Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 15 March 2021

::NATIONAL::

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has announced a new scheme, under which any tourist vehicle operator may apply for an "All India Tourist Authorization/Permit" through online mode.
The permit will be issued after the submission of relevant documents and fees within 30 days of submission of such applications and the new set of rules will be applicable from April 1.
The new set of rules, to be known as All India Tourist Vehicles Authorization and Permit Rules, 2021.
The new rules for permits are expected to go a long way in promoting tourism across the states in our country, while simultaneously, growing the revenue of state governments.
The step was discussed in the 39th and 40th Transport Development Council meetings and was appreciated and concurred to by participants from the states.
The rules come even as the Ministry is in the pursuit of providing seamless movement to tourist passenger vehicles, after the success of goods carriage vehicles under National Permit Regime.
The scheme allows flexibility in the form of authorization/permit being granted, for a period of three months or its multiples thereof, not exceeding three years at a time.
This provision has been incorporated keeping in mind those areas of our country where there is a limited season of tourism and also for those operators who have limited financial capacity.

The CPI(M) Polit Bureau called the Supreme Court notice to the government seeking a response on the PIL filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, challenging the Places of Worship (Special Provision) Act, 1991, “unfortunate”.
The Act mandates that the character of all religious places of worship should be maintained as it was on August 15, 1947, and no suit or proceedings shall lie in a court of law with respect to the character of places of worship.
This effectively barred courts from entertaining cases which raise disputes over places of worship that existed as of August 15, 1947. While invoking this exemption, the Supreme Court in the 2019 Ayodhya verdict reaffirmed that similar such cases cannot be entertained with respect to other sites in view of this Act.
The Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) reaffirms that the grounds on which this law was enacted need not be re-examined. The Central Government must respond to the Supreme Court, seeking its views, in a firm affirmation of the Places of Worship Act, 1991.

Sri Lanka will soon ban the burqa or face veil, a Cabinet Minister said, as he announced the Rajapaksa administration’s latest policy decision impacting the minority Muslim community.
The authorities would henceforth use the controversial Prevention of Terrorism (PTA) law — that human rights defenders have termed ‘draconian’— to deal with religious extremism, with wide-ranging powers to detain suspects for up to two years, to ‘deradicalise’ them.
Following the IS-inspired Easter terror bombings in Sri Lanka in April 2019, attributed to a local Islamist radical network, the government temporarily banned the face veil using emergency laws.
The announcement on the burqa ban comes after a year-long controversy over the government’s policy of mandatory cremation of COVID-19 victims, based on unsubstantiated claims that the bodies would contaminate ground water.
The government reversed its decision recently, amid persistent calls for burial rights from Muslims, who make up about 10% of the 21-million population, as well as international bodies including the U.N.

Indian Navy Ship Jalashwa arrived at port of Anjouan in Comoros with one thousand metric tonnes of rice.
The highlights of the continuity in the exemplary ties between India and Comoros within the framework of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of SAGAR, Security and Growth for all in the Indian Ocean Region.

About:

The Comoros is an island country in the Indian Ocean, at the northern end of the Mozambique Channel off the eastern coast of Africa.
It shares maritime borders with Madagascar and Mayotte to the southeast, Tanzania to the northwest, Mozambique to the west, and the Seychelles to the northeast.
Its capital and largest city is Moroni.
The religion of the majority of the population, and the official state religion, is Sunni Islam.
As a member of the Arab League, it is the only country in the Arab world which is entirely in the Southern Hemisphere.
It is also a member state of the African Union, the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, and the Indian Ocean Commission. The country has three official languages: Comorian, French and Arabic.

Aviation industry has long been demanding that Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF) should be brought under the GST regime.
ATF or jet fuel cost, which account for 45-55%of an airline’s operating expenses in India is among the highest in the world.
Other excluded categories from GST: Alcohol for human consumption; Petroleum products like crude oil,petrol, High Speed Diesel and Natural Gas; Electricity.

In 2004, NASA’s Mars exploration rover ‘Opportunity’ found several small spheres on the planet, informally named Martian blueberries.
Opportunity’s mini spectrometers studied the mineralogy and noted they were made of iron oxide compounds called haematites.
This caused excitement, as the presence of haematites suggests that there was water present on Mars.

Martian analogue

Several researchers have shown that the Kutch area is a potential Martian analogue locality.
A 2016 paper argued that the occurrences of hydrous sulphate in the Matanomadh area of Kutch, resemble Martian surficial processes.
It has been also argued that the transformation from the wet and humid to dry and arid environment on Mars is mimicked by the history of Kutch.