Syllabus: General studies paper 3 (science and technology)

Context:

Historically, technology competition has been a main aspect of geopolitics. In this day and age, it can be increasingly reflected in geopolitical battles between the us and china. One such technological competition can be easily witnessed in the field of artificial intelligence (ai).

Advantages of Artificial Intelligence:

• Self-driving cars:  ai algorithms are one of the primary components that facilitate self-driving cars to make sense of their surroundings, taking in feeds from cameras installed around the vehicle and detecting objects like roads, traffic signs, other cars, and people.
• Digital assistants and smart speakers: siri, alexa, cortana, and google assistant utilise artificial intelligence to convert spoken words to text and map the text to certain commands. Ai assists digital assistants to make sense of various nuances in spoken language and synthesize human-like voices.
• Translation: for several decades, translating text between various languages was a pain point for computers. But deep learning created a revolution in services such as google translate. But to be precise, ai still has a long way to go before it perfects human language, but so far, the advances are outstanding.
• Facial recognition: facial recognition is one of the most prominent applications of artificial intelligence. It has different uses, including unlocking your phone, paying with your face, and detecting intruders in your home.

Medicine:

• In the medical field also, we will find the wide application of ai. Doctors assess the patients and their health risks with the help of artificial machine intelligence. It educates them about the side effects of various medicines.
• Medical professionals are often trained with artificial surgery simulators. It finds a huge application in detecting and monitoring neurological disorders as it can simulate the brain functions.
• Robotics is often used in helping mental health patients to come out of depression and remain active.

Syllabus: general studies paper 2

Context:

Electoral funding of political parties lacks transparency. Over the years, many steps are taken by the government to make it a more secret affair

Introduction:

• In 2014, the delhi high court heldthat both main national parties (congress and bjp) were guilty of accepting donations illegally. They both accepted donations from companies registered in india but who’s controlling shareholders was a foreign company. The court held that this is a violation of the foreign contribution (regulation) act (fcra), 1976.
• In 2016 and 2018, thegovernment amended the fcra through the annual finance bills. These bills exempt political parties from the scrutiny of funds they have received from abroad since 1976. This enabled new and regressive pathways that afford full anonymity to corporate and foreign political donors.
• In 2017, the amount of anonymous cash donations to political parties was reduced from ₹20,000 to ₹2,000to ensure greater transparency in political funding. However, the introduction of electoral bonds introduced a new form of anonymity. It led to the funding of thousands of crores of anonymous donations.

Issues with electoral funding system:

• Amendments in fcra, 1976:in 2014, the delhi high court held that two national political parties were guilty of illegally accepting donations from two companies registered in india but whose controlling shareholder was a foreign company.
  1. In 2016 and 2018, the government amended the fcra through the annual finance bills, to retrospectively legalise the violations.

Syllabus- General Studies 3 (economy)

Appraisal of education, Health, Physical and Financial Infrastructure Development.

Context

The state of campuses of higher education institutes in India is at its lowest.

• There is still a lack of serious consideration for the safety of campuses, which may be among the most vulnerable sites for the spread of infection at the community level.
• Apart from routine advisories for SOPs, protocols or guidelines issued by the University Grants Commission (UGC), and at the State level by the respective Education Departments, nothing concrete has been done on the ground.

Issues

VULNERABILITY

• Campuses that house hostels, libraries, common rooms-cum-washrooms, canteens, auditoriums, gymnasiums, playgrounds, administrative offices, staff rooms, guest houses and staff quarters, besides classrooms and laboratories, require resources to change and modify their current settings for COVID-19-appropriate behaviour.

Syllabus- General Studies 1(society)

Women empowerment and social justice: Policies for women Empowerment in India, Laws for protection of women, women security and safety initiatives in India.

Context

The recent judgment of a trial court acquitting a former editor of a news magazine, who was charged, in 2013, of having sexually assaulted an employee, a young woman journalist, during an event the newsmagazine had organised in Goa, has created a furor and raised many questions about the law.

• However, the Goa government filed an appeal against the acquittal in the Goa Bench of the Bombay High Court requesting an immediate hearing.
• The Solicitor General of India , during the hearing, said that the lower court’s judgment lacked sensitivity regarding crimes against women and awareness of the sections of criminal laws.

Context

The second wave of Covid-19 is sweeping through the country. Health systems are overwhelmed and the need for critical medical supplies is expanding by the minute.

Amid rising cases, testing — a potent tool to contain the spread — is escalating steadily and inching close to two million tests daily.

Current Situation

• The government’s emphasis on reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), considered the gold standard of tests and essential for sequencing purposes, also continues to remain high.
• The appetite for testing among populations has risen in this wave. Diagnostic labs are reeling under the stress of skyrocketing demand and some private labs have called for government intervention to ensure seamless and expeditious supply of critical material (reagents for RT-PCR).
• However, with parallel tasks of
  • purchasing vaccines under the liberalised Covid-19 vaccination programme,
  • securing medical oxygen supplies, and

Syllabus:

Context:

El salvador became the first sovereign nation to make a cryptocurrency legal tender.

Introduction:

• The law pushed by its 39-year-old president, nayib bukele, passed with 62 out of 84 votes.
• It mandates that bitcoinshould now be accepted as a valid payment by all establishments, except those that do not have the technical wherewithal to do so.
• This puts the digital currency that does not answer to any government monetary policies on the same footing as the country’s primary currency, the united states dollar.

Why el salvador opted for us dollar?

• El salvador fully ‘dollarised’ its economy in 2001.
• Countries adopt the u.s. dollar as their official currency for several reasons, such as when their local currencies fail(for example, zimbabwe, which saw inflation in multimillion percentages), or to take advantage of the stability that it offers and attract investments.
• One of the downsides is that the economies of ‘dollarised’ countriesget linked to the monetary policies of the federal reserve in washington.
• The s. central bank could set ratesthat may benefit the u.s. economy but end up hurting economies that use the same currency.

Rationality behind using bitcoin

• The bill that mr. Bukele proposed said that “central banks are increasingly taking actions that may cause harm to the economic stability of el salvador” and that bitcoin was being adopted “in order to mitigate the negative impact from central banks”.

Syllabus- General Studies 2(Cyber security)

Context

A string of high-profile cyber attacks in recent months has exposed vulnerabilities in the critical infrastructure of even advanced nations. This has reinforced the need for improved defences against actual, and potential, cyber attacks by all countries across continents.

Frequency of attacks

Several high-profile cyber attacks were reported from the United States during the past several months.

• 2020 end– a major cyber attack headlined ‘SolarWinds’ rocked the U.S. It involved data breaches across several wings of the U.S. government, including defense, energy and state.
• Early 2021– thousands of U.S. organizations were hacked in an unusually aggressive cyber attack, by a Chinese group Hafnium, which had exploited serious flaws in Microsoft’s software.
• There after U.S. has witnessed three more major attacks:

Syllabus: General Studies paper 2 ( international relations)

Context:

The meeting of g7 countries is going on in cornwall, england. The expectation from this meeting is to draw out a framework that is inclusive and resilient in nature.

About G7:

• Formed in 1975in the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis, the g7 then collectively produced 70% of the world’s gdp, a number that has dropped to 40% now
• The g7 became the g8 with russia’s admissioninto the group in 1998.
• But it reverted to the g7 in 2014, following russia’s annexation of crimea
• Over the years, the group has taken up a host of issues ranging from economic growth to environmental issues and terrorism.
• The latest summit seeks to address global health challenges.

Latest summit:

• As the leaders of seven nations — the s., germany, the u.k., france, canada, japan and italy— meet in cornwall in south-west england, they would be marking the 47th edition of the “group of seven” summit.
• The g7 prides itselfas a group of nations that steadfastly promote liberal democracy and enjoy economic prosperity, which they seek to institutionalise through multilateral cooperation.
• When mr. Trump was at the helm in the u.s., his transactional approach to international relationsshowed disdain for multilateralism, evidenced in particular in the way he pulled the s out of the paris accord, and openly complained about the summit itself being “outdated”.
• The current president of the u.s., joe bidenhas sought to reorient his country’s policy towards multilateralism, which includes closer coordination with traditional allies in the global north and this sets the stage for a renewed emphasis of purpose for the g7 as they meet in cornwall.
• The theme of this year’s summit is ‘build back better’ and the focus would be on 4 priority

Syllabus- General Studies 2(International Relations)

Bilateral, Regional and Global groupings and agreements involving India and affecting India’s interests.

Context

The G7 meeting is recently being held in Cornwall UK this year.

What is G7?

• The Group of 7 (G7) is an informal group of seven countries — the United States, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom, the heads of which hold an annual summit with European Union and other invitees.
• Together the member countries represent
  • 40% of global GDP and
  • 10% of the world’s population.
• The G7 has no legal existence, permanent secretariat or official members.

Syllabus- General Studies 2(Governance)

Issues relating to quality of life: livelihood, poverty, hunger, disease and social inclusiveness.

Context

As we look ahead to what is promised to be a transition from a lack of vaccine supply to one of greater availability, the plan must be to prioritise people based on the risk of severe disease, and need — essential principles if we plan with justice in mind.

Issues/ target group