Highlights |UPSC Exam Current Affairs 23-12-2019
Current Affairs and News (23-12-2019)- 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.
- School Categorisation by Arunachal Pradesh
- Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI): Annual Report for 2018-19 released
- National Mathematics Day: Tribute to S. Ramanujan
- Core Catcher: Device to contain nuclear accidents
- Winter Solstice: Dec 22
- Indian Pharmacopoeia (IP)
- Hunar Haats: Initiative by Minority Affairs Ministry
- Ujwal DISCOM Assurance Yojana (UDAY): sharp spike in discom losses
- NRC + CAA: Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) & National Register of Citizens (NRC)
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UPSC Exam Current Affairs 23-12-2019 are followed in the part below:
UPSC Exam Current Affairs and News Analysis (23-12-2019)
School Categorisation by Arunachal Pradesh
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-II- Governance
In News
- In Arunachal Pradesh State where educator non-appearance has been a significant issue in the government funded training framework, schools will be checked ‘hard’, ‘delicate’ and ‘medium’- — in view of geology, openness and degrees of trouble in remaining at the spot of posting
- Geology, absence of foundation and hesitance of educators to work past their customary ranges of familiarity are the purposes behind this categorisation
- As indicated by new educators posting strategy: All newcomers will be given a hard posting for a compulsory three years, comprehensive of their probation period.
- The following five years will be in schools with levels of medium trouble, trailed by posting in delicate schools
- This guarantees need-based conveyance of instructors to ensure the scholastic enthusiasm of understudies and streamline work fulfillment among the educators in a free and straightforward way
Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI): Annual Report for 2018-19 released
Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains III- Economy
In News
- A portion of the features of the discharged report are:
- Extra security entrance for 2018 was 2.74%, somewhat lower than the 2.76% of 2017. Protection infiltration is estimated as the proportion of premium (in US$) to GDP (in US$).
- Extra security entrance expanded from 2.15% in 2001 to 4.60% in 2009, and has from that point indicated a by and large diminishing pattern.
- The protection thickness of the life coverage part in 2018 was $55 (same as earlier year). Protection thickness is estimated as the proportion of premium (in US dollars) to the absolute populace
Do You Know?
- The IRDAI is a self-governing, statutory body built up under Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority Act, 1999
- It is entrusted with managing and advancing the protection and re-protection ventures in India.
- Its base camp is in Hyderabad, Telangana and is a 10-part body including the executive, five full-time and four low maintenance individuals named by the legislature of India.
National Mathematics Day: Tribute to S. Ramanujan
Part of: GS Prelims
In News
- December 22, the birth commemoration of India’s popular mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan, is praised as National Mathematics Day.
- Ramanujan was conceived in 1887 in Erode, Tamil Nadu (at that point Madras Presidency) in an Iyengar Brahmin family.
- At age 12, in spite of coming up short on conventional instruction, he had exceeded expectations at trigonometry and created numerous hypotheses without anyone else.
- Living in desperate neediness, Ramanujan then sought after free research in arithmetic.
- In 1914, Ramanujan landed in Britain who worked with GH Hardy and in 1917, Ramanujan was chosen to be an individual from the London Mathematical Society.
- His work in the number hypothesis is particularly respected. He was perceived for his authority of proceeded with divisions, and had worked out the Riemann arrangement, elliptic integrals, hypergeometric arrangement, and the utilitarian conditions of the zeta work
- Ramanujan couldn’t get familiar with the England’s eating regimen, and came back to India in 1919. Ramanujan’s wellbeing kept on crumbling, and he kicked the bucket in 1920 at 32 years old.
- The Man Who Knew Infinity (2015) was a biopic on the mathematician.
Core Catcher: Device to contain nuclear accidents
Part of: GS Prelims and GS Mains III- Energy, Infrastructure, Science & Technology
In News
- Moscow-based Rosatom State Corporation introduced a center dissolve localisation gadget (CMLD) or “center catcher” at Unit 3 of Tamil Nadu’s Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KKNPP).
- The gadget is intended to limit and cool the liquid center material if there should be an occurrence of an emergency mishap.
- Such a mishap happens when the atomic parting response occurring inside a reactor isn’t adequately cooled, and the development of warmth causes fuel bars to soften down
- In 2011, the gadget was first introduced at the Tianwan atomic force plant in China, which is of Russian structure
- In 2018, a 200-ton center catcher is being introduced Rooppur 1 Nuclear Power Plant in Bangladesh (India-Russia coordinated effort which goes into activity in 2023)
Winter Solstice: Dec 22
Part of: GS Prelims
In News
- December 22, is Winter Solstice, the most limited day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere
- It is the day when the North Pole is most tilted away from the Sun.
- In the Southern Hemisphere, on the other hand, today is Summer Solstice — in places like Australia, New Zealand, or South Africa, December 22 is the year’s longest day.
- This circumstance will be turned around a half year after—on June 21/22, the Northern Hemisphere will see the Summer Solstice when the day will be the year’s longest.
- The Earth’s hub of turn is tilted at an edge of 23.5 degrees from the opposite.
- This tilt — joined with components, for example, Earth’s turn and circle — prompts varieties in the length of Sunlight that any area on the planet gets on various days of the year.
Indian Pharmacopoeia (IP)
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-II- Health
In News
- Afghanistan has become the primary nation to officially perceive Indian Pharmacopeia (IP).
- According to the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, IP is assigned as the official book of measures for drugs imported as well as fabricated available to be purchased, stock or show available to be purchased or circulation in India.
- The IP indicates the norms of medications produced and promoted in India as far as their personality, immaculateness and quality.
About Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC)
- It is a self-governing foundation of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare which sets gauges (in type of IP) for all medications that are fabricated, sold and expended in India.
- The IP Commission’s crucial to advance open and creature wellbeing in India by bringing out definitive and authoritatively acknowledged measures for nature of medications including dynamic pharmaceutical fixings, excipients and dose structures, utilized by wellbeing experts, patients and shoppers
- The Secretary, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, is the Chairperson and the Chairman-Scientific Body is the Co-Chairman of the Commission
Hunar Haats: Initiative by Minority Affairs Ministry
Part of: GS Prelims and GS-III- Economy
In News
- Hunar Haat is a display of painstaking work and conventional items made by craftsmans from the Minority people group. It is composed by Ministry of Minority Affairs.
- Hunar Haat is composed under USTTADscheme(Upgrading the Skills and Training in Traditional Arts/Crafts for Development).
- The craftsmans who take part in the occasion will get national and global markets for their indigenous high quality items through “Hunar Haat”.
- It has end up being Empowerment and Employment Exchange for ace craftsmans and skilled workers
- The subject of the occasions to be sorted out somewhere in the range of 2019 and 2020 is Ek Bharat Shresht Bharat
- Government has chosen to sort out around 100 “Hunar Haat” in the following five years the nation over to give market and work openings
(MAINS FOCUS)
POLITY
TOPIC:General Studies 2:
- Government approaches and intercessions for advancement in different segments and issues emerging out of their plan and execution.
Ujwal DISCOM Assurance Yojana (UDAY): sharp spike in discom losses
Context:
- Discom misfortunes, which had continuously diminished in the primary couple of years since the plan’s rollout in November 2015, have bounced back in FY ’19 to about twofold the misfortunes recorded the earlier year.
- Book misfortunes of discoms, which had diminished from Rs 51,562 crore in FY ’16 to Rs 15,132 crore in FY ’18, have almost multiplied this budgetary year to Rs 28,036 crore,
- Discoms have likewise missed the FY ’19 UDAY focus to cut down their total specialized and business (AT&C) misfortunes to 15 percent.
Reason for failure:
- The essential explanation behind disappointment, as is being perceived in arrangement circles, is the disappointment of discoms to gather the full cost that they pay for power — a similar issue that had prompted the struggling of the past two plans.
Solutions:
- Establishment or PPP models.
- The Center is likewise liable to back up the new plan by giving some award support, which it didn’t do in UDAY.
Problems with the Sector:
The huge transmission and conveyance misfortunes can be credited to the accompanying reasons:
- Insufficient Tariff increments
- Poor Power buy arranging
- Clearance of intensity at costs lower than the discom’s acquisition costs
- Political Willingness
- Absence of convenient Subsidy Payments
- Wasteful aspects in metering and charging
- Illicit Connections
- Careless subsidizing by banks to misfortune making Discoms
Why UDAY?
- The UDAY Scheme (not mandatory) will clear route for the takeover of the 75 percent of Discom liabilities by state governments over a two-to-multi year time frame
- Financing of the Debt: Via bonds with a development time of 10-15 years
- Impacts:
- It will help assuage obligation ridden discoms
- It will prompt the acknowledgment of obligations to be determined sheet of the discom while urging them to adjust levies to costs and guaranteeing the manageable working of the equivalent
The utility of UDAY:
- Unfeasible borrowings ought to be controlled to put a stop on regularly expanding misfortune. Under Uday, the future misfortunes can be allowed to back just when a discom bond is ensured by the State Government, along these lines guaranteeing that the discom applies a gainful circumspection
- With components like the guided intercession of the State governments and the reviewed way in which it should be taken up, the plan expect an all-season continuous methodology and not a one-time settlement exertion.
- Certain conditions put crosswise over by Uday includes:
- Misfortune decrease should be helped by circle-wise targets, feeder and DT Metering just as updating and substitution of transformers
- Locales with continued misfortune decrease ought to be boosted (remunerated) by expanded long stretches of supply
- Different activities that can be taken to lessen discom wasteful aspects:
- Setting out a particular presentation checking and consistence system (can be boosted by extra financing and different information sources)
- Checking of loaning by banks to guarantee dependable stock of speculation
- Guarantee normal tax setting
- Vitality evaluating of feeders
- Metering of appropriation transformers (DT)
- Disposal of income holes
- Permit fuel-cost changes in conclusive taxes
- Decrease in transient force buy
- Liquidation of Regulatory Assets
- Guaranteeing advance installments of endowments
Attractive to States:
- The extra obligation won’t be considered for surveying financial duty cutoff points of States
- The 3 to 4 rate point decrease in financing costs will fill in as a consolation
Issues with Uday
- State Subject: Electricity is certainly not a Central subject and accordingly, the plan can’t be made a necessary one-which welcomes inconsistent working of the Discom per State.
- No financial help is being given by the State however states ready to turn into a piece of the plan will be allowed with sponsored subsidizing in the administration’s plans and need in the stock of coal
- The transformation of discom obligation into bonds isn’t as troublesome as is finding a reasonable purchaser for those bonds, detesting SLR Status furthermore
IASbaba’s Views:
- Political reluctance should be fixed and instruments should be carefully followed to plug the provisos to address the obligation ridden discoms and fix the misfortunes.
- This rebuilding bundle should be structured such that it can manage both; a startling levy stun or an expanded weight on the State Government, taking into due thought the specific estimates that should be adequately worked out (listed previously)
Connecting the Dots:
- Do surplus and deficiencies go together? Dissect
- In the light of the grave circumstance of intensity misfortune, can State end up being a signal of light, driving the way away from the emergency? Talk about
POLITY
TOPIC: General Studies 2:
- Indian Constitution-verifiable underpinnings, development, highlights, alterations, critical arrangements and fundamental structure
- Government arrangements and intercessions for advancement in different divisions and issues emerging out of their structure and execution.
NRC + CAA: Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) & National Register of Citizens (NRC)
Context:
- Broad fights against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), particularly in blend with the proposed all-India National Register of Citizens (NRC).
- Home Minister Amit Shah as of late disclosed to Parliament that an across the nation NRC is on the cards, he recognized it from the new citizenship law and said the NRC will have no strict channel. It is indistinct if the legislature will get a crisp law to command an across the country NRC
How does one prove citizenship?
- In Assam, one of the essential criteria was that the names of candidate’s relatives ought to either be in the principal NRC arranged in 1951 or in the discretionary moves up to March 24, 1971.
- Other than that, candidates additionally had the choice to display reports, for example, displaced person enlistment endorsement, birth authentication, LIC arrangement, land and tenure records, citizenship testament, identification, government provided permit or declaration, bank/post office accounts, lasting private declaration, government work authentication, instructive declaration and court records.
Why is it called an “updated” NRC?
- Observer to many years of relocation from Bangladesh — some time ago East Bengal and afterward East Pakistan — Assam as of now has a NRC, which was distributed in 1951 based on that year’s Census. The main state with such a record, Assam is presently refreshing it to distinguish its residents.
- The update, ordered and observed by the Supreme Court, is an aftermath of the Assam Accord of 1985, which sets March 24, 1971 as the cut-off date for citizenship. The individuals who entered Assam before that date are perceived as residents.
Why is Assam different?
- NRC update was commanded by the Supreme Court in 2013. Assam has a history that is molded by movement, and the fights there are against just CAA, not against NRC.
- The Assam Accord, marked by the legislatures of Assam and India, and the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and the All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad in 1985, following a six-year mass development, basically proclaimed that an inhabitant of Assam is an Indian resident on the off chance that she could demonstrate her quality, or a progenitor’s essence, in Assam before March 25, 1971.
- That is the cutoff date for NRC, which CAA stretches out to December 31, 2014 to non-Muslim transients from three nations.
To prove their or their ancestors’ presence before 1971, applicants in Assam had to produce any one of 14 possible documents:
1951 NRC; or
- Appointive roll(s) up to March 24, 1971; or
- Anybody of 12 different sorts of papers, for example, land and occupancy records; citizenship papers; identification; Board/University declaration.
Cutoff date for a nationwide NRC:
- As per the Citizenship Act, 1955, altered in 1986, anybody conceived in India up to July 1, 1987 is an Indian resident by birth. For those conceived on or after July 1, 1987, the law set out a crisp condition: one of the guardians must be an Indian resident. By a 2003 alteration, for any individual conceived on or after December 3, 2004 to be viewed as an Indian resident, one parent must be an Indian resident while the other must not be an illicit migrant.
- This doesn’t make a difference to Assam, because of the cutoff of 1971. For the remainder of the nation, those brought into the world outside the nation after January 26, 1950, and living in India without legitimate archives is an unlawful worker.
Connecting the Dots:
- Do you think NRC + CAA are hindering for the mainstream idea of the nation?
- What might be the route forward ?
(TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE)
Model questions: (You can now post your answers in comment section)
Q.1) Consider the following statements
- Insurance penetration is measured as the ratio of premium (in US dollars) to the total population
- Insurance density is measured as the ratio of premium (in US$) to GDP (in US$)
Which of the given statement(s) above is/are correct?
- 1 only
- 2 only
- Both 1 and 2
- Neither 1 nor 2
Q.2) Consider the following statements
- Winter Solstice is usually on December 22nd which is the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere
- During Winter Solstice in Norther Hemisphere the North Pole is most tilted away from the Sun.
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 Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission
- It is an autonomous institution of the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers
- Its mission is to promote public and animal health in India by bringing out authoritative and officially accepted standards for quality of drugs.
Which of the statement(s) given above is/are correct?
- 1 only
- 2 only
- Both 1 and 2
- Neither 1 nor 2
Q.4) Hunar Haat is an initiative by which body/ministry?
- NITI Aayog
- Union Ministry of Labour
- Union Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship
- Union Ministry of Minority Affairs
Q.5) A recent movie titled The Man Who Knew Infinity is based on the biography of ________ (UPSC CSE 2016)
- S. Ramanuja
- S. Chandrasekhar
- S. N. Bose
- C. V. Raman