VOL. XL NO. 37 PAGES 32 NEW DELHI 12 - 18 DECEMBER 2015 ` 8.00

DIGITAL SHOPPING WITHOUT BORDERS AN EMERGING GLOBAL TREND AMONG THE DIGITAL YOUTH

Dr. Ranjeet Mehta

T oday, an evolution is occurring that will foreverchange the relationship between retailers and their

customers. This new retail model, known as electroniccommerce (e-commerce), consists of (a) Mobile com-merce supported by mobile devices and tablets (m-commerce) and (b) Emerging social commerce plat-forms that bring together advertising, shopping andselling in a social media environment (s-commerce).

While the e-commerce piece of retail today is signif-icant and a huge growth engine, the total impact of dig-ital on the retail enterprise today extends to themajority of retail sales. Around 60 per cent of retailsales in the US are influenced by digital tools insome way. The influence works both ways.According to a November 2013 survey of US digitalshoppers by consulting firm Accenture, 78 percent of respondents reported "webrooming," orresearching online before heading to a store tomake a purchase. At the same time, some storetrips eventually led to a digital purchase. The sameAccenture study found that 72 per cent of respon-dents said "showroom," or "buy digitally after see-ing a product in a store". Consumers, then, havemerged online and offline into a single shoppingexperience.

But sales alone do not tell the whole story of USretail e-commerce. Consumers may not buy onlineall the time, but they are shopping through digitalchannels constantly. Digital shopping doesn'talways lead to an immediate conversion but it doestranslate to influence throughout the path to pur-

chase. In US, Industry experts expect e-commercesales to increase to 11 percent by 2018. While thismay seem like nominal growth, some major retailershave already experienced e-commerce revenuesaccounting for 14.3 percent of their total revenue as ofthe second quarter of 2014. The top 43 Internet retail-ers in the U.S. reported $24.52 billion in combined e-commerce transactions during the second quarter of

2014, a 19.2 percent increase over the samequarter in 2013.

Indian online shoppers will spend Rs54,700 crores buying products from other

countries, and that is expected to rise bymore than 75 per cent in 2016, a report by

payment firm PayPal said."The Indian ecommercespace is experiencing an exciting time where innova-tion is the key. Our research reveals that the advent oftechnology is slowly diminishing borders for onlineshopping. With the number of online shoppers set togrow exponentially, it will lead to increase in the num-ber of shoppers who shop from global retailers withonline presence, as per managing director of PayPalIndia.

The emerging trends show that young consumershave developed a strong taste for shopping online. Ithas also been seen that the primary source of trafficfor online shopping (and other e-commerce portals)

and social media activity are young con-sumers in the age group of 13 to 25. As aresult of this, the number of online shop-ping platforms has increased and expand-ed dramatically over the last few years.

As per a report out of about a total 10million online shoppers in India, roughly3.8 million shop across borders. The aver-age cross-border spend is also higher

than domestic online shopping spends.Average spend on cross-border trans-actions by the estimated 3.8-million

cross border shoppers was estimated tobe about Rs1.42 lakh per cross-bordershopper in 2015. A Goldman Sachs reportin May 2015, pegged the average transac-tion size of about Rs. 1,800 for the Indian

Continued on page 32

Naval Dockyard, Visakhapatnamrequires 1121 Tradesman (Skilled)Last Date : 30 days after publication

(pg 16-17)

NDV

Union Public Service Commissioninvites applicatons for various postLast Date : 31.12.2015 (pg 20-21)

UPSC

Employees’ State InsuranceCorporation, kanpur requires 150Stenographer, Upper Division Clearkand Multi Tasking Staff. Last Date : 06.01.2016 (pg 27)

ESIC

JOB HIGHLIGHTS

@Employ_NewsFollow us on:

Visit our facebook page

WEB EXCLUSIVESFollowing item is available in the WebExclusives section on www.employment-news.gov.in

IFFI 2015 : Cinema from the North EastFinds a Special Place

For Informative articles on current affairsyou can also visitwww.facebook.com/yojanajournalwww.facebook.com/publicationsdivision

Turn over the pages for other vacanciesin Banks, Armed Forces, Railways, PSUsand other Govt. Deptts.

CIVIL SERVICES (MAIN)-2015: INSIGHTSON ESSAY AND CURRENT AFFAIRS

The role played by the essay paper and current affairs indetermining the success of a civil services aspirant is

not fully recognized. A true assessment of the mainspapers brings out very clearly that the route to success liesin commanding over two crucial papers, viz; Ethics andEssay. In addition, the currentaffairs part is also a greatdeterminant of success in themain exam. In my consideredview, a candidate must realizeit at the right stage of his prepa-ration and orient his prepara-tions factoring in the importanceof these three crucial areas i.e.Ethics, Essay , and CurrentAffairs. I would call these threeareas as the dynamic part of thesyllabus as they encompassmost contemporary issues fromall fields of knowledge. In mylast article in this journal (28th November - 4th December,2015), I have already explained about the ethics paper inall its dimensions. In the present article, I will outline thestrategy to cover the essay and the current affairs parts.In these two areas, there is a lack of proper guidance avail-able to the aspiring candidates. My guidelines are relevantfor candidates appearing in CS (main) exam 2015 as wellas for those also who plan to write the exam in 2016.Essay PaperIn its new format, two essays have to be written by the can-didate in three hours time. Though, there is no prescribedword limit for an essay, I recommend that each essayshould be of 1200- 1400 words. The time for one essay

is one and a half hour, which is more than adequate to fin-ish the writing part. However, the real challenge is not writ-ing the essay but managing its structure and design. If theessay is well designed, it will become forceful and fetchhigh marks. Thus, the key to a good essay is its proper

structure and keeping thecontent close to the topic ofthe essay. UPSC has giventhe following guideline for theessay paper." Candidates are expected tokeep closely to the subject ofthe essay , to arrange theirideas in an orderly fashion,and to write concisely. Creditwill be given for effective andexact expression."Now let me explain theserequirements with examples. Keeping closely to the

subject of the essay: "An essay is a piece of writing thatmethodically analyses and evaluates a topic or an issue".Michel de Montaigne, who coined the term essay definesan essay as an "attempt to put ones' thoughts in writing."It is clear from this definition that one has to write close tothe subject of the essay. For example, if the essay is on-'Ethics of Climate Change', then, keeping close to thistopic would mean writing about the ethical rationale forchecking and reversing the climate changes that are tak-ing place. This ethical dimension of climate changeshould be the central theme in this particular essay topic.This theme is: if the world is to do something about climate

Continued on page 31

S.B. Singh

facebook.com/director.employmentnews

Prime Minister has called for climate justice and appealed to developed nationsto vacate carbon space in order that developing nations can accommodate itsdevelopment needs. Addressing the world leaders, at Paris recently, he alsostressed the need for better co-operations among the member countries by shar-ing best practices, regulatory processes and training. Prime Minister also saidthat world look forward to the developed countries to mobilise USD 100 billionannually by 2030 for mitigation and adaptation. He asked the developed coun-tries to make the deepest cut. Prime Minister said that by the year 2020 India tar-gets reduction of carbon emission level by 33 to 35% from the level of year 2005.

The Lok Sabha has recently passed a bill to establish the Bureau of IndianStandards as a National Standards Body for harmonious development of stan-dardization and assessment and quality assurance of goods, processes andservices. The Bureau of Indian Standards Bill, 2015 also seeks to broaden itsambit, and allow the Central government to make it mandatory for certain notifiedgoods, articles and processes to carry the standard mark. It also allows multipletypes of conformity assessment schemes in tune with best global practices.

The Union Cabinet has recently approved the setting up of six new IndianInstitutes of Technology (IITs) in Andhra Pradesh, Chhatisgarh, Goa, Jammu,Kerala and Karnataka. Each new IIT will have an initial intake of 180 students inits first year which would increase to 450 in the second year and to 928 in thethird year of their operation. The total cost for running these IITs would beRs.1,412 crore. Each IIT will have a sanctioned strength of faculty members, witha faculty-student ratio of 1:10.

The Global Initiative of Academic Networks' (GIAN) programme has been recent-ly launched at the IIT Gandhi Nagar. GIAN, a new and catalytic programme, isintended to enlarge and deepen the interface of India's institutions of higherlearning and globally recognised institutions of academic eminence. Within ayear, faculty from highly rated institutions abroad will visit India, interact and part-ner with their counterparts and with students, and deliver specialised courses.

The Reserve Bank of India, in its fifth Bi-monthly Monetary Policy Statement for2015-16, has decided to keep the repo rate same. Governor Raghuram Rajanhas recently announced that the Repo Rate will be maintained at 6.75 per cent,with CRR at 4 per cent. Reverse Repo Rate is held at 5.75 per cent. He saidEconomy showing signs of early recovery, but RBI keeps GDP forecastunchanged at 7.4 per cent with a moderate downward bias.

Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) has launched SIDBI Make inIndia soft loan fund for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMILE). A corpusof Rs 10,000 crore for SMILE and Rs 2000 crore for India Aspiration Fund (IAF)has been launched to boost the start up venture capital and Micro, Small andMedium Enterprises (MSME) ecosystem in the country.

The Government of India is going all out to ensure that the manufacturing sectorpushes up its share of contribution in the GDP from the current 16 per cent to 25per cent with the objective of creating more jobs. Speaking at the '4th National

Conference on Skill Development 2015, Linking Skills to Jobs' recently, organisedby the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), Additional Secretary andDevelopment Commissioner, Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises,Surendra Nath Tripathi said that the government has done the skill mapping of allthe 654 districts and has uploaded all the information related to industries, man-ufacturing and skill profile on the web. Such surveys will help the governmentand the industry to be able to zero in on the specific requirements regardingskilling as well as setting up industries. The Chairman of the National SkillDevelopment Agency and the National Skill Development Corporation, SRamadorai focused on two aspects of skilling-linking people to markets and pro-viding appropriate nature of jobs in rural and semi-rural areas.

Indian Railways has recently signed Rs 40,000 crore contracts with GE andAlstom to set up two locomotive plants in Bihar. The electric locomotive factorywill be set up at Madhepura and diesel locomotive will be established atMarhowrah. This is the first big Foreign Direct Investment, (FDI) in the railwaysector after last year government had relaxed FDI norms in the railway sector.Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) has been recently launched in India as part of the"Global Polio Endgame Strategy". In the first phase this vaccine will be introducedin six states, viz Assam, Gujarat, Punjab, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttar Pradesh.IPV injection will be given to children below one year of age along with the third doseof the Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) at the routine immunization sessions free of cost."Accessible India Campaign"(Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan), has been launchedrecently. It is a nationwide campaign that will enable persons with disabilities togain universal access, equal opportunity for development, independent living andparticipation in all aspects of life in an inclusive society. Under the campaign,atleast 50 per cent of all the government buildings of National Capital and all theState capitals will be made fully accessible for persons with disabilities by July2018. All the international airports in the country and railway stations of A1, A &B categories will be made fully accessible by July 2016. Atleast 10 per cent ofgovernment owned public transport carriers in the country will be converted intofully accessible carriers for these persons by March 2018. India has successfully test-fired its indigenously developed nuclear capable sur-face-to-surface ballistic missile Agni-I from Dr Abdul Kalam Wheeler Island off theOdisha coast recently. Agni-I, the first missile of the Agni series powered by bothsolid and liquid propellants, can travel at a speed of 2.5 km per second anddestroy targets nearly 700 km away. The user trial of the missile was carried outby the Strategic Forces Command of Indian Army. Britain has won the Davis Cup for the first time in 79 years in Ghent recently whenAndy Murray defeated David Goffin 6-3, 7-5, 6-3. Britain is the only nation to havecompeted in all Davis Cup editions since 1900 and its 10th title makes it the thirdmost successful nation after the United States and Australia. Murray, ranked No.2 in the world, is unbeaten in Davis Cup this year.

NEWS DIGEST

www.employmentnews.gov.in 31Employment News 12 - 18 December 2015

change, there has to be an ethicalresponse apart from the scientific andtechnological response. The ethicalresponse will require those responsi-ble for greenhouse emissions toreduce it for the future generationseven if they themselves are not somuch threatened immediately by theiracts. The essay must capture this cen-tral theme and develop along thistheme. To arrange ideas in orderly fash-

ion: This requires a proper structuringof the essay paper. Since an essay isan attempt to persuade its readersabout what his writing is attempting toconvey, it must be accordingly struc-tured in the following parts:a. Introduction: It gives the reader away into your essay. The reader willget a map into a journey that youressay will take him to. In introduction,you should cover (a) the theme of theessay (b) its importance and (c) howyou are going to take up the theme.Introduction should be concise,engaging and well written to create thefirst impression. It must have some-thing to grab the attention of the read-er.b. Main Body of the essay: The mainbody of the essay will consist of three tofour different paragraphs, each havingits own theme connected to the centraltheme of the essay. In the main body,you should be able to develop the cen-tral ideas, arguments, counter argu-ments in different paragraphs.c. Conclusion: Conclusion is thesummary of the main points of theargument made in the essay. It cap-tures the essence of the essay.d. Writing concisely: This guidelinefrom UPSC with regard to essay writ-ing implies that you should be able tomake compact sentences and notdisparate lines which are not connectedwith each other. Each sentence shouldconnect with the next sentence in termsof logic, facts, arguments etc.e. Effective and exact expression:This is about forceful expression. Forthis, you need to use metaphors, sim-

iles, rhetorics, idioms in the essaywherever they can fit in appropriately.Without such usage, your essay willlook dull and descriptive.Expected topics for essay in 2015exam are as follows:Yoga, Smart City, Intolerance, MobileTelephony, Magna Carta, Hundredyears of First World War, Hundredyears of Gandhi's Return to India,Climate Change, Value Education,Twenty First Century as the AsianCentury, Uniform Civil Code, Lack ofa Robust Sports Culture in India.CURRENT AFFAIRSCurrent affairs run through the entireIAS mains syllabus barring some stat-ic parts. But covering and com-manding it is a major challengebecause it entails a wide spectrum ofevents and issues . The best part ofthe current affairs is that if preparedholistically, it can pay you in any partof the General Studies Main papers.For example, if you are covering theissue of climate change, which isextremely relevant for CivilServices(Main)-2015 exam., thenyou should cover it in such a way thatyou can answer it from the perspec-tive of the ethics paper, essay paperor the environment topic in GSPaper III. The climate change has anethical dimension, and from this per-spective, a question can be asked inthe ethics paper. Similarly, it is a sci-entific issue and its scientific/techno-logical aspect can be asked in GSPaper III which deals with environ-ment and ecology. Finally, climatechange can be an essay topic fromthe perspective of an urgent need inhuman agenda. Thus , the sametopic , ( climate change, corruption ,etc ) should be studied in a very wideperspective. Secondly, more thanknowing about the current topics, it ismore important to know the keypoints involved in the topic. Forexample, if you are going to coverSCO ( Shanghai CooperationOrganisation), You should empha-size on two key components of thiskey body viz; importance of Indiajoining it , and secondly, its emphasis

on tackling terrorism. Just knowingabout SCO, without comprehendingits relevance in exam will not fetchyou good marks in the exam.Secondly, in current affairs, the cov-erage is from the events and issues oflast one year. Thus, for IAS Mains,you need to cover events betweenOctober 2014 and November 2015.For Civil Services 2016, you need tocover the major events betweenAugust 2015 and November 2016because you will have to take intoaccount the current questions that aregoing to be asked in the prelims2016 exam as well.Thirdly, in most cases, current affairsquestions have two components.One is about the issue itself whichneeds to be elaborated in youranswer. The second part is about thesolution or your suggestions on theissue. You should answer both theparts of the question in a balancedmanner. In many cases, candidatesjust explain the issue without offeringa proper solution or suggestion intheir answers. This is a very importantpoint to bear in mind while approach-ing a current affairs question.Finally, one should guard against thetendency to put lots of facts and figuresin current affairs questions. It is not atest of your statistical ability to producedata on current affairs. It is about com-prehending the current issues.

Important current affairs topics forCivil Services - 2015 are as follows:Digital India, Swachha Bharat, Netneutrality, FDI reforms and sectorsensitivity (e.g. FDI in media,defence), Niti Aayog, Banking sectorreforms, New bank licenses, Small &payment banks, Japans' new securitypolicy and issues raised by China -effect in Asia, South China sea,NJAC, All India Judicial Service ,Labor law reforms, GST, Reforms inRailways, Shanghai CooperationOrganization- India's entry in SCO,BRICS, New development bank - Canit be a parallel to World Bank?,Energy Security in India, NationalSolar Mission, Coal tax regime,India's intended national defined tar-get for Paris COP 21 for renewal ofKyoto like protocol, Forward Marketand Food inflation, National GreenTribunal & issues regarding its ambitof power, Uniform Civil Code, Lack ofconcerted policy in fighting global ter-rorism, ASTROSAT, IRNSS, Marsmission, North east insurgency, Nagaissue, Inner Line Permit, AFSPA,Uniform Civil Code, Smart City, Geo-engineering etc.(The author is a noted academicianand IAS mentor. He can be reached at email: sb_singh2003@yahoo.com)

CIVIL SERVICES (MAIN) ...Continued from page 1

Pushpinder Kaur (GM & Chief Editor)

Hasan Zia (Senior Editor)

Ayanedi Venkatappaiah (Editor, Advt.)

Dr. Mamta Rani (Editor)

Gopajit Das (Editor)

V.K. Meena (Joint Director, Production)

Sandeep Nigam (Production Officer)

P.K. Mandal (Sr. Artist)

K.P. Manilal (Accounts Officer)

J.C. Jaiswal (Business Executive, Circulation)

E-Mail: GM-cum-Chief Editor:

director.employmentnews@gmail.com

Advertisement: enewsadvt@yahoo.com

Editorial : 26195165

Advertisement : 26104284

Tele Fax : 26193012

Circulation : 26107405

Tele Fax : 26175516

Accounts (Advt.) : 26193179

Accounts (Cir.) : 26182079

Employment News