OUTER SPACE EXPLORATION

 Once in a time the stars in the sky,the sun and the moon exploring outer space capture the imagination of people.Such an exploration was viewed with pride and satisfaction.Today it has become new normal and outer space no longer captures our mind space.Why,because major countries of the world are opening new avenues to the private firms and countries which were once not active like UAE are engaging in activity of outer space.Earlier space was forte of government body,But today it has private organization like Space X ,Blue Origin,Virgin Galactia which has pioneered in outer space exploration.Countries like China are also starting there programs like Beidou,which  happens to be satellite navigation system and Russia recently conducted a non destructive test of space based anti Satellite weapon.See, what we are witnessing right now is that the government organization are not only the one,it is the private organization and countries which were earlier not active have also  involved in space exploration.Let's talk about reasons-

*Space mining-Man has everything in the planet,but man's greed is so much that infact Mahatma Gandhi went on to saying there is everything for a man's need but not for man's greed.One such theory about space exploration is there are some metals and some minerals which we can explore in outer space.

One such example is according to USA,asteroid named 16 psyche has some heavy metals which is worth around 10,000 quadrillion dollar.This is the amount of heavy metal which is present in outer space only with respect to one asteroid.So,extraction of valuable mineral has lead to what is called space mining as an objective and this is the primary reason why countries are exploring the outer space. There are many agency who are now studying about asteroids that includes NASA,European space Agency,that is because they want to know how how asteroids have impacted earth previously and in case there is threat emanating from these asteroid we would be able to control them if there is possibility.The asteroid impact is about 3800 times more energetic then a magnitude 8 of earthquake.So,we would be able to control its impact,and this is why countries are investing in asteroid study.

Erstwhile the cost of reaching Low Earth orbit was extremely huge,the prices were too high,but this has been reduced,has been declined by a factor of 20 times in less than a decade.All the stats reveal that more and more countries exploring outer space has lead to decline in cost of space exploration.Today,if we look back at the space market according to bank of America it is about 350 billion dollar worth industry and it will touch about 2.7 trillion dollar by the year 2050.It can lead to creation of jobs,investment and we will have more satellite which are minuscule and small in nature and ultimately all these industries will provide internet connectivity to rural areas as well.    

QUEST FOR POWER

Recently,the newly elected government in Sri Lanka drafted a new constitution which will abandon the nineteenth schedule of Sri lankan constitution passed in year 2015.It diluted the eighteenth amendment which gives power to the president of Sri Lanka.The nineteenth amendment diluted the power of president,set up a constitutional council and this constitutional council monitors the functioning and working of the important commission.It also strengthen the  parliament of Sri Lanka.That means eighteenth amendment has given wide powers to the parliament and council but these powers were  snatched by the dilution of nineteenth amendment moreover the tenure which was fixed to  be twice for a presidential candidate  has also been increased to indefinite period of time.

Russian president Vladimir Putin passed a referendum which was unopposed passed in their parliament and that made him president till 2034. Alexei Navalny who was the only opposition leader in Russia since 2001 although he never won the election because the elections are rigged in Russia, has recently been poisoned by some anonymous group.

Chinese President Xi Jinping(General Secretary of Communist Party of China) has labelled himself president for lifetime.But a communist nation taking this decision does not look scandalized at all because there is no such thing called freedom which exist.Moreover it snatched the freedom of Hong Kong by passing the national security law and making the Chief executive officer Carry Lam a puppet of People Liberation Army(PLA)

.Alexander Lukashenko,president of Belarus has declared himself president for continuously five terms.Despite having a strong opposition,peoples support,exit polls in favor for the opposition leader,he again turned out to be victorious.Despite being member of the European Union and NATO,it is said that he got support from Russian President as it shares boundary with Russia and also erstwhile part of Soviet Union.This has resulted in dissent of people for present government resulting in demonstration during this crisis.

Recently,Poland came up with a law to punish the judges who try to amend the laws passed by the parliament.See Russia and China we all know about these communist nation so, when they come up with such laws,it does not surprise us much.But in the recent times there had been many democratic countries who had been moving on the path of being autocratic.This can be labelled as quest for power which is thriving now in democratic country as well.

   

FAULTS IN OUR PAST

 See,when the Bombay plan was proposed we came to a agreement that the core sector investment will be made by public sector and in non core sector investment by private sector with the support of the government.But,India failed to capitalize because in 1970 and 1980,India's PSU,failed to modernize.The failure of Indian R&D to innovate to modernize can be traced back to Bombay Plan.

Because of Bombay plan,private sector has established a monopoly in non core sector and it was maintaining a monopoly in these non core sectors,and hence,private sector was not interested in making any investment in core sectors and on the other hand public sector suffered due to lack of autonomy,lack of manpower,lack of modernization by the government,which was result of inadequate investment which the government has made in education and health care.

So,due to deficiency of public sector and lack of interest of private sectors to invest in public sector(R&D),Indian innovation suffered in 1970 & 1980,and as a result the productivity and quality of Indian industry took a major hit.So,during this time India saw a time of low innovation and low productivity during this time.So,this was the time of third industrial revolution which India completely missed out.It was the time of Electronics,computers,mobiles,processors and we lost out entirely to other Asian economies due to the failure to invest in public sector investment(R&D)wing.Then came the era of LPG,and India's focus shifted to buying technology from rest of the world and this made India excessively reliant on external supply,especially critical technology.

The introduction of LPG reforms failed to modernize our PSU,and instead making them self reliant it made them dependent.As a result indigenous research and development suffered.So,post LPG reforms we saw that very few PSU invested in research and development , innovate and develop their own technology.The LPG reforms did allow the foreign companies to set foot in India and bring in much needed FDI,but there investment in R&D,does not account for indigenisation. As a result of these flawed policy in past,India has minimum investment in R&D,that is 1% of GDP.

If we compare with other Asian economies,such as Japan,South Korea,Hongkong,Taiwan and Singapore.They are completely self reliant with regard to critical technologies.So,back in 1970-80,these countries made sufficient investment in Public sector lead Research and Development.Over the years,these public sector have not only increased Public investment in Research and Development but they have also extended support to private R&D,and made them capable of relying on indigenous products.

China in 1970-80,when India was lagging behind,China followed the approach of countries such as Thailand,Malaysia and Indonesia as a hub for low end manufacturing,but late 1990,China clearly established itself as manufacturing power house and in this few years,China invested its focus and it has began making massive development,especially in critical area such as 5g,internet of things,AI,machine learning,Super computing etc.So,these things places China in comfortable position to lead the world towards fourth industrial revolution.