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Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 24 June 2018

::NATIONAL::

The Karnataka government on Saturday said the guidelines drawn up by the Centre in formulating the Cauvery Water Management Authority (CWMA) and the Cauvery Water Regulation Committee (CWRC) were “not acceptable” and they need to be corrected.
During the meeting with Prime Minister NarendraModi earlier this week, Karnataka CM said instructions from the CWMA such as asking Karnataka to release water every 10 days and what crops should be grown by farmers would go against the interests of the State.
The Centre on Friday notified the formation of the CWMA and the CWRC, which will include representatives of the riparian States of Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Puducherry. Members of three States, other than Karnataka, have been finalised.
The authority’s mandate is to regulate the storage, apportionment of the Cauvery waters, supervision of operation of reservoirs, and regulation of water release with the assistance of the committee.

The country’s commercial capital on Saturday became the first major city to embrace a tough plastic-free regime, even as the rains made the transition from the ubiquitous polythene carry-bag a tricky affair.
The municipal authorities, meanwhile, decided to defer penal action against users and small traders till Monday, and said the weekend would be used to generate awareness.
The highest number of violations were found around the main markets and railway station. A lot of vegetable vendors and hawkers were let off with warnings as it was only the first day of the ban.

Facing grey-listing by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) during its crucial six-day Paris meeting starting on Monday, Pakistan has notified the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Regulations- 2018, which it claims is fully compliant with the global watchdog’s guidelines.
The development comes amid a strong push by the United States, backed by the United Kingdom, Germany and France, to put Pakistan in the FATF ‘grey list’ for its failure to comply with the anti-money laundering and terror funding guidelines despite repeated attempts.
Over the past few months, Pakistan President MamnoonHussain had issued multiple ordinances in view of the FATF requirements. However, its Parliament was yet to approve a proposed amendment that recognised all the UNSC declarations in Pakistan’s Anti-Terrorism Act, promulgated as an Ordinance in February and laid in the Senate in April 2018
On June 20, the Securities & Exchange Commission of Pakistan said it had notified the regulations that seek to make financial institutions more accountable in terms of money laundering and terror funding activities, it being “mandatory” for the country as a member of the Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering.

Thoseindians who seek to pursue their American dream through illegal means could be walking into a tough terrain.
The fastest growing undocumented population since 2011 by country of origin is Indian.
A Pew Research Centre study in 2015 estimated that there were five lakh Indians living without authorisation in America. This has been rising steeply — there were only 30,000 in 1990 and 2,40,000 in 2000.
The increasing number of Indian citizens living without documents in the U.S. is raising new questions for Indian consulates. When their passports expire, many of them approach the consulates for their renewal.
A new fraud that Indian consulate officials are increasingly encountering is fake American green cards, submitted to claim legal presence in America. Those seeking asylum in America forsake their Indian citizenship rights, and Indian consulates are not involved in the process at all.
While the asylum petition is pending, most people get work authorisation. All this might be changing, as Mr. Trump’s administration seeks to tighten the screws. Many detained without documents are put on a flight to India, if they have travel documents. Those who have lost their Indian passports get temporary travel documents after their identity is ascertained.

A drug (Pranlukast) currently used for treating asthma has been found to be effective against tuberculosis, researchers from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, have found.
The drug uses a unique strategy to target the TB bacteria and is therefore quite unlikely to cause any adverse side-effects either to the human cells or the beneficial bacteria found in humans.
The combination of asthma drug and the two anti-TB drugs was significantly better in killing the bacteria than the currently used first-line combination drugs — rifampicin, isoniazid and ethambutol.

A study by researchers at the Department of Genetics, Delhi University, South Campus, has shown that it is possible to restrict the progression of Huntington’s disease by increasing insulin signalling in the brain’s neuronal cells.
The study, which was conducted in fruit flies (Drosophila), found that increasing the level of insulin signalling enriches the cellular pool of proteins that are essential for cellular functioning and survival.
This in turn restores the cellular transcription machinery, which typically collapses due to the disease, and thus stops the disease from progressing.
Hunington’s disease is an autosomal dominant genetic disorder, which means that even if one parent carries the defective Huntington’s gene, their offspring has a 50:50 chance of inheriting the disease.
Afflicted individuals lose their ability to walk, talk, think and reason. This disease begins between ages 30 and 45, and every individual with the gene for the disease will eventually develop the disease

The Sports Journalists Federation of India at the annual General Body meeting here on Saturday decided to confer the inaugural SJFI Medal to tennis legend Vijay Amritraj.
The Padma Shri awardee will be honoured during the SJFI annual convention scheduled to be held in Bengaluru from September 18-22.

Roger Federer booked his 12th career final at the ATP Halle grass tournament on Saturday, beating qualifier Denis Kudla 7-6(1), 7-5.
it would be his 10th at the event — to remain World No. 1 heading into Wimbledon.