Q.1) Critically examine cause and consequences of child marriage in India. What are the steps taken by government to stop child marriage?
Answer:
Child Marriage is defined as a marriage of a girl or boy before the age of 18 and refers to both formal marriages and informal unions in which children under the age of 18 live with a partner as if married.
Causes of child marriage:
- In communities where the practice is prevalent, marrying a girl as a child is part of a cluster of social norms and attitudes that reflect the low value accorded to the human rights of girls.
- Insecurities of parents of girl children about the possible violence against them in the society.
- The economic cost of bringing up a girl child and marrying her off due to the poor social practices like dowry etc.,
- Lack of awareness on the opportunities that await an educated girl.
Consequences:
- Girls are deprived of their basic rights to education and pursue any employment of their choice. Their bargaining capacity within the family is also bound to reduce.
- Girls who marry earlier in life are less likely to be informed about reproductive issues and because of this, pregnancy-related deaths are known to be the leading cause of mortality among married girls between 15 and 19 years of age.
- Infants born to mothers under the age of 18 are 60% more likely to die in their first year than to mothers over the age of 19.
- Young girls in a child marriage are more likely to experience domestic violence in their marriages as opposed to older women.
Steps taken to stop:
- Beti Bachao Beti Padhao scheme
- Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006
- India is a signatory to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women
- Sukanya Samriddhi scheme
Q.2) Critically examine the role of cooperatives in post Independent India?
Answer:
The Cooperatives play very important role in India because it is an organization for the poor, illiterate and unskilled people. The importance of Cooperative sector for India is given below:
- It provides agricultural credits and funds where state and private sectors have not been able to do very much.
- It provides strategic inputs for the agricultural-sector; consumer societies meet their consumption requirements at concessional rates.
- It helps to overcome the constraints of agricultural development.
- It helps in providing critical credit to rural sector; be it industries or entrepreneurship.
Challenges:
- Mired in corruption and bad credit practices
- Lack of skilled professional
- Failure to self sustain themselves financially
- Excessive dependence on funds from state governments
- Dominance of Commercial banks
Q.3) The existing yield levels of a majority of crops remains much lower than the world average. Discuss the reason for low yield. Also, suggest measures to improve productivity.
Answer:
In India, average yields of wheat is 39% below China and in case of rice 46% below that of China’s.
Reasons:
- Poor quality of seeds
- Fragmentation of land
- Lack of irrigation facilities
- Soil degradation due to poor usage of fertilisers and pesticides
- Disguised unemployment
Measures to improve:
- Introduction of better and efficient irrigation facilities like micro irrigation techniques
- Promotion of agricultural mechanization to increase yield without resorting to hired labour
- Introduction and upgrading of large scale irrigation across the country, particularly in unirrigated areas
- Improve promotion and transport of farm produce by strengthening rural infrastructure
- Remove problems in marketing of farm produce including addressing the issues around APMC act. e-NAM could be a good start
- Improving storage facility, tenant security, supply of better quality seeds.
- Promote multiple cropping
Q.4) How are drug price regulated in India? What are the major issues regarding drug price regulation?
Answer:
Drug price regulations in India:
- NLEM includes essential medicines that satisfy the priority health needs of the population.
- National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority controls and regulates the prices of drugs in India under the Drug Prices Control Order (DPCO), 1995
Issues regarding drug price regulation:
- Cost-based pricing policy resulted in comparatively lower prices than the current market-based policy.
- Supreme Court in 2015 termed national pharmaceutical pricing policy 2015 and drug price control order 2013 as unreasonable and irrational.
- The DPCO follows a market-based pricing mechanism. The ceiling price is worked out on the basis of the simple average price of all brands having at least 1% market share of the total market turnover of that medicine. This mechanism is contested by pharma companies.
- Pharma manufacturing companies feel disincentive in the process
- The recent report of the Competition Commission of India reveals that retailers’ margins as a primary cause of high prices of medicines. Drug price control will have less control in such situations.
