Highlights |UPSC Exam Current Affairs 17-12-2019
Current Affairs and News (17-12-2019)- The following article contains all the updated events and news for IAS Preparation. Our daily IAS Current Affairs and News cover the most important topics to give precise information to the reader and IAS Aspirants.
- Hydrogen cell technology (Fuel Cell Technology)
- Sexed Semen
- GIMS or Government Instant Messaging System
- Asia’s biggest surge pool
- Increase Lok Sabha seats
- GST compensation
- Protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2019
- COP25: Longest climate talks end
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UPSC Exam Current Affairs 17-12-2019 are followed in the part below:
UPSC Exam Current Affairs and News Analysis (17-12-2019)
Hydrogen cell technology (Fuel Cell Technology)
Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains III – Science & Technology
In News
- In front of next July’s Tokyo Olympics, Japan is outfitting to put on its streets a huge number of vehicles dependent on a hydrogen cell innovation, otherwise called ‘energy units’.
- At the core of the energy component electric vehicles (FCEV) is a gadget that uses a wellspring of fuel, for example, hydrogen, and an oxidant to make power by an electrochemical procedure.
- Like traditional batteries under the hats of cars, hydrogen power devices also convert concoction vitality into electrical vitality.
- From a long haul suitability viewpoint, FCEVs are charged as vehicles of things to come, given that hydrogen is the most copious asset known to man.
- Power devices create power through an electrochemical procedure, it doesn’t store vitality
- Depends on a steady inventory of fuel and oxygen — similarly that an interior ignition motor depends on a consistent stock of oil or diesel, and oxygen
- Dissimilar to battery-controlled electric vehicles, energy component vehicles don’t should be connected, and most models surpass 300 km of range on a full tank. They are topped off with a spout, much the same as in a petroleum or diesel station
Criticism of Hydrogen Cell Technology:
- The way toward making hydrogen needs vitality — frequently from petroleum product sources. That has brought up issues over hydrogen’s green accreditations.
- Security — hydrogen is more dangerous than petroleum.
Sexed Semen
Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains III- Science & Technology
In News
- The Union Minister for animal cultivation, dairying and fisheries said that administration intends to give dairy ranchers ‘sexed semen’ for cows for as modest as Rs 100 for each straw by 2020.
- The generation arrangement of cows is like people. Cows convey XX chromosomes while bull semen conveys both X and Y.
- Sexed semen is exceptionally handled semen of bulls from which ‘Y’ chromosomes in sperm cells — which lead to the introduction of a male calf — are either evacuated through an ‘arranging’ process or slaughtered.
- Semen which has just ‘X’ chromosomes can guarantee that a female calf is conceived.
- Sexed semen can help tackle the stray steers issue in nation as male calves(and dairy animals which has quit giving mil) are surrendered on the streets by ranchers as they don’t give milk.
- The assurance of a female calf being conceived is never 100 percent. It very well may be up to 90 percent
- High caliber traditional semen straws are accessible for just around Rs 20-40 for each straw in particular while sexed semen costs in any event Rs 1,200 for each straw without endowment.
GIMS or Government Instant Messaging System
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-II – Governance
In News
- The administration is trying a model of an Indian likeness well known informing stages, for example, WhatsApp and Telegram, for secure interior use – codenamed GIMS
- Structured and created by the Kerala unit of National Informatics Center (NIC)
- GIMS is being bundled for workers of Central and state government offices and associations for intra and entomb association correspondences
- It is being created as a protected Indian option without the security concerns appended with applications facilitated abroad or those possessed by remote elements. Like WhatsApp, GIMS utilizes start to finish encryption for coordinated informing
Do You know?
- There was a WhatsApp rupture through a spyware called Pegasus some Indian clients’ cell phones were focused on
- Pegasus code can be transmitted by means of Whatsapp call.It sends the objectives contacts, calls and messages to its controller. It can likewise transform the telephone into a government agent gadget by turning on the camera or amplifier.
Asia’s biggest surge pool
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-III – Economic Development
In News
- The Stage is good to go for the filling of the Asia’s greatest flood pool (open to sky) with the waters of the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project
- The flood pool estimates 92 meters down and 56 meters measurement and would store one tmc feet of water, which would be lifted by utilizing four engines to the Ananthagiri Reservoir.
- The open-to-sky Surge pool was built in a record time of 13 months at an expense of Rs 2,700 crore
Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project
- It was recently known as Pranahita-Chevella Lift Irrigation Project
- It is multi-reason water system venture at the intersection purpose of Pranhita River and Godavari River i.e, at Kaleshwaram town in Telangana.
- Pranahita stream in itself is a conjunction of different other littler tributaries like Wardha, Penganga and Wainganga Rivers.
- Under the plan, 89 cumecs (cubic meters every second) of water will be lifted to a tallness of 106 meters from the Sripada Yellampalli store to Medaram repository and will be utilized for water system and water supply in close by dry spell inclined regions.
Increase Lok Sabha seats
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-II- Polity
In News
- Previous President Pranab Mukherjee put forth a defense for raising the quantity of Lok Sabha electorates to 1,000 from the current 543 and for a relating increment in the Rajya Sabha’s quality,
- He contended that India has a “lopsidedly huge size” of electorate for chose agents and in this manner needs development of Parliament
- The last time the quality of the Lok Sabha was modified was in 1977, which, he noted, depended on the 1971 registration that put the all out populace at 55 crore.
- The populace from that point forward has dramatically increased, and there is a ‘solid case’ to expel the freeze in the delimitation work out. It ought to be obviously expanded to 1,000,
GST compensation
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-II – Federalism
In News
- The Center discharged ₹35,298 crore to the States in Goods and Services Tax (GST) pay, only two days before a critical gathering of the GST Council.
- Prior in Nov 2019, the Center had written to States voicing worry that because of lower GST assortments, the remuneration cess probably won’t be sufficient to pay for the misfortunes emerging out of the reception of the duty framework.
- While the legislature had planned for ₹6,63,343 crore in GST assortments for the current monetary, 2019-20, it had earned uniquely about half of its spending gauge in the initial eight months.
About GST Council
- The GST Council is a protected body set up under Article 279A of Indian Constitution
- It makes suggestions to the Union and State Government on issues identified with Goods and Service Tax (GST).
- The GST Council is led by the Union Finance Minister.
- Its different individuals are the Union State Minister of Revenue or Finance and Ministers responsible for Finance or Taxation of the considerable number of States.
(MAINS FOCUS)
POLITY
TOPIC:General Studies II
- Government arrangements and intercessions for advancement in different divisions and issues emerging out of their structure and usage.
Protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2019
Context:
- Fights against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act at Jamia Millia Islamia in Delhi and Aligarh Muslim University, trailed by fierce conflict among understudies and police, have had a far reaching influence the nation over.
Background
Acquiring Indian citizenship:
- As indicated by the Ministry of Home Affairs, there are four manners by which Indian citizenship can be obtained: birth, plummet, enlistment and naturalization.
- The arrangements are recorded under Citizenship Act, 1955.
By birth:
- Each individual conceived in India on or after 26.01.1950 however before 01.07.1987 is an Indian resident independent of the nationality of his/her folks.
- Each individual conceived in India somewhere in the range of 01.07.1987 and 02.12.2004 is a resident of India given both of his/her folks is a resident of the nation at the hour of his/her introduction to the world.
- Each individual conceived in India on or after 3.12.2004 is a resident of the nation given the two his/her folks are Indians or if nothing else one parent is a resident and the other isn’t an illicit transient at the hour of birth.
By registration with conditions:
- An individual of Indian birthplace who has been an inhabitant of India for a long time before applying for enlistment.
- An individual of Indian birthplace who is an inhabitant of any nation outside unified India.
- An individual who is hitched to an Indian resident and is commonly occupant for a long time before applying for enlistment.
- Minor offspring of people who are residents of India.
By descent:
- An individual brought into the world outside India on or after January 26, 1950 is a resident of India by plunge if his/her dad was a resident of India by birth.
- An individual brought into the world outside India on or after December 10, 1992, yet before December 3, 2004 if both of his/her parent was a resident of India by birth.
- On the off chance that an individual brought into the world outside India or after December 3, 2004 needs to procure citizenship, his/her folks need to announce that the minor doesn’t hold the visa of another nation and his/her introduction to the world is enrolled at an Indian department inside one year of birth.
By naturalisation:
- An individual can get citizenship by naturalization on the off chance that he/she is normally inhabitant of India for a long time (all through a year going before the date of utilization and 11 years in the total) and satisfies all capabilities in the third calendar of the Citizenship Act.
Dual citizenship:
- The altered Citizenship Act of 1955 doesn’t accommodate double citizenship or double nationality.
- Any resident of India, who by enlistment, naturalization or generally deliberately takes the citizenship of another nation, will upon such procurement stop to be a resident of India.
- Instances of end or discontinuance of citizenship will be resolved at last by official courtrooms.
The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2019:
- The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill or CAB, which awards Indian citizenship to the non-Muslims of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh(Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Buddhist, Jains and Parsis)
- The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill proposes to give citizenship to the non-Muslims Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Buddhist, Jains and Parsis — from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh who landed in India before December 31, 2014.
- Taxi clears route for Indian citizenship to lakhs of migrants, who distinguish themselves with any of the given religions, regardless of whether they did not have any record to demonstrate their residency. It additionally implies that any migrant who doesn’t have a place with the said networks would not be qualified for Indian citizenship
- Any illicit settler from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh who has a place with these said networks won’t be ousted or detained on the off chance that they are not conveying any substantial records for their residency in India
- The span of the foreigners’ residency was 11 years. The altered bill has decreased it to five years. This implies workers from the three nations and from the referenced religions, who have entered India before December 31, 2014, would not be treated as unlawful outsiders.
Exemptions:
- Bill excludes certain territories in the North-East from this arrangement ancestral regions of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura as remembered for Sixth Schedule of the Constitution and the region secured under the Inner Limit advised under the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873.(Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram alongside practically entire of Meghalaya and parts of Assam and Tripura)
The Overseas Citizens of India (OCI) cardholders:
- According to the citizenship charge, an outsider may enlist as an OCI under the 1955 Act on the off chance that they are of Indian source (e.g., previous resident of India or their relatives) or the companion of an individual of Indian beginning.
- The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill qualifies the OCI cardholders for advantages, for example, the privilege to head out to India, and to work and concentrate in the nation. The Citizenship Bill, which was passed in the Rajya Sabha, revises the Act to permit abrogation of OCI enrollment if the individual has abused any law informed by the Central government.
Concerns :
- Absence of incorporation of a few non-Muslim nations around India, for example, Sri Lanka,concern about the citizenship status of Tamil-speaking Hindus who were permitted to legitimately settle in the Indian territory of Tamil Nadu because of past separation on the
- Tibetan exiles from China are additionally prohibited from the bill in spite of being a progressing concern and being not able secure Indian nationality
- The entry of the Act caused huge scale dissents in India Muslim gatherings and mainstream bunches have fought claiming strict separation, for damaging the common Constitution of India and its guarantee of correspondence under Article 14 and trust it legitimizes strict segregation
- The individuals of Assam and other north-eastern states keep on fighting expecting that the non-Muslim unlawful workers in their areas would be permitted to remain. The fights originate from the dread that illicit Bengali Hindu transients from Bangladesh, whenever regularized under CAB, will compromise social and phonetic personalities of the state.
- Act was condemned by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom
Way forward:
- Appeasement would be the most ideal route forward to contain viciousness and console those needing consolation, pending an assurance by the Supreme Court on the protected legitimacy of the Act.
- Ignitable proclamations and flippant blame dealing based on no proof isn’t required
Conclusion:
- Prelude of India guarantees balance of status and opportunity the demonstration is clear that it disregards this rule and it likewise abuses UDHR 1948 revelation so steps must be taken to guarantee this status
ENVIRONMENT
TOPIC:General Studies III
- Protection, ecological contamination and debasement, natural effect appraisal
COP25: Longest climate talks end
Context:
- The 25th yearly talks under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), alluded to as the Conference of Parties (COP), was as of late held in Madrid.
- It finished with no result.
- It was the fifteenth gathering of the gatherings for the Kyoto Protocol (CMP15), and furthermore, it was the second gathering of the gatherings for the Paris Agreement.
- The prime target of the meeting is to finished the standard book to the 2015 Paris Agreement that will get successful in 2020 to supplant the 1997 Kyoto Protocol (reaches a conclusion in 2020).
Conference of Parties (COP)
- The COP is the incomparable basic leadership body of the Convention.
- All States that are Parties to the Convention are spoken to at the COP, at which they audit the usage of the Convention and whatever other lawful instruments that the COP embraces and take choices important to advance the successful execution of the Convention.
- The primary COP meeting was held in Berlin, Germany in March, 1995.
Kyoto Protocol 1997
- The Kyoto Protocol is a universal arrangement which broadens the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that submits state gatherings to decrease ozone harming substance discharges, in view of the logical accord that (section one) an Earth-wide temperature boost is happening and (section two) all things considered, human-caused CO2 outflows to have dominatingly caused it.
- That convention legitimately bound created nations to outflow decrease targets.
- Nonetheless, the understanding was generally accepted to be insufficient in light of the fact that the world’s two top carbon dioxide-emanating nations, China and the United States, decided not to take an interest
Paris Agreement, 2015
- Paris Agreement or COP21 was received in December 2015.
- It meant to decrease the emanation of gases that add to an Earth-wide temperature boost.
- The Paris Agreement likewise planned for supplanting the Kyoto Protocol(to fortify outflow decreases, in 1997)
Aims of Paris Agreement
- The aim of the agreement is to decrease global warming, enhancing the implementation of the UNFCCC through:
- Holding the expansion in the worldwide normal temperature to well beneath 2 °C above pre-mechanical levels .
- Expanding the capacity to adjust to the antagonistic effects of environmental change.
- Making money streams predictable with a pathway towards low ozone depleting substance emanations and atmosphere versatile advancement
- This system included alleged 20/20/20 targets, in particular the decrease of carbon dioxide (CO2) emanations by 20%, the expansion of sustainable power source’s piece of the pie to 20%, and a 20% increment in vitality proficiency.
COP 25: Focus
- Desire for this gathering were restricted in light of the fact that numerous nations were centered around tight specialized subtleties, for example, the activities of the globalcarbon markets.
- It was trusted that nations would make plans to take a shot at increasingly aspiring carbon targets expected to satisfy the objectives of the 2015 Paris understanding.
Why CoP25 failed?
- The disappointment of the discussions underlined obviously the monstrous hole between what researchers state the world’s countries need to do on environmental change, and what the most dominant political pioneers on earth are set up to try and examine.
- As indicated by researcher, talks concentrated on a portion of the guidelines for executing the 2015 Paris understanding, yet the superseding issue of how quick the world needs to cut ozone depleting substance emanations has gotten minimal authority consideration.
- Nations concurred in Paris in 2015 to return to their atmosphere promises by 2020. Be that as it may, numerous nations were pushing this year for an unmistakable require all nations to submit progressively driven atmosphere promises one year from now.
- Be that as it may, nations, for example, China and Brazil contradicted putting any commitment on nations to submit improved promises one year from now, contending it ought to be every nation’s own choice. They rather contended the attention ought to be on pre-2020 activity by creating nations to meet their past promises
- There was an acknowledgment that harder carbon targets are required all inclusive, however not many nations thought of any and the determination to return one year from now with increasingly yearning plans was worded too feebly to even think about satisfying most campaigners.
India’s stance:
- India assumed a blended job at the as of late finished up 25th Conference of Parties (CoP 25) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change at Madrid.
- On the subject of business sectors, India stressed the progress of the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) credits earned under the Kyoto Protocol to the Paris Agreement.
- Called attention to that that unreasonably modest outflows decreases empowered by the CDM just as the plausibility of twofold checking could degenerate the procedure.
- India assumed a solid job in investigating the built up world’s proceeding with poor record on atmosphere activity.
- It contended that except if a stocktaking activity of the satisfaction of different pre-2020 duties by created nations ,India would not raise its atmosphere aspiration for its next round of Paris Agreement focuses due in 2020.
- India additionally took a lead in calling for more account for creating nations for atmosphere activity, (“not by any means 2 percent” of the guaranteed “$1 trillion over the most recent 10 years” had been conveyed)
Way forward
- It is completely suitable for nations, for example, India to demand not taking on a significantly increasingly out of line portion of the worldwide alleviation trouble except if created nations convey on the insignificant parameter of satisfying their current guarantees.
- It is significant that India keep on pushing created nations in this design as the whole worldwide atmosphere activity structure has been placed in peril by the inaction of enormous polluters.
Connecting the dots:
- Do you think COP25 atmosphere summit has finished in amazing disappointment of authority?
- Do you think Climate change is Real?
(TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE)
Model questions: (You can now post your answers in comment section)
Q.1) Consider the following statements about Hydorgen Fuel Cell
- The fuel cell combines hydrogen and oxygen to generate an electric current, water being the only byproduct.
- Like conventional batteries, hydrogen fuel cells too convert chemical energy into electrical energy.
Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct?
- 1 only
- 2 only
- Both 1 and 2
- Neither 1 nor 2
Q.2) Consider the following statements about GIMS or Government Instant Messaging System
- It is Indian equivalent of popular messaging platforms, such as WhatsApp and Telegram, for secure internal use.
- It is being developed by National Informatics Centre
Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct?
- 1 only
- 2 only
- Both 1 and 2
- Neither 1 nor 2
Q.3) Consider the following statements about GST Council:
- It is a constitutional body established under Article 279A of Indian Constitution
- It is Chaired by Prime Minister of India
Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct?
- Only 1
- Only 2
- Both 1 and 2
- Neither 1 nor 2
Q.4) Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project is at the confluence of which two rivers?
- Ganga and Yamuna River
- Godavari and Kaveri river
- Pranhita River and Godavari River
- None of the above
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