📰 Literacy, numeracy mission deadline pushed back two years
No extra funds, money coming from Samagra Shiksha’s 20% lower budget
•The Centre’s new mission to ensure that every Class 3 child has foundational literacy and numeracy within five years will be rolled out on Monday. Although the National Education Policy had included a 2025 deadline to achieve the goal, the Centre has pushed back the target date to 2026-27, given that COVID-19 has already disrupted two academic years.
•The School Education Department says no additional funding is being allocated for the National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy (NIPUN Bharat). Instead, money is being allocated from the flagship Samagra Shiksha scheme, which actually saw a 20% drop in its budget this year.
•“The vision of NIPUN Bharat Mission is to create an enabling environment to ensure universal acquisition of foundational literacy and numeracy, so that every child achieves the desired learning competencies in reading, writing and numeracy by the end of Grade 3, by 2026-27,” said an Education Ministry statement, adding that a five-tier implementation mechanism will be set up at the national, State, district, block and school levels. NIPUN Bharat is likely to emphasise goal setting and accountability for State governments, and provide guidelines for teacher training, assessment and the creation of printed resources, according to people who helped develop the mission.
•“It will be funded through Samagra Shiksha itself,” said a senior official of the School Education Department, confirming that there is no additional allocation being made. “Samagra Shiksha is an umbrella scheme, and this year it has been revised. According to that revision, a provision has been kept for FLN (foundational literacy and numeracy),” added the official. For 2021-22, the budget estimate for Samagra Shiksha was ₹31,050 crore, a 20% drop from the previous year’s estimate of ₹38,750 crore, although the revised estimate for 2020-21 was just ₹27,957 crore, with poor utilisation due to COVID-19 disruptions.
•Central Square Foundation, a non-governmental organisation with a focus on foundational literacy and numeracy, has provided inputs and technical support to the Centre in the development of this mission. “We estimated that achieving the goal would cost about ₹500 per child per year, amounting to an annual cost of about ₹2,200-2,300 crore nationwide,” said CSF’s co-managing director Bikkrama Daulet Singh. “We estimate that State governments were already drawing about ₹1,600 [crore] to ₹1,700 crore for students up to the Class 3 level from Samagra Shiksha anyway. So it is not a large increase,” he added.
•He felt that one of the critical elements of NIPUN Bharat would be to guide States in how this money is to be used. “It will ensure that there are specific heads and line items so that there is holistic progress. Otherwise, previously, States would do whatever they wanted — some would spend on teacher training only, others on equipment,” said Mr. Singh. The lion’s share of funding could go to creating a print-rich environment, apart from spending on assessment, training, awareness and goal-setting, he said.
•Rukmini Banerji, CEO of the Pratham Education Foundation, also provided feedback on the Centre’s draft plan. She emphasised that money would not be the decisive factor, but rather a mindset change.
•“So far, the goal has simply been to enrol children in school, and then to ensure that they finish Class 10. This mission specifies stage-wise learning goals to ensure that students are acquiring the necessary building blocks,” she said. Pratham’s Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) found that less than 30% of Class 3 students could read at Class 2 level or do double digit subtraction in 2018. Operationalising a changed mindset would require changes in curriculum, teacher training, assessment, and messaging to parents, such as holistic report cards, she said.
•Dr. Banerji also emphasised the need for following the NEP recommendation to see early childhood education as a continuum, with a focus on the Anganwadi and pre-school systems as well. Given the COVID-19 school closures, she said there would be a need to ensure that when schools are reopened, there is a focus on school readiness activities for younger classes, rather than going straight to a traditional curriculum.
•Mr. Singh also said NIPUN Bharat could recommend a 60-90 day focus on foundational literacy and numeracy before transitioning to a regular timetable.
Restoring health of every constituent sectoris a must for long-term growth in exports
•India’s merchandise exports reached an all-time quarterly high of $95 billion in the three months ended June, providing welcome cheer on the economic front. That the record was notched up during a quarter when the second wave of the pandemic hit its peak, and amid varying degrees of lockdowns, is all the more noteworthy. Exports last month surged 47% from June 2020 to $32.5 billion. Even discounting the fact that the year-earlier period provided an anomalous base as the economy had just begun reopening from a protracted nationwide lockdown, growth in shipments was still a robust 30% when compared with the pre-pandemic June of 2019. Propelling the surge from the 2019 levels were non-rice cereals, which quadrupled; iron ore, which more than doubled; and organic and inorganic chemicals that rose 62%. Engineering goods exports had the biggest jump in dollar terms, adding $2.73 billion in value, or 42% over June 2019, as the rising vaccination coverage and economic recovery in key developed markets including the EU and the U.S. bolstered demand. Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal was enthused enough by the export performance to posit that shipments of goods to overseas markets could touch the $400 billion mark this fiscal, a figure which, if achieved, would represent an annual record.
•Trade data, however, reveals that a significant driver of the export growth has been the runaway rally in commodity prices that have benefited from the accelerated reopening of major economies, as well as an increased appetite for raw materials and grains in China. On the other hand, the crucial job-generating export sectors including readymade garments, leather and leather products and tea all posted double-digit declines from June 2019 levels, reflecting the deeper structural problems that dog each one of them. If the tea industry has been facing a long-term downtrend exacerbated by inadequate product variety, lack of marketing-savvy and sharp competition from rivals including Sri Lanka and Kenya, the leather goods segment has been put on the ropes by a combination of short-sighted policy measures, WTO-mandated withdrawal of export incentives and a pandemic-induced slowdown in orders. For a segment that provides large-scale employment, the recent imposition of an import duty on a key raw material has thrown the sector’s very viability into question. With the Government dragging its feet on notifying the rates applicable under the Remission of Duties and Taxes on Export Products (RoDTEP) scheme, exporters are still unsure of how to price their products while bidding for orders. A container shortage and heightened congestion have also sent freight rates out of Indian ports soaring. Policymakers need to look beyond headline numbers and expedite action to restore the health of every constituent sector if economically enduring long-term growth in exports is to be ensured.
📰 The problem now with the military synergy plan
The Indian military must note that consultative strategising is a prerequisite before a concrete structure is put in place
•It is indisputable that the Indian military continues to work in silos, like all governmental agencies in India, and a need was rightly felt and directions issued by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to bring about jointness, leaving the task to the first Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) of India. It is also indisputable that the aim is to bring about a synergy in operations while economising through the elimination of duplication and wasteful practices or processes. At the outset, it also needs to be clearly stated that, contrary to the recent media reports, debates and some opinions, the Indian Air Force (IAF) is not playing ‘dog in the manger’ and resisting the formation of theatre/functional commands. With my 40 years in uniform, as I understand the doctrine and philosophy of the IAF, it is keen to bring in the requisite reforms to improve the war-fighting capabilities of the Indian military as a whole while also economising.
Nuances of air power
•The statement that the IAF wants to fight its own private war thus comes from people who do not understand the nuances and capabilities of air power and lack the expertise in its effective utilisation. In the current formulation of theatres, the objections from the IAF have essentially been due to air power being seen as an adjunct to the two surface forces, the Indian Army and the Indian Navy, and being divided into penny packets which would seriously degrade the effectiveness of air operations in any future conflict or contingency. It is better that such objections and dissenting opinions come out now before the structure is formalised than once it is set in stone and the use of air power is found to be sub-optimal under the military ethos of “an order is an order”. We must remember that in war there is no prize for the runner-up. The nation would then end up paying a heavy price, with the Air Force carrying the burden and blame for the failures.
Political objectives
•If war is the continuation of politics by other means, then it is essential to first define the political objectives flowing into a national security strategy before any effective use of force can be truly contemplated. The failures of the mightiest militaries in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and even our own Indian misadventure in Sri Lanka bear testimony to the lack of clear political objectives and appropriate military strategies.
•It is, therefore, unfortunate that even after over seven decades after Independence, India still does not have a clearly articulated national security strategy. Only such a strategy can define the types of contingencies the military is expected to address, leading to appropriate military strategies, doctrines and required capabilities. That would define the structures required for the conduct of synergised operations with the requisite communications and training requirements. Concurrently, such an intellectual exercise would identify duplication, wasteful resources and practices. This is what the CDS should have been pursuing before first freezing the structure and then trying to glue the pieces together or hammer square pegs in round holes.
•As argued elsewhere earlier, such an exercise may well result in identifying air power as the lead element, particularly since the Indian political aim, even in the foreseeable future, is unlikely to be occupation of new territories. A large, manpower-intensive army with unusable armour formations would then also come into focus. Even the proposed air defence command conflicts with the domain commands in seamless employment of air power. It is due to the absence of such an intellectual exercise that the IAF does not wish to see its limited resources frittered away in fighting frontal defensive battles by a land force commander with little expertise in employment of air power. The Army fails to realise that offensive air power is best not seen, busy keeping the enemy air force pinned down elsewhere while giving own surface forces the freedom to manoeuvre and operate with impunity, as shown in 1971.
The Army-Air Force silo
•Historically, the Indian Army has always kept the IAF out of the information loop and demonstrated a penchant to ‘go it alone’. The charge that the IAF joined the party late during Kargil (1999) is also totally baseless and shows a lack of knowledge of events and a failure to learn from historical facts. Recorded facts and a dispassionate view would clearly show that the IAF began conducting reconnaissance missions on May 10 as soon as the Indian Army just made a request for attack helicopters, without sharing full information. It is also surprising that a request for photo-reconnaissance of the entire area was not made to first gather essential intelligence on what the Army was facing, before launching foot patrols which were mostly ambushed with unnecessary casualties, instead of asking for armed helicopters. This despite the IAF pointing out the unsuitability of armed helicopters at these altitudes and their vulnerability.
•The use of offensive air power close to the Line of Control also required that the political leadership be kept informed due to possibilities of escalation, something that the Army was unwilling to do. Even the Chief of Army Staff (CoAS) initially threatened to go it alone on his return from his visit abroad. As for silos, the CoAS himself admitted later that information was not shared even between the Director General of Military Operation (DGMO) and the Director General of Military Intelligence (DGMI) within Army headquarters, much less with the IAF. All this was despite the fact that the Defence Programme post-1962 was based on the assumption that China posed the major threat and that the IAF be made capable of assuming some of the Army’s deterrence capability.
Echoes from Kargil
•Seen in this light, the Chinese incursion into Eastern Ladakh last year is reminiscent of Kargil. While the response has been swift, it is evident that a clear intent to use combat air power, as against 1962, has significantly contributed in deterring China. However, such intent and a joint strategy would have been forcefully signalled by the presence of air force representatives in the ongoing negotiations to restore status quo ante. The continuing build-up of the infrastructure for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) in Tibet further emphasises the need for an air-land strategy, with air power as the lead element to deter or defeat the Chinese designs at coercion.
Address the structural gaps
•Finally, theatre or any lower structure requires an institutionalised higher defence organisation, which has been sadly missing since the Defence Committee of the Cabinet (DCC) became defunct in the 1950s, leading to little regular dialogue between the political and military leadership, except in crises resulting in knee-jerk responses. This led to a remark from a scholar-warrior that, “it is ironic that the Cabinet has an Accommodation Committee but not a Defence Committee”. In the current proposal, it appears that the CDS, as the permanent chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee (CoSC), would also exercise operational control of the theatre/functional commands, a move that is unlikely to be palatable to the politico-bureaucratic leadership and which has, perhaps, called for further deliberations.
•Prudence demands that instead of ramming down such structures without adequate deliberations and discussions with all stakeholders, we first evolve appropriate military strategies in a nuclear backdrop in concert with the political objectives. Thereafter, joint planning and training for all foreseen contingencies, with war-gaming, would automatically indicate the required structures with suitable command, control and communications.
📰 How Chhattisgarh has stalled a historic judgment
The Salwa Judum judgment was delivered 10 years ago, but nothing has been done to implement it
•Ten years ago, on July 5, 2011, Justices B. Sudershan Reddy and S.S. Nijjar delivered a historic judgment banning Salwa Judum, a vigilante movement started in 2005 and sponsored by the Chhattisgarh and Central government, ostensibly to fight against the Maoists. The judges also ruled that the use of surrendered Maoists and untrained villagers in frontline counter-insurgency operations as Special Police Officers (SPOs) was unconstitutional. It directed that the existing SPOs be redeployed in traffic management or other such safe duties. Other matters, especially prosecution of security forces and others involved in human rights violations, and rehabilitation of villagers who had suffered violence, were left pending, since the State had been asked to submit comprehensive plans for this.
•Ten years on, nothing has been done to implement the judgment. Instead, the State government has merely renamed the SPOs. They are now known as the District Reserve Guard (DRG). Conversations with DRG members have revealed that most of them are captured or surrendered Maoists and are given automatic weaponry as soon as they join the police force. Some of them get one-three months of training, and some not even that. They commit the most excesses against their former fellow villagers, suffer the most casualties in any operation, and are paid much less than the regular constabulary, all the reasons the judges had outlawed their use. A contempt petition filed in 2012 is still awaiting hearing. Although ‘final hearings’ commenced in December 2018 before another bench of Justice Madan Lokur and Justice Deepak Gupta, the judges retired soon thereafter and there has been no hearing since.
New struggles
•Much has happened on the ground since then. At its peak between 2005 and 2007, the Judum involved forcing villagers into government-controlled camps. Those who refused were punished by having their villages burnt. Hundreds of people were killed and their deaths were not even recorded as ‘encounters’. Villagers fled to neighbouring States or into the forests around their villages. Sangham members — active but unarmed Maoist sympathisers — were either jailed or compelled to join the security forces as SPOs.
•Today, the Judum camps are virtually empty with only the former SPOs and their families remaining, in now permanent houses. Villagers split between those who went to the camp and those who went to the forest are now reconciled. People have come back and started cultivation. An entire generation has grown up and, as we see in the movement against the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) camp in Silger, have embarked on new struggles.
•Across the region, villagers are demanding schools and health centres. Instead, what they have got in abundance are CRPF camps. These have come up at intervals of less than 5 km, and roads are being bulldozed through what were once dense forests. The only Supreme Court direction to have been implemented since 2007, when the case began, was that security forces vacate the schools where they were camped. But that is because with its own larger takeover of public land and private fields, the CRPF no longer has any use for these ruined structures.
•Villagers have tried out all the tools of getting justice but failed. The residents of Tadmetla, Timapuram and Morpalli, whose villages were burnt by the security forces in 2011, travelled hundreds of kilometres to give evidence before the Central Bureau of Investigation, which found in their favour, and filed a charge sheet against some SPOs. In a rare moment, the National Human Rights Commission castigated the government for violations in village Kondasawli, in a case filed by lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj. The villagers of Sarkeguda, where 17 innocent people, including children, had been shot dead one night in June 2012, showed great courage and persistence in deposing before a judicial enquiry commission. But in all these cases, where the government and security forces have been indicted by independent inquiries, no steps have been taken to prosecute those responsible.
•T.R. Andhyarujina and Ashok Desai, the lawyers who argued for the villagers pro bono in the Supreme Court, have passed away. And Justice Nijjar too. Ms. Bharadwaj has been in jail since 2018 on contested charges. Along with five others, I have survived a false charge of murder levelled by the police, and even been compensated by the NHRC for the mental trauma undergone, though our case is an exception. Podiyam Panda, former Communist Party of India (CPI) activist, who supported the Tadmetla villagers to demand justice, was arrested, allegedly tortured and is now a ‘police informer’. The Maoists will not let him or his wife, the former sarpanch of Chintagufa, return to the village, even though all the people in Chintagufa and neighbouring villages want them back.
Promises not kept
•In 2014, a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government replaced the 10-year-old Congress government at the Centre. In 2018, a Congress government replaced the 15-year-old BJP government in Chhattisgarh. Mahendra Karma, the Adivasi face of a violent movement jointly run by the BJP and Congress, was killed by the Maoists in 2013. The medical college hospital in Dimrapal is now named after him. S.R.P. Kalluri, as Bastar Inspector General of Police, was accused of many human rights violations. He was moved out of Bastar, but never prosecuted despite being named in an internal report by the CBI for burning Tadmetla.
•When contesting the elections in 2018, the Congress promised to do something about the thousands of innocent villagers who are arrested en masse by the police as suspected Maoists and spend long years in jail before being acquitted. For these villagers, meeting their families is difficult and hiring lawyers drains their meagre resources. Even as a few dedicated human rights lawyers have tried to help, the scale of arrests is massive. Yet, the government’s resolve in freeing prisoners – even during COVID-19 – is in stark contrast to its resolve in setting up security camps and arresting more people.
•Deaths in encounters between jawans and Maoists periodically hit the national headlines. But extrajudicial killings of villagers and Maoists and killings of suspected informers by Maoists continue at a steady pace, rarely hitting any high publicity note. An estimate given to the press on June 28 at Sarkeguda claimed 187 deaths in fake encounters between 2015 and 2021.
•Another promise made by the Congress — providing protection to journalists — also lies in shreds. The difficulties faced by activists of the Chhattisgarh Bachao Andolan and the CPI in reaching Silger and Sarkeguda show how the BJP’s tactics continue. The villagers were told that COVID-19 restrictions meant they could not mourn the victims on the anniversary of the Sarkeguda massacre, but a day later, the administration laid out a red carpet and large crowds to welcome Congress MLA Kawasi Lakhma.
•Unless both sides get serious about peace talks, another 10 years will pass. The 2011 Supreme Court judgment will be rendered even more meaningless, as will the idea of justice or the rule of law ever being possible in this land, in this time.
📰 The heavy footprint of a light rail
A part of the land that has been earmarked for acquisition for the light rail in Kerala are wetlands
•A light rail is a symbol of modernity that would surely appeal to the vanity of a society’s establishment. What is less evident though is the cost at which it could come. These are not just the upfront costs of installing one but also the hidden environmental impact, which can vary enormously according to geography and the project’s spread. A light rail project has found favour with the Government of Kerala. It’s unique selling proposition, apparently, is that it will reduce very substantially the travel time between the two extremities of the State, namely the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram in the south and the town of Kasargod in its north. So far, the project has mostly drawn criticism from environmental groups but there are also economic considerations that must be brought to the table when judging its desirability. It may seem odd to say this as the economy is embedded in nature and we cannot ignore environmental cost. However, there are instances when the environmental impact of alternative projects is the same but the economic returns vary significantly and vice versa.
Environmental costs
•What are the environmental costs of yet another rail line in Kerala? The land here is of an undulated topography combined with an often rocky surface that is prone to crumbling when dislodged. Excessive quarrying and construction have already left it vulnerable to torrential rain, as seen in the devastating landslides recorded across the State in recent years. Therefore, the first thought that comes to mind when contemplating another railway, light though it may be, is how it will impact the stability of the earth’s surface along its course. So far, we have only considered the consequences of the land use at stake. However, natural capital comprises not only the earth’s surface, and the services it renders to us, but also the ecosystem as a whole. It has been pointed out that a part of the land that has been earmarked for acquisition for the project are wetlands, including paddy fields. This should concern us. Paddy is the staple food of Malayalees. Its production in Kerala has been in decline for over half a century. Part of this is explained by economic factors but some part of it is due to the lack of an assured water supply. A double whammy of building over paddy fields and shrinking water bodies threatens food security. There is a recognisable pattern to the development strategy of the present government in Kerala. Two years ago, it had dismissed protests by the villagers of Keezhattur in Kannur District against a highway project that would destroy their paddy fields. It now has a chance to listen to citizens’ concerns on the plan to install a light railway across the State, the consequences of which will be far more widespread.
Taking into account alternatives
•It is not anyone’s case that the government should not develop transportation. The point is that it should take into account all alternatives. Kerala already has a railway line that is two-laned for the most part. There is an international airport in every urban conurbation. It is well connected by road, with one of the higher road densities among States. But of the highest promise are the possibilities of transportation over water. There is at present an ongoing project for transportation through inland waterways. Finally, nothing prevents the government from developing a sea-borne ferry service connecting Thiruvananthapuram with Kasargod, and all the ports in between. This would leave the land untouched.
•There is an irony in the pitch for a light rail by a Communist government. In the 1950s, when it was believed that land reforms would deliver the land to them, the peasants hopefully sang “we will (one day) harvest all the fields”. Now, by their actions, the ruling class seems to be saying to the workers who installed them in power “we shall (one day) kill all the fields”. Spoken in Malayalam, the statements rhyme.
