Indus Valley Civilization provided inputs to the present day urbanization

To what extent has the urban planning and culture of the Indus Valley Civilization provided inputs to the present day urbanization? Discuss. 


Indus valley civilization is known as the urban civilization because of the town planning and architecture. Cities in Indus vallley has the proper drainage system just below the roads similarly we are using nowadays. The house planning was also has impact even today. They have pucca-bricks houses with planning and having rectangular rooms with bathroom in each house. The warehouse and great baths found in sites are beautifully designed are examples of social rituals and storage system. Even nowadays we use warehouses and have common places to take bath and rituals.

Civilization was well developed and they were using copper, clay pottery and different ornaments; domesticated animals like sheep, pig, goat and dogs.

In Dholavira there is water reserve foundfor the water supply.

Indus valley civilization provided inputs for urban civilization as we are planning our houses having planing for drainage systems and making pucca houses with security. Such things are inputs from Indus civilization.


---Another Answer----

Indus valley is the source of innumerable elements that enrich the modern day civilisation.

Systematic town planning
__________________________
The scientific construction of building using baked brick in indus valley is an ingredient to modern day urbanization planning.

Drainage system
________________
The sewage water system of this civilisation is mind-blowing. The drains connected with bathroom is an aspect of modern day sewage system.

Sanity and cleanliness
_______________________
The style of bathroom of harappan civilisation with standing bath system is similar to modern day urbanization sanitary system.

Sanity and cleanliness
_______________________
The large brick slabs that covered the sewers of indus valley drainage gives inputs to modern day urbanization.

Commerce
___________
The trade of lapis lazuli; cotton and other export and import commodities with mesopotemia; sumeriyan is origin of modern day commerce.

Clustered buildings
___________________
The workers building of harappa resembles to coolie lines of modern day tea estates in structure.

Importance of water and sanctity
________________________
The strong belief of sanctity of water by harappans resembles to the belief of south indians who keep water tank in temples is a cultural input to modern day civilisation as south indian temples are centre of urbanized process.

Fashion
________
The pigtail hair and other jewelleries of indus valley women resembles to modern day fashion of women.

Use of Carpentry;pottery;seal;stone
_______________________
The use of all these three elements in harappan civilisation gives similarity to modern day use of decoration; amulet etc.

Use of citadel
_____________
The citadel of harappan provides ingredients to to the modern day social structure.

Agriculture

___________________

From the site of Kalibangan the evidence of ploughed field is found which is relevant in the modern days too as well system of canals was present in sites of afghanistan which is similar in present scenario also.

किताबें / सफ़दर हाशमी

किताबें

करती हैं बातें
बीते ज़माने की
दुनिया की इंसानों की

आज की, कल की
एक – एक पल की
खुशियों की, ग़मों की
फूलों की, बमों की
जीत की, हार की
प्यार की, मार की !

क्या तुम नहीं सुनोगे
इन किताबों की बातें ?
किताबें कुछ कहना चाहती हैं
तुम्हारे पास रहना चाहती हैं |

किताबों में चिड़ियां चहचहाती हैं
किताबों में खेतियां लहलहाती हैं
किताबों में झरने गुनगुनाते हैं
परियों के किस्से सुनाते हैं |

किताबों में रोकेट का राज है
किताबों में साइंस की आवाज़ है
किताबों का कितना बड़ा संसार है
किताबों में ज्ञान का भंडार है |

क्या तुम इस संसार में
नहीं जाना चाहोगे ?
किताबें कुछ कहना चाहती हैं
तुम्हारे पास रहना चाहती हैं |

-Safdar Hashmi

SIA

What do you understand by Social Impact Assessment? Way was it included in the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act 2013? Critically examine. 


Social Impact Assessment was a methodology to review the positive and negative social impacts of any industrial and infrastructural project.  SIA was incorporated with LARR for following reasons-

1. To assess impact of land acquisition and to know it has a public purpose or not.
2. To prevent the forceful acquisition of land. With SIA norms, its required 70-80% confirmation of locals.
3. To prevent the forceful acquisition of land by state. 
4. Earlier district collector was sole decider of land acquisition, which is making it more burnable to misuse of power.
5. To check and prevent it s economical and environmental effects.
6. Most important, India has a bitter  past of acquisition during British Raj. So, government in 2013 thought of giving deciding power to locals for their land acquisition.

Although it made the acquisition process slow and ultimately slowing industrial development but  it has long time benefit and the SIA carries with it the very spirit of democracy and justice, and for logistical difficulties, must not be done away with.

PMKSY integrating with MGNREGA

Write a note on the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana (PMKSY). Do you think it is better to integrate this scheme with MGNREGA as proposed by the Prime Minister? Justify. 

Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana (PMKSY) is a centrally sponsored scheme, launched by the Union Agricultural Ministry with a budget of Rs. 1000 crores, to improve the Agricultural Yield in the country. Under the programme:

1. Each farmer is to be provided with irrigational facilities to minimize his dependence on the monsoons
2. Rivers will be inter-linked to avoid situations of drought and floods
3. Farmers will be issued a Soil Health Card which will help them know the productivity of their land the crops it can grow best
4. Krishi Vigyan Kendras or agriculture science centres would also be strengthened in all the districts of the country so that they could come to the aid of farmers

The Prime Minister has proposed to link this scheme with the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Scheme, under which people are assured 100 days of employment in a year at minimum wages towards creation of community assets. However, in recent years, MNREGA workers have not been able to find productive work and hence although the income of the workers may have increased, the value addition by them has been negligible.

In light of this, linking the PMKSY and the MNREGA would be beneficial for the following reasons:

1. Workers would be employed in productive work, which will bear a very positive externality towards irrigation
2. Employment would automatically be for more than 100 days
3. Since most of the MNREGA workers are farmers or their families, the quality of work will also be high since it will finally be serving their own community
4. Government expenditure in one scheme will become an investment for the other, therefore helping in fiscal consolidation

However, there are also some concerns like:

1. Duplication of benefits: MNREG workers getting employed in the PMKSY will exclude other workers who may not have been able to enroll for MNREGA but equally need employment
2. Coordination, between the Agricultural Ministry and the Ministry of Rural Development may pose problems of slowing down processes and other bureaucratical hurdles

Despite the concerns, the benefits of merging the two schemes are far reaching a hence it is a welcome step.

Making ‘Make in India’ happen / Ravi Venkatesan

At this moment, the Prime Minister’s “Make in India” campaign appears to be exactly this — an imaginative marketing campaign. But there is much thought and even more work that is required to convert this to reality.

The theory behind “Make in India” is as simple as it is compelling. India must become a manufacturing powerhouse in order to gainfully employ its demographic dividend; there is no choice here. Fortunately, we have many natural advantages including a big labour pool and a large domestic market. In addition, with China’s competitive advantage in manufacturing eroding, India has the opportunity to take some share of global manufacturing away from China. All we have to do to improve the ease of doing business in India are these —stop tax terrorism, improve infrastructure, reform labour laws, invest in skills development, make it easier to acquire land, implement Goods and Services Tax (GST) and fast track approvals. Voila, we will take our rightful place as the world’s factory alongside China.

Energy factor

This is an attractive thesis that has a lot of merit. A simple step of making it easier to do business will make a huge difference to India’s manufacturing competitiveness. It is one plank of a manufacturing strategy. India ranks 142 on the World Bank Index; China is ranked 90. If we were to improve by just 50 places, it would be a huge perceptual breakthrough. However, this is not a manufacturing strategy in itself. As Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Raghuram Rajan correctly and controversially pointed out, much has changed in the world since China elbowed itself into becoming the world’s factory two decades ago. The nature of manufacturing is changing. Low-cost automation and robotics are making pure labour cost arbitrage less important. Lead times and a flexibility of supply chains are far more important, leading many companies to move manufacturing back closer to the big markets, the United States and Europe. Energy is the new labour in the sense that the cost of energy will significantly drive where things are made. Here, the U.S. with its huge new shale gas reserves has a big advantage. Developed countries are also realising how crucial local manufacturing is to jobs and to having stable, prosperous societies and so there is an attempt to reverse outsourcing and revive local manufacturing by embracing new technologies and innovations such as 3-D printing and the “Internet of things”.

For an industrial policy

To become a manufacturing powerhouse, India needs a manufacturing strategy, otherwise known as industrial policy. The idea of an industrial policy is out of vogue these days. It is seen as ineffective at best and even retrograde, running contrary to the idea of free trade. This is patent nonsense. Japan, Korea, China, Germany have all prospered by having a clear industrial policy and vigorously implementing it. The U.S., the United Kingdom, France and Italy have seen themselves deindustrialise by not having a clear industrial policy and are trying hard to course-correct this mistake.

There is a successful precedent even in India; our success in IT services was not an accident. It was the result of clear-eyed policies driven by the Department of Electronics, which included reducing import tariffs on hardware and software to zero, setting up software technology parks with tax incentives, and improving connectivity. Policy has always mattered and when it comes to manufacturing competitiveness, India must have a clear industrial policy that spells out priority sectors and how we will build competitive advantage in a way that is consistent with our obligations to the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Building on advantages

India’s industrial policy must recognise where we have important competitive advantages. India is quite uncompetitive at low skill manufacturing. On the other hand, it is good at making complex things which require skilled labour and frugal engineering. Despite all its shortcomings, India remains a very competitive manufacturing location for sophisticated things such as construction machinery, cars and automotive components and diesel engines. It is no accident that companies such as JCB, Cummins, Deere, Volvo, Hyundai and Ford are using India as a major export hub.

We must focus on building competitive advantage and global scale in sectors where we have a large domestic market and certain inherent capabilities. Strategy is all about making choices. Here, five priority industries come to mind. Defence, because we are the world’s leading arms importer. Localising what we buy as a condition for all defence deals along with a willingness to allow majority foreign ownership can turbocharge our local defence industry. The second critical industry is electronics hardware. India imports $45 billion of mobile phones, computers and communications hardware; by 2020, this is projected to grow to $300 billion and exceed our oil import bill. This is unsustainable. We have to create policy incentives to create a local electronic hardware manufacturing ecosystem. Since most component suppliers, Original Equipment Manufacturers and Original Design Manufacturers are Chinese, this will necessarily imply incentivising Chinese companies to establish factories in India. The size of our domestic market should make this possible. Concerns about security are misplaced; all our personal computers, cellphones and a lot of switches and routers are already made in China, so we are conceding nothing. The third industry is construction. India will invest a trillion dollars over the coming years in improving infrastructure. We need to create incentives that not only spur investment in manufacturing materials such as cement and steel but also construction equipment, locomotives, power generation equipment and so on. Everything we install should be made in India. The fourth is health care. India’s generic pharmaceutical industry is world class. We must not concede on intellectual property rights that neutralise our advantage. India is also exceedingly good at frugal innovation in medical devices such as low cost X-ray and ECG machines. We have a real shot at being a world leader in innovation and manufacturing in this space. Finally, agro-industries. We are one of the largest agricultural nations. A third of what we grow just rots and spoils. Investing in agro-industries such as food processing and establishing a reliable cold chain would make a huge difference in terms of rural employment and food security. If we had to pick just five industries where we want to bootstrap a strong competitive advantage it would be these. In other industries, whether it be textiles, toys, or automotive, we need to ensure that we do not disadvantage local manufacturing.

Creating ecosystems

Another critical strategic question is this: where do we want to make things? It is difficult to make a country the size of India into a uniformly attractive manufacturing location. Even China started its manufacturing odyssey by creating a few oases in the form of four special economic zones which were remarkably easy places to manufacture in. Where is India going to start its global odyssey? Manufacturing is all about hubs that are ecosystems for innovation, specialised skills and supply chains. Where will India’s hubs be for pharma, for defence, for electronics, for machinery and construction equipment? How do we catalyse these hubs by creating world-class academic institutions and skills training institutes? What incentives will attract the world’s leading companies to establish global innovation and manufacturing centres in these hubs? Pune, Chennai, Bengaluru and Delhi are already emergent hubs but what will enable them to scale up to compete with Shenzen and Tianjin?

To become a manufacturing nation, India has to quickly move beyond rhetoric to create a clear strategy and favourable policy environment for manufacturing to take off. The government has chosen to quietly dismantle the sclerotic National Manufacturing Competitiveness Council (NMCC) but it needs to foster a more vibrant think tank in its place. A close dialogue and partnership between government and the private sector, both domestic and foreign, is critical. Indian companies along with Chinese, Japanese, German, American and Swedish companies are all vital partners and we must create an environment that is open and welcoming. For this, the right leadership of this vital mission is critical. There is a clear and short-lived window of opportunity to become a manufacturing nation. We must not squander it.

electronics products | Make in India

In order to give push to ‘Make in India’ campaign, recently the government asked all government departments to give preference to domestically manufactured electronics products in their procurement. Is this a right step? Critically examine.


To give the edge to it's ambitious "Make In India " program government recently asked the all departments to give their preference to the domestic manufactured electronic items in their procurement's. But it is essential to analyse the move in the lime light of both it's pros and cons.
Pros-
They biggest advantage of this move that it will help in the development of indigenous market. Such procurement's also enhance the share of manufacturing in the economy, which give the competitive edge to the manufacturing sector. Furthermore giving emphasis to the indigenous manufacturer helps India to fix it's infrastructural bottleneck and it will also generate additional employment opportunity in nation. Here it should to be also noted that the government is investing large share of it's revenue in importation such electronic items and if the same amount will pump in the domestic market it will be admire both social and economical obligations of government.

cons-
The main concern in this regard is the lack of proper infrastructure. Despite of tremendous 6 % growth the manufacturing sector failed to give the competitive edge to the sector. This will hinder the domestic procurement's. Furthermore it has been also observe that the indigenous electronic items is not of so high quality and internationally they did not enjoy the eminent position as Chinese, Japanese or Korean enjoys. In this regard it is worth to mention that the such step to government also revoke their reformist zeal , as now the government is their buyer.Furthermore giving too much emphasis on the domestic market can create a unhealthy working environment for the foreign entities, which is not a good signal for any economy as a whole. Furthermore it also deteriorate the bargaining power and have great probability to create a monopolistic market. 
So while analysing all these arguments it is very clear that although the need of the hour is to promote indigenous market but it does not mean that eventually India should be turn in closed economy. Rather than a proper equilibrium between the indigenous and foreign players can adore the larger public interest.

A year of man-made health crises

Over the past year, several significant public health crises have unfolded in India and globally. As this year hurtles to an end, it becomes important to examine these events, if only momentarily, to understand the lessons they hold.

On closer examination, it becomes apparent that many of these crises were man-made — either because of continued neglect, a lack of focus on prevention and insufficient investment in health, or a focus on addressing diseases but not their root causes, i.e., the social determinants of health.

Early in the year, the war in Gaza and the blockade exacerbated a health crisis caused by continued international neglect of the people of Gaza. At the last count, the four-week conflict left 10,000 homes annihilated and displaced 4,50,000 people. The real public health crisis was the lack of electricity, clean drinking water and safe homes. Overcrowding and the lack of water and sanitation facilities led to a rise in the incidence of water-related diseases. As time passes, this destruction will expectedly result in multiple health crises that will affect the physical and mental well-being of hundreds of thousands of people.

Yet nothing made more news than the Ebola crisis in West Africa, where over 7,000 people have died. In the poorest and perhaps most politically unstable part of the continent where this crisis unfolded, the biggest areas of neglect were health systems, infrastructure, funding, trained human resources and little community education. Ebola has been endemic to the West Africa region for almost two decades. Yet, the ability of this region to address this disease, or any other, remains severely limited. Ebola wasn’t a global priority either, because it was centred in a poor region. International agencies bickered and took their time to respond while people died. When the first case emerged in the U.S., Ebola finally qualified as an important disease, and new experimental drugs, vaccines and preparedness soon followed. As always, it seemed too little, too late.

Health care in India

Let’s turn homeward. As India marched towards acche din , it also marched towards global leadership in many diseases. This year witnessed repetitive crises in malaria and dengue. Diabetes and heart disease continued to confound us. Earlier this year, we had a shocking stock-out of HIV testing kits and later of HIV drugs that, ironically, we produce and supply globally. Even as thousands were deprived of drugs in the public health sector, the government defended itself saying the situation was not “too bad.” India’s drug-resistant TB crisis too came out of the closet with over a 1,00,000 cases. We also finally admitted on national television that TB is the country’s time bomb.

However, the highlight was the sterilisation tragedy in Chhattisgarh. Over 10 of the 83 women who underwent sterilisation surgeries in the State died, while many others were hospitalised in a critical condition. The incident revealed the patriarchal mindset of successive governments who focus on female surgical sterilisation as a cornerstone of family planning. It also revealed the ongoing nexus between government officials and petty manufacturers, as the antibiotics given to patients were suspected of containing rat poison. Unfortunately, no politician or government official has been tried for culpable homicide. These deaths remain unpunished.

On a broader level, the quality of health services in urban and rural India, in both the public and private sectors, continued to be abysmal, as millions of patients travelled to access health services elsewhere. Over 60 per cent of all Indians continued to access healthcare in the private sector (many from quacks) at exorbitant costs and were often exploited with inappropriate tests and treatment. India’s epidemic of micro bacterial resistance also continued unabated as pharmacies sold antibiotics over the counter without sufficient control from the government. The biggest blow came at the end of the year as news leaked that the new government would cut health spending by around 20 per cent. For a country whose spending on health is among the lowest in the world, this was a terrible way to wrap up the year.

Lessons for the next year

What can we learn for 2015? Governments in India and elsewhere that promise development, growth and human well-being must recognise this: all this is not possible without investments in health and health systems. We need to invest in improving preventive and primary health care, sanitation, waste management and health education. Finally, if our long history of continuing disease and recent crises teach us anything, it is that the fundamentals of health remain critically important in disease control — sufficient nutrition, safe habitation, better air quality, sanitation, health-seeking behaviours, safety, and reduced conflict. All of these are deeply linked, not just to health but social and economic policy. Reducing spending on health will make things worse, not better, in India and elsewhere. Acche din will not arrive either next year or the decade after unless India integrates these lessons with its public policy.

‘Pro-farmer’ amendments: Modi

“Proposed amendments meet twin objectives of farmer welfare; along with expeditiously meeting strategic and developmental needs of the country,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted on Monday night on the ordinance to amend the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) Act, 2013.

While the National Alliance of People's Movements, a network of social activists, described the step as “anti-poor” and pushing a corporate agenda, Mr Modi described the ordinance as including a “pro-farmer step” of bringing compensation and rehabilitation under 13 exempt central laws at par with the norms of LARR 2013. “Certain amendments have been made in the Act to further strengthen the provisions to protect the interests of the ‘affected families’,” he noted.

Under Section 105 of LARR Act, 13 central laws, including the National Highways Act 1956, the Railways Act 1989, Coal Bearing Areas Acquisition and Development Act 1957, are exempt from the provisions of the Land Act. The Land Act, however, required that within a year from the commencement of the Act the government may allow LARR’s provisions of rehabilitation to apply even in acquisition under the 13 laws that are currently exempt, subject to Parliament’s approval.

“The Act mandated that within a year, the notification including these 13 exempt laws be laid before Parliament while it is in session, for a total period of 30 days in one session or in two or more successive sessions, which was not possible this session. That is why the government found the ordinance route necessary,” said a senior Ministry of Rural Development. However, Jairam Ramesh, Minister of Rural Development with the UPA government said this was not true. “The one-year deadline for including the exempt laws already got over in September 2014.” Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi said the government was taking to the ordinance route as it was afraid of public accountability. “Criticism of the opposition against the ordinance betrays its frustration, after failing to derail the government's reform agenda”, said Shrikant Sharma, BJP national secretary. The Confederation of Indian Industry welcomed the ordinance describing it as a sign of the government's “serious commitment to economic reforms.”

Source: http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/profarmer-amendments-modi/article6736869.ece

LARR Act

The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill (LARR Act) was enacted by UPA Government in 2013 which replaced decade old Land Acquisition Act of 1894. The enacted law brought many provision which was favorable to land holders such as increased compensation which would be four times and two times of the market value if the land is acquired in rural and urban areas respectively. Indeed, the law was laudable but there was having certain provisions which were contentious such as that there should be 80 percent consent of the family affected, if the land is acquired for PPP project.
Current regime has has brought certain amendment in the said bill through ordinance route to do away contentious part. Some of the amendments are-
-There should be no consent requirement and environmental impact assessment for the PPP projects. 
-Modification of the clause which stipulates the annulment of land acquisition if compensation is not paid within a time frame of 5 years, this time frame has been increased to 10 years
-Earlier compensation clause was not applicable to 13 Central Acts but now compensation requirement will be applicable for 12 central acts.
Removal of EIA decrease the time for the acquisition of land but this may compromise the environmental healthand removal of consent clause may affect families as they will have no say in the acquisition process.
The said amendment is necessary for the development as said by the current government but there should be some safeguards which may protect the interest of affected families. It would have been better if the amendments was to be brought after consulting with various stake holders rather in haste.

Healthcare in India

 “The quality of health services in urban and rural India, in both the public and private sectors, continues to be abysmal, as millions of patients travel to access health services elsewhere.” Critically comment.

Healthcare in India is a major issue as basic health is not reaching rural areas and villages and 60% of Indians are depend on private sector which is too costly for common man. The quality of health is an issue in India as rural areas are filled with jholachhap doctors, AYUSH doctors practising  allopathic medicines and in cities everyday we are receive several complains over mis-conducts of private hospitals.

Recently the deaths in Chhattisgarh, Multidrug resistance TB cases and shortage of AIDS test kits are few examples of failure quality of health services in country.

For the major deceases, there is few centres in the country and we are unable to provide facilities to every part. Even specialised private hospitals are limited.

Although medical tourism is increasing in the country and 100% FDI is lucrative, on ground level the quality of health services in urban and rural India, in both the public and private sectors, continues to be abysmal and we need better plans more efforts, awareness and dedicated people to improve the healthcare facilities in India.