📰 Pak. duplicity key hurdle in fight against terror: Sushma
The External Affairs Minister tears into Pakistan in her UN General Assembly address
•Pakistan’s duplicity is a key obstacle in the global fight against terrorism and India is an immediate and continuing target of terrorism originating from there, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj told the United NationsGeneral Assembly (UNGA) on Saturday.
Osama’s safe haven
•“The most startling evidence of this duplicity was the fact that Osama Bin Laden, the architect and ideologue of 9/11 was given safe haven in Pakistan….that claimed to be America’s friend and ally,” Ms. Swaraj said in searing speech, trying to put Islamabad in the dock for the tensions in the region.
•“The killers of 9/11 met their fate; but the mastermind of 26/11 Hafiz Saeed still roams the streets of Pakistan with impunity,” the Minister said, comparing the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States with the 2008 November terrorist attack on Mumbai. India is always willing to talk to Pakistan, but continuing terrorist attacks have made peace process impossible, she said.
•Though the international community has become increasingly aware of Pakistan’s role in promoting terrorism, the absence of an international agreement on the definition of terrorism allows Pakistan to characterise terrorists as “freedom fighters,” Ms. Swaraj said.
World cautious
•“What is heartening is that the world is no longer ready to believe Islamabad,” she said, citing the heightened scrutiny on Pakistan by the the Financial Action Task Force or FATF, for terrorism financing earlier this year. But this is not sufficient, she said, calling for accountability through international law.
•Extenal Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Saturday reiterating India’s demand for a Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT) at the UN General Assembly.
•In her address to the Assembly which consisted of an attack on Pakistan for sponsoring terror, Ms. Swaraj said: “In 1996, India proposed a draft document on CCIT at the United Nations. Till today, that draft has remained a draft, because we cannot agree on a common language. On the one hand, we want to fight terrorism; on the other, we cannot define it. This is why terrorists with a price on their head are celebrated, financed and armed as liberation heroes by a country that remains a member of the United Nations. Cruelty and barbarism are advertised as heroism.”
•“Pakistan glorifies killers; it refuses to see the blood of innocents,” she said.
•Naming terrorism and climate change as the two existential threats to humanity, Ms. Swaraj called for increasingly efficient multilateralism to tackle global challenges. She said if the UN did not undertake immediate reform, it could meet the fate of the League of Nations that could not forge a global agenda and prevent the Second World War. “The League went into meltdown because it was unwilling to accept the need for reform. We must not make that mistake,” she said.
•“The United Nations must accept that it needs fundamental reform. Reform must begin today; tomorrow could be too late. If the UN is ineffective, the whole concept of multilateralism will collapse,” she said.
•Ms. Swaraj mentioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s name several times to argue that India was promoting its development goals in a sustainable way. “At the heart of Prime Minister Modi’s transformative vision is a radical idea: that the uplift of any nation is best achieved through the all-round empowerment of women. All the schemes that I have just spoken about have the welfare of women at their core,” she said, listing the several welfare schemes underway in India.
📰 IMA slams govt.’s move to scrap MCI
Says the actionis ‘unwarranted and mala fide’
•The Indian Medical Association (IMA) action committee, in an emergency session in Mumbai, condemned the “supersession” of the Medical Council of India (MCI) and noted that “this action of the Government, at a juncture when the election to the MCI has been announced, is unwarranted and mala fide.”
•Earlier this week, in a move to enhance the governance and the quality of medical education, an Ordinance was issued dissolving the MCI and replacing it with a seven-member Board of Governors (BOG) led by NITI Aayog member Dr. V.K. Paul.
•A Bill to replace the MCI with the National Medical Commission (NMC) is pending in Parliament.
•The Board of Governors also includes Dr. Randeep Guleria, Director, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi; Dr. Jagat Ram, Director, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh; Dr. B. N. Gangadhar, Director, National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences, Bengaluru; and Dr. Nikhil Tandon, Professor, Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism at AIIMS Delhi.
‘It is unacceptable’
•A release issued by the IMA on Saturday, said the composition of the Board itself was unacceptable. “Directors of major institutions would scarcely find time to administer more than 450 medical colleges and their undergraduate and postgraduate courses. Moreover, there is no representation to women and registered medical practitioners,” said the release.
•The IMA added that the “supersession” of the MCI is only a smokescreen and a ploy to prepare the ground for the NMC and sabotage the democratic process of the Council. That the government was in a hurry to scuttle the democratic election process was evident, it said. The Association demanded that the Board should refrain from taking major policy decisions or amendments changing the character of the IMC Act. It also demanded that the election process of the MCI should be allowed to continue. “This is the fourth time that the BOGs are being appointed. All the previous attempts were abject failures. The eminent clinicians appointed have little exposure to the day-to-day administration of the MCI. Moreover, the government has not cited any reason for superseding the MCI,’’ said IMA national president Dr. Ravi Wankhedkar.
•The Association has demanded that the BOG should conform to the basic tenets of the IMC Act and refrain from tinkering with its fundamental structure. “Crosspathy, registration of non medical persons, bridge courses and mixing of syllabi are core concerns. 184 private medical colleges are awaiting recognition due to the strict norms of the outgoing MCI team. By removing the democratically elected MCI checks and balances have been removed and chances of arbitrary actions have increased. A generation of substandard doctors will be the legacy of this action,’’ noted the release.
📰 India to gift Mig-21 fighter jets to Russia
The aircraft will also get new registration numbers, and may be adopted for vintage flight.
•A highlight on the sidelines of the upcoming India-Russia bilateral summit is likely to be the gifting of three MiG-21 fighter jets to Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin will be in New Delhi on October 4 and 5 for the annual summit with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
•“Three MiG-21s are scheduled to be handed over to Russians based on a request from their Defence Minister to our Defence Minister. They comprise one Type 75 aircraft and two Type 77 aircraft,” an official source said.
•The aircraft to be gifted are in flight-worthy condition and the cost of crating and transportation will be borne by the Russians, another official said.
•This will be major symbolic gesture to showcase the all-weather friendship and deep strategic partnership between India and Russia, which has been put to test in recent times due to changing geopolitical conditions.
•The aircraft will get new registration numbers and may be adopted for vintage flight. However, it is not clear how the Russians intend to use them.
•The MiG-21 has more of emotional value for Russia, as it has the distinction of being the most produced supersonic fighter in history. According to the website militaryfactory,com, close to 11,500 aircraft were built and operated by over 50 countries.
•The MiG-21, a product of the Soviet Union, was designed by the Mikoyan-Gurevich Design Bureau in the 1950s. It made first flight in 1956 and entered service in 1959. However, Russia stopped producing the aircraft in 1985, while India continued operating the upgraded variants.
•India inducted the MiG-21s in 1963 and got full technology transfer and rights to license-build the aircraft in the country. It is the first supersonic fighter aircraft of the Indian Air Force. The IAF still has about 120 MiG-21s in service which will all be phased out of service by 2021-22.
📰 Swaraj for global framework on terror
‘In 1996, India proposed a draft document on terrorism; it has remained a draft’
•External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Saturday reiterated India’s demand for a Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT) at the UN General Assembly.
•In her address to the Assembly which consisted of an attack on Pakistan for sponsoring terror, Ms. Swaraj said: “In 1996, India proposed a draft document on CCIT at the United Nations. Till today, that draft has remained a draft, because we cannot agree on a common language. On the one hand, we want to fight terrorism; on the other, we cannot define it. This is why terrorists with a price on their head are celebrated, financed and armed as liberation heroes by a country that remains a member of the United Nations. Cruelty and barbarism are advertised as heroism.”
•“Pakistan glorifies killers; it refuses to see the blood of innocents,” she said.
•Naming terrorism and climate change as the two existential threats to humanity, Ms. Swaraj called for increasingly efficient multilateralism to tackle global challenges.
•She said if the UN did not undertake immediate reform, it could meet the fate of the League of Nations that could not forge a global agenda and prevent the Second World War. “The League went into meltdown because it was unwilling to accept the need for reform. We must not make that mistake,” she said.
•“The United Nations must accept that it needs fundamental reform. Reform must begin today; tomorrow could be too late. If the UN is ineffective, the whole concept of multilateralism will collapse,” she said.
📰 Mizoram’s date with displaced Brus
•The displacement of some 40,000 Bru people from Mizoram in 1997 got much less traction than that of the Kashmiri Pandits seven years before. But making them return home from relief camps in adjoining Tripura has been equally frustrating for the Centre and the north-eastern States for almost 21 years now. A few families have accepted the package offered by the Centre and returned, but most of the internally displaced refugees have refused to budge unless they get a better deal. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has set them a September 30 deadline and threatened to stop free rations and other facilities.
Where were they displaced from?
•The Brus, also called Reangs, are scattered across Assam, Mizoram and Tripura. In Mizoram, they inhabit small pockets of Mamit, Lunglei and Lawngtlai districts, but the biggest chunk is in Mamit bordering North Tripura district of Tripura. A conflict with the majority Mizos in 1995 made influential organisations like the Mizo Zirlai Pawl (students’ union) demand that the Brus, labelled a non-indigenous tribe, be deleted from Mizoram’s electoral rolls. This led to an armed movement by the extremist Bru National Liberation Front, which killed a Mizo forest official on October 21, 1997. Many Bru villages were burnt down and scores allegedly raped and killed. Thousands of Brus fled to North Tripura where they were given shelter in six relief camps, three each in the Kanchanpur and Panisagar subdivisions. Most of the refugees were from Mamit and a few from Kolasib and Lunglei.
What was the political impact?
•Except for some say in three of Mizoram’s 40 Assembly constituencies, the Brus are not a major voting force. Resistance by Mizo NGOs to their return made the refugees relevant only during elections, with Mizoram officials crossing over to Tripura for facilitating their franchise. Talks of repatriation began in 2009 but Bru extremists allegedly killed a Mizo teenager, triggering another round of retaliatory attacks and exodus of Brus to Tripura. As tempers cooled, the first phase of repatriation in November 2010 saw 8,573 members of 1,622 Bru families having been resettled in Mizoram. But the protest by Mizo groups halted the process in the next few years. With time, the Brus began demanding relief on a par with that of Kashmiri Pandit and Sri Lankan Tamil refugees. The impasse increased the Centre’s bill. Since 1997, it has given Rs. 348.97 crore to Tripura in financial assistance for relief and rehabilitation, and Rs. 68.9 crore to Mizoram for those resettled in 2010.
What hit the new rehab package?
•The MHA brought the stakeholders to the talks in 2015, and a financial package of Rs. 435 crore was arrived at in July. The Centre signed an agreement with the Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Forum and the governments of Mizoram and Tripura. The package covers 32,876 members of 5,407 Bru families, entailing a one-time assistance of Rs. 4 lakh in fixed deposit within a month of repatriation, monthly assistance of Rs. 5,000 through direct benefit transfer, free rations for two years, and Rs. 1.5 lakh in three instalments for building houses. The package included Eklavya residential schools, permanent residential and ST certificates and funds to the Mizoram government for improving security in the Bru resettlement areas. The refugees were given the September 30 deadline to move or face harder times in the camps. But the Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Coordination Committee (MBDPCC), another refugee group, has demanded a better package that includes resettlement in clusters and an autonomous council for Brus.
Where does it go from here?
•Since July, only 42 Bru families have returned to Mizoram. MBDPCC leaders say they are undaunted by the threat to stop assistance to or wind up the camps, since “we survive by doing odd jobs, anyway.” But Mizoram and Tripura officials involved in the repatriation process feel the government will relax the deadline for more refugees to “change their mind.” The pressure is also from local Brus of Tripura, who are reportedly facing an identity crisis because of the refugees.
📰 The lowdown on IL&FS cash crunch
What is it?How did it come about?Why does it matter?What lies ahead?
•The cash crunch and debt pile-up being faced by Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS), a major infrastructure finance and construction company, has led to concerns about risks in the entire non-banking financial sector, a fear that spooked markets all of last week.
•The crisis began when it defaulted on a short-term loan from SIDBI a month ago. This was followed by a series of defaults that led to a ratings downgrade. IL&FS Financial Services, a 100% subsidiary of IL&FS, has also defaulted on loans worth Rs. 440.46 crore since September 12. The IL&FS funds long-term projects, of over 10 years, but its borrowings are of a lesser duration, which widens the asset liability gap. Broking firm JM Financial pointed out that IL&FS has an aggressive asset liability management profile. According to estimates, while for the one-year bucket, it has a positive mismatch, but for three years there is a 17% negative mismatch. Asset liability mismatch turns negative when the outflow of liabilities are more than the inflow of assets. Incorporated in 1987 and initially promoted by the Central Bank of India, Housing Development Finance Corporation Limited (HDFC) and Unit Trust of India (UTI), IL&FS has a complex structure with 169 subsidiaries. Over the years, its shareholding has broad-based and it inducted institutional shareholders, including the SBI, the LIC, ORIX Corporation of Japan, and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. The LIC is the largest shareholder, with a 25.34% stake followed by ORIX which has 23.54%.
•The IL&FS default rattled investors of non-banking finance companies, particularly housing finance companies with stocks like Dewan Housing Finance and Indiabulls Housing Finance dropping significantly. Banks and mutual funds are main sources of funding for housing finance companies and other non-banking finance companies. While banks contribute 40% of the funding, mutual funds contribute 30%. Mutual funds, in particular, have become a key source of short-term liquidity, with estimates suggesting that NBFC commercial papers have gone up three times since March 2016, with MFs now holding 60% of the total NBFC CP issuance. With the liquidity situation tight in September due to factors like advance tax outflow and rush by banks to meet targets, problems for NBFCs compounded as mutual funds too looked to cut exposure to the sector. Market estimates suggest mutual funds have around Rs. 2,000 crore exposure to IL&FS. Both the banking regulator and the market regulator swung into action. In a joint statement, the RBI and the SEBI said they are closely monitoring developments in the financial markets and are “ready to take appropriate actions...” The RBI later decided to open the liquidity tap by purchasing government bonds from open market operations. As of September 26, banks had availed themselves of Rs. 1.88 lakh crore through term repos from the RBI. Following infusion of funds, short-term rates that have spiked over 100 basis points in a week cooled down.
•“IL&FS will not be allowed to collapse” — that was the statement of LIC chairman V.K. Sharma after a meeting with Finance Ministry officials last week. The banking regulator has also avoided any knee-jerk reaction so far and the strategy of the central bank is to be non-disruptive. The banking regulator also met the large shareholders of IL&FS, though the RBI has refrained from commenting on the matter. The IL&FS has initiated a three-way strategy to tide over the crisis: offer a rights issue, sell assets to repay debt and address liquidity issues till the asset sale starts. It is planning to raise Rs. 4,500 crore through a rights issue in which it will be issuing 30 crore equity shares at Rs. 150 per share. Its board has also approved the recapitalisation of group companies of Rs. 5,000 crore in IL&FS Financial Services, IL&FS Transportation, IL&FS Energy, IL&FS Environment and IL&FS Education.
📰 59 plant species in IUCN threat categories
The work also generates threat status for 38 species never assessed by the IUCN before
•Threatened wildlife is not just about tigers but numerous plants too. Recently, scientists identified the threat status of 59 Indian plant species based on criteria used by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), in the hope that this “streamlines” conservation efforts for the plants.
•Quantifying threat levels of species can be crucial for their conservation. For instance, funding agencies often consider the threat status of species provided in IUCN's Red List (a catalogue of the world's threatened species), to sponsor research and conservation activities to save them. Around 2,700 plant species in India are at risk but very few have been assessed by the IUCN, according to Dr. S.K. Barik, Director of Lucknow's CSIR-National Botanical Research Institute.
•To bridge this gap, Dr. Barik and experts from several institutes prioritized 59 plant species that are at risk of “elimination” if the threat levels they face are not assessed soon. They assigned each species a threat status based on IUCN criteria.
•This included the extent and area of each plant's geographical range, which revealed that 10 species are critically endangered, 18 endangered, six vulnerable, five near threatened and one species each are data deficient and least concern.
•The threat levels of some plants have been altered as a result; for instance the palm Bentinckia nicobarica is currently listed as endangered; however the new study suggests it is critically endangered based on its distributional attributes (the palm is reported only from the Great Nicobar Island).
•Based on population sizes and numbers of mature individuals remaining in the wild (using field surveys that also revealed that habitat loss was a huge factor affecting many declining plant populations), the team classified 10 species as critically endangered, three as endangered and five as vulnerable. Germination tests in the laboratory also suggest that factors such as low seed viability could have caused declines in the wild too.
•The study initiated in 2012 to assign threat status to select plants, is published in Current Science. The study also generated data on 38 species that have never been assessed by the IUCN.
•“We hope IUCN will take this assessment into account while updating their Red List,” said lead author Dr. Barik.
