Cloud computing offers numerous benefits that can significantly improve scalability and flexibility for businesses, including:

1. On-demand resources: Cloud providers offer scalable resources, such as servers, storage, and databases, that can be quickly provisioned and scaled up or down as needed.
2. Flexibility in infrastructure: Cloud infrastructure is highly flexible, allowing businesses to choose the best combination of public, private, or hybrid cloud models to meet their needs.
3. Cost-effective: Cloud computing eliminates the need for upfront capital expenditures on hardware and software, reducing costs and allowing businesses to pay only for what they use.
4. Rapid deployment: Cloud-based applications and services can be quickly deployed, allowing businesses to respond quickly to changing market conditions or customer needs.
5. Global accessibility: Cloud computing enables global access to applications and data from anywhere, at any time, making it easier to collaborate with remote teams and partners.
6. Scalability for peak demands: Cloud resources can be scaled up during peak periods, ensuring that businesses can handle increased demand without downtime or performance issues.
7. Disaster recovery: Cloud providers offer built-in disaster recovery capabilities, ensuring business continuity and minimizing downtime in the event of an outage or disaster.
8. Upgrades and maintenance: Cloud providers handle software updates and maintenance, freeing up IT staff to focus on more strategic activities.
9. Access to advanced technologies: Cloud computing provides access to the latest technologies and innovations, such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and the Internet of Things (IoT), without the need for significant upfront investments.
10. Enhanced collaboration: Cloud-based collaboration tools enable seamless communication and collaboration across teams, locations, and devices.

In terms of specific benefits for businesses, cloud computing can:

1. Improve customer experience: By providing faster response times and more reliable service, cloud computing can enhance customer satisfaction and loyalty.
2. Increase agility: Cloud computing enables businesses to respond quickly to changing market conditions or customer needs, giving them a competitive edge.
3. Reduce costs: Cloud computing reduces costs by eliminating the need for upfront capital expenditures on hardware and software, as well as reducing energy consumption and IT personnel costs.
4. Improve employee productivity: Cloud-based collaboration tools and applications enable employees to work more efficiently and effectively, improving productivity and job satisfaction.
5. Enhance data security: Cloud providers offer robust security measures to protect business data and applications, giving businesses peace of mind.

Identity and Access Management (IAM) systems play a crucial role in the cloud, ensuring that only authorized users have access to cloud resources and data. Here’s an overview of how IAM systems work in the cloud:

Components of an IAM System:

1. Identity Repository: A database that stores user information, such as username, password, and attributes (e.g., role, department).
2. Authentication: Verifies the identity of a user or entity, typically using credentials like usernames and passwords.
3. Authorization: Grants or denies access to resources based on a user’s role, permissions, or attributes.
4. Policy Engine: Enforces access control decisions based on pre-defined policies.
5. Auditing and Logging: Monitors and records user activity for security, compliance, and incident response purposes.

Cloud-specific Challenges:

1. Multi-tenancy: Multiple customers share the same infrastructure, requiring IAM systems to manage isolation and segregation.
2. Scalability: IAM systems must handle a large number of users, devices, and applications.
3. Security: Cloud environments are more vulnerable to attacks, making robust security measures essential.

Cloud IAM Solutions:

1. AWS IAM (Amazon Web Services Identity and Access Management): Provides fine-grained control over access to AWS resources.
2. Azure Active Directory (AAD): Integrates with Azure services and on-premises Active Directory.
3. Google Cloud Identity and Access Management (IAM): Manages access to Google Cloud resources and services.
4. Okta, Ping Identity, and other Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS) providers offer cloud-based IAM solutions.

Key Features of Cloud IAM Systems:

1. Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): Enhances security with additional verification factors like biometrics, tokens, or one-time passwords.
2. Role-Based Access Control (RBAC): Assigns roles to users or groups for simplified access management.
3. Attribute-Based Access Control (ABAC): Controls access based on user attributes, such as job function or department.
4. Just-in-Time (JIT) Provisioning: Automatically creates accounts and grants access when a user is added to a group or role.
5. Real-time Auditing and Logging: Provides visibility into user activity for security, compliance, and incident response.

Best Practices for Cloud IAM:

1. Implement MFA: Use multiple factors to verify user identity.
2. Use RBAC: Simplify access management with role-based controls.
3. Limit Privileges: Grant least privilege access to ensure users only have necessary permissions.
4. Monitor User Activity: Regularly review logs and auditing data to detect potential security threats.
5. Stay Up-to-Date: Keep your IAM system software up-to-date with the latest security patches and features.

Modern states are large and complex with several cultural and economic problems and historical experiences add complexity to their problems. Since independence Indian states have had to deal with the demands of separate statehood largely based on language, culture, ethnicity, religion, etc. Later the basis for separate statehood demands was largely shifted to better governance and greater participation, administrative convenience, economic viability in the developmental needs of sub-regions. As democracy takes firm roots, such aspirations also grow. The hitherto neglected sections of the populations realize their importance; demand new provinces or states want new borders and secure autonomy.

Ethnicity And Influence On Creation Of Separate States

1. Relative cultural deprivation causes ethnic minorities like Nagas to aspire for separate territorial statehood. Nagas are culturally heterogeneous groups of different communities/tribes having a different set of problems from the mainstream population.
2. The demand for autonomy is the motive behind Gorkhaland, which is a proposed state covering areas inhabited by the ethnic Gorkha (Nepali) people, inhabiting Darjeeling hills and Dooars in the northern part of West Bengal.
3. Denial of economic opportunities caused Bodos, the largest ethnic and linguistic community in northern Assam to demand a separate state of Bodoland. The agitation resulted in an agreement in 2003 between the GoI, the Assam state government, and the Bodo Liberation Tigers Force. According to the agreement, Bodos were granted the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC), within the State of Assam under Sixth Schedule.
4. Distinct language consciousness caused Tulu people to demand a separate Tulu Nadu state since the late 2000s, considering unique language and culture as the basis for their demand.
5. Though ethnicity and ideology, the former more than the latter—remain major influences on separatist and autonomist groups in parts of India like the northeast, religion is increasingly beginning to influence the political agenda of some of these groups. Religious distinctiveness, when coterminous with ethnicity, exacerbated the sense of otherness in the Naga and the Mizo hills.

Reasons Other Than Ethnicity

1. Telangana leaders accused the people of Andhra of “colonizing the region” by grabbing their jobs and land, and the government of not investing in the region’s infrastructure.
2. Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh came into being on 1 November 2000 as the 26th State of the Union. It fulfils the long-cherished demand of the people for better regional development.
3. In Vidarbha that comprises the Amravati and Nagpur divisions of eastern Maharashtra, the backwardness of the region due to the neglect of successive state governments is justified as the basis for the demand for a separate state. The State Reorganisation Act of 1956 recommended the creation of Vidarbha state with Nagpur as the capital, but instead, it was included in Maharashtra state, which was formed on May 1, 1960.
4. The movement for a separate Saurashtra state was initiated in 1972 by Ratilal Tanna. Lack of better water supply to the region, lack of job opportunities, and subsequent youth migration have been cited as major reasons for the demand for statehood. Saurashtra is also linguistically different from the rest of the state.

Economic and social viability rather than political considerations based on homogeneous ethnic identity must be given primacy. Parent states that lose out in terms of physical and human capital may be adequately compensated. There should be certain clear-cut parameters and safeguards to check the unfettered demands. It is better to allow democratic concerns like development, decentralisation, and governance rather than religion, caste, language, or dialect to be the valid bases for conceding the demands for a new state. Apart from this the fundamental problems of development and governance deficit such as the concentration of power, corruption, administrative inefficiency, etc also must be addressed to tackle the demand for separate statehood.

In 1975 barely over two decades after it gained independence, India faced its biggest political crisis. On 26 June 1975, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared a national emergency under article 352, on the grounds of internal disturbance. The events leading up to the emergency were marked with rising poverty, economic inequality, and social unrest due to protests across Northern India, mainly due to the JP movement. Emergency was perhaps the darkest period and biggest crisis Indian democracy has faced in the post-Independence era.

Circumstances Leading To Promulgation Of Emergency

1. The height of popularity which Mrs. Gandhi achieved post-1971 war, began to decline by the beginning of 1973. She came to power with slogans of Garibi Hatao, but people’s expectations were unfulfilled and there was rising discontent. 2. Economic situation: It was the main reason for this discontent. A combination of recession, growing unemployment, rampant inflation, and scarcity of foodstuffs created a serious crisis.

1. The post-war efforts and the burden of feeding and sheltering 10 million refugees, had depleted grain reserves. The war had caused a massive budgetary deficit and drained foreign reserves creating more economic woes.
2. Successive failure of rains in 1972 and 73 led to drought and also drop in power generation which created an industrial recession. The combination of this is rising unemployment and prices of goods.
3. The problem was further compounded by the oil shock of 1973 leading to a rise in fuel and fertilizer prices. Just 1972-73 saw a 22 percent rise in prices which affected the poor and middle class alike and also created a shortage of essential commodities.

3. Social conditions: The severe economic crisis, unemployment, scarcity of goods all led to largescale industrial unrest, with a wave of strikes all through 1972, and 1973 culminating in an all-India railway strike in 1974 for 22 days. Law and order deteriorated, particularly during 1974–75. Strikes, student protests, and popular demonstrations often turned violent. It was during this time, three major social classes, began detaching themselves from Congress. The middle class due to price rise and unemployment, the rich landed class due to social reforms, and the capitalist class due to talk of socialism, nationalization banks, etc. 4. Political situation: The situation of 1973 and 74 required strong leadership. But congress by this time had begun declining as an organization and proved incapable of dealing with the crisis at hand creating a political crisis. The economic and political crisis was turned into a crisis of the entire political system, due to popular movements in Gujarat and Bihar and the leadership provided to the Bihar movement by Jayaprakash Narayan. Gujarat in January 1974 saw popular anger over the rise in the prices of foodgrains, and other essential commodities explode in the cities and towns of the state in the form of a student movement which was soon joined by the Opposition parties. Forced by the strength of the agitations and fast unto death by Morarji Desai, Indira Gandhi dissolved the assembly and announced fresh elections.

1. Inspired by the success of Gujarat agitation a similar student movement started in Bihar, where the protests turned violent resulting in the death of 27 people in a week.
2. The movement in Bihar was led by JP, who gave calls for total revolution against the corrupt system and he took the movement across the country, demanding the removal of congress and Indira Gandhi.

5. Spark for emergency: At the time when the JP movement was declining, judgment in the Raj Narain case by Justice Sinha of Allahabad High Court convicted Mrs.Gandhi for campaign corruption and declared her election as void. This decision means that she cannot contest in the 1976 election or hold office for six years. While the appeal of Mrs. Gandhi was pending in Apex court, in the Gujarat election Congress suffered a severe blow with the Janata party forming the government. The Allahabad HC judgment and Gujarat election results revived the opposition movement, who now not willing to wait for 1976 general elections decided on a countrywide, one-week campaign to force Mrs. Gandhi to resign. The response of Mrs. Gandhi to this planned campaign and agitations was to impose an emergency on 26th June, on grounds of an internal emergency.

Implications Of Emergency

A. Political Implications

1.Negatives

1. The proclamation of emergency suspended Federal provisions of the constitution, Fundamental rights, and civil liberties.
2. The government imposed strict censorship on the press and stifled all protests and opposition to the government. Several opposition leaders like JP, Morarji Desai, academics, journalists, trade unionists, and student leaders were jailed under the MISA act.
3. During the emergency, parliament was made ineffective. The speeches of opposition MPs who were not arrested were not reported in the press. The state governments were strictly controlled and non-congress governments in Tamilnadu and Gujarat were dismissed.
4. A series of decrees, laws and constitutional amendments reduced the powers of the judiciary. The 42nd amendment act especially tried to put an end to judicial review of constitutional amendments.
5. Fundamental Rights were indirectly emasculated by being made subordinate to an expanded version of the Directive Principles of State Policy embodied in the constitution.

2. Positives:

There was also an immediate and general improvement in administration, with government servants coming to office on time and being more considerate to the public. Quick, dramatic, and well-publicized action was taken against smugglers, hoarders, black marketeers, illegal traders in foreign currency, and tax evaders, with several thousand of them put behind bars under MISA. Serious efforts were made to implement the Twenty -Point Programme; and some quick results were produced in terms of reduction of prices, free availability of essential commodities, and check on hoarding, smuggling, and tax evasion. Congress lost the 1977 elections and the Janata government which came to power brought into force the 44th constitutional amendment act, which changes aspects related grounds on which emergency can be imposed, better protection for fundamental rights, etc.

B. Social Implication:

1. Positives:

1. In the initial days after imposition, people responded with passivity and some even supported the emergency because of the strict measures taken against anti-social elements.
2. With the restoration of public order and discipline, many felt relieved that the country had been saved from disorder and chaos. There was less crime in the cities; gheraos and uncontrolled, often violent, demonstrations came to an end.
3. Emergency has restored social order with teachers, students attending classes. It created an environment of calm that was not known for years.
4. The 20 point program made some progress to uplift the urban poor by providing house sites, distributing surplus land, and laws were passed placing a moratorium on recovery of debts, etc. 2.

Negatives:

The bureaucracy and the police now had increased power that was unchecked by criticism and exposure from the Press, courts, MLAs and MP s, political parties, and popular movements and they abused this power.

1. Drastic press censorship and the silencing of protest led to the government being kept in complete ignorance of what was happening in the country.
2. Because the people knew that what appeared in the Press or on the radio was heavily censored, they no longer trusted them and thus they started trusting rumors, believing the worst about the government.
3. Denial of civil liberties began to be felt by the common people as it began to impact their daily lives in the form of harassment and corruption by petty officials.
4. Delay in lifting the Emergency began to generate the fear that the authoritarian structure of the rule might be made permanent or continue for a long time.
5. The one thing which created the most resentment among people was the growth of the extra-constitutional power center in the form of Sanjay Gandhi. His programs of forced family planning, slum clearance were resented by the masses.

In January 1977, Mrs.Gandhi announced elections to Loksabha, released political prisoners, lifted press censorship. The subsequent elections saw congress losing. It was a time many Indians and people abroad had doubts about the future of democracy in India. However India has not only survived the dark period of emergency and the social unrest of the JP movement, it even thrived. The democratic system has taken firm roots not just because of the constitution or courts but because the people of India have internalized it.

The JP movement, also called the Bihar Movement, after its leader Jayaprakash Narayan launched the movement in the backdrop of pre Emergency crises and continued during Emergency crises. Jayaprakash Narayan gave a call for ‘Total Revolution’ or ‘a struggle against the very system which has compelled almost everybody to go corrupt’ and also demanded the resignation of the Congress government in Bihar and dissolution of the assembly.

Flaws In Philosophy Of Jp Movement

1. Jayaprakash Narayan was justly renowned for his integrity, lack of ambition for office, fearlessness, selflessness and sacrifice and lifelong commitment to civil liberties and the establishment of just social order. But, ideologically, he was vague.
2. From the early 1950s, he became a critic of parliamentary politics and parliamentary democracy. For years, he tried to popularize the concept of ‘partyless democracy’. During 1974–75 he also advocated ‘Total Revolution’ (Sampooran Kranti) but socio-economic and political content, programmes or policies of the Total Revolution were never properly defined.
3. Both concepts were unclear and nebulous, and at no stage was he able to delineate or explain what a political system without political parties would involve or how the popular will get expressed or implemented in it.
4. The JP movement consisted of political parties and groups which had nothing in common in terms of programme and policies and were ideologically incompatible. It included the communal Jan Sangh and Jamaat-i-Islami, the neofascist RSS, the conservative and secular Congress (O), Socialists and the extreme left Naxalite groups.
5. Almost entirely negative in its approach, the movement could not fashion an alternative programme or policies except that of overthrowing Indira Gandhi.

Flaws In Character Of Jp Movement

1. The agitational methods adopted and propagated by the JP Movement were also extra-constitutional and undemocratic and also incited army, police and civil services to rebel.
2. The movement that claimed to preserve and protect democracy, tried to overthrow the democratically elected government through strikes, violent protests and in other unconstitutional ways. The ideal way would have been to wait till Indira Gandhi’s term is over and fight her in an election in a democratic way.
3. The movement talked about rural transformation, but the participation in the movement extensively came from Urban India and not from rural India. The movement did not take adequate steps to ensure the participation of people from rural India.
4. This is one of the major drawbacks of the movement. While more than half of India lived in rural areas, a movement extensively focused on urban problems cannot bring in the total revolution.

Despite its limitations, the JP movement had a profound impact on Indian politics. It led to the formation of the first non-Congress Government in 1977. It focussed on change in the individual as well as in society. The primary emphasis is on moral values, decentralisation of economic and political power. It also served as an inspiration for later anti-corruption movements.