Probe ordered after data on stealth submarine is leaked
Scorpène-class submarine
The Scorpène-class submarines are a class of diesel-electric attack submarines jointly developed by the French DCN and the Spanish company Navantia and now by DCNS. It features diesel propulsion and an additional air-independent propulsion (AIP).
In 2005, India chose the Scorpène design; purchasing six submarines for US$3 billion ($500 million per boat). These submarines are to be manufactured under a technology transfer agreement by the state-owned Mazagon Docks in Mumbai and delivered between 2012 and 2016, however the project is running four years behind schedule. Construction started on 23 May 2009. India plans to incorporate the DRDO-developed air independent propulsion (AIP) system onto the last two submarines being built and also to equip the P75I submarines, of which the DCNS is participating in the tender process. It was reported in November 2014, that the DRDO-developed AIP system for the last two Scorpène submarines for the Indian Navy has been developed and is ready for testing in February 2015. The first Scorpène submarine, named INS Kalvari, was undocked for the purpose of starting sea trials in April 2015 and will be delivered in September 2016. In August 2016, a serious leak of over 20000 confidential pages of submarine’s manual were leaked by Australian Media and stiring up a controversy about a potential impact to India’s future ambitions of becoming a blue-water naval force. DCNS answered those documents were not critical.
Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2016
The Union Cabinet, cleared the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2016, banning commercial surrogacy in India.
The Bill also bars foreigners, homosexual couples, people in live-in relationships and single individuals.
Only childless, straight Indian couple married for a minimum of five years eligible for surrogacy.
Eligible couples will have to turn to close relatives, not necessarily related by blood for altruistic surrogacy — where no money exchanges hands between the commissioning couple and the surrogate mother.
The Bill also prohibits couples who already have biological or adopted children from commissioning babies through surrogacy.
The Bill approved will apply to the whole of India, except Jammu and Kashmir. Further, the new Bill mandates that women acting as surrogates can do so only once. And all Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) clinics will be registered.
10 months time have been given during which pregnancies under way now can be seen through and the babies delivered to the commissioning parents. After that all clinics will have to adhere to these new laws once Parliament passes the Bill.
In 2002, India became the first country to legalise commercial surrogacy. By 2012, India had become the ‘surrogacy capital’ of the world with surrogacy tourism valued at approximately $500 million annually by a paper written by advocate Amil Malhotra titled, ‘All
aboard for the fertility express.’
The surrogacy debate started in India in 2008, when two-week-old Baby Manji Yamada was left stateless after the commissioning parents in Japan divorced during the pregnancy and the commissioning mother refused to accept the baby. While the court granted custody to the baby’s grandmother after a long legal battle, the case led the Gujarat HC to state that there is “extreme urgency to push through legislation” which addresses such issues.
Subsequently, the 228th report of the Law Commission of India recommended prohibiting commercial surrogacy and allowing ethical altruistic surrogacy to the needy Indian citizens by enacting a suitable legislation.
Criticisms against the bill:
Gynaecologists and infertility specialists, said surrogacy is most often the last resort for people wanting a child.
The draft Bill bans renting a womb for money and allows it only if the woman is doing so for altruistic reasons, which surrogacy experts dubbed illogical and unreasonable. How many people actually have someone who will be willing to be a surrogate.
It is a violation of the reproductive right of the surrogate mother.
The draft Bill even banned egg donation that would only ensure that a sizeable number of people seeking IVF treatment would not be able to take it up now.
For women who did not have a uterus or had a medical condition that prevented them from conceiving, the government was taking away from them their last shot at parenthood.
Surrogacy should be viewed as a service available at a cost.
Private sector bears higher TB burden: Study
A study has found that in 2014 there were 2.2 million TB patients treated in India’s private sector alone. This is 2-3 times higher than current estimates.
The higher TB burden in the private sector might still be an underestimation as drug-resistant TB cases were not taken into account.
Thus, the private sector is treating an enormous number of patients for TB. In contrast, the State-run Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) treated 1.42 million TB patients in 2014.
According to a 2015 WHO report, six million new TB cases were reported to WHO from across the world in 2014. And India’s TB contribution accounted for 26 per cent of these reported cases.
Despite the private sector treating more patients than the public sector, systematic data on the private sector was lacking.
The results of the study have major implications for TB strategy for India. The disorganised private sector poses several challenges to TB control. Since free TB care is assured even to patients opting for private sector, India has to redouble efforts to reach patients being treated in the private sector and to deliver the highest possible standards of TB care. Second, surveillance of TB in the private sector has to be strengthened.
In 2014, as against 2.2 million cases, only a little over 100,000 cases were notified by doctors in the private sector. Finally, there is a compelling need to find the true TB burden in the country. TB burden is typically measured through TB prevalence surveys which need to be conducted more broadly across the country.
Nod for Rs.27,000 cr. projects
The Centre gave its green signal for investments worth more than Rs. 27,000 crore in new highways and railway lines across the country to boost economic growth.
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approved infrastructure projects worth Rs. 27,328 crore for expansion of railway lines in 11 states and development of 1,120 km national highways in five states.
Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA)
Composition:
Prime Minister.
Minister of Home Affairs.
Minister of External Affairs.
Minister of Finance;
Minister of Corporate Affairs.
Minister of Urban Development;
Minister of Housing and UrbanPoverty
Minister of Information and Broadcasting.
Minister of Road Transport and Highways;
Minister of Shipping.
Minister of Defence
Minister of Railways
Minister of Chemicals and Fertilizers;
Minister of Parliamentary Affairs.
Minister of Law and Justice;
Minister of Electronics and Information Technology.
Minister of Civil Aviation.
Minister of Food Processing Industries.
Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare.
Functions:
(i) to review on a continuous basis economic trends, problems and prospects with a view to evolving a consistent and integrated economic policy framework for the country;
(ii) to direct and coordinate all activities in the economic field including foreign investment, requiring policy decisions at the highest level;
(iii) to deal with matters relating to fixation of prices of agricultural products and price controls of industrial raw materials and products, industrial licensing policies and foreign investment policies;
(iv) to deal with increase in the prices of essential commodities or bulk goods under any form of formal or informal control;
(v) to lay down priorities for public sector investment;
(vi) to deal with industrial licensing cases involving proposals from the Ministries for the establishment of Joint Sector Undertakings;
(vii) to review the performance of Public Sector Enterprises;
(viii) to review progress of activities related to rural development including those concerning small and marginal farmers;
(ix) to facilitate finalisation of factual reports on the accomplishments of the Ministries, Agencies and Public Sector Undertakings involved in implementation of prioritised schemes or projects for evaluation by the Prime Minister;
(x) to consider issues relating to disinvestment;
(xi) to decide the price band and final price of sale of shares held by Government of India in all Central Public Sector Enterprises;
(xii) to decide the final pricing of the transaction and the strategic partner in case of the strategic sales; and
(xiii) to consider cases of increase in the firmed up cost estimates or revised cost estimates due to reasons such as time overrun, changes in scope, underestimation,etc.