Daily CURRENT AFFAIRS

Daily Current Affair - UPSC/KAS Exams - 11th Oct 2021

What is in news : Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi, a senior judge of the Allahabad High Court's Lucknow Bench, will now be the Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court.

Procedure

• As per article 217, the Chief Justice of the high court is appointed by the President in consultation with the Chief justice of India as well as the Governor of the state in question.
• Till 1981, the situation was that the Chief Justice of the High Court used to make a recommendation to the Governor. After that, the matter used to go to the Centre level and the Chief justice of India was consulted. Based upon that either the appointment was made or not made.
• In 1999, the situation changed after Supreme Court rendered a unanimous opinion on a presidential reference. The decision said that Consultation with CJI means Consultation with the plurality of the Judges in the formation of the opinion of the CJI. So, normally the CJI consults with 4 regular judges of the Supreme Court.

Other Details

• If a Judge of High Court is appointed on a permanent basis, he holds the office until he completes the age of 62 years. (In Supreme Court it is 65 years).
• The Minimum Qualification prescribed is Indian Citizenship and minimum 10 years of experience either as an advocate of the High Court of India or as a Judicial officer with a minimum 10 years of experience.
• If, an advocate later becomes a Judicial Officer, then, in computing 10 years, the experience as an advocate can be combined with that of a Judicial Officer.
• The salaries and other expenses of the judges and maintenance of the state high courts are charged from the consolidated fund of the state.
• Removal : Article 217 (b)- a Judge may be removed from his office by the President in the manner provided in clause ( 4 ) of Article 124 for the removal of a Judge of the Supreme Court
• A Judge of the High Court can be removed from office by impeachment only for proved misbehavior or incapacity and only in the same manner in which a Judge of the Supreme Court is removed.
• The President of India can remove a Judge of the High Court, from his office only if each house of the parliament passes a resolution by the majority of total members of the house and by a two-thirds majority of its members present and voting in each house requesting him to remove the Judge.
• Transfer of the Judges is done by the President in consultation with the following
  • Chief justice of India’ whose opinion is formed by senior-most judges of the Supreme Court.
  • Chief Justice of the High court from where the transfer is to take place.
  • Chief Justice of the High Court to where the transfer is to take place.

What is in news : In a interview the representative and country director of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), Bishow Parajuli, said Eliminating social taboos with regard to food diversification is crucial for improving nourishment levels among the Indian population

WORLD FOOD PPROGRAMME

• Is the food assistance branch of the United Nations and the world’s largest humanitarian organization addressing hunger and promoting food security.
• Strives to eradicate hunger and malnutrition, with the ultimate goal in mind of eliminating the need for food aid itself.
• Member of the United Nations Development Group and part of its Executive Committee.
• Launched -  1961
• Working in India since 1963
• Pursues a vision of the world in which every man, woman and child has access at all times to the food needed for an active and healthy life.
• Governed by an Executive Board which consists of representatives from member states.
• Funded by voluntary donations from world governments, corporations and private donors
• Aid is also directed to fight micronutrient deficiencies, reduce child mortality, improve maternal health, and combat disease, including HIV and AIDS.
• The objectives:
  • Save lives and protect livelihoods in emergencies.
  • Support food security and nutrition and (re)build livelihoods in fragile settings and following emergencies.
  • Reduce risk and enable people, communities and countries to meet their own food and nutrition needs.
  • Reduce under-nutrition and break the inter-generational cycle of hunger.
  • Zero Hunger in 2030

OBSERVATIONS ON INDIA

• Transformed from a food-deficit country to a food-surplus country.
• With a biometric system – One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC) –covering food supplies for nearly 800 million people, the midday meal (MDM) scheme catering to 120 million beneficiaries, and other schemes covering anganwadis, among others, India has improved on many fronts.
• Also, despite the amazing efforts taken during the pandemic, the issue of malnutrition persists in the country. It is unfortunate that high levels of stunting and anaemia are prevalent in some states.
• The recent announcement made by the prime minister towards rice fortification — distributed through ration shops, MDM or ICDS — is a good step forward. The latest decision to expand the MDM scheme to PM Poshan (The Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment) has been taken after a clear realisation that nutritional support is imperative from childhood till a certain age. These intensified efforts are expected to improve the situation.

What is in news : The Labor Bureau released the results of the All-India Quarterly Establishment-based Employment Survey (QES) for the first quarter (FQ) of 2021 (April to June).

Details

• Covers establishments employing 10 or more workers in the organized segment in nine sectors (manufacturing, construction, trade, transport, education, health, accommodation and restaurants, IT/BPO, and financial service activities)
• These sectors account for 85% of the total employment in establishments employing 10 or more workers as per the Sixth Economic Census (EC), which serves as the basis of the survey.
• While the QES provides a demand side picture, the National Sample Survey or Periodic Labor Force Survey (PLFS) gives the supply side picture of the labor market.
• Objective : Enable the government to frame a “sound national policy on employment”.

What is in news : The deal proposed by OECD has been accepted by 136 countries

Which countries are yet to ratify : Kenya, Nigeria, Pakistan and Sri Lanka

ABOUT

What : It is a minimum tax to ensure big companies pay a minimum tax rate of 15% and make it harder for them to avoid taxation

Benefits :

• Strained budgets after the COVID-19 crisis
• Income from intangible sources such as drug patents, software and royalties on intellectual property has migrated to these jurisdictions, allowing companies to avoid paying higher taxes in their traditional home countries.

How will it work :

• The global minimum tax rate would apply to overseas profits of multinational firms with 750 million euros ($868 million) in sales globally.
• Governments could still set whatever local corporate tax rate they want, but if companies pay lower rates in a particular country, their home governments could “top up” their taxes to the 15% minimum, eliminating the advantage of shifting profits.
• A second track of the overhaul would allow countries where revenues are earned to tax 25% of the largest multinationals’ so-called excess profit – defined as profit in excess of 10% of revenue.

What is in news : The Delhi government, in a move to provide an alternative to stubble burning and combat air pollution, will start its campaign to use bio-decomposer – PUSA solution on farmlands under its winter action plan.

About :

• The decomposer was sprayed last year too and it saw a success
• It is a common practice in October and November across North West India, but primarily in Punjab, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh to quickly clear crop residue from their fields before planting the rabi wheat crop.
• To tackle the issue ‘Pusa Decomposer’ capsule has been developed by Indian Agriculture Research Institute (IARI).
• ‘Pusa Decomposer’ is essentially a fungi-based liquid solution that can soften hard stubble to the extent that it can be easily mixed with soil in the field to act as compost.
• This would then rule out the need to burn the stubble, and also help in retaining the essential microbes and nutrients in soil that are otherwise damaged when the residue is burned.

How

• A liquid formulation is formed using decomposer capsules and fermenting it over 8-10 days and then spraying the mixture on fields with crop stubble to ensure speedy bio-decomposition of the stubble.
• The farmers can prepare 25 litre of liquid mixture with 4 capsules, jaggery and chickpea flour. The mixture is sufficient to cover 1 hectare of land.
• It takes around 20 days for the degradation process to be completed.

Benefit

• Improves the fertility and productivity of the soil as the stubble works as manure and compost for the crops and lesser fertiliser consumption is required in the future.
• It is an efficient and effective, cheaper, doable and practical technique to stop stubble burning.
• It is an eco-friendly and environmentally useful technology.

KATOL METEORITE

What is in news : Based on research over KATOL meteorite researchers have unravelled the composition expected to be present in the Earth’s lower mantle which is at about 660 km deep.

KATOL

• Striked Katol region of Nagpur in 2012
• Initial studies revealed that the host rock was mainly composed of olivine, an olive-green mineral. Olivine is the most abundant phase in our Earth’s upper mantle.
• Mineralogy was determined using a laser micro-Raman spectrometer.

About new Study

• Reports the first natural occurrence of a mineral called BRIDGMANITE. (named in 2014 after Prof. Percy W. Bridgman)
• 80% of the Earth’s lower mantle is made up of bridgmanite
• bridgmanite in the meteorite was found to be formed at pressures of about 23 to 25 gigapascals generated by the shock event. The high temperature and pressure in our Earth’s interior have changed over billions of years causing crystallisation, melting, remelting of the different minerals before they reached their current state.
• It is important to study these individual minerals to get a thorough idea of how and when the Earth’s layers formed.

Background

• “CODE RED” to humanity by The Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group – 1  to meet a 1.5 degree Celsius hotter planet by 2040
• The UK is set to host the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (CoP26) in Glasgow from October 31 to November 12 with a view to accelerate action towards the Paris Agreement’s goals.

NEED FOR INDIA

• 22 of the 30 most polluted cities in the world are in India is a major cause of concern. We know well that Delhi is the world’s most polluted capital as per the World Air Quality Report, 2020.
• For those of us residing in Delhi, the winter months become a challenge as stubble burning in adjoining states and low wind speeds take the AQI beyond 300 on average, with some days going as high as 600 to 800, while the safe limit is below 50.
• According to the Global Carbon Atlas, India ranks third in total greenhouse gas emissions by emitting annually around 2.6 billion tonnes (Bt) CO2eq

EMISSIONS

• Sector-wise global emissions show that electricity and heat production and agriculture, forestry and other land use make up 50 per cent of the emissions. But the emissions pie in India owes its largest chunk (44 per cent) to the energy sector, followed by the manufacturing and construction sector (18 per cent), and agriculture, forestry and land use sectors (14 per cent), with the remaining being shared by the transport, industrial processes and waste sectors.
• The share of agriculture in total emissions has gradually declined from 28 per cent in 1994 to 14 per cent in 2016. However, in absolute terms, emissions from agriculture have increased to about 650 Mt CO2 in 2018, which is similar to China’s emissions from agriculture.
• Agricultural emissions in India are primarily from the livestock sector (54.6 per cent) in the form of methane emissions due to enteric fermentation and the use of nitrogenous fertilisers in agricultural soils (19 per cent) which emit nitrous oxides; rice cultivation (17.5 per cent) in anaerobic conditions accounts for a major portion of agricultural emissions followed by livestock management (6.9 per cent) and burning of crop residues (2.1 per cent).

HOW CAN A POLICY HELP

• A carbon policy for agriculture can  aim not only to reduce its emissions but also reward farmers through carbon credits which should be globally tradable.
• With the world’s largest livestock population (537 million), India needs better feeding practices with smaller numbers of cattle by raising their productivity.
• Rice cultivation on around 44 million hectares is the other culprit for methane emissions, especially in the irrigated tracts of north-west India.
• While direct seeded rice and alternative wet and dry practices can reduce the carbon footprint in rice fields, the real solution lies in switching areas from rice to maize or other less water-guzzling crops. In this context, opening up corn for ethanol can help not only reduce our huge dependence on crude oil imports but also reduce the carbon footprint. If we can devise a system for rewarding farmers for this switch by making corn more profitable than paddy, it can be a win-win situation.
• If we develop global carbon markets, India needs to clearly spell out in its policy how it would adjust carbon credits when it sells to polluting industries abroad so that emission reductions are not double counted in India and the country buying carbon credits.
• Agricultural soils are the largest single source of nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions in the national inventory. Nitrous oxide emissions from use of nitrogen-fertiliser increased by approximately 358 per cent during 1980-81 to 2014-15, growing at a statistically significant rate of 5,100 tonnes per year. An alternative for better and efficient fertiliser use would be to promote fertigation and subsidise soluble fertilisers.
• Government should incentivise and give subsidies on drips for fertigation, switching away from rice to corn or less water-intensive crops, and promoting soluble fertilisers at the same rate of subsidy as granular urea.

REPORTS & INDICES

By : World Bank

Details :

• The projected growth (8.3%) is supported by an increase in public investment to bolster domestic demand and schemes like the Production Linked Incentive (PIL) to boost manufacturing.
• Gross Domestic Product (GDP) increased by 20.1% in the first quarter (April-June quarter) of financial year 2021-22 in the backdrop of “a significant base effect, limited damage to domestic demand and strong export growth”.
• In the first quarter of financial year 2020-21, GDP contracted by 24.4% because of nationwide coronavirus lockdown.
• Disruption in India’s economy during the second wave of the pandemic was limited, compared to the first.
• Suggestions:
  • Rethink policies about medium term growth
  • Build social protection and adopt greener policies, because the next shock might be from the environment.
  • Integrate the informal sector and women into the economy

• Popular since the early 20th century, the rail link between Nepal and India is ready to resume on the neighbouring country’s first-ever broad gauge passenger service. The first stretch is ready: a 34-km line between Bihar’s Jayanagar and Nepal’s Kurtha, with the Hindu pilgrimage city of Janakpur Dham in between.
• The second phase of the Malabar naval war gaming exercise with the four Quad members – India, US, Japan and Australia – will take place in the Bay of Bengal from October 12 till October 15.
• A recent analysis by the Mahamana Centre of Excellence in Climate Change Research (MCECCR) at Banaras Hindu University (BHU), in collaboration with the Department of Science and Technology and the Ministry of Earth Sciences, has found a spatial shift of heatwaves in India, with this weather event now occurring in new regions in the country.
• 300^th birth anniversary of Bhai Taru Singh Ji celebrated. Bhai Taru Singh (1720 – 1745) was a prominent Sikh martyr known for sacrificing his life, in the name of protecting Sikh values, by having had his head scalped rather than cutting his hair and converting to Islam. Gurdwara Shaheed Bhai Taru Singh or Gurdwara Shahidi Asthan Bhai Taru Singh ji is a Sikh Gurdwara at Naulakha Bazaar in Lahore, Pakistan, which commemorates the spot where Bhai Taru Singh was martyred.
• United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced its plan to send a probe on an asteroid between Mars and Jupiter for collecting data regarding origins of the universe.