Volume 9 Issue 2, August 2020
Thursday, October 08, 2020
Delhi University DUET PG answer key 2020 released, how to raise objections
DUET PG answer key 2020: The candidates can raise objections on the answer key if any till October 9. Check the procedure here
DUET PG answer key 2020: The National Testing Agency (NTA) released the answer key for the Delhi University Entrance Test (DUET) post graduate (PG) exams. The candidates who have appeared for the entrance test can check the answer key and download it through the website- nta.ac.in, ntaexam2020.cbtexam.in. The probable score can also be calculated.
The candidates can raise objections on the answer key if any till October 9. “The National Testing Agency has uploaded the question papers and answer keys for 61 postgraduate courses for candidates to challenge. This facility is available on the link given below- ntaexam2020.cbtexam.in.” The online window to raise objections on the answer key will be opened up to 11:50 pm tomorrow.
The answer key for DUET UG entrance was earlier released on September 27.
NTA DUET PG answer key 2020: How to download
Step 1: Visit the website- nta.ac.in
Step 2: Click on the download ‘answer key link
Step 3: Enter application number, date of birth
Step 4: Answer key will be released
Step 5: Download, and take a print out.
How to raise objections on DUET answer key
Step 1: Visit the website- nta.ac.in
Step 2: It will redirect to login page
Step 3: Enter your details
Step 4: Click on raise objection, fill the form, type complain
Step 5: Submit fee to raise the objection
The entrance test- DUET was conducted from September 6 to 11 for admissions to 61 postgraduate courses. A total of 1.50 lakh (1,50,670) candidates had appeared for the entrance exam.
Source: Indian Express, 8/10/20
Artificial intelligence solutions built in India can serve the world
Written by Abhishek Singh
The RAISE 2020 summit (Responsible AI for Social Empowerment) has brought issues around artificial intelligence (AI) to the centre of policy discussions. Countries across the world are making efforts to be part of the AI-led digital economy, which is estimated to contribute around $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030. India, with its “AI for All” strategy, a vast pool of AI-trained workforce and an emerging startup ecosystem, has a unique opportunity to be a major contributor to AI-driven solutions that can revolutionise healthcare, agriculture, manufacturing, education and skilling.
AI is the branch of computer science concerned with developing machines that can complete tasks that typically require human intelligence. With the explosion of available data expansion of computing capacity, the world is witnessing rapid advancements in AI, machine learning and deep learning, transforming almost all sectors of the economy.
India has a large young population that is skilled and eager to adopt AI. The country has been ranked second on the Stanford AI Vibrancy Index primarily on account of its large AI-trained workforce. Our leading technology institutes like the IITs, IIITs and NITs have the potential to be the cradle of AI researchers and startups. India’s startups are innovating and developing solutions with AI across education, health, financial services and other domains to solve societal problems.
Machine Learning-based deep-learning algorithms in AI can give insights to healthcare providers in predicting future events for patients. It can also aid in the early detection and prevention of diseases by capturing the vitals of patients. A Bengaluru based start-up has developed a non-invasive, AI-enabled technology to screen for early signs of breast cancer. Similarly, hospitals in Tamil Nadu are using Machine Learning algorithms to detect diabetic retinopathy and help address the challenge of shortage of eye doctors. For the COVID-19 response, an AI-enabled Chatbot was used by MyGov for ensuring communications. Similarly, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) deployed the Watson Assistant on its portal to respond to specific queries of frontline staff and data entry operators from various testing and diagnostic facilities across the country on COVID-19. AI-based applications have helped biopharmaceutical companies to significantly shorten the preclinical drug identification and design process from several years to a few days or months. This intervention has been used by pharmaceutical companies to identify possible pharmaceutical therapies to help combat the spread of COVID19 by repurposing drugs.
AI-based solutions on water management, crop insurance and pest control are also being developed. Technologies like image recognition, drones, and automated intelligent monitoring of irrigation systems can help farmers kill weeds more effectively, harvest better crops and ensure higher yields. Voice-based products with strong vernacular language support can help make accurate information more accessible to farmers. A pilot project taken up in three districts — Bhopal, Rajkot and Nanded — has developed an AI-based decision support platform combined with weather sensing technology to give farm level advisories about weather forecasts and soil moisture information to help farmers make decisions regarding water and crop management. ICRISAT has developed an AI-power sowing app, which utilises weather models and data on local crop yield and rainfall to more accurately predict and advise local farmers on when they should plant their seeds. This has led to an increase in yield from 10 to 30 per cent for farmers. AI-based systems can also help is establishing partnerships with financial institutions with a strong rural presence to provide farmers with access to credit.
An AI-based flood forecasting model that has been implemented in Bihar is now being expanded to cover the whole of India to ensure that around 200 million people across 2,50,000 square kilometres get alerts and warnings 48 hours earlier about impending floods. These alerts are given in nine languages and are localised to specific areas and villages with adequate use of infographics and maps to ensure that it reaches all.
The Central Board of Secondary Education has integrated AI in the school curriculum to ensure that students passing out have the basic knowledge and skills of data science, machine learning and artificial intelligence. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) had launched a “Responsible AI for Youth” programme this year in April, wherein more than 11,000 students from government schools completed the basic course in AI.
As AI works for digital inclusion in India, it will have a ripple effect on economic growth and prosperity. Analysts predict that AI can help add up to $957 billion to the Indian economy by 2035. The opportunity for AI in India is colossal, as is the scope for its implementation. By 2025, data and AI can add over $500 billion and almost 20 million jobs to the Indian economy.
India’s “AI for All” strategy focuses on responsible AI, building AI solutions at scale with an intent to make India the AI garage of the world — a trusted nation to which the world can outsource AI-related work. AI solutions built in India will serve the world.
AI derives strength from data. To this end, the government is in the process of putting in place a strong legal framework governing the data of Indians. The legislation stems from a desire to become a highly secure and ethical AI powerhouse. India wants to build a data-rich and a data-driven society as data, through AI, which offers limitless opportunities to improve society, empower individuals and increase the ease of doing business.
The RAISE 2020 summit has brought together global experts to create a roadmap for responsible AI — an action plan that can help create replicable models with a strong foundation of ethics built-in. With the participation of more than 72,000 people from 145 countries, RAISE 2020 has become the true global platform for the exchange of ideas and thoughts for creating a robust AI roadmap for the world.
This article first appeared in the print edition on October 8, 2020 under the title ‘Making AI work for India’. The writer is president and CEO, NeGD, CEO MyGov and MD and CEO, Digital India Corporation.
Source: Indian Express, 8/10/20
Digital space is serving as the scene of sex crime. We need to frame a response
The dissemination of nude photos and videos of a victim engaging in a sexual act deserves to be defined as a continued sexual violation for what is once put in the digital space can rarely be wholly retracted.
With only three days to go for the wedding, the bride-to-be received a call from her fiancé. Nothing could have prepared her for what he had to say. Hundreds of links had suddenly appeared on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook flashing extremely obscene pictures of the woman. Thus began a terrible nightmare for the hapless woman, her sole solace, the extraordinary strength of character and commitment of the groom-to-be.
A losing battle against this flood of obscenity began immediately. The photos and videos had been mass downloaded and were being shared by hundreds of accounts solely in the business of supplying pornographic content on social media websites. Paid folders promised “a good time” — from Rs 30 for five photos to Rs 200 for seven photos and two videos. Associates of the accused began contacting the victim for sexual favours and to extort money to “delete” the pictures in their possession. The victim plunged into a dark depression. Emotionally drained from a lonely fight of four months, the couple finally approached the police.
It was a classic case of revenge porn — an invasion of sexual privacy and a form of online harassment where the perpetrator, usually a disgruntled ex-partner, posts intimate photos, often to shame the subject. The consequences for victims can be extreme, encompassing honour killings, breakdown of relationships, destruction of reputation and career, and immense emotional trauma. Two high profile suicides last year involving Korean pop star, Goo Hara, and a student at the University of London, Damilya Jossipalenya, both victims of revenge porn, are cases in point
While the police may succeed in collecting evidence and prosecuting the perpetrators of such crimes, it can do little to clean up the mess left behind on the internet, the root cause of the victim’s suffering. Reporting of such non-consensual content by victims to the concerned social media platforms is often of no avail. The scale of the problem can be gauged from the half-a-million reports of revenge porn received per month by Facebook alone. All social media companies operate Law Enforcement Agency (LEA) portals where police authorities make requests for IP addresses of errant accounts and the removal of obscene content. However, often the portals are a mere formality, with the requests from investigative agencies remaining unacknowledged and unaddressed. While Facebook has in place a reasonably responsive legal support system, Twitter, Instagram and Whatsapp are virtually bereft of one. This is a frustrating stonewalling of the police and thousands of desperate victims. A country which offers one of the largest subscriber bases in the world deserves better legal support.
Given that the digital space is increasingly serving as the scene of unprecedented sex crimes, there is a dire need for an impactful solution. At present, cases of revenge porn are typically booked under the Information Technology Act or relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) like 509, 499, 292 and 354C. There is merit in clearly classifying revenge porn as a sex offence in the IPC. The dissemination of nude photos and videos of a victim engaging in a sexual act deserves to be defined as a continued sexual violation for what is once put in the digital space can rarely be wholly retracted. With such classification, the offence will move to the category of serious offences and encourage the reporting of such crimes by victims who may otherwise choose to suffer alone under the presumption that cyber abuse is endemic to contemporary digital life.
The more important intervention is demanding accountability and responsiveness from social media giants for law enforcement and investigation purposes. Several countries have begun negotiating tough laws on the issue, including a time-bound removal of social media content declared illegal, fines as high as 50 million euros on tech companies, and even imprisonment of their executives in extreme cases of non-compliance of requests made by law enforcement authorities.
With the world’s largest population of young people, vulnerable to new mutations of deeply scarring sex crimes, the criticality of the PIL filed in India’s Supreme Court to establish an efficient mechanism to remove sexually-graphic abusive content and to seek accountability from social media platforms cannot be overemphasised.
This article first appeared in the print edition on October 8, 2020 under the title ‘Call social media to account’. The writer is an IPS officer serving as DCP, Crimes against Women & Children in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.
Source: Indian Express, 8/10/20
Tuesday, October 06, 2020
Quote of the Day October 6, 2020
“Storms make trees take deeper roots.”
‐ Claude McDonald
“तूफ़ानों से पेड़ों की जड़ें और गहरी व मज़बूत होती है।”
‐ क्लॉड मैक्डॉनल्ड
Hindi’s century-long struggle to be recognised over a more powerful Urdu
In the 18th and early 19th centuries, Urdu was the predominant language in those areas of the subcontinent that are today called the ‘Hindi belt’.
In the years immediately following the Independence of India, the literary genius Sadaat Hasan Manto wrote a short fiction commenting on the strange language dispute that had been simmering since the earliest days of the freedom struggle. The Hindi vs Urdu debate appeared odd to Manto. He compared it to an imaginary debate over lemon-soda and lemon water. “Why are Hindus wasting their time supporting Hindi, and why are Muslims so beside themselves over the preservation of Urdu? A language is not made, it makes itself. And no amount of human effort can ever kill a language,” he noted in his story titled ‘Hindi aur Urdu’.
The Hindi vs Urdu debate was in fact just about a century old then. It is only from the mid 1800s that we see a gradual politicisation of the two languages, and their consequent polarisation. “It is a misconception that Hindus speak Hindi and Muslims speak Urdu. Reputed writers like Premchand and Amrita Pritam wrote in Urdu, even though they were not Muslims,” explained linguist and cultural activist Ganesh Devy. “ Even today, Urdu is spoken in Punjab, Bihar, and Maharashtra very widely, and not just by Muslims ” he added.
In the 18th and early 19th centuries, Urdu was the predominant language in those areas of the subcontinent that are today called the ‘Hindi belt’. Historian Sumit Sarkar in his celebrated book, ‘Modern India, 1885-1947’, noted: “Urdu had been the language of polite culture over a big part of north India, for Hindus quite as much for Muslims.” He elaborated: “As late as 1881-90, 4380 Urdu books had been published in UP as compared to 2793 in Hindi, while the corresponding circulation figures for newspapers were 16,256 for Urdu and 8002 for Hindi.”
The roots of the Hindi vs Urdu debate
At the time when the English East India Company (EIC) started making inroads in the Indian subcontinent, Persian was the official language of administration in the Mughal empire. In the 1830s, the EIC replaced Persian with English at the higher levels of administration and local vernaculars at the lower levels. This meant that in large parts of north India, Urdu took the place of Persian.
Consequently, from the 1860s, a large scale controversy erupted over what should be the official language in north India. The debate took the form of literary works like plays and poetry, petitions, memorandums, gloating over the merits of Hindi and Urdu.
Historian Christopher King in his research paper published in 1977, titled, ‘The Hindi-Urdu controversy of the north-western provinces and Oudh and communal consciousness’, explained the changes that took place in the socio-political environment of north India between the 1830s-60s that led to the emergence of the Hindi-Urdu dispute. “The rapid expansion of the government educational system, its bifurcation into two vernaculars, Hindi and Urdu, and the favoured position of Urdu in administration, made it inevitable that the competition for government service would come to express itself in linguistic and communal terms,” he wrote.
It is not as though education in Hindi and Urdu or Persian were officially bifurcated between Hindus and Muslims. However, surveys of the period showed that the Hindi schools were largely consisting of Brahmin, Rajput and Baniya castes. On the other hand, Muslims and the Kayasthas were more likely to be educated in Persian and Urdu schools. King noted that all through the 19th century, Persian and Urdu educated Muslims and Kayasthas held a virtual monopoly over government service.
When language and religion became one
As proponents of Hindi started spelling out the merits of having Hindi as the official language of administration, they drew upon narratives emphasising that the language belonged to the original inhabitants of India, and that it was in popular use before the Muslims took over large parts of the country.
Babu Shiva Prasad of Benaras, an official in the department of public instruction was one of the first to publish such a memorandum. In his work, ‘Memorandum: Court characters in the upper provinces of India’, he wrote: “When the Mohommedans took possession of India, they found Hindi the language of the country, and the same character the medium through which all language was carried on.” Prasad argued that the new Muslim rulers did not bother learning the new language, rather forced the Hindus to learn Persian. Consequently, he wrote that by making Hindi the language of administration, not only would the masses be able to understand court proceedings, but also ‘Hindu nationality’ would be restored.
Similar arguments were also made by Bhartendu Harishchandra, also known as the father of Hindi literature, and by Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya who went on to establish the Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha. At the same time, several organisations also started cropping up to put forward a case for Hindi. Instrumental in this regard were Nagari Pracharini Sabha formed in Banaras in 1893, Hindi Sahitya Sammelan in Allahabad in 1910, Dakshina Bharat Hindi Prachar Sabha in 1918 and Rashtra Bhasha Prachar Samiti in 1926.
Things came to a head in 1880 when the government of India appointed a commission under the chairmanship of Sir William Hunter to take stock of the progress made by education in India. Many came under the impression that the commission had the power to bring about a change in the language policy. “Several North West Provinces and Oudh organisations collected over 67,000 signatures in favour of Hindi and Nagari and sent them to the commission along with a hundred memorials,” wrote King in his book, ‘One language, two scripts: the Hindi movement in nineteenth century north India’
After a lengthy and robust campaign, the Hindi advocates found a ray of hope in 1900 when the government of North Western Provinces and Oudh declared an equal status to be shared by the Devanagari and Urdu script. King in his article noted how many educated Muslims reacted sharply to the decision. He quoted a report from the Indian Daily Telegraph of Lucknow that summarised the reaction of the Urdu speakers: “This calamity…hangs above our head; we are required thereby to wander amidst the zigzag of the strange and horrible characters of the Devanagari script and bid farewell to the language which reminds us of the glory of our forefathers and which is now the remnant of the once mighty sovereigns of India.”
Urdu writers came to believe that with the resolution of 1900, their language would become extinct. Several organisations sprang up with the objective of defending and promoting the Urdu language. Chief among these was the Anjuman Taraqqi-e-Urdu (Society for the progress of Urdu) which was set up in 1903.
Though the resolution of 1903 did not actually bring much of a change in the official and popular usage of the two languages, it did embitter Hindu-Muslim relations for decades to come. Many believe that the Hindi-Urdu controversy of the 19th century contained the seeds of Muslim separatism, and found itself finally manifesting in the Partition of the country. The religious dichotomy between the two languages acquired further currency when Pakistan adopted Urdu as its national and official language, and India adopted Hindi along with English as its official language.
Further reading:
The hindi-urdu controversy of the north-western provinces and oudh and communal consciousness by Christopher King
One language, two scripts: the hindi movement in nineteenth century north india by Christopher King
Modern India, 1885-1947 by Sumit Sarkar
Language, religion and politics in north india by Paul R. Brass
Source: Indian Express, 14/09/20
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