Daily Hindu Editorials

💥 Daily Word Bytes - 2  from editorial  - The strain in Spain  💥 strain (noun) – pressure, stress, demand/burden. Hindu Editorial usage  :  The strain in Spain  hover (verb) – remain at a specific level. Hindu Editorial usage  :   Political uncertainty hovers over Madrid as the new PM tries to stabilise his government swiftly (adverb) – quickly, rapidly, fast. Hindu Editorial usage  :   Spain’s conservative-led minority government, which fell on Friday, has been swiftly succeeded by a wobbly minority government led by the Socialists wobbly (adjective) – unsteady, unstable, shaky. Hindu Editorial usage  :   Spain’s conservative-led minority government, which fell on Friday, has been swiftly succeeded by a wobbly minority government led by the Socialists count on (phrasal verb) – rely on, depend on, bank on. Hindu Editorial usage  :     It counts on support from, among others, Catalan and...

💥 Daily Word Bytes - 1  from editorial  - Farm friction: on the malaise in agriculture 💥 friction (noun) – conflict, dispute, argument. Hindu Editorial usage  :  Farm friction: on the malaise in agriculture malaise (noun) –  trouble, unease, unhappiness/dejection. Hindu Editorial usage  :  Farm friction: on the malaise in agriculture systemic (adjective) – organizational, constructional, formational. Hindu Editorial usage  :   The government must move purposefully to address the systemic malaise in agriculture draw someone’s attention to (phrase) – to attract someone to notice/focus on something. Hindu Editorial usage  :   Since June 1, many farmers are on an unusual 10-day ‘strike’ to draw the government’s attention to distress in the fields. distress (noun) – hardship, adversity, trouble/calamity. Hindu Editorial usage  :   Since June 1, many farmers are on an unusual 10-day ‘strike’ to draw the...

👉Cross-border environmentalism is crucial for South Asia, but India is not inclined to take the lead👈 Ecological ruin is on a gallop across South Asia, with life and livelihood of nearly a quarter of the world’s population affected. Yet, our polities are able to neither fathom nor address the degradation. The distress is paramount in the northern half of the subcontinent, roping in the swathe from the Brahmaputra basin to the Indus-Ganga plain. Within each country, with politics dancing to the tune of populist consumerism, nature is without a guardian. The erosion of civility in geopolitics keeps South Asian societies apart when people should be joining hands across borders to save our common ground. Because wildlife, disease vectors, aerosols and river flows do not respect national boundaries, the environmental trends must perforce be discussed at the regional inter-country level. As the largest nation-state of our region, and the biggest polluter whose population is t...

👉The government must move purposefully to address the systemic malaise in agriculture👈 Since June 1, many farmers are on an unusual 10-day ‘strike’ to draw the government’s attention to distress in the fields. A federation of 130 farmer bodies has decided to stop supplies of vegetables and dairy produce to major cities and hold a dharna on 30 national highways, without blocking vehicular passage. Prices of vegetables and fruits are inching up in urban centres given the supply shock created by this ‘Gaon Bandh’; in cities like Mumbai fishermen have joined the cause. The farmers’ demands are not new — enhancement of the minimum support price regime for crops in line with the M.S. Swaminathan Commission’s recommendations, higher prices for milk procurement and loan waivers to offset low or negative returns on investment. Leaving out vegetables, food prices rose by just 0.55% in the first four months of 2018 — almost a fourth of the average 2% rise recorded in the same months between...

👉Political uncertainty hovers over Madrid as the new PM tries to stabilise his government👈 Spain’s conservative-led minority government, which fell on Friday, has been swiftly succeeded by a wobbly minority government led by the Socialists. It counts on support from, among others, Catalan and the extreme left parties. In this sense, the changeover represents continuity of the relative uncertainty that has characterised Spain since the 2016 general election. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who had held office since 2011, was voted out after top functionaries of his People’s Party were convicted for operating a slush fund during Spain’s construction boom in the last decade. The judicial verdict centre-staged Pedro Sánchez, the Socialist Party chief who masterminded the no-confidence motion against the government. Ironically, Mr. Rajoy had managed to form a minority coalition in October 2016 only after Mr. Sánchez’s failed bid for premiership and ouster as party leader, breaking a pro...

👉Misuse of the office by some is not a justification for removing it altogether. We need proper checks👈 The article, “Do we need the office of the Governor?”  raises important questions about a constitutional post which has come under fire. While the developments in Karnataka over government formation after the Assembly election results are the peg for this, calls to do away with this often maligned position are hardly new. 👉An overseer Under the constitutional scheme, the Governor’s mandate is substantial. From being tasked with overseeing government formation, to reporting on the breakdown of constitutional machinery in a State, to maintaining the chain of command between the Centre and the State, he can also reserve his assent to Bills passed by the State Legislature and promulgate ordinances if the need arises. Further, under Article 355, the Governor, being the Central authority in a State, acts as an overseer in this regard. There are numerous examples of the...

👉India should prepare a third generation right to food legislation to address failings in food security👈 The right to food is a well established principle of international human rights law. It has evolved to include an obligation for state parties to respect, protect, and fulfil their citizens’ right to food security. Our current understanding of food security includes the four dimensions of access, availability, utilisation and stability. As a state party to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, India has the obligation to ensure the right to be free from hunger and the right to adequate food. 👉From availability to access Broadly speaking, attitudes towards food security in India can be divided into two generations subsequent to Independence. While the demarcation is far from exact, it indicates how the importance given to different elements of food security altered over time. The years post-I...

👉Whether in Chennai, Delhi or Mumbai, why we need to rethink our approach to building 'slum-free cities'👈 Another season of evictions has begun in Chennai. As temperatures soar in the city, thousands of families living along the Cooum river watch bulldozers reduce to rubble their homes, painstakingly built over decades. Over 4,000 homes were demolished to “restore” the Cooum in 2017. Scores of once-buzzing neighbourhoods, with their schools, youth clubs, community halls, and shrines, are now wastelands of debris. Their buried histories will soon be overwritten by landscaped parks with fountains or bicycle tracks, going by national trends in urban riverfront development. Contemporary eco-restoration projects are everywhere dislodging ecologies of low-income settlement and urban livelihoods, whether on the Yamuna in Delhi, the Sabarmati in Ahmedabad or the Musi in Hyderabad. River rejuvenation has emerged as among the most exclusionary interventions in our urban develop...

👉Telangana government and Aga Khan Trust are working to restore Hyderabad’s 17th century Badshahi Ashoorkhana.👈 About Hyderabad’s 17th century Badshahi Ashoorkhana: The 400-year old Ashoorkhana was built by Muhammed Quli Qutub Shah. It was a house of mourning, where large congregations of Muslims gathered in memory of the martyrdom of Imam Hussain during the month of Muharram. The building consists of a Kaman, Naqqar Khana (where ceremonial drums are beaten), Niyaz Khana (where visitors are fed), Sarai Khana (place to rest), Abdar Khana (drinking water is stored), the chabutra (platform) and a guard room. During the rule of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, in 1178 Hijri (about 1764 AD), the Ashoorkhana was converted into a bandikhana. For 80 years, it was used as a stable where horses were kept, before it was restored as a place of worship by the then mutawalli Mir Nawazish Ali Khan. The eight wooden pillars were reconstructed and the alams were reinstalled. During t...