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The Supreme Court condemned the illegal felling of over 6,000 trees to construct buildings, ostensibly for “eco-tourism” at the Jim Corbett National Park in Uttarakhand, as a “classic case” of nexus between politicians and officials working to ransack the environment for short-term commercial ends.
“The present case depicts a sorry state of affairs of human greed devastating one of the most celebrated abodes of tigers, i.e. the Corbett Tiger Reserve,” a three-judge Bench headed by Justice B.R. Gavai observed.
The court also directed the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change to form a specialised committee to study and recommend whether tiger safaris should be permitted in the buffer areas of a tiger reserve.
States
Human-wildlife conflict a State-specific disaster: Kerala (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
The Kerala Cabinet declared human-wildlife conflict a State-specific disaster. The decision comes in the wake of increasing deaths, injuries, and crop and property loss caused by recurrent wildlife incursions into human habitations abutting forests in the State.
The Cabinet’s declaration has opened the door for the Kerala State Disaster Management Authority to play a vital role in mitigating such conflicts.
The Cabinet also created a committee to alleviate the threat of marauding wildlife to humans, especially plantation workers and tribal communities.
The government also decided to form neighbourhood watch groups to increase grassroots vigilance in localities plagued by wildlife ingress. The groups will work with officials to mitigate the problem and give advance warnings.
Editorial
The tale of ‘have money, buy miracle drug’ (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
For almost every week in the last few months, newspapers have been publishing articles about the use of ‘magic injections that guarantee weight loss’.
This ‘magic injection’ contains a drug called Semaglutide. Originally used for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes mellitus, this drug also results in weight loss.
However, many of the articles promoting these drugs fail to mention that this weight loss drug has not been approved for sale in India but is being administered by doctors to patients who are mostly affluent.
The press releases by global pharma companies advising patients not to use this product in India do not get any publicity in the media.
The media is also guilty of not reporting the significant side-effects that these drugs can cause. For some of us who lived to tell the tale, this is eerily similar to Rimonabant and Fen–Phen.
Opinion
Safeguarding local democracy (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, Judiciary)
On February 20, a three-judge Bench of the Supreme Court led by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud used its plenary powers to declare Kuldeep Kumar, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) candidate, as the validly elected Mayor of the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation.
With CCTV visuals indicating that the presiding officer had defaced some ballot papers in the mayoral polls, the Supreme Court conducted a physical examination of the ballots to determine the winner.
The Court observed that in such cases it is duty-bound to intervene under Article 142 of the Constitution to ensure that “democracy is not allowed to be thwarted by such subterfuges”.
However, just before the Court’s verdict, three AAP councillors from Chandigarh joined the BJP. With the help of these defections, BJP candidates won the elections to the posts of deputy and senior deputy Mayor held on March 4. With the BJP now having a majority in the council and the Mayor possessing limited independent powers, the INDIA alliance has essentially lost control over the municipal corporation.
The shenanigans in Chandigarh raise questions regarding local democracy: the fair administration of local elections; the problem of local-level defections; and the challenge of ensuring democratic governance in Union Territories (UTs).
Text & Context
Remembering the forgotten women of science in India (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 3, Science nd Technology)
The Indian Academy of Sciences founded by physicist and Nobel Laureate C.V. Raman in Bangalore in 1934 has never had a woman scientist at the helm.
The academy’s statistics suggest women make up around 14% of India’s working scientists; only 15% of faculty members in various research institutes across the country are women.
The Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science & Technology given annually by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research for notable research in biology, chemistry, physics, engineering, mathematics, medicine and environmental science, has been awarded to 571 scientists between 1958 and 2023.
In the last 65 years, only 20 women scientists have received India’s most prestigious science award — for the first time in 1961 and the last in 2020.
News
PM launches India’s first underwater Metro line in Kolkata (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 3, Infrastructure)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated Kolkata Metro’s Esplanade-Howrah Maidan section, which passes below the mighty Hooghly river through the country’s first underwater transportation tunnel.
He also took a ride on a Metro train from Esplanade to Howrah Maidan and interacted with school students during the journey passing through the tunnel, which is a testament to the country’s engineering capabilities.
Mr. Modi returned to the Esplanade station through the same route, and was accompanied by Leader of the Opposition in the State, Suvendu Adhikari, during the trip. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee did not attend the programme.
Navy commissions INS Jatayu, MH-60R helicopter squadron (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Defence)
The Indian Navy commissioned INS Jatayu at Minicoy island, its second base in Lakshadweep after INS Dweeprakshak in Kavaratti.
Later, the Navy commissioned its first MH-60R multi-role helicopter squadron INAS 334 ‘Seahawks’ at Kochi, a major capability boost for its rotary fleet and its anti-submarine warfare capabilities.
INS Jatayu is the beginning of a phased expansion plan to strengthen India’s surveillance and security posture in the strategically located islands close to the Nine Degree channel and critical sea lanes of communication.
This is very close to the Nine Degree channel, so this is the region [in] which lot of the maritime traffic flows both into and out of the Arabian Sea.
So we hope to substantially improve our understanding and graph of the traffic that is flowing through it. So we will know who is operating here, who is passing through this area, what are they doing, what is their intent and so on.
It will substantially improve our maritime domain awareness,” Chief of Naval Staff Admiral R. Hari Kumar said in Minicoy.
President presents Sangeet Natak Akademi Awards (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 1, Culture)
President Droupadi Murmu presented the Sangeet Natak Akademi Awards for 2022 and 2023 to eminent artists in the field of performing arts.
Ms. Murmu also gave away the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship, or Akademi Ratna, to seven eminent artists. It is the highest honour given to artists for his or her exceptional contribution to a performing art form.
The fellows are folklorist Vinayak Khedekar, veena virutoso R. Visweswaran, Kathak exponent Sunayana Hazarilal, Kuchipudi dancers Raja and Radha Reddy, and theatre artists Dulal Roy and D.P. Sinha.
Twelve artists from the field of music, 12 from dance, 11 from folk and tribal arts, and nine from the field of theatre received the Akademi Awards for 2023.
World
With 8,565 dead, UN says 2023 was the deadliest year in a decade for migrants (Page no. 15)
(GS Paper 1, Social Issues)
At least 8,565 people died on migration routes worldwide in 2023, making it the deadliest year since records began a decade ago, the UN’s International Organization for Migration said.
The 2023 death toll represents a tragic increase of 20% compared to 2022, highlighting the urgent need for action to prevent further loss of life.
Last year’s total surpassed the previous record reached in 2016, when 8,084 people died during migration.
The IOM said that because safe and regular migration pathways remain limited, hundreds of thousands of people attempt to migrate every year via irregular routes in unsafe conditions.
The Mediterranean ocean crossing continues to be the deadliest route for migrants, with at least 3,129 deaths and disappearances registered last year.
Business
OPEC expects Indian oil imports to rise again (Page no. 16)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
OPEC will win a bigger share of India’s oil imports in coming decades due to the supplies proximity, the producer group’s head told Reuters, after its dominance was recently eroded by competition from discounted Russian oil.
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) share of oil imported by India declined from 65% in 2022 to 50% last year, according to industry data, after New Delhi became the biggest buyer of seaborne Russian crude in the aftermath of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Science
What makes ASML’s chip-making machine a scientific marvel? (Page no. 20)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Computers denote data in bits — the famous 0s and 1s — using semiconductors. These are small physical devices that store these values and perform mathematical operations on them. The sum of all these operations is what allows the computer to compute.
The world has powerful computers almost everywhere around us thanks to a technology called semiconductor lithography — the science of printing intricate circuits with extreme precision.
There are machines that automate this process, at a cost of anywhere between ₹800 crore and ₹1,600 crore. Only one company, ASML, headquartered in the Netherlands, makes them, giving it an absolute monopoly in a market worth $125 billion and rendering it the technology company with the highest market value in Europe.
2023 El Niño is among the strongest on record: WMO (Page no. 20)
(GS Paper 1, Geography)
The 2023-2024 El Niño has peaked as one of the five strongest on record and will continue to affect climate in the coming months despite a weakening trend, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said on March 5.
The U.N. agency also said above-normal temperatures are predicted over almost all land areas between March and May.
The prevailing El Niño conditions have already fuelled record temperatures and extreme events worldwide, with 2023 being the warmest on record.
In its latest update, the WMO said there is about a 60% chance of the El Niño persisting during March-May and an 80% chance of neutral conditions (neither an El Niño nor a La Niña) during April-June.
Scientists closely tracking the development in India have said La Niña conditions setting in by June-August could mean monsoon rains will be better this year than they were in 2023.
El Niño is the periodic warming of the ocean surface in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean. It occurs every two to seven years on average and typically lasts nine to 12 months at a time.
It is associated with more rainfall in the Horn of Africa and the southern U.S. and dry and warm conditions in Southeast Asia, Australia, and southern Africa.