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Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 13 July 2020

::NATIONAL::

The Supreme Court, in a significant decision, confirmed that persons with disabilities are also socially backward and entitled to the same benefits of relaxation as Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe candidates in public employment and education.
A three-judge Bench led by Justice RohintonNariman upheld a 2012 judgment of the Delhi High Court in AnamolBhandari (minor) through his father/Natural Guardian v. Delhi Technological University.
“In AnamolBhandari, the High Court has correctly held that people suffering from disabilities are also socially backward, and are therefore, at the very least, entitled to the same benefits as given to the Scheduled Caste/ Scheduled Tribe candidates,” the Supreme Court held in a judgment on July 8.
The decision by the Justice Nariman Bench came on a petition by Aryan Raj, a special needs person represented by senior advocate Colin Gonsalves, and advocate Rajan Mani, against the Government College of Arts, Chandigarh. The college denied Mr. Raj relaxation in minimum arks in the Painting and Applied Art course.

The National Intelligence Grid has signed anMoU with the National Crime Records Bureau to access the centralised online database on FIRs and stolen vehicles.
First conceptualised in 2009, NATGRID seeks to become the one-stop destination for security and intelligence agencies to access database related to immigration entry and exit, banking and telephone details of a suspect on a “secured platform”. The project aims to go live by December 31.
The MoU, signed in March, will give NATGRID access to the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems database, a platform that links around 14,000 police stations.

Finance Minister NirmalaSitharaman reviewed the implementation of AatmaNirbhar Bharat Package pertaining to Ministries of Finance and Corporate Affairs.
The government has decided that Global tenders will be disallowed in Government procurement tenders up to Rs 200 crore. In the review it was decided that no Global Tender Enquiry (GTE) shall be invited for tenders uptoRs 200 crore, unless prior approval is obtained from Cabinet Secretariat.
Giving relief to contractors, it was announced that all central agencies like Railways, Ministry of Road Transport and Highways and Central Public Works Department will give extension of up to 6 months for completion of contractual obligations, including in respect of EPC and concession agreements.
The Finance Minister announced that the Centre has decided to accede to the request and increase borrowing limits of States from 3 per cent to 5 per cent for 2020-21 only in view of the unprecedented situation. This will give States extra resources of Rs 4,28,000crore.

Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar on Friday released new operational guidelines for setting up and promotion of 10,000 FPOs in the country. A Farmer Producer Organisation (FPO), formed by a group of farm producers, is a registered body with producers as shareholders of the organisation.
It deals with business activities related to farm produce and works for the benefit of member producers.The guidelines were released by Tomar during a meeting with agriculture ministers of states through video conferencing.
A total of 10,000 FPOs are to be formed in the country by 2023-24 and each FPO will be supported for five years. About Rs 6,866 crore will be spent for this purpose, an official statement quoted Tomar as saying in the meeting.

The US remained India's top trading partner for the second consecutive fiscal in 2019-20, which shows increasing economic ties between the two countries. According to the data of the commerce ministry, in 2019-20, the bilateral trade between the US and India stood at USD 88.75 billion as against USD 87.96 billion in 2018-19.
The US is one of the few countries with which India has a trade surplus. The trade gap between the countries has increased to USD 17.42 billion in 2019-20 from USD 16.86 billion in 2018-19, the data showed.
The bilateral trade between India and China has dipped to USD 81.87 billion in 2019-20 from USD 87.08 billion in 2018-19. Trade deficit between the two neighbours have declined to USD 48.66 billion in 2019-20 from USD 53.57 billion in the previous fiscal.
The data also showed that China was India's top trading partner since 2013-14 till 2017-18. Before China, UAE was the country's largest trading nation.
India is also considering certain steps like framing technical regulations and quality control orders for host of items with a view to cut import dependence on China and boost domestic manufacturing.
India is seeking relaxation in US visa regime, exemption from high duties imposed by the US on certain steel and aluminium products, and greater market access for its products from sectors such as agriculture, automobile, automobile components and engineering.

India recorded a staggering 1.2 million snakebite deaths in the 20-year period from 2000 to 2019 with an average of 58,000 deaths caused by snakebite annually. Around 70% of these deaths occurred in low altitude, rural areas of eight States — Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Rajasthan and Gujarat.
The study, conducted by the Centre for Global Health Research (CGHR) at the University of Toronto, Canada, with Indian and U.K. partners, also points out that half of all the snakebite deaths occurred during the monsoon period from June to September. The study said that snakebite deaths occurred mostly in rural areas (97%), were more common in males (59%) than females (41%), and peaked in the age group of 15-29 years (25%).
In the largest ever such survey published in 2011 and titled ‘Snakebite Mortality in India: A Nationally Representative Mortality Survey’, researchers of the Million Death Study project estimated 46,000 annual snakebite deaths in India. The World Health Organization (WHO) recognises snakebite as a top-priority neglected tropical disease.

ViditGujrathi (right, with Anand) was on Sunday named captain of the Indian team that will take part in the Online Chess Olympiad 2020, scheduled to begin on July 22.
The India No.2 was nominated skipper in consultation with teammate ViswanathanAnand and the AICF selection committee.