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The Union Cabinet decided to provide free foodgrains to all 81 crore beneficiaries covered under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) for one year.
The beneficiary families which used to pay ₹1 for coarse cereals, ₹2 for wheat and ₹3 for rice per kg will now get 35kg of foodgrains free for the next one year and others will get 5kg for free in a month till December 2023. The Centre has estimated an additional amount of ₹2 lakh crore for the scheme.
Briefing the decision after the meeting of the Cabinet, Union Food Minister Piyush Goyal said the move was yet another reflection of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pro-poor stand
This is another remarkable decision of the government. The Prime Minister has taken a decision to provide free foodgrains for 81.35 crore people who are covered under the NFSA, adding that the entire expenses for the scheme would be borne by the Centre.
Mr. Goyal said though the economic situation after the pandemic was normal, a decision was taken to extend the benefits of the Antyodaya Ann Yojana, PMGKAY and the NFSA to more people by merging them. The PMGKAY, launched during the lockdown in April 2020, was scheduled to end on December 31, 2022.
The Centre has been maintaining that the country has adequate storage of foodgrains to meet the welfare schemes. The Opposition has also been urging the Centre to provide foodgrains for needy people considering the economic situation, inflation and unemployment. The ruling BJP had used the schemes as a point for political campaign in the recently held Assembly elections too.
Meanwhile, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, chaired by Mr. Modi, also approved the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for copra for the 2023 season.
The approval is based on the recommendations of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices and views of major coconut growing States, the Centre said.
Bharat Biotech’s nasal COVID vaccine available as booster (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
With the threat of COVID-19 resurfacing and India ramping up health surveillance measures, Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said that a vaccine, which could be administered as nasal drops, would henceforth be available for public use.
We have made available a nasal vaccine, developed by Bharat Biotech, that can be used as a precaution (booster) dose. So, whether you have been administered Covaxin or Covishield or any other vaccine, the nasal shot can work.
A spokesperson for Bharat Biotech told The Hindu that appointments for the nasal vaccine would be available via the CoWIN website.
iNCOVACC, co-developed by Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech and the U.S.-based Washington University, was approved in November for ‘restricted emergency use’ for those aged 18 or older.
The nasal vaccine is approved both as a primary dose and a heterologous booster.It was approved as a primary dose after Phase-3 trials, and was separately tested for safety and immunogenicity as a booster, according to a company statement.
Uttarakhand’s conversion law gets Governor nod (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Governor of Uttarakhand, Lt. Gen. (Retd.) Gurmit Singh, gave a nod to the State’s Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act.
The State will now issue a formal notification of the amended bill after which forced conversion will come under the category of “crime”.
Mr. Ranjit Sinha, Secretary to the Governor, has confirmed the Governor’s assent to the Uttarakhand Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act.
There was a long standing demand in Uttarakhand for strict action against forced conversions, Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami had said.
Following this, the Uttarakhand government introduced the Uttarakhand Religion Freedom Amendment Bill in the Assembly on November 29. After the bill was passed, it was sent to the Governor for approval.
As per the amended bill, conversion by force, greed or fraud will be a crime in the State. Those found guilty will get imprisoned for up to 10 years.
In the new law, a fine of ₹50,000 has been made compulsory. Anyone found guilty of conversion will have to pay up to ₹5 lakh to the victim.
This law was made in Uttarakhand in 2018. There was a provision of punishment of one to five years for conversion by force or inducement.
States
Kerala farmer uses UAVs in his plantation, shares the idea with agricultural scientists and officials (Page no. 5)
(GS Paper 3, Technology in the aid of farmers)
With unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) or drones emerging as a powerful tool in the agricultural sector, a farmer in Wayanad has trained himself in the technology for use in his plantation as well as to train officials of various government agencies.
C.P. Chandrasekharan, an engineer-turned-farmer at Muttil in the district, has been using the technology on his farm and has also trained the officials for the past year after completing a six-month online course on ‘Drones for Agriculture’ from the Wageningen University and Research, The Netherlands.
He procured a base model drone and started trials by calculating area, elevation, and gradient in his own plantation, and later started doing bigger projects.
When we think about drones, what comes to mind is aerial spraying. Actually this is just a minimal application.Whereas with the help of various software and different types of sensors, mainly electrochemical, the potential of drones is innumerable—it can revolutionise agriculture, the farmer says.
We could calculate different vegetative indices that help in monitoring pest and disease incidence, nutrient deficiency, moisture, and stress on various crops, and take corrective measures selectively with the help of mapping the software attached to drones, he says.
The major advantage of the technology is the access to real-time information on the field. Selective application of weedicides, fertilisers, and micronutrients can be done in precision farming.
Drones can improve agricultural practices at a low cost. Moreover, several ecological and environmental impacts can be alleviated by selective irrigation and the application of fertilisers and pesticides.
Editorial
Alleviating the scourge of private healthcare (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
India ranks poorly on multiple health financing indicators. Its public health expenditure as a percentage of its GDP (1.28%) and share of general government expenditure dedicated to health (4.8%) remain akin to the poorest countries.
Per capita health spending growth has not kept pace with rising incomes. Private spending still constitutes nearly 60% of overall expenditure on health.
This is driven by the dominant role of the private health sector. Yet, the discourse on addressing high healthcare costs remains limited to what the government can do to share the personal expenditure burden. It automatically becomes an issue of increasing government spending to reduce personal spending.
The private sector in India is inexorably dispersed, with marked inequities between rural and urban areas and widespread market failure.
Creating organised networks of providers like health maintenance organisations (HMOs), which can be regulated easily, has been envisioned in recent policy pronouncements.
However, unlike in the U.S., where managed care models arose in response to cost pressures, the typical Indian context of income disparities, backwardness, and under-regulation incentivised the private sector to differentiate into a host of organisations of varying sizes and scopes, each serving its own customer base.
These often provide care at apparently inexpensive rates but of dubious quality. Such contexts offer few natural incentives for consolidation. Achieving this solely through public health insurance is a mammoth task.
In such a scenario, initiatives that seek to make private healthcare more affordable without affecting care quality assume importance.
This is likely to encompass a wide range of policy instruments that alter the operating conditions of the private sector. Moreover, such policies have to be enshrined in our national health policy.
This should not be confused with driving public funds into public-private partnerships. Rather, we need overarching policies that drive down private healthcare costs even for the self-paying consumer with little or no government subsidy.
News
Cabinet approves pending OROP revision for veterans (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Union Cabinet approved a pending pension revision for pensioners from the armed forces and their families under the One Rank One Pension (OROP) scheme, which has been delayed since July 2019.
Arrears will be paid from July 1, 2019 to June 30, 2022 which is approximately ₹23,638 crore as per the applicable dearness relief.
Pension of the past pensioners would be re-fixed on the basis of average of minimum and maximum pension of defence forces retirees of calendar year 2018 in the same rank with the same length of service.
More than 25.13 lakh people, including over 4.52 lakh new beneficiaries, armed forces pensioners and family pensioners will benefit, it said.
Armed forces personnel with a retirement date up to June 30, 2019, excluding premature retirees with effect from July 1, 2014, will be covered under this revision.
In the backdrop of delays, veterans had taken the legal route to pursue the revision. The case has been repeatedly delayed with the Government asking for more time in the Supreme Court.
OROP implies uniform pension to personnel based on rank and length of service, and irrespective of the date of retirement.Pension for those drawing above the average shall be protected and the benefit would also be extended to family pensioners, including war widows and disabled pensioners.
Arrears will be paid in four half-yearly instalments. However, all the family pensioners, including those in receipt of special, liberalised family pensions, and gallantry award winners, shall be paid arrears in one instalment.
The estimated annual expenditure for the implementation of the revision has been calculated as approximately ₹8,450 crore based on 31% Dearness Relief (DR).
CAG pulls up DRDO for the delay in the completion of projects and failure to achieve key parameters (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Assessing the Mission Mode (MM) projects of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has flagged time and cost overrun in completion of projects, irregular closure of projects declaring them successful despite non-achievement of one or more key objectives and parameters, and taking up of new projects for realising the unachieved objectives of earlier closed projects declared as successful.
“In 119 out of 178 projects, the original time schedules could not be adhered to. In 49 cases, the additional time was in fact more than 100% of the original time frame.
Overall, the delays ranged from 16% to 500% and extension of time for completion of projects was taken multiple times. Time overruns in completion of MM projects, where technologies are either available or easily accessible, defeats the purpose of taking them up as an MM Project,” CAG said in a performance audit on ‘Management and Outcome of Mission Mode Projects in DRDO’, the report of which was tabled in Parliament on December 21.
Out of 86 projects declared as successful during January 2010 and December 2019, in 20 projects involving an expenditure of ₹1,074.67 crore, one or more key objective(s)/parameter(s) was/were not achieved, the report noted.
Mission Mode (MM) projects are taken up by DRDO as high-priority projects based on specific user requirements with a definite time frame for their completion.
These projects depend on technologies that are already available, proven and readily accessible within DRDO/India or from abroad at a short notice.
The report highlighted that despite the fact that MM projects have a very high outcome certainty due to ready availability of underlying technology, there were considerable delays in initiation and sanction of such projects by DRDO.
Stating that there were abnormal delays in submission of Administrative Closure Reports ranging from 15 to 112 months, the report said, “Out of 86 successfully closed projects, in 25 projects, the Transfer of Technology (ToT) has not been concluded or production has not started even after five to 12 years of successful closure of projects.