Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 30 January 2017

:: National ::

RBI turned down EC's request to enhance withdrawal limit for candidates

• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has turned down the Election Commission’s request to enhance the cash withdrawal limit for nominated candidates in the five poll-bound States, from Rs. 24,000 to Rs. 2 lakh per week.

• Asking the RBI to reconsider, the EC wrote to it expressing serious concerns “about the cursory manner in which this issue has been dealt with and it appears that the RBI has not realised the gravity of the matter.”

• The EC reiterated that in order to facilitate proper conduct of elections, it was imperative that its directions were complied with.

• It had earlier written to the RBI stating that it had been told about the problems being faced by the candidates from different political parties, particularly in the rural areas, due to imposition of cash withdrawal limits.

• As per the EC directive, each candidate has to open a separate bank account. All receipts and payments of the candidates during the election process have to be routed through that account.

• The EC pointed out that the entire election process lasted only three to four weeks and therefore, the total amount that could be withdrawn would be only Rs. 96,000.

• This is against the statutory limit of expenditure of Rs. 28 lakh in Punjab, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh, and Rs. 20 lakh in Manipur and Goa, as fixed by the Central government on February 28, 2014.

Oil spil leads to death of marine animals

• A thick oily tide from the sea lapped at the coast of several fishing hamlets in north Chennai, a day after two cargo ships, one of them an oil tanker, collided off Kamarajar Port in Ennore.

• Several dead turtles and hatchlings coated with the black oil were washed ashore and discovered among the boulders. By afternoon, the spread of oil was seen on a 400-metre long stretch, 40 metres wide, near the Ernavur junction.

• Since there was a spill from the oil vessel, the Ennore Kamarajar Port authorities placed containment booms around the ships.

• The floating oil along the shore of north Chennai came as a shock to the fishing villages, since the Port authorities had said that there was only a thin sheen from the ships and it would disappear soon.

• Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) visited Bharathiyar Nagar off Ernavur junction on the Ennore Expressway, where the spill was visible even in the evening.

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:: International ::

Judicial order stayed the deportation of people from seven countries

• A judicial order stayed the deportation of people from seven Muslim-majority countries who arrived in the U.S. after President Donald Trump barred their entry through an executive order.

• As the world watched Mr. Trump's move with dismay, protests erupted across America, particularly at airports where travellers were detained.

• The judicial order does not deal with the merit of the executive order issued by Mr. Trump that could be deemed unconstitutional as it effectively sanctions religious discrimination.

• The New York court order extends to all of America and provides relief to people in similar situations but at least three more similar court rulings were reported from other States by Saturday night.

• Earlier, Mr. Trump said the travel restrictions did not amount to a ban on Muslims.

• “It’s not a Muslim ban…very strict ban, and we’re going to have extreme vetting, which we should have had in this country for many years,” he said, as he signed  executive order, to prepare within 30 days a blueprint for defeating the IS.

:: Business and Economy ::

Finance Ministry has agreed to contribute to a new dedicated railway safety fund

• The Finance Ministry has agreed to contribute partially to a new dedicated railway safety fund in the upcoming Budget to be presented on February 1.

• Train derailments have increased to a six-year high of 74 till January 23 this year compared to 65 in 2015-16 and this may prompt the Railways to bring back a cess on railway tickets to fund safety efforts.

• Fund is proposed to be utilised for track improvement, bridge rehabilitation work, rolling stock replacement, human resource development, improved inspection system and safety work at level-crossings, among other things.

• The Railway Ministry had requested the Finance Ministry to create a ‘non-lapsable’ safety fund named ‘Rashtriya Rail Sanraksha Kosh’ over five years.

• However, the Finance Ministry is likely to grant a fresh infusion of only Rs. 5,000 crore in the upcoming financial year out of the initial proposed corpus of Rs. 20,000 crore.

• About Rs. 10,000 crore will likely be earmarked from the Central Road Fund (CRF) that is collected by levying a cess on diesel and petrol at present for safety-related work.

• The Railway Ministry, which was expecting an annual budgetary support of Rs. 20,000 crore over five years from the Finance Ministry for the proposed Rs. 1.19 lakh crore safety fund, may now be asked to fund the remaining Rs. 5,000 crore for the initial corpus from its own resources.

• Now, it may either have to bring back a cess on rail tickets to finance its share of Rail Safety Fund or look to fund it from non-budgetary resources.

• In 2001, when a Special Railway Safety Fund of Rs. 17,000 crore was created, the Railways raised Rs. 5,000 crore through safety surcharge on passenger fare and the remaining Rs. 12,000 crore came from the Finance Ministry.

• Back then, the Railways levied a fee of Rs. 1 for second-class ordinary trains and Rs. 2 for second-class Mail or Express trains, per person.

• For other classes, the surcharge on tickets had ranged between Rs. 10 and Rs. 100 depending on the class and distance of journey.

• The Railways had asked for ‘Rashtriya Rail Sanraksha Kosh’ to be set up based on the recommendations of a high-level safety review committee under former chairman Atomic Energy Commission Dr. Anil Kakodkar.

• The Committee, which submitted its report in 2012, had projected an investment requirement of Rs. 1 lakh crore on safety over five years.

• The Centre has so far fully implemented 22 out of 87 partially or fully accepted recommendations made by the panel.

First Budget without seperate railway budget

• The Indian Railways (IR) is a behemoth employing 1.3 million workmen, lifting more than 1 billion tonnes of freight annually and carrying 24 million passengers in its 12,000 passenger trains each day.

• Only a few railway systems in the world match or outdo these indices, but one factor that no other railway had matched was that the Indian Railways had its own budget - to be presented every year on the floor of the Parliament.

• At least this was the case until last year. 2017 will go down in history as the first year when the Rail Budget was subsumed in the General Budget.

• A separate rail budget has its genesis in the recommendations of the Acworth Committee of 1920, pointed out the need for unified management of the entire railway system.

• It recommended that “the Finance department should cease to control the internal finances of the railway, that the railway should have a separate budget of its own”

• This was considered necessary because the Railways’ revenues far outstripped the general revenue and had the potential of masking small yet important aberrations in the general budget of the Government of India, if presented together.

• In 1947, when Independence was achieved, railway revenues were still 6% more than the general revenue.

• The Railway Convention Committee headed by Sir Gopalaswamy Ayyangar recommended, “separation of Railway finances from General finance should continue”.

• A resolution to this effect was approved by the Constituent Assembly on December 21, 1949.

• The revised convention was to be effective for a period of five years starting 1950-51, but continued for 66 years, just as a few other constitutional provisions for language and reservation have enjoyed an extended life.

• By the 1970s, the size of rail revenues had shrunk and was about 30% the size of general revenues. By 2015-16 it was down to 11.5%. The writing was on the wall; only the Railway Board failed to read it.

• Could the Indian Railways have avoided this fate? It erred on two facets of its philosophy for growth. First and foremost was its penchant for subsidising the passenger fares from artificially jacked up freight rates.

• The non-AC fares have remained static for the past 12 years; this has been nothing short of suicidal. Freight rates now are at such high levels that road hauliers successfully compete with Railways on grounds of being cheaper.

• It is not surprising that the rail share in the overall freight kitty is down from 89% in 1950-51 to less than 30% in 2014-15.

• Secondly, the Railways themselves have been withdrawing from their core areas of operations and concentrating on peripheral items. They have withdrawn themselves from all urban transport activities.

• In the 1990s, if the IR had devised innovative solutions like forming Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) to catalyse construction of metro lines, both the people of India and the Railways would have benefited from it.

• Instead, in the 1990s, a situation was created, albeit unwittingly, which made transportation of petroleum products cheaper by pipeline.

• At that time, movement of petroleum products was the most profitable business for the Railways and it had a lion’s share of 75% in this sector. It is now down to 10%!

• It will be harsh to contend that a separate rail budget has not served the country well. In 1947, the same administration controlled the areas in the present day Pakistan and Bangladesh.

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:: Sports ::

Roger Federer wins his fifth Australian open

• Roger Federer was in tears as he won a thrilling, five-set Australian Open final against his great rival Rafael Nadal to clinch a record-extending 18th Grand Slam title.

• Federer won a classic, fluctuating encounter 6-4, 3-6, 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 in three hours 38 minutes to move four Major titles ahead of Nadal and Pete Sampras on the all-time winners’ list.

• After an astonishing comeback from six months out with injury, the Swiss became the oldest man in the post-1968 Open era to win a Major since Ken Rosewall at the 1972 Australian Open.

• It was Federer’s fifth Australian title in his sixth final, and ended a long, seven-year wait to win again in Melbourne after his 2010 triumph over Andy Murray.

• It was the 35th meeting between the two long-time rivals with Nadal now leading 23-12 and 6-3 in Major finals, including his five-set win over Federer in the 2009 Australian final.

• Federer becomes the first man in history to win five or more titles at three different Grand Slam events. He has won five Australian Opens, seven Wimbledons, five US Opens and one French Open.

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