THE HINDU

EDITORIAL Presents

2nd October 2023

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State PSC, CAT,CTET,RAILWAY EXAMS,CDS,
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 VOCABULARY

1. Rift: a serious disagreement that separates two people who

have been friends and stops their friendship continuing. मनमुटाव
Synonyms: estrangement, dispute
Antonyms: harmony, concord
Example: The argument caused a rift between the two friends.
2. Rupture: the ending of agreement or of good relations
between people, countries, etc. अलगाव
Synonyms: discord, schism
Antonyms: reconciliation, unity
Example: The rupture of the friendship left both of them feeling
hurt and distant.
 VOCABULARY

3. Steadfast: not changing in your attitudes or aims. !ढ़

Synonyms: resolute, unwavering
Antonyms: faltering, fickle
Example: Despite the challenges, she remained steadfast in her
pursuit of her dream job.
4. Ardent: very enthusiastic and showing strong feelings about
something/somebody. उ$ाही
Synonyms: fervent, avid
Antonyms: apathetic, indifferent
Example: His ardent love for classic cars led him to collect vintage
automobiles from the 1950s.
 VOCABULARY

5. Absurd: extremely silly; not logical and sensible. बेतुका

Synonyms: preposterous, outrageous
Antonyms: pragmatic, prudent
Example: It's absurd to wear a winter coat in the scorching summer
heat.
6. Pragmatically: in a practical and sensible way rather than relying
on fixed ideas or theories. -ावहा/रक 1प से
Synonyms: rationally, logically
Antonyms: impractically, unrealistically
Example: She approached the problem pragmatically, finding the
most efficient solution.
 VOCABULARY

7. Articulate: to express or explain your thoughts or feelings clearly

in words. 45 1प से कहना
Synonyms: state, enunciate
Antonyms: mumble, stammer
Example: Sarah is known for her ability to articulate her thoughts
clearly in any conversation.
Phrasal verbs
8. Whipped up: encouraged or caused people to have strong
feelings about something.
9. Shoring up: helping to support something that is weak or
going to fail.
10. Contingent on: depending on something else in the future in
order to happen.
 VOCABULARY

Idioms
11. By a landslide: winning something very easily and by a huge
difference.
12. At odds: in disagreement.
13. The ball is in one's court: it is time for someone to deal with a
problem or make a decision, because other people have already
done as much as they can.
14. Rang the death knell: caused the end of something.
Jargon
15. Zero-sum game: a situation in which one person or group can
win something only by causing another person or group to lose it.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Article for reading

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 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

The Maldives has chosen a new leader, replacing President Ibu

Solih, who won by a landslide in 2018, with Mohamed Muizzu,
the Mayor of Male and the choice of the previous ruling party,
the PPM. Mr. Muizzu won Saturday’s presidential run-off that
followed an inconclusive first round in which no candidate
crossed 50% of the vote, winning nearly 54% to Solih’s 46% in
this round. Mr. Solih’s electoral loss is being attributed to a
heavy anti-incumbency sentiment and concerns over the post-
COVID-19 economy that is dependent on tourism, the rift within
Solih’s party, the MDP, due to a rupture in his old friendship with
former President Mohamed Nasheed, as well as concerns over
“sovereignty” issues, whipped up by Mr. Muizzu’s PPM that is
behind an “India out” campaign to oust Indian military
personnel.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

PPM chief and former Maldives President Abdulla Yameen,

the chief architect of that campaign and serving a jail term of
11 years, was openly at odds with India during his tenure. He
had paved the way for a free trade agreement with China and
loans for infrastructure projects that the Opposition said had
led the Maldives into a “debt trap”. Mr. Solih turned the
Maldives’s international compass, committing publicly to an
“India First” policy, as New Delhi undertook many
infrastructure projects, assisted the Maldives during the
pandemic, and helped it during the campaign to have
Maldives Foreign Minister Abdulla Shahid elected President
of the UN General Assembly. As a result, the Solih-Muizzu
run-off was billed as an India versus China contest by
commentators, who have sought to portray the result as a
“setback” for India.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was among the first to

congratulate President-elect Muizzu on social media. New
Delhi must avoid the impression that it has favourites within
the Maldivian polity. The ball is now in Mr. Muizzu’s court to
take up the promise of keeping India-Maldives ties close — he
has not himself criticised India in the way his party has.
Among his tasks would be shoring up the Maldivian economy
as debt repayments come due, and taking lessons from
events in the neighbourhood such as Sri Lanka’s handling of
its economic crisis. It remains to be seen whether he will
ensure the release of Mr. Yameen, and what control the
previous President will have over the new government.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Mr. Muizzu will have to preside over an upcoming referendum

vote, which Mr. Nasheed has pushed for, to decide whether
the Maldives will revert to a parliamentary system rather than
the presidential one. Given its location in the Indian Ocean,
along key shipping routes, Mr. Muizzu will have to balance
traditional, strategic interests with India, which is its closest
and most powerful neighbour, while engaging China and the
United States, that keenly watch developments there. It is
important that neither Delhi nor Male view these interests
through the prism of “zero sum” games, as that has led to
tensions between them in the past.
Summary:

The Maldives has elected Mohamed Muizzu as its new leader, replacing
President Ibu Solih. Muizzu, supported by the previous ruling party PPM, won
the presidential run-off with 54% of the vote, while Solih received 46%. Solih’s
loss is attributed to anti-incumbency sentiment, economic concerns post-
COVID-19, rifts within his party, and sovereignty issues fueled by PPM’s "India
out" campaign. The election was seen as an India-China contest, with India
having supported Solih’s administration. Now, Muizzu must address economic
challenges, navigate international relations with India, China, and the U.S., and
oversee a potential referendum on the country’s political system.

The tone of the passage is informative and analytical.

 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Article for skimming

A time to articulate new

constitutional ideas for
India
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

The Government of India is on a mission to decolonise the country.

Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker’s grand Parliament building has just
given way to Bimal Patel’s modern reinterpretation and the name
“Bharat” is being used more frequently to describe the country,
challenging the monopoly of “India”. So far, names and buildings are
on the chopping block. But what about the Constitution? Should it
change? If so, in what way? And following whose ideas? When we
think of the Constitution of India, our mind may naturally go back to
1950 when it came into force. But constitutional ideas in India
predated it. A startlingly original, indigenous account of what the
Constitution would look like was presented by Mahatma Gandhi in
1908. Gandhi was steadfast in his view that without decolonising the
Constitution, we may become independent but would not have swaraj.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

The English would be driven away and India would get itself a
new democratic government, but the nature of government
itself would not change. It would be “English rule without the
Englishman”, “not Hindustan but Englistan”. But what kind of
constitution would India have? For him, a swaraj constitution
ought to ideally be based on ancient village republics and not
a large government in Delhi. The economy would be founded
on ordinary Indians producing enough to be self-sufficient
and trading the rest at local markets. India would be united
not because a constitution promised rights, but because
Indians themselves considered it their duty to forge a nation
out of a people. His ardent follower, Shriman Narayan
Agarwal was given the task of drafting such a constitution to
put Hind Swaraj into action.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

But Agarwal’s draft of the “Gandhian Constitution for Free

India”, first published in 1946, was less of a legal text and
more a moral code. In it, the rights to personhood, liberty and
equality would be contingent on a duty to be faithful to the
state. As legal provisions, these were absurd. How would a
citizen have to demonstrate loyalty? If they failed, could they
be killed because the right to personhood was dependent on
it? When properly thought through, the Gandhian
Constitution was a recipe for untold oppression. This is why
Gandhi pragmatically distanced himself from a constitution
that bore his name.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

At that time, there was considerable momentum towards a

progressive post-war constitution based on a big state with
the authority to ensure law and order, separation of powers to
prevent overreach and a range of fundamental rights to
capture the global move towards universal human rights for
all. Gandhi found such a constitution “entirely Western” but
grasped its prospect of consensus instinctively. He himself
rang the death knell of the Gandhian Constitution by
persuading Rajendra Prasad to appoint B.R. Ambedkar as the
Chairperson of the Drafting Committee of the Constitution in
August 1947. Ambedkar had a clear and well-articulated
vision of what India’s Constitution should look like. It was
nothing like Gandhi’s.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

He believed that India needed a powerful state machinery that

could ensure law and order at the margins of the country.
Gandhi on the other hand believed that a large state would be
too distant from the people. For Ambedkar, the state would be
duty-bound to manage the economy and control industries
for the common good. But for Gandhi, self-sustaining villages
based on agriculture and cottage industry were the way
forward. Centuries of feudalism, sectarianism and casteism
would be uprooted, in Ambedkar’s vision, through
fundamental rights to life, liberty and equality for every
individual. Gandhi thought differently: history could not be
undone by a policy document such as a constitution — it
needed individuals to change themselves.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Gandhi had grave disagreement with each of Ambedkar’s

visions but realised that they enjoyed a wide consensus
across party lines. As a result, he was content in letting his
ideal constitution wait its turn. Today, we are much like India
was in 1908 when Gandhi wrote Hind Swaraj — a nation in
flux — than in 1950, when India was a nation imbued with
new-found freedom. This is why it is a good time not to draft a
new constitution, but to articulate a vision of what new
constitutional ideas India needs. These ideas have to be built
not just on the existing Constitution worked on by B.R.
Ambedkar and other members in the Constituent Assembly
but also with the Gandhian ideas they ignored as too radical.
This is not a suggestion to be pre-modern as many Gandhian
thoughts were.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Rather, it is an invitation to ask the fundamental question that

Gandhi did — what kind of constitution can bring good
governance to India? During the frenetic years of 1947-1950,
the urgency to enact a constitution for free India meant that
this question had to be given a go-by. Seventy-five years on,
it is time to set that right. Unlike names and buildings,
constitutions do not, and should not change overnight. But
that does not mean that they should not change at all.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Today's Descriptive Question

Write an essay of 200 words highlighting the strides

India has made in the field of health and technology.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

In recent years, India has made significant strides in the field of

health and technology, ushering in a new era of innovation and
accessibility. In the realm of healthcare, India has witnessed
remarkable advancements. The launch of the Ayushman Bharat
program, the world's largest government-funded healthcare
scheme, has extended health coverage to millions of
underprivileged citizens, promoting equity in healthcare access.

Additionally, India's pharmaceutical industry has become a

global powerhouse, producing cost-effective generic drugs and
vaccines, contributing to the worldwide fight against diseases.
Furthermore, telemedicine and healthcare mobile apps have
gained prominence, making medical consultations more
accessible, especially in rural areas.
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

In the technology sector, India's information technology and

software services industry continue to thrive, with the
country being a global leader in IT outsourcing. The "Digital
India" initiative has spurred digitalization across various
sectors, promoting e-governance, and fostering innovation
in technology startups.

India's strides in health and technology signify its

commitment to improving the quality of life for its citizens
and positioning itself as a global technological hub, with the
potential to drive innovation and economic growth on a
global scale.
Please write a letter to the manager of a bank, thanking him or her for making
significant improvements in the app of the bank and making it effortless to use.

[Your Name]
[Your Address]
[City, State, PIN Code]
[Date]
Date
[Bank Name]
[branch Address]
[City, State, PIN Code]
Subject: Gratitude for improving the app of the bank
Dear Sir/ Ma’am
I extend my heartfelt gratitude for the remarkable enhancements to our bank's
mobile app. The recent updates have transformed it into a seamless and user-
friendly platform, greatly simplifying financial transactions and account
management. The intuitive interface and enhanced functionality have made
banking effortless.
Your dedication to improving our banking experience is commendable, and it
reflects the bank's commitment to customer satisfaction. I appreciate your
team's hard work in making these changes. It's a testament to the bank's
commitment to technological innovation.
Thank you for making our banking journey smoother and more efficient.
Yours sincerely,
[Your Name]
 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

Match the words with their meanings.

Column A Column B

Desist causing or increasing very strong feelings such as

anger or excitement

Underscore that cannot be questioned or proved to be false

Inflaming made someone brave or willing to take more risks

Emboldened to stop doing somethin

Undisputed to emphasize the importance something

 THE HINDU EDITORIAL LIVE DAILY @ 7 AM

VOCABULARY FOR ALL

1. Rift:
2. Rupture:
3. Steadfast:
4. Ardent:
5. Absurd:
6. Pragmatically:
7. Articulate:
8. Whipped up:
9. The ball is in one's court:
10. Rang the death knell:
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