New virus, more outbreaks

A look at state-wise data shows that states with larger numbers of fatalities are also those with less successful public health infrastructure as a whole

In July 21, 2009, 14-year-old Rida Sheikh returned from St Anne’s School, Pune, with a runny nose and a headache. A quick trip to the neighbourhood physician later, she was back at school the next day. Five days later, she was on antibiotics. Three days after that, she was in the ICU on ventilator support. On July 30, her throat swabs were sent to National Institute of Virology. On August 4, swine flu had claimed its first recorded Indian victim.

Close to six years later, the Influenza A (H1N1) 2009 virus has killed 4,407 Indians according to officially recorded numbers. The extent of its spread is, however, far wider.

One of the reasons the virus has captured public imagination is that it is incredibly infectious. In research led by the World Health Organisation and Imperial College and published in 2013, Maria D. Van Kerkhove and her colleagues estimated that one-fifth of the population in 19 countries including India were infected with the virus in 2009-10, the first known season of the virus after the first case was discovered in Mexico in April 2009. The first official case in India was a 23-year-old man who flew into Hyderabad from the United States on May 19, 2009, and was screened at the airport.

The WHO declared H1N1 swine flu a pandemic in June 2009 when laboratories had identified cases in 74 countries, and only declared the pandemic to have ended in August 2010.

The fatality rates from swine flu however, are low; Ms. Kerkhove and her colleagues’ study estimated it at 0.02 per cent of all cases, meaning that only two out of every 100,000 people infected with swine flu died in 2009-10. These fatality ratios are lower than that of seasonal influenza, though public health experts warn against comparing a newer and less well-surveyed virus with seasonal flu.

Younger targets

Swine flu also disproportionately affected young children and younger people, leading to a larger loss in human years than seasonal influenza.

Officially, the world is in a “post-pandemic period” when it comes to swine flu. “Based on knowledge about past pandemics, the H1N1 (2009) virus is expected to continue to circulate as a seasonal virus for some years to come. While the level of concern is now greatly diminished, vigilance on the part of national health authorities remains important. Such vigilance is especially critical in the immediate post-pandemic period, when the behaviour of the H1N1 (2009) virus as a seasonal virus cannot be reliably predicted,” the WHO said in August 2010, declaring the end of the pandemic.

The threat from swine flu to India now needs to be viewed differently, health experts say, with the virus now settling into what is closer to a seasonal influenza pattern. India had 3,037 cases of swine flu and 275 deaths this year as of Saturday, Dr. Jagdish Prasad, Director General of Health Services, told The Hindu. Rajasthan was proving to be of greatest concern with 497 cases and 73 deaths as of Saturday, Dr. Prasad said, adding that a team had been sent to the state. “It does seem like the virus is settling into a seasonal pattern. As temperatures rise, the number of cases has begun to decline,” he said.

Better monitoring

With more deaths in just over a month than there were in all of 2014, it isn’t yet clear if the virus is spreading faster or if there is better surveillance, or if both are happening, Dr. Manish Kakkar, Senior Public Health Specialist, Communicable Diseases, at the Public Health Foundation of India, said. “Since this is a relatively new virus, we are likely to see outbreaks for several years before it settles down into a seasonal pattern,” he said. “But it is also true that before the pandemic, India never had influenza surveillance in place. There was very little laboratory work, very little data gathering and we weren’t investing much,” he said.

With better monitoring, the number of fatalities should decline as well. A look at state-wise data shows that states with larger numbers of fatalities are also those with less successful public health infrastructure as a whole. “Look at Delhi. It has 706 cases but only five deaths. If detected early, there should be no mortality,” Dr. Prasad said.

The government has begun testing a vaccine, but when it is ready for roll-out, it will be administered only to health workers and high risk individuals, Dr. Prasad said. Influenza vaccines are typically kept for high-risk groups only, and changes in the composition of the vaccine need to be made on a yearly basis, Dr. Kakkar said. “Moreover, there have been several studies showing that the effectiveness of the seasonal flu vaccine in many western countries is extremely low,” he cautioned.

LCA-NP2 makes debut flight

The second prototype of the Navy version of the Light Combat Aircraft took off from the Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd runway at 12.27 p.m. and flew for about 35 minutes.

LCA-NP2, the second prototype of the Navy version of the Light Combat Aircraft, flew for the first time on Saturday.

It took off from the Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd runway at 12.27 p.m. and flew for about 35 minutes, said HAL, the production partner in the indigenous fighter programme. Officials of HAL, the Aeronautical Development Agency, safety certifying agency CEMILAC and other DRDO officials watched the flight.

HAL Chairman T. Suvarna Raju said a main contribution in it was the new and complex landing gear designed for NP-2 by engineers of the Aircraft Research and Design Centre.

Navy test pilot Captain Shivnath Dahiya of the National Flight Test Centre flew the NP-2. The chase aircraft cover was provided by a limited series production aircraft (LSP2) piloted by Gp. Capt. Suneet Krishna (retd).

Will 'Make in India' reform trade, too?

The Budget must feature key elements of the pending trade and business facilitation reforms to reduce the massive trade transaction costs plaguing the Indian economy

India is yet to become a major global player even after launching extremely bold and successful economic reforms in 1991 after a massive balance of payments crisis. The main reason is a complete neglect of trade, industrial and business facilitation reforms in the last decade.

First generation reforms (1991-2004) were not followed up, and hard policy decisions on trade, investment, trade facilitation, and regulatory reform were postponed. Strong global growth, coupled with the lagged impact of earlier first generation reforms that unleashed some of the latent entrepreneurial spirit in the Indian economy, led to strong growth between 2004 and 2008. Growth due to global tailwinds was mistakenly perceived as inherent Indian competitiveness, and the urgency and hunger for reforms got dimmed within the bureaucratic and policy establishment.


During this period of policy paralysis, the international trade landscape underwent major changes. International trade today is defined by integrated production networks that combine intermediate goods and services from several countries to produce the final goods and services. Global fragmentation of production is essentially a division of labour based on specialised tasks that need to be combined through an efficient supply chain. Thus, the focus now is to connect to regional and global supply chains. To succeed in that, the massive trade transaction costs have to be drastically reduced through trade facilitation and logistical facilitation reforms. Alongside, the business environment has to make doing business a breeze. This will enable MSMEs to participate actively in linking to global supply chains. This in turn will encourage a larger flow of efficiency-seeking FDI with the aim of making India a hub in the supply chain process. This will create jobs and make inclusive growth real. This should be at the heart of the prime minister's recent 'Make in India' initiative. The following section highlights some of the key elements to be covered under it.

First, the success of 'Make in India' needs to be predicated upon the need to diversify services beyond IT-and IT-ES. Indian trade policy in services became IT-centric with over-emphasis in its trade negotiation priorities on Mode 4 (or liberalisation of the movement of people), a critical demand of the Indian IT lobby. It did not focus on the barriers preventing the take-off of other services such as behind-the-border regulatory restrictions on accounting, legal, engineering, architecture, or health-related professional services in partner countries. Global trade in off-shored services is becoming increasingly about trade in tasks, i.e. carrying out specialised functions within the broader accounting or legal service professions. With the emergence of big data as a driving force of innovation and business development, data analytics and management will emerge as a huge area of opportunity in professional services exports for India. Trade barriers related to regulatory constraints on undertaking certain types of legal or accounting tasks offshore, and barriers related to emerging issues in data privacy and data restrictions, are now the areas of maximum concern for the future growth of off-shore professional and technical services model (such as BPO or KPO). This requires urgent domestic regulatory reforms of the services sector in India and negotiation of such trade barriers within trade agreements.

Secondly, the objective of 'Make in India' to transform India to become a major global player is linked to strategic regionalism. India's regionalism efforts till now were largely uncoordinated andFTAs were put into motion with modest success. India also invested a lot of negotiating energy in FTAs with industrialised economies like Japan and the EU. These agreements follow the old 20th century model of trade negotiating strategy - focus on tariffs and try to keep sectors that are most sensitive out of the tariff reduction schedule. Deeper engagement on technical standards and related barriers, trade facilitation, or on the regulatory aspects of services market access - the issues that define effective market access in this production chain-related integrated global economy - are not a part of such agreements.

Since India's existing agreements or those currently being negotiated (for example, EU-India) remain shallow in terms of their level of ambition, market access gains will be marginal, especially with industrialised-country partners like Japan and EU, given that tariffs there are already low, and agriculture and a liberalised visa regime are not included in these FTAs. The PM's visit to Japan has laid the groundwork for a much deeper bilateral economic partnership that goes beyond the mandate of the existing FTA between the two countries.

Given the current global scenario, it would make sense for India to look to a deeper regionalism that incorporates the 21st century trade negotiating mandate. This would mean reworking its trade engagement with SE Asia and replacing existing shallow agreements with ones that have a wider mandate, as well as simultaneously considering joining, or at least being ready to conform to the TPP's evolving gold standard in trade policy, so that India is not left out of the largest global supply chain. The RCEP, where India is an ambitious agenda setter on new trade barriers rather than a defensive player trying to cherry-pick domestic winners and losers, provides another avenue. The entire focus now should be towards a link to regional supply chains of Asean countries. This will require policies to attract FDI that would help create these regional linkages. Essentially, trade negotiations would have to be complemented by greater focus on domestic reform - i.e., business facilitation to create a more competitive and diverse manufacturing base in India, creating more opportunities to find a niche in the regional production network.

The critical element of this regionalism is connectivity. An ambitious long-term vision to ensure economic connectivity between India and the rest of Southern Asia is critical to India's trade policy objectives in pursuing regional agreements with Asean economies. Connectivity would not only encompass road, rail, air, and sea linkages but also linkages between Indian and Southern Asian energy networks (pipelines and electricity grids). It would also include institutional mechanisms to facilitate movement of people (thus enabling services trade), customs and other regulatory harmonisation, and liberalisation of education, health, banking and financial services.

One must acknowledge the importance attached to by our PM to trade and business facilitation reforms which featured in the first Budget of the new government, and soon thereafter highlighted by the PM himself in adopting 'Make in India' as a top policy reform initiative. This is totally consistent with India's dynamic comparative advantage and with the evolving global trade and investment landscape. The task ahead is not easy. But it is well within our reach. We just need the political will to keep the momentum of trade and business facilitation reforms going and continue to treat this as a top priority reform initiative. Hopefully, the forthcoming Budget will feature key elements of the outstanding trade and business facilitation reforms to substantially reduce the massive trade transaction costs plaguing the Indian economy.

'The freedom of religion,Barack Obama

Many times as President, I've been reminded of a line of prayer that Eleanor Roosevelt was fond of. She said, "Keep us at tasks too hard for us that we may be driven to Thee for strength." I've wondered at times if maybe God was answering that prayer a little too literally. But no matter the challenge, He has been there for all of us. He's certainly strengthened me "with the power through his Spirit," as I've sought his guidance not just in my own life but in the life of our nation.

Now, over the last few months, we've seen a number of challenges - certainly over the last six years. But part of what I want to touch on today is the degree to which we've seen professions of faith used both as an instrument of great good, but also twisted and misused in the name of evil.

As we speak, around the world, we see faith inspiring people to lift up one another - to feed the hungry and care for the poor, and comfort the afflicted and make peace where there is strife. We heard the good work that Sister has done in Philadelphia, and the incredible work that Dr Brantly and his colleagues have done. We see faith driving us to do right.

But we also see faith being twisted and distorted, used as a wedge - or, worse, sometimes used as a weapon. From a school in Pakistan to the streets of Paris, we have seen violence and terrorperpetrated by those who profess to stand up for faith, their faith, professed to stand up for Islam, but, in fact, are betraying it. We see ISIL (the Islamic State), a brutal, vicious death cult that, in the name of religion, carries out unspeakable acts of barbarism.

We see sectarian war in Syria, the murder of Muslims and Christians in Nigeria, religious war in the Central African Republic, a rising tide of anti-Semitism and hate crimes in Europe, so often perpetrated in the name of religion.

So how do we, as people of faith, reconcile these realities - the profound good, the strength, the tenacity, the compassion and love that can flow from all of our faiths, operating alongside those who seek to hijack religious for their own murderous ends?

Humanity has been grappling with these questions throughout human history. And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. Michelle and I returned from India - an incredible, beautiful country, full of magnificent diversity - but a place where, in past years, religious faiths of all types have, on occasion, been targeted by other peoples of faith, simply due to their heritage and their beliefs - acts of intolerance that would have shocked Gandhiji, the person who helped to liberate that nation.

So this is not unique to one group or one religion. There is a tendency in us, a sinful tendency that can pervert and distort our faith. In today's world, when hate groups have their own Twitter accounts and bigotry can fester in hidden places in cyberspace, it can be even harder to counteract such intolerance. But God compels us to try. And in this mission, I believe there are a few principles that can guide us.

And, first, we should start with some basic humility. I believe that the starting point of faith is some doubt - not being so full of yourself and so confident that you are right and that God speaks only to us, and doesn't speak to others.

Our job is not to ask that God respond to our notion of truth - our job is to be true to Him, His word, and His commandments. And we should assume humbly that we're confused and don't always know what we're doing and we're stumbling towards Him, and have some humility in that process. And that means we have to speak up against those who would misuse His name to justify oppression, or violence, or hatred with that fierce certainty. No God condones terror. No grievance justifies the taking of innocent lives, or the oppression of those who are weaker.

And so, as people of faith, we are summoned to push back against those who try to distort ourreligion - any religion - for their own nihilistic ends. And here at home and around the world, we will constantly reaffirm that fundamental freedom - freedom of religion - the right to practice our faith how we choose, to change our faith if we choose, to practice no faith at all if we choose, and to do so free of persecution and fear and discrimination.

There's wisdom in our founders writing in those documents that help found this nation the notion of freedom of religion, because they understood the need for humility. They also understood the need to uphold freedom of speech, that there was a connection between freedom of speech and freedom of religion. For to infringe on one right under the pretext of protecting another is a betrayal of both.

But part of humility is also recognising in modern, complicated, diverse societies, the functioning of these rights, the concern for the protection of these rights calls for each of us to exercise civility and restraint and judgement. And if, in fact, we defend the legal right of a person to insult another's religion, we're equally obligated to use our free speech to condemn such insults and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with religious communities. Just because you have the right to say something doesn't mean the rest of us shouldn't question those who would insult others in the name of free speech. Because we know that our nations are stronger when people of all faiths feel that they are welcome, that they, too, are full and equal members of our countries.

So humility, I think, is needed. And the second thing we need is to uphold the distinction between our faith and our governments. The United States is one of the most religious countries in the world. And one of the reasons is that our founders wisely embraced the separation of church and state. Our government does not sponsor a religion, nor does it pressure anyone to practice a particular faith, or any faith at all. And the result is a culture where people of all backgrounds and beliefs can freely and proudly worship, without fear. It's from the heart.

It's not the case in authoritarian governments that elevate an individual leader or a political party above the people, or, in some cases, above the concept of God Himself. So the freedom of religion is a value we will continue to protect here at home and stand up for around the world.

India set to become world's fastest growing e-commerce market

To grow from $2.9 bn to $100 bn in 2020, market capitalisation of internet businesses may hit $160 bn

India is on route to becoming the world’s fastest growing e-commerce market, if current projections are anything to go by. This growth story is being driven by robust investment activity in the sector and the rapid increase in internet users. Internet users in India have gone up from 50 mn in 2007 to 300 million in 2014.

Last year, smart phone shipments doubled to 80 mn from a year-ago period. The prospect of connecting 1.24 billion people to the internet may be an opportunity in itself. But what analysts are excited about is the prospect of selling products and services to this digital population. Investment banks believe India is on way to becoming one of the largest internet markets in the world, with implications for consumers and investors.

Morgan Stanley expects the size of the Indian internet market to rise from $11 bn in 2013 to $137 bn by 2020 and market capitalisation of these internet businesses could touch $160-200 bn from the $4 bn at present. Currently, only three internet companies are listed in India but with the pace at which venture capital (VC) firms and private equity (PE) firms are pumping money into India, several internet companies could possibly look at listing in the next couple of years. India’s internet market was at $11 bn (gross merchandise value) in 2013, of which $11 bn was online travel and e-commerce was $3 bn.

As the market matures and more companies get listed, the market cap of internet companies will expand too. Analysts at Morgan Stanley believe that India's internet market can grow to $137 bn by 2020 (a CAGR of 43 per cent) and e-commerce will form the largest part of the internet market at $102 billion. In relatively more advanced markets like China and the US, top 30 listed internet companies account for 12 per cent and four per cent, respectively, of the total market capitalisation. Internet commerce tends to account for more than 50 per cent of the market cap among listed internet firms. Morgan Stanley expects India’s e-commerce market (revenues) to grow from $2.9 bn in 2013 to over $100 bn by 2020, making it the fastest growing e-commerce market in the world.

The basis of this argument is the kind of equity investments made by PE and VC firms in 2014. The total equity investments made in Indian internet companies is $4.5 bn. The growth in internet businesses will also give a fillip to other related businesses like logistics and payment solutions

Assessment-led education reform

We must embrace a culture of data-driven decision making, where learning outcomes are the key indicators of quality in schools. We need standardised assessments of student learning

The tenth Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) was released recently. It highlighted yet again that by the end of primary school, nearly half our children are unable to read Class 2 level text and nearly two-thirds fail at basic maths.ASER as a citizen-led survey has done an excellent job of bringing the issue of poor learning outcomes to the forefront of educational discourse in the country. However, we now need to build on it to promote large-scale student assessments that will give us useful data with which to measure and guide our education system.

Today, we evaluate our education system and formulate education policies based on input-based measures. Just as successful organisations do not evaluate their success based on input measures such as amount of raw material consumed or the qualification of employees, our education system cannot continue to measure success by the number of functional kitchens or qualified teachers in the system.

We must embrace a culture of data-driven decision making, where learning outcomes are the key indicators of quality in schools. We need standardised assessments of student learning outcomes that give us a strong, quantitative understanding of where we stand - at the national, state, district, school, student or subject topic level - and use this data to actively to measure our progress as a system and inform our education policies.

A rigorous and credible standardised assessment of student learning at the national level can provide a meaningful benchmark for our progress on education as a country and enable comparison of state performance. The National Council for Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has administeredNational Achievement Survey (NAS) - a full-length examination in language, mathematics and environment studies for a sample of students in Classes 3, 5, 7 and 8 in 31 states and territories - for over a decade. These surveys are conducted once every four years and presently there is a lead time of about two years in disseminating the results to the states.

Recently, in an encouraging move, NCERT enhanced the technical design of NAS as well as introduced modern analysis techniques that enable comparison of student performance over time. It is critical that we disseminate the results in a timely manner to states and districts, so this data can contribute effectively to the policymaking and planning processes.

While NAS can provide useful insights at a national level, state sample-based assessments can focus on regional nuances of each state's curriculum and pedagogical practices. The results from NAS should also be used as a credible benchmark by all states to track their relative performance.

The ministry of human resource development has taken the lead here by providing financial support to states for conducting state learning achievement surveys (SLAS). Some states such as Himachal Pradesh have conducted state-led student assessments in government schools, and have utilised this data to set learning improvement goals. However, many states lack the technical capability to build a robust large-scale assessment process and use results effectively to feed into their planning. We can further strengthen SLAS by extending it to include private schools and building the capacity of state teams to conduct, analyse and use results from these assessments to feed into their education decision making process.

Over the next five years, all states should migrate to census-based assessments that enable tracking the progress of every child while holding teachers, principals and school systems accountable for every child's learning. Simultaneously, teacher capacity must be built to use student assessment data collected periodically to guide everyday classroom instruction.

Further, we must create a culture of assessment-based reform by building the capacities of decision-makers in the education administration to understand these results and use them to create targeted improvement plans.

We can learn from Brazil which introduced Prova Brasil, a nationwide student assessment in 2005 to benchmark the performance of states, districts and schools and plan remediation strategies. Until 12 years ago, Brazil was ranked amongst the bottom of most international learning achievement surveys. Using data generated from Prova Brasil, that measures learning levels of children in Class 4 and 8 in language and mathematics, Brazil managed to break out of that norm.

As our nation prepares to implement Padhe Bharat, Badhe Bharat, which focuses on strengthening foundational skills of students such as early reading, writing, comprehension and mathematics, we should ensure integration of assessments as part of the programme. Assessment results must be used effectively to measure learning outcomes and be converted into actionable plans for improvement. It would be wonderful if the concern over our education system due to the ASER results converts into the use of data for targeted and meaningful improvements.

Higher tax share for states in Budget

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's idea of cooperative federalism is expected to be on display in the 2015-16 Budget with the government planning to transfer more untied funds to states through centrally sponsored schemes. Besides, states are likely to receive a higher tax devolution in line with recommendations from the 14th Finance Commission.

The number of centrally sponsored schemes stands at 66, with states having the flexibility to spend 10 per cent of the total allocation at their discretion but within the overall objectives of the programme. Earlier, there used to be 147 such schemes.


States were allocated over Rs 3 lakh crore funds through the central schemes in 2014-15, over Rs 2 lakh crore of which were tied. States are expected to receive most of the funds as untied in 2015-16.

Officials said the number of schemes could be brought down to around 15, which reflected the priorities of the Modi government and would incorporate flagship programmes launched by the previous United Progressive Alliance government such as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee and the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana.

In the case of new schemes too, officials said views from state governments would be incorporated within the broad objectives, giving them flexibility for local adjustments.

Besides, the Finance Commission's recommendations are likely to reflect in the Budget, although that will make the Centre's job of reining in the fiscal deficit at 3.6 per cent of the gross domestic product in 2015-16 a little more difficult.

The commission is expected to suggest states' share of the divisible tax pool be raised to 42 per cent from 32 per cent. At 32 per cent, the states' share was Rs 3,82,216 crore of gross tax revenue of Rs 13,64,524 crore in 2014-15. Cess and surcharges do not form part of the divisible pool.

At 42 per cent, states would have received Rs 5,01,658 crore. However, the recommendations will be implemented from 2015-16. The 13th Finance Commission had raised the states' share to 32 per cent from 30.5 per cent.

The commission also recommended switching to an accrual-based accounting from a cash-based system. This might mitigate the practice of carrying over the subsidy amount by the Centre whenever it struggles to meet the fiscal deficit target.

In cash accounting, income is recorded when cash is received and expenses are recorded when cash is paid out. However, in accrual accounting, income and expenses are recorded as they occur, regardless of whether cash has actually changed hands. Many advanced nations follow accrual accounting.

The commission also observed that the many of the subjects in the State and Concurrent Lists of the Constitution had been encroached into by the Centre, which should be avoided. The commission, headed by former Reserve Bank of India Governor Y V Reddy, submitted its report to the government last year, but it is yet to be tabled in Parliament