Saturday, 31 July 2021

A Tale of Two Shames ?

One is about use of software Pegasus to snoop on unsuspecting citizen for unspecified / assumed anti-national behaviors

Other is :

Over 9 Lakh Children Suffer Severely Acute Malnutrition, States Centre; 3.98 Lakh From UP / Republic world

Extract :

Ø Over 9,27,606 children are Severely Acute Malnourished in India as of 30 November 2020, revealed Union Mister for Women and Child development Smriti Irani on Thursday, in a written reply to Rajya Sabha.

Ø Irani further revealed that of the 9 lakh+ children, 3,98,359 are from the State of Uttar Pradesh. In reply to AAP MP Sanjay Singh, Irani stated that under the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS), supplementary nutrition is provided to these children.

Ø To counter malnourishment among children in the age group of 0-6 years, Irani stated that the POSHAN Abhiyaan was launched on 8th March, 2018. Under the newly launched Mission Poshan 2.0, Irani stated that pregnant women and lactating mothers were focused upon to provide nutritional content.

Ø As per the data, while Rs 5312.79 crores have been released to states/UTs from 2017-18 to 2020-21, only Rs. 2985.56 crores ( 56 % ) , have been utilised up to 31 March, 2021.

Dalit Children more likely to be stunted, shows study / TOI / 30 July

Extract :

Ø That India has the highest number of stunted children in the world ( 40.6 million children, as per NFHS data ) representing one-third of the global total of stunted children under the age of five, is well known

Ø Now, a data narrative published by Ashoka University’s Centre for Economic Data and Analysis shows that stunting is much more likely among Dalit children in areas where caste-based un-touchability is higher, such as the BIMARU states ( Bihar-Madhya Pradesh-Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh )

Ø In their paper titled “ The Missing Piece of the Puzzle: Caste Discrimination and Stunting “, authors Ashwini Deshpande and Rajesh Ramchandran found that rates of stunting are far lower among upper caste Hindus as compared to SC/STs, OBCs, UC Muslims

Ø The stunting incidence was 26 % for children of upper caste Hindus as compared to 31 % of children in SSA

Ø In comparison, 40 % children belonging to SC / ST communities suffered from stunting, 36 % from OBC communities and 35 % from the upper caste Muslim community

My Take :

Ø British ruled over India for 150 years. Under leadership of Mahatmaji, it took us ( the public ), 20 years of fight to win our freedom

Ø Imagine, the only technologies used were “ Non-Violence / Satyagraha / Non-cooperation “

Ø Next year, under our own – and democratically elected – rulers, we will celebrate 75^th year of our Independence

Ø But , we are not anywhere near to win our “ Liberation “ from malnutrition ( - euphemism for starvation ) – despite slogans like, “ Garibi Hatao / No child will go to bed hungry “ etc

Ø In my opinion , this ( failure ) is a matter of SHAME , far bigger than Pegasus !

Ø All the more so, because , those very same MOBILE APP TECHNOLOGIES which power Pegasus , can be employed to liberate us from malnutrition ( and, within 2 years – not 20 years )

Ø Following is the history of my efforts to persuade our Policy Makers to use MOBILE technology to win this WAR against malnutrition :

Ø Two Indias ………………………………………………………………………[ 26 April 2011 ]

Extract :

# 435 million Indians [ 36 % of 1210 million population ] are below

poverty line, unable to spend even Rs.12 ( $ 0.21 ) per day on food /

clothing / shelter

# For this “ Second “ India comprising the remaining 36%, it is starvation

from birth until death ! To them a GDP growth rate of 9 % makes no

sense !

Ø Agriculture in China ………………………………………………………..[ 02 June 2011 ]

Extract :

# And , unlike India ,China does not have 1.6 Million children ( under 5

) dying each year due to starvation

( Indian Government likes to call it , “ Malnutrition “ )

Does any political party of India have the courage to include “

Elimination of Starvation “ in it’s election manifesto , for the

forthcoming National Election in 2014 ?

Ø Starving / Dying can be saved ……………………………………………[ 19 Jan 2012 ]

Extract :

We don’t have to become Jains in order to save the starving millions. Just

don’t waste food

Ø Hunger is not an Issue ! ……………………………………………………….[ 20 Feb 2012 ]

Extract :

# But hunger is not an issue for any political party during the current

State Elections.

How about promising “ hunger quotas “ according to age – groups ?

Model Code of Conduct does not cover this !

==================================================

Ø Saving 1.2 million Kids ………………………………………………[ 29 June 2016 ]

Extract :

# That leaves 20 million who do not go to school , hopelessly

malnourished

How can we ensure that they get some nutritious food everyday ?

If there is a will , there is a way - the following way :

( A ) …. FOOD

( B )….. PACKING

( C )…… MANUFACTURERS

( D )…… DELIVERY POINTS

( E ) ……TECHNOLOGY

* Each NEUTRA-KID bar wrapper will have a bar-code ( till such time

inserting RFID sensors become a reality )

* Bar code will carry all normal instructions + Delivery Destination (

Post Office )

* Each NEUTRA-KID bar will pass thru a Bar Code Reader on the

Assembly Line , before dispatch

* Info collected thru this reader will get transmitted to the Central

Server of concerned Ministries

* After taking his / her weight and entering in a online Database ,

hosted on the Central Server of the concerned Ministries,

each targeted child will get registered at the nearest Post Office

* Each registered child will be issued a blue tooth enabled Smart

phone, duly pre-installed with a Mobile App called " BANMALI "(

Banish Malnutrition in India ) , in which Child's data / Aadhar No

will be entered

* Every day , the concerned child ( and parent ) will visit the post

office to collect the NEUTRA-KID bar

* Before handing over bar, child will be weighed on a weighing machine

and the weight entered in BANMALI

The weight record graph will appear on the screen of the PC located at

the Post Office ( Blue Tooth )

* This record will also get transmitted ( of course , automatically ) to

the COMMUNITY HEALTH CENTRE where the concerned child is "

registered " ( this will be compulsory in order to be eligible for this

Scheme )

* Every time , a child is taken for his/her monthly HEALTH CHECK UP (

also compulsory in order to receive next month's NEUTRA-KID bars )

, concerned doctor will examine the child and enter

his findings in BANMALI

Doctor will be required to enter medicines prescribed as also, increase

/ decrease in the QUOTA of NEUTRA- KID bars recommended for the

next month

· All of these data will get relayed to the Central Servers of the concerned

Ministries

Ø A Mobile App named " BANMALI "………………………………… [ 15 Sept 2016 ]

Extract :

# All over the country , there must be SEVERAL CRORE children covered

under ICDS scheme

# It would benefit all the States - and the Centre - to consider my

suggestion for a COMPREHENSIVE SOLUTION of malnutrition among

children thru implementation of Mobile App " BANMALI "

Ø BANMALI is the TOTAL SOLUTION …………………………………..[ 14 Nov 2016 ]

Extract :

# Union minister for Women & Child Development Maneka Gandhi wants to

put an end to children consuming empty calories. Instead, she wants them

to consume calories rich in nutrition, and her ministry wants to

have sachets containing 600-1000 calories of nutrition for children

# You will notice that my proposal tightly integrates ALL the concerned

Agencies through internet enabled hardware and a SINGLE /

COMMON software database , which not only prevents any

" Benefit Leakages " but broadcasts actual " Achievements " ( Weight gain

/ Reduced Mortality ), instantaneously , / automatically / transparently

=================================================

Ø Can Akshay Patra Banish Malnutrition ? …………………….[ 05 June 2017 ]

Extract :

# The Akshaya Patra Foundation, an NGO focussing on providing mid-day

meals to children, is in talks with food companies to co-create nutritious

recipes and products that can supplement its offerings under the

government’s flagship scheme.

# For instance, with PepsiCo India, the NGO is looking to co-create

an OATMEAL-BASED NUTRITIOUS BAR that can supplement mid-day

meals.

==================================================

> Thank You Madam Maneka Gandhiji …………………………….[ 21 Dec 2018 ]

Extract :

# For what ?

For accepting my suggestions ( all sent as E Mails to Cabinet Ministers )

# How ?

By launching “ Poshan Abhiyan “ at the hands of Shri Modiji on 08 March 2018

# What is it ?

It is a nutrition scheme that aims to reduce malnutrition among children and mothers

# How does it work ?

Through ICDS – CAS Dashboard

To facilitate the functioning of this dashboard, over 200,000 smartphones

have been procured by the states to aid ‘anganwadis’ in monitoring nutrition

levels in children.

· THESE PHONES COME UPLOADED WITH AN APPLICATION THAT

FACILITATES REAL-TIME DATA REPORTING FROM THE GRASS- ROOT LEVEL

AND IS EXPECTED TO COME IN HANDY IN DRAWING A NUTRITION

PROFILE OF THE COUNTRY,

Ø BANMALI arrives : Named as Poshan Tracker …………………[ 17 Apr 2021 ]

Extract :

# Last month, the Ministry of Women and Child Development and the

Ministry of electronics and IT launched an ambitious data-driven platform

called POSHAN TRACKER, to daily monitor the activities of more than

1.1 million Anganwadi workers

# These workers – spread across the country- are responsible for making sure

that pregnant women, infant as well as young children get adequate hot

meals, rations, vaccine doses and medication

# They are also responsible for ensuring early intervention in case of

disabilities or flagging other developmental concerns

# Close to 1 million Anganwadi workers have downloaded the Android App on

their smartphones and are using it DAILY, to key in EVERYDAY STATISTICS

# The project was launched in JANUARY ( 2021 ), and it went live in MARCH

# Since then, 10 LAKH workers have been registered and more than 3

CRORE end beneficiaries have been registered

# EACH DAY, data about vaccines and children’s

height, weight, MALNUTRITION along with details of

whether infrastructure such as toilets are present, is being uploaded

# Anganwadi workers have to download the APP, which can even e integrated by

States for their own programs

in this area

# The DASHBOARD shows,

# Real time data of the attendance of workers

# Number of vaccines

# Hot cooked meals

# Take-Home Rations that are provided

It can be broken down state and district wise

# Every day, a VIDEO-CONFERENCE is held to address any issue faced by these

workers or authorities while using the TECHNOLOGY PLATFORM

POSHAN Tracker

Helping make India malnutrition free

Thursday, 29 July 2021

Will mother Medusa replace son Pegasus ?

Of late there is a lot of heated debate re ( possible ? ) Govt surveillance of public figures, using a software Pegasus

This software is made by an Israeli company NSO ( currently being raided / investigated by the Israel government )

NSO claims :

# Software only meant to survey terrorists / militants

# Sold only to “ vetted “ governments around the world

# Costs a few crores of Rupees

# NSO has no access / knowledge of which Govt used it to survey whom and

when

There is a good chance that Israel may order NSO to stop selling this software outside Israel

In the meantime, our own Supreme Court is likely to hear a PIL in this regard, filed by Shri N Ram

PIL wants SC to ask GOI :

# Have any GOI department / agency purchased Pegasus ( YES – NO ) ?

# Has any GOI department / agency ever used Pegasus to survey any Indian

Citizen ( YES – NO ) ?

# If “ YES “ , who were surveyed ? ( Names of persons )

# If “ YES “ , who authorized this action ? ( Name of Officer who authorized )

# If authorized, were the existing rules for such surveillance ( under IT Act )

followed ( YES – NO ) ?

It is quite possible that GOI may truthfully answer these questions ( the best defense ? )

If current rules were not followed, GOI may even admit so and promise to modify / amend these rules ( for better transparency ) as suggested in :

Ø Who watches the Watchmen ? ………………………………..( 12 Jan 2019 )

It is possible that, after getting such assurance / promise from GOI, Supreme Court may dispose off the PIL with an admonition to the Government

PEGASUS : RIP

MEDUSA : Welcome

Within next 2 years , Pegasus will get replaced with Medusa

And here is how :

# Instead of ONE Israeli company making / selling Pegasus, ONE HUNDRED

companies from all over the World ( including from India ), will start

making Medusa ( a hundred times more sinister version of Pegasus )

# These companies will “license“ Medusa to anyone (not only governments ) as

SaS ( Software as Service )

# They will license Medusa for a FEW RUPEES per “ Usage Instance “ ( pay per

use )

# If a User explicitly AGREES to enable Medusa to transfer ALL snooped data ( of

those who got surveyed ), to the DEVELOPER company, it may even give it

away for FREE ( and make money by selling data )

Those readers who may think my prediction is unlikely, may want to read :

==================================================

Ø Turn off, turn on: Simple step can thwart top phone hackers

Extract :

Ø A robust market currently exists for hacking tools that can break into phones. Some companies like Zerodium and Crowdfence publicly offer millions of dollars for zero-click exploits.

Ø "There was nothing that any of the targets reported seeing on their screen. So that one was both completely invisible as well as not requiring any user interaction," Marczak said.

Ø The NSA's guide also acknowledges that rebooting a phone works only sometimes. The agency's guide for mobile devices has an even simpler piece of advice to really make sure hackers aren't secretly turning on your phone's camera or microphone to record you: don't carry it with you.

Ø IT staff receive upto 40 targeted phishing attacks a year: Report

Extract :

Ø Between May 2020 and June 2021, Barracuda researchers analysed more than 12 million spear phishing and social engineering attacks impacting more than 3 million mailboxes at over 17,000 organizations.

Ø An average organisation is targeted by over 700 social engineering attacks each year.

Ø "Cybercriminals are getting sneakier about who they target with their attacks, often targeting employees outside the finance and executive teams, looking for a weak link in your organisation," said Don MacLennan, SVP, Engineering & Product Management, Email Protection, Barracuda, in a statement.

Ø Mark in the Metaverse

Extract :

Ø The metaverse is a vision that spans many companies — the whole industry. You can think about it as the successor to the mobile internet. And it’s certainly not something that any one company is going to build, but I think a big part of our next chapter is going to hopefully be contributing to building that, in partnership with a lot of other companies and creators and developers. But you can think about the metaverse as an embodied internet, where instead of just viewing content — you are in it. And you feel present with other people as if you were in other places, having different experiences that you couldn’t necessarily do on a 2D app or webpage, like dancing, for example, or different types of fitness.

Ø But the metaverse isn’t just virtual reality. It’s going to be accessible across all of our different computing platforms; VR and AR, but also PC, and also mobile devices and game consoles.

Ø So that can be 3D — it doesn’t have to be. You might be able to jump into an experience, like a 3D concert or something, from your phone, so you can get elements that are 2D or elements that are 3D.

Ø We have these phones. They’re relatively small. A lot of the time that we’re spending, we’re basically mediating our lives and our communication through these small, glowing rectangles. I think that that’s not really how people are made to interact. A lot of the meetings that we have today, you’re looking at a grid of faces on a screen. That’s not how we process things either. We’re used to being in a room with people and having a sense of space where if you’re sitting to my right, then that means I’m also sitting to your left, so we have some shared sense of space in common. When you speak, it’s coming from my right. It’s not just all coming from the same place in front of me.

==================================================

Ø Industry wants Central Portal for Law Enforcement Agencies ……….[ 21 July 2021 ]

Ø Pegasus : Give it to a Surgeon ………………………………….[20 July 2021 ]

Ø Balancing : National Security vs Personal Privacy…….[19 July 2021 ]

Ø Digital Dividend from Demographic Data [ 4 D ]………[ 14 Feb 2019 ]

Ø SARAL ( Single Authentic Registration for Anywhere Login ).[ 10 Feb 2019 ]

Ø Supreme Surveillance Solution ? ………………………………….[05 Dec 2020 ]

Ø A Greed-Ship named Facebook …………………………………….[21 Sept 2020 ]

Ø Nostradamus could have said ? ……………………………………..[08 Nov 2018 ]

Extract :

Read what Microsoft President Brad Smith said 2 days back :

“For the first time, the world is on the threshold of technology that would give

a government the ability to follow,

anyone anywhere, and everyone everywhere.

It could know exactly where you are going, where you have been and where

you were yesterday as well.

And this has profound potential ramifications for even just the fundamental

civil liberties on which democratic societies rely.”

With regards,

Hemen Parekh / hcp@RecruitGuru.com / 30 July 2021

Wednesday, 28 July 2021

Simplifying Land Acquisition

Context :

Panel asks Road Ministry to simplify land acquisition, contract award norms / BL / 29 July 2021

Extract :

Ø A mechanism for UPFRONT PAYMENT to the land-owner can be worked out to guarantee a payment in the form of ANNUITY FOR THE LONG-TERM, financed through land value captured by the State Government

Ø The Committee believes that such a system will reduce land acquisition litigation which cause time and cost overrun, the report said

My Take :

More than 6 YEARS ago, I sent following e-mail to Shri Nitin Gadkariji :

Ø Land Acquisition Solution …………………………………..( 05 May 2015 )

Extract :

Dear Nitinji,

Farmers are opposing this bill for the following reasons :

> Low / Inadequate compensation

> Once land is sold , not being able to benefit from the appreciation of land

value , when the project comes up

> Private parties bought their land at low price and then sold it ( mostly to

private builders ) for a whooping profit

I think there is a simple solution to the concerns expressed by the farmers . Please consider the following :

> Each project will be tied to a specific SPV , created for that purpose only

> In the first instance, affected farmers will create a" Cooperative Society "

> Co-operative Society will issue shares to each land-donor farmer , in

proportion to the QUANTITY / VALUE of the land donated by him

> In turn , Co-operative Society will receive shares in the SPV , equal to the

value of the land + a cash compensation equal to 4 times the value of the

land

> Farmer's shares of Cooperative Society cannot be sold in open market

before 5 years but can be gifted to wife / Children

> Shares of Cooperative Society in the SPV itself cannot be sold for next 10

years

> The " Cash-Value Compensation " received by the Co-operative Society ( ie

4 times the land value ), will be deployed as follows :

* To be immediately paid in cash to the farmers............ 2 times

* To be deposited in the Jan-Dhan Account of each farmer as FIXED

DEPOSIT ( with 10 @ interest ).............2 times

Dear Gadkariji ,

My proposal will ensure :

> Immediate attractive compensation to farmers

> Recurring income from FD in Jan Dhan account ( for a sustained

livelihood )

> Continued sense of " Ownership " in the SPV / Project , which will

facilitate QUICK implementation without resistance

> Willing farmers themselves canvassing / convincing " Reluctant "

farmers

> No fear of private parties benefiting by appreciation of land value

> A sense of " Enlarged Participation " thru Co-operative Society

representing them on the Board of Directors of SPV

> Board Representation enabling farmers to ensure that honest

decisions are being taken

PLEASE , GIVE THIS SUGGESTION A CONSIDERATION

With regards,

Hemen Parekh / hcp@RecruitGuru.com / 29 July 2021