Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 17 January 2023

::NATIONAL::

National Digital University 

• UGC chief recently revealed the framework of the Nat-ional Digital University (NDU), as envisioned under the National Education Policy, 2020. 

How will the university be structured?

• The university will offer exclusively online courses from its partner institutes, which could be both private and public universities, so far as they follow the NDU’s model. 
• The institution will function under a hub-and-spoke model, which is where one product is delivered to various stakeholders from a central location. 
• In this model, courses are to be made accessible to students from one portal. 
• In this case, it is the Study Webs of Active-Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM) portal of the government.
• The students can opt for certificate, diploma, ordegree courses.

How will academic credit be granted?

• Students will be granted the liberty to sign up for whichever courses they like, which, in essence, means that they will be free to design their own curriculum. 
• Courses will hold a certain number of credits, and students will be eligible for a degree from a particular institute when they have accumulated 50% of the credits of a programme from the institute concerned. 
• In case the student earns credits from multiple institutions and crosses the credit threshold, the degree awarded will be by NDU.
• NDU will also be connected with the Academic Bank of Credits, which means that students will have the option of earning credits from multiple institutions and will have multiple exit points throughout the course. Based on the same, they can be awarded certificates, diplomas, or degrees.

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Tharu people

• Forest department, NABARD to give skill-development training to Tharu people.
• Forest officials of the Katarniaghat division say a plan is in the works for the financial inclusion of the Tharu groups that live near the Katarniaghat Wildlife Sanctuary (KWS) and are much affected by human-wildlife conflicts.

About:

• They are an ethnic group indigenous to the Terai region of the Himalayan foothills, located in southern Nepal and in the state of Uttar Pradesh in India.
• Tharu in Nepal officially numbered about 1.5 million and those in India about 170,000.
• They speak various dialects of Tharu, a language of the Indo-Aryan subgroup of the Indo-Iranian group of the Indo-European family, and they are largely Indian in culture.
• Most Tharu practice agriculture, raise cattle, hunt, fish, and collect forest products.
• Although they are Hindu, the Tharu use their own traditional ritual specialists in addition to the Hindu Brahman priests.
• Each Tahru village is governed by a council and a headman.

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::INTERNATIONAL::

Varuna Exercise

• The 21st Edition of the Bilateral Naval Exercise between India and France – Exercise Varuna commenced on the Western Seaboard recently. 

About:

• It is the Bilateral Naval Exercise between India and France.
• This bilateral exercise between the two navies was initiated in 1993.
• It was named ‘VARUNA’ in 2001 and has become a hallmark of India France strategic bilateral relationship.
• This edition will witness the participation of indigenous guided missile stealth destroyer INS Chennai, guided missile frigate INS Teg, maritime patrol aircraft P-8I and Dornier, integral helicopters and MiG29K fighter aircraft.
• The French Navy will be represented by the aircraft carrier Charles De Gaulle, frigates FS Forbin and Provence, support vessel FS Marne and maritime patrol aircraft Atlantique.
• Units of both navies will endeavour to hone their war-fighting skills in maritime theatre, enhance their inter-operability to undertake multi-discipline operations in the maritime domain and demonstrate their ability as an integrated force to promote peace, security and stability in the region.

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Wagner Group of Mercenaries

• The leader of the Wagner Group of mercenaries is using the Russian assault on the Donetsk town of Soledar to “elevate his political stature and indirectly criticize the conventional Russian military,” according to an update published by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW).

About:

• The Wagner Group also known as PMC Wagneris a Russian paramilitary organization.
• It is variously described as a private military company (PMC), a network of mercenaries, or a de facto private army of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
• The group operates beyond the law in Russia, where private military contractors are officially forbidden.
• The group came to global prominence during the war in Donbas in Ukraine, where it aided separatist forces of the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics from 2014 to 2015.
• Today there are thought to be some 10,000 Wagner Group members.
• The U.S. government has called Wagner a “proxy force” of Russia’s defense ministry.

::Economy::

Special Assistance to States for Capital Investment Scheme

• The Union Government will give an additional ₹2,000 crore to States under the Special Assistance for Capital Investment scheme to incentivise them to scrap old vehicles and also provide tax concessions to individuals for it.

About:

• The government in 2022-23 Budget had introduced the ‘Special Assistance to States for Capital Investment’ scheme with an outlay of ₹1.05 lakh crore. 
• Under the scheme, financial assistance is being provided to State Governments in the form of 50-year interest free loan for capital projects.
• To avail the benefit for investments made this fiscal, states will have to submit details like name of the project, capital outlay, completion period and its economic justification to the expenditure department of the Union finance ministry.
• The loan provided under the scheme will be over and above the normal borrowing ceiling allowed to the States.
• Scheme allocation will be used for PM Gati Shakti related and other productive capital investmentof the States.
• The scheme also includes ₹ 5,000 crore interest-free loans which would be provided to incentivise states to undertake privatization or disinvestment of state public sector enterprises and asset monetisation.

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::SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY::

Solitary Wave

• A research team from the Indian Institute of Geomagnetism (IIG), an autonomous institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), has recently identified and reported the solitary waves in the Martian magnetosphere.

About:

• Solitary waves are the distinct electric field fluctuations (bipolar or monopolar) that follow constant amplitude-phase relations. 
• Their shape and size are less affected during their propagation. The magnitude and duration of these pulses are found to be 1-25 milivolt/meter and 0.2–1.7 milliseconds, respectively. 
• These pulses are dominantly seen in the dawn and afternoon-dusk sectors at an altitude of 1000–3500 km around the Mars. 
• The dominant occurrence of solitary waves in the dawn and dusk sector is still a mystery and needs further investigation. Through simulations, it is found that the spatial extent of these structures is very small (30-330 meters). 
• As these waves are known to be responsible for the plasma energization and its transport in Earth’s magnetosphere, the team is further exploring their role in the particle dynamics in the Martian magnetosphere and whether such waves play any role in the loss of atmospheric ions on the Mars.  

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