Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 29 January 2016

:: National ::

Centre releases list of 20 cities for first phase of smart city plan

A new chapter in India’s urban history has started with the Smart Cities Mission finally taking some material shape.
Urban Development Minister announced the list of 20 cities that have qualified to build smart infrastructure with Rs. 200 crore each from the Central government’s first phase of funding.
The Ministry has given top rating to Bhubaneswar for its robust Smart City plan.
Urging the country’s mayors to “work hard” for the improvement of their municipalities, Mr. Naidu said the government would soon introduce the credit rating system for cities so as to attract foreign investors.
Every city should follow credit rating. Otherwise no one will come and invest from outside.
The government would grant every winning city a sum of Rs. 500 croreas “overall cache of start-up funds” and expects the State governments to provide an additional Rs. 500 crore.
According to mission guidelines, the total State and Central financial assistance for each smart city would be Rs. 1000 crore.
With an aim to achieve “inclusive growth”, the mission promotes integrated city planning, where the government’s policies such as Swachh Bharat Mission and Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation complement each other.
The Central government has created an outside agency named Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV), which will be head- ed by a CEO, and will be given powers to “execute” the proposed developments and projects.

Second volume of President Pranab Mukherjee’s memoirs The Turbulent years released

The second volume of President Pranab Mukherjee’s memoirs The Turbulent Years (1980-1996) was released, even as the President himself said that “some facts are to be buried with me”.
While admitting that there were many things that he had kept confidential in this volume of his memoirs.
President memoir says, the inability to prevent the demolition of the Babri Masjid was one of PV Narasimha Rao’s biggest failures.

Former Judge of Allahabad High court to inquire into Rohit Vemula suicide

The HRD Ministry appointed Ashok K. Roopanwal, a former judge of the Allahabad High Court, as the one-man commission of inquiry into the circumstances that led to the January 17 suicide of Hyderabad University research scholar Rohit Vemula.
The scholar had taken his life after the university’s executive council expelled him and four other students from the hostel. His death led to widespread protests by students nationwide.
The commission has also been asked to fix accountability in the context of the UGC guidelines, framed in 2012, which addressed discrimination at universities and colleges.
The UGC (Promotion of Equity in Higher Educational Institutions) Regulations, 2012, were drafted after two suicides in institutes of higher learning.
But the suicide among young students continued, leading to questions about the implementation of the rules.
In its report submitted on January 22, a two-member fact-finding committee, set up by the Ministry, faulted the university administration for failing to address the situation, leading to the suicide.
The students of the university have been on strike since the suicide of Vemula, demanding the resignation of Vice- Chancellor Appa Rao Podile and Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya.
The UGC notification deals with specific acts of discrimination on the basis of caste, creed, religion, language, ethnicity, gender, and disability.
And the guidelines have spelt out the mechanism to address discrimination on campuses.

IMD will issue block level forecasts from year end (Register and Login to read Full News..)

Retired Allahabad HC Judge Justice Sanjay Misra has been appointed as UP Lokayukta (Register and Login to read Full News..)

:: INTERNATIONAL ::

Zika virus spreading fast

The World Health Organization (WHO) expects the Zika virus, which is spreading through the Americas, to affect between three million and four million people.
The WHO’s director-general said the spread of the mosquito- borne disease had gone from a mild threat to one of alarming proportions.
There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika, which is a close cousin of dengue and chikungunya and causes mild fever, rash and red eyes.
An estimated 80 per cent of people infected have no symptoms, making it difficult for pregnant women to know whether they have been infected.
As of today, cases have been re- ported in 23 countries and territories in the [Americas] region.

Emerging economies gained more influence in IMF governance architecture (Register and Login to read Full News..)

:: BUSINESS and ECONOMY ::

All construction workers to be covered under social security schemes

The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has asked the labour ministry to ensure that all construction workers in the country are covered under social security schemes such as the Employees’ Provident Fund.
The biggest challenge in bringing millions of India’s construction workers under various welfare schemes is the seasonal and migrant nature of their job.
Most workers in the construction sector are semi-skilled or unskilled and work at sites across the country for spells of a few months at a time.
With low literacy levels, they are also prone to benefit cheating by employers or contractors they work with.
Every state collects cess on the cost of construction incurred by employers to form a fund to be utilised for welfare of construction workers.
Of the total cess of Rs 16,214 crore collected till December 2014, only Rs 2,859 crore, or a little over 17 per cent, has been spent as most states have failed to design any schemes to deploy these funds.
The matter (of covering construction workers) is being monitored at the highest level in government and this is an area flagged as one of utmost concern.
Thus it becomes imperative that this work is accorded top priority and taken up in right earnest, duly engaging all the stakeholders, including various trade unions and industry bodies.
To counter the issue of frequent changes in employer and location, the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation or EPFO has decided to register construction workers on the Universal Account Number (UAN) portal, thereby allocating them a universal number for easy transfer of PF funds while switching jobs.
The regional commissioners have been requested to organise meetings with public sector units, trade unions and visit big construction sites.
The EPFO has also asked them to hold meetings with state labour departments and to get in touch with the State Building and Construction Workers Board constituted by states to get the database of construction workers.