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“You see, Sasha, this is how it goes,” a tired Mikhail Gorbachev said to his closest aide when he lay down to rest after transferring power to his successor, Boris Yeltsin, in 1991.
Gorbachev, who passed away last week, has been hailed for his role in ending the ideological conflict between communism and capitalism, and also bringing down the Iron Curtain and ending the Cold War between the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Soviet Union.
Sadly, Gorbachev lived to see history return with a vengeance. NATO is expanding eastwards; Russia is threatened: Ukraine is its battleground.
On the economic front, Russia has not recovered from the shock it got from Boris Yeltsin’s “big bang” capitalisation imposed by U.S. economists.
Perversely, an unintended effect of the big bang is the return of authoritarianism under Vladimir Putin. Gorbachev had favoured a slow transition to a “mixed economy” like the Indian model and had approached Rajiv Gandhi for advice.
I was a member of a small team of Indian business leaders which had travelled to Moscow and Riga in 1989 to explain the “Indian model” to economists at the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union.
However, the “Washington economics” model prevailed. Led by a triumphant United States, and economists in U.S. think tanks, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the wave of opening domestic economies to international flows of trade and finance swamped Russia; it also reached India’s shores in 1991.
Overall life expectancy is a good measure of the well-being of a nation’s citizens. When all citizens are well-nourished, when public health systems function well, and when violence in society is low, an average person lives longer.
International comparisons reveal that GDP per capita is an insufficient contributor to longevity. Many countries with substantially lower incomes outperform the U.S. in life expectancy. Cuba is one place above the U.S. in longevity tables even though its income per capita is just 14% of U.S. incomes.
Between the big bang capitalist reforms of the Russian economy in 1991 and 1994, life expectancy fell from 64 to 57 years. Ten million Russian men (6.7% of the Russian population) ‘disappeared’.
Their deaths were caused by suicides, alcohol poisoning, homicides, and heart attacks brought upon by despair with joblessness and hopelessness, created by wholesale privatisation of the economy and disruption of social safety nets.
“Catastrophes of this magnitude typically occur only during pandemics and wars,” says George DeMartino, author of The Tragic Science: How Economists Cause Harm (Even As They Aspire To Do Good).
Yet, losses of this magnitude had not occurred even in the U.S. Civil War (2.1% of the U.S.’s population), or the flu pandemic of 1918-1920 (2.8% of world population).
The Russian deaths were caused by the imposition of an economic ideology that claimed that everyone will be better off with the aid of some mysterious hand when the state is pushed back, the economy is deregulated, and capitalist spirits are let loose.
The difficult path to IndiaPakistan peace (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, International Relations)
After the unceremonious ouster of Imran Khan from the seat of government in Pakistan and the promulgation of Shehbaz Sharif as Prime Minister, there have been signs of a thaw in India-Pakistan relations.
It was reported that the Pakistan Army chief, General QamarBajwa, had countenanced backchannel talks and a “limited trade resumption package” with India.
This was to help alleviate some of the stresses on Pakistan’s flailing and cash-strapped domestic economy that was veering on the edge of a default in the face of a widening current account deficit and high inflation brought on by the after-effects of a global novel coronavirus pandemic, unprecedented floods, and decades of poor planning.
As a respite, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) recently agreed to a one-year extension for Pakistan’s 39-month, $6 billion Extended Fund Facility programme begun in 2019, and further added an additional $1.17 billion to its coffers.
To ease its situation further, especially considering the devastating impact of the floods on food supply in Pakistan, Pakistan’s Finance Minister Miftah Ismail had indicated his openness to import “vegetables and edible items from India”.
However, Mr. Sharif had to quickly retract Mr. Ismail’s suggestion and restate his government’s commitment to prioritising a resolution of the Kashmir dispute before normalisation of bilateral relations could take place.
There has been no official confirmation of India’s proposal to provide food aid to Pakistan, nor of any Pakistani request for the same.
It is abundantly clear that Mr. Sharif, despite the obvious economic benefit of seeking trade in essential commodities with India, is unable to overcome the pressures of domestic public opinion in Pakistan.
His predecessor’s controversial and unpopular departure via a vote of no-confidence and upcoming general elections in Pakistan has swayed Mr. Sharif’s decision-making.
Mr. Khan’s party, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf, won a convincing victory in the hugely important Punjab by-polls earlier this year. Meanwhile, the stock of the Sharif-led coalition is sinking as he has been forced to introduce austerity measures and rollback public subsidies to meet the IMF’s demands.
A simple application of rational choice theory would suggest that Mr. Sharif’s choice is fairly straightforward. Pakistan should ask India, a large agricultural producer in the neighbourhood, to provide it essential aid in its moment of crisis.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi had even tweeted that he was “saddened to see the devastation caused by the floods in Pakistan”.
This suggests an implicit willingness to provide food aid if required. It is worth noting that India provided essential vaccine supplies to Pakistan during the COVID-19 pandemic and there is precedence for cooperation between the two nations when faced with such emergencies.
But still, Mr. Sharif could not muster the political will to serve Pakistan’s short-term interests, despite the fact that such trade would not create long-term dependencies on India, or require extreme concessions, or entail a compromise of principles.
OPED
Public health need not be led by doctors alone (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
It is common for heads of health services at national, state or district levels in India to be orthopaedic or cardiac surgeons or ophthalmologists who have no training in public health.
There is also suboptimal representation of public health professionals in State and Central advisory bodies of health.
During the pandemic, many doctors with no training in public health provided expert advice on public health issues. This is because it is felt that public health does not require specific competencies, and anyone can do this work.
Public health is essentially multi-disciplinary and means different things to different people. Many, even within public health, have a poor understanding of it.
For example, recent Central government guidelines specify an MBBS degree to be a prerequisite for becoming a public health specialist. Some people have commented on the exclusion of grassroots public health workers — ASHA workers, auxiliary nurse midwives and multipurpose workers — from the cadre.
Part of this confusion comes from not being able to differentiate between public health as a discipline and the public health sector.
All those who work for the State or Central government are public sector health workers, but they are not doing public health. Providing medical care at a primary health centre does not make the person a public health professional.
Also, health workers have no training in public health; they are grassroots-level service providers. Asking them to be part of public health cadre trivialises the profession of public health. It is important to understand that public health is a separate profession with a specific set of competencies.
I use four ‘A’ s — academics, activism, administration and advocacy — to describe public health work. Academics refers to a good understanding of evidence generation and synthesis by having a good grounding in epidemiology and biostatistics.
These competencies are also critical for monitoring and evaluating programmes, conducting surveillance, and interpreting data and routine reporting.
If academics is the brain behind the discipline, activism is at the heart of it. Public health is inherently linked to ‘social change’ and an element of activism is core to public health.
Public health requires social mobilisation at the grassroots level by understanding community needs, community organisation, etc. This requires grounding in social and behavioural sciences.
It also includes the study of how non-health determinants, including social and commercial factors, influence health and how these can be addressed.
Administration refers to administering health systems at different levels: from a primary health centre to the district, State, and national level.
This includes implementing and managing health programmes, addressing human resource issues, supply and logistical issues, etc. It includes microplanning of programme delivery, team building, leadership as well as financial management to some extent. A good understanding of the principles of organisational management and health administration is key for acquiring this competency.
Funding public education (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, Education)
A few days before India celebrated the 75th year of Independence, Union Minister of Education Dharmendra Pradhan said in reply to a debate in the Lok Sabha that people should let go of the idea that universities must be funded only by the government.
His remarks are only a corollary to the General Financial Rules of 2017, which encourage all autonomous bodies to maximise generation of internal resources and attain self-sufficiency (Rule 229(iv)).
Still, the Minister’s remarks shocked many, for only a week earlier, while launching education and skill development-related initiatives to mark two years of the launch of the National Education Policy (NEP), Home Minister Amit Shah had said that the public education system is the basis of a vibrant democratic society.
The NEP 2020 envisaged that it would “promote increased access, equity, and inclusion through a range of measures, including greater opportunities for outstanding public education.”
It also provided an assurance that the autonomy of public institutions would be backed by adequate public funding. The NEP noted that public expenditure on education in India was nowhere close to the 6% of GDP envisaged by the 1968 policy, reiterated in the 1986 policy, and reaffirmed in the 1992 review of the policy.
Against this backdrop, it was gratifying that the 2020 policy endorsed a substantial increase in public investment by the Central and State governments to reach 6% of GDP at the earliest.
Elaborating on the reasons, NEP 2020 said this level of public funding was “extremely critical for achieving the high-quality and equitable public education system that is truly needed for India’s future economic, social, cultural, intellectual progress and growth.”
Going by the National Education Commission, also known as the Kothari Commission, which was the precursor to the 1968 policy, higher education should have been getting at least 2% of GDP.
In contrast, the expenditure on higher education by the Centre and the States taken together nosedived from 0.86% of GDP in 2010-11 to a measly 0.52% in 2019-20 (Budge Estimates, or BE).
It is disquieting that the Centre’s expenditure on higher education dropped from 0.33% of GDP in 2010-11 to a mere 0.16% in 2019-20 (BE). The decline in public investment in higher education does not appear due to the fall in the receipts of the Central government.
The revenue receipt of the Union government went up three times from ₹7.51 lakh crore in 2011-12 to ₹22.04 lakh crore in 2022-23 (BE). So have total receipts, from ₹13.07 lakh crores in 2011-12 to ₹39.44 lakh crore in 2022-23 (BE).
In contrast, the Union government’s expenditure on higher education as a percentage of revenue receipt saw a decline from 2.60% in 2011-12 to 1.85% in 2022-23 (BE). As a percentage of the total receipt, the allocation for higher education fell from 1.49% to 1.04% during the corresponding period.
Explainer
Seat belts, head restraints and safety regulations (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The death of Cyrus P. Mistry, former Chairman of Tata Sons, in a car crash in Maharashtra’s Palghar district on September 4 has turned the focus on whether compulsory use of seat belts in cars — including by passengers in the rear seat — can save lives during such accidents.
Media reports cited Police sources to say that Mistry and a co-passenger, Jahangir Pandole, who was also killed in the mishap, were not wearing seat belts.
Although a full investigation has to follow, authorities said preliminary findings showed the car was moving at high speed, covering about 20 km in nine minutes from the last check post where it was recorded by CCTV.
The focus in the aftermath is on the seat belt. The three-point seat belt engineered by Nils EvarBohlin, a passive safety device first incorporated into a car by Volvo in 1959, and now standard in cars sold in India, is a low cost restraint system that prevents occupants of a vehicle from being thrown forward in a crash.
In the U.S, unrestrained drivers and passengers represented 48% of all deaths in vehicle crashes during 2016, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
In a car crash, particularly at moderate to high speeds, the driver or passenger who has no seat belt continues to move forward at the speed of the vehicle, until some object stops the occupant.
This could be the steering wheel, dashboard or windscreen for those in front, and the front seat, dashboard or windscreen for those in the rear. The Centre for Road Safety at the Transport Department of New South Wales, Australia (NSW Centre), which has had a compulsory seat belt rule since 1971 explains that “even if the vehicle is fitted with an airbag, the force at which an unrestrained occupant strikes the airbag can cause serious injuries.”
Without an airbag, and no seat belt restraint, a severe crash leads to the occupant of the rear seat striking the seat in front with such force that “it is sufficient for the seat mountings and seat structures to fail,” says the NSW Centre.
The seat belt performs many functions, notably slowing the occupant at the same rate as the vehicle, distributing the physical force in a crash across the stronger parts of the body such as the pelvis and chest, preventing collisions with objects within the vehicle and sudden ejection.
Newer technologies to “pretension” the belt, sense sudden pull forces and apply only as much force as is necessary to safely hit the airbags.
Absence of seat belts could lead to rear seat occupants colliding with internal objects in the car, or even being ejected through the front windscreen during the collision.
Head restraints, which are found either as adjustable models or moulded into the seats, prevent a whiplash injury. This type of injury occurs mostly when the vehicle is struck from behind, leading to sudden extreme movement of the neck backwards and then forwards.
The ban on conversion therapy for the LGBTQIA+ community (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 1, Social Issues)
The National Medical Commission (NMC), the apex regulatory body of medical professionals in India, has written to all State Medical Councils, banning conversion therapy and calling it a “professional misconduct”.
In a letter dated August 25, it also empowered the State bodies to take disciplinary action against medical professionals who breach the guideline.
The letter said the NMC was following a Madras High Court directive to issue an official notification listing conversion therapy as a wrong, under the Indian Medical Council (Professional Conduct, Etiquettes and Ethics) Regulations, 2002.
Conversion or reparative therapy is an intervention aimed at changing the sexual orientation or gender identity of an individual with the use of either psychiatric treatment, drugs, exorcism and even violence, with the aim being to make the individual a heterosexual.
The conversion therapy umbrella also includes efforts to change the core identity of youth whose gender identity is incongruent with their sex anatomy.
Often, the therapy is offered by quacks with little expertise in dealing with the issue. According to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP), the interventions under conversion therapy are provided under the false premise that homosexuality and diverse gender identities are pathological.
They are not; the absence of pathology means there is no need for conversion or any other like intervention.” Further, according to AACAP and other health experts, conversion therapy poses the risk of causing or exacerbating mental health conditions, like anxiety, stress and drug use which sometimes even lead to suicide.
On June 7, 2021, Justice N. AnandVenkatesh of the Madras High Court gave a landmark ruling on a case he was hearing about the ordeal of a same-sex couple who sought police protection from their parents.
Pending adequate legislation more protective of the community, Justice Venkatesh issued a slew of interim guidelines for the police, activists, Union and State Social Welfare Ministries, and the National Medical Commission to “ensure their safety and security to lead a life chosen by them.
The ruling prohibited any attempt to medically “cure” or change the sexual orientation of LGBTQIA+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual or of any other orientation) people.
It urged the authorities to take action against “professional[s] involving themselves in any form or method of conversion therapy,” which could include the withdrawal of licence to practice medicine.
On July 8, 2022, the court gave an order to the National Medical Commission directing it to “issue necessary official notification by enlisting ‘Conversion Therapy’ as a professional misconduct.” The NMC issued the directive to State Medical Councils on August 25.
News
Preventive detentions rose in 2021(Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
Preventive detentions in 2021 saw a rise of over 23.7% compared to the year before, with over 1.1 lakh people being placed under preventive detention, according to the latest crime statistics released by the National Crime Records Bureau last month.
Of these, 483 were detentions under the National Security Act, of which almost half (241) were either in custody or still detained as of the end of 2021. A total of over 24,500 people placed under preventive detention were either in custody or still detained as of the end of last year — the highest since 2017 when the NCRB started recording this data.
In 2017, the NCRB’s Crime in India report found that a total of 67,084 persons had been detained as a preventive measure that year.
Of these, the report said 48,815 were released between one and six months of their detention and 18,269 were either in custody or still in preventive detention as of the end of the year.
The number of persons placed under detention has been increasing steadily since 2017 — to over 98,700 in 2018 and over 1.06 lakh in 2019 — before dipping to 89,405 in 2020.
Data pertaining to 2021 showed that 1,10,683 persons were placed under preventive detention last year, of which 24,525 were either in custody or still detained as of the end of the year and the rest were let go within one to six months of their detention.
While the number of persons placed under preventive detention has seen an increase in 2021, the NCRB data showed that the number of people arrested in such a manner under the National Security Act had dipped significantly compared to the year before.
Preventive detentions under the NSA peaked in 2020 at 741. This number dropped to 483 in 2021.In 2017, 54.2% of persons detained as such were either in custody or still detained as of the end of the year. In 2021, this number decreased to 49.8%, with more than half of those preventively detained released.
Among other laws under which the NCRB has recorded data on preventive detentions are the Goonda Act (State and Central) (29,306), Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1988 (1,331), and a category classified as “Other Detention Acts”, under which most of the detentions were registered (79,514).
Since 2017, the highest number of persons to be placed under preventive detention has consistently been under the “Other Detention Acts” category.
ShwetankSailakwal, Advocate-On-Record, who has extensively researched preventive detention laws and procedures in India, pointed out that several laws like the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act also provide for making preventive detentions.