Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 04 November 2015

:: National ::

For the second day running, Congress president Sonia Gandhi met President Pranab Mukherjee to express her party's “grave concern” at the “growing atmosphere of fear, intolerance and intimidation being deliberately created by sections of the ruling establishment.”
This war of words comes days before the results of the Bihar Assembly elections in which the Congress — part of the Janata Dal-United-Rashtriya Janata Dal grand coalition — hopes the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance will face a defeat.
It also comes weeks ahead of Parliament's winter session which the Congress plans, along with other Opposition parties, to focus on the sustained campaign by Hindutva forces owing allegiance to the BJP to communalise the polity.

In a signal that it has no intention of giving up its offensive against the collegium system of judges appointing judges, the Union govern-governmentn Tuesday that nothing could stop Parliament from passing a new law to take the place of the recently struck down the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) Act and end the collegium's supremacy.
The government was responding to the Supreme Court's call for suggestions to better the collegium. “Nothing in these suggestions should be construed as ‘estopping' [preventing] Parliament or the Union of India from exercising such power in the first place,” Mr. Rohatgi said.
Mr. Rohatgi pointedly said the Centre was participating [in the proceedings] solely because it shared the com-mon feeling with the Bench that the collegium required reforms.

U.S. Defence Secretary Ashton Carter on Tuesday told his Chinese counterpart Chang Wanquan that the American military would continue to operate in the South China Sea.
With tensions still simmer-ing following a U.S. naval vessel’s cruise near China-claimed islets last week, the pair met for about 40 minutes on the sidelines of a regional defence meeting.
The ship had sailed within 12 nautical miles of at least one of the land formations China claims in the disputed Spratly Islands.

An international agency has been proposed to help represent the small tea growers' sector, which currently contributes about 70 per cent of the world tea crop. Efforts are also on to find ways to directly market small tea growers' produce.
The 11-member Indian delegation was led by Santosh Kumar Sarengi, chairman, Tea Board India. It also included a member represent-ing the interests of India's small tea growers. The need for an international body for small tea growers was brought to the fore by quite a few tea-growing countries including India, Sri Lanka, Kenya and Indonesia.
These countries have among them a small tea holders' group with representatives of the respective governments and the industry. The contribution from this segment of the tea indus-try is highest in Sri Lanka and Kenya.

London Games bronze medallist Yogesh-war Dutt pipped double Olympic medallist and World champion, Sushil Kumar, to become the highest-paid marquee player at Rs. 39.7 lakh in the Pro Wrestling League auction.
The league, with a total cash prize of Rs. 3 crore and a Rs. 20 crore budget for the players, will be staged in six cities — Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Ludhiana, Gurgaon and Noida from December 10 to 27.
In all, over 150 Indian and international wrestlers went under the hammer in the auction conducted by Bob Hayton.