Current Affairs 2016 | Comprehensive News Analysis 16 April 2016

Useful News Articles

A. GS1 Related

1. Second strong quake hits southern Japan

Topic: Geography

Category: Earthquakes

Location: The Hindu

Key points:

Japan’s Mashiki town in Kumamoto prefecture was hit by a second earthquake of magnitude 7.3( magnitude of first earthquake-6.5)
According to the Japan Meteorological Agency, Mashiki sits near two faults on Kyushu (one of Japan’s main islands)
The area is also near Mount Aso, a huge, active volcano

Tags:earthquake, volcano,faults

B. GS2 Related

1. US wants Pakistan to act against all militant groups

Topic: India’s Neighbourhood

Category: Pakistan

Location: The Hindu

Key points:

A US State Department cable suggested strong links between the Pakistani spy agency ISI and the Haqqani network
The U.S. has asked Pakistan to target all militant groups including the Haqqani Network, Al-Qaeda, Lashkar-e Taiba
Pakistani authorities dismissed the allegations

Tags: Haqqani network, ISI

2. ‘Hidden’ vetoes must go, India tells UN

Topic: International Organisations

Category: The UN

Location: The Hindu

Key points:

India wants transparency in the U.N. procedures to designate a group or an individual terrorist
The existing rules allow Security Council members to oppose any move in the sanctions committees secretly without offering any explanation
decisions have to be made unanimously i.eany of the 15 members can veto a move

Tags: UNSC,UN Sanctions Committees

C. GS3 Related

1. Loss-making shipyards get a new lease of life

Topic: Economy

Category: Shipping Industry

Location: The Hindu

Key points:

Twenty seven loss making private shipyards in India are likely to get a fresh lease of life with new government orders
Cochin Shipyard which will get work orders worth Rs 75,000 crore on nomination basis from the Ministry of Defence and other government entities will outsource large part of the ship building and ship repairing jobs to the private shipyards
141 Memorandum of Understandings (MoUs) worth Rs.82,905 crore were signed by various players including major ports, state maritime boards and public sector undertakingsduring the Maritime India Summit

Tags: Cochin Shipyard

2. Room to cut rates on lower inflation, good monsoon: Rajan

Topic: Economy

Category: monetary policy

Location: The Hindu

Key points:

theIMD monsoon forecasts say El Nino is going to weaken, La Nina is going to strengthen. That’s good for the monsoon
The RBI may have room to further cut policy rates if inflation continues to ease and monsoon rainfall is in line with the forecast said governor RaghuramRajan

Tags: RBI, IMD

3. NIA probes Lashkar link to Samjhauta blasts, seeks US help

Topic: Security

Category: Information Exchange

Location: The Hindu

Key points:

The NIA Director General to travel to US to get information about ArifQasmani(LeT operative), the chief financier in the Samjhauta Express blast(2007)
A U.S. charge sheet in 2009 and the U.N. citation in 2010 accused Qasmani of funding the Samjhauta blasts as well as the 2006 train bombings in Mumbai
The information is sought under Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) between India and US
RSS leader Aseemabad stands accused in this case

Tags: NIA, MLAT

4. ISRO to launch 21 satellites in one shot

Topic: S & T

Category: Space technology

Location: The Hindu

ISRO_jpg_2816071f

Key points:

PSLV-C33 to launch 21 satellites in one go
The primary load is Cartosat -2C
the small satellites are of masses ranging from one kg to 130 kg. Three are from Indian universities – the 12-kg NIUSAT from the Noorul Islam University in Kanyakumari; the 2-kg SathyabamaSat; and the 1-kg Swayam from Pune’s College of Engineering

Tags: PSLV- C33, Cartosat -2C

5. Keeping track of fearless rocky mountain climbers

Topic: Biodiversity

Category: Conservation

Location: The Hindu

th16-nation-nil__N_2816112e

NilgiriTahr

Key points:

A major census of the Nilgiritahr is on way in Kerala on to determine the health of these iconic creaturesendemic to Western ghats
It will cover various habitats, particularly the Siruvani area of Silent Valley National Park, the Munnar-Rajamala portion of Eravikulam National Park, the Nelliampathy Hills of Parambikulam Tiger Reserve and parts of Periyar and Agasthyamala sanctuaries
Forest officials at Silent Valley said it was their first comprehensive survey of the species

Tags: NilgiriTahr, National Park

D. GS4 Related

E. Important Editorials: A Quick Glance

The Hindu

1. Oceanic opportunities

Topic: International Relations

Category: Indian Ocean Region

Key points:

Maritime India Summit was flagged off in Mumbai
India’s maritime advantage: coastline of 7500km, strategic location on all major shipping highways
What is being done to tap into the potential: Sagarmalaprogrammeto promote port-led development, improve the coastal economy, modernise ports and integrate them with special economic zones, and create port-based smart cities, industrial parks, warehouses, logistics parks and transport corridors
India has also begun to collaborate with neighbouring Bangladesh and Myanmar in building waterways and port infrastructure
What has to be done: India needs to firm up its maritime strategy
The PM’s visit to the three Indian Ocean island countries reflected “our foreign policy priorities in India’s immediate and extended neighbourhood
The new emphasis is two-sided — securing energy and trade routes to sustain economic growth and keeping a check on increasing forays by other countries into India’s backyard

Tags: Maritime India Summit, SagarmalaProgramme

Indian Express:

1. BR Ambedkar: Icon of many parts, everyone wants one

Topic: History

Category: National Leaders

timeline

baba-books

Key Points:

the left, centre and right political groups wantBabasaheb in their Great Men List:
the Congress has tried to include him in its pantheon by virtue of having invited him to chair the Constitution Drafting Committee, and join Nehru’s cabinet
The communists, who competed with Ambedkar’s Independent Labour Party and the Scheduled Castes Federation for the support of the working class, need to endorse him to escape the criticism that they refuse to recognise the centrality of caste discrimination in India
The Sangh Parivar sees the need to appropriate him because its Hindu unification project includes assimilation of Dalits. Ambedkar converted to Buddhism as an act of revolt against Hinduism — they have focused on his preference for a religion of Indian origin over semetic faiths

Others:

1. Business Standard: Limited integration

Topic: Governance

Category: agriculture

Key Points

At present, farm marketing varies not only from state to state but also within the states, with each wholesale mandi being governed by its own Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC)
These mandis require separate licences and they charge different marketing fees
The use of technology is low, which means that there is very little transparency in transactions, which eventually hurts farmers
The new integrated electronic platform begins, in a limited way, to address many of these problems.
All 585 major farm markets across the country are planned to be linked to the e-platform by March 2018
while this platform is being officially called the “national agricultural market”, it stops well short of making a real national market a reality
There are 3 pre- requisites to make national market a reality-single wholesale trading licence valid across the catchment area, a single-point levy of market fees, and e-auction as the mode for price discovery.
Other requirements:warehouses equipped with facilities for weighing, grading and standardisation of stocks sold through the electronic platform,aggregators to emerge that pool together small marketable surpluses of individual farmers for sale to bulk buyers to attract competitive bidding
The starting point for real reform continues to be what it always has been: amendment of the states’ APMC Acts strictly on the lines of the Model APMC Act circulated by the Centre in 2003
The Centre would need to do a good deal of canvassing to make more states, especially major agricultural states like Punjab, part of this effort

2. Economic Times: A good monsoon will improve growth prospects

Topic: Economy

Category: Monetary Policy

Key points:

RBI is getting more comfortable on the inflation front and has increasing belief that the headline inflation will remain low in the coming
Reasons for the fall in inflation include advantageous global developments, which impacted commodity prices, and measures by the government to contain food inflation.
The RBI has reversed a six-year policy stance of maintaining the system liquidity in a deficit mode and has moved to a neutral mode(During the period between 2003 and 2010 RBI kept the system liquidity on a surplus mode-monetary easing)
The policy measures are likely to usher in a more sustained return from investments in sovereign and corporate debt instruments
Going forward, the most important near-term factor for the economy would be monsoons
Besides helping rein in inflation and creating space for rate cuts, monsoons would be a welcome relief to alleviate the distress in the rural economy and improve growth prospects

F. Concepts-in-News: Related Concepts to Revise/Learn:

APMC Act
E-mandi
Monsoon
UN Sanctions Committees
Cartosat -2C

G. Fun with Practice Questions 🙂

Question 1: Which of the following statements are true?

The Communal Award of 1932 did not grant separate electorate to Dalits
2. The Poona Pact was to have a single Hindu electorate, with Dalits having seats reserved within it

a) 1 only

b) 2 only

c) Both 1 and 2

d) Neither 1 nor 2

Question 2:Which of the following statements is true?

1)Normal Faulting occurs when the crust is being pulled apart

2)Reverse Faulting occurs when the crust is being compressed

a) 1 only

b)2 only

c)Both 1 and 2

d) Neither 1 nor 2

Question 3:Which of the following statements is/are correct?

The Sagarmala programme aims to put up defence installations across the Indian coastline

2. Bharatmala is the name given to the road and highways project to construct roads along India’s borders, coastal areas, ports etc.

a) 1 only

b) 2 only

c) both 1 and 2

d) Neither 1 nor 2

Question 4: Which of the given below statements is/are true?

1. Anaimudi is the highest peak in the Western Ghats

2.It is located in the Eravikulam National Park

a) 1 only

b) 2 only

c) both 1 and 2

d) Neither 1 nor 2

Question 5:Which of the following statements are true about El Nino?

1.It occurs when trade wind reverses direction
2. It leads to low rainfall and warm winters in India

3. It causes upwelling in the eastern pacific coast

4. It could lead to coral bleaching
a. 1 and 2

b. 1 ,2 and 3

c. 1,3 and 4

d. 1,3 and 4

Check Your Answers

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