Current Affairs for BANK, IBPS Exams

12 January 2016

:: NATIONAL ::

India Meteorological Department to come up with different terminology for droughts

• The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has officially expunged the word “drought” from its vocabulary, months after it struck a contrarian note and correctly forecast one of India’s severest monsoon deficits last year.

• According to a circular issued by the department, the move is part of a decision to do away with or redefine terms that are not scientifically precise.

• Beginning this season, for instance, if India’s monsoon rainfall were to dip below 10 per cent of the normal and span between 20 and 40 per cent of the country’s area, it would be called a “deficient” year instead of an “All India Drought Year” as the IMD’s older manuals would say.

• A more severe instance, where the deficit exceeds 40 per cent and would have been called an “All India Severe Drought Year,” will now be a “Large Deficient Year”

• The agency had several definitions of drought: meteorological, hydrological and agricultural, and it was quite possible for a State to have a meteorological drought — 90 per cent shortfall of the average monsoon rainfall — but not suffer an agricultural drought —if the shortfall didn’t affect more than 20 per cent of the State’s area.

Punjab police officer question over Pathankot attack

• Senior Punjab police officer Salwinder Singh was questioned by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in connection with the terror strike at the Pathankot IAF base.

• The NIA, which took over the case immediately after terrorists struck inside the base during the intervening night of January 1 and 2, had summoned Mr. Singh as he was allegedly abducted by the terrorists.

• Mr. Singh, who is at present a Superintendent of Police rank officer posted as Assistant Commandant of the 75th battalion of Punjab Armed Police after he was removed as SP (headquarters) Gurdaspur, had allegedly given contradictory statements about his kidnapping and sequences of events preceding and succeeding the hostage event,

SC distinguishes infants and children rape from other

• Crimes against children was an indication of the abysmal depths to which society is falling,

• Rape of infants and children below 10 years was nothing but brutal perversion. It asked Parliament to enact a separate law providing for harsh punishment.

• This is the first time the Supreme Court has distinguished infants and children below 10 from the general description of “minors” given by law to anyone below the age of 18.

• A Bench, led by Justice Dipak Misra, said Parliament had to separately define the word “child” in terms of rape.

• The pain and distress caused to a child who knows nothing about sex and rape is nothing but brutal perversion. When a society moves this way, it has to be stopped

• The court pointed out how Section 376 (2) (f) of the Indian Penal Code only talked of rape of a “woman below 12 years of age.” The Code had no specific provision dealing with punishment for raping a girl below 10 and infants.

• The court, however, declined SCWLA’s plea to include castration as an additional punishment, saying the judiciary could not issue a mandamus to create a punishment for an offense.

• The Supreme Court’s suggestion to Parliament comes even as new anti-rape laws have made rape punishable with death penalty.

Major changes to the Defence Procurement Procedure (DPP)

• Attempting to streamline defence acquisitions and give a big impetus to indigenisation through the ‘Make in India’ initiative, the government has approved major changes to the Defence Procurement Procedure (DPP).

• The highlights of the new procedure are a new category to promote domestic manufacturing, including government funding for Research & Development (R&D) and recognition of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) in technology development.

• The DPP 2016 will have a new category, Indigenously Designed, Developed and Manufactured (IDDM) platforms, which will be the priority route for procurements. Within this two sub-categories have been created, one with mandatory 40 percent domestic content for a domestic design and the other mandating 60 percent local content if the design is not Indian.

• The domestic companies eligible under this will have majority Indian control and operated by Indian nationals

• the government through the Department of Defence Production will fund private R&D for which various norms have been stipulated. Under this projects are eligible for up to 90 percent funding.

• Of this 20 percent will be given in advance and the tender issued in 24 months. In case the tender is not issued the development will be refunded

• In another significant change, the contentious issue of offsets has been amended from the current Rs. 300 crore to Rs. 2000 crore giving flexibility for foreign companies. Offset clause mandates that a foreign company should invest 30 percent of the contract value back into the country with a view to bring in technology. Offsets push up cost of contracts by 14-18 percent

Temple entry restrictions- Sabarimala

• Taking a swipe at religious customs and temple entry restrictions violating women’s constitutional rights, the Supreme Court said no temple or governing body could bar a woman from entering the Sabarimala shrine in Kerala where lakhs of devotees throng every year.

• When the board countered that the prohibition was based on custom followed for the past half-a-century, Justice Misra asked what proof it had to show that women did not enter the sanctum sanctorum over 1,500 years ago. The Constitution rejects discrimination on the basis of age, gender and caste, he orally observed.

• According to the dress code formulated by Justice S. Vaidyanathan, men should wear “dhoti or pyjama with upper cloth or formal pants and shirts” and women “sari or half sari with blouse or churidhar with upper cloth.” Children could come in “any fully-covered dress.”

• Mr. Justice Ramasubramanian said most of the saints, including Naga Sadhus, spotted during Kumbh Mela, could not enter temples if the dress code prescribed by the judge was enforced.

:: INTERNATIONAL ::

Afghan peace talks

• Delegates from Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the United States held talks to resurrect a stalled Afghan peace process and end nearly 15 years of bloodshed, even as fighting with Taliban insurgents intensifies.

• Senior officials from the four countries are meeting in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, to launch a process they hope will lead to negotiations with Taliban insurgents, who are fighting to reimpose their strict brand of Islamist rule and are not expected at talks.

• Renewed peace efforts come amid spiraling violence in Afghanistan, with last year one of the bloodiest on record following the withdrawal of most foreign troops at the end of 2014.

• Peace efforts last year stalled after the Taliban announced that their founder,Mullah Mohammad Omar,had been dead for two years,throwing the militant group into disarray as rival factions fought for supremacy.

• The Taliban, who were ousted in 2001, remain split on whether to take part in talks. Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour's faction has shown signs of warming to the idea of eventually joining peace talks, and other groups are considering negotiating,senior members of the movement

China revamping its nuclear and conventional missile forces

• The superiority of arch-rival United States in the air and sea may have driven China to revamp its nuclear and conventional missile forces and bring about sweeping changes to its military command and control architecture.

• A write-up in China Military Online, the website of thePeople’s Liberation Army(PLA), quoting an in-house military expert, points out that the Second ArtilleryForce (SAF) — the institution that had exercised operation-al control over the country’s nuclear forces — had been upgraded as the PLA RocketForce (PRF).

• The PRF has now been up-graded into a full-fledged new service on a par with the Army, Air Force and the Navy.Mr. Song explained that un-like its predecessor, the SAF,which was an independent arm in China’s military system, the emergence of a full-fledged service would imply having “several arms and special troops” apart from having“academies, research institutes and logistic support system

• The new service, as it evolves, is expected to deploy its nuclear assets on land, sea and air. Mr. Song pointed out that after incorporating theNavy’s strategic nuclear sub-marine and the Air Force’s strategic bomber, the PRF would become the first independent service with land,sea and air nuclear forces in the world, more integrated than the nuclear forces in theU.S., Russia, Britain andFrance.

• the U.S. and the former Soviet Union had signed an agreement in 1987to cut their ground-to-ground missiles, with ranges from 500to 5,500 km. As a result, America’s Pershing II and land-based Tomahawk, and the for-mer Soviet Union’s SS-4,SS-12, SS-20 and SS-23 missiles were all destroyed. TheRussian army has only two types of short-range tactical missiles.

Golden Globe Awards

• The Revenant, a biographical Western film set in 1823 Montana and South Dakota, bagged three awards — best drama film, best actor in a drama for Leonardo Di Caprio and best director forAlejandro G. Inarritu

• In the TV realm, Amazon Studio’s Mozart in the Jungle won under the category of best comedy series and best actor in a comedy series for GaelGarcia Bernal. The series is inspired by the Mozartin the Jungle: Sex, Drugs,and Classical Music—oboist Blair Tindall’s 2005memoir.

• The best motion picture comedy or musical award went to The Mar-tian, leaving behind films like The Big Short, Joy,Spyand Trainwreck.

• The award for the best actress in a motion picture—drama was won by BrieLarson for Room

• Actors Jennifer Lawrence and Matt Damon took home the awards for best actress and best actor in a motion picture — comedy for Joy and The Martian.

• Actress-singer LadyGaga won her first nomination and victory as best actress in a limited series or motion picture for her role as the countess inAmerican Horror Story:Hotel.

• Sylvester Stallone won the best supporting actor in a motion picture for ‘Creed’; Leonardo Di Caprio bagged the best actor in a drama award for ‘The Revenant’; Kate Winslet fetched the award for best supporting actress in a motion picture for ‘Steve Jobs’.

:: ECONOMY ::

In order to facilitate transfer of mines government will amend law

• The government will amend the mining law in order to facilitate transfer of mines allotted for captive use to end-user industries and to unlock thousands of crore worth of investments stuck in debt-laden minerals and commodities sector, according to the Mines Ministry.

• The Mines and Minerals(Development and Regulation) Act of 1957 was amended last year to ensure all mining rights for major minerals are auctioned transparently rather than allotted arbitrarily as was the case in the past.

• But a clause in the law barred transfer of captive mines that were not auctioned.

• Large investments such as Birla Corp’s Rs.5,000-crore purchase of two Lafarge India cement units and Kumar Mangalam Birla Group’s take-over of Jaypee Group’s cement plants in Madhya Pradesh, are stuck due to this clause.

• The amended Bill, likely to be tabled in the Budget Session of Parliament, includes just one new clause that al-lows the transfer of such mining leases, subject to terms that the central government would prescribe.=

• The transfer provisions will also allow mergers and acquisitions of companies and facilitate ease of doing business for companies to improve profitability and de-crease costs of the companies dependent on supply of mineral ore from captive leases

• The transfer of captive mining leases, granted other-wise than through auction,would facilitate banks and financial institutions to liquidate stressed assets where accompany or its captive mining lease is mortgaged

• The transfer of captive leases would be subject to the consideration of enforcingPerformance Security, Mine Development and Production Agreement and realization of an appropriate amount, if any,if found feasible at the time of framing terms and conditions

Foreign exchange reserves more than 350 billion

• The country’s foreign exchange reserves, which were $350.4 billion as on September 2015, were able to support imports for 9.8 months,up from 8.9 months as on endMarch,

• As on end March, 2015, foreign exchanges reserves were at $341.64 billion.

• Import cover was 8.1 percent in September 2014. The country’s foreign exchange reserves were at $350.4 billion as on January 1, 2016 – the same level seen on September end.

• Foreign exchanges reserves mainly consist of foreign currency assets (FCA), though there is also gold, special drawing rights and reserve tranche position in International Monetary Fund, in the basket.

• Movements in the FCA occur mainly on account of purchases and sales of foreign exchange by the RBI, income arising out of the deployment of the foreign exchange reserves, external aid receipts of the Central Government and the effects of revaluation of the assets

• In a rare admission in December, the RBI said it had decided to intervene in the Exchange Traded CurrencyDerivatives (ETCD) segment–in addition to spot and forward market – without specifying if it had already been active in that market.

The SEBI Board to amend the mutual fund regulations

• As part of its attempts to make mutual funds reduce their exposure to one issuer or a sector in the debt schemes, the capital markets regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI)has lowered the exposure cap for such investments by mutual funds.

• The SEBI Board has decided to amend the mutual fund regulations so that single issuer limit is reduced to 10 percent of the net asset value(NAV) of the scheme, which can be increased to 12 per cent of the NAV but only after an approval from the trustees.The sector specific exposure limit has also been reduced from the current 30 per cent of the NAV to 25 per cent.

• The SEBI board has also approved the disclosure requirements for issuance of green bonds that are issued to raise funds for a ‘green’ project like climate change, renewable energy, sustainable water or waste management or clean transport, among others.

• The capital markets regulator has said that while the issuance and listing of green bonds will be governed under the SEBI (Issue andListing of Debt Securities)Regulations, an issuer of such bonds will have to make incremental disclosures.

:: SPORTS ::

Messi got record fifth Ballon d’or

• Barcelona forward Lionel Messi won his fifth world player of the year crown at theFIFA Ballon d’Or ceremony

• He pipped current holder and three time winner Cristiano Ronaldo, as well as his Barcelona teammate Neymar, to the award.

• Messi and Ronaldo, 30, have hogged the Ballon d’Or between them since 2008.

• Barca’s Luis Enrique won the coach of the year award at the Ballon d’Or ceremony in Zurich

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