Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 12 June 2021

::NATIONAL::

Ministry of Labour and Employment announced that the ESIC would extend benefits of its health insurance cover to all casual and contractual workers at municipal bodies.
ESIC is a statutory corporate body set up under the ESI Act 1948, which is responsible for the administration of the ESI Scheme.
ESI scheme is a self-financed comprehensive social security scheme devised to protect the employees covered under the scheme against financial distress arising out of events of sickness, disablement or death due to employment injuries.

Union Education Minister has released the All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) 2019-20 report.

According to the report, there has been a significant shift in the choice of the discipline of study, as in the last five years engineering and technology registered a negative growth (-13.4), while medical science enrolment has been up by 51.1% in the same period.
The enrolment in higher education stands at 3.85 crores in 2019-20 as compared to 3.74 crores in 2018-19, registering a growth of 11.36 lakh (3.04 %).
Total enrolment was 3.42 crore in 2014-15. (GER) of students belonging to the eligible age group enrolled in higher education in 2019-20 is 27.1% against 26.3% in 2018-19 and 24.3% in 2014-2015.
Gender too indicates an improvement in the relative access to higher education for females of the eligible age group compared to males with 1.01 in 2019-20 as against 1.00 in 2018-19.
Discipline-wise while enrolment in arts/ humanities/ social science has registered 0.4% growth in the last five years, science (13.5%) and commerce (8.5%) on the other hand have found more takers. Enrolment in IT and computer courses too registered a growth of 4.2% in the last five years.

Indian-origin journalist Megha Rajagopalan has won the US' top journalism award, the Pulitzer Prize, for innovative investigative reports harnessing satellite technology that exposed China's mass detention camps for Muslim Uighurs and other minority ethnicites.
The award in the international reporting category that she shared with two colleagues from an internet media, BuzzFeed News, was announced on Friday by the Pulitzer Board.
Another journalist of Indian-origin, Neil Bedi, won a Pulitzer in the local reporting category for investigative stories he wrote with an editor at the Tampa Bay Times exposing the misuse of authority by a law enforcement official in Florida to track children.
This is the 105th year of the Pulitzer Prizes awarded by a board at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism in New York recognising the outstanding work.

The New Atlantic Charter is an agreement that was signed by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson and the President of the United States Joe Biden on 10 June 2021.

The agreement was signed at the first face-to-face meeting between Johnson and Biden at the 2021 G7 Summit in Cornwall, England.
The agreement is a new version of the Atlantic Charter, signed by Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1941.

To defend the principles and institutions of democracy and open societies
To strengthen and adapt the institutions, laws and norms that sustain international co-operation
To remain united behind principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity and peaceful resolution of disputes
To harness and protect the countries' innovative edge in science and technology
To affirm the shared responsibility to maintain collective security and international stability, including against cyber threats; and to declare the countries' nuclear deterrents to the defence of NATO.
To continue building an inclusive, fair, climate-friendly, sustainable, rules-based economy.
To prioritise climate change in all international action
To commit to continuing to collaborate to strengthen health systems and advance health protections.

Discovered Small Field (DSF) bid round-III for international competitive bidding was launched at an event chaired by Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

The government had launched the DSF policy in 2015 for awarding discovered acreages and monetising the non monetised discoveries.
The DSF policy has features like revenue sharing contract model with low regulatory burden, no minimum biddable work programme, no prior technical qualification required, no upfront signature bonus, etc.
In DSF Round-I launched in 2016, 134 bids were submitted for 34 contract areas by 47 companies. In all, 30 revenue sharing contracts were signed.
In DSF Round-II launched in 2018, 145 bids were submitted for 24 contract areas, and 24 revenue sharing contracts were signed.

Scientists with the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) Collaboration, have assembled the largest collection of fast radio bursts (FRBs) in the telescope’s first FRB catalogue.

It is an interferometric radio telescope.
It is located in British Columbia, Canada.
It consists of four antennas consisting of 100 x 20 metre cylindrical parabolic reflectors with 1024 dual-polarization radio receivers suspended on a support above them.
The antenna receives radio waves from hydrogen in space at frequencies in the 400–800 MHz range.