Current Affairs for BANK, IBPS Exams - 22 November 2017

::NATIONAL::

India scored a major diplomatic victory at ICJ

• India scored a major diplomatic victory as its nominee to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) Dalveer Bhandari was re-elected after the United Kingdom withdrew its candidate Christopher Greenwood.
• The U.K. chose to withdraw after it became clear that it would not win the contest in the General Assembly (GA) and it did not have adequate support in the Security Council (UNSC) for its attempts to derail the voting process itself.
• This is the first time in over seven decades of the United Nations, that the U.K. will not be represented in the ICJ; and this is the first time that one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council lost out to an ordinary member in a race.
• This is also the first time that one sitting member of the ICJ lost out to another sitting member.
• The winning candidate required a majority in both the GA and the UNSC, but 11 rounds of voting until last week had ended with India winning in the GA and the U.K. winning in the SC.
• With the UK announcing its exit from the race, in the 12th round, Mr. Bhandari received 183 of the 193 votes in the GA and secured all the 15 votes in the Security Council after separate and simultaneous elections were held at the UN headquarters in New York.
• The U.K. had nine of the 15 UNSC votes in the previous rounds, leading to a stalemate though India had an overwhelming majority in the GA.
• It initially wanted to suspend the voting process and move to a conference mechanism that has never been used in the history of the UN to break the stalemate.
• But this move needed approval by the UNSC in an open voting while the voting for the ICJ is through a secret ballot.
• India thanked UN members for supporting the re-election of its judge to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and said the process reflected respect for its constitutional integrity and independent judiciary.
• The extraordinary support from the UN membership is reflective of the respect for strong constitutional integrity of the Indian polity and independence of the judiciary in India,” said the Government of India in a press release.
• Earlier Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated the diplomatic team headed by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, who had campaigned for the re-election of Judge Bhandari to fill the fifth vacancy for the 2018-2027 term.

Ministerial committee to frame penal provisions on triple talaq

• The Union government has set up a ministerial committee to frame a new law that would attract penal provisions in the case of use of triple talaq or talaq-e-biddat for divorce between Muslim couples.
• Top government sources confirmed that the committee will likely include a high-profile list of Ministers – Home Minister Rajnath Singh, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and at least two Ministers of State.
• The Supreme Court had, in August this year, in a majority judgement set aside the practice of talaq-e-biddat, an arbitrary and unilateral decision by a Muslim husband to end the marriage by utterance of the word talaq three times.
• A senior government official said that the need for a new law was felt after it was found that divorce by way of talaq-e-biddat was taking place even after the SC judgment.

SC gives the thumbs-up for audio and video recording of court proceedings

• Judges have no need for privacy inside the courtrooms they preside in, Supreme Court judge, Justice A.K. Goel said, giving the thumbs-up for audio and video recording of court proceedings.
• Unlike the legislature, proceedings inside courtrooms have been a zealously guarded affair.
• The to and fro between lawyers and judges, submissions made by the advocates and questions asked from the Bench have hitherto been beyond the eye of the camera or the ear of a recorder.
• Signalling a paradigm shift, the Supreme Court Bench of Justices Goel and U.U. Lalit had, in August, mooted the possibilities of having audio and video recordings of proceedings in the constitutional courts — the Supreme Court and the high courts.

India wants international cooperation in space

• Stressing international cooperation in space as in all domains of global commons, Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar called for strengthening global treaties to protect space-based assets and prevent militarisation of outer space.
• In line with this, Dr. Jaishankar said India had more than 200 international cooperation agreements with more than 40 countries and international organisations, and called the maiden moon mission, Chandrayaan-I, a “successful example of international cooperation with international payloads”.
• “The South Asia satellite is a matter of particular pride as it literally raises the heights to which we had taken our ‘neighbourhood first’ policy,” the Foreign Secretary said.
• ISRO launched the communications satellite GSAT-9, also called SAARC satellite, meant to provide connectivity and disaster support to countries in South Asia. The satellite cost around Rs. 235 crore and had a life span of 12 years.
• Saying India is party to all the legally binding instruments on outer space, Dr. Jaishankar said, “India has also noted with concern the growing diverse threats in this frontier and is sensitive to these challenges.”

Printed Study Materials for IBPS, SBI Bank Exam

::INTERNATIONAL::

Robert Mugabe resigned as President of Zimbabwe

• Robert Mugabe resigned as President of Zimbabwe on Tuesday, swept from power as his 37-year reign crumbled within days of a military takeover.
• The bombshell news was delivered by the Parliament Speaker to a special joint session of the assembly which had convened to impeach Mr. Mugabe, 93, who has dominated every aspect of Zimbabwean public life since independence in 1980.
• It was greeted on the streets of the capital Harare with car horns and wild cheering.
• It capped an unprecedented week in which the military seized control, tens of thousands of ordinary Zimbabweans took to the streets to call for the President’s resignation and Mr. Mugabe wrestled to remain in power.
• Mr. Mugabe had ruled Zimbabwe almost unopposed since the country won independence from Britain but his efforts to position his wife Grace as his successor triggered fury in the military that had underpinned his regime.
• His grip on power was shattered last week when the armoured military vehicles took to the streets, blockaded Parliament and soldiers placed the President under house arrest in an operation that had all the hallmarks of a coup.
• It is expected that he will eventually be replaced by former Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who had been Grace Mugabe’s chief rival to succeed her husband and whose dismissal earlier this month triggered the army takeover.
• However, under Zimbabwe’s Constitution, second Vice President Phelekezela Mphoko stands to be elevated as head of state.

::BUSINESS AND ECONOMY::

India will oppose restrictions on price subsidies to farmers in WTO

• At the upcoming meeting of the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) highest decision-making body, India will not agree to severe restrictions on its right to give price subsidies to farmers through the Minimum Support Price (MSP) to procure grains from them for food security purposes.
• The WTO’s Ministerial Conference is slated to take place at Buenos Aires in Argentina next month.
• Currently, an interim mechanism called the ‘Peace Clause’ is in place, per which WTO members had agreed not to challenge developing nations at the WTO Dispute Settlement Mechanism if they breached the cap of the product-specific domestic support (which is 10% of the value of production).
• The ‘Peace Clause’ is available to developing nations, including India, till a permanent solution is found to public stockholding for food security purposes.
• India would fight to ensure that at least the ‘Peace Clause’ is made the permanent solution, and will not accept any ‘terribly stringent or onerous’ conditions.
• However, the ‘Peace Clause’ is learnt to be difficult to invoke even in its current form because prior to using it, the country concerned will have to first admit that it ‘is breaching’ or ‘is about to breach’ the ceiling entitlement to give product-specific domestic support.
• Also, the ‘Peace Clause’ can be used only for public stockholding programmes that have been in existence on the date at which it was agreed upon at the Bali Ministerial Conference in December 2013, and not for new programmes on public stockholding for food security purposes.
• Lastly, most WTO members are of the opinion that there should be a commitment on prohibition of exports from public stockholding saying such exports would be trade-distorting.

The renewable energy sector is in the midst of a lull after the storm

• The renewable energy sector is in the midst of a lull after the storm, as bidding for wind and solar energy projects is seeing a short-term slowdown, said rating agency ICRA.
• The wind energy sector is now following a bid based regime since February 2017, given the success of a reverse auction under two rounds of 1GW each by Ministry of New & Renewable Energy (MNRE) with a bid tariff discovery at Rs. 3.46/kwh in February 2017 & Rs. 2.64/kwh in October 2017.
• This option is being preferred by the State utilities since the bid tariff level is significantly lower than the approved feed-in tariffs by State Electricity Regulatory Commissions (SERCs) for wind power projects.
• “The bidding activity for award of solar projects has slowed down in calendar year 2017 (till Oct.) as reflected in awarded project capacity of 3.75 GW as against 7.2 GW in the corresponding period of CY 2016.”

Sugar production increased drastically in India

• Sugar production during the first 45 days of the current season (October 2017 to September 2018) was 13.73 lakh tonnes as against 7.67 lakh tonnes during the same period last year.
• The Indian Sugar Mills’ Association said in a press release that higher production is seen in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra. While the sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh produced 5.67 lakh tonnes till November 15, those in Maharashtra produced 3.26 lakh tonnes.
• The average ex-mill sugar price, which was about Rs. 3,600 a quintal between March and September this year, has fallen by Rs. 100 to Rs. 200 a quintal. This is mostly for the last year stock which is sold at a discount as the new season has commenced.
• The government has extended the stock holding limit on traders by two months till December 31. With higher production in the current sugar season, sales should improve and prices should be stable.
• Hence, the government should withdraw the stock holding limit on sugar traders with immediate effect, the association said.

  Printed Study Materials for IBPS, SBI Bank Exam

  Current Affairs is Part of Online Course of IBPS Exams.

  Click Here for Daily News Archive