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Article Title: How Not to Create Jobs

 

Article Summary

In the article at hand, the author criticises Cabinet Minister NitinGadkari for making mandatory the use of severely out of demand clay ‘kulhads’ for tea/coffee sale across India. While not all of India is being forced to use these, starting from small places like railway stations, they can, with time, be imposed upon the whole country. Now, in the past, several other politicians have tried to revive the use of these small clay cups and failed, them getting bettered each time by more modern alternatives like ceramic cups or recyclable paper/plastic cups. The argument provided by Gadkari is that kulhad-production will yield new jobs in employment-starved Indian rural landscapes, along with curbing plastic-fuelled environmental degradation. However, there are several drawbacks to this line of reasoning. Environmental degradation is barely curtailed by kulhad use, as it causes disposal problems, the misuse of agricultural land in a time of reducing clay reserves, a lot of heat use, and a lack of recyclability. On the other hand, plastic or paper cups are easily recyclable, and ceramic cups can be used without recycling many times over – at the end of the day, there were reasons these were adopted over kulhads. The author is of the opinion that Gadkari’s method is not how job-creation is boosted, and an impetus to in-demand industries is required for true progress.

 

Article Link: Click here to read the full article

 

Words to learn from this article:             

Ceramic: composed of clay, and then heat-strengthened for durability.

Throwaway: something that can be disposed after use.
Mandated: made compulsory through decree.

Subsidise: second-party investing in something to make the commodity or process cheap to end consumers.

Skyrocket: steeply rise.

 

Article Title: Opinion | End-to-end encryption must be retained at all cost

 

Article Summary

In the article at hand, the author holds forth on the multifaceted benefits of online anonymity, and what the evil repercussions of its removal could be. He starts the article drawing on ancient Grecian realities, where the anonymity-ensuring Ring of Gyges was a subject of debate. In the style of the ring, end-to-end encryption on social messaging platforms today provides absolute and seamless anonymity. There have been talks pushing for the removal of this feature, stating that it provides a cover under which radical and criminal people engage in acts of child pornography, abusing strangers on the Internet, and the like. However, the author argues, technology is only a means, and not an end in itself. It can have no function of furthering or suppressing positive morality, and is but a slave to the human hands using it. ‘Bad’ and ‘good’ are relative terms that can never be applied fully to it, and people will behave according to their true natures no matter the type of tech they are supplied with – so banning anonymity will be apocalyptic. It will oppress the voices of vulnerable classes like mentally sick people, political rebels or sexually abused women, and the author is very opposed to the whole concept.

 

Article Link: Click here to read the full article

 

Words to learn from this article:

Vile: appalling, disgusting.

Violating: breaking rules, or appropriating and damaging by force.

Malicious: an evil force, or possessing evil intentions.

Proliferation: rapidly getting very widespread.

Provocative: something that incites one kind of, especially negative, behaviour.

 

 

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