Joshimath sank 5.4cm in just 12 days

• Satellite images released by ISRO’s National Remote Sensing Centre on 13 January 2023 show that Uttarakhand’s Joshimath witnessed a rapid sinking of 5.4cm in just 12 days — between 27 December 2022 and 8 January 2023.
• The quick subsidence stands in contrast to the slow-paced sinking of the area that was recorded between April and November 2022. According to the government agency’s report, during these seven months, Joshimath sank up to just nine centimetres.
• The report also added that rapid subsidence occurred in the central part of the city. “Crown of the subsidence is located near Joshimath-Auli road at a height of 2180 m”, it mentioned.
• The images and report have come just days after cracks appeared in many roads and hundreds of houses in the city, which has now been declared as a landslide and subsidence-hit zone by the authorities. So far, a total of 168 families have evacuated to temporary relief centres.

What exactly is subsidence?

• Subsidence is the “sinking of the ground because of underground material movement”, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). It can happen for a host of reasons, man-made or natural, such as the removal of water, oil, or natural resources, along with mining activities. Earthquakes, soil erosion, and soil compaction are also some of the well-known causes of subsidence.
• The US-based agency’s website said that this phenomenon can “happen over very large areas like whole states or provinces, or very small areas like the corner of your yard.”

Why is Joshimath sinking?

• The exact reason behind the land subsidence in Joshimath is still unknown, but experts suggest that it might have been caused by unplanned construction, overpopulation, obstruction of the natural flow of water, and hydel power activities.
• Not only this, the area is a seismic zone, which makes it prone to frequent tremors. Warning bells for Joshimath were first sounded about 50 years ago in the MC Mishra committee report, which pointed to unplanned development in the area that already had natural vulnerabilities.
• According to experts, Joshimath city has been built on ancient landslide material — meaning it rests on a deposit of sand and stone, not rock, which doesn’t have a high load-bearing capacity. Moreover, the lack of a proper drainage system could also have contributed to the sinking of the area. The accumulated water seeps into the rocks below, softening them.
• Apart from the aforementioned possible reasons, reports have pointed out that subsidence in Joshimath might have been triggered by the reactivation of a geographic fault — defined as a fracture or zone of fractures between two blocks of rock — where the Indian Plate has pushed under the Eurasian Plate along the Himalayas.

Israel-Palestinian violence on West Bank soars

US has urged Israel and the Palestinians to ease tensions amid a spike in violence that has put the West Bank region on edge.

Where is West Bank?

• The West Bank is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediterranean in Western Asia that forms the main bulk of the Palestinian territories.
• It is bordered by Jordan and the Dead Sea to the east and by Israel to the south, west, and north.

Point of discussion: Anti-Semitism

• Anti-Semitism (hatred against Jews) is an officially stated policy of many theocratic countries (created by divine orders of religion).
• This includes entire Arab world, the self-proclaimed caliphate ‘Turkiye’ and even Pakistan.
• Jews, the micro-minority religion of the world were denied access to their homeland.

What is the Israel-Palestine Conflict?

• The land to which Jews and Palestinians lay claim to was under the Ottoman Empire and then the British Empire in early 20th century.
• Palestinian people —the Arab people from the same area— want to have a state by the name of Palestine in that area.
• The conflict between Israelis and Palestinians is over who gets what land and how it’s controlled.

• Jews fleeing the persecution in Europe at the time wanted to establish a Jewish state on the land which they believe to be their ancient homeland.
• The Arab at the time resisted, saying the land was theirs. The land at the time was called Palestine.
• In 1917’s Balfour Declaration, the United Kingdom declared its support for the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine.
• Arabs resisted it which led to violence.

Jews into West Bank: Arab hinterland in Israel

• Some 75,000 Jews migrated to Palestine from 1922-26 and some 60,000 Jews emigrated in 1935, according to a history published by the University of Central Arkansas.
• It adds that Palestinian Arabs demanded the UK to halt Jewish emigration, but the UK ignored such calls. There were violent incidents, leading to deaths of some 500 people.
• In 1923, the British Mandate for Palestine came into effect.
• The document was issued by the League of Nations, the failed predecessor of the United Nations (UN).
• The mandate gave the UK the responsibility for creating a Jewish national homeland in the region.
• In 1936, the UK government recommended the partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states.

How did the issue escalate?

• In 1947, Britain referred the issue of Palestine to the UN, which came up with a partition plan.
• It put up two proposals. One, two separate states joined economically —the majority proposal— and, two, a single bi-national state made up of autonomous Jewish and Palestinian areas, the minority proposal.
• The Jewish community approved of the first of these proposals, while the Arabs opposed them both.

Israel’s independence

• In May 1948, Israel declared its independence. This was eye-pricking development for Arabs.
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• The Arab countries of Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Egypt invaded the newly-declared country immediately.
• When the war ended, Israel gained some territory formerly granted to Palestinian Arabs under the UN resolution in 1947.
• It also retained control over the Gaza Strip and the West Bank respectively.

Resolving the conflict

Ans. Two-state solution

• The two-state solution refers to an arrangement where Israeli and Palestinian states co-exist in the region.
• However, such a solution has not materialised over the decades.
• As outlined in the beginning and in the briefly explained roots of the conflict, the two-state solution means two separate states for Israelis and Palestinians.

Why it hasn’t worked out?

There are four main reasons why the two-state solution has not materialized by now:

[1] Borders

• There is no consensus as to how to draw the lines dividing the two proposed states.
• Many people say borders should have pre-1967 lines.
• In 1967 Israeli-Arab war, Israel captured Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip, West Bank, Old City of Jerusalem, and Golan Heights.
• Israel is not willing to give up these gains. It returned Sinai to Egypt in 1982.
• Moreover, there is the question of Israeli settlements in West Bank.

[2] Question of Jerusalem

• Both Israel and Palestinians claim Jerusalem as their capital and call it central to their religion and culture.
• The two-state solution typically calls for dividing it into an Israeli West and a Palestinian East, but it is not easy to draw the line — Jewish, Muslim and Christian holy sites are on top of one another.
• Israel has declared Jerusalem its ‘undivided capital’, effectively annexing its eastern half, and has built up construction that entrenches Israeli control of the city.

[3] Refugees

• A large number of Palestinians had to flee in the 1948 War.
• They and their descendants —numbering at 5 million— demand a right to return. Israel rejects this.

• The return of these people would end the demographic majority of Jews, ending the idea of Israel that’s both democratic and Jewish.

[4] Security

• Security concerns are also central to Israel as it’s constantly harassed by terrorist group Hamas that controls Gaza Strip.
• Hamas and other Islamist group in Gaza launch rockets into Israel time-to-time.
• Moreover, there are also concerns of Palestinians’ attack inside Israel.
• This year in March-April, at least 18 Israelis were killed in Palestinian attacks inside Israel.
• A total of 27 Palestinians were also killed in the period, including those who carried out attacks inside Israel. Palestinians too have their concerns.
• For Palestinians, security means an end to foreign military occupation.

Why the two-state solution is needed?

• Besides fulfilling the basic desire of both Jews and Arabs of their own states, supporters of two-state solutions say it must be backed because its alternatives are simply not workable.
• A single state merging Israel, West Bank, and Gaza would reduce Jews to a minority.
• At the same time, in such a state, Jews would be a significant minority which would mean that the Arab majority would be miffed.

Moral reasoning for a two-state solution

• It says that the aspirations of one person should not be overridden for others’ aspirations.
• It’s a struggle for collective rights between two distinct groups of people.
• Jews are the global micro-minority with a very small piece of land to exist.
• Depriving Israeli Jews of a Jewish state or Palestinians of a Palestinian state would represent a subordination of one group’s aspirations to someone else’s vision.

Way forward

• India opines that long-term peace in Israel and Palestine can be achieved only through a negotiated two-State solution leading.
• This can be done with the establishment of a sovereign, independent and viable State of Palestine living within secure and recognized borders.

The Recent Wave Of Tech Layoffs

• Recently, International Business Machines Corp (IBM), based in New York, was the latest to join the list of tech companies that have made large-scale layoffs since late 2022. The company announced that it would lay off approximately 3,900 employees.
• This comes after Big Tech’s “midlife crisis,” technology behemoths Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft have announced the layoff of thousands in the last few months.
• The United States Federal Reserve’s rapid interest rate hikes to control high inflation and slowing consumer demand amid a global economic downturn are also in the background.

What is meant by Layoff?

• A layoff is when an employer terminates an employee’s employment for reasons unrelated to the employee’s performance.
• Employees may be laid off as a cost-cutting measure, as a result of a decline in demand for their products or services, as a result of a seasonal closure, or during an economic downturn.
• Employees who are laid off lose all wages and benefits but are eligible for unemployment insurance or compensation (typically in USA).

Who and how many people have been laid off?

• In 2022, the tech sector alone will have shed over 150,000 employees, with over 40,000 more job cuts announced since the start of the new year.
• Google’s parent company Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft, and Facebook-owner Meta accounted for 51,000 of the total tech layoffs announced in the last few months.
• According to the consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc., layoffs in the technology sector in 2022 will be 649% higher than the previous year.

Companies with Mass Layoffs

• Meta Platforms Inc., which owns Facebook, announced in November last year that it had cut over 11,000 jobs, or 13% of its workforce. The mass layoffs were the first in Meta’s 18-year history.
• Microsoft, the Bill Gates-founded technology corporation headquartered in Washington, announced plans to cut 10,000 jobs, or less than 5% of its workforce, by March 2023, incurring a $1.2 billion charge to earnings.
• Amazon: In early January, Amazon, the world’s largest e-commerce, cloud computing, and streaming company and America’s second-largest private employer after Walmart, announced that it would lay off 18,000 employees, or 6% of its workforce.
• Google: Alphabet, Google’s parent company, announced on January 20 that it would be cutting 12,000 jobs, or 6% of its workforce, in a staff memo signed by CEO Sundar Pichai.
• Spotify is a music-streaming service. Spotify CEO Daniel Ek announced in an all-staff memo that the company would lay off 600 people, accounting for 6% of its global workforce.

• Salesforce: The San Francisco-based tech company Salesforce announced on January 4 that it was cutting 10% of its workforce and closing some offices.
• Twitter: Following Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s $44 billion takeover, social media company Twitter Inc. made aggressive job cuts, laying off half of its workforce, or approximately 3,700 employees, in various departments such as communications, content curation, product, and engineering.
• Others: Cisco announced in November that it would lay off 5% of its workforce as part of a restructuring. HP also announced 6,000 job cuts by the end of fiscal year 2025.

Impact on Indian Professionals

• According to industry insiders, between 30% and 40% of those laid off are Indian IT professionals, with a significant number of them on H-1B and L1 visas.
• The H-1B visa is a non-immigrant visa that allows US companies to hire foreign workers in special occupations that require theoretical or technical expertise.
• Every year, technology companies rely on it to hire tens of thousands of employees from countries such as India and China.
• Many of them are now looking for ways to stay in the United States and find new jobs within the few months allowed under these foreign work visas.

Do the layoffs portend trouble for the tech industry?

• According to the CEOs, growth has slowed from pandemic levels. Analysts also predict that the five major technology companies, including Apple, will report dismal profits for the October to December (2022) period.
• Amazon is expected to report that earnings fell 38% and revenue grew at the slowest rate in more than 22 years.
• Meanwhile, Meta’s profits could drop by 42%. These large tech companies, on the other hand, continue to be massive and profitable.
• Microsoft still reported a profit of more than $16 billion in the quarter ending December 2022, compared to a profit of about $11.6 billion in the same period in 2019.
• Meta earned $4.4 billion in profit in the quarter ending September 2022, despite a 52% drop from the previous year.

What do the layoffs say about the broader job market in the US?

• While the tech sector is experiencing job losses, data from the Labor Department show that the overall U.S. job market remains strong, with the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits declining.

• According to analysts, technology companies account for about 2% of total employment in the country, compared to larger industries that are still hiring.
• Despite the Fed’s aggressive measures to reduce inflation, the labor market has remained resilient.

Significance

• Furthermore, the tech companies have recently made significant investments, particularly in Artificial Intelligence-driven technology.
• While cloud revenues have declined, Microsoft is considering extending its $1 billion stake in OpenAI, the startup behind the viral new chatbot ChatGPT. It is also looking to acquire video game company Activision Blizzard, which would bring with it a workforce of 10,000 people.
• Smaller startups, meanwhile, which benefited from the pandemic digital boom, are attempting to cut costs while also facing reluctance from venture capitalists to invest in their projects.

Asiatic Golden Cat

For the first time, photos of melanistic Asian golden cat were captured through camera traps in West Bengal’s Buxa Tiger Reserve (BTR). In India, the melanistic morph has been earlier reported from north-eastern states including Sikkim, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.

• The Asian golden cat (Catopuma temminckii ) is a medium-sized wild cat native to the Northeastern Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and China.
• The Asian golden cat’s scientific name honors Coenraad Jacob Temminck and is also called Temminck’s cat and Asiatic golden cat.
• Asian golden cats, known as the “fire cat” in Thailand and Burma, and as the “rock cat” in parts of China, are of a medium size and stocky build.
• Asian golden cats are solitary and territorial.
• Once considered nocturnal, a radio-tracking study showed them to be diurnal and crepuscular.
• Asian golden cats are carnivores, often eating small prey like Indochinese ground squirrel, small snakes and other reptiles, muntjacs, rodents, birds, and young hares.
• Asian golden cats are polygynous, which means that one male gets exclusive mating rights with multiple females.
• There appears to be no breeding season for the Asian golden cat, but from April to June no births occur.
• After gestation of about 81 days, 1 to 3 kittens are born.
• Kittens are weaned when they are 6 months old and they reach independence as early as 9 months, the average being 12 months.
• Female Asian golden cats reach sexual maturity between 18 and 24 months, males maturing at 24 months.
• Conservation Status:
  • IUCN: Near threatened
  • Wildlife Protection Act, 1972: Schedule I

About Buxa Tiger Reserve:

• Buxa Tiger Reserve (BTR) lies in Alipurduar sub-division of Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal.

• Its northern boundary runs along the international border with Bhutan.
• The Sinchula hill range lies all along the northern side of BTR and the Eastern boundary touches that of the Assam State.
• National Highway No.31 C roughly runs along its southern boundary.
• It is the eastern most extension of extreme bio-diverse North-East India and represents highly endemic Indo-Malayan region.
• The fragile “Terai Eco-System” constitutes a part of this Reserve.
• The Phipsu Wildlife Sanctuary of Bhutan is contiguous to North of BTR.
• Manas National Park lies on east of BTR.
  • BTR, thus, serves as international corridor for elephant migration between India and Bhutan.
• Some of the endangered species found in BTR are Indian Tiger, Asian Elephant, Leopard cat, Bengal florican, Regal python, Chinese Pangolin, Hispid hare, Hog deer etc.

Finance Commission

The government will soon start the process of setting up the Sixteenth Finance Commission, with the Finance Ministry likely to notify the terms of references for the constitutional body.

About

• The terms of reference for the Sixteenth FC will be worked out after internal government deliberations steered by the Finance Ministry
• the first step towards constituting the Commission will be the appointment of an Officer on Special Duty to drive the process.
  • This officer typically becomes the member-secretary of the Commission, once it is constituted.
• A key new challenge for the 16th FC would be the co-existence of another permanent constitutional body, the GST Council.

About Finance Commission

• It is a Constitutionally mandated body that is at the center of fiscal federalism.
• It is constituted by the President under Article 280 of the Constitution.
• The First Finance Commission was constituted vide Presidential Order under the chairmanship of Shri K.C. Neogy on 6th April 1952.
• the Constitution requires a Finance Commission (FC) to be set up every five years, the 15th FC’s mandate was extended by a year till 2025-26, breaking the cycle.
  • The last time an FC was granted a six-year time frame was for the 9th Finance Commission, formed in June 1987.
• Core Responsibilities:   It is the duty of the Commission to make recommendations to the President as to— 
  • the distribution between the Union and the States of the net proceeds of taxes which are to be, or maybe, divided between them and the allocation between the States of the respective shares of such proceeds;
  • the principles which should govern the grants-in-aid of the revenues of the States out of the Consolidated Fund of India;
  • the measures needed to augment the Consolidated Fund of a State to supplement the resources of the Panchayats in the State on the basis of the recommendations made by the Finance Commission of the State;
  • the measures needed to augment the Consolidated Fund of a State to supplement the resources of the Municipalities in the State on the basis of the recommendations made by the Finance Commission of the State;

• any other matter referred to the Commission by the President in the interests of sound finance.
  • The Commission determines its procedure and has such powers in the performance of its functions as Parliament may by law confer on them.
• Importance: Its working is characterized by extensive and intensive consultations with all levels of government, thus strengthening the principle of cooperative federalism.
  • Its recommendations are also geared towards improving the quality of public spending and promoting fiscal stability.
• Current Commission: The Fifteenth Finance Commission was constituted on 27 November 2017 against the backdrop of the abolition of the Planning Commission (as also of the distinction between Plan and non-Plan expenditure) and the introduction of the goods and services tax (GST), which has fundamentally redefined federal fiscal relations.
  • Features: The Terms of Reference of the current Commission have some distinctive features, including recommending monitorable performance criteria for important national flagship programmes and examining the possibility of setting up permanent non-lapsable funding for India’s defense needs.
    • The reorganization of the State of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories – one of Jammu and Kashmir and one of Ladakh – presents a new dynamic.