Comprehensive News Analysis - 30 November 2016

Table of Contents:

A. GS1 Related:
B. GS2 Related:

1. Son can’t claim a right to live in parents’ house: HC

2. Parrikar visiting Dhaka to boost defence partnership

3. Mini-nukes pose a big threat, says Austrian negotiator

4. ‘AIIB driven by projects, not politics’

C. GS3 Related:

1. ISRO drones help map disasters in north-east

D. GS4 Related
E. Important Editorials : A Quick Glance

The Hindu

1. A last chance for amnesty

2. Finally, a step towards change

The Indian Express

1. Bitter pills

Business Line

1. Pakistan’s corridor of uncertainty

F. Concepts-in-News: Related Concepts to Revise/Learn:
G. BILLS/ACTS/SCHEMES/ORGS IN NEWS
H. Fun with Practice Questions 🙂
I. Archives

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Useful News Articles

A. GS1 Related

Nothing here today folks!

B. GS2 Related
  1. Son can’t claim a right to live in parents’ house: HC

Category: Polity and Governance

Topic: Government Policies, Judiciary, Social Justice   

Key Points:

  • In a landmark ruling the Delhi High Court has said that A son cannot claim a right to live in the self-acquired house of his parents and can do so only at their mercy. 
  • The court observed that merely because the parents have allowed him to live in the house when their relations were cordial does not mean they have to bear his burden throughout life.
  • The Delhi High Court was hearing an appeal against a lower court’s order, asking a man and his wife to vacate the first floor of his parents’ property in west Delhi.
  • The parents said “their sons as well their wives made life hell for them so much so that they were not even paying the electricity bills”.

 

2.  Parrikar visiting Dhaka to boost defence partnership

Category: International Relations

Topic: India and the Neighbourhood

Key Points:

  • Manohar Parrikar will visit Dhaka on a two-day visit this week. This would be the first ever bilateral visit by an Indian Defence Minister to Bangladesh
  • India is keen to assist Dhaka in domestically building its military infrastructure and capacities.
  • Sources believe that this visit is a way to revitalise India’s defence partnership with its immediate neighbours, especially Bangladesh and Myanmar, which share long land boundaries with India.
  • It is important to note that, under the Sheikh Hasina government in Bangladesh, there is a forward looking policy from Bangladesh. With land and maritime disputes behind India and Bangladesh, it is logical to deepen defence cooperation.
  • As part of naval cooperation, India is open to selling Bangladesh platforms and is keen to extend cooperation.
  • It is important to note that the armies of India and Bangladesh, recently, concluded the sixth edition of joint military exercise “Sampriti-2016” which focussed on counter-terrorism operations.
  • Joint exercises in the Naval and Air domains are also on the cards between India and Bangladesh.

 

  1. Mini-nukes pose a big threat, says Austrian negotiator

Category: International Relations  

Topic: Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests

Key Points:

  • Franz Josef Kuglitsch, who is chief of the disarmament division of Austria, which hosts the headquarters of the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency), has cautioned that there is an “increased likelihood” of the use of mini- nukes.
  • He believes that currently the world is seeing signs that small nuclear weapons are being produced by the nuclear weapon states.
  • The proliferation of such small nuclear weapons, increases the likelihood that they would be used in a conflict scenario.

Background

  • It is important to note that the United Nations had adopted a landmark resolution on October 27 calling for the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons worldwide. 
  • This resolution is known as resolution L41.
  • This resolution was adopted on October 27 this year at the U.N. General Assembly with 123 nations voting in favour and 38 against, with 16 abstentions.
  • Further, while most of the nuclear-armed countries voted against the resolution, India and Pakistan abstained from the resolution, which aims to bring a “legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons.”

 

  1. ‘AIIB driven by projects, not politics’  

Category: International Relations 

Topic: Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests

Key Points:

  • According to the Vice-President, Danny Alexander, of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the bank is essentially a multilateral development bank that is driven solely by the “quality of projects and not politics”.
  • His comments assume importance as they come against the backdrop of India’s strategic concerns regarding the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that covers areas including Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir.
  • The CPEC is the so-called ‘flagship’ project of China’s One-Belt-One-Road (OBOR) initiative. This project is aimed at developing infrastructure in more than 60 countries.
  • The OBOR is among those that will get AIIB funding.
  • The AIIB is a multilateral institution that has 57 member countries.

India and the AIIB

  • India is an influential member of the AIIB.
  • It has the second-largest voting share and percentage of shares (next only to China)

 

C. GS3 Related
  1. ISRO drones help map disasters in north-east

Category: Science and Technology  

Topic: Space, Developments

Key Points:

  • The North-Eastern Space Applications Centre (NE-SAC) of the Indian Space Research Organisation has tested unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
  • These tests have been done to assess many regional problems, ranging from measuring diseased paddy fields to damage caused by frequent landslides. 
  • Drones, are now being used to collect land details and add to data from remote sensing satellites.
  • NE-SAC has taken the initiative for design and assembling of UAVs for various applications. 

How can UAVs help?

  • UAVs can perform efficient surveys for disaster-prone or physically inaccessible areas, quick damage assessment of landslides, floods and earthquakes.
  • For example, NE-SAC mapped the area affected by landslides along Meghalaya’s life line, NH40. It gave the extent of damage caused to pest-infested paddy fields in Naramari village of Assam.

 

D. GS4 Related
E. Important Editorials: A Quick Glance
The Hindu
  1. A last chance for amnesty 

Category: Polity and Governance  

Topic: Government Schemes   

Key Points:

Background:

  • Evasion of taxes deprives the nation of critical resources which could enable the Government to undertake anti-poverty and development programmes.
  • It also puts a disproportionate burden on the honest taxpayers who have to bear the brunt of higher taxes to make up for the revenue leakage.
  • The Taxation Laws (Second Amendment) Bill, 2016 (‘the Bill’) has been introduced in the Parliament to amend the provisions of the Income-tax Act, 1961 to ensure that defaulting assessees are subjected to tax at a higher rate and stringent penalty provision.

In this backdrop, an alternative scheme namely, ‘Taxation and Investment Regime for Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana, 2016’ (PMGKY) has been proposed in the Bill.

Highlights of PMGKY

  • The declarant under this regime shall be required to pay tax @ 30% of the undisclosed income, and penalty @10% of the undisclosed income.
  • Further, a surcharge to be called ‘Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Cess’ @33% of tax is also proposed to be levied.
  • In addition to tax, surcharge and penalty (totaling to approximately 50%), the declarant shall have to deposit 25% of undisclosed income in a Deposit Scheme to be notified by the RBI under the ‘Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Deposit Scheme, 2016’.
  • This amount is proposed to be utilised for the schemes of irrigation, housing, toilets, infrastructure, primary education, primary health, livelihood, etc., so that there is justice and equality.

This scheme is essentially an extension of the recent Income Disclosure Scheme that cleaned up about Rs.65,000 crore of undeclared income by levying 45 per cent tax.

 

  1. Finally, a step towards change

Category: International Relations 

Topic: India and the Neighbourhood

Key Points:

  • In Nepal, a first step towards positive change has been made in addressing federal concerns.
  • The CPN(Maoist-Centre)-led government in Nepal approved amendments to the Constitution that will be tabled in the Nepalese Parliament.

What do these ammendments include?

  • They will include federal redrawing of boundaries that will allow for at least two Madhesi-dominated Terai provinces
  • The amendments also cater for substantial recognition of rights of naturalised citizens, especially women, and some degree of proportional representation in the Upper House.

 

The Indian Express

  1. Bitter pills

Category: Indian Economy

Topic: Industry- Pharma Industry

Key Points:

  • Recently, twenty-seven commonly-used medicines in the country have failed quality tests in seven states. 
  • These medicines included antibiotics, painkillers, cough syrups, anti-psychotic and anti-inflammatory drugs.
  • These medicines were found wanting on several counts, including false labelling and inadequate quantity of ingredients.
  • An important statistic to note is that India consumes more than 385 billion medicines every year.

The longstanding problem

  • The Central Drug Standard Control Organisation believes that inferior medicines constitute about five per cent of the drugs in the Indian market. 
  • A 2014 study by ASSOCHAM estimated that around a fourth of the drugs sold are either substandard or counterfeit.
  • It is important to note that ensuring quality drugs remains a problem in the absence of adequate regulations and shortage of drug inspectors and lab facilities to check purity. 
  • Unfortunately in the country, drug regulatory offices have been hamstrung by incomplete digitisation — and in some cases, even incomplete computerisation.
  • Further, the inspection system is too lax to ensure quality control.
  • In most cases, failure to comply with standards results in a short-term suspension of a manufacturer’s production license, but unfortunately, this short-term suspension of license is hardly an effective deterrent when manufacturers have several production units. 

 

Business Line

  1. Pakistan’s corridor of uncertainty

Category: International Relations

Topic: India and the Neighbourhood

Key Points:

  • During the second week of November 2016, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor became operational.
  • It is important to observe the pace at which the project progressed despite political controversies. The Chinese and the Pakistanis went ahead with the corridor within a period of two years.

Challenges to the project

  • Political opposition by non-Punjabi provinces — especially in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Regions such as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan complain that the CPEC investments will benefit Punjab more than rest of the provinces in terms of economic and power projects.
  • It is important to note that the CPEC is not just a ‘corridor’ or a ‘route’ comprising road and rail networks. If we look at the breakup, only around $12 billion is allocated to building the ‘corridor’; the rest — around $34 billion — will go into investing in energy projects such as coal and hydel — and creating economic zones and related projects from Gilgit-Baltistan to Gwadar.
  • There have been few concerns from financial and environmental perspectives as well. These concerns especially relate to power projects.
  • Fiscal concerns: Pakistan’s power sector is known for its bad governance; there has been a long-running controversy over the pricing in terms of the cost of electricity produced per unit.
  • Another concern that was recently raised in Pakistan’s parliament is a rather interesting concern. The concern is whether the Chinese want to use the CPEC to trade with India?

Indian Perspective

  • The CPEC as a corridor runs through Gilgit Baltistan which is in PoK.
  • There is also something for India to learn from the pace at which the CPEC got operationalised.


F. Concepts-in-News: Related Concepts to Revise/Learn:
  • Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Deposit Scheme, 2016’
  • Sampriti-2016
  • China, Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)


G. BILLS/ACTS/SCHEMES/ORGS IN NEWS

Taxation Laws (Second Amendment) Bill, 2016


H. Fun with Practice Questions 🙂
Question 1: Consider the following statements,
  1. India and Bangladesh, recently, concluded the sixth edition of joint military exercise “Sampriti-2016”.
  2. This joint military exercise focussed on counter-terrorism operations.

Which of the following statements is/are correct?

a) 1 Only

b) 2 Only

c) Both 1 and 2

d) Neither 1 nor 2 


Question 2: Consider the following statements,
  1. It is important to note that recently, the United Nations had adopted a landmark resolution, named resolution L41, calling for the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons worldwide.
  2. While most of the nuclear-armed countries voted against the resolution, India and Pakistan abstained from the resolution.

Which of the following statements is/are correct?

a) 1 Only

b) 2 Only

c) Both 1 and 2

d) Neither 1 nor 2 


Question 3: Consider the following statements,
  1. The North-Eastern Space Applications Centre (NE-SAC) of the Indian Space Research Organisation is located in Shillong.
  2. The NE-SAC has taken the initiative for design and assembling of UAVs for various applications.
  3. UAVs can perform efficient surveys for disaster-prone or physically inaccessible areas, quick damage assessment of landslides, floods and earthquakes.

Which of the following statements is/are correct?

a) 1 and 2 Only

b) 2 and 3 Only

c) All 1, 2 and 3

d) 3 Only 


Question 4: Consider the following statements, regarding the ‘Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Deposit Scheme, 2016’,
  1. This scheme is essentially an extension of the recent Income Disclosure Scheme.
  2. In addition to tax, surcharge and penalty (totaling to approximately 50%), the declarant shall have to deposit 25% of undisclosed income in a Deposit Scheme to be notified by the RBI under the ‘Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Deposit Scheme, 2016’.
  3. This amount is proposed to be utilised for the schemes of irrigation, housing, toilets, infrastructure, primary education, primary health, livelihood, etc., so that there is justice and equality.

Which of the following statements is/are correct?

a) 1 and 2 Only

b) 2 and 3 Only

c) All 1, 2 and 3

d) 3 Only 


Question 5: Consider the following statements,
  1. The AIIB is a multilateral institution that has 57 member countries.
  2. India is a member of the AIIB.
  3. India has the second-largest voting share and percentage of shares (next only to China)

a) 1 and 2 Only

b) 2 and 3 Only

c) All 1, 2 and 3

d) 3 Only


Check Your Answers

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