(FREE) UPSC Current Affairs 2024 PDF

Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 03 June 2016

:: NATIONAL ::

Five protesters and two policemen, including an SP-rank officer, were killed and over 40 injured in clashes during an eviction drive in Mathura district.
The clashes broke out when the police were trying to evict illegal occupants of a land in Jawahar Bagh, believed to be activists of Azad Bharat Vidhik Vaicharik Kranti Satyagrahi, on the directions of the Allahabad High Court.
SP (City) Mukul Dwivedi and SHO Farah police station Santosh Kumar were killed in firing by the encroachers.

Have an opinion about the NDA government that you would like to share with Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself?
More than 15,000 people have already done so on MyGov.in, a portal run by the government of India, and much like your Friday matinee, ratings have been solicited by the PM on 15 of his pet projects.
At the end of these responses, (and they are there for anyone who logs on to MyGov.in to see), the scores on just what and whose work makes the cut in the government is telling.
Ranking right there at the top, with an average of 4.6 stars are the initiatives taken by the government on rail connectivity and modernisation, so hurray for Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu.
Following closely in the list of above average work are the initiatives on roads and highways; they score an average of 4.55 stars.
Number three is the work of a Minister who was conspicuous by her absence (due to ill-health) from the second anniversary: External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj. Her Ministry’s work gets an average of 4.5 star rating.
Make in India, and initiatives in the power sector are the next two popular areas of government work. Each scored an average of 4.2 stars.

The official committee on constitutional reforms in Sri Lanka has not been able to arrive at a consensus while making recommendations on several contentious areas such as the nature of state, religion, merger of provinces and land powers.
Despite this, the 20-member committee has come up with an exhaustive Bill of Rights and provisions for curtailment of powers of the office of Governor, a subject that has been of great interest to the Northern and Eastern Provinces.
It covers 32 types of rights, ranging from right to life (not included in the 1978 Constitution) to freedom of religion to rights of people with diverse sexual and gender identities.
In many ways, views of the committee also presented a microcosm of diversities of views and positions in society.
On the issue of religion, the committee points out that despite the existing constitutional position of providing Buddhism “the foremost place”, the Supreme Court has called Sri Lanka a “secular State”.
The committee is also for retaining the present national flag or designing one without any reference to ethnicity, while representing Sri Lankan collective life, or framing a new flag symbolising the equality of all ethnic groups.
Terming the merger of the Northern and Eastern provinces as “the most controversial”, the committee makes six recommendations.
One of them is for allowing the current structure of nine provinces with constitutional provisions for power- sharing.

U.S. Defence Secretary Ashton Carter arrived in Singapore ahead of a regional security summit likely to be dominated by China’s continued military build up in the South China Sea.
His attendance at this weekend’s Shangri-La Dialogue is part of a broader U.S. diplomatic push to build and maintain alliances in the Asia-Pacific region, which America sees as key to its own long-term economic and security interests.
In the year since the last summit, China has stepped up its maritime patrols across the South China Sea and built up a series of military bases on small islands it reclaimed from the ocean.
Mr. Carter has spoken forcefully about China’s military moves in the South China Sea and last week said Beijing risked building a “Great Wall of self-isolation”.
China has indicated it may soon declare an Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) that would require civilian aircraft to identify themselves to military controllers in the region.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has told commercial banks to ‘immediately’ put in place a cyber security policy, duly approved by the board, in the wake of increasing cyber attacks in the financial system.
The policy would also include setting up an adaptive incident response, management and recovery framework to deal with adverse incidents/disruptions, if and when they occur, according to the central bank.
“There is an urgent need to bring the board of directors and top management in banks up to speed on cyber-security related aspects, where necessary and hence banks are advised to take immediate steps in this direction,” according to the statement.
Banks have been asked to formulate a Cyber Crisis Management Plan (CCMP) which should be a part of the overall board-approved strategy.
“CCMP should address the following four aspects—Detection, Response, Recovery and Containment.”
The central bank has observed that with the use of technology by banks gaining momentum, the number, frequency and impact of cyber incidents/attacks had increased manifold in the recent past.
The regulator has emphasised that the cyber security policy should be distinct and separate from the broader IT policy/IS Security policy so that it can highlight the risks from cyber threats and the measures to address or mitigate these risks.
The Reserve Bank of India said it had observed banks were hesitant to share information on cyber security-related incidents.

Government plans to set up 250 small agro-processing clusters at an estimated cost of over Rs.5,000 crore, Food Processing Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal said.
After getting required approvals, the Food Processing Ministry will invite expressions of interest from public and private players.

Sources: Various News Papers & PIB

NEW! UPSC IAS COMPLETE NOTES