NITI Aayog
Sixth Governing Council Meeting of NITI Aayog Concludes

Relevance IN - Prelims ( about Governing Council of NITI Aayog) + Mains ( GS II Governance + Centre State Relations)
What's the NEWS

• The sixth meeting of the Governing Council of NITI Aayog was held under the chairmanship of Hon'ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi
• It was attended by 26 Chief Ministers, 3 Lieutenant Governors and 2 Administrators, apart from Union Ministers, who are Ex-Officio Members, and Special Invitees.
• NITI Aayog Vice Chairman, Members and CEO,Principal Secretary to the PM & other senior officers from PMO; Cabinet Secretary; and Chief Secretaries of States/ Union Territories also attended the meeting.

Sixth Governing Council Meeting (highlights)

• The Sixth Governing Council Meeting was unique as it brought together the country's highest decision-makers on one platform.

The Agenda for the Sixth Council Meeting comprised the following items:

1. Making India a Manufacturing Powerhouse
2. Reimagining Agriculture
3. Improving Physical Infrastructure
4. Accelerating Human Resources Development
5. Improving Service Delivery at Grassroots Level
6. Health and Nutrition

• The Council deliberated on several steps for making India a manufacturing powerhouse, such as reducing compliance burden, initiating reforms at the State level, improving logistics, promoting exports through district-level competition and creating jobs.
• For improving physical infrastructure, the Chief Ministers expressed the need to raise public capital investment and completing projects under the National Infrastructure Pipeline, while enhancing investments in infrastructure through private and Public Private Partnerships, improving last-mile connectivity, reducing energy costs and configuring an enhanced and efficient role of States in project implementation.
• The Governing Council Meeting seeks to build on the strength of every State so that everyone can learn from each other's best practices.
• The Council members deliberated on strengthening institutions for skilling, reskilling, and upskilling of workforce.
• Focus was also laid on improving service delivery at the grassroots level, by ensuring digital infrastructure for the rural regions.

Know! about the Governing Council of NITI Aayog

• The Governing Council of NITI Aayog comprises the Prime Minister of India, Chief Ministers of all the States and Union Territories with Legislature, Lt Governors of other UTs, Ex-Officio Members and Special Invitees.
• It is the premier body tasked with evolving a shared vision of national development priorities, sectors and strategies with the active involvement of States in shaping the development narrative. Including today, a total of Six meetings have been held so far.
• NITI Aayog has been mandated with fostering Cooperative Federalism through structured support initiatives and mechanisms with the States on a continuous basis, recognizing that strong States make a strong nation on the principles of ‘SabkaSaath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas'.
• It seeks to design and assist the implementation of strategic, long-term policy frameworks and programme initiatives, while monitoring their progress and efficacy.
• The Governing Council, which embodies these objectives of cooperative federalism, presents a platform to discuss inter-sectoral, inter-departmental and federal issues to accelerate the implementation of the national development agenda.
• This Governing Council meeting paved the way for synergies across all tiers of the Government, with substantial collaboration and cooperation in the Agenda items.
• The meeting provided an opportunity to address the objectives of advancing economic, social and demographic welfare.

Cooperative Federalism

• It is the foundation of India's progress. Cooperative and Competitive Federalism should be made more effective and taken to the district level
• This Governing Council meeting assumes even more significance as it provides an opportunity to brainstorm and further strengthen Cooperative and Competitive Federalism, which are essential pillars for successful achievement of the national aspirations
• NITI Aayog's commitment to work tirelessly with States and Union Territories in the spirit of Cooperative Federalism.

Defence
Indian Navy And Indonesian Navy Conducts PASSEX In Arabian Sea To Enhance Interoperability

Relevance IN - Prelims ( about bilateral military exercise PASSEX)
What's the NEWS

• The Indian Navy and the Indonesian Navy conducted bilateral military exercise PASSEX in the Arabian Sea.
• The exercise was conducted with a view to enhancing interoperability & strengthening Bilateral Maritime Cooperation between the two navies.
• Indian Navy Ship INS Talwar and Indonesian Navy's multirole Corvette KRI Bung Tomo were part of the Passage Exercise.

Know! about recent Maritime Exercises

• The Indian Navy has participated in the Maritime Exercises with a number of countries recently including Japan, Russia, Australia and the US, despite the COVID-19 pandemic posing challenges.
• Indian Navy had conducted PASSEX with Russian Federation Navy (RuFN)in the Eastern Indian Ocean Region (IOR) in December 2020.
• The PASSEX with RuFN involves the participation of RuFN guided-missile cruiser Varyag, the large anti-submarine ship Admiral Panteleyev and medium ocean tanker Pechenga while the Indian Navy was represented by indigenously constructed guided-missile frigate Shivalik and anti-submarine corvette Kadmatt along with integral helicopters.
• PASSEXs are conducted regularly by Indian Navy with units of friendly foreign navies, whilst visiting each other's ports or during a rendezvous at sea.
• In November 2020, India hosted the Malabar exercise, in which the navies of the US, Japan and Australia participated.
• India invited Australia for the exercise, effectively making it a drill by all the Quad member nations.
• In September 2020, the PASSEX was conducted Royal Australian Navy in the east Indian Ocean region.
• It involved advanced surface and anti-air exercises including weapon firing, seamanship exercises, naval manoeuvres and Cross Deck Flying Operations.
• The exercise is usually conducted in the east Indian Ocean region.
• The PASSEX in September reflected the growing strength of Indo-Australian bilateral relations as comprehensive strategic partners, particularly in defence cooperation in the maritime domain.

Governance
Passport services integrated with DigiLocker platform, govt launches scheme
Relevance IN - Prelims ( about DigiLocker platform + about Passport Seva Programme V2.0) + Mains ( GS II governance, transparency and accountability)
What's the NEWS

• Union Minister of State for External Affairs launched a new scheme by which an applicant can leverage the DigiLocker platform of the Government of India while applying for passport-related services from anywhere in India.
• "With the launch of this new scheme, applicants applying for passport services can provide link to their specific documents uploaded in the DigiLocker.
• This would enable citizens to submit various documents required for Passport Services through DigiLocker in a paperless mode.
• They are not required to carry the original documents

DigiLocker

• DigiLocker is a key initiative under Digital India, a flagship program aimed at transforming India into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy.
• DigiLocker provides citizens a sharable private space on a public cloud enabling availability of all documents/certificates provided on this cloud.
• Targeted at paperless governance, DigiLocker is a platform for issuance and verification of documents/ certificates in a digital way, thus eliminating the use of physical documents.
• Further, once passports are also uploaded in DigiLocker, details would be easily accessible to authorized users from any location, which would be useful especially in case of loss of passport

e Passport for citizens

• The Ministry plans to roll out ePassport for citizens, which will increase security and improve facilitation of immigration processes at foreign airports.
• In the upcoming Passport Seva Programme V2.0, the use of emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, Chat-Bot, Analytics, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), etc. will help ease the citizen experience and expeditious service delivery
• The passport programme was introduced in the year 2010 to improve the delivery of passport services.
• It has introduced a major digital transformation in the last six years.

Health
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, India sign MoU to promote health research

Relevance IN - Prelims ( about the MoU -highlights) + Mains ( GS II Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.
What's the NEWS

• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Indiahave signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to support the development, conduct and promotion of health research in India.
• Gates Foundation and CSIR will work together to identify opportunities to initiate scientific and technological collaborations.

MoU to promote health research ( highlights)

• These will focus on developing and testing new preventions, therapies and interventions that can help to solve major health concerns that affect India and other developing countries.
• As per the MoU, areas of research collaboration would include genetic diseases that impact infant and neonatal mortality; new diagnostics and devices for infectious disease and environmental surveillance; development of cost-effective processes for drug, vaccines, biologics, and diagnostics manufacturing; novel microbiome-directed foods; socio-economic impact of science and technological tools; and other areas of health and development.

Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR)

• CSIR is India's premier S&T organization comprising 37 research laboratories focused on diverse scientific and industrial research areas.
• CSIR's research covers a wide spectrum of science and technology - from aerospace, oceanography, geophysics, chemicals, drugs, genomics, biotechnology and nanotechnology to mining, aeronautics, instrumentation, environmental engineering and information technology and provides significant technological intervention in many areas with regard to societal efforts which include environment, health, drinking water, food, housing, energy and agricultural sectors.

Health
Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0

Relevance IN - Prelims ( about Intensified Mission Indradhanush 3.0) + Mains ( GS II Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.
What's the NEWS

• The Intensified Mission Indradhanush 3.0 will have two rounds starting from February 22 and March 22, 2021 and will be conducted in pre-identified 250 districts/urban areas across 29 States/UTs in the country.
• Focus of the IMI 3.0 will be the children and pregnant women who have missed their vaccine doses during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• They will be identified and vaccinated during the two rounds of IMI 3.0.

IMI 3.0.

• As per the Guidelines released for IMI 3.0, the districts have been classified to reflect 313 low risk; 152 as medium risk; and 250 as high risk districts.
• Each round will be for 15 days each. Beneficiaries from migration areas and hard to reach areas will be targeted as they may have missed their vaccine doses during COVID19.
• IMI 3.0 will build on the gains of previous phases of the campaign and make lasting gains towards Universal Immunization: "Since its first phase, Mission Indradhanushhas covered 690 districts and vaccinated 37.64 million children and 9.46 million pregnant women.
• The present eighth campaign will target achieving 90% Full Immunization Coverage (FIC) in all districts of the country and sustain the coverage through immunization system strengthening and foster India's march towards the Sustainable Development Goals
• Intensified Mission Indradhanush 3.0 (IMI 3.0) aimed to reach the unreached population with all the available vaccines under Universal Immunisation Programme (UIP) and thereby accelerate the full immunization and complete immunization coverage of children and pregnant women.

Mission Indradhanush

• It was launched in 2014 to provide affordable and accessible healthcare to all citizens of the country
• Every year the Universal Immunization Programme caters to the vaccination needs of 2.65 crore children and 2.9 crore pregnant women against 12 Vaccine Preventable Diseases.
• Despite these efforts by all the States and UTs, some children and pregnant women get missed out from this network.
• Mission Indradhanush is indeed a successful strategy to reach out to every dropped out and left out child and pregnant woman.
• There has been remarkable improvement in the immunization coverage which is also evident in the NFHS5 data as available for 22 States.
• The Mission Indradhanush campaigns have proven to be tailor made for the Indian context, and have given far reaching results during the earlier phases.
• Mission Indradhanush& Intensified Mission Indradhanush has enabled the immunization system in reaching hard to reach and high-risk areas including brick kilns, construction sites and nomadic population.
• The previous campaigns also helped in improving the micro-planning, generating demand for immunization services and strengthening the supporting systems."

Universal Immunization Programme

• Expanded Programme on Immunization was launched in 1978.
• It was renamed as Universal Immunization Programme in 1985 when its reach was expanded beyond urban areas.
• In 1992, it became part of Child Survival and Safe Motherhood Programme and in 1997 it was included in the ambit of National Reproductive and Child Health Programme.
• Since the launch of National Rural Health Mission in 2005, Universal Immunization Programme has always been an integral part of it.
• Universal Immunization Programme (UIP) is one of the largest public health programmes targeting close of 2.67 crore newborns and 2.9 crore pregnant women annually.
• It is one of the most cost-effective public health interventions and largely responsible for reduction of vaccine preventable under-5 mortality rate.
• Under UIP, immunization is providing free of cost against 12 vaccine preventable diseases:
• Nationally against 9 diseases - Diphtheria, Pertussis, Tetanus, Polio, Measles, Rubella, severe form of Childhood Tuberculosis, Hepatitis B and Meningitis & Pneumonia caused by Hemophilus Influenza type B
• Sub-nationally against 3 diseases - Rotavirus diarrhoea, Pneumococcal Pneumonia and Japanese Encephalitis; of which Rotavirus vaccine and Pneumococcal Conjugate vaccine are in process of expansion while JE vaccine is provided only in endemic districts.
• A child is said to be fully immunized if child receives all due vaccine as per national immunization schedule within 1^st year age of child.
• The two major milestones of UIP have been the elimination of polio in 2014 and maternal and neonatal tetanus elimination in 2015.

New vaccines

• Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV): IPV has been introduced in UIP as part of Global Polio end-game strategy, to mitigate the risk associated with tOPV to bOPV switch. IPV was introduced in November 2015 initially in 6 states, which was expanded across the country by April 2016.
• Rotavirus vaccine (RVV): RVV has been introduced to reduce mortality and morbidity caused by Rotavirus diarrhoea in March 2016. It has been introduced in 11 states (Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Assam, Tripura, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh). The vaccine will be expanded across the country in 2019-20.
• Measles Rubella (MR) vaccine: India is committed to the goal of measles elimination and rubella control and to achieve the goal MR vaccine was introduced in the country through a campaign mode in a phased manner in 2017. MR campaign target around 41 crore children in the age group of 9 months to 15 years (covering ⅓ of the total population of the country) followed by 2 doses in routine immunization at 9-12 months and 16-24 months. Rubella component is now under routine immunization as MR vaccine.
• Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine (PCV): PCV has been launched in May 2017 for reducing Infant mortality and morbidity caused by pneumococcal pneumonia. It has been introduced in Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, 19 districts of Uttar Pradesh and 18 districts of Rajasthan.
• Tetanus and adult diphtheria (Td) vaccine: TT vaccine has been replaced with Td vaccine in UIP to limit the waning immunity against diphtheria in older age groups. Td vaccine to be administered to adolescents at 10 and 16 years of age and to pregnant women.

The recommendations to introduce these new vaccines have been made after numerous scientific studies and comprehensive deliberations by the National Technical Advisory Group of India (NTAGI), the country's apex scientific advisory body on immunisation.
Mission Indradhanush

• Mission Indradhanush (MI) was launched in December 2014 and aims at increasing the full immunization coverage to children to 90%.
• Under this drive focus is given on pockets of low immunization coverage and hard to reach areas where the proportion of unvaccinated and partially vaccinated children is highest.
• A total of six phases of Mission Indradhanush have been completed covering 554 districts across the country.
• It was also identified as one of the flagship schemes under Gram Swaraj Abhiyan (16,850 villages across 541 districts) and Extended Gram Swaraj Abhiyan (48,929 villages across 117 aspirational districts).
• While the first two phases of Mission Indradhanush resulted in 6.7% increase in full immunization coverage in a year, a recent survey carried out in 190 districts covered in Intensified Mission Indradhanush (5th phase of Mission Indradhanush) shows 18.5% points increase in full immunization coverage as compared to NFHS-4 survey carried out in 2015-16.

New Initiatives in Vaccine Logistics & Cold Chain Management
Capacity building

• National Cold Chain Training Centre (NCCTE), Pune and National Cold Chain & Vaccine Management Resource Centre (NCCVMRC) -NIHFW, New Delhi have been established to provide technical training to cold chain technicians in repair & maintenance of cold chain equipment

System strengthening
Electronic Vaccine Intelligence Network (eVIN) rollout:

• The Government of India has rolled out an Electronic Vaccine Intelligence Network (eVIN)system that digitizes the entire vaccine stock management, their logistics and temperature tracking at all levels of vaccine storage - from national to the sub-district.

• This enables program managers to have real time view of the vaccine stock position and their storage temperature across all the cold chain points providing a detailed overview of the vaccine cold chain logistics system across the entire country.
• eVIN system has been completed in 12 states in the first phase - Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh Gujarat, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Nagaland, Odisha, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh.
• Second phase is ongoing in 9 states - Andhra Pradesh, Daman & Diu, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Goa, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Telangana, Tripura and Uttarakhand.
• eVIN is to be scaled up to entire country.
• National Cold Chain Management Information System (NCCMIS) to track the cold chain equipment inventory, availability and functionality.

Prelims Factoids
Transport Minister Shri Nitin Gadkari launches ‘Go Electric' Campaign
Relevance IN - Prelims ( about Go Electric" Campaign )
What's the NEWS

• The Union Minister for Road Transport & Highways, launched the "Go Electric" Campaign to spread awareness on the benefits of e-mobility and EV Charging Infrastructure as well as electric cooking in India.

Go Electric' Campaign - nationwide campaign

• The Go Electric Campaign is an important initiative that would help in reducing the import dependence of our country in the coming years and would be an important step towards a cleaner and greener future.
• The campaign is aimed at creating awareness at PAN-India level and is expected to boost the confidence of Electric Vehicle manufacturers.
• Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), under the aegis of the Ministry of Power has been mandated to undertake an awareness drive for promoting Public Charging, e-mobility & its ecosystem.
• To implement the ‘Go Electric' campaign at National and State level, BEE will extend technical support to the State Designated Agencies (SDAs). As a Central Nodal Agency, BEE will provide content and details to State Designated Agencies and other partners to ensure uniformity of information.
• This campaign would go a long way in fulfilling the main objective of Energy Transition to move ahead on the path of Low Carbon economy, thereby saving our Country and the Planet from the adverse impact of Climate Change.
• It will also help in reducing the country's dependence on other countries for energy needs.
• The launch Event also witnessed the unveiling of "Go Electric" logo which depicts the evolution of e-mobility eco-system.

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