Ebola Virus Disease

Ebola virus disease (EVD), formerly known as Ebola hemorrhagic fever, is a severe, often fatal illness in humans.EVD outbreaks have a case fatality rate of up to 90%.EVD outbreaks occur primarily in remote villages in Central and West Africa, near tropical rainforests. The virus is transmitted to people from wild animals and spreads in the human population through human-to-human transmission. Fruit bats of the Pteropodidae family are considered to be the natural host of the Ebola virus.

Ebola first appeared in 1976 in two simultaneous outbreaks, in Nzara, Sudan, and in Yambuku, Democratic Republic of Congo. The latter was in a village situated near the Ebola River, from which the disease takes its name. Although non-human primates have been a source of infection for humans, they are not thought to be the reservoir but rather an accidental host like human beings.

Transmission

Ebola is introduced into the human population through close contact with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected animals. In Africa, infection has been noticed among those handling infected chimpanzees, gorillas, fruit bats, monkeys, forest antelope found ill or dead or in the rainforest. Ebola then spreads in the community through human-to-human transmission, with infection resulting from direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes) with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected people, and indirect contact with environments contaminated with such fluids. Men who have recovered from the disease can still transmit the virus through their semen for up to 7 weeks after recovery from illness.

Health-care workers have frequently been infected while treating patients with suspected or confirmed EVD when infection control precautions are not strictly practiced.

Signs and symptoms

EVD is a severe acute viral illness often characterized by the sudden onset of fever, intense weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. This is followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash, impaired kidney and liver function, and in some cases, both internal and external bleeding. The incubation period, that is, the time interval from infection with the virus to onset of symptoms, is 2 to 21 days.

Diagnosis

Before a patient is diagnosed as infected with EVD, one should rule out malaria, typhoid fever, shigellosis, cholera, leptospirosis, plague, rickettsiosis, meningitis, hepatitis and other viral hemorrhagic fevers like dengue, yellow fever and kyasanur forest disease etc.

Vaccine and treatment

There is no specific treatment nor is any licensed vaccine for EVD available. Several vaccines are being tested, but none are available for clinical use. Severely ill patients require intensive supportive care. Patients are frequently dehydrated and require oral rehydration with solutions containing electrolytes or intravenous fluids.

Prevention and control

No animal vaccine against this is available. Routine cleaning and disinfection of pig or monkey farms (with sodium hypochlorite or other detergents) should be effective in inactivating the virus.

If an outbreak is suspected, the premises should be quarantined immediately. Culling of infected animals, with close supervision of burial or incineration of carcasses, may be necessary to reduce the risk of animal-to-human transmission. Restricting or banning the movement of animals from infected farms to other areas can reduce the spread of the disease.

As this viral outbreak in pigs and monkeys have preceded human infections, the establishment of an active animal health surveillance system to detect new cases is essential in providing early warning for veterinary and human public health authorities.

In the absence of effective treatment and a human vaccine, raising awareness of the risk factors for Ebola infection and the protective measures individuals can take is the only way to reduce human infection and death.

India and EBOLA

There is a risk the deadly virus could be imported into the country if the large population of Indians working in the four affected West African nations returns. There are nearly 45,000 Indian nationals living and working in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria - where an outbreak of the disease has killed 932 people. While the risk of Ebola virus cases in India is low, preparedness measures are in place to deal with any case of the virus imported to India. Government has advised against all non-essential travel to the four countries, and authorities will screen travelers who originate from or transit through affected nations, and track them after their arrival in India.
The government will also set up facilities at airports and ports to manage travelers showing symptoms of the disease. State authorities have been instructed to designate hospitals with isolation wards for response to possible cases and to stock personal protective equipment.

Misunderstanding secularism

Speaking as the chief guest at a conference at Gujarat University’s convention hall on August 2, Supreme Court judge Justice Anil R. Dave said, “Had I been the dictator of India, I would have introduced Gita and Mahabharata in Class I. That is the way you learn how to
live life. I am sorry if somebody says I am secular or I am not secular.But we have to get good things from everywhere.”
These words reflect some of the current misunderstandings about Indian secularism. It is in consonance with Indian secularism to borrow “good things from everywhere”, including the Gita and the Mahabharata. This “ism” does not imply the secularisation of society. On the contrary, whereas French laïcité involves a clear separation between public and religious spaces, far from excluding religion from the public sphere, Indian secularism officially recognises all faiths, as evident from the Constitution and its implementation in the first decades of the Indian republic.
Jawaharlal Nehru himself wrote in 1961: “We talk about a secular state in India. It is perhaps not very easy even to find a good word in Hindi for ‘secular’. Some people think it means something opposed to religion. That obviously is not correct. What it means is that it is a state which honours all faiths equally and gives them equal opportunities.” Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, president of India when Nehru was prime minister, expressed a similar vision in these eloquent terms: “When India is said to be a secular state, it does not mean that we as a people reject the reality of an unseen spirit or the relevance of religions to life or that we exalt irreligion. It does not mean that secularism itself becomes a positive religion or that the state assumes divine prerogatives. Though faith in the supreme spirit is the basic principle of the Indian tradition, our state will not identify itself with or be controlled by any particular religion.”
The specificity of Indian secularism transpires clearly in these quoted passages. Far from being areligious, irreligious or anti-religious, this principle is, on the contrary, perfectly compatible with religiosity. But, recognising the importance of religion in the public space, the state intervenes in favour of all religious communities. It thus subsidises all kinds of religious activities, including pilgrimages for Sikhs (to Pakistan) and Hindus (like the one to Amarnath in Jammu and Kashmir). The state also subsidises major religious celebrations such as the Kumbh Melas. The one in 2001, for instance, cost Rs 120 crore. Since 1993, Indian pilgrims to Mecca have been largely state-funded, too.
This multicultural approach has been recently illustrated in the way President Pranab Mukherjee hosted an iftar party towards the end of Ramzan, soon after publicly offering prayers at the Padmanabhaswamy temple.
This rather unique configuration is the product of a long history. Its immediate antecedentcan be found in the words and deeds of Mahatma Gandhi, who advocated the recognition of religious communities in the public space and their cohabitation as early as 1919, during the Khilafat Movement in which he joined forces with Muslim leaders. Subsequently, he tried to make the Congress party a “parliament” in which all denominations were represented. In Hind Swaraj (1909), he promoted a conception of the Indian nation that ruled out identifying the nation with any religion: “If the Hindus believe that India should be peopled only by Hindus, they are living in dreamland. The Hindus, the Mahomedans, the Parsis and the Christians who have made India their country are fellow countrymen, and they will have to live in unity, if only for their own interest. In no part of the world are one nationality and one religion synonymous terms; nor has it ever been so in India.”
Beyond Gandhi’s contribution, going further back in time, emperor Akbar practised religious tolerance. During his rule, Islam had
a limited place in the state apparatus, in which several communities other than the Muslims participated. This modus operandi was already in existence under the reign of Ashoka. While he worked for the glory of Buddhism with the fervour of a new convert, this emperor also advocated coexistence of religions and mutual respect.
Like Justice Dave, these architects of Indian secularism thought that they had “to get good things from everywhere”, including the Gita, the Quran, the Bible, etc. For them, the question of teaching one religion alone never arose. The fact that it does today is revealing of the way Hindu majoritarianism is gaining momentum. This view clearly contradicts the Constitution because it implies the non-recognition of all religions on an equal footing. Freedom of conscience, speech and worship was written into the Constitution through a number of articles having convergent effects. Article 15 forbids discrimination on religious grounds (among others); Article 16 applies this rule to recruitment in the civil service; Article 29 to admission to a public school or receiving state aid. Most especially, Article 25 states: “Subject to public order, morality and health… all persons are equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise and propagate religion.”
In addition to these individual rights, there are collective rights — the Indian state not only recognises no official religion and protects citizens from having to pay religious taxes, but it also gives each religion equal consideration. Article 26 stipulates: “Subject to public order, morality and health, every religion, religious denomination or any section thereof shall have the right: (a) to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes; (b) to manage its own affairs in matters of religion; (c) to own and acquire movable and immovable property; and (d) to administer such property in accordance with law”. Article 30 reads similarly: “All minorities, whether based on religion or language, shall have the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice.” In awarding aid to educational institutions, thestate must in no way discriminate against those administered by a religious or linguistic minority. It is worth noting that the importance given to collective rights by Indian secularism is one of its trademarks, as is its correlative respect for the role of religions in the public space.
If India was to discontinue this tradition and replace it with Hindu majoritarianism, it would embark on the same trajectory as its neighbours — except Nepal, where secularism has recently become the order of the day. The past experience of the other countries of South Asia shows that minorities have been the first casualties of the erosion of secularism, regardless of the majority religion. Hindus, as a minority, have been at the receiving end in Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh where religious conflicts have resulted in violence

How to manage uncertainty,financial sector

A transparent monetary policy has a clearly defined goal like price stability. In the case of India, the RBI came out with a new monetary policy framework in January 2014, anchoring for an inflation (CPI-based) target of 4.0 per cent with a band of plus/ minus 2.0 per cent. It has also proposed to bring the targeted CPI (consumer price index) inflation down to 8.0 per cent by January 2015 and 6.0 per cent by January 2016, before bringing it down to 4.0 per cent in three years. The adoption of such a rule-based framework has made the monetary policy exercise highly transparent for India. In fact, in every bi-monthly policy statement, the RBI tries to show the degree of consistency between the actual inflation trajectory and its anticipated path.

The credibility of policy is attained when the central bank’s actions are consistent with reaching its monetary policy goal. The easing of retail inflation for two consecutive months, the recent fall in global crude prices, the benign outlook on global non-oil commodity prices and the government’s firm commitment to fiscal consolidation had given rise to the wide-ranging expectation of an easing cycle. Some had wrongly interpreted the RBI’s stance in the June policy as “dovish” because it had said that further policy tightening will not be warranted, if the economy stays on a disinflationary course witnessed during May-June, 2014. However, that was a conditional statement and in June as well as in August, the RBI has clearly warned of several upside risks to inflation on account of adjustments in administered prices, deficient monsoon and its impact on food production, possibly higher oil prices stemming from geopolitical concerns and exchange rate movement, and growth in the aggregate demand. In the latest policy review, the central bank appears to be more concerned about achieving the 6.0 per cent inflation target by January 2016 than achieving the 8.0 per cent target by January 2015. And, therefore, it has suggested a heightened state of policy preparedness to contain inflationary risks. According to the RBI, a lot depends on the government’s actions on food management and timely completion of projects that would set the pace for the supply-side response.

Given these uncertainties, the RBI remains worried about the medium-term sustainability of the disinflation process and, hence, it has chosen to keep the policy rates as well as the CRR (cash reserve ratio) unchanged on August 5, 2014.

While “pessimistic” on the inflation front, the RBI appears to be quite confident about the evolving growth trajectory. This confidence stems from the improved performance of exporting industries, ongoing revival of investments, unlocking of stalled projects, government’s commitment to fiscal consolidation and its favourable impact on theprivate sector’s investment expenditures, stabilisation of global commodity prices, etc. According to the RBI, in the absence of any strongly negative surprise from the exogenous factors, an economic growth of 5.5 per cent can be sustained for India during 2014-15.

The other major move in the latest policy review is a cut in the SLR (statutory liquidity ratio) by 50 basis points (bps, from 22.5 to 22.0 per cent of net demand and time liabilities or NDTL), even if there is no significant pick-up in credit demand and the banking industry continues to hold excess SLR securities. In our opinion, this is not just a move to improve liquidity. Rather, it has to be viewed as a long-term reform measure that would improve the functioning of debt markets. As said by the RBI’s Committee on Comprehensive Financial Services for Small Businesses and Low Income Households headed by Nachiket Mor, the SLR as a prudential tool has outlived its utility for both banks and non-bank financial companies (NBFCs), given the much-enhanced emphasis on capital buffers under the new risk-management framework. A high level of SLR in India compared to other emerging markets has distorted not just the interest rate structure but also its usefulness as a signalling mechanism. Moreover, the gradual reduction in the SLR undertaken by the RBI also reflects its confidence in the government’s ability to improve its finances in line with its revealed commitment. This is a strongly positive signal to bond market participants. Of course, given the large supply of government papers in the current month, the said measure may increase volatility in bonds in the short term. But the reform orientation of this measure, combined with appropriate liquidity management by the RBI through term repos of various maturities, should support the bond market sentiment in the medium term. Moreover, this reduction in SLR would increase the resources with banks to extend credit to the private corporate sector by Rs 40,000 crore, once the credit demand picks up.

The RBI also reduced the ceiling for banks’ total holdings of SLR securities in the held-to-maturity (HTM) category to 24.0 per cent of NDTL from 24.5 per cent of NDTL with effect from August 9, 2014. This step is taken to increase banks’ participation in financial markets. This measure may give an opportunity to banks to reduce their HTM holdings as per the market conditions, going ahead. It also means that banks have reduced facility to park securities in the HTM bucket, which, in turn, would force them to value securities at a regular interval and take a hit in the form of mark-to-market valuation, if there is any adverse movement of the security prices. This would promote more disciplined functioning of the banks’ treasury divisions.

Thus, while the primary focus of the policy is on “price stability”, it has touched some critical areas to improve the functioning of the financial markets and support the liquidity conditions for banks.

Given the RBI’s explicitly expressed concern over the inflation outlook from a medium-term perspective,we do not see much scope for the commencement of the easing cycle during the financial year 2014-15.

Prime Minister to Dedicate Two Hydel Power Projects in J&K Tomorrow ; Also to Lay Foundation Stone for Leh-Kargil-Srinagar Transmission System

The Prime Minister Shri. Narendra Modi will dedicate to the nation tomorrow two hydel power projects in Leh and Kargil in Jammu & Kashmir .  These projects are the 44 MW Chutak hydroelectric project in Kargil district and the 45 MW Nimoo Bazgo project in Leh district. The  Prime Minister would also lay foundation stone for the first power transmission line from Leh to Kargil and Kargil to Srinagar. 45 MW Nimoo-Bazgo Hydro electric  Project The 45 MW Nimoo-Bazgo Hydro electric Project is a Run of the River scheme to harness the potential of river Indus in Leh district of Ladakh region of Jammu & Kashmir. The project is designed to generate 239 MUs of energy.          The Nimoo-Bazgo power station is located on river Indus in Leh district of Ladakh region of Jammu &Kashmir. The Power station comprises of a 57m high concrete gravity dam, 3  intake structures on the power dam portion on right bank for diversion of water through 3.3 m diameter steel penstock of about 55.0 m long, a surface power house located at the toe of the dam on right bank and a short tailrace channel.  The power house has an installed capacity of 45 MW (3 x 15 MW).          The approval for the project was accorded on 24.08.2006 by Govt. of India at the estimated cost of Rs. 611 Crore . However, on account of escalation, statutory charges and higher cost of award, project cost has now been revised to Rs 985 crore. The Composite tariff of Nimmo Bazgo power station is Rs. 6.33 per unit for year 2013-14. All the units were commissioned at available load in June 2013, commencing commercial operation in October 2013 and beneficiary state for 100% share is Jammu &Kashmir. 44 MW Chutak hydroelectric  Project             The 44 MW Chutak hydroelectric  Project is located in Kargil District of Jammu & Kashmir. Barrage site is located about 14 km upstream of Kargil near village Sarzhe. The project is a run-off-river scheme on the river Suru, to generate 216 MU in a 90% dependable year having installed capacity of 44 MW (4 x 11 MW) utlising a rated head of 52m developed by construction of a 15.0 m high barrage and through 4780 m long 5.9M dia horse shoe shaped Head race tunnel. Chutak Project involves construction of 15M high and 47.5M long barrage near village Sarzhe  and an underground power house on right bank of river Suru. The Power house & barrage sites are 9Km and 15Km away respectively from Kargil, on Kargil Zanskar road.The approval for Chutak project was accorded on 24.08.2006 by Govt. of India at Rs. 621 crore . However, on account of escalation and statutory charges, Project Cost has now been revised to Rs. 894 Crore. The Composite Tariff of Chutak Power Station is Rs. 6.26 per unit for year 2013-14. Power generated from Project is being supplied to Kargil District of Ladakh region of J&K. Leh-Kargil-Srinagar Transmission System             The Power Grid Corporation of India the central transmission utility under Ministry of Power, Government of India, is implementing the Leh-Kargil-Srinagar Transmission System for connectivity of Leh/ Kargil area in Ladakh  with Northern Region Grid at 220kV level for meeting demands of the Ladakh region.             Leh-Kargil-Srinagar Transmission System includes 375 km Transmission line at 220kV voltage level from Alistong (Srinagar) to Leh via Kargil with four 220/33kV Sub-stations at Drass, Kargil, Leh and Khalsti. This transmission system shall be able to facilitate availability of power of about 100-150 MW in the Ladakh region.             Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir, of about 56,000 sq km area, comprising of Leh and Kargil districts, covers about 70% of the total area of Jammu and Kashmir region and is one of the highest inhabitation in the world with an elevation of 2400m to 4500m above sea level. The difficult terrain has left Ladakh region isolated with no electrical connectivity with the rest of the National power grid. The power demand of the area is met by some local small micro Hydel (14 MW) and diesel generators (12 MW). The region is experiencing an energy shortage of about 95%.This transmission system shall be able to feed about 100-150 MW to Ladakh Region.             The Prime Minister Shri. Narendra Modi had last month inaugurated the 240-Megawatt Uri-II Hydro Electric Project (HEP) located near the Line of Control (LoC) in Baramulla district of Kashmir.

Special Economic Zone (Sez) at Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust

The Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi is to lay the foundation of a Port- Based Multi-product Special Economic Zone (SEZ) at the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) at Sheva, Navi Mumbai on Saturday, August 16, 2014. This industrial infrastructure project is to be established on 277 hectares with a total Public and Private investment of about 4,000 Crore rupees. This is being planned as a Self-Sustainable Integrated Development Project having a potential of generating over 1.5 lakh direct and indirect jobs. The ambitious SEZ to be developed through JNPT-SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) under the Engineering, Procurement & Construction (EPC) mode is scheduled to be completed within three years. With a focus on the upcoming sectors of India, the SEZ will develop Free Trade Warehousing Zone, Engineering Goods Sector, Electronics and Hardware Sectors, Non- Conventional Energy Sector, Multi Services (IT and Healthcare) Sectors and Apparel and Textiles Sectors. Shri Modi, who is to arrive in Mumbai on a day’s visit to Maharashtra, is also scheduled to lay the foundation of a Port Connectivity Highway Project at the JNPT and also allot land to the JNPT Project Affected Persons (PAPs) under the 12.5% scheme of Maharastra government implemented by the City and Industrial Development Corporation of Maharastra Ltd. Various projects have been expedited by the Union Minister of Road Transport, Highways & Shipping & Rural Development, Shri Nitin Gadkari over the last two months. These projects in Mumbai are to be inaugurated as part of these measures. The Port Connectivity Highway Project with a Cost of about Rs.1927 Crores is to be completed by December 2017. The Ministry of Shipping has decided to execute this Project on (Engineering, Procurement & Construction (EPC) mode through the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV). The project has been undertaken under the National Highway Development & Port Connectivity Programme of the union government. Due to rapid development in the area on account of development of JN Port, JNPT-SEZ, and the proposed International Airport, etc. it was felt necessary to augment the carrying capacity of the existing road network to 6/8 lane configuration by providing improved facilities comprising of flyovers, railway over bridges, interchanges etc for uninterrupted flow of traffic plying on the road network connecting the Port and the National Highways. Accordingly, it is now proposed to develop this road network to 6/8 lane configuration with service roads. The NH-4B, Amra Marg & SH-54 were earlier developed to a four-lane facility by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) through the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) comprising of NHAI, JNPT & CIDCO. Allotment of land under 12.5% scheme to Project Affected Persons (PAPs) of JNPT has also been a long pending issue. Resolution of the dispute was essential for smooth operation and future development of JNPT. The land owners, whose lands were acquired for JNPT, have been agitating for land allotment under the 12.5% scheme as decided by the Government of Maharashtra in respect of land acquired by CIDCO for the Navi Mumbai Project. A decision was taken to grant the benefit of 12.5% land allotment scheme on humanitarian grounds to the JNPT PAPs, though legally as per the Hon’ble Supreme Court order the Port was not liable to implement 12.5% scheme. Based on the decisions taken, a proposal was moved for approval of the Cabinet by the Ministry of Shipping to transfer 12.5% of the 1172 hectares of land to Government of Maharashtra to distribute it to the JNPT PAPs. Though 12.5% of 1172 hectare worked out to 146.5 hectares, 35.5 hectares have already been given to four (4) villages under the Gaothan Extension Scheme of Maharashtra Government by JNPT. Hence, it was proposed to transfer the remaining 111 hectare (146.5 hectares – 35.5 hectares) which was in accordance with the decisions taken at the meeting on 22.3.2011. The Union Cabinet approved the transfer of 111 hectares of JNPT land to Government of Maharashtra for allotment to PAPs of JNPT in line with the Government of Maharashtra’s scheme for PAPs of Navi Mumbai of CIDCO. The Cabinet also allowed JNPT to provide CIDCO the cost of development of minimum amenities to be finalized in consultation with CIDCO/Government of Maharashtra. Accordingly, Ministry of Shipping accorded approval to the proposal of JNPT to provide Rs.212.34 crores for development of basic amenities which was worked out in consultation with CIDCO. Based on the approval of the Union Cabinet, JNPT initiated action to hand over 111 hectares of land to the Government of Maharashtra for distribution to the PAPs. Meanwhile, Chief Minister of Maharashtra wrote a D.O. letter dated 6.11.2013 to the then Minister of Shipping with a recommendation to consider allotment of total land of 160 hectares instead of 111 hectares allotted as per the Cabinet decision for distribution among the PAPs (12.5% of 1172 hectares private land) for implementation of the 12.5% land scheme and for allotting 40 SQM land to each of the landless labourers in the project affected villages). It was also submitted by the PAP Sangharsha Samiti as well as by the officials Government of Maharashtra that while computing the land requirements for distribution under 12.5% scheme, the aforesaid 35.5 hectares should have been deducted from the total private land acquired by the Port i.e. 1172 hectares. It was submitted that PAPs are entitled for 12.5% of total land of 1136.5 hectares after such deduction which comes to 142.06 hectares and not 111 hectares as sanctioned by the Ministry of Shipping. The Ministry of Shipping has recently forwarded a proposal for seeking approval of the Cabinet for sanctioning additional land of 47.20 ha which falls under CRZ-I in addition to 111 ha of land as already approved by the Union Cabinet. Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (formerly NhavaSheva Port Trust) was commissioned on 26th May, 1989. For the construction of the Port, land to the extent of 1172 hectares was acquired through Government of Maharashtra from 12 villages of the UranTaluka, Dist. Raigad, Maharashtra, in the 1980s. This was done as part of the land acquisition for the Navi Mumbai Project. During the acquisition of land, there was strong resistance from the land owners. However, after a lot of discussions, assurances and promises, the task was completed successfully. One of the assurances given to the land owners of the Navi Mumbai Project (from which JNPT was given land) at the time of acquisition of the land was that they would be given back developed land to the extent of 12.5% of the land acquired from each of them. This issue of compensating the erstwhile landowners of JNPT warrants a permanent solution, so that the functioning of the Port which handles about half of India’s international trade goes on smoothly and unhindered.

Tests and protests

It is the ticket to the so-called steel frame, a career of power and prestige: the IAS. But the civil services aptitude test, part of the preliminary examination, has thrown open a class and geographical divide - aspirants from the Hindu belt fear being outshone by the English-speaking 'elite' in the test. The last word has not yet been said on this struggle.

If the Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT), part of the Civil Services preliminary examination make many aspirants apprehensive, an evident push for Hindi since the Modi government took over has turned the debate into a language row, which had been more or less settled in the five decades since it flared up.

What was essentially apprehension about the advantage Engineering and Management graduates had over those from a Humanities background in cracking CSAT has been compounded by poor translation into Hindi of these questions by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) and the failure to address this problem in the years since the prelims format was changed in 2011 to give more emphasis to aptitude.

Even now, nearly a week after the government took the view that the marks obtained in the English comprehension skills component of CSAT should not be used for merit or gradation purposes while calculating the prelims results, the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has not spoken on whether it will factor in this opinion and how it will be implemented. Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that in the first CSAT in 2011, the UPSC set a cut-off in the English component of the paper as a qualifier, and the commission’s silence on this front this time round is not helping matters at all.

CSAT tests comprehension, interpersonal communication skills, logical reasoning and analytical ability, decision-making and problem-solving, general mental ability, basic numeracy, data interpretation and data sufficiency, besides English comprehension skills (all of class X level). This paper replaced the objective-type “optional subject”, which along with the test on General Studies, in which aptitude questions were a component, constituted the prelims for over three decades.

Protesting students like Vikas Kumar allege that there has been a sharp drop in the number of students who opt for languages other than English to take the main examination since the introduction of CSAT. “This means that those from the regional language medium are just not getting through the prelims,” he said.

Referring to the number of candidates who took the main examination in other languages in the Civil Services Examination of 2013, he said only 26 appeared in Hindi and a total of 54 in all languages other than English. “Pre-CSAT, it was 50:50,” said the young man who has made six attempts at the prelims and three at the mains. Of his six prelims, two were in the CSAT era, both of which he failed.

Now that the English component has been removed, the agitating students’ demand is that the prelims be postponed by a month to make up for the time spent in protests. While they want CSAT to be scrapped, an alternative goalpost they have set is to make this a qualifying paper and use General Studies only for merit. Any candidate who gets 30 per cent marks in CSAT should be deemed as qualified and the General Studies scores should be used for deciding the merit list.

While the government’s opinion on doing away with the English component of CSAT has gone down well with the Hindi belt students, may others feel a tad short-changed as the English questions accounting for 22.5 per cent marks were their sure shot in the paper.

In making this recommendation, the government, says Rajya Sabha member J.D. Seelam, went by the point raised by Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti convener Dinanath Batra in his petition against CSAT in 2010. Stating that the English component put those from the regional language medium at a disadvantage, he wanted it to be removed from CSAT. The Delhi High Court asked the government to set up a committee to look into the matter. The government purportedly firmed up its mind on doing away with the English component after consulting with this committee and the UPSC.

Stating that Hindi had become a slave to the English “queen”, Mr. Batra, who has been the general secretary of Vidya Bharati, a network of schools run by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, has gone on record to claim that “We think that we have been behind the motivation of this struggle.” He said he had met Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh on the CSAT issue in July and flagged points from his petition to him.

The former Union Minister and educationist Y.K. Alagh, who had headed the committee which recommended CSAT in 2001, has alleged that the protests were being spearheaded by coaching institutions. However, Jojo Mathews, a founder director of Alternative Learning Systems, a coaching institution with several centres across the capital, says there has been no spike in demand for prelims coaching post-CSAT.

Mr. Mathews, as many others, insists that the paper is not tough. “CSAT can be cracked by students from a Humanities background with some practice,” he says.

Now the government has accepted the “force” in the argument that aspirants should be allowed to take the examination in all languages included in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. The fact is that while the question papers are in English and Hindi for the prelims and the mains, the answers for the latter, except the mandatory English paper, can be written in any Eighth Schedule language and the prelims are anyway objective-type papers where answers have to be only marked out.

World class MSME India

“Your article last week on customer value touched the core of my heart as I am constantly fighting for this cause,” wrote my valued reader Commodore G S Kanwal, retired from the Indian Navy. “But we are more or less in a Catch 22 situation.”
Small businesses, like the 44-bedded hotel service that Commodore Kanwal runs and is fighting various social and career factors to retain trained staff in, are the real backbone of our country. I’ve promoted the cause of MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises) in this column as well as detailed how to encourage their activities in my books Jalebi Management and its sequel Strategic Pokes. We should always remember that all big companies began as MSMEs. Courier service UPS, with over $55 billion revenue, started with just four bicycles in 1907 and is now among the world’s best companies. Another example of an MSME blooming is the $473 billion Walmart retail company that started as Walton’s 5&10 in 1950 — a dime store in a small US town called Bentonville in Arkansas.

Among developed countries, the outstanding performance and internationalisation of Germany’s MSME sector is worth emulating. According to Sequa gGmbH, a development organisation where Germany’s top four business membership organisations DIHK, ZDH, BDI and BDA are shareholders, Germany’s economic structure is determined by MSMEs that account for almost 99 per cent of all businesses, and employ about 80 per cent of regular workers. The government has several support programmes and measures to promote MSMEs. Contributing significantly to GDP, they’ve made the German economy the strongest in Europe today.

Unlike in Germany, about three-fourths of India’s MSMEs cannot access banks or institutional financing as per a study by industry body Assocham and finance advisory Resurgent India. Without adequate credit, most MSMEs actually borrow from their family and friends, which naturally impacts their business planning in terms of time and ability to raise the required amount. A new kind of short-span, flirting with money entity, has mushroomed in our economy; the start-ups funded by angel investors. Start-ups remind me of the attitude some bachelors have regarding their girlfriends. By hook or crook, these start-ups have to prove their model is working. They try to hike valuation to sell out and encash big money within a short span of time. In relationship analogy, it’s like working hard and making a name to grab the plum dowry that’s waiting when he opts for an arranged marriage, ditching his girlfriend. Most angel investors look for short-term investment and quick earnings. This influence of working to finally sell out is not setting a good example. To become a solid entrepreneur, you have to drive your business for the long term.

Let me note some hard truths that MSMEs face in India’s modern economy:

1. MSMEs oftenrun like a family business where there’s no question of hiring hardcore professionals.

2. The younger generation does not want to carry forward the business the father set up. Having witnessed the fair amount of struggle required to run the show, these youngsters prefer to become an employee with less responsibility and the assured monthly pay slip.

3. Entrepreneur fathers consider that only their generation can do business. Having sent their children to the kind of schools they themselves have not gone to, the children develop an outlook that’s rather dissimilar from their parents. Thereafter, the father develops low confidence in his child’s capability and the son doesn’t want his father as boss at work.

4. For arranged marriages and social recognition, the value of young people working in big corporate houses and being the manager of a large number of people is higher than if they were working in their father’s business.

5. To be an entrepreneur, you need to have three skillsets: (a) Knowing your product in depth so you know its selling point; (b) People management skills to keep employees motivated and reduce attrition; (c) Be an outstanding salesperson to play in a competitive marketplace. It’s not always the case that one person will have all three competencies. As an entrepreneur, you may have one or two of these skillsets, so it’s extremely important that you find an appropriate partner.

6. An entrepreneur who does not have the right capability for the segment of business being pursued tends to spread out into diverse business areas. But without single focus, a long-term steady business can never be built up.

7. Such diversification leads to most funding institutes not trusting the competency, sustaining strategy and capacity of MSMEs. To safeguard their loans, banks ask for detailed documentation and securities that leave MSMEs flummoxed. Even short-term working capital on credit is not easy for them to get. Actually banks have evidence too of suffering non-performing assets on having loaned to small businesses. So for MSMEs, cash flow is a constant problem to run day-to-day operations and fuel their future growth.

In these points I’ve listed, there is a big role the government can play. Several industry and government bodies already exist to facilitate MSMEs, but how concretely is help provided? It’s essential to create “World-class MSME India” as a driving force where the two basic requirements for MSME business growth would be customer centricity and retaining a defined global quality standard.

My earnest request to our new government is to take non-bureaucratic action in this area. Among such actions could be the professional handling of MSMEs to represent their interests in capability building and getting loans, having our embassies overseas promote business with MSMEs, encouraging them through consultancy to develop innovative power, and having a dynamic TV channel by Doordarshan exclusively dedicated to MSMEs with inspiring stories and professional advice to get ahead. When MSMEs flourish, employees will not leave their jobs so easily, and the country’s GDP can experience galloping growth.