What to Read in The Hindu Editorial( Topic and Syllabus wise)

Editorial 1: The Beijing India Report as milestone and opportunity

Context

The report shows a weak climate-gender link, which needs correction through policy and ground-level action.

 

Introduction

“It hurts to see girls drop out of school because of climate change and migration,” says a woman from Dhanelikanhar village, Chhattisgarh. “This generation was meant to do better.” It’s been 30 years since the Beijing Declaration, which pushed for gender equality in areas like education, health, and economy. India made progress with laws like the Domestic Violence Act and POSH Act, but implementation still lags, creating a gap between rights and real life.

 

An important integration

• Gender Inequality & Climate Crisis: Key Challenges
  1. Gender inequality and the climate crisis are major challenges.
  2. The quote from the Chhattisgarh woman shows the impact on girls' education.
  3. There is a clear need to combine gender and climate actions, especially in rural India.
• Why the Beijing India Report 2024 Misses the Mark
  1. The report lacks a strong climate-gender lens.
  2. This is a missed opportunity: combining both is key to equality, resilience, and human rights.
• Problems Faced by Women in Rural Areas
  1. Women have less access to resources and decision-making.
  2. Most rural women work in agriculture.
  3. Climate issues like heat, drought, and displacement worsen women’s health.

 

Health Impacts

Climate Factor	Impact on Women
Extreme heat	Infertility, menstrual issues
Droughts & malnutrition	Hysterectomies, anaemia, poor health
Displacement	Loss of homes, safety risks

• 50%+ of pregnant women in India are anaemic.
• Food insecurity raises anaemia risk by 1.6 times.

 

Climate Change & Women's Workload

• Unpaid care work (like water collection, fuel gathering) increases during climate stress.
  1. Women in India work over 8 hours/day, with 71% of that unpaid.
  2. By 2050, unpaid work may reach 8.3 hours/day (Arsht-Rock report).
• Economic Losses for Women
  1. Heat and rainfall extremes reduce agriculture and human productivity.
  2. Leads to:
     • Income loss (up to 33%)
     • Migration
     • Infrastructure damage
     • Service disruptions for women

Gaps in Climate Policy

Focus Area	Policy Mention (%)
Women	6%
People in poverty	1%
Farmers	6%

• Most policies focus on energy, transport, and efficiency, not gender.
• Violence and Climate

1. India has the highest rate of intimate partner violence in the study.
2. As temperature rises:
   • Physical violence ↑ by 8% per °C
   • Sexual violence ↑ by 7.3% per °C

 

Role of Women in Climate Action

• Women are key to climate adaptation and mitigation, especially in rural areas.
• Their traditional knowledge of sustainable farming and resource management protects local ecosystems.
• Indigenous women preserve climate-resilient seeds suited to local weather.
• Women should be part of local decision-making and lead climate initiatives.
• Women produce nearly 50% of the world's food and use sustainable methods.

 

Women Collectives and Priorities

• Formal and informal groups of women:
  1. Share workloads
  2. Increase productivity
  3. Act as first responders during disasters
• Urban women's focus: pollution and waste management
• Indigenous women’s priorities:
  1. Mahua: forest-based livelihoods
  2. Mao: safety amid resource conflicts
  3. Migration: distress movement and support needs
• Gaps in the Beijing India Report
  1. The report lacks a strong climate-gender focus.
  2. Needs to include:
     • Gender-responsive climate action
     • Data and indicators on climate’s gender impact
     • Stronger insights on women’s climate experiences

 

Challenges in Climate Budgeting

Current Issues	What’s Needed
Greenwashing	Real gender-responsive climate funding
Using women as resource conduits	Gender-audited budgets
Women excluded from decisions	Platforms for rural women in decision-making

1. Disaster aid
2. Health and safety services
3. Migration awareness
4. Reproductive rights protection

 

Action Points for Inclusion

• Organize community consultations with active women participation.
• Promote women leaders in:
  1. Green energy
  2. Local politics on climate action
• Invest in:
  1. Education
  2. Capacity building
  3. Women-led climate solutions
• Study human-animal conflict through a gender lens.
• Impact of Closing Gender Gaps

Area Improved	Potential Impact
Access to agricultural resources	Farm yield rise by 20–30%
	100–150 million more people fed

 

Policy-Level Needs

• Gender-responsive NAPCC and SAPCC must reach grassroots.
• Focus areas:
  1. Disaster preparedness for vulnerable women
  2. Strengthening public services
  3. Addressing trafficking risks
  4. Supporting elderly women
• Push for:
  1. Livelihood diversification
  2. Non-farm jobs and skill training for women

 

Private sector participation is important

• Green funds should support:
  1. Women-led innovations
  2. Women-friendly technologies
  3. Women's role in building a green economy
• These funds should help women start and grow green businesses, products, and services.
• More money needs to go to people working on the ground in climate-affected areas to improve resilience.
• The private sector should:
  1. Invest in projects that empower women
  2. Use gender-inclusive practices
  3. Provide access to climate-resilient tools and services that help women most affected by climate change.

 

Conclusion

There needs to be cooperative partnerships between the government, civil society, research institutions, the private sector, citizens, and international organisations. In all these, the emphasis should be on knowledge sharing, regular communication, consultations, capacity exchange, recognition of champions and best practices, and collective advocacy to empower women as leaders in building climate resilience for a more sustainable future in India.

Editorial 2: Giving shape to the university of the future

Context

Building a higher education system in India as per the National Education Policy 2020 will require a carefully planned and well-structured approach.

 

Introduction

The National Education Policy aims to move away from a siloed system by setting up large multidisciplinary institutions. It focuses on cross-disciplinary learning, better teaching methods, and more interdisciplinary research.

 

How to transform India’s higher education and research system:

• Move from just having multidisciplinary campuses to:
  1. Cross-disciplinary teaching and research
  2. Interdisciplinary thinking
  3. Research based on combined knowledge from different fields

 

Types of Approaches

• Multidisciplinary:
  1. Many subjects exist side by side
  2. No real interaction between them
  3. Each uses its own methods and stays in its own space
• Cross-disciplinary:
  1. Encourages collaboration between subjects
  2. Builds connections and dialogue
  3. Example: An educationist and an economist writing together
• Interdisciplinary:
  1. Blends ideas and methods from different fields
  2. Solves complex real-world problems
  3. Creates new knowledge across boundaries

 

How to Phase Out Single-Stream Colleges and Build Multidisciplinary Campuses

There are two main ways to shift from single-discipline institutions to multidisciplinary campuses:

1. Add Departments Within Existing Institutions
   • Example: IITs are adding humanities and social sciences to their core technical focus.
   • They are offering integrated master's programmes in economics and related subjects.
2. Create University Clusters
   • Combine nearby single-stream colleges (e.g., commerce + science + arts).
   • These form a cluster university through collaboration.
   • Needs administrative coordination, not just academic teamwork.
   • It’s a cost-effective and time-saving method in the short term.
3. Challenges to Clustering

Issue	Detail
High number of undergrad colleges	Many offer only bachelor's degrees
35% are single-stream	Hard to find mixable disciplines nearby
Lots of B.Ed. colleges	Limited options for cross-disciplinary variety

 

4. Future Steps
   • India aims to have at least one multidisciplinary university per district by 2030.
   • It’s better to build one strong campus in a district, rather than many small branches.
   • Research shows: Public universities are good at teaching.
   • But when they manage multiple campuses, research quality drops.

 

Vision for the University of the Future

• What It Should Not Be: A simple collection of independent departments.
• What It Should Be: An academic space that promotes:
  1. Collaboration across disciplines.
     • Openness to diverse viewpoints.
     • Faculty experienced in interdisciplinary work.

 

Steps to Build a Cross-Disciplinary Culture

1. Start with Students:
   • Encourage students to take courses outside their core discipline.
   • Provide exposure to multiple academic perspectives early in their education.
2. Enable Collaborative Work:
   • Support joint research and projects across departments.
   • Encourage faculty and students to apply their specific expertise in collaborative settings.
3. Create Cross-Disciplinary Courses:
   • Example course:

Course Title	Departments Involved
Economic Changes and Class Structures in Indian Cinema	Economics, Sociology, Film Studies

 

Institutional Support and Sustainability

• Facilitation of cross-disciplinary:
  1. Courses
  2. Projects
  3. Research centres
• Funding Needs: Sustained and dedicated funding is essential to support and grow interdisciplinary initiatives over time.

International Example

Programme	Country	Key Features
IGERT (Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship)	United States	Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF); aims to develop:

• Depth in a major field
• Breadth across disciplines
• Skills to work in interdisciplinary settings.

 

On inter-disciplinary thought

• Cross-disciplinary learning: Involves collaboration across distinct academic fields.
• Interdisciplinary research: Requires deeper integration, drawing connections to build unified frameworks.
• IGERT experience (positive): Integration was successfully achieved in combinations like biotechnology, medicine, chemistry, and biology.
• IGERT experience (challenges): Fields like engineering and architecture faced issues with publishing, academic placement, and disciplinary recognition.
• Core problem: Existing academic systems often do not accommodate integrated work, pushing interdisciplinary efforts back into conventional molds.
• Required reforms: Overhaul funding systems, reshape publication platforms, and redesign faculty hiring and promotion practices to support and sustain interdisciplinary research.

 

Conclusion

The changes ahead will be very costly and will take many years to complete. To manage this, the government will need to rethink how it spends public money. At the same time, any changes in rules and governance must be carefully planned. India is aiming to build a higher education system similar to the peak of the American model, which developed naturally over a century in a very open and competitive environment.