NEW DELHI : Prompted by the public outrage over Kathua and Unnao rape cases, Maneka Gandhi, Union Minister for Women and Child Development has suggested that all police officers be re-trained on various aspects of sexual offences, particularly those related to collection and preservation of evidence.

In a letter addressed to Chief Ministers of all the States/UTs, Ms Gandhi  has outlined various steps to be taken by the States/UTs in preventing and curbing the crimes against women and children. These include re-training of all police officers  on various aspects of sexual offences particularly those related to collection and preservation of evidence, issuing instructions that utmost priority is to be given to complete the investigation of cases of sexual offences against children strictly as per the timelines of law, and that the State governments must take strict action against those police officers who are found to be obstructing the investigation or colluding with the perpetrators of such cases.

A quick and timely professional investigation is the only method in which a potential offender can be deterred but this can be done only by the States as the police department is the State subject. Forming a special cell only for sexual offences or specially for sexual offences on children, would be a significant step in this regard, she said in her letter.

The Women and Child Development Minister offered help to State governments in establishing Forensic Laboratories in States which can be used for forensic analysis of evidence in the investigation of sexual offences.

The WCD Minister has requested the states to generate awareness among the children in using the e-box set up under POCSO with child-help line number 1098. The Minister also highlighted that till date 175 One Stop Centres for women affected by violence have been set up by the Ministry of Women and Child Development. One Stop Centres are to help those women who have no access to either police or medical facilities or are not able to visit a police station in times of distress.

The letter also stressed that Section 21 of the POCSO Act may be invoked in all cases wherever failure to report or record is noted. Section 21 states that any officer who fails to report or record the commission of an offence under section 19/20 of the Act is liable for punishment.

The WCD Minister has also called for suggestions from the state Governments on dealing with the crimes against women and children.

Even as the country rages over the horrid instance of the gang rape and murder of the eight-year-old in Kathua, and similar incidents that were reported from other parts of the country, an analysis by CRY – a child rights group– suggests that for a long time now sexual offences against children have been on a steady rise.  

A sexual offence is committed against a child in India every 15 minutes, the analysis has suggested.

In a cumulative analysis, it revealed a significant increase in crimes against minors of more than 500% over the past 10 years (1,06,958 in 2016 over 18,967 in 2006). Further, retrospective comparison within the mentioned timeframe points at a sharper rate of rise between 2012 and 2016 than that recorded between 2006 and 2011.

The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data suggests that crime against children in India has increased by a staggering 14% between 2015 and 2016.

As per a 2016 analysis of crimes under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, sexual offences accounted for 1/3^rd of all crimes against children in India.

Going by the nature of crimes and categories those were booked under, child rape is the second largest category of crime against children in terms of number of reported cases, amounting to more than 18% of all crimes, while kidnapping and abduction (K&A) tops the list accounting for more than half of the total number of crimes (51.1%, number of crimes 54723) as recorded in 2016.

All crimes under POCSO Act constitute around 33% of total crimes against children. The number of sexual offences registered against children increased by an alarming 300% over the last 5 years.

Speaking about the worrying trend of crime against children, Komal Ganotra, Director Policy and Advocacy at CRY said, “Though the topic has been debated and deliberated at length for quite some time now, in the wake of increased incidences of crime against children, what we really lack is an all-encompassing concerted action by all duty bearers. We have consistently fallen short with not having robust prevention mechanism, poor awareness on the issue, failure in rolling out rigorous policies and programs, poor conviction rates and in inadequate budgetary allocation for child protection.”  

“It is non-negotiable for the state and other duty bearers to equip themselves in recognising the risks involved, and put robust preventive and responsive systems and processes to assess and eliminate the same,” she added.

Looking at the concentration of reported incidents across the States, more than 50% of crimes against children have been recorded in just five States, such as Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi UT and West Bengal. While Uttar Pradesh tops the list with 15% of recorded crimes against children, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh closely follow with 14% and 13% respectively. It is also a matter of grave concern that in 11 out 36 States and UTs, more than 50% of the offences against children are sexual offences and in 25 out of 36 States and UTs more than 1/3^rd of the crimes against children are sex crimes.

New Delhi:  Afghanistan has expressed disappointment over Pakistan’s attitude  to its  latest initiative for bringing an end to conflict  through offer of unconditional peace talks with Taliban.

It has also asserted that there will be no reduction of  India’s engagement with the country under pressure of Islamabad. So far there had been no response from Pakistan to act on the important points agreed to during their Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi’s recent visit to Kabul, Ambassador Shaida Mohammad Abdali  said here, adding that  one of these points was making the Taliban agree to engage in negotiations with the Afghanistan government                  

”We are still awaiting a positive step forward from Pakistan even as border violations were continuing,” Mr Abdali said during an interaction with members of the  Indian Association of Foreign Affairs Correspondents here yesterday. It may be pointed out that Kabul and Washington have been putting pressure on Islamabad to deny safe havens to insurgents blamed for attack in Afghanistan.

The Afghan Ambassador said his country has now to see how far Pakistan goes to push Taliban towards peace talks. In this connection, his government had adopted a two-pronged approach- one to engage at  government to government level with Pakistan,  and the other to deal with the Taliban as a group, the Ambassador said.

So far,  the Taliban had not got back to our government over the unconditional peace talks offer, which means they were pondering over it, he said. The Afghan envoy also accused the Taliban of  deceiving and creating confusion among his country’s friends  by projecting a  Taliban vs Daesh  tussle in his country. ”The fact was that this Daesh had not come from Iraq or  Syria but was part of  the Pakistani Taliban, consisting of local people across the Duran Line, ” he said.

The Afghan envoy stressed there was a consistent effort to prolong war in Afghanistan by creating distrust between regional and international partners of the country. He also said the Afghan people would never like to see the Taliban back, as these groups were imposed from without.

Replying to a question, Mr Abdali said his country  would not come under pressure of Pakistan to reduce India’s role in his country. ”For Afghanistan ties with India are very important and this partnership is very special.” He said besides economic engagement, India  was also playing a very substantive role in strengthening his country’s defence forces.

India was obtaining four fighter helicopters for Afghanistan through Belarus as an interim help. This help was urgent to bolster  the air force for the coming summer fighting season. This was an interim arrangement before  the four -year US plan(1918-22) for strengthening Afghan defence is completed, he said. ”Besides, our defence minister attended the Chennai Defence expo where he has seen new products, and we will soon be giving our new list ,” he said .

Guwahati : The Group of Ministers on Transport constituted by the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways has recommended a uniform structure of road tax for vehicles across states. In its meeting held  in Guwahati today, the GoM observed that a uniform tax structure will put a  check  on people registering their vehicles in low tax states and running them in other states.  This would also bring necessary relief to genuine cases requiring transfer of vehicles.

The GoM, headed by Yunus Khan, Minister for Transport, Rajasthan and comprising State Transport Ministers, seeks to find solutions to the various problems plaguing the road transport sector in the country so as to improve road safety and facilitate ease of transport. Today’s meeting in Guwahati, inaugurated by Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, was held to deliberate upon One Nation- One Tax and One Nation- One Permit proposal.

The GoM has also recommended a national bus and taxi permit on lines of such permit for goods transport. Public transport in the country is growing annually at a rate of just about 2 percent, as against a 20 percent annual growth in private transport.  A national permit will give the much needed fillip to public transport and help reduce road  congestion and its attendant problems.

In order to promote alternate fuel for vehicles the GoM had proposed liberalization of permit system for electric vehicles. In addition, it has recommended raising the tax on diesel vehicles by 2 percent while lowering the tax on electric vehicles.

The Most Film Friendly State Award was announced today by the Chairman of the Jury, Ramesh Sippy. The Most Film Friendly State Awards would be presented by President of India on May 3rd, 2018 during the presentation of the National Film Awards.

Madhya Pradesh was conferred the award for the Most Film Friendly State for its efforts towards easing filming in the State by creating a well-structured web site, film friendly infrastructure, offering incentives, maintaining databases, undertaking marketing and promotional initiatives, unanimously by the Jury from among the 16 States that participated. Madhya Pradesh also received positive feedback from established filmmakers who have shot there.

The efforts taken by the State to present their case for the Awards were also appreciated. State of Uttarakhand is given a Special Mention Certificate to recognize the efforts made by the State of Uttarakhand towards creating a film friendly environment.

Speaking on the occasion, Ramesh Sippy Chairman of the Jury said “The Jury members laud the continuing efforts of Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat towards creating a film friendly eco system in their States and hope that they keep up the good work. This year Madhya Pradesh where a lot of filmmakers have shot over the years, has won the award due to the ease of filming that the State offers along with excellent on ground support and filmic infrastructure, an informative website and incentives for film making. Their entry was also presented beautifully with all required documents given in a very comprehensive manner. The jury would like to acknowledge the sincere efforts made by Uttarakhand in this direction, despite it being a relatively new State with a difficult terrain and hence has been given the Special Mention.”

The jury for selecting the Most Film Friendly State Award 2017 was chaired by acclaimed filmmaker Ramesh Sippy and comprising of renowned filmmakers, Nagraj Manjule, Raja Krishna Menon, Vivek Agnihotri, and Shri Uday Singh, MD, Motion Picture Distributors Association.

Home-based Care for Young Child (HBYC) would be a crucial component of POSHAN Abhiyaan. Under this, ASHAs supported by Anganwadi workers (AWW) will visit the homes of children aged between 3 to 15 months and sensitise mothers on energy density and diet of child.

The HBYC would be rolled out within a month as will the social and behaviour change road map and action. The focus of the National Nutrition Mission will be on the first 1000 days of the child. 

These announcements were made at the first meeting of National Council on India’s Nutrition Challenges under POSHAN Abhiyaan was held today. The Council which has been set up under POSHAN Abhiyaan is the apex body to formulate overall policies, guide and monitor all nutrition based schemes. 

It was announced that the first lot of 40 Swasth Bharat Preraks is being dispatched by end of the month and would be available at district level to assist the staff in smooth roll-out. Under the Abhiyaan, Swasth Bharat Preraks will be deployed one in each District for coordinating with District officials and enabling fast and efficient execution of the Abhiyaan across the country. Swasth Bharat Preraks would function as a catalyst for fast tracking the implementation of the Abhiyaan. By July 2018, 315 Swasth Bharat Preraks are likely to be deployed in 315 districts of Phase I of the POSHAN Abhiyaan.

The mandate of the Council is to provide policy directions to address India’s nutrition challenges through coordinated inter-sectoral action, coordinate and review convergence among ministries, and to review programmes for nutrition on a quarterly basis.

The meeting also decided to include another 235 districts as part of phase 2 of Poshan Abhiyan in 2018-19, taking the total number of districts to 550. The selection of the districts has been made on the basis of level of stunting, all left wing extremism (105) and aspirational districts (117), and whenever a gap of 1 district was left to achieve saturation in States/UTs.

As many as 315 districts were already covered under the first phase of Poshan Abhiyan. The remaining 167, out of a total of 718 districts will be covered under phase 3.

Taking cognisance of the problems in procurement of tablets for Anganwadi supervisors raised by the participants, the Council decided to procure Smartphones instead of tablets.

Dr. Rajiv Kumar, Vice Chairman Niti Aayog stressed on the need for ground level work and participation from all sectors, for converting the mission into mass movement and achieving the goals. 

Dr. Vinod Paul, Member, NITI Aayog in his address highlighted that the focus is on the first 1000 days of the child and preventive care for adolescent girls, women and mothers. He also said that the meeting decided to conduct pilot in 10 districts for conditional cash transfer (CCT) through direct benefit transfer but States/UTs to continue their existing system of providing supplementary nutrition under Anganwadi services.

Dr. Rajesh Kumar, Joint Secretary, said that various incentives have been made a part of POSHAN Abhiyaan. To encourage Anganwadi workers to use mobile phones for real time monitoring (ICT-RTM), incentive funds shall be provided for each Anganwadi worker per month. It will be linked to the achievements of certain targets.

Centralised call centre will be established for monitoring, grievance redressal and interventions. Speaking on the importance of ICDS-CAS, he said that it will help in collecting real time data enabling supportive supervision and timely intervention by department officials. He also added that it would further create robust monitoring, evaluation and analysis platform at all hierarchical levels, through an integrated dashboard. E learning module has also been created for Anganwadi workers. Comprehensive Guidelines and Manuals are now available at State Level for all Abhiyaan Components.

Mr Rakesh Srivastava, Secretary, WCD Ministry said that there is a need to ensure convergence of various programmes spread across Ministries such as Anganwadi Services, Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana, Scheme for Adolescent Girls of Ministry of Women & Child Development; Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY), National Health Mission (NHM), Home-based New born Care, Home-Based Yong Child Care, Anemia Mukt Bharat  and Rashtrya Bal Swasth Krayakram of MoH&FW;   Swachchh Bharat Mission, Construction of toilets and WASH of Ministry of Drinking Water & Sanitation (DW&S);    Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS),  of Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD); and  Drinking Water & Toilets with Ministry of Panchayati Raj.

STOCKHOLM:  India and Sweden on Tuesday announced the adoption of the Joint Action Plan aimed at implementing the joint innovation partnership between them.

After the delegation level talks here, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Swedish counterpart Stefan Lofven witnessed the signing and exchange of  Joint Innovation Partnership and  announcement of adoption of the Joint Action Plan.

Infusing new energy into their bilateral relations, Mr. Modi and Mr. Lofven held fruitful discussion on issues related to cooperation in innovation, trade and investment and culture.  “I would like to commend the Indian government  and its strong focus on innovation as a key to progress and prosperity,’’ said  Mr. Löfven

The two leaders also exchanged views on regional and multilateral cooperation at the delegation-level talks. There are excellent opportunities for cooperation in the fields of smart cities, clean technology, universal housing, renewable energy, e-mobility, start-up, waste disposal, and many others with an objective of creating jobs and sustainable development for the people in India.  They had a productive exchange of views on bilateral and regional issues.

Setting the tone for a fruitful exchange of views at the talks, the two Prime Ministers walked together from the residence of Mr. Lofven to office for the delegation-level talks.

“Sweden can be our important partner in seeking innovative solutions for developmental challenges facing India today.  A relationship that has grown in intensity over the years and has a huge potential.  The two leaders had a productive exchange of views on bilateral and regional issues,’’ Ministry of External Affairs official spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said in a series of tweets.

At the City Hall, Prime Minister Modi exhorted top Swedish CEOs to invest in India and participate in India’s flagship initiatives. Both Mr. Modi and Mr. Lofven interacted with top business leaders at the Roun.

In his press statement after meeting with Mr. Lofven,  Prime Minister Modi highlighted innovation, investment, start up and manufacturing as the main areas of cooperation.

Prime Minister Modi tweeted Sweden has been “a strong contributor to our ‘Make in India’ program. Swedish PM led a big delegation to the Mumbai summit in 2016.’’

“This is my first visit to Sweden and a visit by an Indian PM after a gap of nearly 30 years,’’ Mr. Modi tweeted soon after arriving in Stockholm.

Earlier, Mr. Modi began his day with a call on the  King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden. Leaders exchanged views on strengthening bilateral cooperation across several sectors.

Sweden : PM Narendra Modi has arrived in Sweden late night on Monday 9:30 p.m. (local time) to embark on his two-day visit to Sweden as part of the India-Nordic Summit. 

Prime Minister Modi was received by his Swedish counterpart Stefan Lofven at the Stolkhome Arlanda airport. 

Prime Minister Modi also received a ceremonial reception. 

PM Modi’s visit to the India-Nordic Summit is likely to strengthen ties with Sweden and increase bilateral trades between the two nations countries. He is on the first leg of his five-day tour which will also take him to the UK where he will attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM).

Raveesh Kumar spokesperson MEA tweeted “Scripting history! PM @narendramodi arrives in Stockholm on a first bilateral visit by an Indian PM in 30 years to a warm and personal welcome by @SwedishPM Stefan Löfven at the airport and to participate in the first ever India-Nordic Summit.”

The bilateral ties between India and Sweden go back to the 1940s. Several companies have engaged in trade leading to the establishment of bilateral trade of more than USD 2.2 billion as of 2016.

NEW DELHI : There are reports of cash shortages and some ATMs running dry of cash or becoming non-functional in some parts of the country.

There has been unusual spurt in currency demand in the country in last three months. In the current month, in the first 13 days itself, the currency supply increased by Rs.45000 crores.  This unusual spurt in demand is seen more in some parts of the country like Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, MP and Bihar.

The Government of India with the Reserve Bank of India have taken all steps to meet this unusual demand. We had adequate reserves of currency notes which have been used to meet fully the extraordinary demand generated so far.  We continue to have in stock adequate currency notes of all denominations, including of Rs.500, 200 and Rs.100 to meet any demand.

The Government would like to assure all the people that there have been adequate supply of currency notes which have met entire demand so far. The government would also like to assure that it would be supplying adequate currency notes to meet even higher levels of demand if such demand were to continue in the coming days/months.  

The Government is taking all steps to ensure that ATMs are supplied with cash and to get non-functional ATMs normalised at the earliest.

Pune: As the parched Indian subcontinent eagerly awaits the monsoon, all indications are that it will be a normal monsoon, especially since no El Niño is in the offing for 2018. 

The long-term monsoon trend has been getting much attention recently. The seasonal total rainfall which has decreased by about 10% since the 1950s till the beginning of the 21^st century, is reported to be ‘recovering’. This may sound like good news but the details may matter as to how the rainfall will be distributed in terms of frequency and intensity. Heatwaves, droughts and floods are serious socioeconomic hazards for India and a monsoon recovery will not necessarily mean a reduction in these hazards.

As the Sun crosses the equator into the Northern Hemisphere on March 20, Indian landmass begins to warm up. Due to its lower heat capacity compared to the ocean, it warms faster than the Indian Ocean and thus a northward increase in air temperature is set up which is critical for initiating the monsoon circulation and the supply of moisture from the ocean over to land. 

The impact of increased greenhouse gases and atmospheric dust in addition to land use changes such those in forestation are the controlling factors that determine the rate of land warming. The relative warming of land versus the ocean determines whether the monsoon trends downward or upward in a warming world.

Roxy Mathew Koll of Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) Pune has led three studies that this writer was also part of. The first one reported the downward trend in the mean rainfall and showed that the ocean has been warming faster than land from 1950s onward and this has flattened the ocean-to-lad temperature increase, resulting in a weakening monsoon. This study did not focus on the causes for a slower land warming. Other researchers have argued that the increased air pollution has been blocking solar heating and slowing the warming of land. An IIT Bombay study led by Supantha Paul showed that increased deforestation can explain the reduction in rainfall due to reduced evapotranspiration independently of any change in the ocean-to-land temperature gradient.

The second study led by Koll focused on impact of the changes in Indian Ocean warming and monsoon circulation on marine primary production and fisheries. Near-surface warming in the ocean tends to inhibit mixing up of nutrients from below the surface by increasing vertical stratification and thus reduces primary production, which in turn, affects the entire marine food web including fisheries. The decrease in primary production over western Indian Ocean is about 20% for six decades since 1950 but has accelerated to over 30% since 1985. Monsoon changes, thus, involve vegetation change over land as well as in the ocean.

In the third study, we showed that there has been a threefold increase in widespread floods over a large swath of central India extending from Gujarat and Rajasthan to Odisha and Andhra Pradesh. The interesting fact here is that moisture for fueling such widespread floods is being supplied from the northern Arabian Sea which is also warming rapidly and monotonically. 

Just as the bad news seemed to be getting worse, a study from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) reported recently that the monsoon has, in fact, been recovering since 2002. The downward trend seems to have reversed due to a decrease in aerosols over India and return to faster land warming expected under global warming compared to the ocean. A second study by MIT researchers provides further evidence of the cessation of reduction in monsoon by showing that the increase in rainfall is seen as an increase in vegetation cover over the arid and semi-arid regions of northwest India. 

Monsoon recovery is obviously great news. However, many caveats must be offered. The first is that a decade does not make a trend. We need to watch cautiously for many more years to be certain that this is indeed a revival of the monsoon. Model projections for the future seem to indicate that the ocean warming will continue unabated. We are uncertain whether the reduction in aerosols and land warming are driving the monsoon recovery or whether reforestation and increased vegetation cover are responsible for it. India has been aggressive about reforestation to keep pace with its commitment to the Paris Agreement with tall claims being made about increase in forest cover. But these are much more recent than 2002 when the monsoon recovery is argued to have started. 

Some monsoon modelling studies, such as one by Sabeerali and Ajayamohan of NYU-Abu Dhabi, have projected shorter monsoon season due to the warming by 2100, mainly due to likely shifts in the onset and withdrawal. But such studies are based on models that do not capture historical monsoon features like decrease in monsoon since the 1950s and the recovery since 2002. They are also inconsistent with the ocean-atmosphere dynamics. Models also do not accurately simulate the aerosol loading and thus the solar dimming by aerosols. 

The most important caveat is that even if the total rainfall recovers, there is no indication that heatwaves, droughts, extreme events and widespread floods are about to go away. Loss of life, crops and property will continue to be significant challenges in coming years and decades. Reforestation must continue to not only reduce aerosols and facilitate the monsoon recovery but also to enhance soil moisture persistence which increases drought resilience and recycled precipitation in addition to reducing the overall impact of urbanization which exacerbates floods. 

The ocean warming and its impact on the monsoon and widespread floods are not entirely in our control but mitigative actions like reforestation certainly are. We must do everything within our means to hedge our bets against a return to a downward trend in the monsoon. (India Science Wire)

(The author is a Professor at the Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, University of Maryland and a visiting faculty at IISER, Pune and IIT, Bombay.)