Daily CURRENT AFFAIRS

NEWS

The government has notified certain amendments to Census rules to allow online self-enumeration in the upcoming Census and National Population Register (NPR)

WHAT IS CENSUS

• Total process of collecting, compiling, analyzing and disseminating demographic, economic and social data pertaining, at a specific time, of all persons in a country or a well-defined part of a country
• Also provides the trends in population characteristics

WHAT DOES NEW RULES INCLUDE

• Census Rules, 1990 is amended to include “electronic form” and “self-enumeration” in the schedule of questions to be asked during census enumeration
• Self-enumeration’ means filling-up, completion and submission of census schedule by respondents themselves
• Census commissioner will devise the census schedules or questionnaires and provide to the State Governments or Union Territory Administrations for publication in their respective Gazette in order to canvass in the census and to be used for self-enumeration after in the census

WHAT IS NATIONAL POPULATION REGISTER (NPR)

• Updation exercise will be undertaken alongside Census 2021
• Will be conducted by the Office of the Registrar General of India (RGI) under the Home Ministry
• By definition - It is a list of “usual residents of the country”.
• A “usual resident of the country” is one who has been residing in a local area for at least the last six months, or intends to stay in a particular location for the next six months.
• Being prepared under provisions of the Citizenship Act 1955 and the Citizenship (Registration of Citizens and Issue of National Identity Cards) Rules, 2003.
• It is mandatory for every “usual resident of India” to register in the NPR.

 NEWS

Government of India launched ‘India Water Pitch-Pilot-Scale Start-up Challenge’ under AMRUT 2.0 which will select 100 start-ups through this challenge and provide Rs.20 lakh each as funding support

AMRUT 2.0

Continuation of the AMRUT mission launched in June 2015 to ensure that every household has access to a tap with the assured supply of water and a sewerage connection.

AMRUT 2.0

• Aims to provide 100% coverage of water supply to all households in around 4,700 ULBs (Urban Local Bodies).
• Seeks to promote Atmanirbhar Bharat through encouraging Startups and Entrepreneurs (Public Private Partnership).
• Objectives:
  • It will build upon the progress of AMRUT to address water needs, rejuvenate water bodies, better manage aquifers, reuse treated wastewater, thereby promoting a circular economy of water.
  • It will provide 100% coverage of sewerage and septage in 500 AMRUT cities.
  • Recycling and reuse of treated wastewater is expected to cater to 20% of total water needs of the cities and 40% of industrial demand. Under the Mission, fresh water bodies will be protected from getting polluted to make natural resources sustainable.
  • Pey Jal Survekshan will be conducted in cities to ascertain equitable distribution of water, reuse of wastewater and mapping of water bodies.

NEWS

The Odisha government has proposed to ban movement of mechanised fishing boats in the Mangalajodi area of the Chilika lake, an important haunt of migratory birds, to provide the winged guests an undisturbed ecosystem for six months every year.

MANGALAJODI

LOCATION - Tangi, Odisha block in Khordha district of Odisha at the northern edge of Chilika Lake.

OTHER DETAILS

• Recognised as globally important for the conservation of birds. Migratory birds arrive there for roosting.
• However, no statutory rules and regulations are there for protecting the 8.3-sq.km marshland with emergent vegetation.
• Many occasions and festivals are celebrated in Mangalajodi. Danda Yatra is one of the oldest ritual occasions celebrated in the month of Chaitra. Paika Akhada is another dance performed by some villagers.

CHILIKA LAKE

LOCATION

• Mouth of Daya River
• Spread over Puri, Khurda and Ganjam districts of Odisha state

OTHER DETAILS

• Area -  1,100 km²
• Largest coastal lagoon or brackish water lake in India and Asia
• Second largest lagoon in the world
• It is Largest wintering ground for migratory waterfowl
• One of hotspot of biodiversity in country and some rare, vulnerable and endangered species listed in IUCN Red List of threatened Animals
• Designated as the first “Ramsar Site” of India on account of its rich bio-diversity and ecological significance

NEWS

PM paid tributes to Mahatma Gandhi and all the eminent persons who marched to Dandi in order to protest injustice and protect our nation’s self-esteem. The day also marks beginning of Civil Disobedience Movement

CDM & DANDI MARCH

CAUSES

• Formation of the Simon Commission
• Failure of Demand for Dominion Status
•  Protests against the arrest of social revolutionaries

BACKGROUND

INC Emergency session in Lahore in December 1929 under the presidency of Jawaharlal Nehru

• Declared Complete Independence, or ‘PurnaSwaraj,' as the Congress goal
• Gave Mahatma Gandhi the power to launch a nationwide campaign of civil disobedience at any time and place he chose.

HOW IT STARTED

• On January 31, 1930, Mahatma Gandhi wrote Viceroy Irwin a letter outlining and imposing eleven demands
• The demand to abolish the salt tax, which is consumed by both the rich and the poor, was the most stirring of all the demands
• The demands had to be met by March 11th, or the Congress would launch a civil disobedience campaign
• Mahatma Gandhi led the popular salt march, which was accompanied by 78 of his trusted volunteers. From Gandhiji's ashram in Sabarmati to the Gujarati coastal town of Dandi, the march covered over 240 miles
• On the 6th of April, he arrived in Dandi and ceremonially broke the law by boiling seawater to make salt
• The Civil Disobedience Movement got its start with this movement

IMPORTANCE OF SALT

• As Gandhi famously stated, "There is no other item outside of water that the government can tax in order to reach the starving millions, the sick, the maimed, and the completely helpless. It is the most inhumane poll tax that man's ingenuity can concoct."
• In an instant, salt connected the ideal of swaraj to a very real and universal grievance of the rural poor (and with no socially divisive implications like a no-rent campaign).
• Salt, like khadi, provided a meagre but psychologically important income for the poor through self-help.

SALT SATYAGRAHA

• On March 12, 1930, Gandhiji set out from Sabarmati with 78 followers on a 241-mile march to the coastal town of Dandi on the Arabian Sea. There, Gandhi and his supporters were to defy British policy by making salt from seawater.
• At Dandi, thousands more followed his lead, and in the coastal cities of Bombay and Karachi, Indian nationalists led crowds of citizens in making salt.
• Civil disobedience broke out all across India, soon involving millions of Indians, and British authorities arrested more than 60,000 people. Gandhiji himself was arrested on May 5, but the satyagraha continued without him.
• On May 21, the poet Sarojini Naidu led 2,500 marchers on the Dharasana Salt Works, some 150 miles north of Bombay. The incident, recorded by American journalist Webb Miller, prompted an international outcry against British policy in India.
• In January 1931, Gandhiji was released from prison. He later met with Lord Irwin, the viceroy of India, and agreed to call off the satyagraha in exchange for an equal negotiating role at a London conference on India’s future.
• In August 1931, Gandhiji traveled to the conference as the sole representative of the nationalist Indian National Congress. The meeting was a disappointment, but British leaders had acknowledged him as a force they could not suppress or ignore.

DID IT INFLUENCE OTHER PARTS

• After Gandhi's symbolic breaking of the salt laws at Dandi, defiance of the laws spread throughout the country. CDM involved students, women, tribals, merchants and petty traders, workers and peasants from all walks of life.
• Salt laws were defied in various provinces as well, under the leadership of various leaders. The Salt Satyagraha was led by C Rajagopalachari in Tamil Nadu, K Kelappan in Malabar, and Sarojini Naidu and Manilal Gandhi in Dharasana Salt Works (Gujarat).
• The defiance of salt laws at Dharasana salt works is noteworthy for its scale, as a group of 2000 volunteers offered nonviolent resistance in the face of a large police force armed with steel-tipped lathis, which attacked non-resisting Satyagrahis (protestors) until they fell down.
• The Gandhi-Irwin pact put an end to the civil disobedience movement. On March 5, 1931, Mahatma Gandhi and Lord Irwin, the then Viceroy of India, signed it.

CONTEXT

• Even though the U.S. imposed sanctions on Russia including a ban on transfer of technology, the scheduled missions for a transfer of crew on the ISS between the two countries seem to be unaffected.
• If Russia backs out of the mission, SpaceX’s dragon module and Boeing’s Starliner are the other two options which can dock with the ISS.
• Russia’s part in the collaboration of the ISS is the module responsible for making course corrections to the orbit of the space station. They also ferry astronauts to and from the ISS.

WHAT IS ISS?

•  The ISS is a manmade space station or artificial satellite that is habitable for humans in space
• It is in the low-earth orbit and there are astronauts living onboard the space station conducting experiments on earth science, biology, biotechnology, astronomy, microgravity, meteorology, physics, etc.
• The astronauts generally don’t live on the station for more than six months at a time.
• The first piece of equipment of the ISS was launched in 1998 and other parts and modules were added and assembled in space at different times.
• The first crew arrived on the ISS in 2000 and since then it has always been manned by astronauts.
• The ISS was developed and built by five space agencies namely, NASA (USA), Roscosmos (Russia), European Space Agency (ESA-Europe), JAXA (Japan) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA-Canada).
• The ISS is usually at an altitude between about 200 km and 400 km and weighs more than 400,000 kg. It is 73 m long and 109 m wide.
• The ISS orbits the earth at about 5 miles per second and makes 15.5 orbits per day. It takes roughly 93 minutes for it to make one revolution around the earth.
• According to NASA, more than 240 people from 19 nations have visited the space station. More than 3000 educational and research investigations have been carried out in various fields.
• Astronauts conduct spacewalks (that is, stepping out of the ISS onto space) and conduct maintenance and repair works on the station. There have been over 200 spacewalks until now.

What is Russia’s role in maintaining the ISS?

• The ISS is built with the co-operation of scientists from five international space agencies — NASA of the U.S., Roscosmos of Russia, JAXA of Japan, Canadian Space Agency and the European Space Agency.
• Each agency has a role to play and a share in the upkeep of the ISS. Both in terms of expense and effort, it is not a feat that a single country can support.
• Russia’s part in the collaboration is the module responsible for making course corrections to the orbit of the ISS.
• They also ferry astronauts to the ISS from the Earth and back. Until SpaceX’s dragon spacecraft came into the picture the Russian spacecrafts were the only way of reaching the ISS and returning.

Why does the orbit of the ISS need to be corrected?

• Due to its enormous weight and the ensuing drag, the ISS tends to sink from its orbit at a height of about 250 miles above the Earth.
• It has to be pushed up to its original line of motion every now and then.
• Approximately once a month this effort has to be made. It is not necessarily a regular operation, and may be missed once and compensated for later.
• The other reason for altering the path of the ISS is to avoid its collision with space debris, which can damage the station.
• These manoeuvres need to be done as and when the debris is encountered.

What is the extent of effort and expense involved in this?

• Manoeuvering the ISS is expensive. In a year, 7-8 tonnes of fuel may need to be spent, with each manoeuvre costing nearly a tonne of fuel.
• If a manoeuvre is put off for later, the ISS may sink a little more and the delayed operation would cost more as a larger correction needs to be made.

If Russia should back out of the effort, are there spacecrafts that can substitute?

There are right now two possibilities. SpaceX’s dragon module and Boeing’s Starliner can dock with the ISS. Starliner also has the capacity to carry, say, ten tonnes of fuel.

What is the likelihood of Russia backing out?

• Though there have been previous occasions when conflicts have risen between Russia and the U.S., the operation of the ISS has not been interrupted.
• The mission means to take up two Russians and an American astronaut, and the preparatory work is in progress.
• On March 30, it is planned that the mission will return an American astronaut to Earth from the ISS. These seem to be going on as per plan.

Is it true that Russia does not have the risk of the ISS crashing down on their country?

• The orbit of the ISS does not fly over the Russian territory mostly. Places that are closer to the equator run a greater risk of it falling in their domain.
• The orbit is at about 50 degrees and so most probably, the ISS will fall in that level. But this is only a probability, as it can move or disintegrate.

But in case of this eventuality, people in the ISS will be brought back, modules can be detached thereby making it much smaller which will ensure that it disintegrates before touching the earth.

NEWS

The United States, the European Union, Britain, Canada and Japan to move jointly to revoke Russia’s “most favoured nation” (MFN) status over its invasion of Ukraine

MOST FAVOURED NATION STATUS

BY - World Trade Organization

WHAT

• Members commit to treating other members equally
• All benefit from each other’s lowest tariffs, highest import quotas and fewest trade barriers for goods and services
• This principle of non-discrimination is known as most favoured nation (MFN) treatment
• Exceptions - when members strike bilateral trade agreements or when members offer developing countries special access to their markets.
• For countries outside the WTO, such as Iran, North Korea, Syria or Russian ally Belarus, WTO members can impose whatever trade measures they wish without flouting global trading rules.

REMOVAL

• There is no formal procedure for suspending MFN treatment and it is not clear whether members are obliged to inform the WTO if they do so
• India suspended Pakistan’s MFN status in 2019 after a suicide attack by a Pakistan-based Islamist group killed 40 police
• Pakistan never applied MFN status to India.

WHAT DOES LOSING MFN STATUS MEAN?

• Revoking Russia’s MFN status sends a strong signal that the United States and its Western allies do not consider Russia an economic partner in any way, but it does not in itself change conditions for trade
• It does formally allow the Western allies to increase import tariffs or impose quotas on Russian goods, or even ban them, and to restrict services out of the country. They could also overlook Russian intellectual property rights.
• Ahead of MFN status removal, the United States had already announced a ban on imports of Russian oil and gas.
• Canada said last week it was withdrawing MFN status for Russia and Belarus, which allowed Russian troops to move into Ukraine from its territory, setting a 35% general tariff on virtually all imports.
• The European Union has already banned about 70% of all imports, such as tobacco, potash and products made of wood or steel, from non-WTO member Belarus. However, it is waiting for formal adoption of MFN suspension before taking similar action against Russia. Imports from Russia include mineral fuels, precious metals and stones, iron and steel, fertilizers and inorganic chemicals.

• ‘Grameena Habba,’ a platform for rural artisans to sell handicraft, agricultural, and handloom products, is being held by NABARD’s Karnataka regional office in Bengaluru
• University of Mysore will be conferring a honorary doctorate on late actor Puneeth Rajkumar at its 102nd annual convocation
• The four-day All-India Vice-Chancellors’ Conference will be held in Mysuru . University of Mysore is hosting the conference where the V-Cs of universities from across the country will participate with some on the virtual platform.
• 11th edition of `Khel Mahakumbh’, an annual sports competition organized by the Gujarat government was recently organized
• Katalin Novák has been elected as Hungary’s first female president by the Hungarian parliament.