| | 5 THINGS FIRST | PM Modi leaves for 5-day US visit; Foreign affairs minister S Jaishankar to take part in the G4 foreign ministers meet; CBI, ED officers summoned by West Bengal Speaker; IPL: DC vs SRH; AFC Cup semifinal: Nasaf Quarshi vs ATK Mohun Bagan | |
| | 1. What’s in a (brand) name? Ask the UK and India |  | India on Tuesday threatened retaliation against the UK’s “discriminatory” action to consider people who have been administered both doses of Covishield Covid-19 vaccine as unvaccinated and hence, not ease travel restrictions for them. India’s riposte- Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla said that India had “raised the discriminatory nature of UK vaccine recognition for AstraZeneca but not Covishield” and if the UK didn’t reverse its decision, India would be well within its “rights to take reciprocal action.”
- Foreign minister S Jaishankar also raised the issue with his British counterpart, UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and “urged early resolution of quarantine issue in mutual interest.”
India’s grouse- Last week, the UK issued new travel rules, effective October 4, that placed India in the red list of countries where the Covid-19 vaccines being used to inoculate the population are not recognised or considered approved by UK authorities — meaning travellers from India will have to undergo a compulsory 10-day quarantine on arrival in the UK. While majority of the Indians have been vaccinated using Covishield, a version of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine Vaxzevria, the UK only recognises the latter brand name, along with vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen.
Why the discrimination- Even though Covishield is biologically identical to Vaxzevria, it is manufactured in India by Serum Institute of India (SII) under licence from AstraZeneca. A different brand name and a different manufacturer makes it imperative for SII to seek regulatory approval from the relevant authorities by supplying its own efficacy data.
- The European Medicines Agency’s (EMA) ‘vaccine passport’ programme that came into effect from July, also left out Covishield while including Vaxzevria as SII, which had been busy trying to ramp up its production to meet its Indian and globals commitments, hadn’t bothered submitting an approval application for Covishield to the EMA.
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| | 2. Macron reaches out to India amidst tiff with US, Aus |  | File picture
India and France vowed to "act jointly in an open and inclusive Indo-Pacific area" following talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron. - In an indirect reference to China, the two also agreed to promote "regional stability and the rule of law, while ruling out any form of hegemony," a French statement said.
- The two leaders also discussed the recent developments in Afghanistan and shared their concerns about the possible spread of terrorism, narcotics, illicit weapons and human trafficking, an Indian statement said.
Context: - The phone call was held ahead of Modi's US visit for the UN General Assembly (UNGA) and a meeting of the Quad leaders, where Chinese aggression and Afghanistan are on the agenda.
- It also comes amidst French anger over the US-UK-Australia deal to help the latter build nuclear-powered submarines. That deal meant Australia scrapped a $66 billion contract with France to build 12 conventional submarines. India already has a relationship with the French Naval Group, which is helping it build 6 scorpene class conventional submarines.
Over at UNGA...- US President Joe Biden said the US can cooperate with China on climate change even as the two compete economically and ideologically. Biden also defended the troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, saying the US was closing an era of endless war to open “a new era of relentless diplomacy”.
- Modi and Biden are to hold bilateral talks on September 24.
Also: Just walk the walk... - K-Pop band BTS released a music video of 'Permission to Dance', shot at the General Assembly hall, to promote the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.
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| | 3. Net freedom continues to decline in India |  | - Internet users in a record number of countries have faced arrest and physical attacks for their posts over the past year, revealed the annual Freedom on the Net report compiled by US thinktank from Freedom House, as online rights declined globally for the 11th year in a row.
- The 2021 survey gave 70 countries a score out of 100 for the level of internet freedom enjoyed by citizens, including the extent to which they face restrictions on the content they can access. Other factors included whether pro-government trolls seek to manipulate online debates.
- Globally: While China ranked as the worst environment for internet freedom for the seventh year in a row, the greatest deteriorations were documented in Myanmar, Belarus, and Uganda, where state forces cracked down amid electoral and constitutional crises. Myanmar’s 14-point score decline is the largest registered since the Freedom on the Net project began. Full report here.
- And India? With the second-largest number of internet subscribers in the world after China, the country figured in the bottom 30 with internet freedom weakening for a fourth straight year.
- Labelled 'partly free', its internet freedom score dropped from 51/100 last year to 49/100. ('0' meaning least free and '100' meaning most free.) The three categories used to assess freedom were obstacles to access (11/25), limits on content (21/35) and violations of user rights (17/40). Full India analysis here.
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| | 4. Airports authority to exit joint ventures |  | - The Airports Authority of India (AAI) will soon exit the joint ventures tjhat operate some of the biggest airports in the country, the TOI reports. The state-run firm has a 26% stake each in Delhi and Mumbai airports and 13% each in Hyderabad and Bengaluru.
- The union aviation ministry has moved a Cabinet note seeking the approval to divest the stake, and the process is likely to start with Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Mumbai and Delhi may follow in the second phase.
- The union government has been on a busy streak of privatisation, and Adani Group has emerged as the largest private operator in the country. The Group won the bid to operate six airports that were previously under the AAI: Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Mangaluru, Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram. It also acquired a 74% stake in the Mumbai International Airport (from GVK and other investors), which operates the Mumbai airport and has the rights to the upcoming Navi Mumbai international airport.
- Earlier this month, AAI cleared a plan to privatise 13 more airports by clubbing seven small airports with six big ones: Varanasi with Kushinagar and Gaya; Amritsar with Kangra; Bhubaneswar with Tirupati; Raipur with Aurangabad; Indore with Jabalpur and Trichy with Hubli.
- According to the National Asset Monetisation Pipeline prepared by the NITI Aayog recently, the government aims to raise Rs 20,782 crore through aviation assets in FY22-25 by privatising 25 AAI airports and selling AAI’s stake in JV airports.
- AAI has earned approximately Rs 30,069 crore till 2020-21 from its joint venture airports and public-private partnership (PPP) airports being run by private entities, union minister of state for civil aviation V.K Singh told Lok Sabha recently.
Meanwhile, Gautam Adani said his conglomerate will invest over $20 billion in clean energy over the next 10 years, including in power generation, transmission and distribution, and component manufacturing, as India's two richest men — Mukesh Ambani had announced a similar outlay for Reliance Industries — steer their businesses in line with the government’s renewable energy goals. | |
| | | 6. Women to be inducted into NDA next year, says Centre |  | - The Ministry of Defence (MoD) on Tuesday informed the Supreme Court (SC) that a notification to allow women to sit for the National Defence Academy (NDA) examination will be issued next year in May. Last month, in an interim order, the court had said that women will be allowed to appear for the NDA which was earlier scheduled for September 5 but was rescheduled for November 24.
- In its affidavit filed before the SC, the MoD argued that it needed reasonable time to formulate policies for the intake of women candidates such as determining the medical standards taking into account their age and nature of training, fixing the intake strength, formulation of training standards for women and building of physical infrastructure such as residential quarters for women with strict physical separation, including separate bathroom cubicles.
- The MoD in its affidavit added that “any dilution of physical training and service subject like firing, etc. would invariably impact the battle worthiness of the Armed Forces adversely.” Earlier this month, the Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Aishwarya Bhati, while submitting that the Centre had decided to “induct girls for permanent commission”, urged the court to “consider granting status quo for this examination and let it continue as it will need policy, procedure, training and infrastructure changes.”
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| | 7. Will Ola, Uber, Zomato and Swiggy pay PF & pension to their workers? |  | - “Gig workers” of companies such as cab aggregators Ola and Uber, as also food delivery apps like Swiggy and Zomato have filed a petition in the Supreme Court (SC) seeking social security benefits from the companies under the Unorganised Workers’ Social Welfare Security Act, 2008. Social security benefits include provident fund, gratuity, old age pension, health and life insurance, among other things.
- Contending that “denial of social security to the said “gig workers” and the “platform workers” has resulted in their exploitation through forced labour”, the petition argued that “the right to livelihood includes the right to work on decent and fair conditions of work.”
- The petitioners have been emboldened by the ruling by a UK court earlier this year which said that Uber’s “drivers were rightly found to be "workers"” as they were “in a position of subordination and dependency in relation to Uber such that they have little or no ability to improve their economic position through professional or entrepreneurial skill.”
- Last year, a French court had also ruled against Uber, observing that “the driver does not provide services as a self-employed person, but as an employee” as after “connecting to the Uber digital platform, a relationship of subordination is established between the driver and the company.”
- Gig workers are usually designated as ‘partners’ by the aggregators which enables companies to get away with no fixed base salary. Zomato, for instance, pays a measly Rs 20 per order to its delivery personnel, if it’s within four kilometres (km), with an extra Rs 5 per km for distances beyond that. However, the delivery boys or girls have to spend out of their own pocket on expenses such as fuel and data plans for their phones.
- Highlighting this aspect, the petition said that the partnership “contracts are a mere device to disguise the nature of relationship, which is de-jure and de-facto relationship of employer and worker being a contract of employment” or like that of a “master and servant.”
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| | 8. A tale of two young pacers |  | Tyagi (right) & Arshdeep- Punjab Kings (PBKS) needed just four off the last over with eight wickets in hand to seal a much-needed victory against Rajasthan Royals (RR) on Tuesday. Little had anyone imagined that Kartik Tyagi, who had starred for India at the U-19 World Cup in 2020 as a teenager, would do a near impossible on the IPL field.
- Having gone wicketless for 28 in his three previous overs, the 20-year-old pacer sent down five dot balls, removing well set batsman Nicholas Pooran and Deepak Hooda — both caught behind — in the process, off the third and fifth balls. The solitary run he conceded was off the second ball as another set batsman Aiden Markram went off strike. Tyagi also joined Munaf Patel for the fewest runs — 4 — successfully defended in the final over of an IPL game. Out of the contest for 19 overs, PBKS had choked against the opponents' most inexperienced bowler.
- Earlier, 28-year-old pacer Arshdeep Singh picked up his maiden IPL five-wicket haul as Punjab Kings restricted RR to below 200, which looked a certainty after solid cameos from Yashaswi Jaiswal, Evin Lewis, Liam Livingstone and Mahipal Lomror. It wasn't just his best figures in an IPL game, he also became the third-youngest player to take an IPL five-for.
- Before the innings, Arshdeep had taken 13 of his 22 IPL wickets in the death overs. On Tuesday, he picked up three of his five scalps in the last four overs as Punjab conceded only 49 conceded in the last 36 balls along with seven wickets.
- Scorecard: RR 185 (Jaiswal 49, Lomror 43, Arshdeep 5/32) beat PBKS 183/4 (Mayank 67, Rahul 49, Tyagi 2/29) by 2 runs
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| | 9. Trudeau survives an election gamble, but misses his mark |  | - Justin Trudeau secured a third term as the prime minister of Canada after his Liberal Party won the most seats in the snap election called two years before schedule, a gamble Trudeau hoped would reward him with an outright majority in the parliament based on his pandemic track record. Trudeau, 49, has been in power since 2015.
- But that was not to be. The results left him more or less where he was. The Liberal Party was leading or elected in 158 seats — one more than they won in 2019, and 12 short of the 170 needed for a majority in the House of Commons.
- The gamble to call an early election amidst a pandemic was pilloried by the opposition parties, particularly the conservatives. Those criticisms and some recent controversies played a spoilsport in Trudeau's calculations.
- Voters picked Liberals over the Conservatives, whose leader Erin O’Toole had opposed lockdown and vaccine mandates. The Conservatives were leading or elected in 119 seats, two less than 2019. The leftist New Democrats, led by Jagmeet Singh, were leading or elected in 25, while the Bloc Québécois were leading or elected in 34 seats and the Greens were down to two.
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| | Answer to NEWS IN CLUES | Indian Air Force. The government on Tuesday appointed Air Marshal VR Chaudhari (in pic), presently the Vice Chief of Air Staff, as the next Chief of Air Staff. Chaudhari will take charge as the next Chief of Air Staff after the retirement of Air Chief Marshal RKS Bhadauria on September 30. | |
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