Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 25 June 2021

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Niti Aayog will launch the first-of-its-kind online dispute resolution (ODR) handbook in India.
The handbook is an invitation to business leaders to adopt ODR in India. It highlights the need for such a mechanism, the models of ODR that businesses can adopt and an actionable pathway for them.
Supreme Court Judge Justice DY Chandrachud will deliver the opening address and launch the handbook.
A Niti Aayog release said that ODR is the resolution of disputes outside courts, particularly of small and medium-value cases, using digital technology and techniques of alternate dispute resolution (ADR), such as negotiation, mediation, and arbitration.
While courts are becoming digitized through the efforts of the judiciary, more effective, scalable, and collaborative mechanisms of containment and resolution are urgently needed. ODR can help resolve disputes efficiently and affordably.

Union Health Ministry has categorised the Delta Plus variant (B.l.617.2.1) as a‘variant of concern’.
Like Delta,it has mutation in the spike protein region of the RNA virus, making it more transmissible.
WHO classifies a variant as one of concern when it is associated with

1. an increase in transmissibility;
2. increase in virulence or change in clinical disease presentation;3.

Recently, UNESCO released a draft report recommending the reef’s World Heritage status be downgradedbecause of its dramatic coral decline.
Great Barrier Reef is located on the north-east coast of Australia.
It contains the world’s largest collection of coral reefs, with 400 types of coral, 1,500 species offish and 4,000types of mollusc.
It also holds great scientific interest as the habitat of species such as dugong (‘sea cow’) and large green turtle, which are threatened with extinction.

It is an initiative from World Economic Forum’s Global Blockchain Council intended to lay out a foundationalset of principles for those building with blockchain technology and decentralized infrastructure.
These principles will provide creators of blockchain applications with a baseline for designing systems thatpreserve the rights of their participants.
Principles aim to preserve following participant rights: Transparency and Accessibility, Agency &interoperability. Privacy & security, Accountability & governance.

RBI governor enthused the markets with a new programme — Government Securities Acquisition Programme (G-SAP).

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It will purchase government securities worth Rs 1 lakh crore in the first quarter of FY22.
The RBI also announced that it will continue with a variable rate reverse repo to suck excess liquidity.
While the 10-year G-Sec bond yields dropped 0.6% to 6.08 on Wednesday, the benchmark Sensex gained 0.9% to close at 49,661.7.
RBI has to ensure goes through without causing disruption, G-SAP aims to provide more comfort to the bond market, market participants.
Market participants say they have always wanted to know the RBI’s Open Market Operations (OMO) purchase calendar, and the RBI has now provided that to the market through this announcement on GSAP.

A group of international astronomers has discovered 12 rare quasars, each offering four distinct quadruple images, commonly called Einstein’s cross.
This discovery could help refine the existing understanding about our universe’s rate of expansion and unravel mysteries surrounding dark matter.
The first quadruple quasar image was captured in 1985 and since then, only 50 such quasars have been identified.
The latest finding has now increased the total confirmed Einstein’s crosses by 25 per cent.

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Quasars are extremely luminous cores of distant galaxies that are powered by supermassive black holes.
They can help determine the expansion rate of the universe and help address other mysteries, such as darkmatter.
Scientists have recently found quasars warped by a naturally occurring cosmic "lens" and split into foursimilar images.

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Olympic Day was introduced in 1948 to commemorate the birth of the modern Olympic Games on 23 June 1894 at the Sorbonne in Paris. The formation of the IOC happened on this day.
The goal was to promote participation in sport across the globe regardless of age, gender or athletic ability.