Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 11 October 2014

National

SC asked centre to make it a national appeals court’

• The Supreme Court asked the Centre to consider, and dispose of, a representation on the Law Commission recommendation to make the court a national court of appeal to decide only constitutional issues.
• A Bench comprising Chief Justice H.L. Dattu and Justices S.A. Bobde and A.M. Sapre granted six months to the Centre to take a decision on the plea of V. Vasanthakumar, lawyer.
• The petitioner said the present system of the court handling all types of appeals against orders of the High Courts and other fora and even those against interim orders had burdened poor litigants.
• He quoted a 1986 judgment which stated that by converting the court into a regular court of appeal, the SC would soon be reduced to a position where it would find itself unable to remedy injustice to all on account of backlog.

India-Norway expected to reach an accord on N-safety

• India and Norway are expected to reach an agreement on nuclear safety measures during the upcoming visit of President Pranab Mukherjee to Oslo — the first-ever by an Indian head of State to that country.
• Mr. Mukherjee, who will leave for Oslo on 12th October, has his State visit scheduled for October 13-14. He will then travel to Finland on October 15-16.
• Venu Rajamony, Press Secretary to the President, told presspersons that education was a key focus area of the visits to both Norway and Finland.
• A number of vice-chancellors are travelling with the President and several agreements will be signed in both Norway and Finland. “It will be a substantial visit with deliverables,” he said.
• Mr. Mukherjee will be the first Indian Head of State to visit Rovaneimi, the “official home” of Santa Claus. Rovaneimi is promoted as a destination where you can meet Santa Claus every day.
• Referring to India’s entry into the Arctic Council (which coordinates Arctic policy) as an observer in May 2013, Navtej Sarna, Secretary (West) in the External Affairs Ministry, said New Delhi was not working with the objective of exploiting Arctic resources.

Tens of thousands of people evacuated along AP coast

• Tens of thousands of people from low-lying areas of coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh have been evacuated as the state intensified preparations to face Cyclone Hudhud, expected to reach the northern coastline around Visakhapatnam very soon.
• As many as 24,000 people were shifted from Visakhapatnam district, 15,000 from Vizianagaram and 46,000 from Srikakulam and 160 from East Godavari district so far, special commissioner, state disaster management authority, K Hymavathi said.
• She said that 146 cyclone relief shelters have been opened in the coastal districts. National Disaster Response Force has deployed 19 teams (each comprising 45 to 50 members) to undertake rescue and relief missions.
• In addition, a large number of Army personnel have also been kept ready in Visakhapatnam. In Srikakulam, sea conditions were rough.
• Met department has warned that extensive damage to ’kutcha’ houses, uprooting of big trees and partial disruption of power and communication lines and minor disruption of rail and road traffic are expected.
• Eastern Naval Command of the Indian Navy too is ready to help with four ships on stand—by. These ships have been equipped with additional divers, doctors, inflatable rubber boats, integral helicopters and relief material including food, tent, clothes, medicines, blankets etc, in quantities sufficient to sustain over 5,000 persons.

Norway supports India’s Arctic efforts

• India’s investment in polar research might seem strange to some but not to Norway’s King Harald V. “That is where we see the changes most quickly as far as climate change is concerned. [In the Arctic] it is very obvious what is happening,” the King told in an interview.
• The King shared hopes of reaching a strong deal at the U.N. climate change conference in Paris in 2015.
• Climate change is a top priority for Norway and it has established links in the field with India, which has a base in the Arctic at Ny-Ålesund in Svalbard. It will also be a running theme during the visit by President Pranab Mukherjee on October 13 and 14.

Govt prohibits ongoing Bosch plant strike

• Karnataka government has issued an order which prohibits the ongoing strike at auto component maker Bosch’s plant in Bangalore. The workers are on strike since September 16 in support of their demands pertaining to wages, benefits and regularisation of temporary workers.
• In a press release, Bosch said the State government issued the order dated October 10 prohibiting the strike with immediate effect.
• The Mico Employees Association president S. Prasanna Kumar, however, declared the strike will continue. “It is holiday tomorrow and day after, we will continue our strike,” he told.
• A writ petition filed by the Association in the High Court of Karnataka, challenging the conciliation being declared a failure by the government, is scheduled to be taken up on 13TH October.
• The release from Bosch Ltd said prior to the order, the Labour Department had convened conciliatory meetings between the management and workers. There were also ‘special interventions’ by many senior government officials and senior ministers. The proceedings, ‘unfortunately’ did not result in a mutually agreeable resolution.
• Stating it will ‘continue to adopt a fair, but firm approach,’ the company asked the workers to call off the strike, report to work and restore normalcy.

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Persons in news

Leela Samson quits Sangeet Natak Akademi

• Renowned Bharatnatyam danseuse Leela Samson has resigned as chairperson of Sangeet Natak Akademi.
• Minister of State for Culture Shripad Yesso Naik was quoted by Press Trust of India saying that her resignation, which was received on September 30, has been accepted.
• Senior Ministry bureaucrats and Ms. Samson, who has a year of her tenure left, were tight-lipped although sources confirmed the development.
• Ms. Samson, who was earlier Director of Kalakshetra Foundation in Chennai, continues as the chairperson of the Central Board of Film Certification although she has completed the three-year term. In 2012, the order of reinstatement of Ms. Samson as Kalakshetra Foundation Director was set aside by the Madras High Court.
• Interestingly, the terms of several members of the executive board of the Sangeet Natak Akademi have also expired and once Ms. Samson formally moves out, no major decisions can be taken until a new leadership is put in place. The Akademi is an autonomous body fully funded by the Ministry of Culture.

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International

U.S. judges hear chimp’s plea to be free

• In a case closely watched by animal rights activists, legal curiosity seekers and unknown numbers of circus owners, a state appellate court has heard arguments about whether a chimpanzee can be considered a “legal person,” and — with human aid — sue for his freedom.
• The action was brought on behalf of Tommy, a 26-year-old chimp with no job, no criminal record and an allegedly grimy living situation in a small cage in the city of Gloversville, about 50 miles northwest of Albany.
• Tommy’s legal team — the Nonhuman Rights Project, a Florida-based animal rights group — lost its initial bid to have a lower-court judge rule whether the chimp had been unlawfully imprisoned. Its appeal was heard by a somewhat quizzical five-judge panel.
• “He’s detained against his will,” said Steven M. Wise, the president of the rights group, who argued the case, adding that no chimpanzee would want to live “in the conditions in which he’s living.”
• “He can understand the past, he can anticipate the future,” Mr. Wise said, “and he suffers as much in solitary confinement as a human being.”
• The respondents in the case — Patrick and Diane Lavery, the Gloversville couple who own Tommy — did not appear in court, nor did a lawyer representing them. They did speak out last December, however, saying that they rescued Tommy from his previous home, and if others had seen those conditions, “they would jump up and down for joy about where he is now,” Patrick Lavery said then.

China-Russia strategic gas project takes off

• China and Russia have begun implementing their $400 billion mega-gas deal — a strategic project that would allow Moscow to lower its dependence on the European market, and open prospects of tapping the growing energy demand in the Asia-Pacific, with Beijing as the star consumer.
• Russia’s eastward shift is anchored by the agreement to supply China 38 billion cubic meters of gas every year for 30 years. Gas flows will commence in 2018 after the lengthy Siberia Power Pipeline, having both Russian and Chinese components, gets completed.
• The Chinese side froze the design and construction plan on its side for the pipeline, which will start in northeast China’s Heilongjiang province and terminate in Shanghai, China’s premier commercial and industrial hub. Construction is expected to start next year, covering three main segments before the pipeline terminates in Shanghai three years later.
• Work on Russian segment of the pipeline, linking Siberia’s Kovyktin and Chayandin gas fields with the eastern port city of Vladivostok — a distance of 4,000 km — commenced last month.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin has underscored the importance of the project by pointing out that Moscow and Beijing were now “launching a large-scale strategic project on the global level”.
• Underscoring the energy deal’s larger geopolitical fall-out, he said that the “new gas pipeline will significantly strengthen [Russia’s] economic cooperation with the governments of the Asia-Pacific region and, first and foremost, with our key partner China”.

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Business & Economy

Economic recovery is likely only beyond December: RBI Governor

• On a day when official data showed further weakening of the industrial sector, Reserve Bank Governor Raghuram Rajan said that the Indian economy was expected to weaken further and a recovery was likely only beyond December.
• He cautioned that despite the sharp surge in sentiment in the economy, captured by consumer and investor confidence surveys, including by the Reserve Bank, a pick-up in investments would take time.
• “We have to accept that recoveries are not straight-line recoveries … there is volatility around the general trend … investment is yet to pick up on a strong basis, [though] we are seeing signs of the coming together of conditions for it [including a stable government that has signalled pro-investments initiatives] … there will be slight weakening compared with the first quarter in the second and third quarters, but beyond that we will hopefully see some strengthening of the economy,” he told.
• Dr. Rajan is here to attend the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank Group annual meetings. Official data released in New Delhi showed factory output growth slowed further to 0.4 per cent in August, marginally lower than the 0.5 per cent in July.

SEBI censures NSE in Nifty crash case

• Coming hard on top stock exchange NSE for its conduct with regard to ‘freak’ 920-point crash in benchmark index Nifty, the Securities and Exchange Board of India censured the bourse and ordered an independent comprehensive review of its processes and systems to ensure overall market stability.
• In a strongly-worded order, SEBI also asked the National Stock Exchange (NSE) to be “careful and cautious in its dealings in the securities market and comply with all the legal requirements that govern its functions as a stock exchange.’’ SEBI also said that “the system followed by NSE is not robust” and the incident, which took place on October 5, 2012, shows that “wrong action on the part of one individual could result in bringing the entire system to a halt.’’
• In the order, SEBI’s whole-time member Prashant Saran said: “NSE is directed to carry out a comprehensive review, by an independent expert of the processes followed, checks in place, systems employed by NSE, not only in respect of the situation specific to this case but also for maintaining stability of markets in general.”
• The consultant would need to “suggest a more robust securities trading system” and submit its report to NSE within three months from the date of this order.

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Sports

BCCI instructs its umpires

• Strengthened by the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) tough stand to crack down on bowlers with suspect action, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has instructed its umpires to be more active and take firm steps to deal with the issue at the junior level.
• As a result, nine bowlers were reported for suspect action in the first round of the under-19 tournament for the Vinoo Mankad Trophy, it is learnt. The list includes a team captain, not a regular bowler, but eager to showcase his off-break skills.
• For long, India spin great Bishan Singh Bedi has been advocating stern measures to deal with this menace. The recent incidents at the international level with bowlers being reported to have stirred the umpires into taking some bold decisions.

Science & Technology

Astronomers most detailed map exoplanet’s weather

• Using the Nasa Hubble Space Telescope, a team of scientists — including an Indian-origin researcher — has made the most detailed map ever of the temperature of an exoplanet’s atmosphere and traced the amount of water it contains.
• The planet targeted for both the investigations was the hot-Jupiter exoplanet WASP-43b. It is a planet the size of Jupiter but with double the mass and an orbit much closer to its parent star than any planet in the solar system. It has one of the shortest years ever measured for an exoplanet of its size — lasting just 19 hours.
• “These maps can be used to constrain circulation models that predict how heat is transported from an exoplanet’s hot day side to its cool night side,” said Kevin Stevenson from University of Chicago.