The Hindu Editorial Analysis | Free PDF

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Prepaid payment instruments are methods that facilitate purchase of goods and services against the value stored on such instruments.
The value stored on such instruments represents the value paid for by the holder, by cash, by debit to a bank account, or by credit card.
The prepaid instruments can be issued as smart cards, magnetic stripe cards, internet accounts, online wallets, mobile accounts, mobile wallets, paper vouchers and any such instruments used to access the prepaid amount
Under new norms on customer liability, the regulator said frauds due to third-party breach where neither the customer nor the PPI issuer is at fault, there cannot be any liability for the customer, in case the incident in reported within three days.
If the fraud is reported between three and seven days, customer liability will amount to the transaction value or ₹10,000, whichever is lower.

Categories of Prepaid Payment Instruments
The prepaid payment instruments that can be issued in the country are classified under following categories:
Closed System Payment Instruments
These are payment instruments issued by a person for facilitating the purchase of goods and services from him/her/it. Closed wallets are wallets which are issued by a company to a consumer for buying goods and services exclusively from that company. Examples: Bigbasket Wallet, Cleartrip Wallet
Semi-Closed System Payment Instruments
These payment instruments are redeemable at a group of clearly identified merchants that contract specifically with the issuer to accept the payment instrument. These instruments do not permit cash withdrawal or redemption by the holder. Example: Oxigen Wallet,Mobikwik Wallet
Semi-open System Payment Instruments
These are payment instruments that can be used to purchase goods and services at any cardaccepting merchant locations (Point of sale terminals). These instruments do not permit cash withdrawal or redemption by the holder.
Open System Payment Instruments
These payment instruments can be used for purchase of goods and services and also permit cash withdrawal at ATMs, Merchant Local Locations, and automated business correspondents. Examples: Visa, Mastercard, RuPay
Mobile Prepaid Instruments
These are prepaid talk time instruments issued by mobile service providers. This talk time value can also be used to purchase ‘value added service’ from the mobile service provider or third-party service providers.
Eligibility

- Banks and Non-Banking Financial Companies (NBFC), who comply with the eligibility criteria, would be permitted to issue all categories of prepaid payment instruments.
- Only banks permitted to provide Mobile Banking Transactions by the Reserve Bank of India shall be permitted to launch mobile based prepaid payment instruments.
- Other entities would be permitted to issue only closed system prepaid payment instruments and semi-closed system prepaid payment instruments.

Mobile Service Providers are permitted to issue mobile prepaid value. In addition to talk-value the use of such prepaid value as a payment instrument shall be restricted to the purchase of only such value added digital contents or services for use on the mobile phones. The use of mobile prepaid value for purchase of other goods and services shall not be permitted.

The Constitution (108th Amendment) Bill, commonly known as the women’s reservation Bill, needs to be approved by the Lok Sabha in order to become law.
Women members in the Rajya Sabha on Friday urged the government to ensure the passage of the women’s reservation Bill in the Lok Sabha.

The Bill, which proposes a 33% reservation for women in Parliament and State legislatures, was passed by the Rajya Sabha in 2010 but has been stuck in the Lower House for nine years.
▪ The draft bill, which was released last year, had proposed that critical personal data of Indian citizens be processed in centres located within the country.
▪ It had also proposed financial penalties for data processor for violations of the data protection law.
▪ Likening Google to the East India Company, BJP MP Rakesh Sinha said companies in the West have collected data related to all aspects of the lives of Indians and this was a step in the direction of “neo-imperialism.”
▪ finalising guidelines for social media intermediaries such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google and WhatsApp

- Andhra Pradesh’s second largest petroglyph site, containing about 80 petroglyhs, has been discovered at Mekala Benchi, near Aspari, in Kurnool district.
- These petroglyphs, or rock carvings, underscore Kurnool’s importance as a major site of Neolithic settlements in south India.
- Kandanathi, with 200 petroglyphs, is also in Kurnool district.
- While Mekala Benchi has rock carvings dating back from the Neolithic to the Megalithic period, Kandanathi’s carvings range from the prehistoric to the historic period.

FDI policy on e-commerce, first pronounced through Press Note 2 of 2000, permitted 100% FDI in B2B ecommerce activities
B2C e-commerce, that is multi-brand retail through inventory based model, has all along remained prohibited for FDI.
FDI is not permitted in inventory based model of e-commerce which amounts to multi-brand retail.
there is no change in the FDI policy on food product retail trading, which permits 100% FDI under approval route, including through e-commerce, in respect of food products manufactured and/or produced in India.

What is a marketplace and inventory based model?

Marketplace based model of e-commerce means providing an information technology platform by an e-commerce entity on a digital & electronic network to act as a facilitator between the buyer and seller.
Inventory based model of e-commerce means an ecommerce activity where inventory of goods and services is owned by e-commerce entity and is sold to the consumers directly.

▪ Some observers say that China’s advances can mutate into a Cold war-style competition in outer space with the United States. Already, China and the United States are roiled in a so-called trade war.
▪ U.S. administration officials are on record stating that there is deep opposition to the ‘Made-in-China 2025’ project.
▪ Homegrown GPS
▪ It follows the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System — China’s homegrown Global Positioning System that started worldwide service last month.
▪ Next year China plans to launch its Mars explorer mission.
▪ In 2022, it hopes to complete its own earth-orbiting space station.

Editorials

Child care institutions in India have been trapped in an administrative blind spot, as revelations of the sexual abuse of inmates in a balika grih at Muzaffarpur in Bihar showed last year.
A home meant to protect girls rescued from exploitation itself turned into a den of predation.
The shocking rot in the management of such shelters has now been reported by a Central government committee.
Reform of this depressing system, as the Ministry of Women and Child Development seeks, can be achieved only through systematic scrutiny by State governments.
This could be done by appointing special officers whose task it would be to ensure that all institutions register under the JJ Act, account for funds received by each, and enforce mandatory child protection policies during adoption.

As per the recently disclosed study, only 32% of Child Care Institutions or Homes were registered under the JJ Act as of 2016, while an equal number were unregistered, and the rest were either empanelled under other schemes or awaiting registration
The priority should be to bring about uniformity of standards and procedures

Stock markets across the world had very little reason to celebrate in 2018.
They witnessed the return of extreme volatility after many years, and most of them recorded their worst performance in a decade.
rise in fears that global economic growth could come to a grinding halt in the near future.
Many believe that a recession is overdue now
After years of adopting a monetary policy regime marked by near-zero interest rates, central banks like the Fed now have very little room to lower rates if they want to fight a recession.
The next recession may thus witness central banks adopting even more unconventional methods to stimulate their economies
A major worry for policymakers globally will be the lack of sufficient central bank firepower should the global economy move into a full-fledged recession in 2019.
A further escalation in the trade war between the u.S. And china is another imminent risk to global growth
Policymakers will have to come up with reforms to boost economic productivity, instead of just relying on an ultra-easy monetary policy to boost their economies

India must be prepared for the potential consequences of withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan

The course seems set for a thinning of american presence in Afghanistan.
Trump keen to bring back most, if not all, troops before his re-election bid in 2020
Suggested that regional players like Russia, India and Pakistan should be more involved in stabilising the situation, and mocked india for not doing enough.
The U.S. War in afghanistan, in recent years, challenged by the resurgence of the taliban, it has now become a mission mainly to ensure an honourable exit.

President barack obama had faced similar challenges in 2010
India must consider the consequences closely

Shift in policy

Its time to recognise that the U.S.’s South Asia Strategy for Afghanistan, as announced by Mr. Trump in August 2017
Mr. Trump had defined the strategy with three features: that

U.S. troops would remain involved in the country until “conditions”, not a timeline, mandated their return;
U.S. would put Pakistan on notice for its support to the Taliban and a political settlement with the Taliban would only follow “after an effective military effort”; and that
the policy would hinge on further developing the strategic partnership with India

The appointment of special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad in September to lead talks with the Taliban after a particularly brutal year
casualties of Afghan National and Defence Security Forces in May-September 2018 were the “greatest it has ever been” compared to corresponding periods since 2001,
Mr. Khalilzad’s direct talks with the Taliban that cut out the National Unity government (NUG) in Kabul reportedly didn’t even have President Ashraf Ghani in the loop until after the first talks were held in Qatar —
this reversed the previous U.S. position not to engage the Taliban until it engages the NUG

Complex situation with Pak

▪Far from the tough talk on Pakistan for support to the Taliban, Mr. Trump wrote a letter to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan thanking him for his efforts.
▪ Afghanistan’s High Peace Council members also disclosed that Mr. Khalilzad was on a deadline: Mr. Trump has reportedly given him six months to show results with the talks process, failing which the pullout may be speeded up.

Afghanistan tough with Pak

In December, Mr. Ghani appointed two aides of former President Hamid Karzai known for their hardline position on the Taliban and Pakistan as his Defence and Interior Ministers.
clear drift in the U.S. Afghanistan and South Asia policy from the past was the exit of Defence Secretary James Mattis, author of the South Asia policy.

Mr. Mattis had pushed most strenuously to keep India in the Afghan game by swinging a waiver for India on Chabahar and Iran oil purchases. It remains to be seen whether Mr. Trump will continue those waivers past May this year

Turmoil in Afghanistan polity

uncertainty of the democratic process.
Parliamentary elections were held in October, but even their preliminary results haven’t yet been declared
doubt on the government’s ability to conduct elections.
Presidential elections have been postponed till July, despite the constitutional clause

For India, these developments may appear discouraging, but a more pragmatic view is necessary to deal with all possible outcomes

We must be ready for :The U.S.’s eventual pullout as Afghanistan’s peacekeeper is inevitable,
New Delhi was caught off guard in 2010 when Mr. Obama planned the drawdown and discouraged India from a stake in projects there in an effort to placate Pakistan
Mr. Trump’s administration, much more welcoming of indian investment in afghanistan, BUT
Its symptomatic Desire to pare down “pax americana” in every part of the world.

The removal or reduction of the U.S. presence from most theatres of action has created space for regional players:
▪ leaving Syria to Iran and its allies;
▪ Yemen to Saudi Arabia;
▪ Afghanistan to players like Russia, Pakistan and Iran; and
▪ Pakistan to China

Some other hard truths must be faced: India cannot replace Pakistan’s position geographically, nor can it ever offer the U.S. or any other force what Pakistan has offered in the past
The decision to abandon the SAARC may have provided some short-lived returns in “isolating Pakistan”, but it has had the effect of cutting Afghanistan loose from Indian leadership of South Asia as well

India’s best course with Afghanistan remains its own regional strategy
Finally, it is necessary to recognise the cyclical nature of interventions in Afghanistan, which has been called the “graveyard of empires” for forcing all world powers to retreat at some point or the other