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Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 11 December 2020

::NATIONAL::

PM Modi emphasised over making of Aatmanirbhar Bharat

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, India will not allow its “flood of opportunities” to go waste, with indicating the growing potential for India in a post-Covid world order.
The PM also emphasised that no force can stop the making of Aatmanirbhar Bharat and that debates and discussions must continue in Indian democracy both inside and outside Parliament, as he laid the foundation stone of the new Parliament building here.
Observers feel that PM hinted about utilising the growing opportunities for India as the world looks forward to a post-Covid scenario with the arrival of vaccines.
He also invoked Guru Nanak to say that you speak sometimes and you listen at other times, as long as life continues.
The PM also emphasised that the responsibility of his government is to uphold democracy while all its policies are aimed at “nation first”.
He also cited evidence of democratic systems and writings in ancient India, much before Magna Carta, to say that “One day, the world will recognise India as the mother of democracy.”
PM said, the new building would not only give more facilities to lawmakers and inspire them to work more, but will be a witness to Aatmanirbhar Bharat, fulfilling aspirations of a 21st century India.

Urban Governance Index

According to Urban Governance Index (UGI), Odisha has topped all Indian states in urban governance while Manipur and Nagaland areat the bottom.

About:

It was recently released by the Praja Foundation.he Praja Foundation said the study for the Urban Governance Index 2020 conducted over three years (2017-2020) in 40 cities across 28 states as well as the NCT of Delhi.
It comprised 1,568 interviews, 20 state-level consultations, one regional consultation and a national-level consultation with key stakeholders such as elected city representatives.
UGI ranks states to indicate where they stand in terms of real empowerment of grassroot democracy and local self-government.
Index showed that no state has devolved the 18 functions mentioned in the 12th Schedule (deals withMunicipalities) of the Constitution to their city governments.

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::INTERNATIONAL::

First rail link between Iran and Afghanistan

The leaders of Iran and Afghanistan inaugurated the first railway link between the two countries. This expressing hope it would enhance trade links across the region.
The 140-kilometer (90-mile) line running from eastern Iran into western Afghanistan will eventually be expanded by 85 kilometers to reach the Afghan city of Herat, providing a crucial transport link for the landlocked country, where decades of war have hindered infrastructure development.
The $75 million project began in 2007, with Iran funding construction on both sides of the border as part of its development assistance to Afghanistan.
Iran hopes to transform itself into a regional transport hub, allowing Afghanistan and other landlocked Asian countries to transport goods to its ports on the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.
Iran already has rail links with Turkmenistan, Pakistan and Turkey.

World carbon dioxide emissions drop 7 per cent during pandemic

New preliminary figures show that, a locked-down pandemic-struck world cut its carbon dioxide emissions this year by 7%.
The Global Carbon Project, an authoritative group of dozens of international scientists who track emissions, calculated that the world will have put 37 billion U.S. tons (34 billion metric tons) of carbon dioxide in the air in 2020.
The study published in the journal Earth System Science Data.
Scientists say this drop is chiefly because people are staying home, traveling less by car and plane, and that emissions are expected to jump back up after the pandemic ends. Ground transportation makes up about one-fifth of emissions of carbon dioxide, the chief man-made heat-trapping gas.
The same group of scientists months ago predicted emission drops of 4% to 7%, depending on the progression of COVID-19. A second coronavirus wave and continued travel reductions pushed the decrease to 7%.
Emissions dropped 12% in the United States and 11% in Europe, but only 1.7% in China.
The calculations based on reports detailing energy use, industrial production and daily mobility counts were praised as accurate by outside scientists.

Economy

Centre left with mere 10% NREGA funds as scheme sees 243% jump in Corona times

In Covid pandemic time, the Central government has made a record payment to MG-NREGA workers, the world’s biggest job guarantee scheme, in the financial year 2020-21.
It resulting in the rural development ministry being left with 10% of the total funds to be spent on the scheme in the remaining four months of the current fiscal year, shows government data.
The rural development ministry, MG-NREGA scheme, was provided with Rs 84,900 crore for the current financial year by the finance ministry in two instalments. Of this amount, the ministry data shows, Rs 76, 800 crore has already been spent. In comparison, till November 2019, the ministry had spent about Rs 50,000 crore on the scheme.
According to MG-NREGA tracker said the huge expenditure on the scheme was on account of 10 million more households getting work under the MG-NREGA this year (till November), 243% increase in person days (work) generated and higher wage paid to workers as compared to previous years. The total active job cards this year was 90.2 million and of them, 83.09% sought work,” the tracker prepared by People Action for Employment Guarantee (PAEG).
The higher demand for MG-NREGA work was because of close to 20 million workers returning to their villages from cities after the Central government announced nation-wide lockdown on March 24. Although the demand peaked in the month of May, it slowed down in subsequent months as workers from poorer states such as Odisha, Bihar and Jharkhand started returning to cities for work.
The report said the average work provided to individual households was less than the previous years.
The report also said that around 13% of the 75 million households, who demand work, got no work. “The data shows that there was a surge for NREGA work demand due to the pandemic and the government failed to meet the demand,” the report said.

Science and Technology

Quantum key distributiontechnology

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) successfully demonstrated communication between its two labs using Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) technology, which is a “robust” way to share encryption keys, said an official statement.
In the QKD technology, encryption keys are sent as qubits in a fibre optic cable. Quantum computing uses qubits as basic resources, similar to how bits are used as basic resources in classical computing.
The QKD is designed in a way that if an illegitimate entity tries to read the transmission, it will disturb the qubits - which are encoded on photons - and this will generate transmission errors, leading to legitimate end users being immediately informed.
The Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) and The Research Centre Imarat (RCI) were the two labs that participated in this demonstration.
“Quantum Communication using the time-bin QKD scheme was performed under realistic conditions. The setup also demonstrated the validation of detection of a third party trying to gain knowledge of the communication.
• Time-bin encoding is used to encode qubit on a photon.

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Sports

Paris Olympic Games 2024

Skateboarding, sport climbing, surfing and breaking (breakdancing) were confirmed as additional sportsproposed by the Paris 2024 Organising Committee.
Surfing, skateboarding and sport climbing are also part of next year’s Tokyo Games.
It is aimed to make the Games more gender balanced, more youthful and more urban.
It will help to refresh the sports program in a bid to remain relevant to sponsors, broadcasters and younger fans.