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Hours after India said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping had “agreed” to “direct their relevant officials to intensify efforts at expeditious disengagement and de-escalation” of troops along the Line of Actual Control, Beijing provided a different account of the meeting as it did not mention any agreed outcome.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson did not refer to any agreement, and said President Xi “stressed that improving China-India relations serves the common interests of the two countries and peoples, and is also conducive to peace, stability and development of the world and the region”.
Beijing also said that the conversation took place at the request of Prime Minister Modi. Indian officials were quick to counter this and said there was a pending request from the Chinese side for a bilateral meeting.
The two leaders, however, had an informal conversation in the Leaders Lounge during the BRICS Summit, sources said.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry said that the two leaders spoke at Prime Minister Modi’s request and had a “candid and in-depth exchange of views on current China-India relations and other questions of shared interest”.
In a statement put out on the Chinese Foreign Ministry website, in a Q&A format, the spokesperson also said, “The two sides should bear in mind the overall interests of their bilateral relations and handle properly the border issue so as to jointly safeguard peace and tranquillity in the border region.”
Rover moving on moon, has already covered 8 metres, all payloads are performing: ISRO (Page no. 3)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Two days after Chandrayaan-3 landed on the Moon, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) released the first video of the rover moving on the lunar surface.
In an update later, the space agency confirmed that the rover had covered a distance of 8 metres on the lunar surface and the two science experiments it was carrying had also been switched on.
The rover is capable of travelling a total distance of 500 metres.
A two-segment foldable ramp on the lander module helped the rover roll down with a cord attached to it. The cord was retracted after the rover touched the surface of the Moon.
As it was rolling out, a solar panel also opened up, allowing the rover to generate 50W power for its journey.
All planned rover movements have been verified. The rover has successfully traversed a distance of about eight metres,” ISRO said, adding that rover payloads LIBS (LASER Induced Breakdown Spectroscope) and APXS (Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer) had been switched on.
Rate hike not best option to curb inflation can hurt recovery says FM (Page no. 3)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
While taming inflation remains a key priority for the Centre, hiking interest rates to tackle runaway prices might not always be the best approach as it can “come in the way of economic recovery. She also cautioned central banks around the world to keep in mind “growth, and growth-related priorities”.
Elevated interest rates for a considerable time can come in the way of economic recovery. So, the tendency to use interest rates as the only solution for dealing with inflation has its own downside.
She said not accounting for supply-side factors and focusing only on increasing interest rates “will not give a complete solution for inflation.
The task for central banks is to keep in mind growth and growth-related priorities even as equally looking at controlling inflation.
The comments come after India’s retail inflation rate surged to a 15-month high in July. Also, the RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das, in the minutes of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting held on August 8-10, had noted that supply side measures need to be continued to check spiralling of food shocks into generalised economy-wide price impulses.
Although headline inflation has softened from last year’s elevated level, it still rules above the target, the governor said. “Our task is still not over”.
Govt & Politics
Modi, Greece PM agree on strategic partnership, doubling trade by 2030 (Page no. 3)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
In the first Prime Ministerial visit to Greece after 40 years, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Greek PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis decided to elevate bilateral ties to strategic partnership, promised to double bilateral trade by 2030 and agreed to firm up a migration and mobility pact soon.
Modi, after holding bilateral talks in Athens, said, “This is the first visit by an Indian prime minister to Greece after a gap of 40 years. Still, neither the depth of our relations has diminished, nor has there been any decrease in the warmth of our relations.”
“Therefore, today the prime minister and I have decided to take the India-Greece partnership to a ‘strategic’ level,” he added.
We have decided that we will strengthen our strategic partnership by expanding our cooperation in the fields of defence and security, infrastructure, agriculture, education, new and emerging technology, and skill development.
Mitsotakis said, “today, the most populous, largest democracy on the planet is coming to the first democracy on Earth.” He said Greece is very pleased to upgrade its ties with India to strategic partnership, adding that both sides are ready to “walk side by side to deal with various challenges, especially in a period of international turmoil and war in Ukraine — events that make it even more imperative to observe the UN Charter”.
Express Network
Smart cities Awards: MP adjudged best state, Indore best city for 6th year in row (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
The Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry on Friday named Indore the best city and Madhya Pradesh the best state in the Smart Cities Mission in its India Smart Cities Awards 2022.
Surat and Agra were named second and third best among cities and Tamil Nadu second in states, with the third prize being shared by Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.
A total of 66 winners in different categories were announced on Friday; the awards would be presented by President Droupadi Murmu at a ceremony in Indore on September 27.
The cities were selected based on their ranking in terms of progress of projects, project outcomes and presentations submitted for the awards.
Indore has topped the cleanliness rankings under the Swachh Bharat Mission, being named the cleanest city for the past six years in a row. Madhya Pradesh, too, won the tag of the cleanest state in the Swachh Survekshan 2022. In the Smart Cities awards, Indore had shared the first place with Surat last time.
In the Smart Cities Awards 2022, Coimbatore’s project of model roads, restoration and renovation of lakes was ranked the best in the category of built environment, while Jabalpur won the award for its incubation centre in the economy category.
Chandigarh’s public bike sharing and e-governance services won in the mobility and governance categories, respectively. Chandigarh also won the overall award in the Union Territory category.
State of birds “Most species dip, Indian peafowl among those flourishing (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
THERE IS a general decline in numbers in most bird species in the country – some recording current decline and others projected to decline in the long term, according to a report based on data from about 30,000 birdwatchers that was released. Raptors, migratory shorebirds and ducks have declined the most, the report has found.
The State of India’s Birds, 2023 report, also says that several bird species such as the Indian Peafowl, Rock Pigeon, Asian Koel and House Crow are not only healthy in both abundance and distribution, but showing an “increasing trend”.
The Peafowl, India’s national bird, is one of the most rapidly increasing species in the country today, it says, “expanding into habitats where it has never occurred previously”.
In the last 20 years, Indian Peafowl has expanded into the high Himalaya and the rainforests of the Western Ghats. It now occurs in every district in Kerala, a state where it was once extremely rare.
Apart from expanding its range, it also appears to be increasing in population density in areas where it occurred earlier.
Among the bird species that have been doing well, compared to their pre-2000 baseline, the Asian Koel has shown a rapid increase in abundance of 75%, with an annual current increase of 2.7% per year.
So have the House Crow, Rock Pigeon and the Alexandrine Parakeet that has established new populations in several cities.
Explained
Revised NCF: How school education could change (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 2, Education)
Once the revised National Curriculum Framework (NCF) comes into effect next academic year, students will study three languages in grades 9 and 10, two of which will have to be Indian; and two languages in grades 11 and 12, one of which will have to be Indian.
The revised framework released makes the study of Indian languages an integral part of school education, and allows students the freedom to choose from a range of subjects across streams.
This is in line with the vision of the National Education Policy 2020 to promote teaching and learning in Indian languages, and make greater inter-disciplinarity possible in school education.
The 640-page NCF, an update on the draft released in April, was developed by a 13-member steering committee led by former ISRO chief K Kasturirangan. The NCF, a key document on which textbooks are based, was last revised in 2005.
Like the draft, the revised NCF divides school education into four stages: Foundational (preschool to grade 2), Preparatory (grades 2 to 5), Middle (grades 6 to 8), and Secondary (grades 9 to 12).
It recommends the teaching of two languages till the middle stage, supplemented by a third language from the middle stage to class 10. Two out of these three languages must be “native to India”.
In the middle stage, students are expected to study, apart from the languages, mathematics, art education, physical education, science, social science, and a subject of vocational education.
Editorial
At G20, agreeing to agree (Page no. 16)
(GS Paper 2, International Organisation)
At this stage of the G20 process, as the leaders’ meeting approaches, it would be helpful to focus on areas where convergence is possible. Indian proposals on LiFE, adopting a lifestyle that protects the environment, and on sharing its digital public infrastructure, should be widely acceptable.
Improving financing availability is necessary for progress on most aspects. While emerging and developing economies (EMDEs) tend to emphasise development financing for reaching SDG goals, advanced economies (AEs) emphasise the creation of global public goods (GPGs), in particular the mitigation of climate change risk.
But convergence is possible since there is large overlap between SDGs and GPGs. The poorest suffer the most from natural disasters.
Flood resistant drainage systems in cities, smart green infrastructure and better air quality improve health and development goals, and reduce distress migration to AEs. Climate finance should add to, and not substitute for, ongoing development assistance.
There is a coming together for a second reason. EMDEs tend to ask for public money to compensate for all the carbon AEs have put in the atmosphere.
But AEs feel they have little to spare after spending on the pandemic and the Ukraine war effort. They have not delivered even the $100bn pa promised earlier by 2020. Current estimates of requirements for EMDE mitigation financing go to 4tr$ pa till 2030.
Ideas Page
The new discourse of global south (Page no. 17)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
China is the world’s second most powerful nation. Yet, President Xi Jinping insisted at the BRICS summit in Johannesburg that it would be a part of the “developing world”.
Although India aspires for the tag of a “developed country” by 2047, Prime Minister Narendra Modi emphasises on the construct of “Global South”, and describes BRICS as a platform “for discussing and deliberating on issues of concern for the entire Global South”.
As the so-called developed countries struggle to manage their economies, putting a question mark over their future trajectory, this new discourse of Global South acquires significance.
The World Trade Organisation says that it doesn’t have any definitions for “developed” and “developing” countries.
Members announce for themselves whether they are ‘developed’ or ‘developing’ countries. However, other members can challenge the decision.
The United Nations, too, does not have any clear definition. Yet, it categorised entire Europe, North America, Japan, Australia and New Zealand as the “developed world”, and the remaining 150 plus countries as “developing”.
Many have been questioning this classification. In 2014, in their “annual letter”, Bill and Melinda Gates argued that “the terms ‘developing countries’ and ‘developed countries’ have outlived their usefulness”. Bill went on to claim that by 2035, “there will be almost no poor countries left in the world”.
World
Highly mutated COVID variant found but numbers low says WHO official (Page no. 20)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
A highly mutated Covid variant called BA.2.86 has now been detected in Switzerland and South Africa in addition to Israel, Denmark, the US and the UK, according to a leading World Health Organisation official.
The Omicron offshoot carries more than 35 mutations in key portions of the virus compared with XBB.1.5, the dominant variant through most of 2023 - a number roughly on par with the Omicron variant that caused record infections compared to its predecessor.
It was first spotted in Denmark on July 24 after the virus infecting a patient at risk of becoming severely ill was sequenced.
It has since been detected in other symptomatic patients, in routine airport screening, and in wastewater samples in a handful of countries.
A dozen scientists around the world said while it was important to monitor BA.2.86, it was unlikely to cause a devastating wave of severe disease and death given immune defenses built up worldwide from vaccination and prior infection.
Economy
Don’t favour rate hikes at this point, tightening since last year still working (Page no. 21)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
One of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) members who voted for a repo rate pause in the August policy, says the rate hike since May 2022 is still working and is expected to maintain pressure on inflation — which rose to 15-month high of 7.44 per cent in July — over the next several quarters and bring it close to the Reserve Bank of India’s comfort band of two to 6 per cent.
Varma, Professor of Finance and Accounting at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, tells Hitesh Vyas and George Mathew that the spike in inflation due to a rise in vegetable prices lasts only a few months when monetary policy is conducted appropriately. Excerpts:
Headline inflation in the range of 7-8 per cent for a couple of months and so the actual print did not surprise me. It appears to me that we are witnessing large differences in rainfall across time and across regions, but the overall level of the monsoon does not appear to be seriously deficient. We have to keep our fingers crossed till the season is over to make an assessment of what the situation will turn out to be
Value chains to MSMEs, G20 ministers set out priority areas (Page no. 21)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Ending without a joint communiqué, the two-day G20 Trade and Investment Ministerial Meeting endorsed an outcome document and Chair’s summary, calling for measures to promote digitalisation of trade documents, a generic mapping framework for global value chains (GVCs) and a “Jaipur Call for Action” to enhance the access of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to information.
All G20 member nations “unanimously agreed” on the outcome document, barring one paragraph on “geopolitical issues” linked to the Russia-Ukraine war, as taken from the G20 Bali Leaders’ Declaration in November last year.
Russia and China took distinct positions on the paragraph relating to geopolitical issues. Russia rejected the inclusion of geopolitical para in the Jaipur outcome document stating it does not conform to the G20 mandate. China stated that the G20 Trade Ministerial is not the right forum to discuss geopolitical issues.
The outcome that we have come up with today, agreed by the entire group of ministers, is actually one of the most significant outcomes in the G20.
It’s an outcome document and Chair summary. It has several new elements which were not part of the G20 agenda before and can become the framework or guiding principle, through which we can see significant progress in international trade and growth of the world economy.
US India in final stages of setting up monitoring mechanism (Page no. 21)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
India and the US are in the final stages of setting up a joint monitoring mechanism to enable domestic exports of certain steel and aluminium products to America without paying extra duties, an official said.
Indian exports of these products attract additional duties in the US as Washington, in 2018, imposed a 25 per cent import duty on steel products and 10 per cent on certain aluminium products on grounds of national security.
In retaliation, India in June 2019 imposed additional customs duties on 28 American products.
During the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in June, the two countries decided to remove trade irritants and as part of that both sides agreed to end six trade disputes at the World Trade Organisation (WTO).
They have mutually resolved those six disputes and India has decided to remove additional duties on eight US products, including chickpeas, lentils and apples, which were imposed in 2019.
The US, on its part, has agreed to provide greater market access to certain Indian steel and aluminium products, a development which would help increase outbound shipments of these goods.