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Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 28 August 2020

Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 27 August 2020

::NATIONAL::

Supreme court says states can sub classify SC/ST’s for providing preferential treatment

A five-judge Bench of the Supreme Court on Thursday held that States can sub-classify Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the Central List to provide preferential treatment to the “weakest of the weak”.The Constitution Bench, led by Justice Arun Mishra, said reservation has created inequalities within the reserved castes itself.
With this, the Bench took a contrary view to a 2004 judgment delivered by another Coordinate Bench of five judges in the E.V. Chinnaiah case. The Chinnaiah judgment had held that allowing the States to unilaterally “make a class within a class of members of the Scheduled Castes” would amount to tinkering with the Presidential list.
Justice Mishra’s judgment is significant as it fully endorses the push to extend the creamy layer concept to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. The judgment records that “once a mortgage always a mortgage” cannot be pressed into service for submitting that once a backward class of citizens, always such a backward class.
“Citizens cannot be treated to be socially and educationally backward till perpetuity; those who have come up must be excluded like the creamy layer,” the judgment said.
The Central List of Scheduled Castes and Tribes is notified by the President under Articles 341 and 342 of the Constitution. The consent of the Parliament is required to exclude or include castes in the List. In short, States cannot unilaterally add or pull out castes from the List.

Vice President holds mock RajyaSabha session

In preparation of an unprecedented monsoon session of Parliament where members of both Houses will be sitting in multiple locations to adhere to the physical distancing norms, RajyaSabha Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu held a 45-minute mock session on Thursday to check the facilities.
To comply with the physical distancing norms amid the COVID-19 pandemic, RajyaSabha members will be seated in the main hall and four galleries of the Upper House along with the LokSabha hall. This requires Mr. Naidu to keep an eye on six locations from where the members will be participating in the proceedings.
Officials of the RajyaSabha were made to sit in the chambers of both the Houses and the galleries for the mock proceedings.

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::ECONOMY::

Centre give states borrowing options to compensate GST shortfalls

States have been given two borrowing options to meet shortfall of GST compensation. After chairing the 41st GST Council meet yesterday, Finance Minister NirmalaSitaraman said, the two options were placed before states so that each state does not have to struggle for loans.
Ms Sitharaman said, this year's entire GST compensation gap of two lakh 35 thousand crore rupees can be met by the States, in consultation with RBI. She said, States have requested for details of both the options, and sought seven working days to deliberate on it and get back.
These options will be available only for this year. The Minister said, once the arrangement is agreed upon by GST Council, dues will be cleared fast and also take care of the rest of the financial year. She said, government will give a further relaxation of 0.5 per cent in States' borrowing limit under FRBM Act.
Finance Minister said there was no proposal to raise tax rates to make up for the shortfall that has been compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic.Finance Secretary Ajay BhushanPandey has said, GST collection has been severely impacted due to covid pandemic.

Government bring sin new routes under UDAN scheme

The Government has approved 78 new routes under the 4th round of Regional Connectivity Scheme - UdeDeshKaAamNagrik, (UDAN) to further enhance the connectivity to remote and regional areas of the country.
The Civil Aviation Ministry said, North East Region, Hilly States and Islands have been given priority in the approval process for the new routes. It said, 29 served, eight unserved and two underserved airports have been included in the list for approved routes. The Ministry said, overall 766 routes have been sanctioned so far under the UDAN scheme.
Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Civil Aviation, UshaPadhee said, the Ministry had launched the 4th round of UDAN in December last year with a special focus on North-Eastern Regions, Hilly States and Islands.

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::INTERNATIONAL::

ASEAN-India Business Council virtual meeting held

Commerce and Industry Minister PiyushGoyal has said, Cooperation, Collaboration and Commitment, will guide the strategic partnership between India and ASEAN countries.
Addressing the ASEAN-India Business Council virtual meet yesterday, Mr Goyal said the COVID-19 pandemic period provided a unique opportunity to India to demonstrate itself as the trusted partner to the world, particularly in times of stress. The Minister also extended a hand of friendship to the ASEAN region, which he described as deep and valuable partners and partners in the progress.
Mr Goyal said that Aatamnirbhar Bharat connotes a self-reliant country which is ready to engage with the world from the position of strength and confidence, and on equal and fair terms. He said India and ASEAN have not been able to harness the full trade potential, for various reasons, but now is the time to open matrix to expand trade, address concerns of all nations and businesses, and resolve the differences.
He extended India’s friendship and partnership to ASEAN through businesses, so that both the partners are able to succeed and achieve a target of 300 billion dollar trade.

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China test fires missiles in South China sea

China on Wednesday fired at least two missiles into the South China Sea in what Chinese media described as a warning to the U.S., amid escalating tensions between the countries over Chinese maritime claims and the military exercises being conducted in disputed waters by China.
The missiles were fired into waters between Hainan province and the Paracel Islands in an area that China had previously notified would be off-limits because of planned drills, also expected to include missile tests.
Chinese media reported the missiles were fired a day after the U.S. flew spy-planes through at least two areas where drills were being held.
China has been conducting military exercises simultaneously in four seas — the Bohai Sea in the north, the Yellow Sea, East China Sea, and the South China Sea. Beijing said an American Lockheed U-2 aircraft had flown through what it had notified as a northern no-fly zone as part of a live-fire drill on Tuesday, while a Boeing RC-135S reconnaissance aircraft had flown over the South China Sea drills the following day.

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::SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY::

C & I ministry launched GIS enabled land bank system

Recently the Union Minister of Commerce and Industry launched National GIS enabled Land Bank System.
The platform is to provide database of industrial clusters all over India. It will serve as one-stop solution to free and easy accessibility of industrial information. The platform is to be supported by National Centre of Geo-Informatics, Invest India, National E-Governance Division, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Bhaskaracharya Institute for Space Application and Geo-Informatics.
This will help India in achieving its target of 5 trillion USD economy in five years. In order to achieve the target, the manufacturing sector has to play a major role as it has the potential to provide value addition and employment.
During the launch of the system, the states were called upon to adopt Public Procurement Policy. Also, the states were suggested to adopt local manufacturing to boost AtmaNirbhar Bharat Abhiyan.
The platform has mapped 3,300 industrial parks covering 4,75,000 hectares of land. It holds information related to forest, raw material heat maps, drainage and multiple layers of connectivity.

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::SPORTS::

NBA players decide to continue playoffs

NBA players, on Thursday, voted to resume the post-season, a day after a boycott by the Milwaukee Bucks forced the league to halt the playoffs and left the campaign hanging in the balance, reports said.
ESPN and The Athletic website said players attending a meeting here had agreed to resume the playoffs, although games scheduled for Thursday were postponed.

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