% from 50.06% in the previous year while corporate taxes’ contribution dipped to 46.5% from 49.6%.
Preparing India for water stress, climate resilience
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Prelims syllabus: General issues on Environmental Ecology, Biodiversity and Climate Change
- As the India Meteorological Department (IMD) predicts a hotter summer and longer heat waves from April to June, India must also prepare for water stress.
- The challenge is that we are programmed to consider acute stresses (heat, water, or extreme weather) as temporary, to be handled often as disaster relief.
- We must move from panic reactions when disaster strikes (like the water crisis in Bengaluru), to understand and respond to the chronic nature of risks we face.
- Moreover, climate action cannot be left to a few sectors or businesses. Nor can environmental sustainability be reduced to sapling plantation drives over a few days.
- This Earth Day (April 22) should be a wake-up call. The climate is the economy now, and the economic production frontier will expand or shrink depending on how we understand the intersections between land, food, energy and water.
Empower the guardians of the earth, do not rob them
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GS 3: Environment- Conservation
- In the southern expanse of the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago, off the shores of Little Nicobar, lie seven tiny islands.
- Classified as “uninhabited” in the government’s records, these islets are nonetheless integral to the indigenous communities of the region.
- Two, officially called Meroë and Menchal, are known as Piruii and Pingaeyak, respectively, to the Payuh, the indigenous southern Nicobarese peoples, who hold traditional rights over these and other islets.
- For millennia, these historically isolated indigenes have relied on these islands as resource reservoirs for sustenance and protected them.
- Menchal is revered, used, and protected under the spiritual realm called Pingaeyak (a spirit that is believed to reside on the island), prohibiting the overexploitation of resources or any undue harm to its ecosystem.
- Similarly, Meroë is believed to be the abode of a legendary islander community. Here, too, spiritual belief systems influence how the islanders use and protect natural resources.
Sobering assessment
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GS 3: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilization of resources, growth, development and employment
- The global economy has avoided the spectre of a debilitating recession, with the IMF last week raising its forecast for worldwide aggregate growth in 2024 to 3.2%, from the 2.9% it had projected in October.
- The IMF has underlined the fact that the global economy has, with surprising resilience, ridden out several shocks as well as ‘significant central bank interest rate increases aimed at restoring price stability’ and sustained the growth momentum, largely on the back of advanced economies led by the U.S. undergirding demand.
- However, the Fund has also pointed to a growing gulf between the economic north and south by observing: “A troubling development is the widening divergence between many low-income developing countries and the rest of the world.
- For these economies, growth is revised downward, whereas inflation is revised up.”
- These poorest countries, in Africa and including some Latin American, Pacific island and Asian nations, had also suffered the most scarring from the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of estimated drop in output relative to pre-pandemic projections, and were struggling to recover.
- To compound their woes, these economies were now saddled with a mounting debt service burden that was severely impairing their ability to spend on vitally needed public goods including better education, health care and social nets to improve food security.
The challenges of renewable energy
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GS 3: Indian Economy - Infrastructure – Energy, Ports, Roads, Airports, Railways etc
- At a recent speech, the United Nations Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell said the “next two years are essential in saving our planet.”
- Record-breaking heat, shortage of water, and other environmental issues are regular headlines in the context of the need to achieve development, increase employment, and reduce poverty and inequality, among others.
- Yet, the linkages between the pathways of development, sustainability, and climate change mitigation are far from well-understood.
- Our current models of development drive greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, are unsustainable, and inequitable.
- Although India aims to achieve Net Zero GHG emissions by 2070, mainly led by a massive transition to large-scale renewable energy, the implications of such a transition on developmental or sustainability outcomes are unclear at the local and national levels.
Sustaining our earth and nourishing our bodies
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GS 3: Environment- Conservation
- The women of a self-help group in Khamdorgi village in Kanker district, Chhattisgarh, have spared 10 decimals of land for multi-layer farming to mitigate land degradation and under-nutrition, and to secure round-the-year incomes.
- They created four layers: the root layer to grow radish and beetroot; the surface layer for leafy vegetables; an above-the-surface layer for brinjal; and creepers (bottle gourd and long beans).
- They also planted two papaya trees, which are yet to bear fruits. Apart from minimising disruptions to the soil ecosystem, the initiative started to generate an income for the group in two months with minimal input costs while promising nutritional security.
- Climate change, nutrition, and food security have an intricate relationship emphasising an urgent need to address issues at this intersection at both the global and the regional levels.
On the fall in household savings
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GS 3: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilisation of resources, growth, development and employment
- The fall in household savings has been at the heart of recent debates in India.
- The decline in household savings is brought about by a drastic reduction in net financial savings as the household net financial savings to GDP ratio attained a four-decade low.
- The sharp reduction in household net financial savings in 2022-23 has been associated with an overall fall in household savings despite marginal recovery in physical savings.
Australia to deepen ties with ‘top-tier partner’ India
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GS 2: International Relations- Bilateral, regional and global groupings and agreements involving India and/or affecting the Indian interests
- India is a top-tier security partner for Australia, stated its new National Defence Strategy (NDS) 2024 released last week and through the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between Australia and India, the government is continuing to prioritise practical and tangible cooperation that directly contributes to Indo-Pacific stability.
- “Australia will continue to support India’s key role in the region by increasing the depth and complexity of our defence cooperation.
- The government will continue to seek opportunities with India to drive practical bilateral and multilateral cooperation, defence industry cooperation and information sharing,” the NDS released on April 17 said.
