From Education to Agriculture: Here are Modi govt's top policies which changed 2020

With Coronavirus (COVID-19) being biggest challenge for governments all around world, Indian government passed major reforms along with handling pandemic this year. India- which implemented strictest lockdown in March - saw its ecomy shrink to -23.9% in first quarter of 2020-21, necessitating need for major reforms. In a bid kickstart ecomy, Modi government several key policies this year like - Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan, three Farm Laws, three labour codes, Banking Regulation (Amendment). government also unveiled long-awaited National Education Policy 2020, Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment.

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Here are key policies of Modi govt in 2020:

Aatmanirbhar Abhiyan Scheme

Hit hard by COVID-19 lockdown, Modi government unveiled its 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' scheme - in form of five ecomic tranches - amounting to 20 lakh crores. 

• first tranche dealt with credit to MSMEs, NBFCs, EPF support, liquidity infusion into various sectors and extending filing Income Tax return for Fiscal Year 2019-20 upto December 2020. 
• As a part of second tranche, nine main measures to aid migrant workers, street vendors, small farmers, self-employed people were anunced under government's MUDRA, MNREGA schemes.
• Under third tranche, government anunced 11 measures - of which 8 of m focused on strengning infrastructure, capacities and building better logistics in Agriculture, Fisheries and animal husbandry, while rest 3 pertained to governance and administrative reforms - i.e Farm Laws.
• fourth tranche of its ecomic pack made structural reforms in eight sectors namely - Coal, defence production, minerals, civil aviation (Airports, Air Mgmt & MRO), power distribution in UTs, and atomic energy opening up se sectors to privatisation, corporatisation.
• last tranche anunced 7 steps namely for MNREGA, health and education, for states, and for easing of business, infusing more capital into existing government schemes.

National Education policy 2020: M Phil discontinued, fee capped for Higher education

three farm Bills

As country opened up after lockdown, Centre promulgated three ordinances - Essential Commodities (Amendment) Ordinance, 2020 & Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm services ordinance, 2020. amendment to Essential Commodities act was to enable better price realisation for farmers by attracting investments - making agriculture sector competitive.  Agriculture foodstuff including cereals, edible oils, oilseeds, pulses, onions and potato are to be deregulated while stock limits were to be imposed only under extreme conditions. Under Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm services ordinance, 2020, it provided a framework for protection and empowerment of farmers with reference to sale and purchase of farm products overriding all state APMC laws. 

Inspite of five rounds of talks with Centre, farmers from Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh are currently camped outside Delhi, demanding a repeal of se laws.

se are all 5 tranches and 50 measures of India's 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' ecomic pack

Three Labour codes

Three of four labour code bills, that comprise government's labour reforms - condensing existing 44 labour codes were passed by both Houses, amid Opposition boycott. Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 deals with setting guidelines for those working in factories, mines and docks and are t universal in nature, leading to unions' boycotting it. Meanwhile, Industrial Relations Code 2020 allows companies with up to 300 workers to lay off people without state government's approval and industrial worker is allowed to go on strike without a 60-day tice. Code on Social Security, 2020 extends social security funds to workers for app-based firms like Uber, Ola, Swiggy and Zomato apart from existing labourers. 

National Education Policy 2020

In July, as Indian ecomy began to recover, Modi cabinet approved National Education policy 2020 - after previous policies in 1968, and 1986, which was later amended in 1992.  After six years of deliberation, NEP 2020, Union Human Resource Development Ministry was renamed to Ministry of Education. 

• School-level reforms

Reforming school education, Right to education (RTE) act has been extended in a new 5+3+3+4 formula instead of current 10+2 model. Proposing coding lessons, vocational training for students from Class 6 onwards, Inclusion Fund for girl child development, policy also recommends medium of instruction to be regional langu at least till Class 5 and preferably till Class 8. Moreover, National Testing ncy will offer a common entrance exam to all higher educational institutions and Transparent online self-disclosure shall be encourd. Gross Enrolment Ratio from pre-school to secondary level should be 100% by 2030, aims Centre.

• Higher education reforms

In Higher education sector, government recommended multiple entry/exit points to be allowed - UG program : 3 to 4 years, PG Program - 1 to 2 years, Integrated 5 years bachelors/ masters program and M Phil to be discontinued. Regulating fee structure under a broad regulatory framework, policy recommends a single regulator for all higher education working under a self-disclosure based transparent system for approvals in place of numerous 'inspections'. Pushing for Public investment in education sector to reach 6% of GFP at earliest, policy recommended evolving Standalone Higher Education Institutes and professional education institutes into multi-disciplinary education with a National Educational Techlogy Forum (NETF) to be created - merging Arts, Science and Commerce branches.

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Banking Regulation (Amendment) Bill, 2020

Banking Regulation Ordinance introduced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman aims in getting all co-operative banks under purview of Reserve Bank of India (RBI). ordinance which has been promulgated on June 26, 2020, aims at tackling misappropriation of funds amid PMC Bank scam, PNB Bank scam etc. Ordinance also excludes primary agricultural credit societies, cooperative societies involved in long term financing for agricultural development from Act.

Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2020 (FCRA)

Bill which was introduced by Finance Minister (MoS) Nityanand Rai amends Act regulating acceptance and utilisation of foreign contribution by individuals, associations, and companies. Tightening regulations previously amended by UPA government in 2010, Modi government has prohibited public servants too from accepting foreign donations. This Bill also prohibits transfer of foreign contribution to any or person, mandates Aadhaar registration, reduces foreign contribution for administrative purposes to 20% and allows suspension of registration upto 360 days.