19 minute read
Tsutsamo Ezung
from 6 july
Way out and in
incidents along the assam-Nagaland border between Jorhat/Sivasagar districts in assam and mokokchung district in Nagaland are not infrequent, especially at areas adjoining mariani and amguri where certain sections of people there grab at any opportunity to add fuel to the situation instead of letting the due process of law take its course. Such incidents have been occurring with glaring regularity almost every year. The only time no incident occurred was in 2020 probably due to the pandemic. When much efforts were made to discuss issue across the table, the spell of incident-free record from 2020 till may 2021, was broker on June 29 this year. On that day, a hundred-strong company of uniformed personnel led by the armed police Battalion intruded inside Tzurangkong area (under mokokchung district) for setting up of a border outpost at the vicinity of Vikuto village. What has surprised many observers was that the assam police has taken such a step in setting up an outpost within Nagaland and in doing so has blatantly violated the 1972 border agreement between the two states. The agreement was that both states will maintain a status quo along their borders and undertake no activity without the consent of the other. Of course assam provoked and sparked the 1984 merapani incident which Nagaland had to respond. people from both sides of the border have been involved in sparking incidents but this time it appears the assam government has decided to adopt an aggressive policy. it may be recalled that in past incidents, public of assam have been urging and pressurising their government to establish police checkposts deep within Nagaland. On July 23,2018 some labourers from assam were prevented from clearing jungles within Nagaland and this led to bandh imposed at amguri on Nagalandbound vehicles. again the following year on January 24, 2019, huts hurriedly built for assam police, were dismantled by villagers from Nagaland since the latter claimed that the huts were erected within their land. What needs to be noted is that on may 23,2013 mobs at mariani assaulted Naga passengers passing through and damaged their vehicles. The mobs did not spring up from nowhere nor were the incidents spontaneous. The mobs had been imposing their economic blockade on Nagaland for days on end. Eventually a district-level meeting between the DCs of Jorhat and mokokchung and also talks at the highest level led to suspension of the blockade.it needs to be noted that the recent incident was preceded by another incident where the mLa of mariani, rupjyoti Kurmi who had been elected since 2006 as Congress candidate, had gone to the border on may 27 this year with an armed escort. There was some firing which, on video that went viral on social media, seemed like warning shots allegedly aimed at Kurmi. Later, Kurmi defected and joined BJp under chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma. it seemed like a coincidence but even at the assam-mizoram border, assam police has erected its outpost and caused heightened tension. The question is whether assam, now under chief minister Himanta is taking its glove off? However, what is important for Nagaland is to have its own road network without being under perpetual fear or threat. This can only be achieved if the ongoing Foothill road linking Dimapur with Wokha-mokokchng and mon districts. it is easier to blame assam for these problems but it is crucial to re-examine what Nagaland itself has been doing?
Advertisement
dailydevotion Don’t Plan Without God
Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. —Psalm 37:5
Don’t plan without God. God seems to have a delightful way of upsetting the plans we have made, when we have not taken Him into account. We get ourselves into circumstances that were not chosen by God, and suddenly we realize that we have been making our plans without Him— that we have not even considered Him to be a vital, living factor in the planning of our lives. And yet the only thing that will keep us from even the possibility of worrying is to bring God in as the greatest factor in all of our planning.
In spiritual issues it is customary for us to put God first, but we tend to think that it is inappropriate and unnecessary to put Him first in the practical, everyday issues of our lives. If we have the idea that we have to put on our “spiritual face” before we can come near to God, then we will never come near to Him. We must come as we are.
Don’t plan with a concern for evil in mind. Does God really mean for us to plan without taking the evil around us into account? “Love…thinks no evil” (1 Corinthians 13:4-5). Love is not ignorant of the existence of evil, but it does not take it into account as a factor in planning. When we were apart from God, we did take evil into account, doing all of our planning with it in mind, and we tried to reason out all of our work from its standpoint.
Don’t plan with a rainy day in mind. You cannot hoard things for a rainy day if you are truly trusting Christ. Jesus said, “Let not your heart be troubled…” (John 14:1). God will not keep your heart from being troubled. It is a command— “Let not….” To do it, continually pick yourself up, even if you fall a hundred and one times a day, until you get into the habit of putting God first and planning with Him in mind.
What is education? Answer to this question is multifaceted. Some say that it is the process of acquiring knowledge, skills, values and habits. Swami Vivekananda rightly said that, “Education is the manifestation of the perfection already in the men.” Mahatma Gandhi said that, “Education is the basic tool for the development of the consciousness and the reconstitution of society”. However, recent moves by our policy and decision makers try to belie this belief, as these moves seems aimed at taking India back to the old ages.
Education is a journey, which gives the art of living, not just the livelihood. It makes us learn how to nurture our life and be more creative. Education makes us understand our conflicts. Thus, education is not merely learning of facts but is to train our mind to think. Education systems must provide opportunities to each and every individual to learn through experience and should help to develop critical thinking and problem solving skills.
However, in India the education system has evolved in a completely different manner. Instead of focussing on critical thinking, expressing new ideas and debating and writing critically on any issue, our students are forced to learn through the rote route.
This concept of education goes back to the British colonialists, who wanted an army of clerks with basic understanding of the language and mathematics, to support their administrative system. However, this concept got roots in India and instead of focussing on developing mental and critical thinking faculties of the students and promoting research, our education system tuned into one where you amass degrees by cramming.
Educational advance in India
Education and the right to education is one of the fundamental rights of our country’s citizens. It is compulsory for children aged between 6-14 to have an education. Over the many years, especially after independence, India has managed to increase its literacy rates to nearly 75% by 2021, and some states even boast of 100% literacy rate.
Most important focus in the recent decades has been on enhancing infrastructure, incentivising enrolments in schools by providing benefits such as midday meals etc. The private sector with government support has played a significant role in the expansion of the Indian education system and improving its quality. But it can also be credited with corporatising the education system, thus making education accessible to a privilege few.
In the research domain, Indialags behind many countries. Our universities and colleges lack a multidisciplinary approach to stimulate enquiry-based research skills. Absence of a proper framework for developing industry linkages with academia to promote research, further limits the faculty and students to work in this area.
We can perceive that most measures are more on paper with no tangible results evident. In 2004, the then UPA government had imposed an Educational Cess of 2% on every transaction in the country. In a three year period this cess generated 32,000 crore rupees. But how this amount was used, nobody knows and if one asks then vague answers are given. In fact if this amount hadbeen used prudently, we would have a well-equipped and wellstaffed middle-level school functioning in every village of the country. Similarly, for the last ten years, every taxpayer is bound to pay a 1.5% education cess on his total income tax. Where this money goes, nobody knows.
Tinkering with school syllabus
Last year, in a completely uncalled for move, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) revised its syllabus for students of Classes 9th to 12th in the name of handling the stressful situation of teachers and students in view of the continuing Covid19 pandemic, and in the name of rationalising the syllabus.
Some of the important chapters that have been deleted include: Federalism, citizenship, nationalism and secularism from class 11th political science subject besides India’s foreign relations with neighbouring countries and citizenship, besides Social and New Social Movements chapter in India from class 12th political science paper. Demonetisation from class 12th Business Studies paper. Colonialism and the countryside colonial cities and understanding partition from class 12th History subject have been deleted.
The irrational exclusions smacks of a political tone, aimed at keeping a large and young part of the population unaware of these issues. We should not forget that depriving the young generation of its right to increase its knowledge base is not only authoritarian but it might also boomerang. Most of the deleted topics form the foundation of democratic societies and students need to learn about these to enhance their knowledge base.
National Education policy 2019 and 2020
The national educational policy came into force in the year 1968 to make education accessible to masses. It was aimed to strengthen national integration through a unified culture of learning. Since then constant measures have been taken to reform the Indian education system to provide better education services in the country, the latest being the National Education Policy (NEP) 2019 and 2020.
However, if we analyse critically the NEP 2019 and 2020, the overall intent and decision maker’s mindset, in tandem with the moves taken last year, will be clearer.
A critical study of the 484-page NEP 2019 reveals an issue deserving of wider, more heated debate. The words “secular” or “secularism” are not found anywhere in the NEP 2019. Though a clear reference to secular education was vital to be seen as the base for these ambitious reform proposals.
The absence of the word “secular” in the NEP 2019 becomes all the more pronounced when seen in contrast to the earlier policies of mentioning secularism as a core Indian value for the Indian education. The omission of the words “secular” and “secularism” in the NEP 2019 is ominous, along with the frequent affirmation of its aim of inculcating constitutional values in the education system, making it doubly odd.
The NEP 2019 was launched last in its new avatar as NEP 2020, but many of the contentitious isssues still remain.
In contemporary India, which has seen a sharp rise in caste and religious violence, the curriculum and teaching methods in Indian classrooms clearly have a key role to play in making caste and religious prejudices in society irrelevant and out of times. The challenge is to find fresh and creative ways of making young minds grasp these difficult contemporary social realities.
You have to understand that you can’t hide history by giving it a new twist. Even in countries like the UK there are demands to teach the medieval history to the school students again. If you feel that by hiding the truth on your controversial decisions you’ll be able to befool people or hide your misjudgements then you are wrong, as the history will ultimately judge you, whether you like it or not.
asad mirza
(Asad Mirza is a political commentator based in New Delhi. He was also associated with BBC Urdu Service and Khaleej Times of Dubai. He writes on Muslims, educational, international affairs, interfaith and current affairs.)
Country’s education system needs to be remodelled as per the requirements and aspirations of today’s world, instead of taking it back to the old ages.
Zoonotic diseases: A neglected public and planetary health frontier
The Covid-19 pandemic has impacted human lives and resulted in socioeconomic disruption of unimaginable scales. While several hypotheses, counterhypotheses, and even conspiracy theories about the likely origin of SarsCoV-2 are currently in circulation, the one indicating its zoonotic origin remains the most plausible one.
Simply put, this hypothesis suggests the possibility that a virus that was already circulating in a wild animal without causing disease, underwent certain random natural genetic changes to gain the ability to infect and damage human cells. Subsequently, when a human being came in contact with a wild animal carrying this “novel” virus, the pathogen made the species jump. It thus started a human to human infection chain, which rapidly engulfed the entire humanity.
Though the actual identity of the species of wild animal(s) involved in this event is still under investigation, the catastrophic outcome of this phenomena is on display across the globe.
The prime reason that makes this hypothesis most plausible is that such interspecies spillovers of diseases from animal to human are not new. Rather, such diseases, broadly termed as zoonotic diseases, impact humankind since the beginning of its association with animals.
They are also the most numerous ones. Out of all the human disease causing pathogens identified so far, over 60% are of animal origin. These include the causative agents for several well-known human and livestock diseases such as Tuberculosis, Brucellosis, Anthrax, Leptospirosis, and Rabies. The scale and spread of these diseases are so high that every year, at the global level, the top 13 zoonotic diseases lead to nearly 2.4 billion cases of human illness, and 2.2 million human deaths. Other than their enormous impact on human health, their footprints on global and national economies are discernible.
Even more unsettling are the new and emerging Infection Diseases, against which neither we nor our immune system are fully prepared. As high as 75% of the diseases catalogued in this group are of zoonotic origin. They include dreaded human diseases such as HIV/Aids, Ebola, Avian influenza, Swine Flu, Zika, Nipah, Mers, and Sars; many of which have caused havoc in several parts of the world in recent times. Covid-19 is the newest addition to this list.
While they are so prevalent, our responses towards these diseases have been far from satisfactory. It is unfortunate that a problem of such devastating potential has so far failed to elicit the required support from policymakers and resource allocators. Despite repeated warnings from conservationists, veterinarians and public health professionals about the possibility of zoonotic diseases causing large scale disruptions in human lives and activities, they were never given the warranted consideration, either in our planning or in action. It ultimately took a global pandemic of the current scale, coming with an enormous human cost, to spotlight the long-pending discussion on zoonotic diseases and the drivers behind them.
Though the natural genetic changes that make these pathogens more infectious and lethal are outside our control, several field observations and scientific investigations have established that the increased incidences of zoonotic diseases in recent times are a direct consequence of the ongoing abuse of nature.
Our irresponsible actions such as large scale deforestation and encroachment of pristine natural ecosystems; reckless land-use changes either to enhance agriculture and livestock productions, or to provide land for infrastructure and industrial developments; and unsustainable consumption, coupled with unregulated trade of wildlife and their derivatives, often via a long and unhygienic supply chain, provide the enabling conditions for such disease spillovers. These activities expose humans and their livestock to distant wild animals and the pathogens they carry, by shattering the intricate arrangements of niche-separation established through slow and delicate evolutionary manoeuvring by nature, spread over several centuries. The pathogens exchanged during these interactions often end up causing deadly diseases in their new and previously unexposed human hosts.
From this, it is evident that since such diseases are the outcomes of a complex interaction between the ecosystem, animals, and humans, a selective approach of dealing with only human health cannot succeed. Also, after closely witnessing the ongoing global struggle against the virus, it is clear that humanity cannot afford to deal with individual pathogens on a case-by-case basis, and certainly cannot bear the cost of more such pandemics coming in quick succession.
Hence, if we wish to minimise the risk of future pandemics and mitigate its impact, a long-term and holistic approach for ensuring wholesome planetary health, involves humans, animals (both domesticated and wild), and natural ecosystem’s health needs to be pursued. Such a comprehensive approach, recognized as One-Health, should be the target of all our preparedness and responses against the future pandemics of zoonotic origin.
In short, if we wish to aspire to a safe and disease-free future for us and our coming generations, we have to immediately start repairing our fractured relationship with nature. The time for doing this is fast running out, as the next pandemic might be around the corner.
Saket Badola, Indian Forest Service officer and head of TraFFIC in India
(TRAFFIC is an international network that deals with wildlife trade issues)
Digital India - Redefining the way we work
As we reach the milestone of six years of Digital India, we find more and more people daily using some form of a digital service, whether digital payments or COWIN vaccinations. The pace of digital transformation, especially in the post-pandemic year, has been phenomenal.
The number of registered users on Digilocker has gone up from 37 million in April 2020 to 66 million today - an increase of almost 78 per cent. The number of registered users on UMANG has gone up by 66 per cent from 19.7 million in April 2020 to 33 million. MyGov has seen an increase of almost 65 per cent in the number of registered users from 11.1 million to 18.3 million. On Social media platforms, MyGov has seen an increase of 216 per cent on YouTube subscribers, 162 per cent on Instagram followers, 125 per cent on Facebook followers, 138 per cent on LinkedIn and 37 per cent on Twitter. Poshan Tracker, a project that was launched in March 2021 to get data on nutrition and health from around 1.4 million Aanganwadi centers is regularly getting updates from more than 9.5 crore beneficiaries. The volume of digital payments has exceeded Rs 4 lakh crores from around Rs 100 crores in 2016.
Our investments in building the JAM platform - Jandhan- Aadhaar-Mobile— has not only enabled financial inclusion but also proved to be extremely useful in enabling money transfer through DBT to the poor when they needed it the most. The government has been able to transfer more than 16.79 lakh crore directly to the bank accounts of beneficiaries.
Almost 10 crore farmers have benefited through PM Kisan Scheme and this year we have had a record procurement of wheat at an MSP price of Rs 19750 per MT - almost 432.58 lakh MT of wheat was procured and more than 85000 crore was transferred to bank accounts of farmers.
When we look back at the year that was, one notices a key difference in the way these projects have been executed. Most team members’ are not physically present in the office. Work goes on most through virtual meetings, collaborating through digital tools like VC rooms, e-Office, Open Forge, E-mail and instant messaging apps. Almost 300-plus team members from 50-plus cities, towns, and villages collaborate virtually to deliver projects on time and with quality.
There are project-wise breakout rooms. The day begins with team meetings to review work done and tasks on hand and members then move to their breakout rooms after the mandatory video attendance. These virtual rooms function just like adjoining rooms in a physical office. One can seamlessly move from one room to the other without needing to click any link or login again. VPN is used as and when needed to securely access e-office and data center environments. There are breakout rooms for meetings and conferences also. There is also a cafeteria room where team members can have lunch together in a relaxed atmosphere. There is also a water-cooler point where senior management is not allowed and that provides a convenient outlet for stress-venting. In such a remote working environment, productivity has gone up by almost 30 per cent.
Work from Anywhere has significant savings for everyone. Team members save on commute time and they can add almost 1-2 hours in daily work time. The number of people taking leave has gone down Work from Home has really helped female employees continuing their work without the need to take time off due to domestic responsibilities. We have team members who delayed their entitled maternity leave as they could manage work and their health working remotely. It also helped in savings as many team members terminated their lease rentals and moved to their villages and family homes and continued working.
This shift in work culture has many unseen benefits also. One has realised it is possible to hire good quality resources at very reasonable costs since it obviates the need for relocation. Remote working is also having an impact on Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities as more companies resort to WFH and remote working. This is resulting in more disposable incomes in these cities and will result in growth in the services sector in these areas and the creation of more jobs. Digital India and the new age working models have the potential to not only transforming India through digital inclusion and citizen empowerment but will also result in more equitable growth.
abhishek Singh
(The writer is CEO, MyGov and NeGD and MD, Digital India Corporation, Government of India. The views expressed are personal.)
Reader’s Post
Auto drivers flouting SOPs
Sir,
Autos have been allowed to ply throughout the roads of Dimapur on the grounds that they follow necessary measures to curb the Covid crisis. However, a lot of these drivers have been seen flouting the rules and regulations. Most of these drivers are seen with masks on their chin and the transparent partition sheet being lifted. Yes, I do agree that the Dimapur weather makes it unbearable to wear masks but none of us want to die either. Therefore, I request everyone to obey the rules. Now is not the time to be careless and act according to our own thoughts. There is a reason why the SOP exists hence, follow it without failure.
