(Current Affairs) National Events | June: 2014

National Events

Interceptor Missile Test

  • India for the first time tested a state-of-the-art interceptor missile at supersonic speed that sought, to engage and destroy an incoming target missile at a very high altitude of 120-140 km over the Bay of Bengal.

  • Entirely new interceptor and target missiles have been developed by scientists of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) for the upcoming engagement, to be conducted in exo-atmosphere (altitude above 40-50 km) on April 27 or 28. The test was originally planned to be conducted in November, 2013 but had been delayed since then.

  • Describing it as a “big challenge,” they said the interceptor’s “kill vehicle,” equipped with a dual seeker, would attack the payload (warhead portion) as it descends towards its intended target. The advantage of intercepting an incoming missile at such a high altitude was that the debris would not fall on the ground and there would be no collateral damage.

  • After some more trials, India plans to deploy a two-tiered Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) system to protect important cities from external threats. In the first phase, incoming enemy missiles of 2,000-km range are envisaged to be waylaid and destroyed, while those with about 5,000-km range would be tackled by the interceptors in the second phase.

  • So far, six of the seven interceptor missile tests, carried out by the DRDO, have been successful. While two interceptions were conducted in exo-atmopshere (altitudes between 47 and 80 km) the rest were in endo-atmosphere (below 40 km altitude).

Transgenders as third gender

  • The Supreme Court has recognised transgenders or eunuchs as third category of gender and directed Centre and States to grant them all facilities, including voters ID, passport and driving licence.
  • The Centre and States were also directed to take steps for bringing the community into the mainstream by providing adequate health care, education and employment.
  • A bench of Justices K.S. Radhakrishnan and A.K. Sikri directed the government to take steps for granting recognition to transgenders as a separate third category of gender after male and female.
  • The bench also said they are the citizens of the country and have equal rights to education, healthcare and employment opportunities like other people belonging to male and female gender.
  • The apex court expressed concern over transgenders being harassed and discriminated in the society and passed a slew of directions for their social welfare.

Scientific methods in crime detection

  • The Supreme Court has asked investigating agencies to adopt scientific methods in crime detection to save the judicial system from low conviction rates.

  • “The criminal judicial system in this country is at a crossroads. Reliable, trustworthy, credible witnesses to the crime seldom come forward to depose before the court and even hardened criminals get away from the clutches of the law. Even reliable witnesses for the prosecution turn hostile due to intimidation, fear and a host of other reasons. Investigating agency has, therefore, to look for other ways and means to improve the quality of investigation, which can only be through the collection of scientific evidence.”

  • Writing the judgment, Justice Radhakrishnan said there was a need to strengthen forensic science for crime detection. The judiciary needed to be equipped to understand and deal with such scientific materials.

  • The Bench gave this ruling while modifying the death sentence awarded to Dharam Deo Yadav, who murdered Diana Clare Routley, a 22-year-old girl from New Zealand who visited Varanasi in 1997. The trial court had awarded death sentence and it was confirmed by the Allahabad High Court.

Dying declaration of Nirbhaya

  • The Supreme Court has directed the Delhi Police to place before it the dying declaration of the December 16 gangrape victim along with other trial court records of the case in which four convicts were awarded death sentence.
  • Besides Mukesh (27) and Pawan (20), the Delhi High Court had also upheld the conviction and death penalty of Akshay Thakur (29) and Vinay Sharma (21).
  • While dismissing their appeals, the High Court had termed the offence as “extremely fiendish” and “unparallelled in the history of criminal jurisprudence” and said the “exemplary punishment” was the need of the hour.
  • The 23-year-old paramedic, on the night of December 16, 2012, was brutally assaulted and gangraped by six persons in a moving bus in South Delhi and thrown out of the vehicle with her male friend. She died in a Singapore hospital on December 29, 2012.
  • The prime accused in the case Ram Singh was found dead in Tihar Jail in March last year and the trial against him was abated.
  • The sixth accused, a juvenile, was on August 31, 2013, convicted and sentenced to a maximum of three years in a reformation home by the Juvenile Justice Board.

Cancellation of tax benefits

  • The Election Commission (EC) has sought withdrawal of tax exemption benefits to ten political parties from the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) on the grounds that they failed to submit their mandatory expenditure contribution reports on time to the poll body.

  • The EC, in its latest communication, has asked the CBDT to take action against the defaulting parties under provisions of Section 29C (Declaration of donation received by the political parties) of the Representation of the People Act in consonance with I-T laws

  • The EC has identified the ten parties as Nagrik Ekta Party, Dharamrajya Paksh, Socialist Unity Centre of India (Communist), Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party, Sunder Samaj Party, Loktantrik Manavtawadi Party, Rastriya Mahila Janshakti Party (RMJP) and the Indian People Green Party as the defaulters in filing their contribution and donation receipt reports for the financial year 2012-13.

  • The stipulated time limit for this exercise was September 30, 2013 but all these parties defaulted in submitting the records to EC by an average of one-five months while one party (RMJP) did it within the time limit but the poll body found some discrepancies in their records and hence referred it to the CBDT.

The curious case of ‘ Transsexual’

  • A woman, who was terminated from the Tamil Nadu police service last year after a medical examination report declared her a ‘transsexual,’ is set to get the job back, thanks to a Madras High Court order .

  • Allowing a petition challenging the termination, the court declared the petitioner as a female for all purposes. She has right to retain such sexual/gender identity.

  • Setting aside the termination order, Justice S. Nagamuthu directed the police to issue the consequential order within six weeks permitting her to join duty as a Grade II Police Constable (woman) with continuity of service.

  • She had the liberty to choose a different sexual/gender identity as a third gender in future based on the medical declaration, if a law was put in place recognising female to males (FTMs) as a third gender.

Voting through internet ?

  • Non-resident Indians may be able to cast their votes through Internet from overseas as the Election Commission recently  told the Supreme Court that it is exploring such a possibility.
  • The Commission, however, told a bench headed by Justice K S Radhakrishnan that it is almost impossible to make any such arrangement for NRI to cast their votes from overseas in the ongoing general election as electoral rolls have been concluded in almost all the constituencies.

BrahMos missile test fired

  • The Army successfully test-fired an advanced version of 290 km range supersonic cruise missile BrahMos as part of a user trial at Pokhran test range in Rajasthan.
  • The missile was launched by a mobile autonomous launcher deployed in full configuration with mobile command post at the ranges.
  • The launch was successful and the missile hit the designated target.
  • Both the Army and Navy have already inducted the missile, developed by India in partnership with Russia.

Candidates with criminal past

  • The Congress has fielded the highest number of Vidhan Sabha candidates with criminal records among all parties, according to an analysis of contestants’ affidavits from 70 assembly segments going to polls on April 10 in Odisha.
  • Forty-four Congress nominees, around 63% of its 70 candidates, have criminal history compared to overall 22% of the total candidates with tainted past, the Odisha
  • Election Watch (OEW) and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) analysis released said.
  • As many as 31 Congress nominees have serious criminal charges such as rape, murder and kidnapping. Subal Sahu, who is seeking re-election from Bijepur, has been charged for rape.
  • Among other parties, 17 (24%) of 70 BJD candidates, 26 (37%) of 70 from BJP and four (9%) out of 43 candidates from AAP have declared criminal cases in their affidavits.
  • Of them, 13 (19%) BJD candidates, 23 (33%) from BJP and three (7%) AAP nominees have mentioned serious criminal cases, which can attract punishment of at least five years jail.
  • Altogether 147 of the 673 candidates have criminal cases pending against them. They include 115 candidates with serious criminal charges.

‘Know your candidates’ tool

  • Google recently announced the launch of a new tool as part of its elections portal offering ‘google.co.in/elections’, called ‘Know Your Candidates’.

  • The new tool will allow citizens to get easy access to relevant information about political candidates contesting from their constituency and their incumbent Member of Parliament. This tool integrates publicly available information sourced from Indian organizations such as the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), PRS Legislative Research and Liberty Institute India.

  • The tool will provide information for each sitting Lok Sabha MP and contesting candidates such as their disclosed educational background, financial details and social media presence (wherever available) including video bios of the candidates provided by Ping networks. Mapped onto Google Maps interface, citizens will be able to find the information by using pin codes of their area or by zooming on their locality on the map. The tool will be updated regularly to provide information about all candidates as they get finalised and will be made available at least a week before the voting day in each constituency.

  • Google created its first elections tools seven years ago when our engineers noticed a huge increase in search traffic around the election period in the United States.

  • Today over 20 countries including Malaysia, Thailand, and now, India have elections pages that aid voters during election periods. Google aims to encourage people to be more participative and engage with candidates. It also allows voters to have a deeper understanding of politics and governance through engagement with the candidates.

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