GS Analyst: Daily Current Affairs

Context:

Gender equality reform hinges on acknowledging unpaid work and fairly dividing household chores to ensure equitable progress.

Gender Representation in Indian Politics

• Women's Reservation Bill: The recent passage of the Women's Reservation Bill in Parliament, offering one-third reservation for women in the Lok Sabha and Legislative Assemblies, is a significant step toward achieving gender equality in Indian politics.
• Global Gender Gap: India's current representation of women in Parliament, at around 15%, ranks it 141st out of 193 countries.
• Moral Imperative and Consensus: Increasing women's representation in politics is widely acknowledged as a moral imperative, and the smooth passage of this law indicates a growing consensus on the importance of women's participation in governance.

Challenges and Contingencies in Implementation

• Census and Delimitation: The effective implementation of the Women's Reservation Bill depends on the conduct of the next Census and subsequent delimitation exercises.
• Legality of Contingency Clause: The legality of linking a law to an uncertain future event, such as delimitation, raises questions that may need to be addressed by constitutional courts, introducing further complexities into the reform process.
• Societal Change: Achieving gender justice requires equitable sharing of household responsibilities, addressing the substantial burden of unpaid labour borne by women.

Building Capacity and Ensuring Effective Reform

• Unpaid Labour Recognition: Recent research reveals the significant disparity in unpaid domestic labour, with women spending far more time on these responsibilities than men.
• Capacity Building: As more women enter politics due to the reservation law, Lessons from initiatives like EMILYs List in the U.S. underscore the importance of mentorship, campaign guidance, and capacity-building efforts for women in politics.
• Role of Government and Institutions: The National Commission for Women and the Parliamentary Committee on Empowerment of Women need to be restructured to ensure the law's effective implementation.

Context:

India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 can address data ethics, commodification, and regulation challenges in the digital age.

Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023

• Data as a Neutral Commodity: The prevalence of data-centric discussions sustains the mystique of computational networks as reliable decision-makers.
• Alignment with Global Regulations: India's Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act 2023 aligns with global data protection regulations seen in the EU, UK, and China.
• Data Protection and Privacy: DPDP Act 2023 emphasizes the importance of data protection, privacy, and the right to be forgotten, holding entities accountable for transparent and ethical data practices.

Ethical Concerns and Economic Value of Data

• Ethics of Data Generation: Digital data not only describe actions but also define individuals and predict their future behaviours.
• Data as a Commodity: Excessive emphasis on the economic value of data perpetuates the idea that all data can be commodified and harvested.
• This approach disregards the embodied nature of data, rooted in personal experiences and practices.
• Data Circulation and Consent: While data can travel, regulations must consider whether data can be alienated from the subject, creating digital and temporal distance that eliminates the need for consent.
• Legal scholars argue for data's inalienable nature, urging a reevaluation of how far data can travel without losing its origin and consent.

Step towards Data Equity

• Historic Landmark in India: The DPDP Act 2023 aims to establish data equity and justice, particularly for vulnerable individuals.
• Operational Realities: Operationalization should focus on ethics in data generation, redefining data as an embodied resource, and regulating data circulation to protect consent and provenance.
• Three Data Principles: To fulfill its aspirations, the DPDP Act must challenge and critique the three de facto principles of digital data: neutrality, commodification, and limitless circulation.

Context:

The crisis in Joshimath, Uttarakhand has highlighted land subsidence, lack of transparency, and the need for sustainable development.

Lack of Information Transparency

• Calamitous Start to the Year: The year began with reports of the temple town of Joshimath in Uttarakhand sinking and showing cracks in buildings.
• People fled and took refuge in tents due to fears of their homes collapsing, resulting in a humanitarian crisis.
• Factors Behind Land Subsidence: The land subsidence issue was attributed to tunnelling activities from the Tapovan Vishnugad power project by the National Thermal Power Corporation.
• Secrecy Surrounding Information: Satellite imagery was considered a factor in causing panic, and information was to be shared only after clearance from the Central government.

Infrastructure Risks in Uttarakhand

• Non-Compliance with Building Codes: The region's fragile geology makes infrastructure projects, resembling cities, inherently risky.
• Need for Monitoring: Comprehensive town planning and construction measures are essential to minimize the risk of accidents and loss of life.
• Sustainable Development and Public Awareness: Governments must prioritize sustainable decisions over short-term electoral gains. Disseminating risk information widely and incorporating it into public consciousness is crucial.

Role of Scientific Counsel

• Independent Scientific Counsel: Independent scientific advice should play a central role in policymaking, especially in geologically fragile regions.
• Setting Development Limits: Clear boundaries should be established concerning the extent of development permissible in the region.
• Creating Balance: Balancing citizens' needs with responsible land use and infrastructure development is essential.

Context:

On September 24, NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft successfully dropped off a capsule on Earth containing around 250 grams of rocks and dust collected from the Asteroid 101955 Bennu. Bennu sample can help human understanding beyond the immediate

Asteroid Bennu's Significance

• OSIRIS-REx Capsule Landing: Bennu, a carbonaceous asteroid, holds crucial clues about the early solar system and potential ingredients for life on Earth.
• Importance of Bennu's Study: Scientists believe asteroids like Bennu could have delivered life-forming compounds to Earth through impacts.
• Collision Prevention: Bennu's orbit could intersect with Earth's path between 2178 and 2290, making it vital to study and understand its trajectory to develop collision prevention strategies.

OSIRIS-REx Mission Details

• OSIRIS-REx Mission Overview: OSIRIS-REx was placed into orbit around Bennu in 2018, landing briefly in October 2020 to collect a sample from a predetermined location.
• Collaboration with Japan's Hayabusa Missions: OSIRIS-REx is part of NASA's 'New Frontiers' program, along with Japan's Hayabusa missions to asteroids Itokawa and Ryugu.
• Quest for Origin of Life: The return of OSIRIS-REx's capsule represents a remarkable achievement in our exploration of the cosmos.

Expanding Knowledge of the Solar System

• New Frontiers Program's Significance: OSIRIS-REx is NASA's third element in the 'New Frontiers' program, following New Horizons and Juno missions.
• Commercial Opportunities: Studies of Bennu and similar missions offer commercial prospects, such as space mining, and advancements in impact mitigation technologies.
• OSIRIS-REx Capsule: The return of OSIRIS-REx's capsule brings a tangible piece of the universe to humanity, symbolizing our quest to understand the infinite.