📰 India tightens oversight on funds received by NGOs
New guidelines to banks on Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act rules.
•The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has laid down a charter for banks which says that “donations received in Indian rupees” by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and associations from “any foreign source even if that source is located in India at the time of such donation” should be treated as “foreign contribution”.
•As per the existing rules, all banks have to report to the Central government within 48 hours, the “receipt or utilisation of any foreign contribution” by any NGO, association or person whether or not they are registered or granted prior permission under the FCRA.
•Last September, the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 2010, was amended by Parliament and a new provision that makes it mandatory for all NGOs to receive foreign funds in a designated bank account at the State Bank of India’s New Delhi branch was inserted.
•FCRA regulates foreign donations and ensures that such contributions do not adversely affect the internal security of the country.
•All NGOs seeking foreign donations have to open a designated FCRA account at the SBI branch by March 31.
•The NGOs can retain their existing FCRA account in any other bank but it will have to be mandatorily linked to the SBI branch in New Delhi.
Penal provisions
•The Ministry has laid out a series of guidelines and charter to make the NGOs and the banks comply with the new provisions.
•The charter for the banks said, “It may be noted that foreign contribution has to be received only through banking channels and it has to be accounted for in the manner prescribed. Any violation by the NGO or by the bank may invite penal provisions of The FCRA, 2010.” It added that “donations given in Indian rupees (INR) by any foreigner/foreign source including foreigners of Indian origin like OCI or PIO cardholders” should also be treated as foreign contribution.
•Recently the National Investigation Agency (NIA) registered a case against Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a foreign based group that advocates secessionist and pro-Khalistani activities in India.
•NIA summoned 40 people, all associated with the ongoing farmers agitation, to join the probe in the case where it alleged that large amounts of funds being collected by Khalistani terrorist outfits are being sent through NGOs to pro-Khalistani elements based in India.
•In 2019, MHA had amended FCRA rules where it said that even persons prohibited to receive foreign funds such as journalists, politicians, members of the judiciary “are allowed to accept foreign contribution from their relatives” if the amount does not exceed ₹1 lakh. Any such transaction above ₹1 lakh will have to be informed to MHA.
•MHA also said down “good practices” to be followed by NGOs in accordance with standards of global financial watchdog- Financial Action Task Force (FATF). It asked NGOs to inform the Ministry about “suspicious activities” of any donor or recipient and “take due diligence of its employees at the time of recruitment.”
•FCRA regulates foreign donations and ensures that such contributions do not adversely affect the internal security of the country. The Act, first enacted in 1976 was amended in the year 2010 and then 2020.
Healthcare policy must continue focusing on its long-term priorities, says survey
•The ongoing pandemic has showcased how a healthcare crisis can get transformed into an economic and social crisis, noted the Economic Survey 2020-21. It said the healthcare policy must not become beholden to ‘saliency bias’, where policy overweighs a recent phenomenon. “To enable India to respond to pandemics, the health infrastructure must be agile,” it said.
•Stating that COVID-19 had spread worldwide because it is a communicable disease, the survey notes that the next health crisis may not possibly involve a communicable disease and that India’s healthcare policy must continue focusing on its long-term healthcare priorities.
•“Following the COVID-19 pandemic, a key portfolio decision that healthcare policy must make is about the relative importance placed on communicable versus non-communicable diseases. To enable India to respond to pandemics, the health infrastructure must be agile. For instance, every hospital may be equipped so that at least one ward in the hospital can be quickly modified to respond to a national health emergency while caring for the normal diseases in usual times. Research in building such health infrastructure can guide how to build such flexible wards.”
Telemedicine potential
•It added that the pandemic had revealed the potential of telemedicine to provide healthcare access in remote areas. “This needs to be harnessed to the fullest by especially investing in Internet connectivity and health infrastructure.” The National Health mission had played a critical role in mitigating inequity as the access of the poorest to pre-natal and post-natal care as well as institutional deliveries had increased significantly, it said.
•“Therefore, in conjunction with Ayushman Bharat, the emphasis on the NHM should continue,” says the survey.
Information asymmetry
•The Survey notes that a bulk of the healthcare in India is provided by the private sector and suggests that it is critical for policymakers to design policies that mitigate information asymmetry in healthcare, which creates market failures and thereby renders unregulated private healthcare sub-optimal.
•“Information utilities that help mitigate the information asymmetry can be very useful in enhancing overall welfare. The mitigation of information asymmetry would also help lower insurance premiums, enable the offering of better products and help increase the insurance penetration in the country,” the Survey suggests.
•The Survey notes that India’s healthcare policy must continue focusing on its long-term healthcare priorities. It notes that countries with more fragmented health systems tend to have lower performance as reflected in higher costs, lower efficiency, and poor quality.
•“Therefore, in addition to providing healthcare services and financing healthcare, a key role for the government is to actively shape the structure of the healthcare market,” it says.
📰 Economic Survey | ‘High out-of-pocket expenses for health can lead to poverty’
Survey for rise in public healthcare spend to 3% of GDP
•India has one-of-the highest level of Out-Of-Pocket Expenditures (OOPE) contributing directly to the high incidence of catastrophic expenditures and poverty, notes the Economic Survey.
•It suggested an increase in public spending from 1% to 2.5-3% of GDP — as envisaged in the National Health Policy 2017 — can decrease the OOPE from 65% to 30% of overall healthcare spend.
•The Survey states about 65% of deaths in India are now caused by non-communicable diseases (NCDs) with ischemic heart diseases, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and stroke being the leading causes.
•The Survey observes that the health of a nation depends critically on its citizens having access to an equitable, affordable and accountable healthcare system. The OOPE, as a share of total health expenditure, drops precipitously when public health expenditure increases.
•The Survey also underlines that OOPE for health increases the risk of vulnerable groups slipping into poverty because of catastrophic health expenditures. The life expectancy in a country correlates positively with per capita public health expenditure, it notes.
Private healthcare
•The Economic Survey observed that bulk of the healthcare in India is provided by the private sector. “Private hospitals charge much higher than government hospitals for treatment of same ailment and higher charges do not assure better quality,,’’ it said.
•The Survey added that for enabling India to respond to pandemics, the health infrastructure must incorporate flexibility as events requiring healthcare attention may not repeat in identical fashion in future.
•The survey further highlights that typically, consumers tend to demand primary care less than the economically optimal levels as the price elasticity for this product/service is very high. For instance, among TB patients in Delhi who initially visited a qualified practitioner in 2012, the average length of time from when TB symptoms first appeared to when they reached a DOTS facility was over five months. Similarly, India has very low rate of screening for cancers among women in the age bracket of 15-49 years at 22 per cent for cervical cancer, 10 per cent for breast cancer and 12 per cent for oral cancer when compared to 62 per cent, 59 per cent and 16 per cent respectively in OECD Countries.
•In fact, the privately optimal preference for primary care may be so low that individuals may have to even be paid to use adequate primary care. Individuals also under-estimate health risks and may, therefore, not purchase adequate health insurance,’’ it said.
📰 Bare necessities gap between States has narrowed since 2012: Economic Survey
States such as Kerala, Punjab, Haryana and Gujarat had the highest access to the bare necessities while it was the lowest in Odisha, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Tripura.
•Poorer States have reduced the gap with rich States when it comes to in providing their citizens with access to the basics of daily life — housing, water, power, sanitation, cooking gas — according to a new ‘Bare Necessities Index’ (BNI) in the Economic Survey 2020-21.
•The index, which draws its name from Baloo the Bear’s song in the movie adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s Jungle Book, uses existing National Statistical Office (NSO) survey data to show that between 2012 and 2018, serious gains were made in the area of sanitation although equity in housing access still lagged behind.
•Richer States such as Kerala, Punjab, Haryana and Gujarat top the index, while the eastern Indian States of Odisha, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Tripura occupy the lowest rungs. States which showed significant improvement include Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.
•“Inter-State disparities in the access to ‘the bare necessities’ have declined in 2018 when compared to 2012 across rural and urban areas,” said the survey.
•“Access to ‘the bare necessities’ has improved disproportionately more for the poorest households when compared to the richest households across rural and urban areas. The improvement in equity is particularly noteworthy because while the rich can seek private alternatives, lobby for better services, or if need be, move to areas where public goods are better provided for, the poor rarely have such choices.” it added.
•However, the survey noted that there was still a gap between urban and rural India, as well as among income groups, and recommended “effective targeting of the needier population” in government schemes.
•Better Centre-State coordination with local governments is needed, given thatas they were responsible for civic amenities in urban areas, added the survey. It also suggested that the BNI could be constructed at district level using large annual household survey data, to show progress.
•The index attempts to carry forward the ‘Thalinomics’ exercise in the last Economic Survey, which calculated the average Indian’s access to a plate of food. The survey also correlated the BNI to child mortality and school enrolment data to show the link to health and education outcomes.
•Access to household toilets, piped water, and a reduction in air pollution due to the use of clean cooking fuel have an outsize impact on child health. Studies also showed that girls were more likely to go to school if they had access to toilets, and do not need to spend time hauling water for their families every day.
📰 Wide aisle: On 2021 Budget session of Parliament
Instead of pushing through laws, the govt. must use Parliament for a detailed debate
•The government and the Opposition are headed on a collision course in the Budget session of Parliament, with the latter planning to move a joint motion demanding a repeal of the three laws that are agitating farmers in much of the country. The confrontation over these laws is a legacy of the last session when they were passed without detailed and proper consultation with political parties, experts and farmer representatives. The session began with around 20 Opposition parties boycotting the President’s address to a joint sitting of Parliament. BSP President Mayawati belatedly announced her party’s decision to also stay away as a mark of protest. The delay clearly outlined her intention to keep a distance from the Opposition bloc, which among others has the Congress and the Samajwadi Party. The boycott indicated a worsening of the relationship between the government and the Opposition. In January 2020, the Opposition had attended the President’s address wearing black bands. The last time the Opposition boycotted the President’s Address was in November 2019 to commemorate the Constitution Day. President Ram Nath Kovind said the government would keep the farm Bills on hold as per a Supreme Court directive but did not indicate any rethink.
•The government has advantages over the Opposition, in terms of the numerical strength in both Houses of Parliament. With the Tamil Nadu and West Bengal Assembly elections round the corner, two key Opposition parties, the DMK and the Trinamool Congress, are expected to be largely absent, further reducing the Opposition’s strength. The Opposition, despite its united front on the first day of the session, has a record of disintegrating in the face of the BJP’s manoeuvring in previous sessions. There will be discussion on the Motion of Thanks to the President and later on the Budget. As of now there are no indications of the Opposition skipping these events. In legislative business, recent ordinances such as the Arbitration and Conciliation (Amendment) Ordinance, 2020, which has provisions to deal with domestic and international arbitration and defines the law for conducting conciliation proceedings, and the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation (Amendment) Ordinance, 2021, which is for merging the J&K cadre of All India Services Officers such as the IAS, IPS and the Indian Forest Service with the Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram Union Territory (AGMUT) cadre, will have to get a parliamentary nod. The government draws its legitimacy from a parliamentary majority, but democratic conduct is more than enforcing the will of the majority. The government’s conduct in Parliament and outside, where its critics are facing the strong arm of the state machinery, should meet the high standards India has set for itself as a democracy.
📰 A champion of science, pro-poor technology
C. Subramaniam’s call for ‘science for the economic freedom of humanity’ echoes on his birth anniversary today
•The year 1910 was very significant for India and science. This was the year two great Indian stars, the astrophysicist, Dr. Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, or SC, and C. Subramaniam, or CS, were born.
•Dr. Chandrasekhar was concerned about processes of importance in the evolution of stars in the universe. Mr. Subramaniam was concerned about the problem of food security in India. He sowed the seeds of the Green Revolution in Indian agriculture. Dr. Chandrasekhar explored space and propounded the concept of black holes, while Mr. Subramaniam championed the cause of science and technology to solve societal problems. The science of the universe was the call of Dr. Chandrasekhar. Science for humanity was the call of Mr. Subramaniam. And today, January 30, is the birth anniversary of Mr. Subramaniam, an architect of public policy for Indian science and of the ‘Green Revolution’ in the country.
•In addition to the above, CS championed the cause of planned public investments in science. This year, 2021, is significant for another reason — it is the golden jubilee year of the founding of India’s Ministry of Science and Technology. CS had an abiding trust in science and believed that technology alone could offer solutions to the problems faced by society. He called for the practice of science celebrated not only by other scientists but also by citizens and humanity.
Food sufficiency goal
•In the grammar of life, the spirit of Mr. Subramaniam continues to live on a high moral ground. If one looks for the trademarks of CS, they are: superordinate national goals, probity in public life and institutional mechanisms. The Ministry of Science and Technology bears testimony to his lived life. When India faced the reality of ship-to-mouth status in the 1960s — when a few million tonnes of grain were imported — a superordinate goal that India became self-sufficient in food in five years was set. The goal was realised and has been sustained since then. After the Green Revolution, the site used for storing food grains (given in aid by the U.S. Government under Public Law 480) became the Technology Bhavan that continues to house the Ministry of Science and Technology; it serves as a reminder to scientists that the purpose of public investments in science must include its duty to ensure social and public good.
•Our generation is a beneficiary of the long-term impacts of CS’s several contributions to education, agriculture, science and technology to name a few. He was one of the architects of modern India and relied on evidence-based approaches in decision making. Transparency and probity were his powerful tools. The blueprint for linking science and technology to the development path of India was cast by CS even before the formation of the dedicated Science and Technology Ministry. He was a rare combination of being a visionary and a missionary at the same time, and Indian science remains a beneficiary.
The agro foundation
•He realised that the economic freedom of every citizen of India was heavily reliant on the 4Es: Education, Environment, Economy and Empowerment of our farmers. The National Agro Foundation (NAF) was his gift to the nation on his 90th birthday. NAF, in its journey of 21 years, has lived up to his ideals. It institutionalised his will through farmer-centric programmes. In today’s world, rare are leaders like him. They did not live for themselves and their immediate families. They did not work for fame or glory. They sought no positional power. They practised the principles enshrined in civilisational legacies. They were rooted in culture with an agility to embrace changes in real time, with science and technology playing change functions. Mr. Subramaniam was a leader among leaders and remains a living role model for generations to come. No words of praise can fully capture the value of a life well lived.
•Today is the 111th birth anniversary of CS. It is also a year since the first case of COVID-19 was reported in India, in Kerala. The novel coronavirus pandemic has pushed millions of people below the poverty line. The best way to pay tribute to a patriot like Mr. Subramaniam is to connect to science and see to it that it brings succour to the poor. He was a revered promoter of scientific temper and a shining Ratna of Bharat. His call for “science for [the] economic freedom of humanity” echoes loudly on his birth anniversary. May his voice for pro-poor technology be heard and worked upon.
