Indian Government Policies Research Articles

"News has various shades": Quantifying and Analyzing Media Bias at Aspect-level Granularity

This research presents a novel approach to dissecting media narratives, with a specific focus on aspect-level granularity and variance in addressing multifaceted news topics. Unlike previous studies, which often concentrate solely on ideological or political biases, our methodology delves deeper, exploring how diverse media outlets navigate the complexities of various news aspects. Through a detailed case study on Indian government policies, we uncover distinctive biases and variations in reporting between Indian and international media. Crucially, our methodology leverages Natural Language Inference (NLI) to identify news aspects and ascertain aspect-level sentiment from news text, enabling scalable and precise quantification of bias across diverse media narratives. Our findings illuminate the multifaceted layers of media coverage, revealing nuanced stances on different aspects of the same topic and the dynamic nature of biases over time. Importantly, our comprehensive framework quantifies media bias through data-driven quantitative evaluation, capturing both selection bias based on news aspect coverage and statement bias based on sentiment polarity. It is relevant to note that in our context, bias is not inherently favourable or unfavourable but rather serves as a quantitative metric to measure divergence in news presentation from the overall average. Thus, our contributions not only enhance understanding of media bias but also introduce a methodology distinguished for its comprehensive and scalable approach to analyzing media narratives, with substantial implications for future research and discussions in this domain.

Breaking the Rationality Assumption

This paper explores the role of Behavioral Economics in understanding how psychological factors influence consumer decisions, often leading to irrational choices. Traditional economics assumes rational decision-making, but in reality, emotions, cognitive biases, and social factors drive behavior. The paper highlights how illiteracy impacts decision-making, forcing short-term thinking over long-term benefits. It also discusses how psychological barriers like overconfidence, peer pressure, and emotional responses prevent rational decisions. Several Indian government policies, such as the Population Control Policy, Reservation System, and Demonetization, are reviewed to show how poor execution can lead to negative consequences. The paper concludes by emphasizing the need for better education, critical thinking, and informed policymaking to improve decision-making and empower people to make rational choices. Effective decision-making requires understanding both economic and psychological factors, which can lead to more balanced, thoughtful choices for the betterment of society.

E-Mobility Revolution: Examining the Types, Evolution, Government Policies and Future Perspective of Electric Vehicles

: Electrification is a suitable method for establishing a transportation system that is both clean and energy-efficient, addressing environmental concerns. The transportation industry widely recognizes electric vehicles as a highly promising green technology that can reduce carbon emissions and energy consumption. Besides, electric vehicles are defined as vehicles that can be externally charged and propelled by an electric motor powered by a battery. Moreover, an electric vehicle consists of two distinct types: firstly, an all-electric vehicle, which relies exclusively on battery power to move an electric motor, and secondly, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles. This study aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of electric vehicles by covering four key aspects: types of electric vehicles, the history of electric vehicles, government policies related to electric vehicles, and future prospects of electric vehicles. This paper first discusses the basic types of electric vehicles. Through a comprehensive analysis of several categories of electric vehicles, their distinct characteristics, and their advantages, research enables individuals to make well-informed decisions when contemplating sustainable transportation alternatives. After that, a brief history of electric vehicles is discussed. Documenting the historical evolution of electric vehicles provides context for understanding the technological advancements, challenges, and milestones achieved in the development of electric vehicles over time. After that, Indian government policies related to electric vehicle promotion are discussed. Consequently, this encompasses various incentives, subsidies, initiatives for infrastructure development, and other policy measures with the objective of fostering the use of electric vehicles. Lastly, future prospects of electric vehicles are discussed.

Natural Gas Matters: LNG and India’s Quest for Clean Energy

India, the world’s most populous country, is the world’s third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases (GHGs). Despite employing several energy sources, it still relies heavily on coal, its primary energy source. Given India’s swiftly rising energy demand, this challenges meeting emission reduction targets. In recent years, India has significantly increased investments in renewables like solar and hydrogen. While commendable, these initiatives alone cannot meet the country’s expanding energy demands. In the short term, India must rely on both domestic and imported fossil fuels, with natural gas being the most environmentally friendly option. In this context, this paper attempts to forecast energy consumption, natural gas production, and consumption in India until 2050, using both univariate and multivariate forecasting methods. For multivariate forecasting, we have assumed two alternative possibilities for GDP growth: the business-as-usual and the high-growth scenarios. Each of our forecasts indicates a notable shortfall in the projected production of natural gas compared to the expected demand, implying our results are robust. Our model predicts that nearly 30–50 percent of India’s natural gas consumption will be met by imports, mainly in the form of LNG. Based on these findings, this paper recommends that Indian government policies emphasize increasing domestic natural gas production, importing LNG, and expanding renewable energy resources.

Ab. No. 74 Women-Focused Cardiac Rehabilitation in India - An Urgent Need

Introduction: To review and highlight the current scenario of Cardiovascular disease (CVD) and Cardiac Rehabilitation (CR) offered to women in India and globally. CVD in women resulted in a 35% mortality rate among the total deaths worldwide in 2019. Women’s cardiovascular health needs additional attention because of increased CVD risk factors like diabetes, use of oral contraceptives, menopausal and postpartum issues, and low socioeconomic position. Globally, the rate of women screened, diagnosed, treated for CVD, and enrolled in rehabilitation is way more than in India. Method: Comprehensive literature search was done on search engines, PubMed and Google Scholar. Articles were selected based on the inclusion/exclusion criteria. 25 articles were screened and 16 were included and reviewed. A descriptive analysis was done. Result: The paper summarizes the increasing need and existing shortage of women-focused cardiac care in India. The male-female ratio of cardiac care utilization under Indian government policy was 70:30. Indian women’s low participation is due to financial dependency, lack of knowledge, and poor accessibility. There exists a lack of skilled professionals, dedicated CR centres pan India, and policies to advocate Women-focused CR (WFCR). Globally, 40.9% of countries have CR with 32.1% centres offering WFCR. These programs encompass community classes, home-based/online delivery models, women support groups, buddy programs, flexible scheduling, and comprehensive delivery of educational programs. Conclusion: The way forward for CR in India is to explore possibilities to reduce the barriers faced by women to avail of CR services. Policies need to be formulated to draw women’s attention to healthcare. Training programs should be introduced to upskill our nation’s young physiotherapy professionals. Implication: A bridge between CVD and CR must be formed and more women-centric CR programs should be designed for holistic cardiac health.

Water-energy-food-ecosystem nexus in India—A review of relevant studies, policies, and programmes

Current approaches for utilization of resources in water-energy-food-ecosystem (WEFE) sectors appear to be unsustainable and sub-optimal because of silo-based approaches that ignore interconnectedness across these interdependent sectors. A nexus approach that considers the interactions and interdependence among the sectors helps overcome weaknesses of silo-based approaches to better address synergies and trade-offs. This paper discusses the concept of the WEFE nexus-based approach for achieving water, energy, food, and environment security in India and presents a review of recent relevant literature. The paper critically reviews the key Indian government policies and programmes in the WEFE sector to assess the synergies and trade-offs among them. More than ≈ 40 programmes across WEFE sectors were studied to understand the efforts underway in these sectors to attain the respective policy goals. Although the implementation of the nexus concept will depend upon the enabling government policies and programmes, we find that discussions on these aspects are missing in the literature. Our review shows that the policies of different sectors give inadequate consideration to the impacts of decisions on the other related sectors. Although the various programmes are appreciably contributing to the policy goals and security for respective sectors, there are significant overlaps among the programmes which could positively or negatively impact other sector(s). There is a need to quantify the trade-offs by using an integrated approach including modeling with the WEFE nexus lens. The study also discusses the key challenges and barriers in implementing the nexus concept in India and how to overcome them.

Direct and indirect air pollutant reductions as co-benefits of the energy transition toward carbon-neutrality in India's residential sector

With increasing air pollution, exposure to air pollutants is becoming a critical health and environmental issue all over the world. In case of India, due to significant differences in the economic status and energy consumption characteristics, substantial variation in the air pollutant emissions is observed across Indian states in urban and rural areas. This study aims at developing a residential sector model to project CO2 emissions up to 2070, leading India's progress towards carbon-neutrality, and evaluating the dual benefits of reducing the aforesaid emissions. A bottom-up optimization model is used to analyze these emission projections for greenhouse gases (GHGs) and air pollutants across Indian states in rural and urban areas. Further, to evaluate the effects of Indian government policy, various mitigation scenarios are analyzed, which capture the energy transition and direct and indirect emissions in India's slow, medium, and fast-developing states. Rapid energy transition in India doubles the total energy consumption in the business-as-usual (BAU) scenario from 2010 to 2070. Consumption of traditional biomass and coal energy sources dramatically falls, and advanced energy sources such as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and electricity are adopted. Energy transitions help decrease the vulnerability to harmful direct air pollutants such as black carbon (BC), organic carbon (OC) and particulate matter (PM) among rural households. There are serious tradeoffs, however, as increased usage of LPG and electricity may raise total CO2, SO2, and NOX emissions. Higher LPG consumption leads to a more than two-fold increase in CO2 emissions by 2070, compared to 2020 in residential sector. By pursuing carbon-neutrality through a renewable electricity transition, the most ambitious scenario in this study, India could reduce CO2, SO2, NOX, and BC emissions by 67%, 87%, 89%, and 99%, respectively, from the 2070 BAU levels.

A Comprehensive Study Assessing the Transformative Role of Artificial Intelligence in India\'s Governance Policy Framework

Abstract: Artificial Intelligence (AI) has gained significant prominence worldwide, and India is actively embracing its potential for transforming various sectors. This paper comprehensively studies the intersection between artificial intelligence and Indian government policies. It explores the opportunities, challenges, and implications of AI implementation in the Indian context, and discusses the evolving role of the Indian government in harnessing AI technologies. The paper addresses the challenges and risks associated with AI implementation in India, including ethical considerations, socioeconomic implications, privacy concerns, workforce capacity building, and infrastructure requirements. This section underscores the need for appropriate policies and regulatory frameworks to address these challenges effectively. The paper further examines the Indian government's policies and initiatives on AI, including the national AI strategy, policy frameworks, AI centres of excellence, startup ecosystem, and international collaboration efforts. It delves into key policy considerations such as data governance, ethical and responsible AI, regulation and standards, skills development, and inclusivity.

A Paradigm Shift in Indian Competition Regime Vis-A-Vis Restructured Adjudicatory Institution

In the recent past Indian government policy relating to the reform of the tribunals has raised debate amongst researchers, policy makers, judiciary and stake holders. However, this reform was never called for in respect of Indian competition law, despite many instances of discord between the relevant adjudicatory and regulatory bodies. Significant time and effort is required to develop an appropriate jurisdiction specific antitrust regime, which is distinct from that required in respect of other sectoral tribunals. Any structural reform pertaining to a developing competition jurisdiction can have a serious impact on its performance and the disposal rate of competition cases. In this paper a substantial performance analysis has been carried out from the perspective of the pre and post restructured adjudicatory institution of competition regulatory body. Ultimately, it is concluded that the reform has resulted in a steady reduction in the performance of the Indian competition enforcement system, thus calling for reconsideration of the reestablishment of a dedicated competition law adjudicatory institution. Competition law, government policy, antitrust regime, litigation disposal rate, developing jurisdiction, specialized tribunal, synergy, AAEC, domain expertise, restructured institution

Recent trends of plastic waste management for sustainable environment in Indian context

One of the most rapidly expanding waste streams in municipal solid waste worldwide is plastic waste. Due to their non-decaying, large quantities and difficulties in disposing of them, waste plastics have become a significant threat to the environment. India has ranked 12th among the countries with improper management of waste plastics, but it is projected that it will be ranked 5th by the year 2025. Energy recuperation from pyrolysis of plastic waste in the form of liquid fuel is acquiring fascination overall by meeting the difficulties of energy security and natural assurance. A brief overview about the conversion of different types of plastic waste into fuel and summary of the results emphasising the utilization of fuel as a replacement of diesel is presented in this paper. The different operating parameters of pyrolysis process, their impact on yield, constraints of the implementation in large scale of this technology and recent technological advancements have been covered in this review. The review has also discussed the Indian government policies on plastic waste management, challenges and future scope.

A sustainability assessment framework for high-rise residential projects: a case of India

In India, the polarization of growth towards urban areas leads to a considerable rise in multifamily, high-rise residential projects. Hence, incorporating sustainability in high-rise residential construction is one of the key aims of sustainable urban development. This study presents a comprehensive framework for the sustainability assessment of high-rise residential projects in India, addressing economic, environmental and social dimensions throughout the project’s life cycle. The proposed framework comprises 44 attributes, 11 criteria and three dimensions of sustainability based on an extensive literature review, Indian government policies and guidelines for environmental clearance of residential projects and India’s commonly adopted green building rating systems. The present study has identified 12 economically favourable sustainability attributes which can be helpful to encourage developers to implement them. Further, the analytic hierarchy process was used to evaluate the weights of identified sustainability attributes, criteria and dimensions based on experts’ opinions. The developed sustainability assessment framework provides a blueprint for promoting sustainable practices in high-rise residential construction. It can also be used to develop a sustainability assessment tool for high-rise residential projects.

Large-Scale Education Reform in General Equilibrium: Regression Discontinuity Evidence from India

The economic consequences of large-scale government investments in education depend on general equilibrium effects in both the labor market and the education sector. I develop a general equilibrium model capturing the consequences of massive countrywide schooling initiatives. I provide unbiased estimates of the model’s elasticities, using a regression discontinuity derived from Indian government policy. The earnings returns to a year of education are 13.4%, and the general equilibrium labor market effects substantially depress returns, by 6.6 percentage points. These general equilibrium effects have distributional consequences across cohorts and skill groups, whereby unskilled workers are better off and skilled workers worse off.

Analysis of Key Performance Indicators to Study the Growth and Development of Selected Software Companies in India

The Indian software industry plays a significant role in developing the national economy, from an inward looking economy into a dynamic digitally empowered society. Nearly 95% of the foreign exchange inflows in the service sector are contributed by IT and Buisness Process Outsourcing (BPO) industries. Indian government policy was introduced in 1986 and modified in 1988 in relation with the world market policy, Software Technology Parks of India scheme support to attract Foreign Direct Investment. Recent advancement in the field of information and communication has significantly modified the role of IT in all organizations. Enormous growth in IT industry has changed the outsourcing strategy and buying behavior. Organizations can realize more benefits by investing more funds in IT. India is considered a pioneer in software development and a favourite destination for software and IT enabled services. IT industry has produced a revolutionary variation in the economic scenario and a huge number of personnel are working with higher productivity and association with Multi National Corporations (MNCs).

Platform-Based Internationalization of Smaller Firms: The Role of Government Policy

Governments are recognizing anticompetitive concerns and market distortions associated with the rise of e-commerce platforms. Thus, policies are being crafted to level the playing field between large platform operators and small platform sellers. In addition, policies mitigating barriers to internationalization associated with using e-commerce platforms are also being developed. This study aims to explore these policy actions impacting the platform-based internationalization of small and micro enterprises (SMEs). The case study method is adopted to provide rich insights into the Indian Government policy actions impacting the e-commerce platform-based internationalization of Indian SMEs. More specifically, this investigation analyzes the extent to which the Indian Government policy actions have mitigated the home market and industry-level barriers to export for SMEs leveraging e-commerce platforms for their internationalization efforts. Study findings provide rich policy implications and fodder for future empirical testing of key qualitative insights uncovered in this study.

EVALUATING THE EFFECT OF MACROECONOMIC INDICATORS ON INDIAN STOCK MARKET IN POST LIBERALISATION ERA

Due to liberalisation and globalisation policies of Indian government in 1991, Indian capital market has undergone tremendous changes. Indian capital market has proved to be a key driver of modern market-based economy and has acted as the major source of raising resources for Indian corporates, leading to financial development and economic growth of India. Macroeconomic variables play a vital role in framing government policy decisions. The present study attempts to evaluate the impact of macroeconomic variables on the performance of the Indian stock market during the study period 1993-94 to 2018-2019. Gross Domestic Product, Broad Money, Crude oil Price, Current deficit and Foreign Exchange Reserve have been used as Macroeconomic Indicators whereas; Sensex and Nifty have been used as Stock Market performance to study the research objectives. Step-wise Backward Elimination Method of Multiple Regression Analysis has been used. It is found that GDP and FER are the significant variables in explaining the variations of Sensex whereas FER, CD and COP are the significant variables contributing to the variations of NSE Nifty

Investigating political polarization in India through the lens of Twitter.

Social media plays a pivotal role in shaping communication among political entities. Substantial research has been carried out for examining the impact of politicians’ social media usage and interactions on political polarization. Analysing political polarization is particularly significant for fragmented political systems like India where collaboration between parties is essential for winning support in parliament. Different topics of discussion between political entities may induce different levels of polarization. This study aims to examine the presence of polarization on Twitter social media platform with respect to different topics of political discussions among Indian politicians. The investigation is based upon two conflicting notions about social media in influencing political polarization. The first notion regards social media as a medium for interaction between different ideological users. The second opinion on the other hand focuses on prevalence of selective exposure in social media leading to polarization. The study will investigate the use of Twitter for forming communication ties in and between parties and the extent of divergence of opinions during political discourse. The investigation performs social network analysis and content analysis of the tweets posted by Indian politicians during some major events in India from 2019 to 2021. For an unbiased topic-specific analysis of polarization, some important topics related to Indian government policies, national security and natural disaster events have been considered. The findings of the study suggest that Twitter not only opens up communication spaces to Indian political users but also makes online political discussions among them polarized. Moreover, the extent of polarization varies with respect to topics of political discussions. Polarization is more for controversial and debatable topics than non-controversial ones.

IMPACT OF FRUIT BATS (Rousettus leschenaulti AND Cynopterus sphinx) IN THE TROPICAL ECOSYSTEM OF TIRUNELVELI DISTRICT, TAMIL NADU, INDIA

Fruit bat diversity available in the ecosystem of Tirunelveli District is important for pollinating flowers and seed dispersal. Two common megachiropterans Rousettus leschnaulti (fulvous fruit bat) and Cynopterus sphinx (greater short-nosed fruit bat) interacting in different agro and tropical forest ecosystem of Tirunelveli district has been selected as study animals for this impact analysis. Various food selections, processing strategies, the economical and ecological importance of bat dependent plants have provided a glimpse on the fruit bat’s bio-agent role in the ecosystem. Identification of left outs from the feeding roosts, observations with video recording and mist-netting in the foraging areas is the documented data for fruit bat–plant interdependence. Their species specific dietary preferences immensely help to retain the community structures and long time survival of specific taxa in the ecosystem. In spite of their special role they have attracted little recognition under Indian government legislations and policies. The documented species specific impact and ecosystem services of R. leschnaulti and C. sphinx in the Tropical ecosystem is the field proof data which can be of use to revise the status of fruit bats under Schedule V, Indian Wildlife Protection Act 1972.

Prospects of Agriculture as a Lifelong Livelihood Option for Young Indian Rural Population

There is a huge untapped reservoir of employment opportunities in agriculture which requires cultivating the young generation of farmers, food entrepreneurs, etc. Due to agricultural innovations made at the global and national level, the young population can leverage technology, leading to increase in productivity, efficiency and output and addressing the issue of food security. For promoting employment for youths in agriculture and making farming a remunerative economic activity, initiatives have been taken by FAO and by Government of India. The present study focuses on demographic profile of the youth, explores agriculture as an economically viable livelihood option for the youth and highlights the Indian Government policy measures and technological interventions for making agriculture an attractive employment option; discusses the initiatives taken by FAO for promotion of employment in agriculture and finally paper concludes by examining the role of rural youth in addressing the challenge of food security at the national level.

The Outbreaks of Acute Encephalitis Syndrome in Uttar Pradesh, India (1978-2020) and Its Effective Management: A Remarkable Public Health Success Story.

IntroductionAcute encephalitis syndrome (AES) is a major public health enigma in India and the world. Uttar Pradesh (UP) is witnessing recurrent and extensive seasonal AES outbreaks since 1978. Government of India and UP state government have devised various mitigation measures to reduce AES burden and AES associated mortality, morbidity and disability in Uttar Pradesh. The aim of this study was to describe the public health measures taken in order to control seasonal outbreaks of AES in UP between 1978 and 2020.MethodsWe used literature review as a method of analysis, including the Indian government policy documents. This review utilized search engines such as PubMed, Google Scholar, Research Gate, Cochrane, Medline to retrieve articles and information using strategic keywords related to Acute Encephalitis Syndrome. Data was also collected from progress reports of government schemes and websites of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme (NVBDCP) and Integrated Disease Surveillance Programmes (IDSP).ResultsThe incidence of AES cases in UP have declined from 18.2 per million population during 2005-2009 to 15 per million population during 2015-2019 [CI 12.6–20.6, P-value < 0.001] and case fatality rate (CFR) reduced from 33% during 1980-1984 to 12.6% during 2015-2019 [CI 17.4–30.98, P-value < 0.001]. AES incidence was 9 (2019) and 7 (2020) cases per million populations respectively and CFR was 5.8% (2019) and 5% (2020). This decline was likely due to active surveillance programs identifying aetiological agents and risk factors of AES cases. The identified etiologies of AES include Japanese encephalitis virus (5–20%), Enterovirus (0.1–33%), Orientia tsutsugamushi (45–60%) and other viral (0.2–4.2%), bacterial (0–5%) and Rickettsial (0.5–2%) causes. The aggressive immunization programs against Japanese encephalitis with vaccination coverage of 72.3% in UP helped in declining of JE cases in the region. The presumptive treatment of febrile cases with empirical Doxycycline and Azithromycin (EDA) caused decline in Scrub Typhus-AES cases. Decrease in incidence of vector borne diseases (Malaria, Dengue, Japanese Encephalitis and Kala Azar) i.e., 39.6/100,000 population in 2010 to 18/100,000 population in 2017 is highlighting the impact of vector control interventions. Strengthening healthcare infrastructure in BRD medical college and establishment of Encephalitis Treatment Centre (ETC) at peripheral health centres and emergency ambulance services (Dial 108) reduced the referral time and helped in early treatment and management of AES cases. The AES admissions increased at ETC centres to 60% and overall case fatality rate of AES declined to 3%. Under clean India mission and Jal Jeevan mission, proportion of population with clean drinking water increased from 74.3% in 1992 to 98.7% in 2020. The proportion of household having toilet facilities increased from 22.9% in 1992 to 67.4% in 2020. Provisions for better nutritional status under state and national nutrition mission helped in reducing the burden of stunting (52%) and wasting (53.4%) among under five children in 1992 to 38.8% (stunting) and 36.8% (wasting) in year 2018. These factors have all likely contributed to steady AES decline observed in UP.ConclusionThere is a recent steady decline in AES incidence and CFR since implementation of intensive AES surveillance system and JE immunization campaigns which is highlighting the success of interventions made by central and state government to control seasonal AES outbreaks in UP. Currently, AES incidence is 9 cases per million population (in year 2019) and mortality is 5.8%.

Kashmir conflict: Yearning for an elusive peace in the contemporary South Asian Region

The conflict in Jammu & Kashmir has become a critical issue not only for India-Pakistan relations but for the whole of South Asia. After careful analysis, the origin of the conflict has been identified by scholars as a failure in demarcating a practical border between India and Pakistan by the British colonial rulers. The consequence was that after gaining independence, both countries went to war three times over Kashmir. In addition, numerous breakouts of hostilities were reported along the line of control between India and Pakistan in the Kashmir region. The United Nations Organization made several attempts to arrive at a permanent solution for the Kashmir issue. In addition, several bilateral meetings were held by India and Pakistan to work out a solution to bring about long-lasting peace in Kashmir. However, all the initiatives failed, and hostilities are still going on. The situation has further deteriorated after several incidents of cross-border terrorism that had its roots in Kashmir politics. Today the Kashmir issue has become a key threat to South Asian security after the changes that have taken place in global politics as well as regional politics. The aim of this paper is to study the conflict in Kashmir to find a way to build peace in the new global context. This paper is based entirely on secondary data and uses the descriptive analysis method. Indian government policy on Jammu & Kashmir has been influenced by past events in Kashmir, while Pakistan is looking for alternative strategies to build peace in Kashmir. The impact of this conflict on the South Asian region will mostly depend on the Indian Government’s determination to keep Kashmir under its control while it is continually challenged by the Pakistani regime, which also has claims on this territory.