Comprehensive News Analysis - 26 November 2016

Useful News Articles

A. GS1 Related

Nothing here today folks!

B. GS2 Related

End lip service to constitution, live by it

Key Points:

Observations made by the Supreme Court

26^th November was declared as the ‘Constitution day’ last year through an official gazette notification as it was the day when the Indian constitution was adopted by the constituent assembly in 1949.
HRD Ministry, Department of Sports, Department of Youth affairs etc had organized various activities like quiz, ‘run for equality’ on this day in 2015.
B.R Ambedkar, the father of the Indian constitution, was the chairman of drafting committee of the constituent assembly which drafted the masterpiece with inputs from the Indian society and other constitutions as well.
For Indian constitution, flexibility and rigidity go hand-in-hand, with 101 amendments yet retaining its basic structure.
For realizing the ideals of our forefathers, which the preamble contains, and to transform India in to Ramrajya, violation of the constitution has to be stopped. The political class should take the initiative as they are the ones who disobey constitution the most.

HIV community rejects AIDS bill in current form

Key Points:

4 million HIV positive community of India has rejected the AIDS bill passed recently by the lower house of the Parliament for diluting the provisions guaranteeing them their right to treatment under clause 14 (1) of the bill, which now includes the phrase ‘as far as possible’ relating to prevention of spread of the virus.
The rules for injection safety requirements have not been stated under Clause 22 of the bill, which earlier clarified the need to strengthen injection safety program.
The bill overall emphasizes more on prevention than treatment of the viral disease.

Landmark ruling deals blow to U.K deportation programme

Key Points:

The Court of Appeal in London has asked the government to review the cases relating to deportation of thousands of students from U.K.
An American institute Education testing services, responsible for running English language tests, was evidently found to be indulged in fraud; which in turn escalated the deportations by the British government.
Close to 4000 people were also accused of involvement in fraud and were prosecuted even without evidences.
Over 70% of them were of Indian nationality as suggested by the Indian workers association.

Rajapaksa’s visit part of the India-China ‘Great Game’ in Sri Lanka?

Key Points:

Mahinda Rajapaksa, the former President of Sri Lanka, is on a visit to China supposedly to push the relations with China further. He was on good terms with Chinese government while in office, mainly because of the financial support from China to build ports and airports etc.
It is a strong message from Beijing to the current Sri lankan government, which had criticized it for expensive loans and the Indian government.
SriLanka holds an important place for both India and China considering the geopolitics in the Indian Ocean.

The gathering crisis in Seoul

Key Points:

Because of alleged involvement in extortion and exercising illegal authority, Choi Soon, aide of the South Korean President Park, has displeased thousands of citizens who are protesting for the impeachment of the President.
If the President is impeached tensions with nuclear armed North Korea, relations with the United States, slowing down economy etc would be the immediate concerns to be looked upon by the new President.

Appointing a Lokpal

Key Points:

Supreme court has asked the Union government to appoint a Lokpal pertaining to the provisions of 2013 Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act.
The cause for delay is the selection panel which consists of 5members, one of them being the leader of opposition in the house.
The issue is that there is no recognized opposition leader in the Lok Sabha.
The speaker of the Lok sabha is supposed to recognize the LoP according to the ruling by G.V Mavalankar which says that the leader of the party with at least 10% members in the lower house can be recognized as LoP.
But the 1977 law concerning the salary of office holders defines LoP as the leader of the party in opposition with greatest numerical strength and as recognized by the speaker.
An amendment to this effect has been the reason for the delay.

C. GS3 Related

Centre forms committee to push cashless transactions

Key Points:

A panel tasked with pushing cashless transactions has been announced by the centre which is to be headed by Amitabh Kant, NITI Aayog CEO.
The committee is supposed to identify and operationalise user friendly digital payment options in every sector of the economy, identify the bottlenecks in this transformation to a cashless economy, engage regularly with Central ministries, regulators, state governments, district administration, local bodies, trade and industry associations to promote adoption of digital payment systems, estimate costs involved in various digital payments options and oversee implementation of measures to make such transactions between the government and citizens cheaper than cash transactions.
Common Service Centres are to help the merchants in using digital payment systems. A part of the expense involved has to be borne by the CSCs.
Deputy Collectors across the country have been asked by the Cabinet Secretary to make people aware of and push digital payments.
Transformation to a cashless economy would surely take time but is in no way infeasible. We already have the example of mobile phones reaching almost every corner of the country.

D. GS4 Related

Nothing here today folks!

E. Important Editorials: A Quick Glance

Nothing here today folks!

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

Nothing here today folks!

G. Fun with Practice Questions 🙂

Question 1.Who prepared the first draft of the Indian constitution?

Recently, the Centre has announced that the Union Budget would be presented on February 1.
This would be a break with the colonial practice of budget presentation on the last working day of February.
The word ‘budget’ has its origin in French word ‘bougette’ which means small bag.

a) J.L Nehru

b) B.R Ambedkar

c) Vallabh bhai Patel

d) B.N rau

Question 2.How many articles were there in the original constitution?

a) 389

b) 379

c) 362

d) 382

Question 3.Consider the following statements:

Common service centers scheme was launched by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.
They are meant to empower citizens digitally under the Digital India programme.

Which of the above statements is/are correct?

a) i) only

b) ii) only

c) both i) and ii)

d) None

Question 4.

human body can get rid of HIV completely.
HIV attacks CD4 cells and thus weakens the immune system.

Which of the above statements is/are incorrect?

a) i) only

b) ii) only

c) Both i) and ii)

d) None

Check Your Answers

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