Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 04 November 2014

National

Delhi appears headed for fresh assembly election

• Delhi appears headed for a mid-term Assembly election after all the major political parties — the BJP, Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) — expressed their inability to form a government.
• Lt. Governor Najeeb Jung is likely to send a report to the President recommending dissolution of the Assembly, ending the eight-month-long political uncertainty. The Assembly has been in suspended animation ever since President’s Rule was imposed in mid-February.
• Mr. Jung had called the political parties for a consultation to explore the possibility of government formation. In separate meetings with him, all the three parties said they do not have the numbers to form a new government and sought fresh polls.
• Top BJP sources said the party had taken “an in-principle” decision not to take a shot at government formation and the Central leadership had already conveyed to the Delhi unit to start preparations for fresh polls. “The party has decided to decline any offer of government formation. We will prefer going to the polls,” a senior party leader in Delhi said.
• Delhi BJP president Satish Upadhyay and senior leader Jagdish Mukhi met the L-G in the morning and are understood to have conveyed the party’s view on the political situation. With 31 seats, the BJP had emerged as the single largest party in the elections last December, falling four short of a simple majority.

Mauritius offers help on black money issue

• Mauritius, often accused of being a route for round-tripping of funds by Indians, conveyed to India that it was ready to support its Special Investigation Team (SIT) to unearth black money.
• This was conveyed to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj by Minister of Foreign Affairs, Regional Integration and International Trade, Arvin Boolell, during a meeting, an External Affairs Ministry spokesperson said.
• Mr. Boolell said Mauritius would take measures to ensure it remains a “jurisdiction of repute,” he said. Mauritius used to be the biggest gateway for flow of funds into India through FDI as well as FII routes, but its position has come down.
• It recently slipped to the second place after the U.S. in terms of quantum of money being brought in by overseas investors into Indian markets.
• According to the SEBI, Mauritius accounted for Rs. 3.31 lakh crore worth ‘assets under custody’ of foreign institutional investors in the Indian equity and debt markets at the end of 2013, as against over Rs. 4.37 lakh crore in the case of the U.S.
• Fund flows from Mauritius have fallen amid concerns about suspected money laundering, even though the Indian Ocean island nation has been consistently denying such allegations.
• Round-tripping is usually referred to routing of domestic investments through Mauritius to take advantage of the Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) between the two countries.

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International

World Trade Center reopens after 9/11 attack

• Thirteen years after the 9/11 terrorist attack, the resurrected World Trade Center is again opening for business marking an emotional milestone for both New Yorkers and the United States as a whole.
• Publishing giant Conde Nast will start moving into One World Trade Center, a 104-story, $3.9 billion skyscraper that dominates the Manhattan skyline. It is America’s tallest building. It’s the centerpiece of the 16-acre site where the decimated twin towers once stood and where more than 2,700 people died on Sept. 11, 2001, buried under smoking mounds of fiery debris.
• “The New York City skyline is whole again, as One World Trade Center takes its place in Lower Manhattan,” said Patrick Foye, executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey that owns both the building and the World Trade Center site.
• With construction fences gone and boxes of office equipment in place, Conde Nast CEO Chuck Townsend planned to walk into what Foye calls “the most secure office building in America.”
• Only about 170 of his company’s 3,400 employees are moving in now, filling five floors of the tower, said Patricia Rockenwagner, a Conde Nast vice president and spokeswoman. About 3,000 more will arrive by early 2015.
• The building is 60-percent leased, with another 80,000 square feet going to the advertising firm Kids Creative, the stadium operator Legends Hospitality, the BMB Group investment adviser, and Servcorp, a provider of executive offices.

Persons in news

Dr. Manmohan Singh chosen for Japan national award

• Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been chosen for one of Japan’s top national awards for his contribution to India-Japan ties, becoming the first Indian to receive the rare honour.
• Dr. Singh will be awarded ‘The Grand Cordon of the Order of the Paulownia Flowers’ for his “significant contribution to the enhancement of relations and promotion of friendship” between Japan and India for about 35 years, a Japanese Embassy statement said.
• It is a “high level National Order” and a rare honour awarded to those who are recognised for their distinguished contribution, it said, adding “Manmohan Singh is the first Indian recipient of this Order.”
• Dr. Singh said he was truly honoured and felt “humbled by the love and affection showered upon me by the people and government of Japan.”
• He said it had been his dream to see India-Japan relationship grow and prosper and “this is an objective towards which I have worked, not only in my tenure as the Prime Minister of India, but across the larger part of my career in public service.”
• Dr.Singh, who served as the Prime Minister for 10 years from 2004, said he was heartened to witness today the transformation in India-Japan relations into a durable partnership.
• He is among 57 foreign recipients named for the 2014 Autumn Imperial Decorations.

Business & economy

Indian ‘E-commerce business will take time to evolve’

• Indian e-commerce business is in a `euphoria phase’ now and business models will take time to evolve, a top official from Reliance Retail Limited said.
• “The business models will evolve in the next 12-18 months. It has to come through trial and error,” Damodar Mall, CEO of Value Format at Reliance Retail Limited, said speaking at the sidelines of TiECON Chennai recently.
• Indian ecommerce industry has gained a lot of action with billions of dollars poured into the sector.
• It has attracted global honchos such as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, who is investing $2 billion in India, and Japanese Internet baron Masayoshi Son’s Softbank, which recently invested in Snapdeal. Flipkart raised $1 billion recently.
• Mr. Mall said that modern retail was only around 25 per cent even in metro markets. “There is lot of scope still to grow the retail supermarket format,” he added.
• Mall did not want to disclose Reliance plan for e-commerce. Reportedly, Reliance Retail is working on a pilot for its e-commerce foray.
• Mr. Mall joins Future Group chief Kishore Biyani, who had expressed similar views about Indian e-commerce last week. Biyani had said the euphoria in Indian ecommerce would last 6-18 months.

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Science & technology

Google announced the creation of an ILIA to promote Indian languages

• Google announced the creation of an Indian Language Internet alliance (ILIA), in partnership with various content providers, to make available local language content on the Internet with an aim to bring 300 million Indians online by 2017.
• Content providers include media houses such as ABP News, NDTV and Network 18, government agency C-DAC, and firms like Firstouch, LinguaNext Technologies, among others.
• “The ILIA will be critical to make Internet useful to all Indian users and not just English speaking Indians. Through this initiative we hope to enable 300 million Indian language users to become highly engaged Internet users by 2017,” Google India Vice-President and Managing Director Rajan Anandan said.
• India has about 200 million Internet users with about 5 million new users being added every month and 100 per cent of these coming through mobile devices. However, only 198 million people in the country are estimated to be proficient in English, with most of them already on the Internet, he said.
• The Alliance will work together to accelerate building Indian language content for Indians who will come online for the very first time, mostly via smart phones and mobile devices.
• As a part of its efforts, Google showcased demos of voice search in Hindi and launched a website, www.hindiweb.com, to help Hindi-speaking Internet users discover Hindi content across websites, apps, videos and blogs.

Sports

Lewis Hamilton wins US Grand Prix

• Race by race and point by point, Lewis Hamilton is tightening his grip on the Formula One world championship and squeezing out Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg.
• “This whole season has been incredible,” Hamilton said after playfully taking former world champion Mario Andretti’s black Stetson cowboy hat on the winner’s podium. “I pushed as hard as I could.”
• Mercedes had another 1-2 finish in a dominating season that has pushed Hamilton and Rosberg well clear of the pack in the title chase. Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo was third for his eighth podium finish on the season.
• Rosberg could still find a way to steal the title from Hamilton. Formula One moves to Brazil next weekend and the final race in Abu Dhabi will be worth double points in a rule change this season.
• “Full attack,” Rosberg said. “We’ll try to be on the pole and win (in Brazil). There’s a lot of points to be had.” “We’re hunting for those points. So far, I’ve done what I’ve needed to do. I should continue to do the same,” Hamilton said.
• The Mercedes drivers have waged a season-long duel for the title, a tense back-and-forth that has strained their long friendship, and Sunday’s race was more of the same.
• Rosberg started from pole position and Hamilton chased him for 23 laps, steadily keeping up the pressure and slowing gaining on him. Hamilton finally made his move on lap 24, squeezing inside Rosberg’s left on the tight 12th turn out of the long straightaway.
• It was the same spot and a similar move to Hamilton’s pass of Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel that propelled him to the victory here in 2012.