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RSTV IAS UPSC – Income Tax - E Assessment

Income Tax - E Assessment Archives TOPIC General Studies 3 Economy In News: The government of India has over the last few years taken various steps to reduce human interface between the tax administration and the taxpayers and bring in consistency and transparency in various tax matters through use of Information Technology. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has inaugurated the Income Tax Department’s National E-assessment Centre (NeAC). The NeAC will be based in Delhi, and will look after the functioning of e-Assessment scheme. The body would be headed by principal chief commissioner of income tax. Regional e-assessment Centre (REC): Additionally, there would be eight Regional e-Assessment Centres (ReAC) in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata Ahmedabad, Pune, Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Apart from assessment units, these centres would also be home to review, technical and verification units. Each ReAC will be headed by chief commissioner of income tax (CCIT). “Cases for the specified work shall be assigned by the NeAC to different units by way of automated allocation systems Assessment units (AU): AU will perform the function of scrutinising tax returns, analysing submissions made and evidence submitted by the assesse and make requests, if any verification or technical assistance is required. Verification units (VU): VU will perform the function of making enquiry, cross verification, examination of records or witnesses and recording statements, as may be required for verification. Technical units (TU): TU will give advice on legal, accounting, forensic, information technology, valuation, transfer pricing, data analytics, management or other technical matter required for conducting assessments. Review units (RU): RU will review draft assessment order (DAO) to check if all material evidence, relevant points of fact and law, relevant tax case laws have been included in the DAO. It will also ensure the arithmetical accuracy of modifications proposed and perform other functions as may be required for review. A paradigm shift in e-assessment Between 2016 and 2018, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), which is the apex tax administrative body, progressively amended rules, notified various procedures and issued the required guidelines to increase the scope of e-proceedings. The CBDT also issued instructions that income-tax assessment proceedings to be framed in the year 2018-19 and 2019-20, shall be conducted through the e-proceeding facility. Exceptions were carved out for certain types of proceedings such as search and seizure cases, re-assessments, best judgement assessments, etc., where the assessment would be done through personal hearing process. CBDT also specified certain situations where taxpayer may be required to appear in person although the assessment is being carried out through e-proceedings. However, under this framework, the element of personal interaction with the tax department was always present as the entire tax assessment was carried out by the tax officer having jurisdiction over the taxpayer. The government’s objective was, therefore, to move from ‘e-proceedings’ towards an ‘e-assessment’ mechanism where the tax officer conducting the assessment would not be known to the taxpayer. Towards this objective, the Finance Act, 2018, amended the provisions of the Income-tax Act, 1961, (Act) to empower the government to notify a new tax assessment scheme, whereby the proceedings will be conducted entirely in an electronic mode. The finance minister while presenting the Union budget in July also stated that the new scheme would be launched in a phased manner in the current financial year, i.e., financial year 2019-20. The new scheme was slated to bring in a paradigm shift in the way tax assessments were carried out in India by eliminating person-to-person contact to the extent it is technologically feasible, providing a fair and transparent framework of assessments, ensuring the tax assessments were technically sound and that consistent tax positions were taken. E-Assessment Scheme, 2019 Centre Government had recently notified e-Assessment scheme to facilitate faceless assessment of income tax returns through completely electronic communication between tax officials and tax payers. The first few steps…: In the first phase, the income tax department has selected 58,322 cases for scrutiny, for which e-notices have been served before September 30, belonging to cases of Assessment Year 2018-19. The cases for scrutiny in first phase have been identified based on risk parameters and are computer generated. Why is it important? The new system optimises the utilisation of resources through economies of scale. It will reduce face-to-face interaction between taxpayers and tax officials. Will reduce taxpayer’s grievances in line with the Prime Minister’s vision of ‘Digital India’ and promotion of ease of doing business It introduces team-based assessment with dynamic jurisdiction which will ease of compliance for taxpayers.  It is also expected to bring transparency and efficiency, thus improves the quality of assessment and monitoring. The department claimed that it will dispose of the cases expeditiously. Under the new system, taxpayers will receive notices on their registered e-mails as well as on registered accounts on the official web portal. They will also receive real-time alerts by way of SMS on their registered mobile number, specifying the issues for which their cases have been selected for scrutiny. The reply to the notice can be prepared at ease by the taxpayer at own residence or office and can be sent by email to the National e-Assessment Centre by uploading the same on the designated web portal. In view of the dynamic and all India jurisdiction of all officers of NeAC and ReAC, this kind of connective and collaborative effort of officers is likely to lead to better quality of assessments.

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Daily Current Affairs IAS | UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 17th October 2019

IAS UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 17th October 2019 Archives (PRELIMS + MAINS FOCUS) GLOBAL HUNGER INDEX Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains II - Health In News The latest Global Hunger Index (GHI) has ranked India a lowly 102 among the 117 countries it has mapped The report, prepared jointly by Irish aid agency Concern Worldwide and German organisation Welt Hunger Hilfe. For each country in the list, the GHI looks at four indicators – Undernourishment (which reflects inadequate food availability); Child Wasting- share of children under the age of five who have low weight for their height - which reflects acute undernutrition; Child Stunting - that is children under the age of five who have low height for their age -which reflects chronic undernutrition; Child Mortality – mortality rate of children under 5 years (which reflects both inadequate nutrition and unhealthy environment). On the whole, the number of hungry people has risen from 785 million in 2015 to 822 million. Multiple countries have higher hunger levels now than in 2010. With an overall score of 30.3, India falls in the “serious” category. India has the highest percentage of children who suffer from acute undernutrition. On other parameters, where India has improved, the pace has been relatively slow Among the BRICS grouping, India is ranked the worst, with China at 25 and a score of just 6.5. Within South Asia, too, India is behind every other country. Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan (in that order) are all ahead of India. Indigenous breeds record marginal rise Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains III - Economy In News According to 20th Livestock Census released there are 4.85 crore desi (native) milch cows in the country compared to 4.81 crore population in the last census in 2012, indicating less than 1% increase On the other hand, the milch population of exotic and crossbred cattle — including varieties such as Jersey or Holsteins which have much higher milk yields — saw a whopping growth of 32% over the last seven years, growing from 1.9 crore to 2.5 crore animals. The Rashtriya Gokul Mission, launched by the Bharatiya Janata Party-led (BJP) government in 2014, aimed to promote indigenous desi breeds.  However, the total population of such cattle (indigenous desi breeds) — male and female together, milk-producing or not — actually dropped 6% to 14.2 crore animals, while exotic and crossbred cattle saw an overall growth of almost 27% to 5 crore animals. https://d39gegkjaqduz9.cloudfront.net/TH/2019/10/17/CNI/Chennai/TH/5_07/9ddc121e_3264579_101_mr.jpg Army mulls over Joint Services Act Part of: GS Prelims and Mains GS-III - security In News In his Independence Day address, PM Modi announced the creation of the post of Chief of Defence Staff to provide “effective leadership at the top level” to the three wings of the armed forces, and to help improve coordination among them. CDS offers seamless tri-service views and single-point advice to the Executive on long-term defence planning and management, including manpower, equipment and strategy, and above all, “jointsmanship” in operations. Thus there is a need for creating arrangements and structures to synergise and which can pave way for effective integration Currently, each Service has an individual Act passed by Parliament. A Joint Services Act on approval by the government will facilitate faster integration. KHON RAMLILA Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains I – Art & Culture In News The Culture Department of Uttar Pradesh government is going to organise the country’s first training and performance programme of world famous KHON Ramlila in collaboration with Thailand government. KHON Ramlila is a masked form of Ramlila art of Thailand. It is a form of masked dance depicting the scenes of Ramlila. It has no dialogues and background voices narrate the whole story of Ramayana. It is also famous for its beautiful attire and golden masks. It is included in the list of UNESCO’s Intangible cultural heritage.  The Ramakien (literally ‘Glory of Rama’) is Thailand's national epic, derived from the Hindu epic Ramayana. (MAINS FOCUS) TRADE TOPIC: General Studies 2: Bilateral, regional and global groupings and agreements involving India and/or affecting India’s interests Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests, Indian Diaspora. RCEP and Data Context: Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership trade negotiations, being held with Association of Southeast Asian Nations, China, South Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, India may accept free data flow clauses with some public policy exceptions. It needs to be understood that suitable data controls and policies are not to be exceptions but the mainstream of a digital economy and society. Arguments: India will largely end up ceding most of its data policy space, and data sovereignty.  it will give up any chances for effectively using Indian data for India’s development, and for digital industrialisation to become a top digital power. It will effectively be laying the path for permanent digital dependency, with India’s data flowing freely to data intelligence centres in the U.S., and  China.  A  few global “intelligence corporations” will digitally, and intelligent-ally, control and run the entire world. About RCEP: Regional Comprehensive Cooperation agreement – is a proposed free trade agreement between 10 members of ASEAN and its five FTA partners (China, India, Australia, Japan, New Zealand) RCEP negotiation was formally launched in 2012, whose member states together account for 3.4 billion people and approximately 40% of world’s GDP. Img: http://www.businesskorea.co.kr/news/photo/201711/23601_19813_0.jpg Do you know? Members of Indian Industry are resisting RCEP due to following concerns  Flooding of the market with Chinese goods impacting domestic manufacturers Lack of access to Indian services in the RCEP countries (Services is India’s strong area and has huge potential to tap into RCEP market) Issues: India’s trade deficits with nations have always widened after signing free-trade-agreements (FTAs) with them, citing the cases with ASEAN, Japan, Korea, and Singapore, most of which are RCEP nations. It has also been pointed out that India’s vulnerable agriculture and dairy sectors, which are not in positions to compete with Australia and New Zealand, will be exposed to vagaries of global trade. Indian manufacturing is not competitive enough to face the vagaries of a free trade regime. Even after 27 years of liberalisation, inefficiency prevails due to a host of unimplemented reforms in the product and the factor markets. On the factor side, labour market reforms are incomplete. Labour productivity in manufacturing is still one of the lowest in the world with spatially fragmented labour laws are escalating the costs of doing business. Given this, Indian industry is hardly in a position to compete in the level-playing ground in a free-trade region. Differences: India apprehends that, given its $60-billion trade deficit with China, the RCEP demand to reduce tariffs on 90 per cent of the traded goods to zero will have a disastrous effect on its already struggling MSME sector. India is especially apprehensive about Chinese goods swamping its market, forcing domestic producers to cut production or shut down. India has expressed its reservations over inclusion of e-commerce in the RCEP talks. The RCEP draft is opposed to data localisation, while India fears the monopoly power of digital giants which includes the likes of Tencent and Alibaba. ASEAN+3: India could be out of the mega trade deal (RCEP). China has started pushing for a free trade pact between ASEAN + 3 (which includes the ten-member ASEAN, China, Japan and South Korea). This would effectively mean that among the 16 countries negotiating the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), all except India, Australia and New Zealand would get included in the proposed pact. China may be trying to push for an ASEAN + 3 arrangement to speedily create a new order in the region with itself at the helm to counter the challenge posed by the US with which it is engaged in a trade war. Data concern: The global digital or artificial intelligence (AI) economy is currently a two-horse race between the U.S. and China.  It is feared that all other countries, including the European Union (EU) and major developing countries such as India, will have to become fully digitally dependent on one of these two digital superpowers.  This will considerably compromise their economic and political independence, something referred to as digital colonisation. Solution: Efforts to escape such a dismal situation, like in the French and the U.K.’s AI strategies, numerous EU documents, and India’s NITI Aayog’s AI strategy, focus on one central issue — more data-sharing within the country, and better access to data for domestic businesses. With few global digital corporations such as Google, Facebook, Amazon and Uber, continually vacuum out India’s and Indians’ data, and then by default treat it as their private property it is difficult Way forward Despite all the concerns, the government must take into account that either slowing down India’s RCEP engagement or walking out of the talks at this stage would cut India out of the rules-making process for the RCEP and give China further space in the regional trade and security architecture. At a time when the U.S. has broken from the global consensus on multilateral trade agreements, an Indian walkout would endanger the united message that RCEP countries, which represent 40% of the global GDP, would wish to send out. It would also be a sharp departure from India’s “Act East” slogan and its extended outreach to ASEAN. Appropriate data policies must ensure that the required data is actually available to Indian digital businesses. Asserting a community’s legal right over data that is derived from, and is about, the community concerned, or about ‘things’ that belong to it. This is the concept of community data inscribed in India’s draft e-commerce policy. Data classification, data ownership rights, data sharing, data trusts must be dealt with Conclusion: Disengaging from signing binding agreements on uninhibited data flows across borders does not mean that a country would simply localise all data. Some kinds of data may indeed need to be localised, while others should freely flow globally.  It just means that a country retains complete data policy space, and the means to shape its digital industrialisation, and thus its digital future. Connecting the dots: India must not trade away its national data rights at the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership negotiations. Justify FOREIGN POLICY TOPIC: General Studies 2: India and its neighbourhood- relations. Bilateral, regional and global groupings and agreements involving India and/or affecting India’s interests Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests, Indian Diaspora. IND-US and Global Politics Global politics is changing at a fast pace.  The global order is now dipping into a vortex of disruptions largely caused by the United States, China (Trade war)and Brexit.  India also stands at the crossroads in terms of its foreign policy approach. India’s Foreign policy  options: Stable policy of non-alignment and strategic autonomy;  Join the bandwagon of unilateralism and be a permanent treaty ally of one of the superpowers, Embark upon a calculated trip with the objective of expansion in terms of forging new relations and exploring fresh territories by adopting a strategy of “multi-alignment and transactional autonomy”. Concerns in IND-US Relations: A  no-trade deal,  U.S.-Pakistan bonhomie Trade deal failure: The prospects of an agreement unravelled due to the failure to reach an agreement on Information and communications technology (ICT) products.  U S Wanted, The U.S. has wanted India to eliminate tariffs (20%) on ICT products, but New Delhi is concerned that this could open up the market to flooding by Chinese technology. The U.S. wanted greater access to Indian markets for medical devices, such as stents and knee implants, ICT and dairy products and sought the removal of price caps. The US had sought the removal of price caps (“Trade Margin Rationalization” or TMR) on medical devices and greater access for dairy products and some other categories of agricultural goods.  India wanted, The reinstatement of preferential market access to U.S. markets under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program, which was revoked in early June.  It had also wanted facilitation of processes in agricultural product markets where it already had access (such as easier certification of food product irradiation facilities)  Greater access in some agricultural markets (table grapes, pomegranates for instance), US-Pakistan Bonhomie: United States has been one of the largest sources of foreign direct investment in Pakistan and is Pakistan’s largest export market.   Trade relations between the United States and Pakistan continue to grow  The U.S. government supports this relationship by funding reverse trade delegations, business conferences, technical assistance, and business outreach. Ind-US  Relations Good shades : India-U.S. civil nuclear deal, the ongoing defence cooperation of the past decade worth billions of dollars  The signing of three “foundational defence agreements”, i.e. the Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement, the Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement and the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement for Geo-spatial Cooperation. Bad shades : Current trade challenges,  The U.S.’s hyphenation of India with China in its trade war  U S call for the removal of the “developing country” tag assigned by the WTO. During the 1971 war, the U.S. sent its fleet towards India to assist Pakistan. India’s procurement of defence material from Russia  US  unreal expectations such as India having military boots on the ground in Afghanistan. Concerns: The recent and abrupt abandonment by the Trump administration of the Kurds who assisted the Americans in fighting the Islamic State both in terms of resources and manpower should serve as a warning sign to India in terms of its Afghanistan strategy The current Indian dispensation must prepare for the eventuality of a sudden withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan which could lead to a complete takeover by the Taliban, with potential repercussions on India’s northern front. With respect to Pakistan, there is confused signalling from the official “advisers” of the White House The U.S. campaigned for Iran’s nuclear deal in 2015, then withdrew itself from the accord in 2018 and has now adopted a blanket sanction policy qua any nation dealing in oil transactions with Iran. Way forward: Before taking any decision on the future trajectory of India-U.S. dynamics, the Indian establishment must remain mindful of the unpredictability and inherent contradictions in U.S. foreign policy  At the same time, capitalise on U.S. “isolationism and retrenchment” by maintaining its time-tested policy of “non-alignment and strategic autonomy”. The Prime Minister must ensure that India-U.S. bilateralism survives the axe of unilateralism without sacrificing India’s “sweet spot” and tag of being “everyone’s friend”.  Mr. Trump needs to realise that India at this juncture cannot afford to get derailed from the tracks of globalisation, regional alliances, trade opportunities Conclusion: The convergence of perception between India and the U.S. on global and regional issues of common interest provides enormous opportunities for both countries to work closely in reshaping the global political order. Connecting the dots: A setting where there was a chariot of peace, joint co-operation, multilateralism and liberalism whose strings were controlled by institutions such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the International Court of Justice has now become one of warhorses pulling in different directions to embrace unilateralism, protectionism and isolationism. Analyse. (TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE) Model questions: (You can now post your answers in comment section) Note:  Featured Comments and comments Up-voted by IASbaba are the “correct answers”. IASbaba App users – Team IASbaba will provide correct answers in comment section. Kindly refer to it and update your answers. Q.1)KHON RAMLILAis predominantly associated with which country/region? Thailand Vietnam South Korea None of the above Q.2)Consider the following statements aboutChief of Defence Staff (CDS) India does not have CDS as of 2019and creation of one will enable to offer seamless tri-service views and single-point advice to the Executive on defence management Currently, each Service has an individual Act passed by Parliament. A Joint Services Act on approval by the government will facilitate faster integration Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct? 1 only 2 only Both 1 and 2 Neither 1 nor 2 Q.3)Rashtriya Gokul Mission is being implemented which ministry/body?  Niti Aayog Ministry of Agriculture Ministry of fisheries, animal husbandry & dairying Ministry of Rural development Q.4)GLOBAL HUNGER INDEXis being released by which organisation? World Food Organisation UNESCO World Bank None of the above MUST READ Refusing to recuse: On Justice Arun Mishra The Hindu Agents of change: On investing in women’s education The Hindu Not green, but greenwash The Hindu Intelligence of the future IE Light on national security IE

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Daily Current Affairs IAS | UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 16th October 2019

IAS UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 16th October 2019 Archives (PRELIMS + MAINS FOCUS) Nobel laureate Michael Kremer’s India Link Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains II - Education In News Kremer’s non-profit advisory service -Precision Agriculture for Development (PAD)- has helped 6 lakh farmers Randomised controlled trials – the research for which the Nobel was awarded – showed that a low-cost mobile phone based agriculture consulting service, developed by PAD led to an annual income growth of about ₹7,000 per farmer. When farmers could call a helpline for real-time expert advice on sowing and irrigation decisions and inputs such as seeds, fertilizers and pesticides, yields rose by 28% for those producing cumin and 8.6% for those growing cotton in Gujarat, PAD India began work with 2,000 cotton farmers in Gujarat in 2016, and now reaches six lakh farmers across the country, with the biggest contingent of 5.25 lakh coming from Odisha. Working with the Coffee Board of India, PAD India has connected 15,000 coffee growers in Karnataka to hydrologists and agronomists over the last year, with a plan to ramp up numbers to 50,000 farmers. Nationwide, PAD India projects get 800-1,000 calls a day, with answers being provided within two hours to 72% of queries. PM-JAY health scheme Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains II - Health In News Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh have emerged as the top performing States of Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana Nearly Rs7,901 crore has been availed under the scheme for secondary and tertiary level treatments Half-a-crore hospital treatments have been provided and there are 9 hospital admissions every minute across India More than 60% of the amount spent has been on tertiary care. Cardiology, Orthopaedics, Radiation Oncology, Cardio-thoracic and Vascular Surgery, and Urology have emerged as the top tertiary specialities. About PM-JAY PM-JAY is the flagship scheme of the government with an aim to bring quality healthcare to around 50 crore poor and vulnerable Indians. The scheme gives annual healthcare benefits of up to ₹5 lakh for every entitled family. The scheme has resulted in saving of over ₹12,000 crore to the beneficiary families in the past one year of its operations.  REMBRANDT Part of: GS Prelims and Mains GS-I – Art & Culture In News In 2019, India and the Netherlands will commemorate Rembrandt’s 350th death anniversary with a showcase that will celebrate the two countries’ culture and heritage. Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606 – 1669) was a Dutch draughtsman, painter and printmaker. He is generally considered one of the greatest visual artists in the history of art and the most important in Dutch art history. Rembrandt was interested in Mughal miniatures, especially around the 1650s. He made 25 drawings based on Mughal miniatures from India during 1656 to 1661, at the height of his career. This is in spite of the fact that the Dutch artist never set foot on Indian soil. These miniatures include paintings of Shah Jahan, Akbar, Jahangir and Dara Shikoh. They may also have influenced the costumes and other aspects of his works. KAYAKALP AWARDS Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains II - Health In News Union Health Minister gave away Kayakalp awards to Public and Private Health Facilities for high standards of sanitation and hygiene. Kayakalp awards were launched by Union Health Ministry in 2015 as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan to felicitate Public Health Facilities (PHCs) for maintaining high standards of sanitation and hygiene.  Objective isto inculcate culture of cleanliness for gaining the trust and confidence of community in these facilities. The Union Health Ministry grants the awards through the National Health Mission. PHOSPHORESCENCE Part of: GS Prelims and Mains GS-III – Science & Technology In News A novel security ink that emits intense red colour when exposed to 254 nm wavelength UV and emits green colour soon after the UV source is turned off has been synthesised by a team of researchers from the Delhi-based National Physical Laboratory (CSIR-NPL). The emission of red is due to fluorescence while green is due to phosphorescence phenomenon. This is the first report of an ink that contains two pigments that emit different colours at very different wavelengths when exposed to UV light of a particular wavelength The ink has the potential to be used as a security feature on currency notes and passports. Phosphorescence It is a type of photoluminescence related to fluorescence. Unlike fluorescence, a phosphorescent material does not immediately re-emit the radiation it absorbs. In certain materials, absorbed radiation is re-emitted at a lower intensity for up to several hours after the original excitation. Everyday examples of phosphorescent materials are the glow-in-the-dark toys that glow after being charged with a bright light such as in any normal reading or room light Pic: https://d39gegkjaqduz9.cloudfront.net/TH/2019/10/13/VIS/Visakhapatnam/TH/5_13/0fea5b9e_3258936_1_mr.jpg (MAINS FOCUS) POLITY TOPIC: General Studies 2: Structure, organization and functioning of the Executive and the Judiciary National Judicial Appointments Commission Context: Four years ago, on October 16, 2015, the Supreme Court (SC) struck down as unconstitutional an amendment to the Constitution establishing the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC). The amendment and the corresponding law were challenged by the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association (SCAORA) believing, rightly, that the amendment would violate the basic structure of the Constitution by depriving the judiciary of its independence. Do you know? The right to select judges to the Supreme Court was taken upon itself by the apex court in 1993 and revalidated in a 1998 judgment (Third Judges case). The current government tried to change that with the passage of a law on the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC), but the law was shot down — again by the Supreme Court. NJAC was struck down by the SC because it would have compromised the independence of the CJI and given a role to the government in the appointment of judges. Unlike in the U.S. where judges are appointed by the President and are known to be leaning towards the Democrats or Republicans, Indian judges are not supposed to have any political affiliation. Do you know? The Collegium includes the five senior-most judges of the Supreme Court, who collectively constitute the selection panel for judicial appointments to the Supreme Court (and the three senior-most judges when it comes to the High Courts). India is one of the few countries where judges have the last word on judicial appointments, through the mechanism of the Collegium. The Collegium itself is not mentioned in the text of the Constitution. It arose out of a judgment of the Supreme Court, and in response to increased executive interference in judicial appointments, particularly during Indira Gandhi’s regime. Therefore, the Collegium began life as a tool to secure and guarantee the independence of the judiciary.  “National Judicial Appointments Commission”, which was suggested as an alternative to Collegium system. But NJAC was struck down by the SC in 2015. What was the proposed composition of the NJAC? The CJI was the chair, ex officio, and along with him were the next two senior judges. The Union Minister of Law and Justice was an ex officio member along with two eminent persons. They were to recommend persons for appointment as judges of the SC and high courts and the transfer of judges of the high courts (including chief justices) Why was NJAC struck down by the SC? SC bench had held that judicial primacy in appointments was the only constitutionally-authorised way of securing/ensuring judicial independence against an increasingly powerful political executive. However, the Collegium had come under increasing criticism, because of its opacity and perceived notion that judicial appointments were too often made in an ad hoc and arbitrary manner. SC too acknowledged the above criticism and vowed to evolve a system where concerns of transparency will be addressed. A small step towards this was made during Dipak Misra’s tenure as CJI, when the resolutions of the Collegium began to be published online. In his NJAC judgment (2015), Justice J.S. Khehar discussed the issue of reciprocity at length in striking down the commission. Justice Khehar preferred exclusion of the political executive from the appointment of judges as a feeling of gratitude towards the government impacts the independence of the judiciary. It was for this very reason that even B.R. Ambedkar wanted to insulate the judiciary from political pressures. Recent developments: CJI had written to the law minister that 43 recommendations made by the collegium were pending with the government and the vacancies in the high courts were to the extent of about 37 per cent. the collegium recommended that Justice Irshad Ali be made a permanent judge of the Allahabad High Court, government rejected the recommendation (without furnishing any reason or justification) Connecting the dots: The unconstitutional NJAC is rearing its head and is now Frankenstein’s monster. Critically analyze. POLITY TOPIC: General Studies 2: Indian Constitution- historical underpinnings, evolution, features, amendments, significant provisions and basic structure One nation one language Context Recently, on the occasion of Hindi Divas, the Union Minister of Home Affairs held that if one language can do the work of uniting the country, then it is the most spoken language, Hindi. Why? It is important to have a language of the whole country which should become the identity of India globally. Hindi can unite the country since it is the most spoken language. There is a huge influence of English on the citizens of India. Background The Constituent Assembly of India adopted Hindi written in Devnagari Script along with English as the official language of the country on September 14, 1949, under Article 343(1). Article 351 gives power to the Union Government to issue a directive for the development of the Hindi language. The Hindi language is one of the 22 languages of the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution of India. The imposition of Hindi was contested in many non-Hindi states, especially in the southern state of Tamil Nadu. Violent protests broke out in southern India leading the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, to introduce the ‘Official Languages Act’ in 1963, which assured the continuation of English along with Hindi as the official language of the Union of India. Criticisms: People across India—particularly in the East and the South—Hindi is not the language of choice of most people. It is a language of convenience. An evened out version of Hindi would be a disaster for Hindi itself. It would destroy its multiple identities, many of them quite charming. It will compromise our many wonderful regional languages, the languages that give us our identity, our sense of belonging. Bangladesh case: Bangladesh was liberated by a handful of brave Bengali students who raised the flag of protest when the attempt was made to impose Urdu, the language of political power in West Pakistan, on them. Way Forward Rethink the three-language policy(Kothari committee), which exists just on paper now. Try other ways to foster national unity than imposing a language.. A united nation has to have space for diversity and  India is united in its diversity. Conclusion: A Tamilian needs to be a Tamilian first. A Maharashtrian needs to be a Maharashtrian first. A Naga needs to be a Naga first before he understands what being an Indian is. Our identities are defined by the language we are born into, the culture we inherit, the myths we grew up with, the stories we heard from our grandparents in the language they spoke. Nothing can ever replace that. Certainly not an Aadhar card. Nor a national language. Connecting the dots : Playing with language is akin to playing with fire. Analyse It is a fallacy to imagine that we need a common language to feel connected. Justify. (TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE) Model questions: (You can now post your answers in comment section) Note:  Featured Comments and comments Up-voted by IASbaba are the “correct answers”. IASbaba App users – Team IASbaba will provide correct answers in comment section. Kindly refer to it and update your answers. Q.1)Consider the following statements about Pradhan Mantri Jan AarogyaYojana  (PM-JAY) PM-JAY is the world’s largest government funded healthcare program,with an aim to bring quality healthcare to around 50 crore poor and vulnerable Indians. The scheme gives annual healthcare benefits of up to ₹5lakh for every entitled family per year, for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization. PMJAY will provide cashless and paperless access to services for the beneficiary at the point of service. Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct? 1 and 2 only 2and 3 only 1 and 3 only 1,2 and 3 Q.2)Consider the following statements about Kayakalp Awards Kayakalp awards were launched by Union Health Ministry in 2015 as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan It was instituted to felicitate Public Health Facilities (PHCs) for maintaining high standards of sanitation and hygiene. The Objective of the awards is to inculcate culture of cleanliness for gaining the trust and confidence of community in these facilities. Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct? 1 and 2 only 2 and 3 only 1 and 3 only 1,2 and 3 Q.3)Consider the following statements The Differences Between Fluorescence and Phosphorescenceis that fluorescence emits light immediately after photon adsorption, whereas there is a delay with phosphorescence Everyday examples of phosphorescent materials are the glow-in-the-dark toys, stickers, paint, wristwatch and clock dials that glow after being charged with a bright light Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct? 1 only 2 only Both 1 and 2 Neither 1 nor 2 MUST READ Another grim reminder: On IMF's GDP projections The Hindu Lynching, the scourge of new India The Hindu A cost-effective way to power generation The Hindu Nobel’s literary constraints The Hindu Those who denigrate Mahatma’s legacy today must answer: Is it possible to imagine India without Gandhi? IE

IASbaba's Monthly Current Affairs Magazine

IAS UPSC Current Affairs Magazine SEPTEMBER 2019

IAS UPSC Current Affairs Magazine SEPTEMBER 2019 ARCHIVES Hello Friends, This is the 52nd edition of IASbaba’s Current Affairs Monthly Magazine. Current Affairs for UPSC Civil Services Examination is an important factor in this preparation. An effort towards making your Current Affairs for IAS UPSC Preparation qualitative. We hope you make the best use of it! This edition covers all important current affairs issues that were in news for the month of SEPTEMBER 2019 DOWNLOAD THE MAGAZINE- CLICK HERE

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RSTV IAS UPSC – UN’s Financial Crisis

UN’s Financial Crisis Archives TOPIC: General Studies 2 Role of UN; International organization In News: The United Nations is running a deficit of $230 million, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said, and may run out of money by the end of October. In a letter for the 37,000 employees at the UN secretariat, Guterres said unspecified "additional stop-gap measures" would have to be taken to ensure salaries and entitlements are paid. To cut costs, Guterres mentioned postponing conferences and meetings and reducing services, while also restricting official travel to only essential activities and taking measures to save energy.  Meetings canceled. Escalators stopped. Official travel limited. U.N. documents delayed. Air conditioning and heating reduced. Limits on interpretation to the U.N.’s six official languages. And the fountain outside U.N. headquarters paid for by U.S. school children and opened in 1952 shut down. These are some of the measures Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has ordered effective Monday at all U.N. facilities and operations around the world to deal with the United Nations’ worst cash crisis in nearly a decade. There are 193 member states in the UN, but only 129 have paid their regular contributions to the budget. The UN's regular budget for the year is $5.4 billion and it is separate from the peacekeeping budget of $6.5 billion.  India paid up its $23.25 million dues for the regular budget on January 30 itself, one of the few countries to pay up on time. While India has been among the few countries to have fully paid its dues to the UN on time, the UN owed India $38 million, among the highest it has to pay to any country, for peacekeeping operations as of March 2019. The United States is simultaneously the largest donor and the largest debtor. One of the reasons for the shortfall is the US, which funds 22 per cent of the UN's regular budget amounting $674 million, not having paid up in full so far. The United States owes $381 million from prior budgets and $674 million for the regular budget, according to figures provided by the US mission to the United Nations. It also owes more than $2.6 billion for active peacekeeping missions. Brazil is second in line in unpaid dues for the regular budget, owing $ 143 million, followed by Argentina which owes $51.57 million, Mexico $36 million, Iran $26.96 million, Venezuela $17.29 million and South Korea $9.8 million. What has the practice been? The practice of meeting the cash requirement of active missions by dipping into the cash pool of closed peacekeeping missions and delaying reimbursements to Police and Troop Contributing Countries, creates a false sense of financial soundness. This approach of creative accounting in managing a financial crisis has never worked and never will. It appears that the countries that owe arrears are somewhat insured from the impact of their inaction. India's assertion that the practice of delaying payments to TCCs while other contractual obligations are met, impacts the UN's ability to maintain honest agreements with TCCs on other aspects of the peacekeeping While sufficient cash has been made available in the pool of closed peacekeeping mission accounts for reimbursing the Troop and Police Contributing Countries in accordance with the agreements signed with them, this cash has been diverted to managing the liquidity crisis of the active peacekeeping missions and at times shortfall in the Regular Budget, thereby deferring resolution to the pressing problem. The United Nations is now effectively borrowing for prolonged periods from troop- and police-contributing countries. Many of them are low-income countries for which that imposes a significant financial burden. At the same time, the Organisation is asking those same countries to do more to train their personnel and improve the quality of their equipment, all while operating in increasingly challenging environments. The United Nations, however, is not fulfilling its obligation towards them in a timely manner. Conclusion A sustainable solution to the financial crisis would only emerge when member states begin to honour their budgetary obligations in full and on time. If member-states do not meet their budgetary obligations, then at least in the context of future peacekeeping operations we see two emerging situations – one, where even with the available cash pool Troop Contributing Countries would not be reimbursed on time and two, missions will close with a cash deficit, without fully reimbursing the Troop and Police Contributing Countries. While the UN is working to become more effective, nimble, accountable, transparent and efficient, the success of the organisation’s efforts depends not only on the internal efforts of the Secretariat, but also on the support of Member States and on the predictability and adequacy of their financial contributions to UN programmes and activities. Connecting the Dots: Analyse the financial crisis in the UN. Suggest solutions to go past this situation.

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Daily Current Affairs IAS | UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 15th October 2019

IAS UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 15th October 2019 Archives (PRELIMS + MAINS FOCUS) Economics Nobel Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains III - Economy In News The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the 2019 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, popularly called the Nobel Prize in Economics, to Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo, and Michael Kremer  They were awarded “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty” The experiment-based approach of the laureates involved dividing an issue into smaller and more manageable questions They have shown that smaller and more precise questions are often best answered through carefully designed experiments among the people who are the most affected In the mid-1990s Dr Kremer and his colleagues demonstrated how powerful this approach can be when they used field experiments to test a range of interventions that could improve school results in Western Kenya Impact on Policy Research surrounding remedial tutoring provided arguments for large-scale support programmes that have now reached more than five million children in India Their studies showed that deworming provides clear health benefits for school children but also that parents are very price sensitive. This led the WHO to recommend that medicine should be distributed for free to over 800 million school children living in areas where over 20% of them have a specific type of parasitic worm infection Their studies paved way for heavy subsidies for preventive healthcare that have been introduced in many countries Mother tongue for preschool Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains II - Education In News The first-ever preschool curriculum was released by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT)  The NCERT’s new curriculum is aimed at all pre-school education, defined as the education of 3 to 6-year-olds, whether at anganwadis, nursery schools, kindergartens, playschools or Montessori schools. It recommends that Children between the ages of three and six years should be taught in their own mother tongues Also, the focus on learning should be through play instead of being subjected to rote learning, tests and examinations. The draft National Education Policy has recommended that the Right to Education Act be extended to students in the three years of preschool before Class I. Cataract major cause of blindness above 50 Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains II - Health In News According to the National Blindness and Visual Impairment Survey of India (2015-19), Cataract is the principal cause of blindness for people above 50 years in India The barriers to accessing treatment include the following — no one to accompany [the patient], seasonal preferences, and financial constraints. Cataract is the cause for 66.2% cases of blindness, 80.7% cases of severe visual impairment, and 70.2% cases of moderate visual impairment in the age group. Also, blindness is more pronounced among illiterate (3.23%) than literates (0.43%) and more prevalent in the rural population (2.14%) than urban (1.80%) What makes this worse for India is the fact that approximately 93% of cases of blindness and 96.2% visual impairment cases in this age group were avoidable. About Cataract A cataract is a clouding of the lens in the eye which leads to a decrease in vision. Cataracts often develop slowly and can affect one or both eyes.  Symptoms may include faded colors, blurry or double vision, halos around light, trouble with bright lights, and trouble seeing at night SARAS Aajeevika Mela Part of: GS Prelims and Mains GS-II – Self-Help Groups In News It is an initiative by the Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM). Its objective is to bring the rural women SHGs formed with support of DAY-NRLM, under one platform to show-case their skills, sell their products and help them build linkages with bulk buyers. Through this mela, rural SHG women get vital national level exposure to understand the demand and taste of urban customers. It is organised by Council for Advancement of People’s Action and Rural Technology (CAPART), marketing arm of Ministry of Rural Development. Typhoon Hagibis Part of: GS Prelims and Mains GS-I - Geography In News Hagibis, which means "speed" in the Philippine language, is a super typhoon swirling around Japan. It made landfall in Izu Peninsula, south-west of Tokyo and moved up the east coast. It led to Chikuma river breaching their banks inundating residential neighbourhoods and the torrential rain triggered landslides. The typhoon caused a total of 48 landslides in 12 prefectures and at the storm's peak, more than seven million people were placed under non-compulsory evacuation orders. After it made its landfall, a magnitude 5.7 earthquake shook Tokyo shortly after. Hurricanes, cyclones and typhoonsare all basically the same thing, but are given different names depending on where they appear. Hurricanes are tropical storms that form over the North Atlantic Ocean and Northeast Pacific. Cyclones are formed over the South Pacific and Indian Ocean. Typhoons are formed over the Northwest Pacific Ocean. willy-willy are formed in south-west Australia. FASTags will work as Aadhaar, track vehicles Part of: GS Prelims and Mains GS-II - Governance In News ‘A FASTag uses Radio Frequency Identification technology to make cashless payments through a prepaid account linked to it. The tag is fixed to the windscreen of a vehicle and an RFID antenna in the canopy of the toll gate scans the QR code and the tag identification number, following which the boom barrier lifts to allow a vehicle to pass through it without the need for a vehicle to stop. A FASTag is linked to a bank account. When a vehicle passes through a toll, an SMS with date, time and place of transaction will be sent to the owner of the vehicle. The master data of all transactions will be with the concessionaire of the toll booth concerned, along with the bank with which the owner has registered the FASTag and the National Payments Corporation of India FASTags are likely to reduce the nation’s GDP loss by bringing down loss of fuel while waiting at toll plazas. Cameras at toll booths will take photos of passengers in a vehicle, which can be useful for the Ministry of Home Affairs as there will be a record of a vehicle’s movement. The Union Government has appealed to all the States to adopt the technology so that the entire system could come under the National Electronic Toll Collection programme (MAINS FOCUS) ECONOMY TOPIC: General Studies 3: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilization of resources, growth, development and employment. Inclusive growth and issues arising from it. Experimental approach to alleviating global poverty Image: https://s3.ap-southeast-1.amazonaws.com/images.deccanchronicle.com/dc-Cover-cfguljvgh1bcoi56r407saqpo2-20191014154018.Medi.jpeg The 2019 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel has been awarded jointly to Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty”. The three adopted an evidence-based approach to apply theory to real-life situations using randomised trials and assessing the outcomes.  The effort was to understand the impact of interventions to achieve desirable outcomes.  The approach is derived from the concept of clinical trials in the pharmaceuticals industry.  “new experiment-based” approach: The “new, powerful tool” employed by the Laureates is the use of Randomised Control Trials (or RCTs). So if one wanted to understand whether providing a mobile vaccination van and/or a sack of grains would incentivise villagers to vaccinate their kids, then under an RCT, village households would be divided into four groups. Group A would be provided with a mobile vaccination van facility, Group B would be given a sack of foodgrains, Group C would get both, and Group D would get neither.  Households would be chosen at random to ensure there was no bias, and that any difference in vaccination levels was essentially because of the “intervention”. Group D is called the “control” group while others are called “treatment” groups. Such an experiment would not only show whether a policy initiative works, but would also provide a measure of the difference it brings about. It would also show what happens when more than one initiatives are combined. This would help policymakers to have the evidence before they choose a policy. Critics: Angus Deaton, the winner of the Economics Nobel in 2015, who said “randomisation does not equalise two groups”, and warned against over-reliance on RCTs to frame policies. While randomly assigning people or households makes it likely that the groups are equivalent, randomisation “cannot guarantee” it. That’s because one group may perform differently from the other, not because of the “treatment” that it has been given, but because it has more women or more educated people in it. More fundamentally, RCTs do not guarantee if something that worked in Kerala will work in Bihar, or if something that worked for a small group will also work at scale. Case study: some years ago would explain the concept better. Despite immunisation being free, women were not bringing in their children for the vaccination shot.  The two MIT economists decided to give a bag of pulses free to women who brought their babies for vaccination.  Word soon spread and the rate of immunisation shot up in the region. Conclusion: Governments across the world, including in India, spend big money on social schemes without the vaguest of ideas on whether their objectives have been met.  The field-work based approach that these economists have perfected has revolutionised the field of development economics and made it more relevant in policy making.  The government would do well to borrow from the research of these laureates to understand the impact of its several schemes, and where necessary, tweak them to derive maximum benefit for the thousands of crores of rupees that it spends. Connecting the dots: New experiment-based approach has transformed development economics. Justify ECONOMY TOPIC: General Studies 3: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilization of resources, growth, development and employment. Inclusive growth and issues arising from it. Financial stability and the RBI Context: The slowing of the economy suggests that the central bank’s stance on inflation may have impacted growth Recent measures taken by MPC: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) cut the repo rate or key lending rate by 25 basis points while maintaining an accommodative stance.  The reverse repo rate was reduced to 4.9%. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) also cuts GDP growth forecast for the current fiscal year 2019-20 to 6.1% from 6.9% earlier. A repo rate cut allows banks to reduce interest rates for consumers and lowers equal monthly instalments on home loans, car loans and personal loans. Central banks around the world are loosening monetary policy to offset a global slowdown made worse by U.S.-China trade tensions RBI will take a fresh look at cooperative bank regulations and take it up with the government The RBI has allowed domestic banks to freely offer foreign exchange (forex) prices to NRIs The continuing slowdown warrants intensified efforts to restore the growth momentum. On the crisis in the Punjab & Maharashtra Cooperative Bank (PMC), the RBI governor said one incident cannot be and should not be used to generalise the health of the co-operative banking sector. PCA (Prompt Corrective Action) is an opportunity for the bank to correct itself. Appealed members of the public and all depositors that our banking system remains sound and stable, there is no reason for unnecessary panic. RBI has decided to create a separate category of NBFC, viz., Non-Banking Financial Company-Micro Finance Institution (NBFC-MFI). It acknowledged “the negative output gap has widened further” Negative output gap: A negative output gap indicates surplus capacity in the economy. A widening of this gap means the industry is unable to use much of its capacity due to poor demand. What is Prompt Corrective Action? To ensure that banks don't go bust, RBI has put in place some trigger points to assess, monitor, control and take corrective actions on banks which are weak and troubled.  The process or mechanism under which such actions are taken is known as Prompt Corrective Action, or PCA. Present scenario: Inflation is well within the target giving space to the RBI to focus on growth Crude oil prices are back in the comfort zone, retreating from the spike in mid-September, and food prices are projected to remain soft on the back of a good monsoon. Central bank in west: Reflects two things: the political power of financial interests in the U.S. economy and the global intellectual influence of the American economic model.  This model revolves around the goal of maximum creation of wealth by private individuals unimpeded by societal objectives.  No equal distribution The objective of ensuring stability of the economy is allowed to come in the way of private individuals pursuing wealth enhancement. This model requires of the government only one action, namely, the control of inflation. Inflation: Unanticipated inflation is the problem for producers, as it has the potential to derail their profit calculations.  If fully anticipated, can harm holders of financial assets yielding fixed incomes by eroding their wealth. Borrowers on the other hand are better off with inflation as the real value of their outstanding loans is now less.  This can be tackled through inflation-indexation, the practice is not widespread. This leaves owners of financial wealth averse to inflation. Indexation is a technique to adjust income payments by means of a price index, in order to maintain the purchasing power of the public after inflation, while deindexation is the unwinding of indexation. Inflation control: When inflation control is implemented via monetary policy it results in higher interest rates.  Managers of financial wealth lobby for such a policy on behalf of their clients.  This lobbying is the origin of the policy of inflation targeting.  Inflation targeting by the central bank involves use of the interest rate to keep inflation under control.  it let go of the employment objective and central bank is not accountable for unemployment  in situations where growth, employment and inflation are jointly determined, inflation-targeting via the interest rate can lower inflation only by suppressing growth  This is the mechanism by which inflation-targeting inevitably lowers growth. Way forward: Public regulation, which sets limits to private activity, is rejected as an unnecessary interference in beneficial activity that maximises social gain, and is therefore to be avoided Conclusion: Governments across the world, including in India, spend big money on social schemes without the vaguest of ideas on whether their objectives have been met.  The field-work based approach that these economists have perfected has revolutionised the field of development economics and made it more relevant in policy making.  The government would do well to borrow from the research of these laureates to understand the impact of its several schemes, and where necessary, tweak them to derive maximum benefit for the thousands of crores of rupees that it spends. Connecting the dots: The slowing of the economy suggests that the central bank’s stance on inflation may have impacted growth. Analyse (TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE) Model questions: (You can now post your answers in comment section) Note:  Featured Comments and comments Up-voted by IASbaba are the “correct answers”. IASbaba App users – Team IASbaba will provide correct answers in comment section. Kindly refer to it and update your answers. Q.1) FASTag often seen in the news is related to which of the following area? Tiger census E-governance tracking Toll collection None of the above Q.2)Consider the following statements about SARAS Aajeevika Mela It is an initiative by the Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM). Its objective is to bring the rural women SHGs formed with support of DAY-NRLM, under one platform to show-case their skills, sell their products and help them build linkages with bulk buyers. It is organised by NITI Aayog in collaboration with NABARD and state governments Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct? 1 and 2 only 2 and 3 only 1 and 3 only 1,2 and 3 Q.3)Consider the following statements about The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences Sveriges Riksbank (Sweden’s central bank) established the Prize in Economic Sciences in 1968, in Memory of Alfred Nobel, founder of the Nobel Prize The 2019 prize was awarded to three scholars for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct? 1 only 2 only Both 1 and 2 Neither 1 nor 2 MUST READ Looking beyond the Rafale The Hindu Is India still a minimally decent society? The Hindu Framing laws for outer space The Hindu India needs to pay close attention to deepening of Nepal-China cooperation IE Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer introduced a paradigm shift in approach to alleviating poverty IE

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RSTV IAS UPSC – Syria Crisis - US Backs out

Syria Crisis - US Backs out Archives TOPIC: General studies 2 Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests Important International institutions, agencies and fora- their structure, mandate. In News: US President Donald Trump has casted his decision to abandon Kurdish fighters in Syria as fulfilling a campaign promise to withdraw from "endless war" in the Middle East, even as Republican critics and others said he was sacrificing a US ally and undermining American credibility.  Trump declared US troops would step aside for an expected Turkish attack on the Kurds, who have fought alongside Americans for years, but he then threatened to destroy Turkey’s economy if they went too far.  Even Trump's staunchest Republican congressional allies expressed outrage at the prospect of abandoning Syrian Kurds who had fought the Islamic State group with American arms and advice.  Trump said he understood criticism from fellow GOP leaders but disagreed. He said he could also name supporters, but he didn't.  Pentagon and State Department officials held out the possibility of persuading Turkey to abandon its expected invasion. U.S. officials said they had seen no indication that Turkey had begun a military operation by late Monday.  What is exactly happening? Turkey has long wanted to move across the border into northern Syria, where it sees the Syrian Kurdish forces (specifically the People’s Protection Unit, or YPG, which forms the bulk of the Syrian Democratic Forces) as tied to to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), separatists that Turkey considers a terrorist group. The PKK has waged an insurgency against Turkey for decades, and it’s allied with the Syrian Kurdish forces across the border — which has long put Turkey on edge. Turkey has two main goals in northeast Syria: to drive the Kurdish YPG militia which it deems a security threat away from its border, and to create a space inside Syria where 2 million Syria refugees currently hosted in Turkey can be settled. An economic downturn in Turkey is increasing domestic pressure on Erdogan to resettle 2 million of the 3.6 million people the country has taken in. But the Kurds that Turkey sees as a threat are Washington’s most critical partner on the ground in Syria. Kurdish fighters fought on the front lines against ISIS; they’ve received backing for years, including US technical and intelligence assistance and air support. This put the US in an awkward position from the start — between a NATO ally in Turkey on the one hand and its most reliable partners in fighting (and detaining) the Islamic State on the other. So what was the step taken? In response, in August, the US and Turkey agreed to a security mechanism designed to ease tensions between Turkey and the Syrian Kurds. In Starting in September, the US and Turkey began running joint patrols and the US helped push back some Syrian Kurdish forces from the Turkish border, including destroying their fortifications, to help create a smaller buffer zone in Syria. Basically, it was establishing a “safe zone” step by step, and without the potential violence that a Turkish invasion would unleash. The Pentagon promoted these efforts. But Erdogan had evidently started to get a bit impatient with this approach. The Turkish president apparently found a sympathetic partner in Trump, who’s notoriously skeptical of US troop commitments overseas and may have his own domestic political reasons for doubling down on a promise to end America’s entanglements abroad Implications of the US deciding to pull out of Syria: A new conflict, shifting alliances, and a possible ISIS resurgence This directive — which apparently blindsided allies and lawmakers and national security officials alike — leaves the American-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), largely made up of Kurdish civilians and Kurdish troops who led the fight against ISIS on the ground in Syria, at the mercy of Turkish forces. In doing so, the US is jeopardizing its partners on the ground and unleashing unpredictable consequences for Syria, now in its eighth year of war. For many, Monday’s announcement looks a bit like a repeat of what happened in December 2018, when Trump abruptly announced he was pulling all troops out of Syria over the objections of the Pentagon, including his then-Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who ultimately resigned over the decision. Trump, in that instance, partially walked back his pronouncement, leaving a troop contingent in the country, in part because of Turkey’s threat to the Kurds across the border. And it’s not just troops who are at risk if Turkey invades, it’s also Kurdish civilians who could be massacred in any assault. About 1.7 million Kurds live in the north-eastern region of Syria, though that area is larger than Erdogan’s planned 18-20 mile “safe zone.”  Still, the United Nations has already warned of the possibility of mass displacement and mass slaughter in the wake of such an operation by Turkey. Kurdish forces have established relative peace and security in their region of northeastern Syria after years of fighting ISIS; Turkey’s encroachment threatens to upend it all. The Kurdish forces have also vowed that, if Turkey invades, it will do what is necessary to protect its people and its troops. That opens up the possibility that Syrian Kurds will look elsewhere for protection, and that likely ally is Bashar al-Assad, the ruthless Syrian dictator, who with help from Russia and Iran is trying to retake all of Syria. The Kurds, who control a swath of land in northeastern Syria, have not ruled out making a deal with Assad if the US abandons them, which could potentially return a huge chunk of Syria back to the government’s control. At the same time, diplomats are alarmed at Turkey’s plan to resettle millions of Syrians, which they fear could amount to “demographic engineering” if ethnic Arabs are encouraged to establish themselves in Kurdish-majority villages and towns. They also worry that some people might be coerced into returning against their will. Turkey’s action along Syrian border could result in a break out of prisons guarding Islamic State (IS) detainees. This attack will definitely reduce and weaken the guarding system for those Daesh (Arabic acronym for IS)militants in the prisons. This could lead to their escape or to behaviours that may get out of the control of the security forces. A prison struck by Turkish shelling holds “the most dangerous criminals from more than 60 nationalities” and Turkey’s attacks on its prisons risked “a catastrophe”. Current State Turkey Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in an address to his party’s officials, claimed that as many as 109 ‘terrorists’ (a reference to Kurdish fighters) were killed since Ankara launched an attack. Erdogan also warned that if the European countries continue to label its military incursion in Syria as an occupation, Ankara will release the 3.6 million Syrian refugees in their country to Europe. Turkey launched airstrikes, fired artillery and began a ground offensive against Kurdish fighters in northern Syria, after US troops pulled back from the area, paving the way for an assault on forces that have long been allied with the United States. India “We are deeply concerned at the unilateral military offensive by Turkey in north-east Syria. Turkey’s actions can undermine stability in the region and the fight against terrorism,” the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement. The confusion over Trump’s Syria policy on Monday also damages the US’s credibility, revealing it to be an unreliable and disorganized international partner. That will have consequences beyond Syria. Connecting the dots: Critically evaluate the Donald Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of Syria. Should global institutions interfere in the internal affairs of a country if there are allegations of human rights violations? Substantiate your viewpoint. 

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