Five million salaried people lost jobs in July : CMIE

Why in News?

According to Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) Five million salaried job loss in July. Thus the total number of job losses becomes 18.9 million.

Details or CMIE Report

• History of Job loss : The intial lock down in March leads to a heavy job loss of 121 million and later it decrease to 100 million in one month. By July it becomes 11 million
• Informal Sector : Small traders, hawkers and daily wage labourers were the worst hit by the lockdown in April. Of the 121.5 million jobs lost in that month, 91.2 million were among these. They employed 32 % of all job. Only 6.8 million remain to return.
• Salaried Job : It is estimated that only 21% of all employment in India is in the form of a salaried employment. It has a direct impact on economic decisions. As a result, job losses among them accounted for 15% of all job losses in April. Salaried jobs are not lost easily, once lost they are also far more difficult to retrieve.
  
• Small Entrepreneurs : Entrepreneurs also declared themselves unemployed during the lockdown. They account for about 19 per cent of total employment ie 78 million. Nature of job is similar to that of the small traders.
• Farming : This estimate had risen to 117 million in March 2020 from 111 million. No job loss during the period. Employment remained high in July at 126 million 4 million less than June. 4 million fall in farm employment indicates reverse migration.

About CMIE

Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy is a leading business information company established in 1976. CMIE produces economic and business databases and develops specialised analytical tools.

It analyses the data to decipher trends in the economy. CMIE is a privately owned company. 

Source : Economic Times

Topic : GS II :- Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources

Swadeshi Microprocessor Challenge Launched

Why in News ?

Union Electronics and Information technology minister Ravi Shankar Prasad announced Swadeshi Microprocessor Challenge. It is a part of the government’s vision to become a self-reliant country and give impetus to the start-up ecosystem, innovation and research in the country.

What is Swadeshi Microprocessor Challenge ?

It is launched as a part of Aatmanirbhar Bharat aims at invite innovators, startups and students to use these microprocessors to develop various technology products.

• Initiative is aimed at meeting India’s future requirements of strategic and industrial sectors
• Also to create potential to mitigate the issues of security, licensing, technology obsolescence and most crucially cutting dependency on imports.
• The government will offer financial support of ₹4.30 crore at various stages of the challenge for developing the hardware prototype.
• It will be incubating a start-up will be offered.
• The registration process begins on 18 August, the challenge will be spread over 10 months.
• 25 finalists will win total Rs. 1 crore and top 10 teams entering the finale will get the seed fund of total Rs. 2.3 crore and one year incubation support.
• The registration process can be done through MyGov Portal.

There is a growing need of Indian made hard devices under Atmanirbhar Bharath. Need for devices in various electronics, mechanical and in the field like space, defence etc. equipment processing.

Aatmanirbhar Bharat

It aims to making the country independent against the tough competition in the global supply chain. Also to help in empowering the poor, labourers, migrants who have been adversely affected by COVID through job creation.

• Five pillars of Atmanirbhar Bharat – Economy, Infrastructure, System, Vibrant Demography and Demand.
• The Five phases of Atmanirbhar Bharat are:
  • Phase-I: Businesses including MSMEs
  • Phase-II: Poor, including migrants and farmers
  • Phase-III: Agriculture
  • Phase-IV: New Horizons of Growth
  • Phase-V: Government Reforms and Enablers
• Special economic and comprehensive package of Rs 20 lakh crores – equivalent to 10% of India’s GDP.

Source : PIB

Topic : GS :- Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation

Setting of National Recruitment agency

Why in News ?

Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister decided to set up a National Recruitment Agency (NRA). The proposed NRA will conduct a common preliminary examination for various recruitments in the central government.

About National Recruitment Agency 

• National Recruitment Agency (NRA) is a multi agency, will conduct a Common Eligibility Test (CET) to shortlist candidates for the Group B and C (non-technical) posts.
• NRA will have representatives of Ministry of Railways, Ministry of Finance/Department of Financial Services, the SSC, RRB & IBPS.
• It is envisioned that the NRA would be a specialist body bringing the state-of-the-art technology and best practices to the field of Central Government recruitment.
• The present recruitment agencies for Grou b and C IBPS, RRB and SCC will remain in place.
• The CET will be conducted in multiple languages, in 12 languages that are in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution of India.
• Union Cabinet has approved an amount of Rs 1517.57 crore for the NRA, for a period of 3 years.
• A special focus will be on creating examination infrastructure in the 117 ‘Aspirational Districts’.

Need for such Agencies

About 1.25 lakh vacancies in the central government every year. If NRA set up they will conduct will conduct a common eligibility test (CET) and based on the CET score a candidate can apply for a vacancy with the respective agency.

• The move will benefit the poor candidates as they have to appear in multiple examinations conducted by multiple agencies.
• They have to incur expenditure on examination fees, travel, boarding, lodging and other things.
• The single examination is expected to reduce the financial burden on such candidates.
• Besides women candidates especially from rural areas face constraints in appearing in multiple examinations as they have to arrange for transportation and places to stay in places that are far away. The location of test centres in every District would greatly benefit candidates.
• This may reduce the recruitment cycle.

How the exam will conduct ?

• In the intial phases they will conduct CET test for Group B and C posts. Now these exams are conducted by Staff Selection Commission, Railways Recruitment Board and Institute of Banking Personnel Selection.
• Based on the screening done at the CET score level final selection for recruitment shall be made through separate specialised Tiers (II, III, etc.) of examination which shall be conducted by the respective recruitment agencies.
• To make it easier for candidates, examination centres would be set up in every district of the country.
• The CET score of a candidate shall be valid for a period of three years.

Source : PIB

Topic : GS :- Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

Railways deploys Drone for Surveillance

About News

Indian Railways has started deploying drone-based surveillance system to intensify its security mechanism across its network. The drone named as Ninja.

Importance of Drone based surveillance in Railway

• It is a cost-effective tool for security surveillance over large areas with limited manpower.
• These drones are capable of real-time tracking, video streaming and can also be operated on an automatic fail-safe mode.
• A drone camera can cover a large area, which may require up 10 RPF personnel.
• This helps to a substantial improvement in utilisation of scarce manpower.
• Nine drones have been procured by RPF at a cost of Rs 31.87 lakh for South Eastern Railway (SER), CE, and South Western Railway (SWR) zones and Modern Coaching Factory, Raebareili.
• Also drones can be deployed for data collection analysis and may prove to be useful in vulnerable sections for safe operations of trains.
• For disaster sites the drone surveillance is very helpful and can be used for mapping railway assets. 

Prelims Facts

National Drone Policy

• The National Drone Policy of India came into effect on December 1, 2018.
• The rules announced are the first in a series of several rules and regulations and are titled Regulations 1.0. 
• The policy legalises the use and operation of drones in India.
• Digital Sky Portal are provided for the registration of drones.

Source : Hindustan Times

Topic : GS :- Science and Technology- developments and their applications and effects in everyday life