Chapter-10: Social Infrastructure, Employment and Human Development

What are survey notes on Investment in social expenditure?

• Public investment in social infrastructure like education and health is critical in the development of an economy. However, the expenditure on social services by the Centre and States as a proportion of GDP has remained in the range of 6 per cent during 2012-13 to 2014.

Education For All

• The Government of India is committed to achieving the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG- 4) for education – “Ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning” by 2030.
• With a view to achieve the goal of universalization of elementary education, the Right to Free & Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 had been enacted in 2010 that provides a justiciable legal framework entitling all children between the ages of 6-14 years free and compulsory admission, attendance and completion of elementary education. It provides for children’s right to an education of equitable quality, based on principles of equity and non-discrimination.

Student Classroom Ratio

• SCR is defined as average number of pupils (students) per classroom in a school in a given school-year. The ideal size should be at 30 students per classroom. At all India level, percentage of schools with SCR greater than 30 students declined from 43 per cent in 2009-10 to 25.7 per cent in 2015-16.

Pupil Teacher Ratio

• At primary level and upper primary level, the PTR should be 30:1 and 35:1 respectively. As per Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE), the PTR at national level for primary schools is 23:1 in 2015-16. Globally, there are variations in the optimum number of students taught in a particular class and as such the data is not uniformly comparable.
• Gender Parity Index (GPI) in education is a valuable indicator which reflects the discrimination against girls in access to educational opportunities. In higher education, gender disparities still prevail in enrolment for which continuous efforts are being made by the Government to improve net intake rate for women in higher education. With consistent efforts by the Government through programmes like Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao, the GPI has improved substantially at the primary and secondary levels of enrolment.

Beti Bachao Beti Padhao

• Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (BBBP) scheme has been introduced for promoting survival, protection and education of girl child. It aims to address the issue of declining Child Sex Ratio (CSR) through a mass campaign targeted at changing social mind set and creating awareness about the criticality of the issue.
• The scheme launched in 2015 is a tri-ministerial, convergent effort of Ministries of Women and Child Development, Health & Family Welfare and Human Resource Development with focus on awareness and advocacy campaign, multi-sectoral action in select 161 districts (100 districts in Phase-1 & 61 districts in Phase-II), enabling girls’ education and effective enforcement of Pre-Conception & Pre Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PC&PNDT) Act

What are survey notes on Progress In Labour Reforms?

• The Government is in the process of rationalizing 38 Central Labour Acts by framing relevant provisions of existing laws into 4 labour codes viz Code on Wages, Code on Safety and Working Conditions, Code on Industrial Relations, and Code on Social Security and Welfare.
• The draft Code on Wages Bill 2017 has been introduced in Lok Sabha in August 2017 and referred to the Standing Committee on Labour for examination.
• The other three Codes are at pre-legislative consultation stage. The codification of the labour laws is expected to remove the multiplicity of definitions and authorities leading to ease of compliance without compromising wage security and social security to the workers.
• The Government has undertaken numerous technology enabled transformative initiatives such as Shram Suvidha Portal, Ease of Compliance to maintain registers under various Labour Laws/Rules.
• The Universal Account Number have been effected in order to reduce the complexity in compliance and to bring transparency and accountability for better enforcement of the labour laws.
• Further, the Government initiated the National Career Service portal (www.ncs.gov.in) by linking all employment exchanges of the country to facilitate online registration and posting of jobs for job-seekers and to provide employment related services like career counselling, vocational guidance, information on skill development courses and internships.
• Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is one of the important schemes which ensures participation by women in the economic activity by stipulating minimum 33 per cent participation by women. There has been highest ever budget allocation of Rs 48000 crore under MGNREGA during 2017-18.

What are survey notes on women empowerment?

Mahila E-Haat

• For economic empowerment of women through promoting the spirit of creating self-employment ventures, Mahila E-Haat, an initiative for meeting aspirations and needs of women entrepreneurs has been launched with the objective to provide an e-marketing platform by leveraging technology for showcasing product made/manufactured/sold by women entrepreneurs/SHGs/NGOs. This is impacting directly and indirectly over 26000 SHGs and 3.75 lakh beneficiaries.

Maternity Benefit (Amendment) Act, 2017

• As per the Maternity Benefit (Amendment) Act, 2017, the women are entitled to enhanced maternity leave for a period of 26 weeks (6 months) working in registered establishment under any Central or State law. It has been made mandatory for the establishments employing 50 or more employees to provide crèche facility, either separately or along with common facilities within a prescribed distance.

Political Empowerment of Women

• The representation of women in Parliament and in decision making roles in public sphere is one of the key indicators of empowerment. As per the report ‘Women in Politics 2017 (IPU & UN)’ Lok Sabha had 64 (11.8 percent of 542 MPs) and Rajya Sabha had 27 (11 per cent of 245 MPs) women MPs. As on October 2016, out of the total 4118 MLAs across the country, only 9 per cent were women.
• Among the State assemblies, the highest percentage of women MLAs were from Bihar, Haryana and Rajasthan with 14 per cent followed by Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal with 13 per cent and Punjab with 12 per cent (Women & Men in India – 2016, MoSPI).
• As promoting women’s political participation and leadership roles has vast implications for gender equality policies, Article 243D (3) of the Constitution of India provides that not less than one third of the total number of seats be reserved for women. Further, Article 243 D (4) of the Constitution of India provides that not less than one third of the total offices of Chairpersons in Panchayats at each level shall be reserved for women.
• There has been substantial representation of women at the local government levels but varies from State to State. There are 13.72 lakh elected women representatives (EWRs) in PRIs which constitute 44.2 percent of total elected representatives (ERs) as on December, 2017.
• Further, for leadership development and to address women’s issues at village levels, Mahila Shakti Kendra scheme has been launched at the village level. Over 300 thousand student volunteers are being sent out in 115 most backward districts under this new scheme. District Level Centres for Women are also being set up in 640 districts under this scheme, which will provide convergence at the district level for all initiatives related to women. Besides, Nai Roshni, a leadership development programme, is also operational for benefiting the women belonging to minority communities

What are survey notes on Health Sector?

• Ensuring healthy lives and promoting the well-being for all at all ages is essential to sustainable development (SDG-3). India’s commitment to achieve the targets under SDG-3 with some of them also aligned with the National Health Policy 2017, will help in strengthening health delivery systems and in achieving universal health coverage.

Steps taken by the Government to regulate prices of Drugs and Diagnostics

• Under National Health Mission (NHM), Government is supporting States through National Free Diagnostic Service Initiative to provide essential diagnostic services in public health facilities. Government of India has brought out guidelines in July 2015 to provide states with a broad framework for implementing free drug initiatives. The number of tests varies from State to State. An amount of Rs 759 crore has been approved for free diagnostic service initiative under NHM for 29 States/UTs in 2017-18.
• National Free Drug Initiative under NHM aims at expanding the availability of free drug provision in all public health facilities. The initiative would not only provide support to States for purchase of drugs but enabling States to place transparent system of procurement and quality assurance, robust supply management and logistics that would ensure highest level of safety and quallty of drugs. All States have notified free drug policy. Over 25 States are implementing IT based supply chain management of drugs.
• Under Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act, 2010 and Clinical Establishments (Central Government) Rules, 2012, the clinical establishments (in the States / Union Territories where the Act is applicable) shall charge the rates for each type of procedure and services within the range of rates determined by the Central Government from time to time in consultation with the State Governments. The clinical establishments are also required to display the rates charged for each type of services provided and facilities available, at a conspicuous place both in the local language and English. The National Council for Clinical Establishments has approved a standard list of medical procedures and a standard template for costing of medical procedures and shared the same with the States and UTs.
• Medical Council of India (MCI) has amended the Indian Medical Council (Professional Conduct, Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations, 2002 vide notification dated 21.09.2016, which stipulates that ‘every physician should prescribe drugs with generic names legibly and preferably in capital letters and he/she shall ensure that there is a rational prescription and use of drugs’. All the Registered Medical Practitioners under the Indian Medical Council (IMC) Act have been directed to comply with the aforesaid provisions.

What are survey notes on Government Programmes for Women and Children?

In the current financial year (2017-18) the scope of several existing programmes and schemes have been expanded and several new initiatives have been taken up to foster all round development of Women and Children in the country. Some of the schemes are mentioned below:

Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS)

• ICDS scheme aims at the holistic development of children upto 6 years of age and to meet nutritional needs of pregnant women and lactating mothers. Recently, rationalization, restructuring and continuation of four child centric schemes such as
  • Anganwadi Services (in place of ICDS)
  • Scheme for Adolescent Girls (SAG) (in place of SABLA)
  • Child Protection Services (in place of Integrated Child Protection Scheme) and
  • National Crèche Scheme (in place of Rajiv Gandhi National Crèche Scheme) of the Ministry under ‘Umbrella Integrated Child Development Services’ Scheme has been approved by the Government.
• Keeping in line with the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, special emphasis has been given on providing toilet and safe drinking water facility at every Anganwadi Centre under the restructured Anganwadi Services Scheme. The scheme has been universalized with cumulative approval of 7076 projects and 14 lakh Anganwadi Centres (AWCs) including 20,000 anganwadis on demand.
• Digitization of Anganwadi Centres (AWCs) has already begun in 8 States with ICTs enabled monitoring of the Schemes through smart phones/Tablets to anganwadi worker and supervisor. A new web-portal has been created for enabling the MIS data entry by the States/UTs. The Ministry has taken an initiative to address the micro-nutrient deficiencies among women and children in the country. In this regard, fortification of food items with essential micro-nutrients has been made mandatory in the Government funded nutrition related schemes.

Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY )

• The earlier Maternity Benefit Programme, for the eligible pregnant women and lactating mothers (PW&LM) has now been named as Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY) a Centrally Sponsored Scheme, in January, 2017 for providing partial compensation for the wage loss in terms of cash incentive so that the woman can take adequate rest before and after delivery of the first child.
• The cash incentive provided would lead to improved health seeking behaviour amongst the PW&LM. The Scheme envisages providing cash incentive amounting to 5,000/- in DBT Mode during pregnancy and lactation.
• The remaining cash incentive of 1000/- is provided towards maternity benefit under Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY) after institutional delivery so that on an average, an eligible women will get Rs. 6,000/-.

National Nutrition Mission (NNM)

• The Government of India has approved setting up of National Nutrition Mission (NNM) commencing from 2017-18 The NNM, as an apex body, will monitor, supervise, fix targets and guide the nutrition related interventions across the Ministries.
• The programme through the targets will strive to reduce the level of stunting, under-nutrition, anaemia and low birth weight babies. It will create synergy, ensure better monitoring, issue alerts for timely action to achieve the targeted goals.

Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY)

• PMUY was launched in May 2016, for providing LPG connections to 5 crore women belonging to the BPL families over a period of 3 years from 2016-17.
• The scheme aims to safeguard the health of women & children by providing them with a clean cooking fuel – LPG, so that they do not have to compromise their health in smoky kitchens or wander in unsafe areas collecting firewood.
• Since inception, around 3.3 crore LPG connections have already been provided as on 18.01.2018.

Public Health Expenditure by States

• The National Health Policy, 2017 has recommended increasing State sector health spending to more than 8 per cent of the State government budget by 2020.