13 May 2024, The Hindu
A well-intentioned study and a demographic myth
Page 6
Prelims syllabus: Current events of national and international importance
- All is well with the religious minorities in India is the short conclusion of the report of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council (PM-EAC), that has also revived the debate about Muslim population growth.
- Though the report is well intentioned and has been prepared to demonstrate how India’s minorities in general and Muslims in particular are absolutely safe and face no discrimination or persecution at all, it has caused a stir.
- The timing of the report, its use of almost a decade-old data, its not highlighting the nearly 1,520% increase in share in the total population of Buddhists, and, further, that for every one Muslim, five Hindus were born during this period, that the Hindu population (320 million in 1950) has tripled, and that the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of Muslim women saw a drop by 2.05 as against Hindu women’s TFR by 1.36, have all made it controversial.
Investment lessons from the India-EFTA trade deal
Page 6
GS 3: Indian Economy (international trade)
- India’s free trade agreement (FTA) negotiations with countries such as the United Kingdom and the European Union (EU) seem to be on ice due to the ongoing parliamentary elections in India.
- However, before election fever gripped the country, India managed to clinch a historic trade deal, in March, with the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), comprising Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland.
- The newly minted Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement (which we refer to as FTA) between India and EFTA is expected to give a much-needed leg-up to the low levels of extant trade between the two sides.
- The FTA between India and EFTA is also important because, as economist Biswajit Dhar has argued, India has agreed to include issues such as environment and labour, which it has traditionally opposed incorporating in trade agreements.
Modest rebound
Page 6
GS 3: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilisation of resources, growth, development and employment
- India’s factory output growth slowed to 4.9% in March from a downgraded 5.6% uptick in February, despite benevolent base effects from the previous year when the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) had shrunk 1.9%. Output from mines slid to a 19-month low growth of 1.2%, while manufacturing growth picked up from 4.9% in February to 5.2%, still marking a five month-high.
- Electricity generation rose 8.6% but over a contraction in March 2023. The National Statistical Office, which will release fresh GDP growth estimates for 2023-24 this month end, will thus factor in a 5.8% uptick in industrial output through FY2023-24, moderately higher than the 5.2% rise recorded in the previous year.
- Most of this annual increase came from mining, up 7.5%, while manufacturing saw a milder pick up to 5.5% from 4.7% in 2022-23 and electricity generation growth eased to 7.1%.
Clickbait paper
Page 6
GS 1: Society: population and associated issues
- A recent ‘working paper’ titled the ‘Share of Religious Minorities: a Cross-Country Analysis (1950-2015)’, by Shamika Ravi, a credentialed economist and member of the Economic Advisory Council (EAC) to the Prime Minister, and two co-authors, has sparked a political firestorm, dredging familiar anxieties of a decline in the proportion of Hindus in India’s population.
- Freely accessible, the paper draws on a dataset, Religious Characteristics of States Dataset, 2017 (RCS-Dem), where two U.S.-affiliated researchers have compiled an extensive dataset of religio-demographic changes in 167 countries.
- By defining ‘majority’ and ‘minority’ religions based on countries’ official census data, the RCS-Dem quantifies changes in the population of those professing a country’s major religion.
- There is no discussion on the causes or factors driving these changes.
- The current paper does little other than reproduce this data set, explain it, and highlight — what has been known since 2011 in India and discussed threadbare since — that the share of Hindus as a proportion of India’s population declined from 84.68% to 78% (1950-2015).
Clearing the confusion over ‘saptapadi’
Page 7
GS 2: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources
- There is a certain misunderstanding of the Supreme Court judgment pronounced recently in Dolly Rani v Manish Kumar Chanchal that if no saptapadi ceremony is performed, a Hindu marriage between two people cannot be considered valid.
- The Court did not state the law in as many words, but it did not outline in the judgment that there could be other ceremonies to validate the marriage.
- It also did not examine some customary practices where no elaborate ceremonies are performed beyond the exchange of garlands or the amendment to the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, in Tamil Nadu, which introduced the suya mariyadhai (self-respect) form of marriage through Section 7(a).
The poll promise of affordable housing
Page 8
GS 2: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources
- As the 2024 elections drew near, various political parties attempted to woo voters with schemes, freebies and promises.
- If the Narendra Modi government emphasised its commitment to what it called the four “real” castes — women, farmers, poor, and youth, the Congress promised nyay (justice) to five groups: youth, women, farmers, labourers and minority members in the country.
- Poll promises are often woven around the key issues affecting the public — or the most visible ones.
- Among the various issues plaguing the nation, one which political parties often promise to correct is the issue of housing.
- India has around 1.7 million homeless people, according to the 2011 Census.
- Even for people with houses, the quality of build, congestion, and inadequate amenities and infrastructure remain major concerns.
What is DigiLocker and does it keep your data and documents safe?
Page 9
GS 3: Achievements of Indians in science & technology.Indigenisation of technology and developing new technology
- The DigiLocker platform, launched in 2015, operates as an app to store users’ digital records.
- The app can be used when applying for a passport, reviewing marksheets, or proving one’s identity during travel.
- The app is part of the Indian government’s paper-free initiative aimed at letting users access, verify, and store essential documents in a digital wallet so that they are easy to retrieve and present to officials when required.
- As of early May, the app has over 270 million registered users, while nearly 6.7 billion documents — like Aadhaar, insurance policy papers, PAN records, and driving licenses — have been retrieved through it.
