Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

• The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) on May 17 said that a sculpture of a lion, which possibly dates back to the Ganga dynasty, was found during excavation for the controversial heritage corridor project around the 12thcentury Jagannath Temple in Puri,Odisha.
• This is the third such lion sculpture found during the excavation work.

Jagannath temple

• It was constructed in the 12th century by King Anatavarman Chodaganga Deva of the Eastern Ganga Dynasty.
• Jagannath Puri temple is called ‘Yamanika Tirtha’ where, according to the Hindu beliefs, the power of ‘Yama’, the god of death has been nullified in Puri due to the presence of Lord Jagannath.
• It was called the “White Pagoda” and is a part of Char Dham pilgrimages (Badrinath, Dwaraka, Puri, Rameswaram).
• There are four gates to the temple

1. Eastern ‘Singhadwara’(main gate with two crouching lions)
2. Southern ‘Ashwadwara
3. Western ‘Vyaghra Dwara
4. Northern ‘Hastidwara’.

• There is a carving of each form at each gate.
• In front of the entrance stands the Aruna stambha or sun pillar, which was originally at the Sun Temple in Konark.

Jagannath temple Heritage Corridor Project:

• The project includes redeveloping major portions of the holy town and in the vicinity of the Jagannath temple for visitors and tourists.
• The project will include:
• Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA) building redevelopment
• a 600-capacity Srimandir reception center
• Jagannath cultural center
• Badadanda heritage streetscape
• beachfront development
• Puri lake
• Musa river revival plan, etc.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

World of work – the ninth edition of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Monitor was published

Key findings

• The report says that after significant gains during the last quarter of 2021, the number of hours worked globally dropped in the first quarter of 2022, to 3.8% below the employment situation before the pandemic.
• About 11.2 crore jobs might have lost between this period, according to the report.
• The report added that a “great and growing divergence between richer and poorer economies” continues to characterise the recovery.
• While high-income countries experienced a recovery in hours worked, low- and lower-middle-income economies suffered setbacks in the first quarter of the year with a 3.6 and 5.7 per cent gap respectively when compared to the pre-crisis benchmark
• The fresh lockdowns in China, the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, and the global rise in the prices of food and fuel are cited as the main reasons for the findings.
• The ILO urged its member countries to take a humane approach to address the situation.

Findings related to India

• The report said both India and lower-middle-income experienced a deterioration of the gender gap in work hours in the second quarter of 2020
• It report said that for every 100 women at work prior to the pandemic, 12.3 women would have lost their job as an average through the entire period considered by the report.
• In contrast, for every 100 men, the equivalent figure would have been 7.5.
• Hence, the pandemic seems to have exacerbated the already substantial gender imbalances in employment participation in the country.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

President of India has appointed Vinai Kumar Saxena as Delhi’s new Lieutenant Governor

The Lieutenant Governor and the NCT Delhi:

Constitutional Provisions:

• Under Article 239 of the Constitution of India, the administration of UT’s is handled by an administrator appointed by the President of India.
• However, the Constitution (Sixty-ninth Amendment) Act, 1991 introduced Article 239AA which created an elected Legislative Assembly and a Council of Ministers including a Chief Minister for NCT Delhi.
• This Assembly has the power to make laws for NCT Delhi with respect to any of the matters under the State or Concurrent Lists (except public order, police and land matters).
• The Lieutenant Governor (LG) of Delhi was designated the Administrator of the NCT Delhi. 

Power of Lieutenant Governor

• He/She acts on the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers, except when he/she is compelled to act in his/her discretion.
• If the LG and the Ministers disagree on any issue, the LG shall refer it to the President for decision and act accordingly.
• When such a decision is pending with the President, it shall be competent for the LG to take prompt action in any scenario where the matter (in his opinion) is urgent.
• Under Article 239AB, the President may, on receipt of a report from the LG or otherwise, suspend the operation of any provision of Article 239AA by order when a situation arises in which the administration of the NCT cannot be carried out in accordance with the provisions of Article 239AA.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

India and 12 countries led by the US launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) 

• The framework aims to strengthen economic partnership among participating countries to enhance resilience, sustainability, inclusiveness, economic growth, fairness, and competitiveness in the Indo-Pacific region.
• Indian Prime Minister said “The Indo-Pacific Economic Framework is a declaration of our collective will to make the region an engine of global economic growth.”
• Leaders and officials joined in virtually from Australia, Brunei, Indonesia, Republic of Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.
• A joint statement said that the countries share a commitment to a free, open, fair, inclusive, interconnected, resilient, secure, and prosperous Indo-Pacific region that has the potential to achieve sustainable and inclusive economic growth.
• The joint statement said that they are launching collective discussions toward future negotiations, and identified four pillars under the IPEF.
• Trade: To build high-standard, inclusive, free, and fair trade commitments and develop new and creative approaches in trade and technology policy that advance a broad set of objectives that fuels economic activity and investment, promotes sustainable and inclusive economic growth, and benefits workers and consumers
• Supply Chains: Committed to improving transparency, diversity, security, and sustainability in supply chains to make them more resilient and well-integrated.
• Clean Energy, Decarbonization, and Infrastructure: In line with Paris Agreement goals and efforts to support the livelihood of peoples and workers, the framework plan to accelerate the development and deployment of clean energy technologies to decarbonize economies and build resilience to climate impacts.
• Tax and Anti-Corruption: Committed to promoting fair competition by enacting and enforcing effective and robust tax, anti-money laundering, and anti-bribery regimes in line with existing multilateral obligations, standards, and agreements to curb tax evasion and corruption in the Indo-Pacific region.

Indo Pacific

• The Indo-Pacific is a geopolitical construct that has emerged as a substitute to the long-prevalent “Asia-Pacific”, which represented the eastwards shift of global developments from Euro-Atlantic dimension
• It is an integrated theatre that combines the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, and the land masses that surround them.
• One of the reasons behind the popularity of this term is an understanding that the Indian Ocean and the Pacific are a linked strategic theater.
• Also, the centre of gravity has shifted to Asia. The reason being maritime routes, the Indian Ocean and the Pacific provide the sea lanes.

The term ‘Indo-Pacific’ is interpreted differently by different stakeholders.

• India considers the region as an inclusive, open, integrated and balanced space. India continuously emphasizes on strategic inter-connections, common challenges and opportunities between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific.
• The S. considers it to be a free and open Indo-Pacific, highlighting the importance of rules or norms of conduct in the region, thus trying to contain the role of China in the region.
• The ASEAN countries look at Indo-Pacific as a consociational model, thus bringing in China not only for the sake of giving it some stakeholdership but looking for ways to cooperate with it in the region.

Factors driving the global shift towards the Indo-pacific

• Important Sea Lines of Communication – presence of key choke points, from the Mozambique Channel and Bab-el-Mandeb in the west to Lombok Strait in the east
• Flourishing Trade and Economy – The Indo-Pacific Region shares 44% of the world surface area; includes 65% of the world population; accounts for 62% of the world GDP
• Natural resources: The expanse of Indian and Pacific Ocean combined has vast reserves of marine resources including- Offshore Hydrocarbons, Methane hydrates, Sea Bed minerals, Rare earth metals, fisheries etc
• China factor – China’s aggressive foreign policy, rapid economic expansion, military modernization and power projection has raised several red flags among regional and extra-regional countries
• Increasing Militarization of Indian Ocean Region (IOR) – China has established commercial ports across the Indo Pacific, such as Gwadar port (Pakistan), port in Hambantota (Sri Lanka) etc., in addition to its overseas naval base in Djibouti.

India’s interest in the region

• Peace and security in the Indian Ocean: Nearly 50% of India’s trade is centered in the Indo-Pacific Region and the Indian Ocean carries 90% of India’s trade and its energy sources. India wants to assure freedom of navigation, secure choke points, resolve conflicts peacefully and address non-traditional security threats in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).
• Geo-political aspirations: To expand its own presence in the region
• Countering China: Ensuring that China does not gain a significant strategic foothold in the region
• Enhancing Trade and Investment Cooperation: by encouraging greater flow of goods, services, investment and technology between India and other countries in the region.
• Promoting sustainable development in the region, combating marine pollution, Regulating illegal fishing etc

Challenges faced by India in the region

• Limited Naval Capacity and Lack of military bases
• Poor infrastructure connectivity
• Countering China – China has established commercial ports across the Indo Pacific, such as Gwadar port (Pakistan), port in Hambantota (Sri Lanka) etc – India lacks resources for such major projects

Way forward

• It is important to establish connectivity in the region based on respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, consultation, good governance, transparency, viability and sustainability.
• The countries in the region should have equal access as a right under international law to the use of common spaces on sea and in the air that would require freedom of navigation, unimpeded commerce and peaceful settlement of disputes in accordance with international law.
• Strong naval capabilities, multilateral diplomacy, economic integration in the region is the need of the hour.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

India is moving faster than any other country towards a green transition, Petroleum Minister says at Davos

• Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas stated that India will emerge as the leader of green hydrogen

Hydrogen

• Hydrogen is one of the most abundant elements on earth for a cleaner alternative fuel option.

Type of hydrogen depends up on the process of its formation:

• Green Hydrogen: Green hydrogen is produced by electrolysis of water using renewable energy (like Solar, Wind) and has a lower carbon footprint. Electricity splits water into hydrogen and oxygen. By Products: Water, Water Vapor.
• Brown hydrogen is produced using coal where the emissions are released to the air.
• Grey hydrogen is produced from natural gas where the associated emissions are released to the air.
• Blue hydrogen is produced from natural gas, where the emissions are captured using carbon capture and storage.

Uses:

• Hydrogen is an energy carrier, not an energy source and can deliver or store a tremendous amount of energy.
• It can be used in fuel cells to generate electricity, or power and heat
• Due to their high efficiency and zero-or near zero-emissions operation, hydrogen and fuel cells have the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emission in many applications.

Green Hydrogen Policy (GHP)

• Recently, the Ministry of Power (MoP) announced a Green Hydrogen Policy (GHP).
• The policy has set a target of 5 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) of green hydrogen production by 2030, more than 80% of the current hydrogen demand in the country.
• Under the policy, the government is offering to set up manufacturing zones for production, connectivity to the ISTS (Inter-State Transmission System) on priority basis, and free transmission for 25 years if the production facility is commissioned before June 2025.
• Producers will be allowed to set up bunkers near ports for storage of green ammonia for export by shipping.
• Manufacturers of Green hydrogen and ammonia are allowed to purchase renewable power from the power exchange or set up Renewable Energy (RE) capacity themselves or through any other developer, anywhere.

Significance of the Policy

• India’s largest oil refiner, Indian Oil Corp (IOC) estimates that GHP measures will reduce the cost of green hydrogen production by 40-50%.
• Fuels like Green Hydrogen and Green Ammonia are vital for any nation’s environmentally sustainable energy security.
• India has already committed to achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2070, and green hydrogen will play a significant role as a disruptive feedstock in India’s transition from oil and coal.
• The GHP lays a solid foundation for developing a competitive green hydrogen sector in India.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has recognized the contribution of India’s 1 million Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) during the Covid-19 pandemic.

• It is acknowledged that ASHAs facilitate linking households to health facilities, and play pivotal roles in house-to-house surveys, vaccination, public health and Reproductive and Child Health measures.

Genesis & evolution of the ASHA programme

• The ASHA programme was based on Chhattisgarh’s successful Mitanin programme, in which a Community Worker looks after 50 households.
• The National Health Mission was launched to provide effective health care to the entire rural population in the country – The core strategy of the mission is to provide well trained female health activist (Accredited Social Health Activist- ASHA) in each village (1/1000 population) to fill the gap of unequal distribution of health services in rural area.
• Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA) is a trained female community health activist.
• Selected from the community itself and accountable to it, the ASHA will be trained to work as an interface between the community and the public health system.
• At present there are over 9 Lakh ASHAs.

Roles and responsibilities

• The role of an ASHA is that of a community level care provider.
• This includes a mix of tasks: facilitating access to health care services, building awareness about health care entitlements especially amongst the poor and marginalized, promoting healthy behaviours and mobilizing for collective action for better health outcomes and meeting curative care needs as appropriate to the organization of service delivery in that area and compatible with her training and skills.

Success of the programme

• The World Health Organisation (WHO) has recognized the contribution of India’s 1 million Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) during the Covid-19 pandemic.
• ASHAs facilitate linking households to health facilities, and play pivotal roles in house-to-house surveys, vaccination, public health and Reproductive and Child Health measures thus help in keeping track and monitoring of diseases, outbreak, MMR and IMR etc
• In many states, ASHAs are involved in national health programmes
• With newly acquired skills in health care and the ability to connect households to health facilities, ASHAs were able to secure benefits for households.
• In a way, it became a programme that allowed a local woman to develop into a skilled health worker.

Issues

• They get performance-based payments, not a fixed salary like government servants. There have been agitations demanding employee status for ASHA workers.
• In many states, the payout is low, and often delayed.
• The original idea was never to deny the ASHA a compensation that could be even better than a salary — it was only to prevent “governmentalisation”, and promote “communitisation” by making her accountable to the people she served.
• There is a strong argument to grant permanence to some of these positions with a reasonable compensation as sustaining motivation.

Way forward

• It is important to ensure that compensation for performance is timely and adequate.
• Provide opportunities for moving up the skill ladder in the formal primary health care system as an ANM/ GNM or a Public Health Nurse
• Upgrading skill sets and providing easy access to credit and finance will ensure a sustainable opportunity to earn a respectable living while serving the community.
• Strengthening access to health insurance, credit for consumption and livelihood needs at reasonable rates, and coverage under pro-poor public welfare programmes will contribute to ASHAs emerging as even stronger agents of change.

National Health Mission

• National Health Mission (NHM) was launched by the government of India in 2013 subsuming the National Rural Health Mission and the National Urban Health Mission.
• The main programmatic components include Health System Strengthening in rural and urban areas for – Reproductive-Maternal- Neonatal-Child and Adolescent Health (RMNCH+A), and Communicable and Non-Communicable Diseases.
• The NHM envisages the achievement of universal access to equitable, affordable & quality health care services that are accountable and responsive to people’s needs.

The National Health Mission seeks to ensure the achievement of the following indicators:

• Reduce Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) to 1/1000 live births
• Reduce Infant Mortality rate (IMR) to 25/1000 live births
• Reduce Total Fertility Rate (TFR) to 2.1
• Prevention and reduction of anemia in women aged 15–49 years
• Prevent and reduce mortality & morbidity from communicable, non-communicable; injuries and emerging diseases
• Reduce household out-of-pocket expenditure on total health care expenditure
• Reduce annual incidence and mortality from Tuberculosis by half
• Reduce the prevalence of Leprosy to <1/10000 population and incidence to zero in all districts
• Annual Malaria Incidence to be <1/1000
• Less than 1 percent microfilaria prevalence in all districts
• Kala-azar Elimination by 2015, <1 case per 10000 population in all blocks.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

In West Bengal, the unveiling of a statue at Raja Ram Mohan Roy Library Foundation, Salt Lake, by Minister of Culture, will mark the inauguration of the Centre’s celebration plans.

About Raja Ram Mohan Roy

• Raja Ram Mohan Roy was the father of Modern India’s Renaissance and a tireless social reformer who inaugurated the age of enlightenment and liberal reformist modernization in India

His Life

• Raja Ram Mohan Roy was born on 22 May 1772 in an orthodox Brahman family at Radhanagar in Bengal.
• Ram Mohan Roy’s early education included the study of Persian and Arabic at Patna where he read the Quran, the works of Sufi mystic poets and the Arabic translation of the works of Plato and Aristotle. In Benaras, he studied Sanskrit and read Vedas and Upanishads.
• Returning to his village, at the age of sixteen, he wrote a rational critique of Hindu idol worship.
• From 1803 to 1814, he worked for East India Company as the personal diwan first of Woodforde and then of Digby.
• In 1814, he resigned from his job and moved to Calcutta in order to devote his life to religious, social and political reforms.
• In November 1830, he sailed for England to be present there to counteract the possible nullification of the Act banning Sati.
• Ram Mohan Roy was given the title of ‘Raja’ by the titular Mughal Emperor of Delhi, Akbar II whose grievances the former was to present before the British king.

Ideology

• Ram Mohan Roy was greatly influenced by western modern thought and stressed on rationalism and modern scientific approach.
• He believed that religious orthodoxies have become causes of injury and detrimental to social life and sources of trouble and bewilderment to the people, instead of tending to the amelioration of the condition of society.
• Raja Ram Mohan Roy concluded that religious reform is both social reform and political modernisation.
• Ram Mohan was attracted to Islamic monotheism. He said that monotheism is also the fundamental message of Vedanta.
• His idea of single, unitarian god was a corrective to the polytheism of orthodox Hinduism and to Christian trinitarianism. He believed that monotheism supported one universal model for humanity.
• He believed in social equality of all human beings and thus was a strong opposer of the caste system.

Brahmo Samaj

• Raja Ram Mohan Roy founded Brahmo Sabha in 1828, which was later renamed as Brahmo Samaj.
• Its chief aim was the worship of the eternal God. It was against priesthood, rituals and sacrifices.
• It focused on prayers, meditation and reading of the scriptures. It believed in the unity of all religions.
• It was the first intellectual reform movement in modern India. It led to the emergence of rationalism and enlightenment in India which indirectly contributed to the nationalist movement.
• It was the forerunner of all social, religious and political movements of modern India.

Contributions

Social reforms:

• He founded the Atmiya Sabha in 1814, the Calcutta Unitarian Association in 1821, and the Brahmo Sabha in 1828 which later became the Brahmo Samaj
• He campaigned against the caste system, untouchability, superstitions and use of intoxicants.
• He was well known for his pioneering thought and action on the emancipation of women and especially on the abolition of sati and widow remarriage.
• He attacked child marriage, illiteracy of women and the degraded state of widows and demanded the right of inheritance and property for women.
• It was his relentless advocacy alongside contemporaries such as Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar that finally led to the abolition of Sati under the governor generalship of William Bentinck in 1829.

Educational reforms:

• He supported David Hare’s efforts to find the Hindu College in 1817, while Roy’s English school taught mechanics and Voltaire’s philosophy.
• He followed it up with the Anglo-Hindu School in 1822 and, in 1830, assisted Alexander Duff to set up the General Assembly’s Institution, which later became the Scottish Church College.
• In 1825, he established Vedanta College where courses in both Indian learning and Western social and physical sciences were offered.

Literary Works of Raja Ram Mohan Roy

• Tuhfat-ul-Muwahhidin (1804)
• Vedanta Gantha (1815)
• Translation of an abridgement of the Vedanta Sara (1816)
• Kenopanishads (1816)
• Ishopanishad (1816)
• Kathopanishad (1817)
• A Conference between the Advocate for, and an Opponent of Practice of Burning Widows Alive (Bengali and English) (1818)
• Mundaka Upanishad (1819)
• A Defence of Hindu Theism (1820)
• The Precepts of Jesus- The Guide to Peace and Happiness (1820)
• Bengali Grammar (1826)
• The Universal Religion (1829)
• History of Indian Philosophy (1829)
• Gaudiya Vyakaran (1833)

Religious reforms:

• Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s first published work Tuhfat-ul-Muwahhiddin (a gift to deists) published in 1803 exposed irrational religious beliefs and corrupt practices of the Hindus as the belief in revelations, prophets, miracles etc.
• In 1814, he founded Atmiya Sabha in Calcutta to campaign against idolatry, caste rigidities, meaningless rituals and other social ills.
• He criticized the ritualism of Christianity and rejected Christ as the incarnation of God. In Precepts of Jesus (1820), he tried to separate the moral and philosophical message of the New Testament.
• Rabindranath Tagore called him a Bharatpathik by which he meant to say that Ram Mohan combined in his person the underlying spirit of Indic civilisation, its spirit of pluralism, tolerance and a cosmic respect for all forms of life

Political and Economical Reforms

• Through his writings and activities, he supported the movement for free press in India.
• When press censorship was relaxed by Lord Hastings in 1819, Ram Mohan found three journals- The Brahmanical Magazine (1821); The Bengali weekly, Samvad Kaumudi (1821); and the Persian weekly, Mirat-ul-Akbar.
• Administrative reforms: He demanded the Indianisation of superior services and separation of the executive from judiciary. He demanded equality between Indians and Europeans.
• Roy condemned oppressive practices of Bengali zamindars and demanded fixation of minimum rents. He also demanded the abolition of taxes on tax-free lands.
• He called for a reduction of export duties on Indian goods abroad.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) stated that all logistics and connectivity infrastructure projects, entailing an investment of over ₹500 crore will route through the network planning group (NPG) constituted under the PM GatiShakti initiative.

• The DPIIT said that the move will bring down the logistic cost and promote effective and efficient planning of infrastructure projects.
• The DPIIT said that all the departments will approach the NPG first for approval before making a DPR (detailed project reports) at the planning stage, adding after the NPG’s clearance, the project would follow the normal procedure of approval by the finance ministry and the Cabinet, depending upon the projects

PM GatiShakti Initiative

• The government of India has launched the ambitious Gati Shakti scheme or National Master Plan for multi-modal connectivity plan, with the aim of coordinated planning and execution of infrastructure projects to bring down logistics costs.
• The Gati Shakti scheme subsumed the Rs 110 lakh crore National Infrastructure Pipeline that was launched in 2019.
• Besides cutting logistics costs, the scheme is also aimed at increasing cargo handling capacity and reducing the turnaround time at ports to boost trade.
• It also aims to have 11 industrial corridors and two new defence corridors – one in Tamil Nadu and other in Uttar Pradesh.
• Integrated Approach: It intends to bring together 16 infrastructure related Ministries.
• Implementation framework includes Empowered Group of Secretaries (EGOS), Network Planning Group (NPG) and Technical Support Unit (TSU) with required technical competencies.
• NPG consists of heads of the network planning wing of respective infrastructure ministries and it will assist the empowered group of secretaries (EGOS), which is headed by the cabinet secretary.
• EGOS consist of secretaries of 18 ministries as members and Head of Logistics Division, under the DPIIT, as member convenor.
• Further, in view of the complexities involved in overall integration of networks, enhancing optimization to avoid duplication of works for holistic development of any region as well as reducing logistics costs through micro-plan detailing, the Technical Support Unit (TSU) is approved
• TSU shall have domain experts from various infrastructure sectors as Aviation, Maritime, Public Transport, Rail, Roads & Highways, Ports, etc. and Subject Matter Experts (SMEs)

Conclusion

The PM GatiShakti NMP is intended to break Departmental Silos and bring in more holistic and integrated planning and execution of projects with a view to address the issues of Multi Modal connectivity and last mile connectivity. This will help in bringing down the logistics cost. This will translate into enormous economic gains to consumers, farmers, youth as well as those engaged in businesses.

yllabus: General Studies Paper 3

The Union government announced a reduction in the excise duty on petrol and diesel by Rs 8 per litre and Rs 6 per litre respectively.

• Alongside, the government also reduced the customs duty on raw materials and intermediaries for plastic products and iron and steel.

Reason for reduction

• These decisions are driven by the desire to cool the surge in inflation — recent data showed that retail inflation had risen to an eight-year high of 7.9 per cent in April, while wholesale inflation has been in double digits for 13 consecutive months.
• As per some analysts the cut in fuel taxes could help reduce inflation directly by around 20 basis points in June
• This is the second time in the recent past that the Centre has cut fuel taxes. In November last year, the Centre had lowered the excise duty on petrol by Rs 5 and by Rs 10 on diesel.

The entire burden of the tax cuts will be borne by the Centre

• Union Finance Minister said that the entire duty reduction in petrol and diesel announced has been done out of the Road & Infrastructure Cess (RIC) component of the taxes levied on petroleum products so the entire burden of the tax cuts will be borne by the Centre,
• Allaying concerns that the duty cuts will lower the devolution of taxes to States, Finance Minister said that the basic excise duty on petro products, which is sharable with States, has not been touched.

Taxes levied on Petrol and Diesel

• The total taxes levied on petrol and diesel include a Basic Excise Duty (BED), a Special Additional Excise duty (SAED), the Road & Infrastructure Cess (RIC) and the Agriculture & Infrastructure Development Cess (AIDC), of which only the BED is sharable with States
• The two cuts announced (November and the present one) is from Road & Infrastructure Cess (RIC) component of the taxes levied on petroleum products

Excise Duty and Custom Duty

• Excise duty is a form of tax imposed on goods for their production, licensing and sale.
• It is the opposite of Customs duty in sense that it applies to goods manufactured domestically in the country, while Customs is levied on those coming from outside of the country.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

The adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) chips has risen, with chipmakers designing different types of these chips to power AI applications.

What are AI chips?

• AI chips are built with specific architecture and have integrated AI acceleration to support deep learning-based applications.
• These chips, with their hardware architectures and complementary packaging, memory, storage and interconnect technologies, make it possible to infuse AI into a broad spectrum of applications to help turn data into information and then into knowledge
• There are different types of AI chips such as application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), central processing units (CPUs) and GPUs, designed for diverse AI applications.

How are they different from traditional chips?

• When traditional chips, containing processor cores and memory, perform computational tasks, they continuously move commands and data between the two hardware components
• These chips, however, are not ideal for AI applications as they would not be able to handle higher computational necessities of AI workloads which have huge volumes of data.
• Although, some of the higher-end traditional chips may be able to process certain AI applications
• In comparison, AI chips generally contain processor cores as well as several AI-optimised cores (depending on the scale of the chip) that are designed to work in harmony when performing computational tasks.
• The AI cores are optimised for the demands of heterogeneous enterprise-class AI workloads with low-latency inferencing, due to close integration with the other processor cores, which are designed to handle non-AI applications.

What are their applications?

• AI chips are used for a multitude of smart machines and devices, including ones that are said to deliver the performance of a data centre-class computer to edge devices.
• Some of these chips support in-vehicle computers to run state-of-the-art AI applications more efficiently.
• AI chips are also powering applications of computational imaging in wearable electronics, drones, and robots.
• The use of AI chips for NLP (Natural Language Processing) applications has increased due to the rise in demand for chatbots and online channels such as Messenger, Slack, and others.
• They use NLP to analyse user messages and conversational logic.