Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 15 December 2017

::National::

Fast track courts to exclusively prosecute criminal cases against MP's and MLA's

• The Supreme Court gave the green signal for the Centre’s scheme to set up 12 fast track courts to exclusively prosecute and dispose of 1,581 criminal cases pending against Members of Parliament and State Legislative Assemblies within a year.
• A Bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi and Navin Sinha directed the Centre to forthwith allocate Rs. 7.8 crore to the States for setting up of the special courts.
• The States shall, in consultation with the High Courts concerned, make the courts operational by March 1, 2018, the Bench said.
• PIL petitioner and Supreme Court advocate Ashwini Upadhyay said 12 courts were not enough to try 1,581 cases and Rs. 7.8 crore was too little to prosecute “criminal” politicians.
• To this, Justice Gogoi responded that “12 courts are not the end of it. But let them start. It is very easy to blame, but to start something is difficult”.
• “The sum of Rs. 7.8 crore has been earmarked as the required expenditure for the setting up of 12 Courts and the Department of Expenditure, Ministry of Finance has granted in-principle approval to the said allocation.
• Having considered the matter, we direct the Union of India to proportionately allocate Rs. 7.8 crore to the different States in which the Special Courts are planned to be located. This should be done forthwith,” the Bench said.
• Immediately after such allocation, “the State Governments in consultation with the High Courts will set up the Fast Track Courts to ensure that the Courts start functioning from 01.03.2018,” the Supreme Court ordered.
• These 1,581 criminal cases were declared by politicians in their nominations during the 2014 general elections.

Nitish Kumar for “effective” implementation of the liquor policy

• Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar expressed concern over “lucrative illicit liquor business” in dry Bihar and urged people to remain vigilant.
• Leader of the Opposition and former Deputy Chief Minister Tejaswi Yadav, however, took potshots at the government’s liquor policy saying “it has completely failed in the State”.
• The State government, meanwhile, has started looking for a “teetotaller” senior police officer for the newly created post of Inspector General of Police (Prohibition) for “effective” implementation of the liquor policy.
• Mr. Kumar also urged people to remain vigilant and report to the authorities about those violating the new prohibition law as “their identity would be protected”. “Numbers of the helpline are displayed at public places and people must make use of this,” he said.
• The Chief Minister also said that a separate wing of police dedicated to ensure proper implementation has been set up for effective implementation of the new stringent prohibition policy.
• The officers posted to this wing would report directly to the Chief Minister, Home Secretary and the State police chief.
• Last month, the State Cabinet had approved the creation of a new post of IGP (Prohibition). Sources in the State police headquarters said that the hunt was on to select a confirmed “teetotaller” police officer for the job, but there is “no luck” yet.
• Bihar became a dry State in April last year with stringent laws that have provisions for imprisonment from 10 years up to life sentence for violations.
• Over 90,000 people have been arrested across the State and more than 74,000 cases lodged ever since the enforcement of the new prohibition policy but the illegal trade of liquor has remained unabated.
• Every day, police officers seize hundreds of liquor bottles funnelled into Bihar from neighbouring States such as Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

First of six Scorpene diesel-electric submarines came into the Navy

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi formally commissioned the first of six Scorpene diesel-electric submarines into the Navy. This is the Navy’s first modern conventional submarine in almost two decades since the INS Sindhushastra was procured from Russia in July 2000.
• “It is a matter of pride for me to commission this submarine. Kalvari’s induction in the Navy is a big step in defence preparedness,” Mr. Modi said, lauding the Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Ltd (MDL) for undertaking the project to construct the six submarines with technology transfer from the Naval Group (Formerly DCNS) of France.
• The Scorpene submarines can undertake different missions including anti-surface warfare, anti-submarine warfare, intelligence gathering, mine laying and area surveillance.
• The second of the Scorpenes, Khanderi, was launched in January 2017, and is undergoing sea trials. The third, Karanj, is being readied for launch shortly. The rest are in various stages of outfitting. The project is expected to be over by 2020.
• Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said peace in the Indian Ocean, the lifeline of global trade, “is better off with INS Kalvari and her follow on submarines.” INS Kalvari is manned by a team of eight officers and 35 sailors.

NGT clarifies its order on Amarnath shrine

• The National Green Tribunal clarified its orders on ‘maintaining silence’ around the Amarnath shrine and said that its previous order had not been “correctly reported at different quarters”.
• A Bench headed by NGT Chairperson Swatanter Kumar said that the order passed by the Tribunal, had “neither intended nor actually declared the entire area falling under the Amarnath Ji Shrine Board as a silence zone”.
• “The only restriction that the Tribunal had placed and which is now reiterated to provide complete clarity is that the devotee or anyone standing in front of the Amarnath shivling shall maintain silence,” said the green panel Bench.
• Further, the Bench said that the restrictions had been imposed keeping in mind the adverse effects that noise, heat and vibration can have on the natural formation.
• “The direction in our considered view is required to maintain the sanctity and pristine condition of the holy cave on the one hand while on the other to ensure that there are no adverse impacts of noise, heat and vibrations upon the Amarnath Ji Maha Shivling,” said the Bench.
• Dismissing certain reports which were doing the rounds, the green panel clarified that the restriction was not applicable to the daily rituals that were performed.
• Additionally, the Bench directed that a one-way queue of visitors had to be maintained at the shrine.

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::International::

British govt. faces humilation in Parliament on Brexit

• The British government suffered a major defeat as Conservative Party rebels allied with the Labour and other opposition parties to push through an amendment to Brexit legislation going through the House of Commons.
• The amendment will require MPs to have a meaningful say on the terms of Britain’s departure from the EU.
• The Conservative rebels were led by Dominic Grieve, Britain’s former Attorney General, and came despite a last minute attempt by the government to offer a “concession” and intense lobbying by party whips, which reportedly included reducing one MP to tears.
• Anna Soubry, another rebel, highlighted the importance of getting a truly meaningful vote rather than a binary choice that left MPs with little choice but to vote in favour to avoid Britain crashing out of the EU.
• The amendment passed with 309 MPs supporting the motion and 305 opposing.
•  The development was met with anger from hard-line Brexit supporters. “Proud of yourselves,” thundered the tabloid the Daily Mail , which described the 11 Conservative rebels as “self-consumed malcontents” that had betrayed the party, and 17.4 million Brexit voters.
• “This amendment does not prevent us from preparing our statute book for exit day. We will now determine whether further changes are needed to the Bill to ensure it fulfils its vital purpose.”
• The defeat was the first major one in Brexit legislation for the government, but may not be its last.
• The vote came as Prime Minister May travelled to Brussels for the European Commission’s meeting.
• The development casts a shadow over the landmark agreement on the terms of Britain’s exit, after tough negotiations with the EU on the rights of EU citizens, the size of Britain’s divorce payment and the road forward for the Irish border.

::Business and Economy::

WTO’s 164 members unable to reach a consensus on substantive issues

• The December 10-13 meeting of WTO's highest decision-making body ended becalmed with the WTO’s 164 members unable to reach a consensus on substantive issues such as the food security right of developing countries and the centrality of development in multilateral trade negotiations.
• However, the Ministerial Conference managed to salvage a commitment from member nations to secure a deal by 2019 on banning certain forms of fisheries’ subsidies.
• During hectic parleys, the U.S. blocked the demands of more than a 100 developing nations, including India and China, to implement their food security programmes without onerous conditions.
• Since all major decisions in the WTO need to be taken by ‘the membership as a whole’, even a single country can end up being the deal-breaker.
• India, for its part, thwarted attempts by several countries, both developed and developing, to initiate binding discussions on what they called the 21st century challenges to trade — including e-commerce, investment facilitation and proposed norms for small firms.
• This it did by refusing to budge from its position that members should first resolve outstanding issues (such as food sovereignty) of the ongoing Doha Round negotiations that began in 2001 with a ‘development agenda’ (for improving the trading prospects of developing nations), before considering ‘new issues’.
• Mr. Azevêdo said: “It is disappointing that in some areas, particularly where we had a [Ministerial] mandate as you pointed out, we could not get that outcome. But we don’t give up. We just continue. This is the nature of the multilateral system.”

Income inequality in India rose rapidly since the 1980s

• Income inequality in India rose rapidly since the 1980s to a situation where the top 10% of the earners accounted for 56% of the income earned in 2014, according to a new report by economists.
• The report, titled ‘World Inequality Report,’ said inequality rose substantially since the 1980s following the implementation of the deregulation reforms by the government.
• “In 2014, the share of national income captured by India’s top 1% of earners was 22%, while the share of the top 10% of earners was around 56%,” the report said. “The top 0.1% of earners has continued to capture more growth than all those in the bottom 50% combined.”
• “Indian inequality was driven by the rise in very top incomes,” the report added. “The income share of India’s top 1% rose from approximately 6% in 1982-1983 to above 10% a decade after, then to 15% by 2000, and further still to around 23% by 2014.
• The latest data thus shows that during the first decade after the millennium, the share of national income attributable to the top 1% grew to be larger than that pertaining to the bottom 50%.
• By 2014, the national income share of the bottom 50% — approximately 390 million adults — was just two-thirds of the share of the top 1%, consisting of just 7.8 million people.”
• “An even stronger increase in the share of national income was experienced by the top 0.1% and top 0.01%, whose shares grew fivefold and tenfold, respectively, from 2% and 0.5% to almost 10% and 5%, between 1983 and 2014,” it said.
• According to the authors, this rising inequality is in sharp contrast to the trends seen in the 30 years following Independence, when income inequality was widely reduced and the incomes of the bottom 50% grew at a faster rate than the national average.
• These measure, and others, the report said, had a significant impact on reducing income inequality.

Inflation based on wholesale prices accelerated to 8-month high

• Inflation based on wholesale prices accelerated to 8-month high of 3.93% in November due to a sharp rise in onion prices and costlier seasonal vegetables, government data showed.
• Calculated on wholesale price index (WPI), the inflation was 3.59% in October this year, and 1.82% in November last.
• The November figure is the highest so far this fiscal and the previous high was when the WPI touched 3.85% in April. Kitchen staple onion witnessed a whopping 178.19% inflation last month.

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