MAT 2009 Question Paper

Read the passage to answer the questions that follows passage.
Passage III:

“Since wars begin in the minds of men,” so runs the historic UNESCO Preamble, “It is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed.” Wars erupt out when the minds of menare inflamed, when the human mindis blinded and wounded, succumbsto frustration and self-negation. Waris the transference ofthis self-negation into the other-negation. The three Indo-Pak wars and the persisting will to terrorise have emanated from this sawage instinct of other-negationthatis the legacy of the partition carnage and its still-bleeding and_unhealed wound,
Truncated from its eastern wing in 1971, Pakistan ever since has suffered from a sense of total existential self-negation. Plus the scars left by the twopreviously lost wars to India and Kargil fill the Army and the Pakistan pysche with a seething urge to revenge: that Indian has to
be negated, destroyed — in a deep psychological sense, another Hiroshima in the subcontinent is imaginable and possible. Terrorism in Kashmir springs from such deep negating existential grounds. Like the former Soviet Union, Pakistan came into beingas a result of a grand delusion and
massive perversion of reality — the so called two-nation theory. Like the former Soviet Union, it stand in danger of crumbling unless it modifies its reality perception and comesto terms with its post-Bangladesh identity within the prevailing subcontinental equation. Failing this, Pakistan is bound to break up, nudging the region to a nuclear nightmare, including, possible South Asian Hiroshimas. With‘hotpursuits’ and ‘surgical operations’ freely making rounds amongthepolicy elite and the public at large, the national atmosphere looks ominously charged. “On the
brink,” headlines The Week adding, “As men and machines are quickly positioned by India and Pakistan, the threat of war looms real.” To which Gen. Musharraf counters, “If any war is thrust on Pakistan, Pakistan’s armed forces and the 140 million people of Pakistan are fully prepared to faceall consequences with all their might.” According to Indian Express, “Pakistan has deployed medium rangeballistic missile batteries (MRBBs) along the Line of Control (LOC) near Jammu and Poonch sectors in a action that will further escalate the tension between the two countries.”
AndIndia’s Defence Minister ups the ante, “We could take a (nuclear) strike, survive and then hit back, Pakistan would be finished.” (Hindustan Times, December 30, 2001). Mr. Fernandes’s formulation is certainly a tactical super shot, even a strategical super hit in as much as this is
the very logic of India’s ‘No-first-stike’ doctrine. The Defence Minister obviously has no idea of the ethical, phenomeno logical implications of abandoning chunks of the Indian population to ransom for potential Hiroshimas and then ‘finishing’ the neighbouring country of 140 in
what could be nothing short of an Armageddon. Forget these horrendous scenarios. But does this not repudiate the grain of truth for which India’s civilisation stood for and vindicated across the untold millennia ofits history? Yet, Mr. Fernandes, the pacifist and Gandhian, is no
warmonger. As Defence Minister he had to react at a level with the Pakistanis, with their proclivity to drop the nuclear speak whenever that suited them, could have.

Read the passage to answer the questions that follows passage.
Passage IV:

Mobility of capital has given an unprecedented leverage to companies not only to seek low paid, informal wage employees across national boundaries, but the threat of capital flight can also serve to drive down wages and place large numbers of workers in insecure, irregular
employment. Informalisation strategies enable employers to draw on the existing pool of labour as and when they require, without having to make a commitment to provide permanent employmentorany of the employe-supporting benefits associated with permanent jobs. As far as the working class is concerned, informalisation is in fact, a double-edged sword. For not only is the employe denied the rights associated with permanent employment, but the nature of casual work essentially destroyes the foundations of working class organisation. As workmen move from one
employer to another, numbers are scattered, everyday interests become divergent, and individualized survival takes precedence over group or collective struggles. Even workers who have been in sectors with a long tradition ofunionization are difficult to organise once they are removed from the arena of permanent employment. About 50,000 textile mill workers in Ahmedabadcity were laid off during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The move to obtain compensation and rehabilitation for these workers floundered on the weakness ofthe struggle, as numbers of workers who were available for pressing their claims and taking to some kind of activism dwindled, the motivation of leaders declined and the struggle slowly frittered away. If this is the situation with workers familiar with the concept of unionisation, the taskes of organising vast masses of
casual workers who have never been organised, is obviously much more difficult. The problem, essentially, is not only that of organising workers for struggle, but given the wansitory nature of casual employment, employers are not bound to provide insurance of any kind, and frequently, there is no fixed employer against whom workers’ claims can be pressed. In this context, the formation of the National Centre for Labour (NCL) can be seen as a landmark in the history of the working class movement in India. The NCL is an apex body of independent trade unions working in the unorganised sector of labour, registered under the Indian Trade Union Act, 1926. Through its constituent members, the NCL represents the interests of workers in construction, agriculture, fisheries, forests, marble and granite manufacturing, self- employed workmen, contrac’
workers, anganwadi and domestic workers,as also in the tiny and small-scale industries. The NCL, launched in 1995, has about 6,25,000 members spread over 10 states in India. The NCLreflects two tendencies.First, the formation of such a federation highlights that despite the problems in
organising workers in the informal sector, there have in fact, been a rage of organisations which have sought to address these issues. On a collective plane, their activities represent a marked departure from the traditional way of conceptualising uilion activities exclusively around orgnised or formal ector workers. Thus, the unionisation of the hitherto unorganized sector has become inserted into the political universe as a possible and legitaimate activity. Second formation of the NCL, to an extent, overturns the pessimistic logic that the interests of the unorganised sector—given their divers and inchoate form — cannot be articulated from a single platform. For the NCL aims precisely, do not only provide an anchoring for these diverse organisations, but more importantly, to articulate the need for institutionalised norms of welfare which can apply to the unorganised sector as a whole. It is in the context of this generalised movement that one needs to view recent efforts to bring in legislative acts which seek to create a new framework of laws and institutions addressing the needs of the unorganised sector. One of the major problems that has dogged this sector has of course been that of implementation. Thus, for example, while there is a stimulated minimum wages for most industries, this is frequently flouted by employers, a central objective of the NCL has been to advocate legislation to create agencies, which would mediate between the employer and the employee, to institutionalise certain guarantees of welfare and security to the employee. Thus, for example, the State Assisted Scheme of Provident Fund for Unorganised Workers, 2000 proposed by the Labour Department of the Government of West Bengal, introduces the mechanism of a Fund which will contributed to by the worker (wage-earner or self-employed person), the employer, and the Government and to which the worker would be entitiled at the age of 55 or above. By registering a worker to this programme and issuing an identity card, the initial hurdle of identifying a large mass of scattered workers is overcome and a step is taken towards institutionalising their legistimate claims against the employers and from the state. The Karnataka Unorganised Workers (Regulation of employment and Conditions of Work) Bill, 2001, offers a more comprehensive framework for addressing the unorganised sector's needs. It envisages the formation of a fund and a Board, in each sector. The Board, consisting of members from the Government, employers and employees, would be responsible for administering the Fund. Employers must compulsorily pay towards the Fund, a certain fixed percentage of the wages or taxes payable by them, or a certain percentage of the cost of their project, (for example, in construction projects). The concept of the Fund is designed to create the financial viability of social security for workers, and to provide a structure for employers' contribution. Thus, workers would be insured for accident and illness, old age and to unemployment. The Board is designed to provide a mechanism to ensure the working of the Fund, and essentially, to institutionalise workers' claims against employers through an empowered agency. In the broader context of economic liberalization, recently proposed labour reforms seek to extend the scope of contract employment and to facilitate worker lay-off. As casualisation of labour now seems an irreversible trend, the Bills outlined above would appear to be the only way to ensure workers' interest. To this extent, organizations such as the NCL, which have systematically struggled to push for such legislation, are serving can invaluable historical purpose. As the Karnataka Unorganised Workers Bill awaits endorsement during the Assembly sessions being held currently for the protagonists of the movement, this would be a watershed, but, nevertheless only a moment on a struggle that needs to be waged at multiple points and to evolve to newer heights.

Each of these questions has four underlined parts, Identify the part which is not correct