Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Current Relevant Fact
Asia-Pacific leaders ended
their summit in Singapore on
Nov 15 with a final statement
that pledged a conclusion of the
Doha Round of global trade talks in 2010, but re-
moved targets for carbon emissions cuts.
The 21-member Asia-Pacific Economic Coopera-
tion summit dropped a target to cut greenhouse
gas emissions in half by 2050, despite declaring cli-
mate change one of the biggest global challenges.
The APEC leaders also rejected all forms of pro-
tectionism and said they would commit to con-
cluding the Doha Round of trade talks next year.
The talks have been deadlocked over disagreements
between developing and developed nations on cut-
ting farm subsidies and tariffs.
The declaration also said the 21 member econo-
mies will maintain stimulus policies until a durable
global economic recovery has clearly taken hold.
U.S. President Barack Obama meets with Russian
President Dmitri Medvedev on the sidelines of the
APEC forum. The two plan to discuss Iran's
nuclear program and Afghanistan. Mr. Obama also
announced that his native U.S. state, Hawaii, will
host the APEC summit in 2011.
Indian-Americans won one of
their highest-ever appointments
in the US government when
President Obama in november
nominated Dr Rajiv Shah as ad-
ministrator of the United States Agency for Inter-
national Development (USAID).
Dr Shah, who currently serves as Under Secretary
for Research, Education and Economics and Chief
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Scientist at the US Department of Agriculture, will
take his new job after he is confirmed by the Sen-
ate, a step that is expected to happen quickly. With
a budget of over $40 billion and nearly 2000 em-
ployees, USAID is an independent federal agency
that is responsible for most US non-military for-
eign aid, virtually the developmental face of Uncle
Sam.
Shah, a graduate of University of Michigan, earned
his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania
Medical School and his Master of Science in health
economics at the Wharton School of Business. He
also attended the London School of Economics
before becoming a policy wonk, variously work-
ing at the World Health Organisation, advising the
Gore 2000 presidential campaign on health care
policy, and most recently, before joining the
Obama administration, serving as Director for Ag-
ricultural Development at the Bill and Melinda
Gates Foundation.
At USDA, he managed the Agricultural Research
Service, the Economic Research Service, the Na-
tional Agricultural Statistical Service and the Na-
tional Institute of Food and Agriculture, and was
responsible for overseeing more than 10,000 staff
worldwide including 2,200 federal scientists and a
budget of more than $2.6 billion. He also launched
the National Institute of Food and Agriculture
(NIFA) - a new scientific institute created to el-
evate and enhance the capacity of agricultural re-
search to address sustainable food production, cli-
mate change, bioenergy and human nutrition.
But the job as USAID administrator is a major pro-
motion, elevating him to a crucial job that involves
advancing US foreign policy objectives by support-
ing economic growth, agriculture and trade; health;
democracy, conflict prevention, and humanitarian
41
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
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assistance abroad. Although its predecessor agency
International Cooperation Administration dates
back to World War II and the Marshall Plan,
USAID was formally constituted in 1961 and is
considered a crucial foreign policy arm of the US
government.
The agency typically receives foreign policy guid-
ance from the Secretary of State, and expectedly,
Hillary Clinton warmly welcomed the Shah's ap-
pointment, describing him as a "leader in the de-
velopment community, an innovative and results-
oriented manager, and someone who understands
the importance of providing people around the
world with the tools they need to lift themselves
out of poverty and chart their own destinies."
Shah will have his hands full once he is confirmed
by the State since the USAID administrator's post
has been vacant for several months with an acting
administrator holding the fort after Obama came
to office. In fact, the vacancy at the top of USAID
had attracted the ire of Congress, whose members
noted that it was the “only major agency in the
government without a captain at a time when
American leadership in development around the
world is more needed than ever.”
In a September 18 letter to Obama urging him to
expeditiously appoint a USAID administrator,
Senators John Kerry and Richard Lugar complained
that USAID has been shut out of the interagency
processes related to US policy in places such as
Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq.
Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt and Israel are among the
biggest recipients of USAID dollars and Pakistan is
soon expected to join the top ranks since much of
the US non-military assistance to Islamabad is ex-
pected to be sent through USAID. As of Septem-
ber 2009, the USAID said it had contributed more
than $ 170 million in assistance to conflict-affected
population in Pakistan. India, which at one time
got around $ 160 million in USAID funds (a pit-
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tance in per capita terms), has gradually weaned
itself off US dole, preferring trade and business
opportunities.
Recognising India's excellence in education, Aus-
tralia has invited 'elite Indian institutions' to set
up campuses there and help Adelaide become a
'University City'. Some of them are already on the
table.
There are over 500,000 interna-
tional students in Australia pur-
suing university education and
vocational studies, of which 94,000 are Indians --
the second highest group after the Chinese. Thou-
sands of Indians are enrolled in vocational courses
in government and private Technical and Further
Education (TAFE) institutes.
In recent years Australia's education industry has
boomed to become the country's third-largest for-
eign currency earner after coal and iron ore, gen-
erating about $12 billion in revenue in 2008. In-
dian students in Australia alone contribute $3.5
billion a year to the economy.
Dozens of Indian students have been attacked in
Australia throughout this year, making India re-
act strongly. Even Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh took up the issue with his Australian coun-
terpart. The soaring sentiment in India forced many
Australian authorities, including its prime minis-
ter, to tour India, to assure parents about the safety
of their wards.
Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh
on Dec 4 said that all the 2,50,000 Gram
Panchayats in the country will be pro-
vided high speed broadband connectiv-
ity by 2012 to remove asymmetry of in-
formation and opportunities to the rural popula-
tion.
42
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
The Prime Minister was speaking at the closing
ceremony of 'India Telecom- 2009' in the national
capital. Assuring the auction of 3G spectrum, Singh
said that this spectrum will be allocated at a mar-
ket determined price rather than an administered
one.
While, lauding the setting up of seven telecom
centers of excellence by DOT in public private part-
nership mode, he said that sustained competitive-
ness requires a strong research and development
efforts.
The Prime Minister also expressing concern on the
slow growth of the telecom manufacturing sector,
and called for using various fiscal incentives pro-
vided by the Government to attract potential in-
vestors.
Speaking on the occasion, Union Communications
and Information Technology Minister A. Raja said
that telecom sector is recognized as one of the major
drivers of the growth of Indian economy as it is
contributing about 5.6 per cent in GDP.
'Indian economy registered 11per cent rise in FDI,
despite the global recession and liquidity crunch,'
he added.
The Minister further said that it also attracted 2558
million dollar FDI in 2008-09 as compared to 1261
million dollar in 2007-08, which is about 10 per
cent of the total FDI inflow in the country during
2008-09.
Enlisting the achievements of the telecom depart-
ment, the Minister said that target of 500 million
of telephone connections was scaled in September
2009, much ahead of the scheduled time of De-
cember 2010.
The Wolf Hall novel has been
written by British author Hilary
Mantel, winner of the Booker Prize
2009. Set in the 1520s, the novel
tells the story of English statesman Thomas
Cromwell’s rise to prominence through political
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
intrigues in Henry VIII’s court.
Indian government, in collaboration with the
UNDESA, organised the ‘High-Level Conference
on Climate Change: Technology Development and
Transfer’ on October 22 and 23, 2009 at New Delhi.
The conference was a step forward in the process
of the international policy dialogue on technolo-
gies needed to address climate change.
The outcomes of the conference will support the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change (UNFCCC) process.
Google Wave is the latest
buzz to hit the internet shores.
The Web search giant—it has
already sent out 1,00,000 select invites for a lim-
ited preview—has announced what it claims to be
the future of all internet conversations.
What Wave does is to integrate e-mail, instant
messaging (IM), collaboration, Google maps as well
as search. It actually empowers your browser to
handle all your communication needs. The Wave,
however, requires a Chrome Frame plug-in to func-
tion on the ubiquitous Internet Explorer as of now.
The preferred browsers seem to be Chrome, open
source Firefox and Apple’s Safari.
Romanian-born German writer Herta Mueller
has won the 2009 Nobel Prize in literature. The
56-year-old author, who emigrated to Germany
from then-communist Romania in 1987, made her
debut in 1982 with a collection of short stories titled
Niederungen, or Lowlands in English, which was
promptly censored by her government.
In 1984 an uncensored version was smuggled to
Germany where it was published and her work
depicting life in a small, German-speaking village
in Romania was devoured by readers there. That
work was followed by Oppressive Tango in Roma-
nia.
With domain names in Hindi, Arabic and Chi-
nese set to become a reality on the Web, the pun-
dits in this science hub, where the internet was
43
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
arguably invented, claim the next giant leap to-
wards internationalisation will be the grid. The
grid, which is made of thousands of desktops,
laptops, supercomputers, data vaults, mobile
phones, meteorological sensors and telescopes will
start work when protons beams collide with each
other in the world’s biggest experiment ever, deep
in a tunnel on the French-Swiss border.
The United States blasted the
surface of the moon on October
9, 2009 with two rockets on a mis-
sion to look for water below the
lunar surface that could be used by astronauts on
future space missions. At 1130 GMT the LCROSS
satellite crashed into the Cabeus crater floor near
the moon’s south pole, at around 9,000 kilometers
per hour, followed four minutes later by a
shepherding spacecraft equipped with cameras to
record the impact.
The LCROSS cost 79 million dollars and was
launched in June 2009, along with another probe—
the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which is tasked
with producing a detailed map of the moon.
NASA scientists looked into the 350 tonnes of de-
bris ejected from the cold, dark Cabeus crater, and
after thorough analysis confirmed presence of wa-
ter. The crater is 100 km across and between 2.5 to
four km deep.
The mission came just two weeks after India hailed
the discovery of water on the moon with its
Chandrayaan-1 satellite mission in partnership
with NASA.
Finding water on Earth's natural satellite is a ma-
jor breakthrough in space exploration and will pave
the way toward future lunar bases for drinking
water or fuel, or even man living on another planet.
Scientists are mulling to use German-built ro-
bots for clearing rogue satellites from Earth's orbit
or pushing them into the outer space. Robots that
rescue failing satellites and push "dead" ones into
outer space should be ready in four years, British
newspaper 'The Observer' reported.
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Experts have described the development by Ger-
man scientists as a crucial step in preventing a di-
saster in the Earth's crowded orbit. In 2008 it was
reported that critical levels of debris circling the
Earth were threatening astronauts' lives and fu-
ture of the multi-billion-dollar satellite communi-
cations industry.
Alarmed over the sharp drop in the number of
freshwater dolphins surviving in river systems
across the country, the Union government, act-
ing on a proposal made by Bihar Chief Minister
Nitish Kumar, has declared dolphin as a national
aquatic animal. The animal has been declared as a
‘highly endangered’ under the ICUN and Sched-
ule I of Wildlife Protection Act (1972), Govern-
ment of India.
The Ganga River Dolphin is a flag-ship specie,
meaning that their strength in river system would
indicate its health. The freshwater dolphin, a blind
species, is mainly found in the Ganga and
Brahmaputra river systems in India.
Construction of dams and barrages, increase in
pollution-levels, indiscriminate fishing, the dread-
ful prospect of the mammal getting entangled in
nets—all these factors have contributed to a re-
duction in their numbers in two river systems.
In the Ganga, the dolphin is found primarily in
the Bijnore-Narora section in Uttar Pradesh and
the Vikramshila sanctuary in Bihar. Thanks to
greater involvement of the community and stake-
holders and application of modern technology,
WWF-India has been able to save these mammals
from getting depleted.
The world’s largest cruise
liner, Oasis of the Seas, began
its maiden voyage to Florida on
October 30, 2009, gliding out of
a shipyard in Finland. With an
amphitheatre, basketball courts and an ice rink on
board, the 16-deck liner spans 1,200 feet from bow
to stern. Its 2,700 cabins can accommodate 6,300
passengers and 2,100 crew. The ship cost $1.5 bil-
44
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
lion and took two and a half years to build. It boasts
of four swimming pools, volleyball and basketball
courts, and a youth zone with theme parks and
nurseries for children.
India has signed agreements with
the World Bank for $4.2 billion
(around Rs 20,000 crore) credit to
support the country's infrastructure
projects and also for recapitalising the public sec-
tor banks. State-run PowerGrid Corp of India, In-
dia Infrastructure Finance Company Ltd (IIFCL)
signed pacts for $1 billion and $1.195 billion, re-
spectively. The Centre signed the agreement for
$2 billion to recapitalise the state-run banks. The
funding to IIFCL has two components, IBRD loan
of $1.195 billion long-term finance to infrastruc-
ture projects and a grant of $5 million for capacity
building of IIFCL, which finances infrastructure
projects. The loan will be utilised for strengthen-
ing transmission systems for Sasan, Mundra and
Krishnapatnam Ultra Mega Power Projects and
South-West interconnection.
The 150th birth anniversary of Rabindranath
Tagore will be celebrated internationally by the
UNESCO in 2010 as a mark of respect to the Nobel
Laureate whose literary work blends universal
humanistic values and sympathy for the poor. The
agency will also celebrate the 100th birth anni-
versary of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda and 100th
birth anniversary of Afro-Martinican littérateur
Aime Cesaire. The UNESCO will establish prizes
and medals in the name of these literary giants. It
will also organise a series of seminars and confer-
ences across the world to spread awareness about
their literary works.
India has announced sites for setting up light
water reactor-based nuclear plants in cooperation
with the United States, France and Russia. Power
plants would be set up in cooperation with the US
at Chhayamithi Virdi in Gujarat and Kovvada in
Andhra Pradesh, while Jaitapaur in Maharashtra
has been designated as the site for the plant to be
set up with France’s assistance. Kudankulam in
Tamil Nadu and Haripur in West Bengal have been
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
chosen as the sites for power plants to be set up in
cooperation with Russia.
The Reserve Bank of India has
acknowledged the resurgence of
the feel good factor in the Indian
economy but has said that growth
and inflation continue to be a concern.
Maintaining a hawkish stance on inflation, the
central bank has highlighted its concern over slow-
down in credit off-take and surplus liquidity in the
system, giving no clear indication on its rate stance.
In its report on Macro and Monetary Developments
in Q2 of 2009-10, the Reserve Bank has noted that
"The combination of a weak recovery and elevated
CPI (consumer price index) inflation has already
magnified the complexity of policy challenges,
notwithstanding the subdued nature of headline
WPI inflation so far."
While premature reversal of the monetary policy
stance entails the risk of stifling recovery, persis-
tence of accommodative stance could adversely
impact inflation expectations.
However, the results of its survey, based on “as-
sessment for July- September 2009” and “expecta-
tions for October-December 2009”, point to a
strong momentum in industrial recovery. Both the
indices remained above 100 for the second con-
secutive quarter (100 is the threshold that sepa-
rates contraction from expansion). According to the
RBI analysis, this suggests that the industrial re-
covery already seen up to August 2009 in terms of
trends in IIP growth could gain further momen-
tum.
The outlook for employment is also improving and
firms are expected to increase their workforce on
the back of expected increase in demand.
Among the positive pointers to the economic re-
covery include improved financial conditions as
reflected in return of capital flows, significant re-
covery in the stock markets, and better transmis-
sion from low policy rates to declining lending
rates. The RBI has also said that there should not
be any concerns about private credit getting
45
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
crowded out since over 80.4% of the government
borrowing programme has been completed so far
as there is adequate liquidity in the system.
But RBI is concerned about the deceleration in
private consumption and investment demand that
it says needs to be reversed from the low levels
seen in the first quarter of 2009-10 for ensuring a
sustainable recovery.
. transparency in appointments to top institutes. IIM
A key economic think-tank has made the most op-
timistic official projection yet for growth in the
fiscal to March 2010, flagged rising food prices as a
major concern, and suggested that tighter mon-
etary and fiscal policies are unlikely in the coming
months.
The Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Coun-
cil, headed by former RBI governor C. Rangarajan,
said it sees the gross domestic product (GDP) ex-
panding by 6.5% in 2009-10.
In its July 2009 forecast, the RBI had forecast that
India’s economy in 2009-10 would grow by 6%,
with an upward bias, and the Planning Commis-
sion had said in early September that it sees GDP
growth at 6.3%. India’s economy expanded by 6.7%
in 2008-09 after growing at over 9% for three years.
The improving trend is unlikely to prompt any
immediate withdrawal of stimulus measures or a
tightening of monetary policy, even though the
panel made clear its concern about inflation and
fiscal deterioration. It expects the consolidated fis-
cal deficit of the Centre and States at 10.09% for
2009-10 and sees inflation, imported and local food
inflation, as a significant risk for the Indian
economy.
Directors of the prestigious
Indian Institutes of Manage-
ment (IIMs) and members of
their boards will eventually
be appointed through an in-
dependent collegium of industrialists and academ-
ics. Also, IIMs can set up campuses abroad, pro-
vided they come up with “workable proposals and
preferably function together instead of individu-
ally”.
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
"We want to globalise the IIM brand,” said HRD
Minister Kapil Sibal. In another major move, the
government agreed that a collegium, as mooted for
the appointment of vice-chancellors of central
universities, would also apply to IIMs, where ma-
jority appointments so far are cleared by the HRD
ministry, which advertises the positions before
short-listing and selecting candidates.
But that is set to change to advance the cause of
boards are also proposed to be restricted in size,
with HRD ministry describing them as “unwieldy
and huge”. The membership will be limited to 13
(currently over 20 or so.
The boards are proposed to be reconstituted post
January 2010, the deadline which the government
has given to IIM directors to present their views
on the constitution of the collegium, which will
be empowered to recommend names of board
members and directors to the government for fi-
nal selection.
For the institutes to beat competition, autonomy
is the key, feel the directors. Sibal agrees, but with
a rider: “We are for IIM autonomy, for letting go,
but let’s not forget that the primary responsibility
of all education systems is national.”
Twenty two years and Rs 960 crore later, the
government plans to spend another Rs 15,000 crore
over the next 10 years to make the Ganga river
pollution free. This decision was taken at the meet-
ing of the first National Ganga River Basin Au-
thority, chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh, on October 5, 2009.
It has been decided to take up the cleaning of the
Ganga river on a mission mode. Mission Clean
Ganga will ensure that by 2020 no untreated mu-
nicipal sewage and industrial effluents flows into
Ganga. At present, the sewage treatment capacity
is about 1,000 mld, against 3,000 mld sewage be-
ing generated in the towns along Ganga. Nearly
75% of the pollution in the Ganga is on account of
municipal waste.
46
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
The costs will be borne by both the Centre and
the States. There were disagreements over the shar-
ing, with States asking for 100% central funding.
An alternate funding pattern of 70% by the Cen-
tre and 30% by the States has been suggested. A
final decision on the sharing ratio will be worked
out by the Planning Commission, in consultation
with the States and Central government.
In the meantime, the World Bank has offered a
loan of $1 billion for the mission.
India has notified its separation
plan in the IAEA, which formally
separates India’s civilian and military
nuclear establishments. The plan,
which was announced in March
2006, has passed muster at IAEA and India’s safe-
guards agreement is now officially operational.
This is likely to help in the negotiations for the
reprocessing agreement that is currently under way
between India and US. But more than that, this
will silence many non-proliferation critics in the
new Obama-led US administration who had been
looking at the delay in notifying the safeguards
agreement as an example of Indian dithering.
Pakistan has succeeded in its efforts to compel
the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) to
appoint a special envoy for Jammu and Kashmir.
At its meeting in New York earlier in first week of
October 2009, the OIC also stated that it supported
people of Jammu and Kashmir in realisation of their
legitimate right to self-determination in accordance
with relevant UN resolutions and aspirations of the
Kashmiri people.
A fuming India reacted sharply to the OIC action,
dubbing it as interference in the internal affairs of
this country. “Jammu and Kashmir is an integral
part of India and it is our firm position that the
OIC has no locus standi in matters concerning
India’s internal affairs,” the External Affairs Min-
istry said in a statement.
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Condemning the OIC move, New Delhi said in-
herent in its statements and actions on the issue of
Jammu and Kashmir was a complete inability to
understand India’s position.
On October 14, 2009, India signed
an agreement for civil nuclear co-
operation with Argentina, making
it the seventh nation to ink such an
accord with this country after New
Delhi secured a waiver from the nuclear suppliers’
group (NSG) to undertake nuclear commerce.
The agreement for cooperation in the peaceful uses
of nuclear energy was among the 10 accords signed
by the two countries following wide-ranging talks
between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and
visiting Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de
Kirchner, during which they desired to establish
strategic partnership between their two nations.
The two leaders discussed a wide range of bilat-
eral, regional and global issues of mutual interest.
A joint statement issued by India and Argentina
after the visiting dignitary concluded her talks with
Indian leaders said the two sides shared the view
that civil nuclear energy could play an important
role as a safe, sustainable and non-polluting source
of energy in meeting rising global demands for
energy.
The other nine accords signed between the two
sides include: exchange of letters for business visa
providing for five years multiple entry gratis visa
for a single stay of 90 days; programme of coopera-
tion in science and technology for 2009-11; MOU
between ONGC Videsh Limited and ENARSA;
MOU on sports cooperation; MoU on cooperation
in the field of trade promotion and technology
transfer in international trade; and agreement on
outer space.
The two sides also agreed on the need to give a
new impulse to multilateral negotiations in the area
of disarmament, especially weapons of mass de-
struction.
47
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Without getting into the re-
cent spat over Arunachal
Pradesh, Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh and Chinese
Premier Wen Jiabao talked peace
and harmony on October 24, 2009, in a meeting
on the sidelines of the India-ASEAN summit in
Thailand.
The visit of the Dalai Lama to Arunachal also did
not figure in the discussions between the two lead-
ers who instead focused on the positives in the re-
lationship and agreed that "differences" should not
impede cooperation between the two countries.
In an effort to ameliorate the recent strain on the
bilateral relationship, Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh even proposed that the two countries ob-
serve the 60th anniversary of the establishment of
diplomatic ties in a "fitting manner". He also put
stress on the trade and economic relations, calling
it a "vital pillar" in the bilateral relationship.
This exchange at the highest political level came
after an escalation in the rhetoric between the two
sides over the border issue. China had objected to
Mr Singh’s trip to Arunachal Pradesh for the As-
sembly elections. This had elicited a strong reac-
tion from New Delhi which had reminded Beijing
that Arunachal remained an integral part of the
country. New Delhi had further pointed out that
in the democratic system leaders visited States
where elections are taking place. This was further
followed by India protesting against China’s in-
volvement in projects in Pakistan Occupied Kash-
mir, which New Delhi pointed out was also dis-
puted territory. New Delhi had earlier also objected
to Beijing’s practice of issuing visas to people from
Jammu and Kashmir on loose sheets.
Chinese Prime Minister Wen recalled Mr Singh’s
remark about both sides having enough space to
develop and cooperate and added that there are
sufficient areas in the world for India and China to
enhance such cooperation. The Chinese premier
further suggested that the Joint Economic Group
should hold early consultations and that China
would work with India to handle the matter of
the growing trade deficit.
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
India also rejected China’s objections to Dalai
Lama’s Arunachal visit in November while mak-
ing it clear that the Tibetan spiritual leader was
not allowed to indulge in political activities on the
Indian soil. The issue figured when Prime Minis-
ter Manmohan Singh and his Chinese counterpart
Wen Jiabao were seated next to each other at a
gala dinner hosted by the Thailand Prime Minis-
ter for leaders attending the ASEAN and East Asia
summits.
Amidst tension over political is-
sues, India and China have signed an
agreement to cooperate on ways to
fight climate change. Moving closer,
at least on an issue concerning the
entire world, the two neighbours announced set-
ting up of a Joint Working Group (JWG) to ex-
change views concerning international negotiations
on global warming. The memorandum of agree-
ment (MoA) assumes significance in the run-up to
the Copenhagen climate summit. Developed and
developing countries are at loggerheads over who
should reduce emissions of greenhouse gases that
are causing climate change.
India and China are in the same bloc as the Group
of 77 countries in climate negotiations.
The MOA acknowledges that climate change and
its adverse effects are a common concern of man-
kind and need to be addressed through interna-
tional co-operation. It emphasises that the UNFCC
and its Kyoto Protocol were the most appropriate
framework for addressing climate change.
The agreement also reaffirms the principle of com-
mon but differentiated responsibilities, in particu-
lar that developed countries should take the lead
in reducing their greenhouse gases and providing
financial resources, technology transfer and capac-
ity building support to developing countries.
Egypt has invited India to build a ‘India indus-
trial zone’ in the Suez development area for set-
ting up joint ventures with Egyptian companies.
Egypt’s Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, in his meet-
ing with commerce and industry minister Anand
48
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Sharma in Cairo, offered to designate an area for
setting up of the zone exclusively for Indian com-
panies.
India could gain significantly from the offer as it
would give it easier entry to the European and
African markets, since Egypt has preferential ac-
cess to both.
The Suez development area, located on the north-
west coast of the Gulf of Suez, has lower bureau-
cratic barriers to business formation and provides
tax incentives. The law gives more incentives for
priority areas, such as infrastructure, auto parts,
software, oil field services, tourism and manufac-
turing. The terms and conditions of investing in
the proposed India zones and the tax benefits to
industry are to be worked out.
Indian companies have, till now, invested about
$750 million in 40 projects in Egypt. India has a
significant presence in the IT and automobile sec-
tor with companies like Wipro, Satyam, Mahindra
and Tatas having invested in the country.
In a speech delivered at the inau-
guration of the Anantnag-Qazigund
rail link in Anantnag, Prime Minis-
ter Manmohan Singh focused largely
on ties with Pakistan and the ear-
lier success of cross-LoC initiatives.
Targeting domestic audience and also sending out
a message to Pakistan, Mr Singh prefixed his offer
of peace with the rider that Islamabad must bring
perpetrators of terror attacks to justice and destroy
terror camps. "For a productive dialogue it is es-
sential that terrorism must be brought under con-
trol," he said.
Mr Singh said India would put pressure on Paki-
stan to curb the activities of the elements engaged
in terrorism against India. "If they are non-State
actors, it is the solemn duty of the government of
Pakistan to bring them to book, to destroy their
camps and to eliminate their infrastructure. The
perpetrators of the acts of terror must pay the
heaviest penalty for their barbaric crimes against
humanity," he said.
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
With Pakistan now being targeted by terrorism,
Mr Singh said there could be no compromise with
the ideology of terror. "It is a misplaced idea that
one can reach a compromise with the ideology of
the terrorists or that they can be used for one’s
own political purpose. Eventually, they turn against
you and bring only death and destruction. The real
face of the terrorists is clear for the people of Paki-
stan to see with their own eyes," he said.
He maintained that India was ready to discuss hu-
manitarian issues whose “resolution requires the
cooperation of Pakistan”. "We are ready to discuss
these and other issues with Pakistan. I hope that,
as a result, things will be made easier for our trad-
ers, divided families, prisoners and travelers," he
said.
President Pratibha Patil visited UK and
Cyprus from October 27 to 31, 2009.
During her visit to UK she received the
Baton of the Commonwealth Games
from the Queen of England at a cer-
emony in the Buckingham Palace in London on
October 29.
This was the third State visit by an Indian Presi-
dent to the UK. The first was by President S.
Radhakrishnan in 1963 and the second by Presi-
dent R. Venkataraman in 1990. This was also the
first State visit after the commencement of the stra-
tegic partnership between India and the UK in
2009.
During her visit, President Patil interacted with
Queen Elizabeth of England as also met Prime
Minister Gordon Brown, leader of the opposition
David Cameron and leader of the Liberal Demo-
cratic Party Nick Clegg.
She also addressed in London a business meeting
organised by the UK India Business Council.
The President visited Cyprus on an invitation of
the then President of Cyprus Papadopoulos who
visited India in April 2006. The last time an Indian
President visited Cyprus was 21 years ago, again
R. Venkataraman, whereas all former Cyprian
Presidents have visited India during their term of
office.
49
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Cyprus has always supported India on all crucial
issues and expressed its understanding on our
nuclear tests in 1998 and supported Indian posi-
tion during Kargil war, too.
India is planning a major headway in generating
energy through solar sources. It has approached
Cyprus which has made considerable headway in
that direction to develop solar power plants rang-
ing between one MW and 50 MW. An MoU was
signed in the presence of visiting Indian President
Pratibha Patil for providing solar power to India.
The MoU states that NORASCO, UPTURN of
DALCO company and CASE NEUBERG of the
CASE group of companies will supply solar photo-
voltaic systems, kits and technology for solar en-
ergy projects in India. It also states that CASE will
be Indian technology and engineering partners for
setting up turnkey solar energy plants in India and
NORASCO will provide project finance and invest-
ments of EURO 50 million in solar energy sector
in India between 2010 and 2015. The Photovol-
taic Technology Group of University of Cyprus
(PVT Group) also signed an MoU with NORASCO
whereby PVT Group will act as a technology con-
sulting partner for developing solar energy projects
and solar energy education in India.
Jharkhand presents an example
where lack of political stability was
allegedly exploited by a group of leg-
islators led by former Chief Minis-
ter Madhu Koda to fatten them-
selves. The Enforcement Director-
ate, on October 9, 2009, slapped charges under
Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) on
the former Jharkhand CM and three of his former
Cabinet colleagues for allegedly amassing assets
running into several hundred crores—between Rs
700 and 800 crore according to the preliminary
estimate.
Koda, the first Independent to become Chief Min-
ister and now a member of Lok Sabha supporting
UPA government, has been charged with having
business interests of diverse kinds—cement, steel,
auto, power, agro and tourism. His alleged invest-
ments, estimated at Rs 300-400 crore, are just as
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
widely spread—from Singapore to Thailand to
Dubai to Liberia.
The Centre’s plans to take the battle to Naxalites
hinge on a strategy that will see Central and State
forces acting in concert to first wrest control of
areas long considered “Red” zones and then facili-
tate expeditious restoration of civil administration.
The Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) has
okayed a comprehensive approach to Maoist ex-
tremism with a "clear and hold" doctrine at the
centre of the anti-Naxal "action plan". Moving from
the current largely reactive stance which saw oc-
casional jabs into Maoist hinterland, forces will pro-
actively engage the ultras.
The view in government is that the offensive can-
not be delayed much further. With alarming signs
of an emboldened Maoist leadership targeting ur-
ban areas beyond their known forest hideouts—
arrested politburo member Kobad Gandhy was
incharge of operations in cities like Delhi, Mumbai
and Pune—the government is gearing for action
and bracing for casualties.
The strategy for acting on intelligence tip-offs and
hitting at naxal bases deep in Red "liberated" zones
was put to trial in September 2009 in Chhattisgarh’s
Dantewada. The Maoists were routed but the haz-
ardous forests and complete lack of infrastructure
underlined how difficult it would be for a force to
operate "behind the lines". It is felt that the surge
in Central and State forces after the Assembly elec-
tions in Haryana, Arunachal Pradesh and
Maharashtra can be sustained if the local popula-
tion is convinced that Maoists can be defeated and
that the forces will not leave in a hurry. This would
strengthen intelligence collection and provide the
administration with valuable allies as even fence
sitters opt for the winning side.
The Centre plans to deploy 70,000 paramilitary
personnel—drawn from CRPF, ITBP, BSF, SSB,
CoBRA and Nagaland Armed Police—in States like
Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Bengal, Bihar,
Maharashtra and Andhra.
50
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
On October 3, 2009, Irish voters strongly en-
dorsed the European Union's Lisbon Treaty-16
months after their first vote rejecting it plunged
EU reforms into deadlock.
About 67% voted "Yes". Irish Prime Minister Brian
Cowen hailed a "clear and resounding" endorse-
ment. Political leaders across the EU have also
welcomed the result. The President of the Euro-
pean Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso, said it was
a great day for Europe. He urged the leaders of
Poland and the Czech Republic-the only other
countries yet to ratify Lisbon Treaty-to sign the
treaty as soon as possible.
The treaty-which is aimed at streamlining deci-
sion-making in the 27-nation bloc-cannot take ef-
fect until all 27 member States ratify it.
Ireland was the only EU member State to hold a
referendum on Lisbon Treaty, though there have
been calls for referendums in several countries.
Irish opinion is thought to have swung behind the
"Yes" vote this time because of the severity of the
economic downturn, as well as the legal "guaran-
tees" on Irish sovereignty that the EU pledged af-
ter the first referendum.
The legally binding "guarantees" state that Lisbon
Treaty will not affect key areas of Irish sovereignty,
such as taxation, military neutrality and family
matters such as abortion-significant issues in 2008's
campaign in Ireland. But they have not yet been
attached to the treaty.
The treaty is intended to make EU institutions
better suited to the enlarged bloc of 27. But oppo-
nents see it as part of a federalist agenda that threat-
ens national sovereignty.
While China figures among the
only five countries across the world
that improved their Human Devel-
opment Index (HDI) rankings,
2009, by three or more points, India continues to
cut a sorry figure, slipping six points (from the last
compilation) in the latest UNDP Human Develop-
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
ment Index. Overall, however, India made progress
on HDI, improving its value from 0.556 in 2000 to
0.612 in 2007.
As against a standing of 128 in the 2008 UN Hu-
man Development Report, India has been ranked
134th among the 182 nations surveyed. The slip
represents poor progress on some indicators of
people’s well-being, including life expectancy, lit-
eracy, school enrolment and GDP per capita.
In China (ranked 92), along with Colombia, France,
Peru and Venezuela, which improved their
rankings by at least three points, the fillip has been
attributed to increase in incomes and life expect-
ancy. China, Colombia and Venezuela’s progress
has also been driven by improvement in educa-
tion. The report concludes that disparities in life
expectancy in the world can range up to 30 years.
Despite progress in the last 25 years, disparities in
people’s well-being in rich and poor countries con-
tinue to be unacceptably wide.
2009 report represents the most extensive cover-
age ever of 182 countries. As for rankings, the top
three ranked countries in the HDI are: Norway,
Australia and Iceland. France rejoined the top 10
countries after dropping down for one year, while
Luxembourg fell from the top 10.
As the Bangkok round of talks on climate change
in October 2009 came to an end, the rift between
the developed and developing countries appeared
to have deepened and widened. The developed
countries would like to abandon the Kyoto Proto-
col, in favour of a new agreement, while the de-
veloping countries would like an extension of the
Protocol. There has been virtually no progress on
the issue of finance and mid-term emission reduc-
tion targets for industrialised countries.
Developing countries have opposed scrapping the
Kyoto Protocol as it clearly places an obligation on
developed world to deepen emission cuts and to
provide finance to help developing countries to
adapt to and mitigate climate change. The United
States and Australia were among the 42 countries
that sought to junk the Protocol. They argued that
51
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
the world had changed since the 1990s, and keep-
ing in mind the ground realities a new agreement
needs to be crafted. This agreement would require
all countries to take on emission cuts. This move
was resisted at Bangkok, with the developing coun-
tries under the G-77 umbrella argued that such a
proposal would violate the Kyoto Protocol and the
Bali Action Plan.
The bright spot in Bangkok was the unveiling of
an aggressive emission reduction plan by Norway.
The Scandinavian country had previously commit-
ted unconditionally to slashing emissions 30 per
cent below 1990 levels by 2020. Its new pledge is
to cut greenhouse gas output by 40 per cent if an
international agreement is reached in Copenhagen
in December 2009.
Global terrorism with spe-
cial focus on Afghanistan
dominated the ninth trilateral
meeting of the foreign minis-
ters of Russia, India and China (RIC) that concluded
in Bangalore on October 27, 2009.
The ministers emphasised the need for the three
countries to assist Afghanistan in fighting terror-
ism, ensuring security, restoring peace and stabil-
ity and building a democratic and pluralistic Af-
ghanistan.
The meeting was held in the backdrop of two sig-
nificant bilateral issues—meeting between Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and China’s Premier
Wen Jiabao at Hua Hin, Thailand and trade,
economy, scientific and climate meeting with Rus-
sia in Moscow on October 21—and resolved to
jointly fight terrorism and narcotic trafficking with
mention also being made on diplomatic settlement
of Iran nuclear issue and denuclearization of the
Korean peninsula.
The demand for a greater role for India in the
United Nation affairs has gained momentum once
again. Russia and China made a strong bid for
India’s status in international affairs be accorded
importance.
Copyright © 2009 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Trade Ministers from SAARC
countries have decided to fast-track
negotiations on liberalising the ser-
vices market within the region, a
move that will enable freer move-
ment of people within the region and
give a boost to investments in areas like tourism,
financial services and telecom.
Services could be incorporated into the South Asia
Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) soon.
SAARC Ministers, who met in Kathmandu in Oc-
tober 2009, also decided to work on reducing the
negative list of items that are not covered under
SAFTA to make the free trade agreement more
"meaningful". SAFTA is an agreement for elimina-
tion of tariffs on goods traded within the SAARC
region, and was signed in January 2004.
The leaders of 53 countries just concluded a cli-
mate change summit a mere few days before
Copenhagen. Hosted in Trinidad and Tobago on
27-29 November, 2009 , the Commonwealth Sum-
mit aimed to make progress on the negotiations
that will come to a head in Copenhagen beginning
December 7. One key outcome is a figure for a pro-
posed "Copenhagen Launch Fund," of $10 billion a
year, described by President Nasheed of the
Maldives as recognizing in part the plight of island
nations in coping with climate change.
The Commonwealth countries assembled are com-
prised of many former British colonies, and the vast
majority of these countries are severely threatened
by climate change. These are countries like the
Gambia, Cameroon (pictured in this photo),
Guyana, and Kiribati.The countries represented in
Trinidad make up one third of the world's popula-
tion.
Indian companies are way ahead in the region in
disclosing their carbon emissions and setting per-
formance targets for mitigation of green house gases
(GHG) emissions, according to a latest survey of
the Confederation on Indian Industry (CII).
52
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )

The total GHG emissions reported by the respondents of carbon disclosure project (CDP) 2009 stands at
68.9 million metric tones (MT), which is almost double the GHG emissions reported in the last two years.

As many as 68 per cent of the respondents to CDP 2009 have reduction plans in place for slashing either
their energy or GHG emissions as compared to 61 per cent last year while 84 per cent of the companies do
not consider existing regulatory mechanisms as a risk but see it as an opportunity for triggering long term
investment in energy efficient technologies. However, these companies do acknowledge that in future,
the regulations may affect their businesses.

The report says 82 per cent of the companies acknowledge physical risks such as damage, disruption and
displacement due to climate change as some of the major challenges that could result in financial losses.

This year a larger number of companies have not only started disclosing information on their GHG emis-
sions, but they are also adopting more accurate methodologies for doing so and are providing categorical
break-downs of their GHG emissions.
Close to 63 per cent of the companies disclosed their GHG emissions in CDP 2009, which is almost double
as compared to only 33 per cent in CDP 2008.

This is the third edition of the CDP India report since it was first published in 2007 and is based on the top
200 companies in India based on market capitalisation.

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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Current Relevant Facts
Indian mountaineer Reena
Kaushal Dharmshaktu has became
the first Indian woman to ski to the
South Pole. Dharmshaktu (38) was
part of the eight-membered Commonwealth
Women's Antarctic Expedition team. All the eight
women skied around 10 hours a day for 3 days and
covered 915 km to reach the bottom of the earth
(South Pole).
The team reportedly braved temperatures 40 de-
gree Celsius below zero, blizzards and blowing at
over 130 kmph during their Antarctic ski trek.
Love Raj Singh had conquered Mount Everest for
the third time in May, 2009.The expedition marked
the 60th foundation anniversary of the Common-
wealth.
In what would make online
commerce faster for customers, the
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has
mandated that all payments for
such transactions be credited directly to merchants,
instead of getting cleared by intermediaries such
as CC Avenue and Paypal.
Currently, until a payment is authorised and pro-
cessed by intermediaries, a transaction is not com-
pleted. For instance, online retailers such as eBay
do not ship goods purchased online unless funds
are credited to their account, after being routed
through an intermediary. CC Avenue, BillDesk,
Direc-Pay, ICICI PaySeal and Paypal are among
major payment gateways in India.
Under the new system, all payments to merchants
shall be effected within a maximum of three days
from the date of transaction. From now on, no pay-
ment other than the commissions at the pre-de-
termined rates/frequency shall be payable to the
intermediaries. The existing system has some pit-
falls. Often, there is a delay in transferring money
to the merchant; at times it is more than seven
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
days.
SEBI has allowed companies to
go for pure auction of shares (of-
fered at bid price) in a follow on
public offer for pricing of issues for institutional
investors. However, the companies will have to of-
fer shares to retail investors, including employees,
at the floor price, fixed before start of the auction
process and the existing system of public offerings
of shares at an uniform price in a band through
book-build method will also continue.
To encourage small and medium firms to come out
with public issues, SEBI has also allowed existing
stock exchanges to set up a separate trading plat-
form and relax the criteria like track record on prof-
itability for listings. On the issue of trading hours,
the board has left it on exchanges to decide be-
tween 9 am and 5 pm.
It took 17 years and 48 extensions for the
Liberhan Commission, probing the 1992 demoli-
tion of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, to submit its
report to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in June
2009. One of the country’s longest running inquiry
commissions, it has cost the government nearly Rs
7 crore.
During the entire tenure, the one-judge probe was
dogged by procedural delays, non-cooperation from
key witnesses and even constant transfers during
the early days of the commission’s functioning. The
commission’s lawyer, Anupam Gupta, dissociated
himself from the one-man panel after eight years
because of differences with Justice Liberhan.
The commission recorded statements of scores of
politicians from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP),
including senior leaders Advani, Murli Manohar
Joshi, then Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Kalyan
Singh and now Bharatiya Jan Shakti party chief
Uma Bharati. Several members of the Congress and
35
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) were also
questioned.
Former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, se-
nior BJP leaders LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi
and ex-UP Chief Minister Kalyan Singh are among
the 68 persons severely indicted by Justice M.S.
Liberhan Commission for their role in the Babri
Masjid demolition 17 years ago, which led the
country to a “brink of communal discord.”
The commission, surprisingly, is soft on Congress-
man and the then Prime Minister P.V. Narsimha
Rao for his perceived ‘inaction’ in deploying Cen-
tral forces or imposing President’s Rule in then BJP-
ruled Uttar Pradesh to protect the 16th century
structure, purported to have been built during the
reign of Mughal emperor Babar. The commission
refers to it as the Ram Janam Bhoomi-Babri Masjid
structure (RJBM) and has clarified that its role was
not to study if the structure was a mosque or a
temple or even its history.
In his 1,029-page report, Justice Liberhan, a former
Chief Justice of Madras High Court, indicts the
perpetrators for having reduced “the oldest
civilisation to stark intolerance and barbarianism,
all for petty political gains.”
The global economic meltdown
and the swine flu scare appears to
have hit Indian tourism last year,
which saw tourist arrivals fall by
3.3 percent to 5.11 million.Tourism Minister
Kumari Selja said that around 5.11 million foreign
tourists visited India in 2009.
The 2008 figure was 5.28 million. The earlier fig-
ure of 5.37 million had been revised by the Bureau
of Immigration (BOI).
India's tourism growth was better than what was
estimated by the UN World Trade Organisation.
The UN body, which compiles world tourism
rankings, had predicted that the tourism industry
would globally face a minus 6-4 percent growth in
2009.
In December 2009, about 646,000 tourists visited
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
India, compared to 534,000 in the corresponding
month in 2008. The figure was 597,000 for the same
month in 2007.
Foreign exchange earnings from tourism in 2009
were Rs.54,960 crore as compared to Rs.50,730
crore in 2008.
India is the world’s largest pri-
vate gold consumer, but the
government’s holding of gold as an
asset is modest. Even so, the latest
purchase of 200 metric tonne from IMF puts it at
number ten among the list of top 10 gold-holders
in the world.
For India, the purchase, apart from signalling that
its economy has come full circle, is a way of spread-
ing its assets which are said to be currently over-
weighted with foreign currency, mainly in the
form of sovereign US Treasury bonds. In other
words, it is a hedge against a falling dollar.
Of India’s current foreign exchange reserves of
nearly $285 billion, foreign currency assets account
for more than 90% ($268.3 billion), followed by
gold ($10.3 billion), IMF’s Special Drawing Rights
($5.2 billion) and a reserve position in the IMF of
$1.59 billion.
While India’s current gold holdings are said to be
historically low, buying 200 tons in addition to the
358 tons it already holds is expected to bump up
the gold reserves to more than 6%.
India’s gold trauma occurred in the summer of
1991, when faced with dwindling foreign exchange
reserves and a possibility of a default on payments,
the government mortgaged 47 tons of gold to the
Bank of England and 20 tons of gold to the Union
Bank of Switzerland to raise $ 600 million. The
move helped tide over the balance of payment cri-
sis, and also kick-started the reforms process.
Even as the overall inflation rate remains at
around 1.5%, prices of food articles have gone up
13.4% in the last one year. That statistic is bad
36
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
news for the common man, but details of specific
commodities like potatoes, onions and pulses are
even more disconcerting.
According to the latest data, prices of potatoes have
doubled over the last 12 months; onions are 50%
more expensive and the prices of pulses have gone
up by over 23% on average. It’s another matter
that the price of some specific pulses like ‘arhar’
and ‘moong’ have risen to all-time highs of around
Rs 90 per kg.
Contributing to the spike in food prices has been a
weak monsoon in 2009, which is expected to lead
to foodgrain production falling by around 21 mil-
lion tonnes in the current kharif season compared
to kharif 2008. Rice production is estimated to fall
by over 15 million tonnes and the output of coarse
cereals by 5.5 million tonnes.
All-weather roads in the villages
of the country has doubled the in-
come of rural households, raised
literacy rate by 10%, and appreci-
ated land prices by up to 80%, says the World Bank.
“In 2000, about 40% of India’s 825,000 villages
lacked all-weather roads ... With access to roads,
incomes have soared. Household incomes rose by
50% to 100% on average.”
World Bank has been supporting India’s rural con-
nectivity programme—Pradhan Mantri Gram
Sadak Yojana (PMGSY). It aids projects in several
places like Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan,
Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh. Over the years,
World Bank’s concessionary lending arm Interna-
tional Development Association (IDA) has sup-
ported many rural roads projects, both standalone
and components of larger projects. The year-round
connectivity has narrowed gender gap with access
to education for girls and raised job opportunities,
IDA said adding every Rs 10 lakh spent on rural
roads has helped lift 163 people out of poverty.
The World Bank has said "a second project of $1
billion is under preparation". It would aim to im-
prove maintenance, weak capacity, governance and
accountability, and would introduce several effi-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
ciency measures. Meanwhile, for two-laning of
6,372-km of the total of 19,702 km single lane high-
ways in the country, the finance ministry has re-
quested the World Bank for a loan of $3 billion.
India's economy gave yet another indication of
its rapidly improving health, prompting greater
ambition from policy-makers still chary of with-
drawing the stimulus medicine responsible for the
recovery. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) expanded
by a surprisingly strong 7.9% during the July-Sep-
tember second quarter, its fastest pace in a year
and a half. The growth was driven largely by a pick-
up in manufacturing, increased government expen-
diture, robust investments and modest growth in
farm output despite the drought.
The growth in the first half of the year is now a
respectable 7% as against 7.8% during the same
period a year ago. In the fiscal year ended March
2009, the economy grew by 6.7%, its weakest in
six years and way below rates of 9% or more in the
previous three years.
The strong growth may put pressure on RBI to hike
policy rates sooner than March 2010 as worries
about inflation grow. Bond yields firmed up to
7.25%, six basis points up, as traders see a 25-ba-
sis-point hike in key policy rates by January 2010.
There will also be pressure on the government to
cut expenditure and roll back stimulus measures
such as the cut in indirect rates. The fiscal deficit
between April and October 2009 was 61% of the
target for the year, but slower-than-expected tax
collections suggest the government could overshoot
the target of 6.8% of the GDP for the year.
India has revised its National
Ambient Air Quality Standards
(NAAQS), discontinuing the old
practice of different air quality
standards for different land-use
classes like residential and industrial areas. The
country will now have uniform health-based
NAAQS with uniform standards for all areas,
whether residential or industrial.
37
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Revised after a gap of 15 years, new air quality stan-
dards also provide legal framework for controlling
air pollution and protecting public health, mean-
ing that any citizen can now approach the court
demanding better air quality. The revised standards
include initiatives that had been developed in con-
sonance with globally best practices and in keep-
ing with latest advancements in technology and
research.
The big question, however, is of enforcement,
which could prove to be a difficult task.
The standards have brought two new deadly pol-
lutants, PM 2.5 and ozone, within the ambit of
regulation. The standard for nitrogen oxide has
been made more stringent, from the existing 60
micro-gm per cubic metre, it has been tightened
down to 40 micro-gm per cubic metre. Suspended
particulate matter (SPM) as parameter has been
replaced by fine particulate matter (PM 2.5), which
is more relevant for public health.
India has the largest number of
stunted children below the age of
five in the world, according to the
latest United Nations Children's
Fund report.
Approximately 200 million chil-
dren, under the age of five, suffer from stunted
growth in the developing world. The report 'Track-
ing Progress on Child and Maternal Nutrition'
found that stunting is primarily caused due to child-
hood under-nutrition, which contributes to more
than a third of all deaths in children under five.
India also has one of the highest numbers of un-
derweight children, below the age of five, and one
third of 'wasted children'—those facing a greater
chance of death—in the world.
Out of a total of 19 million new-borns per year in
the developing world that are born with low birth-
weight, India has 7.4 million low birth-weight
babies per year—the highest in the world. The
report finds that 80 per cent of the developing
world's stunted children live in 24 countries.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
India, however, does not have the highest preva-
lence of stunted children as the high numbers was
due to its large population. In terms of prevalence,
Afghanistan was first while India was 12th. In 17
countries, underweight prevalence among children
under 5 years old is greater than 30 per cent. The
rates were highest in Bangladesh, India, Timor-
Leste and Yemen,` with more than 40 per cent of
children being underweight.
The study also found that 13 per cent of children,
under 5 years old, in the developing world were
wasted, and 5 per cent were severely wasted (an
estimated 26 million children).
A number of African and Asian countries have
wasting rates that exceed 15 per cent, including
India (20 per cent) Bangladesh (17 per cent), and
Sudan (16 per cent). The country with the highest
prevalence of wasting in the world is Timor-Leste,
where 25 per cent of children under 5 years old
are wasted.
In Asia, the prevalence of stunting dropped from
approximately 44 per cent in 1990 to an estimated
30 per cent in 2008, while in Africa it fell from
approximately 38 per cent in 1990 to an estimated
34 per cent in 2008. Unless attention is paid to ad-
dressing the causes of child and maternal under-
nutrition today, the costs will be considerably
higher tomorrow.
In a move that will enhance the
image of the judiciary, 21 out of the
22 Supreme Court judges—includ-
ing Chief Justice K.G.
Balakrishnan—have declared their
assets and of their wives by posting
the details on the court’s website—
supremecourtofindia.nic.in.
The step is expected to end months of controversy
over the apex court's refusal to place in public do-
main such details, maintaining that it was not
bound to part with these under the Right to Infor-
mation Act (RTI).
The details, provided under the heading “Assets of
38
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Judges,” however, did not have the total assets of
each judge and his wife. Also, the value of a num-
ber of properties owned by them is not given. Most
of the judges had provided such details to the CJI
at the time of their elevation to the apex court,
but these were not placed in public domain.
Australian Prime Minister
Kevin Rudd visited India in No-
vember 2009 with a message to
India that Australia remained a
safe destination for Indian stu-
dents. Mr Rudd said his govern-
ment was committed to using the
“full force” of law to protect Indian students.
During his visit, in an attempt to upgrade bilateral
ties, both countries agreed to elevate the relation-
ship to a strategic partnership. Discussions between
Mr Rudd and Mr Singh covered all aspects of the
bilateral relationship—from trade to climate
change. On climate change, Mr Rudd said: “Indian
Prime Minister and I discussed the great challenge
of climate change. We must have a good ambition
for Copenhagen.” The two sides agreed that it is
an issue of concern for both countries, with the
Indian side reiterating its position on climate
change.
The two sides have also decided to expedite the
feasibility study to look into the impact of an FTA
between the two countries. In fact, the Australian
side has made no secret of its interest in an FTA,
with Mr Rudd saying that he expects the study to
recommend an FTA.
Notwithstanding the US pressure, India has
unequivocally conveyed to Iran its commitment
to participating in the 7.4 billion dollar Iran-Paki-
stan-India (IPI) gas pipeline project. This reassur-
ance was given by both Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh and External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna
at separate meetings with visiting Iranian Foreign
Minister Manouchehr Mottaki in New Delhi.
At the delegation-level talks between the two for-
eign ministers, Iran sought greater cooperation
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
with New Delhi in fighting terrorism emanating
from Pakistan. Like India, Iran has also been af-
fected by terrorism sponsored from the Pakistani
soil. A horrific suicide attack in south-east Iran in
October 2009 targeted the country's Revolution-
ary Guards and was blamed on Pakistan-based
Jundallah, a Sunni extremist outfit.
This was the first high-level contact between the
two countries since the UPA government returned
to power in New Delhi and Mahmoud
Ahmedinejad was re-elected as the President of
Iran in June 2009.
Mottaki renewed an invitation to Manmohan Singh
to visit Iran. The invitation was accepted and dates
of the visit would be finalised in consultations
through diplomatic channels.
The two sides also agreed to convene an early meet-
ing of the joint working group (JWG) on energy
cooperation between them to resolve issues con-
nected with the pipeline project. An Iranian team
would be visiting India soon for the purpose. As
Iran and India share common interests in Afghani-
stan, they also discussed joint infrastructure
projects like the deep sea port of Chabahar and a
rail link to provide better connectivity for Afghani-
stan to Central Asia.
Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh’s deliberations with US
President Barack Obama in end-
November 2009, as his first State
guest, did not result in any dra-
matic announcements but New
Delhi was satisfied that it was able
to persuade Washington to acknowledge that In-
dia was being inflicted by terrorism from
neighbouring Pakistan.
Washington went a step further by calling for the
defeat of terrorist “safe havens” in Pakistan and
Afghanistan and agreed to enhance collaboration
in this effort.
The joint statement was prefaced with a commit-
ment by both leaders to expand and deepen their
39
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
relations. President Obama described India as a
“rising and responsible global power” to assure In-
dia that it was very much on the US radar and that
any impression to the contrary was incorrect.
The two countries signed a new memorandum of
understanding on counter-terrorism cooperation
to help each other in information and intelligence
sharing related to terrorism, which institutionalised
an arrangement which has been in place since the
26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.
President Obama’s commitment on the implemen-
tation of the Indo-US civil nuclear agreement dur-
ing his press conference also found mention in the
joint statement, which also acknowledges India as
a responsible nuclear power. Taking note of the
Obama administration’s sensitivities on non-pro-
liferation, India was quick to reaffirm its unilat-
eral and voluntary moratorium on nuclear testing
and agreed with US to start early negotiations on a
multilateral, non-discriminatory and internation-
ally verifiable Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty. On
its part, the US committed to ratify the Compre-
hensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) at an early date.
There are fears that such a development would
encourage the US to pressurise India to sign the
CTBT, which has not been accepted by New Delhi.
President Barack Obama assured Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh that the US-China joint state-
ment issued on his visit to Beijing earlier in No-
vember was not an endorsement of Chinese me-
diation in the India-Pakistan dispute. Mr Singh said
Obama told him that the intention of that state-
ment was not to support any “third-party inter-
vention in issues in South Asia.” He said he was
“very satisfied” with Obama’s assurance on an is-
sue that caused much heart-burn in New Delhi.
India opposes third-party mediation in the dispute
with Pakistan over Kashmir.
On Afghanistan, Prime Minister Singh said Obama
told him that the US “highly values” India's role in
reconstruction and development of the war-rav-
aged country. Manmohan, who met several Re-
publican Democratic as well as Republican law-
makers while in Washington, said there was bi-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
partisan support for India’s role in Afghanistan.
This role is viewed with suspicion by Pakistan.
India and Canada have entered
into an agreement for enhancing
energy security. Yet another deal
has been inked between the two
nations to kick off negotiations
between the two with respect to free trade area.
This happened during the meeting of Prime Min-
ister Manmohan Singh with visiting Canadian
Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in November
2009, on a range of bilateral issues, including trade
and investment, civil nuclear cooperation, the glo-
bal financial crisis, terrorism and climate change.
The energy security pact will enable better coop-
eration between the nations in areas of renewable
energy and energy efficiency, oil and natural gas,
power generation, transmission, distribution and
end-use, energy research and development.
The FTA deal will enable the formation of a joint
study group for exploring the chances for devel-
oping a Comprehensive Economic Partnership
Agreement, with the first meeting slated to be held
in December.
The two nations have also decided to cooperate
for tackling global terrorism.
On November 28, 2009, India reached a civil
nuclear agreement with Canada. The agreement
was firmed up during a meeting between Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and his counterpart
Stephen Harper on the sidelines of the Common-
wealth Summit.
Canada has become the eighth country with which
India has reached civil nuclear agreement since the
NSG lifted a 34-year-old ban on India to join glo-
bal nuclear trade in September last year. The other
countries with which India has already signed the
civil nuclear deal are the US, France, Russia,
Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Argentina and Namibia.
40
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
The Chinese rhetoric against In-
dia for the Dalai Lama’s visit to
Arunachal Pradesh in November
2009 picked up again with a State-
run newspaper running a report
that said the Tibetan spiritual
leader undertook the Arunachal visit under pres-
sure from New Delhi. India rubbished the assess-
ment and took the opportunity to remind China
that the Dalai Lama was free to travel anywhere
in the country.
Though the Chinese government has refrained
from directly attacking India since the meeting
between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, it is significant that
China’s state-run media ran a report attacking In-
dia over the visit of the Dalai Lama.
“India may make use of the Dalai Lama to solve
the decades-long territorial conflict by encourag-
ing his visit to southern Tibet (Arunachal
Pradesh),” Hu Shisheng, a researcher of southern
Asian studies at the China Institutes of Contem-
porary International Relations, was quoted as say-
ing. China calls Arunachal Pradesh southern Ti-
bet.
“The Dalai Lama went to southern Tibet at this
critical moment probably because of pressure from
India... By doing so, he can please the country that
has hosted him for years,” Mr Hu said. He added:
“India may have forgotten the lesson of 1962, when
its repeated provocation resulted in military
clashes. India is on this wrong track again...When
the conflict gets sharper and sharper, the Chinese
government will have to face it and solve it in a
way India has designed,” Mr Hu said.
China had protested against the visit of the Dalai
Lama to Tawang monastery in Arunachal Pradesh,
but India had dismissed the protests by pointing
out that the Dalai Lama continues to be a guest in
India.
Responding to that attack, the Dalai Lama dis-
missed China’s claim that his visit was anti-China
and had said that Arunachal was an integral part
of India.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Genesis of the dispute: In 1913-14, China, Tibet
and Britain tried to hammer out the Shimla Ac-
cord—a deal defining borders between Inner and
Outer Tibet, and between Outer Tibet and British
India. Henry McMahon, a British administrator,
drew up 550 miles of the boundary demarcating
British India and Outer Tibet. China walked out
of the talks, rejecting the line between Inner and
Outer Tibet, but the Accord nonetheless ceded
Tawang and other Tibetan areas to the British
Empire. Since then, China has declared the line
invalid, citing the absence of its signature on the
Shimla Accord. After the collapse of Chinese power
in Tibet, the McMahon line was, de facto, accepted
as official, and Britain established administrations
in the area. However, Tibet and later the People’s
Republic of China claimed Tawang district after
India's independence. With China all set to take
over Tibet, India declared the McMahon line the
official boundary in 1950.
The North East Frontier Agency was created in
1954. The Tibetan uprising was suppressed by
China and its self-ruling government abolished in
1959. The Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala, and maps
published by the Tibetan government-in-exile now
show McMahon Line as the southern border of
Tibet.
During the 1962 war, China acquired large parts
of NEFA but voluntarily w ithdrew to the
McMahon line. It was only in 1985 that China
declared its ownership claims on the eastern tract
roughly corresponding to Arunachal Pradesh. Until
then, it was prepared to cede this land to India if it
was given the cold western desert of Aksai Chin in
Ladakh, of strategic importance to China. India
rejects China’s claims over both, and post-1985
China has insisted that Arunachal Pradesh is theirs.
On November 6, 2009, India
and the European Union (EU)
signed a major accord for coop-
eration in the civil atomic energy
field and pledged to conclude an
ambitious free trade agreement
(FTA) between them within a year. The atomic
41
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
energy agreement is aimed at facilitating India’s
participation in the international thermonuclear
experimental reactor (ITER) project for fusion re-
search.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led the Indian
side at the 10th India-EU summit while the EU
was represented by Swedish Prime Minister
Fredrik Reinfeldt, in his capacity as chairman of
the EU Council and EU President Jose Manuel
Barroso.
The ITER project on fusion energy is said to be the
costliest experiment of its kind that will cost some
10 billion euros. The first fusion reactor is expected
to be operational in Cadarche in southern France
by 2016.
India and the EU have been negotiating an FTA
since 2007 but have not been able to firm up the
accord due to differences over EU’s attempts to link
trade with climate and other extraneous issues.
Both sides are of the view that a political push was
need for the agreement to be wrapped up by 2010.
In a joint statement the two sides shared the un-
derstanding that the development of nuclear en-
ergy for peaceful purposes should take place in
conformity with the highest standards of safety,
security and non-proliferation. The joint statement
further said India and the EU welcomed the re-
newed momentum in global disarmament talks
while reaffirming their shared interest in working
together for disarmament and for countering the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and
their delivery systems. In this context, they stressed
the importance of strengthening national export
control laws.
On terrorism, the EU condemned the terrorist at-
tacks in Mumbai in November 2008 and reiterated
the need for intensifying global cooperation in
combating international terrorism. Without any
reference to Pakistan, the two sides emphasised
the utmost importance of bringing the perpetra-
tors of the crime to justice.
On international financial crisis and global
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
economy, the two sides reiterated their commit-
ment to continue to sustain a strong policy response
until the recovery was secured, to prepare inter-
nationally coordinated and cooperative exit strat-
egies to be implemented once the recovery has
taken hold, to strengthen and reform financial
regulatory and supervisory systems to ensure glo-
bal financial stability and prevent further crises,
and to ensure that the international financial in-
stitutions reflect contemporary economic realities.
Even as India and the United
States iron out their differences
over the reprocessing of the
spent nuclear fuel under the 123
agreement, the French Parlia-
ment has ratified the India-
France nuclear accord, paving the way for French
nuclear giants to build nuclear plants in India.
The French National Assembly adopted a law
authorising the ratification of the agreement signed
between the two countries on September 30, 2008,
during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to
Paris. This is subsequent to the adoption of the
same law by the Senate on October 15, 2009.
It will enable the early entry into force of the agree-
ment. It now paves the way for strengthening re-
lations between French and Indian partners and
for more concrete developments in the industrial
field.
France was the first country to sign a civil nuclear
cooperation agreement with New Delhi days after
India secured a waiver from the nuclear suppliers’
group (NSG) to undertake nuclear commerce in
2008. Since then, India has signed nuclear deals
with the US, Russia, Namibia, Kazakhstan,
Mongolia and Argentina.
French nuclear supplier Areva has been allocated
the nuclear project site at Jaitapur in Maharashtra
to initially build two power plants.
The Indo-French nuclear agreement allows repro-
cessing of the spent nuclear fuel from French
nuclear reactors under safeguards, and gives an as-
42
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
surance of lifetime supply of nuclear fuel for these
reactors. It does not bar the transfer of enrichment
and reprocessing technologies. With the ratifica-
tion of the agreement by the French Parliament,
France becomes the second country after Russia to
give unconditional rights to reprocess spent nuclear
fuel to India.
The agreement makes it mandatory that reprocess-
ing be done under the safeguards of the Interna-
tional Atomic Energy Agency.
Seven months after its first
charge sheet in the Satyam scam,
CBI on November 24, 2009, filed
a supplementary charge sheet
against disgraced Satyam founder
B. Ramalinga Raju and nine oth-
ers, pegging the Satyam fraud at Rs 14,000 crore
instead of the Rs 7800 crore that Raju had owned
up to in January 2009.
The additional charge-sheet, however, fails to nail
Raju and aides on siphoning of funds from Satyam
Computer, instead saying that the investigating
agency was planning to file a separate chargesheet
on the allegations of funds diversion and income-
tax frauds within the next few days.
The 200-page charge-sheet filed in the CBI court
charged the accused of forging board resolutions
and unauthorisedly obtaining loans worth Rs 1220
crore from banks as well as inflating Satyam rev-
enues to the tune of Rs 430 crore by creating fake
customers and generating fake invoices.
The charge-sheet also identifies 1065 properties
with a documented value of Rs 350 crore that were
acquired by the Rajus with the spoils of the fraud.
These include 6,000 acres of land, 40,000 sq yd of
housing plots and 90,000 sq ft of built-up prop-
erty.
CBI has also slapped charges of criminal breach of
trust and falsifying accounts by inflating the ac-
quisition price of Nipuna Services Ltd, the ITeS
arm of Satyam. It also slapped a criminal breach of
trust on them in the declaration and disbursal of
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
dividends of Satyam Computers.
Meanwhile, the Rs 1,220 crore unauthorized loans
detailed by CBI in the charge-sheet are not re-
flected in the company's books and are over and
above the Rs 1,230 crore that Raju confessed to
Satyam having received from various Raju family
owned companies including Maytas Infra and
Maytas Properties.
The Jharkhand Vigilance Bureau has arrested
former Chief Minister Madhu Koda in the multi-
crore mining and money laundering case. A joint
team of Jharkhand Police and State vigilance bu-
reau arrested Mr Koda after he repeatedly refused
to respond to summons from the Enforcement Di-
rectorate for questioning. Mr Koda described his
arrest as part of Congress’ conspiracy to keep him
away from election campaigning.
Mr Koda is alleged to have laundered thousands of
crores during his stint as the Chief Minister be-
tween 2006 and 2008. ED’s probe into the money
laundering operation, which is spread from
Singapore to Thailand and from Dubai to Liberia,
is set to balloon into one of the biggest bribery and
corruption scandals in the country.
The Nagaland State Legislative
Assembly has extended ‘recogni-
tion’ to the Naga undergrounds for
having “selflessly worked, fought
and sacrificed” for the aspirations
and rights of the Naga people. This
‘recognition’ as a resolution was
adopted in the State Assembly on November 29,
2009, even as talks between the government of
India and the NSCN(IM) have yet to reach a con-
clusive stage. The resolution was passed unani-
mously with members cutting across party lines to
support it.
The State Assembly also reiterated its earlier stand
on integration of all Naga-inhabited areas in the
region, an issue that also figures prominently on
the NSCN agenda.
43
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
The Nagaland Assembly has so far passed four reso-
lutions in favour of integration of Naga areas—first
on December 12, 1964, followed by August 28,
1970, September 16, 1994 and December 18, 2003.
The 60-member House in the resolution also ap-
pealed the negotiating parties of the Naga political
dialogue to expedite the political process and bring
about an early resolution through a negotiated
settlement which was honourable and acceptable
to the Naga people.
The State Assembly, through its resolution, also
appreciated the government of India, particularly
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Union Home
Minister P. Chidambaram for their “renewed sin-
cerity” towards finding a permanent solution to the
decades-old “Indo-Naga” political problem.
The resolution also appreciated the civil society,
churches, NGOs and the Forum for Naga Recon-
ciliation (FNR) for their all out efforts towards rec-
onciliation, understanding and oneness of all sec-
tions of Naga society. The resolution also hailed
the sincerity of the underground groups, especially
their commitment towards peace and understand-
ing by signing the “Covenant of Reconciliation”
earlier at Chiangmai in Thailand on September 23,
2009.
The resolution further decided to constitute a Joint
Parliamentary Committee on the Naga political
issue comprising members from all political par-
ties. This committee would carry the voice of the
House to all concerned sections including the Cen-
tre and the Naga rebel groups.
Home Minister P.
Chidambaram announced on No-
vember 1, 2009 that the Union
government is a ready to launch
the much-awaited full-fledged
anti-Naxal operations in three dif-
ferent areas, considered tri-junctions of Maoist vio-
lence.
The tri-junctions, which have been identified for
the offensive against the ‘Red Rebels’, are: Andhra
Pradesh-Maharashtra-Chhattisgarh; Orissa-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Jharkhand-Chhattisgarh and West Bengal-
Jharkhand-Orissa.
Around 40,000 paramilitary personnel would as-
sist the respective State police forces during the
operations. Almost 7,000 specially trained troops
in jungle warfare are also part of the total strength
of the Central forces to be deployed for the task.
The anti-Naxal plan also includes Rs 7,300 crore
package for unleashing developmental works in
areas cleared off the Left-wing extremists. Offi-
cials feel that the Naxal menace, which has now
spread to 40,000 sq km area across the country,
can be wiped out in a period of 12 to 30 months.
Around 25 lakh people live in areas where Maoists
are now having a free run. The Naxalites have killed
more than 2,600 people, including civilians, in
5,800 incidents in last three years.
Scarcity of potable water
could soon be a thing of the past,
at least in coastal and island
States. The Low Temperature
Thermal Desalination System
(LTTD) converts saline seawater into potable wa-
ter—that too for six to seven paise a litre! The first
plant set up at Kavaratti in the Lakshadweep ar-
chipelago has been converting seawater into po-
table water for 10 paise a litre.
Three similar plants of one-lakh litre per day ca-
pacity are proposed to be set up at Agatti, Androth
and Minicoy in the Lakshwadeep Islands. The tech-
nology—based on indigenously designed, devel-
oped and demonstrated desalination techniques by
the National Institute of Ocean Technology
(NIOT)—uses warm surface sea-water, flash evapo-
rated at low pressure. The vapour is then condensed
with cold deep-sea water to get potable water.
A scheme is also being formulated for large-scale
desalination units at coastal power plants and the
remaining three islands of Lakshadweep Islands on
public-private partnership basis.
Experts say global water consumption is doubling
44
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
every 20 years—more than twice the rate of hu-
man population growth. The world’s water use is
expected to triple in the next 50 years. Almost half
of the world’s population lives in 263 international
river basins, but two-thirds of these basins have
no treaties to share water. The world’s population
is already using about 54 per cent accessible fresh-
water. By 2025, the human share will be 70 per
cent. If per capita consumption of water continues
to rise at its current rate, human-kind could be
using over 90 per cent of all available freshwater
within 25 years, experts say.
Kisan Vision Yojana is an ambitious project of
Indian Railways to set up cold chain facilities across
the country for fresh fruit and vegetables. The first
pilot project is being set up at Singur in West Ben-
gal. The aim of the project is to provide linkage
between production clusters with consumption
centres.
As much as Rs 35,000 crore worth of farm pro-
duce is wasted every year due to lack of proper
storage. If this pilot project is successful, Railways
will build similar perishable cargo centres at
Nashik, Azadpur Mandi in Delhi, New Jalpaiguri,
Dankuni and Mecheda.
Container Corporation of India (CONCOR), which
operates inland container depots for Railways, will
provide container facilities between production
clusters and consumption points. CONCOR’s sub-
sidiary, Farm and Health Enterprises will provide
infrastructure support to these facilities.
In the backdrop of nuclear,
biological and chemical (NBC)
weapons being a major factor in
the geo-political security envi-
ronment, the DRDO is develop-
ing herbal protective measures
to guard the fallout of the use of such weapons.
This is the first such project of its kind in the world
where extracts from herbal plants are being used
to produce agents to protect humans against ra-
dioactivity. Besides military applications, the spin-
off of this project will also have spin-offs in civil-
ian sectors like nuclear medicine and radiology.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
At present there is only one chemical agent avail-
able to combat radioactivity, but that is very toxic
and hence dangerous to handle. The herbal prod-
ucts would counter this drawback. Extracts of two
plants, podophylum hexandrum and the well-
known seabuckthorn, are being used in the project
being undertaken by three different DRDO labo-
ratories at Leh, Delhi and Gwalior.
The plants grow only in high altitude areas above
9000 feet and are native only to the Himalayas.
Efforts are on to cultivate the plants in the DRDO
laboratories to ascertain their characteristics and
their ability to adapt to other geographical condi-
tions for mass-scale production.
Some other herbal products developed by the
DRDO for use by the armed forces include UV
protection agents, high energy food items and in-
sect repellents. So far, NBC warfare and protec-
tion items worth about Rs 800 crore, developed by
the DRDO and manufactured by the industry, have
been supplied to the armed forces. These include
sensors, detection systems, individual and collec-
tive protection systems and medical equipment.
A comprehensive Goods and Services Tax (GST)
has been proposed and the Centre and the Em-
powered Committee of State Finance Ministers.
GST is to have two components; one levied by the
Centre (central GST or CGST) and the other by
States (State GST or SGST). The regime is to be
implemented through multiple statutes, one for
CGST and the rest for the respective SGST stat-
utes. While there would be some flexibility for each
State in formulating its SGST regime, the basic fea-
tures related to chargeability, definition of what’s
taxable, valuation, classification will be uniform
and consistent.
The dual GST (CGST and SGST) would be imposed
on all transactions in goods and services except
exempted transactions and certain goods and ser-
vices kept outside the GST’s purview. The thresh-
old limit for CGST is proposed as Rs 1.5 crore for
goods and Rs 10 lakh for services. The threshold
for SGST is proposed as a cumulative total of Rs 10
lakh for both goods and services.
45
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
On November 1, 2009, Afghanistan's Presiden-
tial challenger announced he would not partici-
pate in the run-off election because his demands
for measures to prevent fraud were rejected. He
stopped short of calling on his supporters to boy-
cott the balloting.
Abdullah made no mention of agreeing to take part
in any future unity government with President
Hamid Karzai, which the US and its international
partners believe is the best hope for curbing the
Taliban insurgency.
In an emotional speech, Abdullah said he did not
believe a free and fair election was possible with-
out changes in the leadership of the electoral com-
mission, which ran the fraud-marred first-round
ballot on August 20, 2009. Abdullah said the Af-
ghan people should not accept results of a ballot
run by the current group.
On November 2, 2009, the
Bangladesh cabinet approved a
proposed law to return Hindu
property, which were confiscated
during the 1965 Indo-Pak war,
when the country was eastern
wing of Pakistan, ending a major violation of the
rights of minorities in the country.
The proposed law is meant to redress the long-dis-
puted law of the Pakistani era, which was widely
criticised as a major violation of the minority rights.
During the Pakistan period, the law was called as
the Enemy Property Act.
The then Pakistani regime enacted the law to con-
fiscate the property of the Hindu families who fled
the country when the India-Pakistan war broke
out in 1965 while the post-independent Bangladesh
government renamed it as the Vested Property Act
1974.
Officials familiar with the process said under the
amended proposal, the government would publish
lists of “returnable and non-returnable vested prop-
erty” within a certain period of times while the
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
claimants could also seek review about “non-re-
turnable” property. Under the law, government
committees at district and upzila or sub-district
levels would settle disputes regarding the disputed
property.
The Awami League had enacted the law to return
the minority property at the fag end of its previ-
ous 1996-2001 tenure setting a two-year imple-
mentation deadline but the subsequent Bangladesh
Nationalist Party (BNP) sat on it exposing it to a
natural death. The 2001 law stipulated that land
that was seized be returned to its original owners,
provided that the original owners or their heirs
remained resident citizens.
On November 19, 2009,
Bangladesh's Supreme Court re-
jected the appeals of five former
army officers and confirmed death
sentence on seven others, who are
living abroad, for killing the
country's founding father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman
and his family members 34 years ago.
A five-judge bench of the apex court delivered the
judgement amid tight security on the court pre-
mises and key establishments across the country,
bringing to an end a long court battle on an emo-
tive issue.
Sheikh Mujib, officially referred to with the hon-
orific Bangabandhu, who was then the country's
President, was killed in a coup on the morning of
August 15, 1975, less than four years after he led a
movement that culminated in the emergence of
Bangladesh after its violent separation from Paki-
stan.
In its judgement, the apex court ruled that the in-
cidents of August 15, 1975, were “a simple murder
and it was not a result of mutiny”. Also gunned
down or bludgeoned in three separate attacks were
most of Mujib's family members, close relatives,
political associates, Mujib's security chief and per-
sonal staff.
Referred to as “killer majors”, since most of them
46
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
were junior officers, the condemned men had later
openly claimed to have carried out the killings in
what they described as national interest.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Mujib's elder
daughter and one of the two survivors, revived the
court trial after she returned to power in January
2009. Sheikh Rehana, the other surviving daugh-
ter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, in her reaction,
said it was important that the verdict had been
upheld by the Supreme Court.
On November 19, 2009, Euro-
pean Union leaders have named
Belgian Prime Minister Herman
Van Rompuy as the bloc’s first
President and appointed Briton
Catherine Ashton as its foreign af-
fairs chief.
A consensus was reached at a summit in Brussels
after Britain dropped its insistence that former
British Prime Minister Tony Blair should become
President, ending weeks of deadlock and opening
the way to agreement on Van Rompuy.
The appointments are intended to bolster the EU’s
standing and help it match the rise of emerging
powers such as China following the global eco-
nomic crisis.
Van Rompuy, 62, and Ashton, 53, are low-profile
compromise candidates little known outside the
EU and at least initially will not have the clout in
foreign capitals that an established statesmen such
as Blair would have had.
Pakistan's embattled Presi-
dent Asif Ali Zardari has
transferred control of the
country’s nuclear arsenal to
Premier Yousuf Raza Gilani
and said he intended to strip
the Presidency of more pow-
ers soon.
The President gave up his control over the nuclear
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
arsenal by re-promulgating the National Command
Authority Ordinance and amending it, a move de-
scribed as a “giant leap forward to empower the
elected Parliament and the Prime Minister.”
Zardari also said in an interview with a TV news
channel that the 17th Constitutional amendment
which gives President sweeping powers to dismiss
the Premier and dissolve Parliament will also be
done away with soon.
Meanwhile, a controversial law which scrapped
graft cases against Asif Ali Zardari and his key al-
lies expired on November 28, 2009, but the Paki-
stan President felt it will not affect him as the Con-
stitution provides “indemnity” to the person hold-
ing the top post in the country.
On November 24, 2009,
Philippines President Gloria
Macapagal Arroyo placed two
southern provinces and a city
under emergency rule after 24
people were killed in the
worst-ever election related violence in the coun-
try.
The orders were issued as troops, using shovels and
bare hands, dug up hastily covered graves on a
grassy hillside in Maguindanao to recover the vic-
tims of the massacre. Some of the dead men had
their hands tied behind their back and one of the
women was pregnant. Eight of those found dead
were local journalists. They were part of a group
of 40 people abducted by gunmen when on their
way to file a candidate's nomination to contest the
governorship in elections May 2010.
Elections in the Philippines are usually marred by
violence, especially in the south, where security
forces are battling communist rebels, Islamic radi-
cals and clan rivalries.
Europe's deepest recession since the second
world war has officially ended after the world's
biggest single trading bloc joined Japan and the
United States in returning to growth. Both the 16-
47
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
nation eurozone, and the 27-nation European
Union as a whole, expanded their economies in the
third quarter, with a 0.4 per cent increase in the
single currency area and a 0.2 per cent rise across
the bloc as a whole.
But despite exiting five quarters running of eco-
nomic retreat, analysts said that the improvement
is unlikely to be robust enough to allow govern-
ments to end State support measures, particularly
with unemployment continuing to rise.
The eurozone economy had shrunk by 0.2 per cent
between April and June after a record collapse of
2.5 per cent in the first three months of 2009. But
growth of 0.7 per cent in Germany, Europe's most
powerful economy, and 0.3 per cent in France, in
the third quarter lay behind the improvement.
Britain, with a 0.4 per cent contraction and Spain,
with a 0.3 per cent decline, contributed to the
lower figure for the EU as a whole.
The European figures compare with a 0.9 per cent
improvement in third-quarter economic output in
the United States, with Japan having already ex-
ited from recession in the second quarter with 0.6
per cent growth.
The Organisation for Eco-
nomic Cooperation and De-
velopment has doubled its
growth forecast for the lead-
ing developed economies in
2010 and predicted a further
acceleration in 2011 as China powers a global re-
covery.
The economy of the group’s 30 member countries
will expand 1.9% in 2010 and 2.5% in 2011, the
Paris-based organisation said in a report. Output
will contract 3.5% in 2009. The OECD, which ad-
vises members on economic policy, forecast 2010
growth of 0.7% in June.
But the recovery will be marred by high unem-
ployment and huge government debt across the
industrialised countries, the OECD said. Central
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
banks and governments in major Western econo-
mies should prepare for a gradual upwards shift in
ultra-low interest rates and for fiscal consolidation
once recovery is stronger, but they will only need
to move in late 2010 at the earliest given that in-
flation is so low.
Output in the OECD economies will only return
to the level achieved in the first three months of
2008 in the third quarter of 2011, underlining the
damage done by the banking crisis.
The OECD gave 2011 growth forecasts for the first
time. The US will grow 2.8%, the euro area 1.7%
and Japan 2%. The Chinese economy will expand
9.3%, it said. The global growth forecast includes
emerging giants China, Brazil, India and Russia
with the mostly industrialized economies of its own
30-country membership and in all covers some 80%
of world output.
The OECD said it expected world trade to grow
6.0% in 2010 and 7.7% in 2011 after a plunge of
12.5% in 2009. China and India are poised to ac-
celerate due to strong stimulus measures, the OECD
projected.
The Paris-based group hiked its growth forecast
for China to 9.3% in 2009 and 10.2% in 2010. In
March, it projected China's growth at 6-7% in 2009.
For India, the OECD boosted its growth forecast
to 6.1% in 2009 and 7.3% in 2010, rising to 7.6%
the following year. The OECD, in March, projected
4.3% expansion for India in 2009. India's recovery
appeared to be only “modestly hampered” by the
driest monsoon in nearly four decades and eco-
nomic data suggested the growth “momentum is
strengthening,” the OECD said. But a resurgence
of inflationary pressures pose a “key challenge” to
Indian policymakers in deciding when to withdraw
stimulus in order to tackle the large public deficit,
it said.
Global markets from Sydney to Sao Paulo
trembled on November 26, 2009, on fears that
Dubai’s attempts to reschedule loans might trigger
a fresh round of financial troubles in a world just
emerging from the worst economic crisis since the
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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
1930s and which may be amplified in India as thou-
sands of expats stare at job losses and reduced trade.
India, which gets nearly a quarter of its remittances
from the United Arab Emirates and has lakhs of
labourers working in the region, may be worse off
than most other nations if the crisis escalates into
a full-blown one like the Russian or Argentinian
crises of the past.
Indian shares and the rupee fell in sync with the
rest of the global markets where investors are flee-
ing for safety after Dubai World, the government
investment company with $59 billion of liabilities,
sought to delay repayment on much of its debt.
Investors believe that there could be more trouble
spots in emerging markets after Vietnam devalued
its currency and raised rates. The Bombay Stock
Exchange’s Sensex fell 2% to 16,854.95, and the
rupee fell 24 paisa to 46.55 against the dollar. The
MSCI Emerging Markets Index lost 1.4%.
Dubai, which borrowed $80 billion in a four-year
construction boom to transform its economy into
a regional tourism and financial hub, suffered the
world’s steepest property slump in the global re-
cession. Home prices fell 50 percent from their 2008
peak, according to Deutsche Bank AG. Banks
around the world have written off more than $1.7
trillion as the credit crisis trashed the value of their
assets.
Dubai World’s lenders include Credit Suisse Group
AG, HSBC Holdings, Barclays, Lloyds Banking
Group and Royal Bank of Scotland Group.
were elated after China announced
ambitious cuts in the carbon intensity of its
economy by 2020 in a major boost to the global
effort to tackle climate change. China announced
a 40-45 percent reduction in the carbon intensity
from the business-as-usual scenario by 2020. Car-
bon intensity measures the amount of carbon di-
oxide—the main greenhouse gas that is causing
global warming—emitted per unit of industrial
output. India's carbon intensity is one of the low-
est among emerging economies.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
International NGO Greenpeace also welcomed
China's announcement but said it was not enough.
"Given the urgency and magnitude of the climate
change crisis, China needs stronger measures to
tackle climate change," said Ailun Yang of
Greenpeace China. "This is a significant announce-
ment at a very important point in time. But China
could do more."
Since 2007, China is the world's largest emitter of
greenhouse gases, though almost all the carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere now has been put there
by developed countries since the start of the In-
dustrial Age.
Yang noted that the announcement by China is
yet another commitment for the climate coming
from a major developing country ahead of the UN
Copenhagen Climate Summit. "This is another
challenge to the industrialised world, particularly
the US, which has just announced an inadequate
emissions reduction target of only 4-5 percent by
2020."
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change—a grouping of over 2,500 scientists from
around the world—has said the developed world
should cut emissions by at least 25-40 percent be-
low 1990 levels by 2020 and reduce 80-95 percent
by 2050.
For China, a low carbon path is a national priority
and a sure way to keep up its economic tempo.
China can ill-afford to let ‘invisible’ carbon denomi-
nated process and production methods (PPMs)
standards shackle its export offensive.
More than India, it is China that should be wor-
ried about the current efforts to re-interpret Ar-
ticle XX (e) of GATT to keep out ‘goods based on
carbon intensive processes’. In reality, China has
been under greater pressure to stave off the ‘cli-
mate related threat’ from the WTO window. By
sending a ‘concrete’ signal of commitment to emis-
sion intensity reduction, the People’s Republic is
doing its best to keep the trade dragon from get-
ting into the FCCC fold.
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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
There could be an interpretation that the Chinese
concession is an implicit acceptance of NAMA.
Given the fact that China is still coal dependent
and looks towards safe and cost-effective carbon
capture and storage (CCS) technologies, it does not
make sense for it to accept NAMA commitments
without quid pro commitments on the technology
transfer front. It is important that India and China
have a concerted position on this issue.
Earlier in the month of November, Brazil had of-
fered to reduce its emissions if it was provided in-
ternational funding to control deforestation of the
Amazonian forests. The move was interpreted by
some as a sell-out to industrialised countries. And,
now India faces the challenge of how to escape
being seen as a global hurdle.
The Chinese move came a day after the US admin-
istration, that held out for long, announced that it
would offer a target of reducing its greenhouse gas
emissions "in the range of" 17% by 2020 as com-
pared to 2005 levels. When converted to bench-
marks set under Kyoto Protocol, this works out to
4% reduction below 1990 levels—almost seven
times less than what the EU has offered and less
than 1/10th of what the UN IPCC requires
industrialised countries to do to check catastrophic
climate change.
One senior official said: "China’s offer are not ab-
solute reductions, please note, and they are purely
voluntary, China has not offered them as a com-
mitment towards international compact. This is
along lines that China had informed us of. But they
leave a positive impression internationally." In fact,
the Chinese are aiming to earn goodwill without
doing much. The industrialized countries are
obliged under the existing UN treaty to reduce their
emissions by absolute levels below a fixed
benchmarked year. China, in comparison has of-
fered a purely voluntary reduction in its carbon
intensity. The carbon intensity target also provides
enough leverage for ‘creative accounting’ in mea-
suring success of targets.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
China supplied Pakistan with
enough weapons-grade ura-
nium for two atomic bombs in
1982 and continued to help
Islamabad out with its nuclear
programme, according to a report in The Wash-
ington Post.
Outing China as a nuclear proliferator, the report,
which sourced the narrative from accounts writ-
ten by disgraced Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q.
Khan, said that a Pakistani military C-130 left the
western Chinese city of Urumqi with the “highly
unusual cargo" in 1982.
That China supplied Pakistan with nuclear know-
how has always been suspected, but this is the first
time that a detailed account of how it took place
has come out and that too straight from the ac-
counts of A.Q. Khan. The uranium transfer was
reportedly part of a secret nuclear deal approved
years earlier by Mao Zedong and Prime Minister
Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in the 1976, four years after
India tested its first nuclear weapon.
But it was realised only during the time of Zia ul-
Haq, who after taking power and hanging Bhutto
was struggling under rumours of a pre-emptive
strike by India. So Khan and a Pakistani general
were sent to Beijing "to borrow enough bomb-
grade uranium for a few weapons." Chinese leader
Deng Xiaoping gave the approval and Khan and
his team flew aboard a Pakistani C-130 to Urumqi
where Khan says they enjoyed barbecued lamb
while waiting for the Chinese military to pack the
small uranium bricks into lead-lined boxes to be
flown to Islamabad.
“Upon my personal request, the Chinese Minister
had gifted us 50 kg [kilograms] of weapon-grade
enriched uranium, enough for two weapons,” Khan
wrote in an 11-page narrative of the Pakistani bomb
programme that he prepared after his January 2004
detention. “The Chinese gave us drawings of the
nuclear weapon, gave us 50 kg enriched uranium,”
he said in a separate account sent to his wife sev-
eral months earlier. China in effect supplied a "vir-
tual do-it-yourself kit that significantly speeded
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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Pakistan’s bomb effort."
Even before that, China sent Pakistan 15 tons of
uranium hexafluoride (UF6), a feedstock for
Pakistan’s centrifuges, whose designs Khan has sto-
len. But it was also a give and take with Khan shar-
ing Europe’s best centrifuge technology in the
1980s with the Chinese in an effort to help China’s
uranium-enrichment programme.
On November 27, 2009, In-
dia joined 24 other countries
at the Vienna-based Interna-
tional Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA) to vote against Iran on
its nuclear programme. India’s censure was based
on IAEA director-general Mohammed El Baradei’s
report on Implementation of the NPT safeguards
agreement in Iran which said all efforts to negoti-
ate with Iran to address the international
community’s concern over its ‘clandestine enrich-
ment programme’ has reached a “dead-end.”
This was the third time that India has voted against
Iran’s alleged clandestine nuclear weapons
programme at the IAEA, the last two occasions
being in September 2005 and February 2006. This
decision had kicked off a massive political storm in
the country. The Left parties, which were offer-
ing critical outside support to the UPA government
at that time, had come down heavily on the ruling
combine and accused it of being arm-twisted by
the US into voting against Iran.
The vote had also raised serious concerns within
the ruling Congress, which feared that this vote
would erode its minority support base. Explaining
New Delhi’s third vote on the governing body reso-
lution Vienna, External Affairs Ministry spokes-
person said: “Our support for the resolution was
based on the key points contained in the Report of
the Director General.”
The IAEA has come to the conclusion that Iran
was not transparent about its nuclear programmes
and concluded that it was pursuing clandestine
nuclear weapons programme. In September, Iran
confirmed the doubts about its weapons
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
programme when it disclosed the existence of a
second uranium enrichment plant in Fordo, not
very far from Tehran.
India, on its part, has been doing a tightrope walk
on the sensitive issue. It has consistently opposed
Tehran on this issue in multi-lateral forums but
continued to engage with Tehran bilaterally. The
reasons for this were explained by Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh when he pointed to the ancient
civilization links between the two countries, New
Delhi’s dependence on Iran for energy and the pres-
ence of five million Indians living in Iran.
Continuing with its balancing act, India was quick
to strike a conciliatory note after its censure of Iran
at Vienna. It pointed out that this resolution should
not be used to renew punitive action or new sanc-
tions against Iran.
The latest resolution was backed by all five per-
manent members of the UN Security Council. The
three countries that opposed the anti-Iran IAEA
resolution were Cuba, Venezuela and Malaysia,
while Pakistan, Afghanistan, Egypt, Turkey, South
Africa and Brazil abstained from voting.
On November 29, 2009,
Iran announced plans to
build 10 new uranium en-
richment plants in a major
expansion of its nuclear
programme—a clear show of defiance after the UN
nuclear watchdog rebuked Tehran over secret such
work. The decision by hardline President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government will further
aggravate tensions between the Islamic Republic
and major powers seeking a diplomatic solution to
a long-running dispute over Iranian nuclear activi-
ties.
It may speed up discussions in the West about pos-
sible new sanctions on Iran over its repeated re-
fusal to halt uranium enrichment, which the US
and its allies suspect is part of a covert bid to de-
velop nuclear bombs. Iran denies this.
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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
The new enrichment facilities would be the same
size as Iran's main enrichment complex at Natanz.
On November 17, 2009, in a deli-
cate balancing act during his visit to
China, US President Barack Obama
supported early resumption of talks
between China and the Dalai Lama’s
representatives while describing Ti-
bet as part of this country. Taking note of the sen-
sitivities of China and the exiled Tibetan leader,
Obama, during his maiden visit to China as Presi-
dent, said: “We did note that while we recognise
that Tibet is part of the People’s Republic of China,
the US supports the early resumption of dialogue”
between the Dalai Lama’s representatives and
Beijing.
Obama’s remarks came after his meeting with his
Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao during which the
two sides discussed a host of issues including In-
dia-Pakistan relations, Iran’s controversial nuclear
programme, Afghanistan, terrorism and climate
change.
The US and China agreed to work together to bring
about stable and peaceful relations in all of South
Asia, Obama said during his joint briefing with
Chinese president Hu Jintao in Beijing. Hu, who
spoke first, didn’t mention Pakistan or South Asia.
This was a rare occasion when a US president ac-
knowledged that Beijing has a role to play in the
India-Pakistan relationship. The move, if serious,
runs counter to predictions of US foreign policy
experts that the US would not acquiesce in a fu-
ture Chinese hegemony in the region.
While the joint statement was met with silence
by New Delhi, it infuriated officials in the foreign
office because it brought back nasty memories of
another US-China joint statement by Bill Clinton
and Jiang Zemin on June 29, 1998. Then too, it
was Clinton and Jiang, in what India considered
“offensive” language, scolding India and Pakistan
for their nuclear tests. India had reacted sharply
then, buffeted by general international condem-
nation after the tests.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
But latest statement cut at the heart of an Indian
effort to build a relationship with the US without
China complicating the issue. The reality is per-
haps that the joint statement was drafted by
Obama’s China officials who don’t read India’s sen-
sitivities. But that it was allowed to go through
signals to many Indian strategists that Obama may
be more than pliant to China, giving it a role in a
region where it’s bound to come into conflict with
a country Obama says is a strategic US partner,
India.
Tracing new links to
the Mumbai carnage, a
Pakistani father-son
duo were arrested from
Italy for allegedly man-
aging money transfer to finance phone communi-
cations of the attackers following leads from In-
dian and US investigators.
The two men, who ran a money transfer agency,
were arrested in an early morning raid from the
northern Italian city of Brescia, police said. The
duo have been identified by the police as
Mohammad Yaqub Janjua, 60, and Aamer Yaqub
Janjua, 31. They have been accused of aiding and
abetting international terrorism as well as illegal
financial activity.
On November 25, 2008, a day before the attacks,
they transferred $ 229 to activate an internet phone
account that was used by the attackers and their
accomplices, said Stefano Fonzi, the head of anti-
terror police in Brescia.
The funds that enabled the terrorists to be in touch
with their handlers in Pakistan were transferred
under the identity of another Pakistani man who
had never been to Italy and was not involved in
the attacks, reports from Italy said. The two man-
aged a money transfer agency where it is reported
to be a common practice to transfer funds using
false identities. The Italian police arrested the two
men in an early morning raid in Brescia, the police
said in a statement.
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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Italian police started their investigation the follow-
ing month after being alerted by Indian authori-
ties and the FBI that funds had been transferred
from Italy.
In what is being seen
as a clever move by
Islamabad to bury LeT
founder and Jamaat-ud-
Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed’s
role as the prime strategist behind the 26/11 at-
tacks, a Pakistani trial court, while framing charges
against seven accused on its soil, has instead named
Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi as the mastermind.
Exactly a year after the Mumbai assault, on No-
vember 25, 2009, the special anti-terror court set
up in Adiala jail in Rawalpindi framed charges
against all the seven accused in Pakistan’s custody,
reportedly confirming Lakhvi as the mastermind
and Zarar Shah, Abu al-Qama, Hamad Amin Sadiq,
Shahid Jamil Riaz, Jamil Ahmed and Younas Anjum
as handlers/facilitators. All seven had pleaded not
guilty. They have been reportedly charged under
the anti-terrorism act and the Pakistani penal law.
The charges include providing training, financial
support, accommodation, equipment and commu-
nication gear to the 10 terrorists who had attacked
Mumbai, including the lone survivor Ajmal Amir
Kasab, who is now in India’s custody.
Interestingly, the dossier submitted by India on
the 26/11 investigations to Pakistani names JuD
chief Hafiz Saeed as the mastermind behind the
Mumbai plot. Zaki-ur-Rehman, Zarar Shah, Abu
Qama and others, now facing trial in Pakistan for
their involvement in the 26/11 attacks, were only
acting under the instructions of Saeed. Saeed is al-
leged to have personally overseen the preparations
and events leading up to the major assault on India’s
financial capital. Senior officials of the security es-
tablishment are obviously disappointed over the
absence of any reference by the Pakistani court to
Saeed’s role in the 26/11 conspiracy. The assess-
ment in India is that the Pakistani court’s move,
timed to coincide with the eve of the 26/11 anni-
versary, was essentially to exhibit to the world its
“commitment” to punish the attacks’ perpetrators
on its soil while ensuring a complete cover-up of
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Hafiz Saeed’s role as the key conspirator.
On November 1, 2009, even as the crucial glo-
bal Arms Trade and Transfers (ATT) treaty, which
seeks to regulate the $55 billion arms trade and
promote democracy, found overwhelming support
from 153 member countries at the UN. India was
among the 19 who abstained from the meet. These
153 countries—including top arms suppliers like
US, Britain, Germany and France—supported a UN
disarmament committee resolution which will lead
into negotiations for the treaty starting 2010.
While India may still take part in negotiations, the
treaty in its present form was not in India’s inter-
est. Certain binding clauses on social issues like
violation of human rights and restrictions on arms
sale expanding into controls on export of advanced
technologies could work against India.
The US under George Bush in 2006 had opposed
the treaty but it came round to supporting it un-
der Barack Obama. The fate of the UN sponsored
treaty still hangs in the balance as the list of 19
who abstained includes China and Russia, as also
Pakistan.
The proposed treaty calls upon States involved in
arms trade to not violate human rights, promote
democracy and refrain from getting into any armed
conflict. It also calls for ban on sale of arms to coun-
tries which promote terrorism.
The fact that India is still dependent on conven-
tional weapons and imports a large number of these
is another major concern. The proposed treaty will
seek to set up export controls on transfers of ad-
vanced weapons, thereby extending the present
Western-inspired controls on export of advanced
technologies. This could impinge on the interests
of India.
The Reserve Bank of
India’s gold stock has shot
up by more than 55 per cent
with the purchase of 200
tonnes of IMF gold at an es-
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Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
timated cost of $6.7 billion. RBI, which pledged
gold during 1991 crisis with the Bank of England
to raise resources to meet external obligations, said
it has purchased 200 tonnes of gold from Interna-
tional Monetary Fund (IMF).
The minimum support price (MSP) of wheat
has been increased by the Union government by
Rs 20 a quintal to Rs 1,100 a quintal. The MSP for
barley has been fixed at Rs 750 per quintal and
‘chana’ at Rs 1,760 per quintal.
Sachin Tendulkar holds the
world record for most number of
fifties in One day matches (91).
He also holds the world record
for most tons (9) in a calendar
year (1998), as also world record
for most runs in a calendar year
(1894 in 34 matches).
Four Indians, including Prime Minis-
ter Manmohan Singh and fugitive Dawood
Ibrahim, have made it to the Forbes list of the
world's most powerful people topped by US Presi-
dent Barack Obama, who is followed by Chinese
President Hu Jintao and Russian Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin. Among the four Indians,
Manmohan Singh has been ranked highest at 36th
position, while the country's top corporate house
Reliance Industries' chief Mukesh Ambani finds
himself ranked 44th ahead of Tata Group Chair-
man Ratan Tata (59th). Ranked very next to
Manmohan Singh is al-Qaida founder Osama bin
Laden at 37th place, while Indian underworld don
Dawood Ibrahim is at 50th position.
The Union government has said it would soon
launch two more schemes to improve the health
status of adolescent girls and mothers. When rolled,
the “Rajiv Gandhi Abla Scheme” and the “Indira
Gandhi Matritva Scheme” would be additions to
the eight government schemes already in place to
fight undernourishment among children aged 0 to
six years and pregnant women. These eight
schemes include: Integrated Child Development
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Scheme (ICDS), Midday Meal Scheme, Targeted
PDS Scheme, National Maternity Benefit Scheme,
Antodaya, Annapurna and National Old Age Pen-
sion Scheme. All schemes are closely monitored
by the Supreme Court under the Right to Food
verdict.
India’s public officials and politicians continue
to be perceived as “highly corrupt” by global ex-
perts and business surveys, says the latest Corrup-
tion Perception Index (CPI) by the Transparency
International. With “Integrity Score” of 3.4, the
CPI 2009 has ranked India 84th among the 180
countries surveyed, below other developing econo-
mies like Brazil (3.7) and China (3.6). The 2009
edition analysed 180 countries, the same number
as the 2008 CPI. In 2008, India scored 3.4, drop-
ping from 3.5 in 2007.
Pakistan, with a score of 2.4, is ranked 139th on
the list, followed by Bangladesh (2.4), Nepal (2.3),
Maldives (2.5) and Sri Lanka (3.1). Haiti, Iraq,
Myanmar and Somalia have recorded the score of
less than 1.5, while leaders of the pack are New
Zealand (9.4), Denmark (9.3) and Singapore and
Sweden (9.2).
Transparency International’s Corruption Index
has ranked India 84 out of 180 countries. How-
ever, with an integrity score of 3.4, India is the
least corrupt country in South Asia, excluding
Bhutan.
With a fortune of $32 bil-
lion, industry leader Mukesh
Ambani has topped the list
of richest Indians, where his
estranged brother Anil fig-
ures at number three with nearly half the wealth.
Steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, who lives in London
but holds an Indian passport, is sandwiched be-
tween the Ambani brothers in the list at number
two with a net-worth of $30 billion, according to
the US business magazine Forbes. The list of India's
richest 100 people included 52 billionaires, nearly
double from 27 in 2008 and just short of 54 in No-
54
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
vember 2007, but there were only six women.The
collective wealth of these 100 is $276 billion (nearly
Rs 13 lakh crore), which corresponds to almost one-
fourth of the country's GDP.
India’s first LTTD (Low Temperature Thermal
Desalination System) plant—with a capacity of 1
lakh litres fresh water a day—was developed and
commissioned in May 2005 at Kavaratti.
84-km Mughal Road, is a dream project under
construction that will connect the Kashmir valley
through Shopian with Bafliaz-Poonch in the
Jammu region. Mughal emperors used to ride into
the valley using this historic road which runs
through high mountains. The centrally-sponsored
Rs 640-crore road project, taken up in 2006, would
be thrown open to public by July 2010.
India joined China, Brazil and South Africa to
prepare a joint front for tough negotiations with
rich nations at the Copenhagen Climate talks. The
four countries, seen as the “BASIC” block, agreed
to a strategy that involved walking out of the con-
ference together if western nations try to force
terms on the developing world.
Kisan Vision Yojna is ambitious project of In-
dian Railways to set up cold-chain facilities across
the country for fresh fruit and vegetables. The pi-
lot project has been started at Singur in West Ben-
gal.
Continuing the commendable trend of the past
decade, India’s forest cover increased by 728 sq km
during 2005-07—a marginal rise of 0.03%. Over-
all, 21.02% of the country’s geographical area is
now under green cover. In the past 10 years, for-
est cover has increased by 3.31 million hectares,
showing an average 0.46% increase every year.
These figures are contained in the State of Forest
Report 2009. The biennial report is based on satel-
lite imagery up to 2007. India’s increasing forest
cover deserved praise, especially compared to the
loss of 2.5 million ha of forests in Brazil every year.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
India, however, lagged behind China’s achieve-
ment of gaining 4 million ha of forests annually.
While India seemed to be doing well in protecting
dense forests, the report indicated that moderately
dense forests weren’t faring too well.
The world’s largest atom
smasher, Large Hadron Collier,
broke the record for proton accel-
eration on November 30, 2009, pre-
viously held by a US lab, Fermilab,
since 2001, sending beams of par-
ticles at 1.18 trillion electron volts around the
massive machine.
During its 40 years, including the last 15 years
it grew rapidly, the Internet has been an alien to
800-900 million non-English speaking Indians. The
Internet started as an English language phenom-
enon, but even in the later years, when technol-
ogy made it possible to have content in local lan-
guages, addresses continued to be in English.
Come February 2010, millions of non-English
speaking Indians will be able to type .bharat in
Devnagari script while accessing popular websites
including Google, Yahoo!, MSN and many others.
The first right of refusal for .bharat URLs will be
given to those with .in registration. For example, a
google.co.in or a yahoo.co.in will get the first right
of refusal to have a google.bharat or yahoo.bharat
in Indian languages.
For users seeking to quaran-
tine their computers by using
anti-virus software available
online, fake anti-virus (FAV) is a
growing, invisible threat. While
it’s much easier to identify a ma-
licious software code received through spam mail,
or other suspicious attachments, fake anti-virus
(FAV) are making it difficult for users to escape
from them. Experts tracking cyber crime say these
FAVs can cost anywhere between Rs 500 to Rs
6,000, with malicious code writers making around
55
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
$10,000 on a good day. According to computer se-
curity firm PandaLabs, only 1,000 samples of FAVs
were reported during the first quarter of 2008.
However, by the second quarter of 2009, such in-
stances have reached 3,74,000. Malware, which is
short for malicious software, has been growing ex-
ponentially during past few years. In 2008, over
1.5 million attacks were detected by McAfee, and
the number has already hit 1.2 million for the first
half ending June 2009.
The UN General Assembly has declared July 18
“Nelson Mandela International Day” to mark the
South African anti-apartheid leader's contribution
to peace. A resolution adopted by consensus by the
192-member world body calls for commemorations
every year, starting on July 18, 2010, Mandela's
birthday, to recognise the Nobel Peace Prize
laureate's contribution to resolving conflicts and
promoting race relations, human rights and rec-
onciliation.
Mandela led the fight against apartheid in South
Africa as head of the African National Congress'
armed wing. He was convicted of sabotage and
other crimes and served 27 years in prison. When
freed in 1990, he helped lead South Africa's tran-
sition toward democracy.
Oil exploration firm Oil and
Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC)
has stumbled upon a reserve of
uranium while carrying out ex-
ploration work at the Borholla
oilfield in Jorhat district. This is
the first time that uranium traces have been found
in an Assam oilfield although other north-eastern
States like Meghalaya have rich reserves.
Surveys conducted by the atomic energy depart-
ment indicate there could be up to 10,000 tonnes
of uranium in and around Domiasiat, about 150
km west of Meghalaya capital Shillong, the area
considered to have the largest sandstone-type de-
posits in India.
Spurred by the recent findings, ONGC is now con-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
templating setting up a nuclear power plant if its
current collaboration with Uranium Corporation
results in the discovery of uranium in Assam.
ONGC Assam's oil production is now about 1.2
million tonnes annually. Assam has over 1.3 bil-
lion tonnes of crude oil and 156 billion cubic metres
of natural gas reserves, of which about an estimated
58 percent is yet to be explored. India produces
about 30 million tonnes of crude oil annually, with
Assam accounting for about five million tonnes.
Apart from ONGC, Oil India Ltd (OIL) is the other
major exploration firm operating in the north-east-
ern State.
Commander Dilip Dhonde of the
Indian Navy, the first Indian to at-
tempt to circumnavigate the world
alone, reached Christchurch in New
Zealand on November 21, 2009, af-
ter covering 9,000 nautical miles on Mhadei, the
Indian Naval Sailing Vessel.
Dhonde, 42, embarked on the solo circumnaviga-
tion of the world on August 19, 2009, from
Mumbai. Less than 300 people the world over have
succeeded in this endeavour till date, with this
being the first attempt for an Indian.
Mhadei, during her voyage of over 21,600 nautical
miles (38,880 km) under sail will take on the ex-
ceptional winds and swell which are prevalent es-
pecially below 60 degree south latitude, called the
Screaming 60s.
India’s nuclear programme crossed a milestone
on November 24, 2009, with fifth unit of the 220
megawatt Rajasthan Atomic Power Project (Raps-
5) attaining criticality. With this, the number of
operating nuclear power reactors in India has gone
up to 18, increasing the total atomic power gener-
ating capacity from 4,120 MW to 4,330 MW. At-
taining criticality in the jargon of the atomic sci-
entists means the start of self-sustaining nuclear
fission chain.
Located in Arunachal Pradesh, this Buddhist
56
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
monastery town was in news due to visit of Ti-
betan spiritual leader Dalai Lama on November 7,
2009. China had protested against visit of Dalai
Lama to Arunachal Pradesh as China considers the
area as disputed territory and lays claim to it.
Tawang was once a part of Tibet. In 1914, the
MacMahon line was drawn by the British and
Tawang became a part of India. Tawang came un-
der effective Indian administration on February 12,
1951, when Major R. Khating led Indian Army
troops to relocate Chinese squatters. India assumed
sovereignty of the territory and established demo-
cratic rule therein.
During the Sino-Indian war of 1962, Tawang fell
under Chinese control. The valiant last stand of
Mahavir Chakra awardee Jaswant Singh Rawat
took place in Tawang. After the withdrawal of
Chinese troops, Tawang once again came under
Indian administration. In recent years, China has
occasionally voiced its claims on Arunachal
Pradesh, especially Tawang, and Chinese troop
incursions continue to occur frequently. India has
rebutted the claims by Chinese government.
Today, Tawang serves as a centre for tourist at-
tractions, thanks to the well-preserved beauty of
the Tawang Monastery.
Aerospace and Engineering major Quest Global
has launched India’s first aerospace special eco-
nomic zone (SEZ) at Belgaum, Karnataka, on No-
vember 14, 2009, for development and manufac-
ture of aerospace precision engineering products.
The SEZ has come up on a 300 acre site at an in-
vestment of Rs 150 crore.
A UN summit on the plight of the planet’s one
billion hungry was held in Rome in November
2009. Pope Benedict XVI was among the inaugu-
ral speakers at the meeting at the Rome headquar-
ters of the Food and Agriculture Organisation.
Rajasthan will soon have its third tiger reserve
after Ranthambore and Sariska. The new tiger re-
serve will come up at Darrah National Park, 50 km
from Kota. The National Tiger Conservation Au-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
thority (NTCA) has given a nod to the project and
the first tiger is likely to be relocated to Darrah by
2011.
At present, Darrah National Park is spread over an
area of 250 sq km and is separated from
Ranthambore by another 250 sq km stretch which
houses Ramgarh Vishdhari Wildlife Sanctuary. The
park has three wildlife sanctuaries—Darrah,
Chambal and Jaswant Sagar. The park has another
positive side—a permanent source of water from
the Chambal Basin.
Meanwhile, with an aim to protect and increase
tiger population, the state government has finalised
a proposal to form a tiger conservation foundation.
The foundation, which will also deal with reha-
bilitation of the big cats to reserve parks with lesser
population, is being set up as per the provisions of
the Wildlife Conservation Act.
India is all set to open a new
front, with the Solar Mission un-
der National Action Plan on Cli-
mate Change, aiming to generate
1,000 MW of power by 2013. The country cur-
rently produces less than 5 MW every year. In the
first phase, between 2010 and 2013, the govern-
ment is proposing to generate 200 MW of off-grid
solar power and cover 7 million square metres with
solar collectors. By the end of the final phase in
2022, the government hopes to produce 20,000
MW of grid-based solar power, 2,000 MW of off-
grid solar power and cover 20 million square metres
with collectors.
Uranium mining in Meghalaya could start within
the first half of 2010, if differences between the
state government and non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) opposed to the extraction of
the mineral are resolved.
Himachal Pradesh announced
it would launch a health insur-
ance scheme in the state for
people living below poverty line
(BPL) from March 1. Chief Minister Prem Kumar
57
Section -3 ( Current Relevant Facts )

Dhumal told that the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna or national health insurance scheme would be
launched across the state from March 1 for one year.

The scheme would be launched in all the 12 districts. Around 2.98 lakh BPL families would be benefited.
For this tied up with the New India Insurance Company Ltd.

The BPL people will get insurance cover ranging from Rs.30,000 to Rs.175,000. The entire expenditure of
the premium of the insurance would be borne by the government. The state government would fully fund
the scheme and Rs.10.81 crore were likely to be spent during the current financial year.

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58
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
sisted and rapidly recovered. This suggests that
these cells may survive therapy and be responsible
for relapsed disease following treatment.
Currently, children with T-ALL are given extended
therapy over two to three years in an attempt to
stop a relapse. More targeted therapy on the thy-
mus cells could reduce the length and toxicity of
treatment and prevent relapse.
Approximately 50 new cases of T-ALL are diag-
nosed every year in Australia, two thirds of these
in children or adolescents. Adults also contract T-
ALL, and the majority succumb to resistant or re-
lapsed disease. The team will now focus on novel
treatments capable of killing these cells, which may
lead to clinical trials within the next five years.
US Internet giant Google
last days said the company
was reviewing its operations
in China after "a highly so-
phisticated and targeted attack on our corporate
infrastructure originating from China" last month
and attempts by the Chinese government to limit
free speech on the web. The US side had criticised
China's policies on Internet administration, allud-
ing that China restricts Internet freedom.
While China asked the US to "respect facts and
stop unreasonable accusations in the name of so-
called Internet freedom". Foreign Ministry spokes-
person Ma Zhaoxu made the remarks while re-
sponding to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's
comment in Washington.
Ma stressed China's Internet is open and the coun-
try has witnessed the most active development of
Internet in the world. Ma added that China has its
own domestic situation and cultural tradition, and
it is in line with the world's common practice that
China administers the Internet according to its laws
and policies.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The Supreme Court has decided to consider a
complex issue wether religious customs can pre-
vail over the right to vote. A bench comprising
Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan and Jus-
tice Deepak Verma gave two weeks time to the
petitioner Ajmal Khan, who had filed a petition in
the Supreme Court pleading that Muslim women
should be allowed to vote in the election in burqa.
The Judges were, however, were not convinced
with the contention of the petitioner that Muslim
women must remain in 'purdah' and can not be
forced to show her face to the election officer or
to anybody else while exercising her right to vote.
Justice Verma reacted strongly by saying "If your
religious feelings are so strong then don't go to
vote".
The Chief Justice also inquired from the petitioner
"what if a Muslim woman wants to contest elec-
tion and will people vote for a candidate who they
are not able to see?" The petitioner had challenged
a Madras High Court order vide which his peti-
tion for exemption for Muslim women from re-
moving her burqa at the time of casting vote was
dismissed.
Rajendra Pachauri, head of the Intergovernmen-
tal Panel on Climate Change (IPCC said the UN
body's fifth assessment report scheduled in 2013
will focus on "socio-economic factors and humani-
tarian" issues. Pachauri said IPCC will ensure a
consistent evaluation of key uncertainties and risks
of climate change.
According to Pachauri they have a comprehensive
and integrated synthesis report for which they have
started focusing very early. They shall make sure
that the synthesis report is kept in focus and there-
fore the working group will deal with issues which
are integrated and synthesised in nature.
The IPCC has decided to include Frequently Asked
Questions in the fifth report for people to under-
stand climate change issues.
The group of over 2,500 scientists worldwide is
likely to address some new issues like cryosphere
dealing with changes in ice sheets in polar and gla-
26
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
cier regions, biochemical changes in ocean, includ-
ing acidification and geoengineering involving
clouds and aerosols.
The other areas to be addressed include migration
and population displacement, conflict, adaptation
measures, carbon accounting, lifestyle changes and
assessment of policies, institutions and finance.
Pachauri said the IPCC has launched a scholarship
with its Nobel Peace Prize winnings to strengthen
climate change science capabilities in developing
countries.
Ruling out his resignation as chief of the Inter-
governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
after its goof-up on melting of Himalayan glaciers,
Rajendra Pachauri said that the UN body will ex-
ercise more surveillance to ensure such a mistake
does not occur again. While admitting the mistake
for the third time in four days Pachauri said it did
not take away from the IPCC report's overall con-
clusion that glaciers in the Himalayas were reced-
ing. The fourth IPCC report in 2007 had said that
Himalayan glaciers will disappear by 2035. The
fifth report is scheduled in 2013.
Former Foreign Secretary Shiv
Shankar Menon took over as the new
National Security Advisor replacing
M K Narayanan, who has been ap-
pointed as West Bengal Governor.
Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh appointed
former Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon as
his new National Security Advisor (NSA).
Menon is the second former Foreign Secretary to
have been appointed as the NSA and will hold the
rank of Minister of State. J.N.Dixit, was the first
former Foreign Secretary to held the coveted Na-
tional Security Advisor's post from May 2004 to
January 2005. It is worth mention that Menon, a
career diplomat, played a crucial role in the sign-
ing of the Indo - US civil nuclear cooperation agree-
ment.
Before becoming Foreign Secretary, Menon had
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
served as High Commissioner to Sri Lanka and Pa-
kistan and, as India's Ambassador to China and Is-
rael. With Union Home Minister P Chidambaram
pursuing reforms in his ministry, Menon is likely
to focus his attention on matters relating to strate-
gic affairs and diplomacy. Diplomacy runs in the
veins of Menon family, which hails from Ottapalam
in Kerala's Palakkad District.
K. P. S. Menon (Senior), India's first Foreign Sec-
retary, is his grandfather and K. P. S. Menon (Jun-
ior), a former Indian ambassador to China, is his
uncle. His father P.N. Menon was also a career dip-
lomat and served as Ambassador to Yugoslavia.
Noted journalist Mrinal Pande was appointed
chairperson of public broadcaster Prasar Bharati.
President Pratibha Patil has appointed Pande as
chairman of the Prasar Bharati Board for a term
upto April 30, 2011 from the day she assumes of-
fice. The Prasar Bharati Board oversees the func-
tioning of state-run All India Radio and
Doordarshan.
The government had accepted the resignation of
previous board chairman Arun Bhatnagar last
month. Pande has been editor of the Hindi daily
Hindustan. She has also worked in television and
written short stories.
A strong pitch for multilateralism was made by
speakers from Africa, European Union and the As-
sociation of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) at
the 16th edition of Partnership Summit 2010 at
Chennai. The summit was organised by the Con-
federation of Indian Industry (CII).
Michael Yeoh, the chief executive officer of the
Asian Strategic and Leadership Institute, Malaysia
said that the important question in the coming
years is if the resumed WTO (World Trade
Organisation) negotiations on trade practices would
be able to reach a consensus. It is important for
regional associations to explore on the ways to forge
global partnerships.
27
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
According to Tarun Khanna, the Jorge Paulo
Lemann professor at Harvard Business School,
much of the trade will happen south-south, that is
between neighbouring countries in the southern
regions. He said trade will happen between devel-
oping countries and developed countries within the
same region where the economic gap was smaller
and scalable than between developing countries in
the south and developed countries of the north.
Britain's Member of Parliament and UK-India Busi-
ness Council chair Patricia Hewitt, pitching for
multilateralism, said small developing nations fear
of the fallout of multilateral regimes and also are
overwhelmed in bilateral deals by "smarter na-
tions".
Malaysia and India should work to finalise an
under-negotiation comprehensive bilateral free
trade pact by the end of this year, Malaysian Prime
Minister Mohammed Najib Tun Abdul Razak said
on Jan 20 during India visit.
The Malaysian leader reached Delhi to begin a five-
day state visit. Buoyed by improving ties, India and
Malaysia signed an extradition treaty and decided
to fast-track negotiations to wrap up a free trade
area agreement by the end of this year. Razak said
the economic cooperation agreement would "spur
additional bilateral trade and investment", and cre-
ate job, investment and economic opportunities for
people of both countries. He also stressed on the
need for expanding the scope of India's free trade
agreement with the Association of South East Asian
Nations (ASEAN), which came into force Jan 1 and
covers only goods.
The Supreme Court on Jan. 22 directed the gov-
ernment to ensure implementation of Juvenile Jus-
tice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000.
The apex court made its direction acting on public
interest litigation (PIL) filed by child rights group,
Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA) on child labour
and trafficking of children for forced labour.
The JJ Act deals with the provisions related to all
children in need of care and protection including
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
the neglected children, trafficked children as well
as children in conflict with the law.
The act is one of the most comprehensive laws in
the country dealing with the rescue, repatriation
and rehabilitation of child labourers, creation and
running of short-stay homes for children, and even
matters pertaining to privacy of children. A divi-
sion bench of Justice Dalveer Bhandari and Justice
A K Patnaik said that we have to look towards the
enforcement of child rights laws.
The court directed the government to ensure that
all provisions relating to the Act are complied with
this, including formation of Child Welfare Com-
mittees (CWC) and Juvenile Justice Boards (JJB),
in each district and appointment of Special Juve-
nile Police Officers (SJPO) to ensure law enforce-
ment within the next six weeks.
The court has also appointed National Commission
of Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) as nodal
agency for monitoring of today's order and report-
ing the same to the court.
Lieutenant General V.K. Singh,
who was named the new Indian
Army chief in the rank of general on
Jan 22, will be the 25th in line to
occupy the post in the world's fourth
largest army.
Singh, who will succeed Gen. Deepak Kapoor, will
be the 23rd Indian to occupy the post since the
country gained independence in 1947. The first two
chiefs were British officers - General Sir Robert
McGregor Macdonald Lockhart and General Sir
Francis Robert Roy Bucher.
Field Marshal K.M. Cariappa was the first Indian
officer to occupy the post, in the rank of general,
assuming office on January 15, 1949. Since then,
Army Day is annually observed on Jan 15.
Cariappa belonged to the Rajput regiment, into
which V.K. Singh was also commissioned.
28
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
cier regions, biochemical changes in ocean, includ-
ing acidification and geoengineering involving
clouds and aerosols.
The other areas to be addressed include migration
and population displacement, conflict, adaptation
measures, carbon accounting, lifestyle changes and
assessment of policies, institutions and finance.
Pachauri said the IPCC has launched a scholarship
with its Nobel Peace Prize winnings to strengthen
climate change science capabilities in developing
countries.
Ruling out his resignation as chief of the Inter-
governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
after its goof-up on melting of Himalayan glaciers,
Rajendra Pachauri said that the UN body will ex-
ercise more surveillance to ensure such a mistake
does not occur again. While admitting the mistake
for the third time in four days Pachauri said it did
not take away from the IPCC report's overall con-
clusion that glaciers in the Himalayas were reced-
ing. The fourth IPCC report in 2007 had said that
Himalayan glaciers will disappear by 2035. The
fifth report is scheduled in 2013.
Former Foreign Secretary Shiv
Shankar Menon took over as the new
National Security Advisor replacing
M K Narayanan, who has been ap-
pointed as West Bengal Governor.
Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh appointed
former Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon as
his new National Security Advisor (NSA).
Menon is the second former Foreign Secretary to
have been appointed as the NSA and will hold the
rank of Minister of State. J.N.Dixit, was the first
former Foreign Secretary to held the coveted Na-
tional Security Advisor's post from May 2004 to
January 2005. It is worth mention that Menon, a
career diplomat, played a crucial role in the sign-
ing of the Indo - US civil nuclear cooperation agree-
ment.
Before becoming Foreign Secretary, Menon had
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
served as High Commissioner to Sri Lanka and Pa-
kistan and, as India's Ambassador to China and Is-
rael. With Union Home Minister P Chidambaram
pursuing reforms in his ministry, Menon is likely
to focus his attention on matters relating to strate-
gic affairs and diplomacy. Diplomacy runs in the
veins of Menon family, which hails from Ottapalam
in Kerala's Palakkad District.
K. P. S. Menon (Senior), India's first Foreign Sec-
retary, is his grandfather and K. P. S. Menon (Jun-
ior), a former Indian ambassador to China, is his
uncle. His father P.N. Menon was also a career dip-
lomat and served as Ambassador to Yugoslavia.
Noted journalist Mrinal Pande was appointed
chairperson of public broadcaster Prasar Bharati.
President Pratibha Patil has appointed Pande as
chairman of the Prasar Bharati Board for a term
upto April 30, 2011 from the day she assumes of-
fice. The Prasar Bharati Board oversees the func-
tioning of state-run All India Radio and
Doordarshan.
The government had accepted the resignation of
previous board chairman Arun Bhatnagar last
month. Pande has been editor of the Hindi daily
Hindustan. She has also worked in television and
written short stories.
A strong pitch for multilateralism was made by
speakers from Africa, European Union and the As-
sociation of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) at
the 16th edition of Partnership Summit 2010 at
Chennai. The summit was organised by the Con-
federation of Indian Industry (CII).
Michael Yeoh, the chief executive officer of the
Asian Strategic and Leadership Institute, Malaysia
said that the important question in the coming
years is if the resumed WTO (World Trade
Organisation) negotiations on trade practices would
be able to reach a consensus. It is important for
regional associations to explore on the ways to forge
global partnerships.
27
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
According to Tarun Khanna, the Jorge Paulo
Lemann professor at Harvard Business School,
much of the trade will happen south-south, that is
between neighbouring countries in the southern
regions. He said trade will happen between devel-
oping countries and developed countries within the
same region where the economic gap was smaller
and scalable than between developing countries in
the south and developed countries of the north.
Britain's Member of Parliament and UK-India Busi-
ness Council chair Patricia Hewitt, pitching for
multilateralism, said small developing nations fear
of the fallout of multilateral regimes and also are
overwhelmed in bilateral deals by "smarter na-
tions".
Malaysia and India should work to finalise an
under-negotiation comprehensive bilateral free
trade pact by the end of this year, Malaysian Prime
Minister Mohammed Najib Tun Abdul Razak said
on Jan 20 during India visit.
The Malaysian leader reached Delhi to begin a five-
day state visit. Buoyed by improving ties, India and
Malaysia signed an extradition treaty and decided
to fast-track negotiations to wrap up a free trade
area agreement by the end of this year. Razak said
the economic cooperation agreement would "spur
additional bilateral trade and investment", and cre-
ate job, investment and economic opportunities for
people of both countries. He also stressed on the
need for expanding the scope of India's free trade
agreement with the Association of South East Asian
Nations (ASEAN), which came into force Jan 1 and
covers only goods.
The Supreme Court on Jan. 22 directed the gov-
ernment to ensure implementation of Juvenile Jus-
tice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000.
The apex court made its direction acting on public
interest litigation (PIL) filed by child rights group,
Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA) on child labour
and trafficking of children for forced labour.
The JJ Act deals with the provisions related to all
children in need of care and protection including
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
the neglected children, trafficked children as well
as children in conflict with the law.
The act is one of the most comprehensive laws in
the country dealing with the rescue, repatriation
and rehabilitation of child labourers, creation and
running of short-stay homes for children, and even
matters pertaining to privacy of children. A divi-
sion bench of Justice Dalveer Bhandari and Justice
A K Patnaik said that we have to look towards the
enforcement of child rights laws.
The court directed the government to ensure that
all provisions relating to the Act are complied with
this, including formation of Child Welfare Com-
mittees (CWC) and Juvenile Justice Boards (JJB),
in each district and appointment of Special Juve-
nile Police Officers (SJPO) to ensure law enforce-
ment within the next six weeks.
The court has also appointed National Commission
of Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) as nodal
agency for monitoring of today's order and report-
ing the same to the court.
Lieutenant General V.K. Singh,
who was named the new Indian
Army chief in the rank of general on
Jan 22, will be the 25th in line to
occupy the post in the world's fourth
largest army.
Singh, who will succeed Gen. Deepak Kapoor, will
be the 23rd Indian to occupy the post since the
country gained independence in 1947. The first two
chiefs were British officers - General Sir Robert
McGregor Macdonald Lockhart and General Sir
Francis Robert Roy Bucher.
Field Marshal K.M. Cariappa was the first Indian
officer to occupy the post, in the rank of general,
assuming office on January 15, 1949. Since then,
Army Day is annually observed on Jan 15.
Cariappa belonged to the Rajput regiment, into
which V.K. Singh was also commissioned.
28
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Cariappa, who retired in 1953, was elevated to field
marshal in 1983 in recognition of his services to
the Indian Army.
There has been only one other five star officer in
the Indian Army - Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw,
who was given the honour for his exemplary dur-
ing the 1971 war with Pakistan that led to the cre-
ation of the independent nation of Bangladesh.
Of the 24 Indian Army chiefs so far, 13 have been
from the infantry, six from the Armoured Corps
and five, including the current incumbent, have
been from the Regiment of Artillery.
This is not surprising, considering the infantry
makes up the bulk of the 1.1 million strong Indian
Army. Prior to independence, there were two ele-
ments of the army in India - the British Army in
India comprising British officers and troops and the
British Indian Army with British officers and In-
dian troops
Four of the eight newly appointed
governors - Shivraj Patil (Punjab), K.
Sankaranarayanan (Maharashtra),
E.S.L. Narasimhan (Andhra Pradesh)
and M.O.H. Farook (Jharkhand - took
their oath on Jan 22 at ceremonies
held in respective state capitals.
Patil, a former union home minister and ex-Lok
Sabha speaker, was administered the oath of office
by Punjab and Haryana High Court Chief Justice
Mukul Mudgal at the Punjab Raj Bhavan in
Chandigarh. He will also hold the charge of ad-
ministrator of the union territory of Chandigarh.
Patil replaces S.F. Rodrigues, a former Army chief,
who completed his tenure. He is the first political
personality in two decades to become Punjab gov-
ernor. The post was mostly held by retired army
chiefs.
K. Sankaranarayanan was sworn in as the new gov-
ernor of Maharashtra at a simple ceremony in
Mumbai by acting Chief Justice of Bombay High
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Court J.N. Patel. Sankaranarayanan, a former min-
ister in Kerala, was appointed governor of Nagaland
in February 2007 and was moved to Jharkhand in
July 2009.
Farook was administered oath of office and secrecy
by Jharkhand High Court Chief Justice Gyan Sudha
Mishra at the Raj Bhavan in Ranchi. A former chief
minister of Puducherry, he was appointed ambas-
sador to Saudi Arabia in 2004.
Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court
A.R. Dave administered the oath of office to E.S.L.
Narasimhan at Raj Bhavan in Hyderabad.
Narasimhan, governor of Chhattisgarh, was sworn
in Dec 27 after being given additional charge of
Andhra Pradesh, following the resignation of N.D.
Tiwari over allegations of his involvement in a sex
scandal. After being appointed full-time governor,
Narasimhan was sworn in again in accordance with
constitutional requirements.
The ad market on television news channels will
cross the Rupees 1,800 crore (Rs.18 billion/390 mil-
lion dollars) mark this year, said a study.
The media lab of the Centre for Media Studies
(CMS) said the size of TV news ad market has in-
creased 16 times in the last decade, from Rs.100
crore in 2000 to Rs.1,600 crore in 2009. It will grow
more in the current year, at a rate of 13 percent.
The upward movement is because the number of
TV channels has increased 48 times in nine years,
resulting in a massive expansion of viewership and
ad market size. Parliamentary elections in 2009 also
came as a boon for the news channels as political
ads brought in a considerable revenue.
India has put all Air India and Indian Airlines
flights operating in South Asia and its airports on
high security alert following inputs that a hijack
attempt may be made by the Al Qaeda linked ter-
rorists.
29
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Ministry of Civil Aviation has directed the step-
ping up of security arrangements at all concerned
airports and airlines following inputs received from
security agencies as well as the Ministry of Home
Affairs.
Following the Ministry's directives, the level of se-
curity to counter threat perception has been up-
graded and all necessary measures have been un-
dertaken by the agencies in-charge of Civil Avia-
tion security, including strengthening of anti-hi-
jacking measures.
There will also be deployment of sky marshals on
certain flights; introduction of stepladder frisking
as an additional precaution and all other necessary
steps with regard to the safety and security of the
passengers, it said.
Former central minister and Samajwadi Party
leader Janeshwar Mishra died of cardiac arrest af-
ter a prolonged illness in Allahabad on Jan 22. He
was 77. Mishra died at the TB Sapru Hospital in
Allahabad.
A close associate of Samajwadi Party chief
Mulayam Singh Yadav, he was among the founders
of the party. He was a central minister both in the
1977-79 Janata Party regime and in the Janata Dal
government of 1989-90. He was among the few
Samajwadi Party leaders who had worked with
veteran socialist Ram Manohar Lohia. Mishra was
often referred to as 'chote Lohia'.
According to a new report from
the World Bank India is expected
to grow at 7.5 percent this year,
powered by skilful macroeco-
nomic management, even as the
global economic recovery that is underway slows
later this year as the impact of fiscal stimulus
wanes,.
India's GDP is projected to grow further at 8 per-
cent in 2011 - compared to 6 percent in 2008 - says
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Global Economic Prospects (GEP) 2010, even as it
warns that while the worst of the financial crisis
may be over, the global recovery is fragile. It pre-
dicts that the fallout from the crisis will change
the landscape for finance and growth over the next
10 years.
Growth in the East Asia and Pacific region as well
as in South Asia, particularly India, has been resil-
ient, buoyed by a massive fiscal stimulus package
in China and by India's skilful macroeconomic
management, the report noted.
Global GDP, which declined by 2.2 percent in 2009,
is expected to grow 2.7 percent this year and 3.2
percent in 2011. Prospects for developing coun-
tries are for a relatively robust recovery, growing
5.2 percent this year and 5.8 percent in 2011 -- up
from 1.2 percent in 2009.
GDP in rich countries, which declined by 3.3 per-
cent in 2009, is expected to increase much less
quickly - by 1.8 and 2.3 percent in 2010 and 2011.
World trade volumes, which fell by a staggering
14.4 percent in 2009, are projected to expand by
4.3 and 6.2 percent this year and in 2011.
Excluding China and India, the remaining devel-
oping countries are projected to grow at 3.3 and
3.9 percent rate in 2010 and 2011, respectively,
compared with 5.4 percent growth on average be-
tween 2003 and 2008, the GEP noted.
Combined, GDP growth in developing countries
is projected to grow by some 5.2 percent in 2010,
after a modest 1.2 percent rise in 2009 (2.2 percent
if India and China are excluded), and by a rela-
tively weak 5.8 percent in 2011.
Despite these relatively robust growth rates, the
unusual depth of the recession will mean that spare
capacity and unemployment will continue to
plague economies in 2011 and some sectors may
well still be shrinking.
M.O.H. Farook became the seventh governor of
Jharkhand on Jan 22, less than a month after Shibu
30
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Soren took over as the state's seventh chief minis-
ter.
Farook was administered the oath of office and se-
crecy by Jharkhand High Court Chief Justice Gyan
Sudha Mishra. He replaces K. Sankaranarayanan,
who has been appointed governor of Maharashtra.
Farook was born at Karaikal in Pondicherry on Sep
6, 1937. He was chief minister of Pondicherry three
times and represented it in the Lok Sabha on three
occasions. In 2004, he was appointed ambassador
to Saudi Arabia.
The Cabinet Committee on Prices on Jan 21,
decided to step up ration supplies of wheat and
rice by 10 kilograms per eligible family during Janu-
ary and February to ease prices of these commodi-
ties. The allocation would be over and above 35
kilograms of rice and wheat supplied to each eli-
gible family now.
According to a statement issued: ‘An ad-hoc allo-
cation of 10 kg per family per month over and above
the existing allocation of foodgrains (wheat and
rice) will be made for two months - January and
February, 2010 to cover all accepted cardholders.'
The CCP also reviewed the prices of essential com-
modities, including pulses, sugar, potato and on-
ion.
The additional allocation of wheat and rice would
be made at Minimum Support Price of Rs 10.80
per kilograms of wheat and Rs 15.37 for rice. The
prevailing prices differ for various categories with
Antodya Anna Yojna cardholders getting wheat
at Rs two per kilograms and rice at Rs 3 a kilo-
grams.
The United States and India
has announced the formulation
of the U.S.-India Aviation Se-
curity Working Group, a bilat-
eral interagency and inter-min-
istry working group led on the U.S. side by the
U.S. Transportation Security Administration and
on the Indian side by the Ministry of Civil Avia-
tion.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The group, conceived during the 2009 U.S.-India
Aviation Partnership Summit held in Washington,
D.C. in December, held its first set of meetings in
New Delhi on January 20 and 21.
A Memoranda of Understanding were signed dur-
ing the working group meeting to strengthen bi-
lateral cooperation on aviation security.
In accordance with the bilateral goals as reflected
by the U.S.-India Air Transport Agreement of 2005,
the purpose of the working group is to build upon
the strategic partnership between the U.S. Gov-
ernment and the Government of India to enhance
international civil aviation security. The group
envisions subsequent meetings to be hosted alter-
natively by each country.
The union cabinet on Jan 21 approved setting
up of a national knowledge network (NKN) that
will connect all major educational institutions like
the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), Indian
Institutes of Management (IIMs) and top universi-
ties for exchange of information and research.
Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure said that one
of the important recommendations of the National
Knowledge Commission (NKC) is to inter-connect
all knowledge institutions through high speed data
communication network. This would encourage
sharing of knowledge, specialized resources and
collaborative research.
The government's decision to set up such a net-
work was announced in 2008-09 and an initial
amount of Rs.100 crore was allocated to the de-
partment of information technology, ministry of
communications and IT for this.
The architecture of the NKN will be scalable and
the network will consist of an ultra-high speed core
(multiples of 10Gbps and upwards), to provide A
nation-wide ultra high-speed data-network high-
way. The network will connect around 1,500 in-
stitutions and the setting up of core network is
expected to be completed in a span of two years.
31
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )

The cabinet said that the network will enable sci-

entists, researches and students from diverse Minister of Tourism Kumari Selja
spheres across the country to work together for
inaugurated the India pavilion at the
advancing human development in critical and
Jan 20-24 Feira International de
emerging areas.
Turismo (FITUR) in Spain where hos-
pitality industry professionals from
"NKN will catalyze knowledge sharing and knowl-
around the globe have gathered.
edge transfer between stakeholders seamlessly -
that too across the nation and globally. NKN is
The 130 sq m-Indian pavilion had been set up by
expected to encourage a larger section of research
the India Tourism office in Paris. The aim to par-
and educational institutions to create intellectual
ticipate in the global event is to promote India as a
property." It will allow sharing of high performance
major tourist hub.
computing facilities, e-libraries, virtual classrooms
and very large databases.
The annual event is a meeting point for tourism
professionals from around the world to discuss lines
Health, education, grid computing, agriculture and
of action, strategies and business alliances to ener-
e-Governance are the main applications identified
gize and consolidate the tourism business.
for implementation and delivery on NKN. Appli-
cations such as "Countrywide Classrooms" will ad-
dress the issue of faculty shortage and ensure qual- The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs
ity education delivery across the country. on Jan 21, gave approval to the proposal of M/s
Alstom Power Holdings SA, France, M/s. Alstom
Technology Ltd, Switzerland and Alstom SA,
More than two months after it banned pre-paid France to establish two joint venture companies in
India with Ms Bharat Forge Limited and or its af-
mobile connections in Jammu and Kashmir citing
filiate companies and to invest 70.5 million euros
security concerns, the government revoked the
(approximately Rupees 490 crore) .
ban, but with stringent terms for identity verifica-
tion. Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Jan 21
The project was cleared on the recommendations
welcomed the move, saying it would bring relief
of the FIPB.
to lakhs of customers.
The project is for the manufacture of state-of-the-
The ban, imposed Nov 1 last year, had evoked sharp
art super critical and sub-critical power plant equip-
criticism from people of the state and the state gov-
ment in India directly and/or through their respec-
ernment.
tive associate entities.
The decision to lift the ban was taken late Jan 20
after several rounds of talks over the past one The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs
month between the home ministry, the telecom on Jan 21 approved the introduction of a new
ministry, the state government and mobile tele- Scheme to provide central assistance for setting up
phone service providers. The issue was earlier even of a model degree college in each of the identified
taken to the Supreme Court. 374 educationally backward districts.

The ban had affected nearly 85 percent of the esti-
mated 45 lakh mobile phone subscribers in the state
after the central government said it had reports
that many of these pre-paid SIMs were being is-
sued without proper verification. Some of the SIM
cards were used by militants to stay in touch with
one another and also to trigger landmines.
The districts the where Gross Enrolment Ratio
(GER) for higher education is less than the national
GER are marked as the educationally backward
districts.
The CCEA decided to provide assistance to the ex-

Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM

32
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
tent of one third of the capital cost for establish-
ment of each college, limited to Rs.2.67 crore, for
Special Category States, the Central share shall be
50 percent of the capital cost limited to Rs.4 crore
for each college.
The land shall be provided free of cost by the State
Governments. The balance amount of the capital
cost, and the recurring cost of running these new
colleges shall be met by the concerned State Gov-
ernments.
The XI Five Year Plan document as approved by
the National Development Council envisages,
among other things, that 370 new Degree Colleges
will be established in Districts with low Gross En-
rolment Ratio based on careful selection.
The Central Electricity Regulatory Commission
(CERC) has issued the Power Market Regulations,
2010. According to a CERC order issued, the Elec-
tricity Act aims at taking measures conducive to
development of electricity industry, promoting
competition therein, protecting interest of consum-
ers and enhancing supply of electricity.
Provisions of these regulations would now govern
transactions in various contracts related to elec-
tricity.
The main features of these regulations are: These
regulations shall apply to various types of inter-
state contracts related to electricity, whether these
contracts are transacted directly, through electric-
ity traders, on power exchanges or on other ex-
changes.
These regulations will govern spot contracts, term
ahead contracts, derivatives and other electricity
related contracts as specified in the regulations.
Launching electricity related contracts on ex-
changes would require permission of the Commis-
sion. However, the contracts already permitted on
power exchanges will not require fresh approval.
These regulations provide that the derivative con-
tracts which could be financially settled and cer-
tain other type of contracts shall be permitted by
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Commission at a future date, taking into account
the availability of electricity supply, liquidity and
maturity of the electricity markets in the country.
The regulations give certain guidelines for the con-
tracts to be dealt with by electricity traders which
are to be complied with. No separate approval is
required for the contracts to be dealt with by elec-
tricity traders. However, electricity traders would
be able to deal with derivatives which could be
financially settled only after such contracts have
been permitted by the Commission.
Detailed capital structure and management struc-
ture for power exchanges has been specified in the
regulations keeping in view the requirements of
ring-fencing, demutualisation and creation of
widely held market institutions.
Power exchanges have been required to realign
their rules and by-laws with the new regulations
within a period of three months.
The CERC has announced these measures under
section 66 of the Electricity Act which mandates
the CERC to promote development of markets in
electricity (including trading) through regulations
and in accordance with National Electricity Policy.
These regulations have been specified in fulfillment
of the statutory mandate of CERC after wide pub-
lic consultation and a public hearing.
The Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure ap-
proved the Rupees 679.36 crore project for
upgradation, operation and maintenance of
Hyderabad Bengaluru section of NH-7 in Karnataka
from 534.72 km to 556.84 km.
The project will be executed as BOT (Toll) on De-
sign, Build, Finance, Operate and Transfer
(DBFOT) pattern under NHDP Phase-VII.
The concession period is 20 years including con-
struction period of 30 months. The project is cov-
ered in two districts of Karnataka--Bengaluru (Ur-
ban) and Bengaluru (Rural).
The project road runs between Devanahalli and
33
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
Hebbal near Bengaluru International Airport and
will provide uninterrupted connectivity to
Bengaluru International Airport.
The main features of the project include under-
passes for pedestrian and cattle crossing; construc-
tion of approaches and widening of flyovers; re-
construction of existing service road; highway il-
lumination and construction of bus bays.
The Cabinet approved the
implementation of the proposal
for increase in the number of Jun-
ior Research Fellowships (JRF)
through CSIR-UGC National Eli-
gibility Test (NET) in the country.
The number of JRFs had been doubled over the
Tenth Plan period by which about 6000 students
had benefited. In the Eleventh Plan too, the CSIR
proposes to increase the number by two fold. By
this, a total of about 12,000 students would be ben-
efiting through JRF-NET.
The total cost of providing fellowships to these
12,000 students in the Eleventh Plan is estimated
at Rs 444.34 crore.
The decision to raise the number of JRFs comes in
the wake of concern expressed by educationists,
scientists and policy markers over declining inter-
est of students to take up careers in basic sciences.
The proposed increase in intake of JRF-NET fel-
lowships with the attractive remuneration would
help in attracting talented youth to take up scien-
tific research as a career and help address the is-
sues related to shortage of scientific manpower in
the country.
The biggest beneficiaries of this programme would
be the University system and scientific institutions
across India as they shall be able to attract bright
minds for their scientific programmes/research.
It will also benefit students from all over the coun-
try who are keen to take up scientific research as a
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
career.
The main objective of the JRF-NET is to identify,
through this national competitive examination,
those talented students who could be enrolled for
PhD programmes in specific science domains,
across India's scientific and academic institutions
and also to identify those who fulfil the eligibility
criteria for employment as lecturers across various
academic institutions.
To evolve new methods of
ensuring better security of rail
passengers, a high-powered
meeting has adopted a seven-
point joint resolution, under
which an effective mechanism would be put in
place for better coordination between various agen-
cies.
Under the joint resolution, there would be a well-
defined system of regular co-ordination between
the Railways, Ministry of Home Affairs, Intelli-
gence Bureau and State Governments to review the
position. The meeting also chalked out an effec-
tive action plan to tackle the problem of theft and
drugging incidents in trains.
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs
on Jan 21 approved the implementation of the
'Provision of Urban Amenities in Rural Areas
(PURA) scheme on a pilot basis within the plan
outlay of Rupees.248 crore during 11th five year
plan.
The fund will be utilized for providing capital grant
upto 35 percent of the pilot project to meet the
viability gap for operations and maintenance in
Public Partnership (PPP) mode after dovetailing
funds from other Central Schemes and investment
from private developers.
The implementation of the restructured scheme
in the manner proposed as an innovative initiative
being taken for the first time in rural areas.
Through the implementation of proposed pilot
34
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
projects, the unique features of this scheme could
be tested on the ground and would enable its
upscaling in future.
The primary objectives of the scheme are provi-
sion of livelihood opportunities and urban ameni-
ties in rural area to bridge the rural - urban divide
thereby reducing the migration from rural to ur-
ban areas.
The core funding will be ensured from the Central
Sector Scheme of PURA complemented by addi-
tional support through prioritized convergence of
Central Government programmes, funding and
managerial support from the private sector and
participation of the local Panchayats.
The scheme would be implemented and managed
by the private sector on viability and sustainability
considerations which shall be fully aligned with
the overall objective of rural development.
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs
(CCEA) approved new interventions in the Cen-
trally sponsored Scheme on National Horticulture
Mission. The Horticulture Mission was launched
during the X Five Year Plan from 2005-06.
Based on feed back received during implementa-
tion of the scheme, new interventions such as High
Density Plantations (HDP), Horticultures Mecha-
nization and certification of Good Agricultural
Practices (GAP) have been included.
Besides, the cost norms of some of the activities
like setting up of nurseries, area expansion, reju-
venation programmes and protected cultivation
have been revisited and revised to provide better
incentives to the farmers for adopting improved
technologies and cultivars.
The cost norms and pattern of assistance for post
harvest management (PHM) have been enhanced
to encourage private sector participation in build-
ing PHM infrastructure.
An outlay of Rs.10363.46 crore, with Centre's share
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
of Rs.8809 crore (85 percent) has been proposed
for implementing the Scheme during the XIth Five
Year Plan.
The focus of the Mission in its revised form will be
on creating forward linkages in terms of post har-
vest management and marketing infrastructure
both in public and private sectors involving pack
houses and on farm collection centers, cold stor-
age units, Controlled Atmosphere (CA) storages etc.
India gave its approval to a proposal from Alstom
of France to set up a joint venture with Bharat
Forge to make power equipment involving foreign
direct investment inflow of 70 million euros or
Rs.490 crore.
The approval was given at a meeting of the Cabi-
net Committee on Economic Affairs, which was
presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh,
based on the recommendations of the Foreign In-
vestment Promotion Board.
The proposal is to establish two joint venture com-
panies in India with Bharat Forge or its affiliate
companies and to invest 70.5 million euros to
manufacture state-of-art super-critical and sub-
critical power plant equipment in India.
Listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange and the Na-
tional Stock Exchange, Alstom's India arm has a
turnover of over USD 500 million, and employs
4,000 people at its research unit in Bangalore, a
technology centre in Vadodara and four manufac-
turing units.
Apart from offering its capabilities in engineering,
manufacturing, project management and supply of
power generation equipment, the Indian arm also
has a major presence in the transport sector, pro-
viding railway equipment and solutions.
Bharat Forge is the flagship of the USD 2.4-billion
Kalyani Group, with interests in manufacturing
various forged and machined components for the
automotive and non-automotive sector.
35
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
It is also one of India's emerging multinationals,
with manufacturing operations across 12 locations
in six countries -- four in India, three in Germany,
two in China and one each in Sweden, Scotland
and the US.
India's imports from
China have been growing at
over 35 percent during the
past few years, said fresh
data from the commerce
ministry on Jan 21, under-
scoring the concern over balance of trade getting
further skewed in favour of the neighbouring na-
tion.
During 2008-09, imports from China touched
Rs.147,605 crore (Rs.1,476 billion or USD 29.5 bil-
lion), an increase of 35.27 percent over the previ-
ous fiscal's figure of Rs.109,116 crore (Rs.1,091 bil-
lion or USD 21.8 billion).
In the year before, the rise in imports was higher
at 38.1 percent with shipments valued Rs.79,008
crore (Rs.790.08 billion or USD 15.8 billion).
The fresh data comes against the backdrop of the
Indian Commerce Minister Anand Sharma's visit
to Beijing earlier this week where he took up the
matter of easy access to Indian merchandise goods
to China and the removal of non-tariff barriers.
Indian government has announced trade defence
measures to the domestic industry to counter un-
fair trade practices followed by exporters of goods
from other countries, especially China.
In case a product is imported into the country at
less than its normal value, and it causes injury to
the domestic industry, the domestic industry can
make an application to Directorate General of Anti-
Dumping and Allied duties (DGAD) in the Depart-
ment of Commerce for imposition of anti-dump-
ing duty.
Similarly, an application for imposition of safeguard
duty can be made by the domestic industry to the
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Directorate General of Safeguards under the Min-
istry of Finance, in case there is serious injury/
market disruption, or threat of series injury/threat
of market disruption to the domestic industry, as a
consequence of increased imports of an article into
India.
During 2008-09 and 2009-10 (up to November
2009) anti-dumping duty was imposed in 22 cases
(final duty in 12 cases and provisional duty in 10
cases) and final Safeguard duty was imposed in 4
cases.
» 2006-07 79,008
» 2007-08 109,116
» 2008-09 147,605
Former President Dr A P J Abdul
Kalam has expressed concern over
unsafe handling of e-waste.
Emphasising the need to conserve
mineral resources for future con-
sumption, former President A P J
Abdul Kalam inaugurated the
country's first e-waste extraction plant.
All electronic items contain potentially hazardous
elements like nickel, cadmium, lead and the like,
which when handled unscientifically can cause
grave damage to the environment including radio-
active pollution, which can have serious implica-
tions.
The new technology focuses on maximum value
extraction from e-waste in its indigenously devel-
oped mettalurgical unit. E-waste in the country is
being increased by 10 per cent every year and only
five per cent of urban e-waste are recycled in In-
dia.
Rise in rural consumption, which helped fast
moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies beat
the downward spiral in demand in urban areas trig-
gered by global meltdown in 2008, can be attrib-
36
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
uted to rise in rural income in India as brought out
in a study commissioned by an industry chamber.
Assocham said that Rural per capita income in In-
dia is expected to increase from Rs 7,335 in 1981
to Rs 15,396 in 2011, a compounded annual growth
rate (CAGR) of 2.5 per cent.
It also said though rural India's contribution to
the national gross domestic product (GDP) has
declined over time (expected to reach 30 per cent
in 2011 as compared to 53 per cent in 1981), rural
income is expected to increase from Rs 8,00,000
crore in 2001 to Rs 13,00,000 crore in 2011.
Since per capita income in rural India is increas-
ing, reflecting a rising consumption capacity for
various products and services, many industries,
especially FMCG companies, have recognised the
potential of rural market and are taking innova-
tive initiatives to tap it. Over 70 per cent of India's
population lives in villages.
Those who are a threat to national security, in-
volved in sedition or convicted for rape-cum-mur-
der will not be granted parole, according to the
new guidelines which the central government sub-
mitted to the Delhi High Court. The court had
earlier expressed its displeasure over the procedure
for granting parole, and said it suspected the pow-
erful and the influential received a preferential
treatment in grant of parole.
The modified parole guidelines were submitted be-
fore a division bench of Chief Justice Ajit Prakash
Shah and Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw by Solicitor
General Gopal Subramaniam.
Tax at source will be deducted at the highest
level on income accruing to people without per-
manent account numbers, following a new notifi-
cation that takes effect April 1.
The tax will be deducted at 20 percent or the high-
est prescribed rate for the category of income,
whichever is higher, said a circular issued by the
Central Board of Direct Tax.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The law will also apply to all non-residents in re-
spect of payments and remittances liable to tax
deduction at source. According to the new guide-
lines, assessing officer will not issue certificate for
deduction at lower rate or zero-deduction unless
an application bears the permanent account num-
ber.
The Supreme Court has issued comprehensive,
eight-point guidelines to high courts to distinguish
a genuine public interest lawsuit (PIL) from a bo-
gus one, while imposing a Rs.100,000 fine on an
Uttarakhand advocate for filing a frivolous PIL in
the state high court.
The courts must encourage genuine and bona fide
PILs and effectively discourage those filed for ex-
traneous considerations, ruled a bench of Justice
Dalveer Bhandari and Justice Mukundakam
Sharma, while imposing a Rs.1 lakh fine on advo-
cate Balwant Singh Chaufal of Nainital for ques-
tioning the appointment of the state's advocate
general L.P. Nathani in 2001.
In its judgment the apex court bench asked the
high courts across the country to expeditiously
frame their uniform rules within three months for
differentiating between genuine and bogus PILs.
The bench also requested the high courts to send
copies of their rules on PILs to the apex court.
Electricity consumption in India, currently at
some 600TWh annually, is set to double by next
decade, by then it would have surpassed Russian
levels in the process, according to a recent survey.
KPMG's Global Advisory Practice released a power
industry research published under the title 'Think
BRIC!' reveals that in order to supply this extra
electricity, total generating capacity should jump
by 90 GW, to 241GW, with an increased emphasis
on nuclear, clean coal and renewables, including
solar and small-hydro.
The survey finds that while the state and federal
37
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )

governments have initiated reforms, legislation since India has an advantage for future investment
designed to supply electricity to all consumer in production and manufacturing facilities. Gov-
groups, conservative elements, social programs, ernment and private utilities are endeavoring to
systemic weaknesses and contradictions within fre- set up an infrastructure framework to facilitate
quently combine to stifle progress. Additionally investments in the country.
factors like increasing economic activity, wealth
and population, an improved standard of living and The central government announced a health
infrastructure developments are all expected to
scheme to address the problem of acute shortage
underline a continuous increase in demand for
of doctors and health workers for mental health
power in the next decade.
disorders, saying India will produce 1,756 such
practitioners, including 520 doctors, every year.
According to the study, the country's peak power
capacity deficit is expected to widen in 2010 to 12.6
Under the mental health scheme worth Rs.1,000
percent of total capacity, up from 11.9 percent last
crore, 11 existing mental health hospitals are be-
year. In addition to the generation deficit, this defi-
ing upgraded and strengthened to produce quali-
cit is also contributed by the inefficiencies in the
fied manpower.
transmission and distribution systems and electric-
Rs.30 crore per centre will be given for academic
ity theft.
block, library, hostel, laboratories, supportive de-
partments and lecture theaters.
To combat this, some respondents expressed con-
fidence in government assurances on formation of
An additional 44 post-graduate seats in psychia-
an independent regulatory system which will sup-
try, 176 M.Phil seats in clinical psychology and psy-
port growth in private investment, in public-pri-
chiatric social work and 220 seats in diploma in
vate partnerships. They also point to the private
psychiatric nursing will be available every year.
investors, who have already made a start in build-
ing independent power plants, with the share of
privately generated electricity currently at around India will have its first vaccine on H1N1 (swine
13 percent of the total and rising. flu) by April end or beginning of May. The gov-
ernment has funded four companies to produce the
Coal, which already provides almost 70 percent of vaccine. While one company will be ready with
India's power, will remain the dominant primary the vaccine by April end or beginning of May, the
fuel, holding out commercial opportunities to those three other companies will take some time.
producers who are global leaders in high efficiency,
clean-burn plant. But with India needing to diver- India and Finland signed a memorandum of un-
sify production, openings will exist for nuclear, gas
derstanding (MoU) here on Jan 21 to promote co-
and small hydro schemes.
operation and exchange of information relating to
the Information Security Sector between the two
Also the need to extend basic electricity to vast
countries.
rural population means that there are massive op-
portunities in terms of wind, biomass and, if we
The MoU was signed by Union Communication
can get the prices right, especially solar energy.
and Information Technology Minister A. Raja and
Finland's Communication Minister Suvi Linden.
The respondents surveyed also feel that India is an
The MoU is in accordance with relevant laws and
attractive destination for foreign capital investment
regulations of each country and on the basis of
equality, reciprocity and mutual benefit. The agree-
ment that comes into effect on the date of signing
will remain inforce for a period of five years.

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38
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )

The national authority for Clean Development
Mechanism (CDM) projects has so far approved
1,467 projects, which, if approved by its interna-
tional counterpart, can net India 6.15 billion dol-
lars by 2012.
CDM projects are carried out by developing coun-
tries to reduce carbon emissions into the atmo-
sphere in some way -- such as saving energy or
replacing a thermal by a hydel power plant. The
carbon emissions saved are paid for by developed
countries, which are legally obliged under the
Kyoto Protocol to reduce their emissions.
The international CDM Executive Board has so far
approved 469 of the projects recommended by its
Indian counterpart, making India the world's sec-
ond largest CDM market after China.
Though India does not have any legal obligation
to reduce carbon emissions under the Kyoto Pro-
tocol, if all the CDM projects are approved by the
executive board it will reduce 615 million metric
tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions by 2012.
India accounts for 3-4 percent of global greenhouse
gas emissions. These emissions are leading to cli-
mate change, which is affecting farm output, mak-
ing droughts, floods and storms more severe and
more frequent and raising the sea level.
Government said that India's exports to the Latin
America region increased from 2.16 billion dollars
in 2004-05 to 6.01 billion dollars in 2008-2009, re-
cording a growth of about 178 per cent.
Africa Customs Union (SACU) comprising
Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa and
Swaziland.
India accounts for only three-four per cent of
the global Green House Gas (GHG) emission. This
has been stated in the National Communication
submitted to UNFCCC.
As on date, the National CDM Authority has ac-
corded Host Country Approval to 1467 projects.
Out of these, 469 projects have been registered by
the CDM Executive Board.
If all the 1467 projects get registered by the CDM
Executive Board, it could attract approximately 6.15
billion US dollars into the country by 2012 through
sale of Certified Emission Reduction (CER) Cer-
tificates.
As per Kyoto Protocol, only Annex-I Parties of the
UNFCCC have quantified emission limitation re-
duction targets. Developing countries including
India have no such obligation to mitigate emissions
and accordingly no target is set.
India does not have emission reduction target un-
der the Kyoto Protocol. However, CDM projects
as mentioned above, if registered by the CDM Ex-
ecutive Board, have the potential to reduce 615
million metric tonnes of CO2 equivalent by year
2012.

Likewise, India's exports to Africa region increased

from 5.6 billion dollars in 2004-05 to 14.57 billion
dollars in 2008-2009, up by 160 per cent.

Government said that it has initiated a process for

expanding the existing India-Chile preferential
trade agreement (PTA) and India-MERCOSUR
(trade bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uru-
guay) trade agreement for further increasing ex-
ports to South American and African regions. Be-
sides, India is also negotiating a PTA with South

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39
Section - 3 ( Current Relevant Facts )
New Delhi's growing role in the war-torn nation
has stoked fears of encirclement in Pakistan, which
considers Afghanistan part of its sphere of influ-
ence.
India's $1.2 billion of aid to Afghanistan makes it
the sixth-largest donor, four times higher than an
estimated $300 million by Pakistan. Indian agen-
cies are involved in construction of highways,
buildings and urban infrastructure, seeking to win
goodwill through a series of simple but targeted
forms of help.
It offered to rebuild the Afghan national airline
Ariana, donating Airbus aircraft despite a short-
age in its own fleet. It also trained Afghan com-
mercial pilots.
New Delhi has donated 600 buses, provided ex-
perts who have restored telecommunication net-
works in at least 11 provinces, and built power
transmission lines in northern Afghanistan. It is
also building the new premises for the Afghan par-
liament, again a symbolic move to underline close
ties between the two countries.
Its most significant development activity, however,
is the construction of a road that connects Delaram
in western Afghanistan with Zaranj on
Afghanistan's border with Iran and another that
links Kandahar with Spin Boldak, a town near the
Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
The construction of these roads provides access to
strategic ports for India and landlocked Afghani-
stan, lessening the latter's dependence on Pakistan.
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New Delhi, denied overland access to Afghanistan
through Pakistan, is seeking to ship goods to the
Iranian port of Chabahar and then transport them
into Afghanistan on the roads that it is building.
Pakistan's aid effort, by contrast, has been much
more restrained, in part perhaps because of the
differing economic conditions in India and Paki-
stan.
Islamabad sees India's rapid insertion of material
support as a strategic loss and one that rolls back
decades of efforts to establish an Islamic alliance
between Kabul and Islamabad.
Since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, India has raised
its diplomatic footprint in Afghanistan, opening
new consulates in Herat in the west and Mazar-i-
Sharif in the north. It also reopened two others in
the southern city of Kandahar and Jalalabad in the
east which had been shut since 1979.
India says the consulates are necessary because of
various development projects it has underway in
Afghanistan.
Pakistan says the consulates are largely staffed by
intelligence agents involved in stirring up unrest
inside Pakistan, especially in southwest Baluchistan
province on the Afghan border where a low-key
insurgency that has raged for decades is showing
signs of escalation.
India denies any involvement in the Baluch insur-
gency. In July last year it agreed to include a refer-
ence to Baluchistan in a joint statement signed by
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his
Pakistani counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani at the end
of a meeting in Egypt to improve ties.
India does not have any troops on the ground in
Afghanistan. But there are more than 500 men
from the Indo-Tibetan Border Police and the Bor-
40
der Roads Organisation involved in construction of roads. These forces are not part of NATO and their
objective is to provide security to consulates, Indian labourers and businesses.

India also trains a small number of officers from the Afghan National Army at defence institutions in India.
In April 2008, Afghanistan's then defence minister Abdul Rahim Wardak visited New Delhi and met his
Indian counterpart A.K. Antony. He also travelled to Srinagar, capital of Indian Kashmir and visited the
headquarters of the Indian army's 15 Corps involved in fighting the revolt in the Himalayan territory.

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41
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)

Making an initial estimate of economic PMEAC said: “The RBI’s monetary policy must
remain alive to the danger that a significant trans-
growth at 8.2 per cent in 2010-11 and nine per
fer of food price inflation to the general price level
cent in 2011-12, the Prime Minister’s Economic
may occur in 2010-11.”
Advisory Council (PMEAC) has listed a host of
farm sector measures that need to be put in place
It also pointed towards the potential of commodi-
for a bounce-back in agricultural GDP and avert
ties prices rising globally owing to a revival in de-
the cascading effect of the current food price spi-
veloping countries and the current unsettled finan-
ral on overall inflation during the new fiscal.
cial conditions.
The overall growth projections, however, are based
While calling for better farm practices, soil re-
on certain basic assumptions. In its ‘Review of the
search, irrigation and increased productivity
Economy 2009-10’ the Council said that the growth
through the supply of quality high-yielding seeds
assessments of both these years assume a normal
to farmers during the medium term, the PMEAC
South West monsoon and absence of any major
suggested urgent imports of sugar to the extent of
calamity or setback at the international level, con-
three to five million tonnes to bridge the demand-
tinuation of strong expansion in industrial and ser-
supply gap during the new fiscal.
vice sector activity during the period, along with
the implementation of the government’s priorities
The PMEAC also urged the Centre to consider rice
and initiatives in the creation of infrastructure with
imports to build stocks if procurement falls below
private sector participation along desired lines.
27 million tonnes in the current season.
Moreover, these growth estimates are based on the
expectation that farm sector growth would bounce
back from the current fiscal’s projected decline of Less than one in three women know that
0.2 per cent. “The Council expects a bounce back a condom can be used just once, and just one in six
in agricultural GDP in the next year and mainte- know that a condom cannot disappear into a
nance of the desired trend growth of four per cent woman’s body.
in 2011-12,” the review said.
These are some of the findings of “Youth in India:
To achieve the projected farm growth target, the Situation and Needs,” a study carried out by the
PMEAC has prescribed a number of measures that Indian Institute of Population Sciences and the
need to be implemented over a period. Population Council.

For the short term, while noting that the authori- The findings show that just 46 per cent of young
ties should be alert in pre-empting a food inflation men and 24 per cent of young women were aware
spill-over to headline inflation through the manu- that a condom cannot disappear inside a woman’s
facturing sector during the coming months, the body. Only 31 per cent of young men and 25 per

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36
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
cent of young women felt that condoms do not
reduce sexual pleasure.
Marital status affects condom consciousness, with
57 per cent married young men compared to 44
per cent unmarried young men being aware that
condoms cannot slip off the man and disappear into
a woman’s body; the corresponding percentages
among young women were 29 and 17 .
The findings also underscore the limited aware-
ness young people have of most sexual and repro-
ductive matters with only 37 per cent of young
men and 45 per cent of young women being aware
that a woman could get pregnant in her first sexual
encounter, and 19 and 15 per cent respectively of
young men and women reporting awareness of
sexually transmitted infections other than HIV.
Leading sources of information on sexual matters,
according to the study, were friends and the me-
dia for both young men and women. In contrast,
just 10 per cent of young men and women cited
teachers and 3-7 per cent cited health care provid-
ers as a source of information; just 2 and 9 per cent
of young men and women respectively cited fam-
ily members.
Teachers and health care providers were relatively
infrequently reported as sources of information on
contraception.
The study further points out that only 15 per cent
of respondents had attended sex education
programmes either in or outside the school set-
ting, notwithstanding the Adolescence Education
Programme, the School AIDS Education
Programme, the Red Ribbon Clubs and special
programmes for out-of-the-school youth.
Speaking on the occasion, Nobel laureate Amartya
Sen stressed the need for education on sexual and
reproductive matters. Basic schooling can be cen-
tral to human security as illiteracy and innumeracy
are forms of insecurity themselves, he said.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Problems
When people are illiterate, their ability to under-
stand and invoke their legal rights can be very lim-
ited. This can be a significant barrier for illiterate
women to make use even of the rather limited
rights that they do actually have. Importantly, it
can also muffle the political voice, Prof. Sen said.
“The removal of survival disadvantages of women,
the reduction of child mortality and moderating
influences on fertility rates are all among the basic
issues involved in removing the “downside risks”
that threaten life and dignity,” he said.
The study was carried out in Andhra Pradesh,
Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and
Tamil Nadu in 2006-07, and is based on interviews
of over 51,000 individuals.
In what may be a broad prescription for
the government's economic policy road map ahead
of the Budget for 2010-11, the Prime Minister's
Economic Advisory Council (PMEAC) pitched for
a partial roll-back of stimulus measures to usher in
fiscal correction by scaling up excise duties and
service tax and “adjusting” Central expenditure
without hurting capital spending on infrastructure.
After releasing the ‘Review of the Economy 2009-
10' which projected a GDP (gross domestic prod-
uct) growth of over 7.2 per cent this fiscal, 8.2 per
cent in 2010-11 and 9 per cent in 2011-12, PMEAC
Chairman C. Rangarajan said that since the expen-
diture stimulus was directed at augmenting con-
sumption and not investment, the corrective mea-
sures must also focus on adjusting expenditure.
“There is a case for adjustment of duties. Adjust-
ments are possible both on the revenue side and
the expenditure side in order to bring down
fiscal deficit,” he said.
Noting that government finances have come un-
der severe strain and the fiscal imbalance “is now
a matter of concern”, the PMEAC said: The Gov-
ernment cannot continue with the kind of large
revenue and fiscal deficits recorded in the last two
37
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
years and will have to initiate fiscal consolidation
in the coming fiscal year (2010-11) itself …in the
forthcoming budget to ensure fiscal sustainability,
enable greater flexibility in monetary policy cali-
bration, contain interest payments and to avoid
upward pressure on interest rates.”
Alongside, in pursuing the exit strategy, the Coun-
cil noted that since more of fiscal expansion was
owing to an increase in expenditure than from tax
cuts, the Centre's expenditure would need to be
curtailed. At the same time, while some items of
spending such as salaries and interest payments are
committed and cannot be reduced, infrastructure
spending is critical and the government will have
to provide adequate viability funding. “Thus, there
is no scope for compressing capital expenditure
while undertaking fiscal correction”.
On the revenue side, while the Goods and Services
Tax (GST) is unlikely to be implemented from the
April 2010 deadline, the PMEAC suggested expan-
sion of the base of service tax “by converting the
selective taxation of services into a general taxa-
tion, unify the threshold and rate structure of
CENVAT and service tax to introduce GST at the
Central level. This along with inflows from disin-
vestment and spectrum auctions, it would be real-
istic to budget for a cut in the Centre's fiscal defi-
cit by 1-1.5 per cent in 2010-11 without any ad-
verse impact on economic growth.
Amplifying on the suggested roll-back of excise and
service tax, PMEAC member Govinda Rao said:
“Partially, we need to roll back and if you partially
roll back, you need to unify (excise duty and ser-
vice tax rates)…There is one possibility that you
unify both the rates at 10 per cent. There is an-
other possibility... that both be raised to 12 per
cent.” Mr. Rao, however, made it clear that it was
for Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to take a
call on this issue in the budget.
As part of the stimulus package to industry to tackle
the impact of the global meltdown, the govern-
ment had reduced the excise duty from 14 per cent
to 8 per cent and service tax from 12 per cent to 10
per cent.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
On the whole, Dr. Rangarajan noted that a cut in
fiscal deficit during 2011-12 by one per cent by
outlay rationalisation and another 0.5 per cent from
the revenue side would be a possibility.
On the issue of inflation, he said he would go by
the overall projection of the Reserve Bank of India
that it would more or less come down to 8.5 per
cent by the end of the current fiscal.
However, the impact of food inflation, now hov-
ering around 18 per cent, could spill over to other
sectors by the next fiscal if adequate steps are not
taken.
In this regard, the PMEAC has advised the gov-
ernment to ensure timely release of sufficient
amount of foodgrains below prevailing market
prices, plan for imports at the first indication of
production shortfalls and develop better distribu-
tion channels. It also sought urgent steps to im-
port white sugar (about 3-5 million tonnes) to meet
the shortfall next fiscal.
A little-known rainforest in north-east
India could be home to the world’s largest number
of wildcat species, with no less than seven species
photo-documented by a wildlife biologist at the
end of her two-year survey.
Kashmira Kakati’s camera-trap shots reveal that the
wildcats share a relatively small, 500 sq.km. patch
of rainforest in the Jeypore-Dehing lowlands in
Assam, which includes the Dehing Patkai Wild-
life Sanctuary.
Among the cats are the elusive and rare clouded
leopard (Neofelis nebulosa), the marbled cat
(Pardofelis marmorata) and the Asian golden cat
(Catopuma temminckii), besides the relatively
more widely distributed tiger (Panthera tigris), the
leopard (Panthera pardus), the leopard cat
(Prionailurus bengalensis), and the jungle cat (Felis
chaus).
The discovery comes in the backdrop of growing
concern among environmentalists over deforesta-
38
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
tion, poaching, crude oil and coal extraction and
mega hydro-electric projects that threaten the ecol-
ogy of the eastern Himalayas. However, new wild-
life species continue to be discovered in this part
of the eastern Himalayas — listed as a “biodiversity
hotspot” comprising Bhutan, parts of northeast
India and Nepal.
Twelve other carnivore species were also recorded
in the Kakati survey, among them the endangered
dhole (Asiatic Wild Dog), the Malayan sun bear,
binturong, mongoose, otter and civets. And among
the 45 mammals documented are six species of pri-
mates, deer, porcupine, wild pig and rodents, which
are prey for the rainforest carnivores.
The fundamental rights enshrined in the
Constitution are inherent and cannot be extin-
guished by any constitutional or statutory provi-
sion, the Supreme Court held on feb 17.
Upholding the power to order a CBI probe with-
out a State’s consent, a five-judge Constitution
Bench, headed by Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan,
said: “Any law that abrogates or abridges such
rights would be violative of the basic structure
doctrine.”
The Bench was disposing of a batch of cases filed
by the West Bengal government and others, chal-
lenging CBI probe ordered by the High Courts con-
cerned. Since important questions of law were
raised in these appeals, the matter was referred to
the Constitution Bench.
According to Bench “The State has a duty to en-
force the human rights of a citizen for fair and
impartial investigation against any person accused
of commission of a cognisable offence, which may
include its own officers.
“The power of judicial review being an integral part
of the basic structure of the Constitution, no Act
of Parliament can exclude or curtail the powers of
the constitutional courts with regard to the en-
forcement of fundamental rights.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
“In a federal Constitution, distribution of legisla-
tive powers between Parliament and State Legis-
latures involves limitation on legislative powers
and, therefore, this requires an authority other
than Parliament to ascertain whether such limita-
tions are transgressed.
“Judicial review acts as the final arbiter not only to
give effect to distribution of legislative powers be-
tween Parliament and State legislatures, it is also
necessary to show any transgression by each en-
tity.”
The Bench noted that when the Delhi Special Po-
lice Establishment Act says that subject to the con-
sent by the State, the CBI can take up investiga-
tion in relation to the crime that was otherwise
within the jurisdiction of the State police, the court
could also exercise its constitutional power of ju-
dicial review and direct the CBI to take up the in-
vestigation within the jurisdiction of the State.
The Bench held that the power of the High Court
under Article 226 could not be taken away, cur-
tailed or diluted by Section 6 of the DSPE Act. Ir-
respective of there being any statutory provision
acting as a restriction on the powers of the courts,
the restriction imposed by Section 6 of the Act on
the powers of the Union could not be read as re-
striction on the powers of the constitutional courts.
The Bench directed that all individual cases be
placed before the respective Benches for disposal
in terms of this judgment.
India and Bangladesh have decided to
set up a joint-venture 1,320-megawatt power plant
as a mark of co-operation. The two neighbours have
also agreed to a cross-border power grid.
The joint-venture power plant, to be constructed
in southern Khulna in Bangladesh, will be opera-
tional within two years.
The decisions were taken at the second meeting of
the Bangladesh-India Joint Steering Committee on
the power sector which was formed during
Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's recent
visit to New Delhi.
39
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Bangladesh Power Secretary Abul Kalam Azad,
who led the host team in the talks, said the two
countries had finalised the details of the grid and
reached a broad agreement on building the coal-
fired plant. The two-unit power plant (660mw
each) will cost about $1.8 billion.
The cooperation will facilitate Bangladesh's import
of 250 mw to meet the power demand. Power Sec-
retary HS Brahma said India was offering “the
cheapest rates” — varying between Rs 2 and Rs
2.5 (Tk 3-3.5).
India's National Thermal Power Cooperation
(NTPC) and the Bangladesh Power Development
Board (BPDB) signed the MoUs.
Mr. Brahma told journalists that the project re-
quired 130km grid connectivity 85km in India and
45km in Bangladesh. The grid costs will be shared
proportionately Tk 1100 crore by Bangladesh and
about Tk 200 crore by India.
The Council of Boards of School Educa-
tion (COBSE) took a “unanimous” decision to adopt
a core curriculum for physics, chemistry, biology
and mathematics at the senior secondary level. The
new curriculum will come into effect from the
2011-12 academic year, Union Minister for Hu-
man Resource Development Kapil Sibal said.
Mr. Sibal described the decision as a “milestone in
the history of education.” Though the meeting
began with scepticism among some boards, the
Minister claimed that apprehensions were ad-
dressed, and now “there will be a core curriculum
which will be accepted by all stakeholders at the
senior secondary level.”
“What it means is that in all schools of India affili-
ated to boards that are members of COBSE, the
core curriculum will be taught, so that all our chil-
dren have a level-playing field.” The core curricu-
lum for these four subjects has been finalised after
consultations within COBSE.
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While the boards will have to draw up the syllabi
on the basis of the core curriculum, they will have
to work out how to tailor their examinations as
per the new regime. And, now that a beginning
has been made with the pure sciences and math-
ematics, COBSE has been asked to explore the pos-
sibility of replicating this in the commerce stream.
The meeting was attended by representatives of
20 boards, including State boards.
With the core curriculum agenda clinched, the
Council has now been asked by the Minister to
work towards a single entrance examination by
2013 in each discipline where entrance examina-
tions are conducted for entering professional
courses. A task force will be set up to explore the
possibility.
A high-powered laser destroyed a target
missile in flight off the Central California coast in
a milestone test of a futuristic but troubled national
defence system, the Air Force announced.
A laser weapon mounted on a Boeing jumbo jet
tracked the missile as it accelerated over the ocean
off the Point Mugu Naval Warfare Center, then
fired an energy beam that heated the missile until
it cracked and broke up, according to statements
from the Air Force and two aerospace companies
involved in the programme.
The test is a boost for a programme that has had
billions in cost overruns and saw its budget sharply
cut last year by Defence Secretary Robert Gates,
who called the concept “fatally flawed”.
The airborne laser programme began in 1996 and
is one in a series of missile defence programmes
that originated in President Ronald Reagan’s Stra-
tegic Defence Initiative in 1983 — the much-ma-
ligned “Star Wars” missile shoot-down effort that
was criticised as impractical, expensive and over-
reaching. While the success of the test is a tech-
nological triumph, it will not save the airborne la-
ser programme from being placed on life-support,
said a defence analyst.
40
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
The system used two low-energy lasers to target
the missile as it was boosting into the sky from a
sea platform, then fired a megawatt-class Chemi-
cal Oxygen Iodine Laser, or COIL.
While ballistic missiles like the one ALTB de-
stroyed move at speeds of about 4,000 miles per
hour, they are no match for a superheated, high-
energy laser beam racing towards it at 670 million
mph.
Asserting that the diversification and
market product focus policy had started bearing
fruit, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry
Anand said that exports were on the path of posi-
tive growth for the third consecutive month, re-
cording a 11.5 per cent growth in January at $14.3
billion. In January 2009, these stood at $12.9 bil-
lion.
Mr. Sharma said this had been possible due to the
adoption of the new Foreign Trade Policy (FTP)
that had focussed on new markets and new prod-
ucts. “We could not have waited for revival of the
traditional markets in the U.S. and Europe and
adopted a cautious but proactive approach.
Revealing the January export numbers, Mr. Sharma
said, “Between now and March 31, we hope to
maintain and further strengthen the growth,
which will help us in registering healthy export
figures and reducing gap (dip in year-on-year ex-
ports) substantially.”
Exports were hit badly by slump in demand in key
markets in the wake of global financial crisis and
fell continuously for 13 months and dipped to
around 39 per cent in May 2009. However, the
trend was reversed under the new FTP in Novem-
ber 2009 by growing 18.2 per cent. In December,
the rise was 9.3 per cent. The rising trend of the
past three months mirrors that the outward ship-
ments have come out of the woods.
Cautioning against abrupt withdrawal of the stimu-
lus package, Mr. Sharma said it was still early to
feel upbeat as some sectors were still struggling to
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
come out of the bad phase. He said engineering
goods, textiles, jute, carpets, handicrafts and leather
“continue to do badly” and were a cause for con-
cern. He further said that though there had been
recovery in global economy it would take time for
the demand for Indian goods to return to pre-re-
cession level.
During April-January 2009-10, exports were about
$133 billion against $144.2 billion in the year-ago
period. In the Foreign Trade Policy 2009-14, the
government had set an export target of $200 bil-
lion for 2010-11.
ONGC Videsh Limited (OVL)-led con-
sortium has announced that it had bagged 40 per
cent stake in a $19-billion project to develop a
major crude oil block in Venezuela.
OVL, Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Oil India
Limited (OIL) along with Spain’s Repsol YPF SA
and Malaysia’s “Petroliam Nasional Bdh” won
rights to develop the Carabobo-1 block in
Venezuela’s Orinoco Belt.
The consortium would pay $1.05 billion to Ven-
ezuela as the signing amount and initially invest
another $9 billion in developing the block that
could produce four lakh barrels of oil a day. The
total spending on the block over 25 years would
be $19 billion. Besides, it would extend $1.05 bil-
lion credit to Venezuela’s state oil company
Petroleos de Venezuela SA (PdVSA), which would
have 60 per cent interest in the project.
OVL, Repsol and Petronas will have 11 per cent
share each in the Empresa Mixta which will de-
velop the Carabobo-1 Norte and Carabobo-1
Centro blocks located in the Orinoco Heavy Oil
Belt, while IOC and OIL will split a 7 per cent
stake in the project equally. OVL, IOC and OIL
will seek the government approval to invest $2.45
billion their share of signature bonus loan to
PdVSA and phase-I development cost.
Since signature bonus is to be paid by only the for-
eign firms, the share of OVL, IOC and OIL would
41
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
be $472.5 million or 45 per cent of $1.05 billion.
They will also contribute a similar amount to
PdVSA as their share of credit.
The license agreement for the block that is likely
to start production in three years would be signed
on March 25, 2010.
Commercial banks will be made to ex-
tend loans at base rates from next fiscal year, which
is expected to benefit consumers and borrowers.
According to Reserve Bank of India Deputy Gov-
ernor Subir Gokarn, the apex bank is keen on en-
suring that banks provide loans on a base rate from
April onwards and not on the basis of current
benchmark prime lending rate (BPLR) as the lat-
ter was not considered a transparent system.
Addressing the conference on Capital markets
‘growth with governance’ organised by Associated
Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India
(Assocham), Dr. Gokarn said that a draft proposal
had been circulated to all stakeholders for their
opinion on fixed rate with the aim of ensuring that
consumers and borrowers gain the best. Under the
BPLR arrangement, banks used their negotiating
power for extending loans and based on that the
rates for lending were decided which meant that
for different consumers banks charged different
interest rates.
Even as people across Sri Lanka protested
the detention of the former Army Chief, General
Sarath Fonseka, it was announced that the snap
parliamentary elections would be held on April 8.
The election schedule was announced after Presi-
dent Mahinda Rajapaksa dissolved Parliament. The
new Parliament is scheduled to meet on April 22.
Meanwhile, a fundamental rights violation peti-
tion, challenging the alleged arbitrary arrest of Gen.
Fonseka, was filed before the Supreme Court by
his wife Anoma and New Democratic Front secre-
tary Shamila Perera.
The petition said the government had infringed
on the General’s fundamental rights to the free-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
dom of thought and conscience and the freedom
from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treat-
ment and punishment, right to equality and equal
protection of the law, freedom from discrimina-
tion on grounds of political opinion, freedom from
arbitrary arrest and detention, freedom of speech
and expression and freedom of association guaran-
teed in the Constitution.
The Moon Minerology Mapper (M3) on
Chandrayaan-1, which famously discovered the
presence of water and hydroxyl molecules on the
lunar surface material last year, has now identi-
fied a new lunar rock type on the far side of the
moon. The M3 is a NASA instrument. This was
reported by Carle Pieters of Brown University, lead
author of the present study, at the Sixth
Chandrayaan-1 Science Meeting being held at the
Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), a unit of the
Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
The rock-type is dominated by a mineral termed
as ‘magnesium spinel.’ Spinel is a generic name
given to a class of minerals having the chemical
formula AB{-2}O{-4} and the usual spinel forma-
tions found in lunar rocks is an iron-magnesium
admixture of the form (Mg, Fe)(Al, Cr){-2}O{-4}.
These rocks are usually found along with magne-
sium-iron silicate (olivine) and calcium-rich alu-
minium silicate (pyroxene).
According to Professor Pieters, the interesting fea-
ture of the new rock type is that it is exclusively
composed of magnesium-rich spinel “with no de-
tectable pyroxene or olivine present.” This, she said,
does not easily fit with current lunar crustal evo-
lution models.
The generally accepted characterisation of the lu-
nar crust is based principally on retrieved lunar
material by the Apollo-Luna missions and mete-
orite samples. The crust is described as a rocky ac-
cumulation, basically rich in calcium-aluminium
silicates (anorthosites) infused with a mix of com-
pounds containing magnesium and iron (‘mafic’
minerals).
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
However, the western ring of the Moscoviense
Basin of the moon appears to be one of the several
discrete areas that exhibit unusual compositions
relative to their surroundings, but without mor-
phological evidence for separate geological pro-
cesses leading to their exposure.
The findings are based on data acquired by M3 in
January 2009 during the first observation period
of Chandrayaan-1 from its initial 100 km altitude
orbit over a 40 km wide strip field of view, with a
spatial resolution of 140 m/pixel. The mapping was
done using the emission spectrum of the surface
over the wavelength region 460-3000 nanometres
with a spectral resolution of 20-40 nm.
The Dutch coalition government col-
lapsed on Feb 20 after the two largest parties dis-
agreed over whether to withdraw the 2,000 Dutch
troops from Afghanistan as planned this year. Fol-
lowing is a look at the consequences of the col-
lapse.
Elections will be called and could be held mid-year
at the earliest. Talks aimed at forming a coalition
may take several months. Polls suggest four or five
parties may be needed to gain a majority coalition
in the parliament.
The fallen government would operate in caretaker
mode until a new government is installed. Minor-
ity-rule governments are possible, however.
If elections are held mid-year, a new government
could be installed in time for a budget for 2011 to
be unveiled as scheduled in September.
Impact
Polls show public opposition to extending the
Dutch mission in Afghanistan and a television sur-
vey showed 76 percent of those polled have little
or no confidence in the government.
Struggling in polls, Labour could regain some elec-
toral support by its stance over Afghanistan.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Labour did not want to extend the Afghanistan
mission because it was agreed in 2007 to end it in
2010 and there was no longer majority support in
parliament to extend. Labour is willing to continue
the Dutch deployment of F16s in Afghanistan and
give training and development aid to the country.
A poll showed the PvdA could count on an extra
seat in the Parliament compared with the previ-
ous poll, while the CDA would lose two if elec-
tions were held now, but both would still be be-
low the number they won at the 2006 election.
The Freedom Party of right-wing MP Geert
Wilders, which had called on the government to
end the Afghan mission, could be the big winner
at the next election. Polls tip his party to either
become the biggest or second biggest party, cam-
paigning on mistrust of the government and an
anti-immigration ticket.
Troop Withdrawal
Dutch troops will most likely return home from
their mission in Afghanistan's Uruzgan Province
from August as planned. It is unlikely that an in-
terim government would take a large policy deci-
sion such as extending the mission.
Budget Cuts
A government collapse will add uncertainty to up
to 40 billion euros in budget cuts called for by the
Finance Ministry. Some 20 panels are due to
present recommendations in March on austerity
measures to rein in a budget deficit that is expected
to top 6 percent of gross domestic product this year.
Some of those measures were expected to be imple-
mented in September for the 2011 budget, but the
worst of them were expected to be delayed until
after the next scheduled general election in the
spring of 2011.
The new government will have to do something,
though, as the finance ministry pledged EU coun-
terparts last December that the deficit would be
cut by 50 to 75 basis points a year every year from
2011 through 2013.
43
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Among the various contentious proposals on the
table are a rise in the retirement age, changes to
international aid programmes and a new 60 per-
cent income tax rate for anyone who earns more
than the prime minister.
Dutch Relationship with NATO
A Dutch withdrawal from Afghanistan is not ex-
pected to influence how NATO is perceived within
the Netherlands, but it may sour relations with
the military alliance.
The Netherlands will also loose visibility as one of
the players in the Afghanistan issue, which could
in turn have a negative influence on the nation's
international standing.
The Netherlands can, however, claim they have
participated in NATO actions on a much higher
level than can be expected of a relatively small
country.
Mission in IN Afghanistan
The withdrawal will have a limited impact on
NATO's Afghanistan mission, but will deliver a
blow to U.S. hopes to boost international troop
numbers.
In Uruzgan Province it could mean a different ap-
proach, such as a more confrontational stance if
the United States takes a lead role in the province.
Most NATO members only have a symbolic pres-
ence in Afghanistan and the fact the burden is on
only a few shoulders is considered harmful to
NATO.
Dutch-U.S. Relations
The U.S. will likely be disgruntled by the with-
drawal after it had heightened pressure on the
Netherlands in recent weeks to keep its combat
troops in place.
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Scientists are working on a tiny liquid
sensor that may detect cancer instantly and could
lead to the creation of its home detection kit.
Jae Kwon, assistant professor of electrical and com-
puter engineering, University of Missouri , is work-
ing on developing an acoustic resonant sensor that
is smaller than a human hair and could test bodily
fluids for a variety of diseases, including breast and
prostate cancers.
Many disease-related substances in liquids are not
easily tracked. In a liquid environment, most sen-
sors experience a significant loss of signal quality,
but by using highly sensitive, low-signal-loss acous-
tic resonant sensors in a liquid, these substances
can be effectively and quickly detected - a brand-
new concept that will result in a noninvasive ap-
proach for breast cancer detection.
Natural progesterone, the sex hormone
used in the first contraceptive pills, is to be tested
on patients with severe head injuries.
Scientists will begin a phase III clinical trial and
say the drug could save patients' lives and reduce
damage to their brains.
They announced the trial at the annual meeting of
the American Association for the Advancement of
Science. It will involve 1,000 patients in 17 trauma
centres across the US.
Dr David Wright, associate professor of emergency
medicine at Emory University in Atlanta, will lead
the trial.
Previous studies have shown that progesterone
supports the normal development of neurons in
the brain, and that the hormone has a protective
effect on damaged brain tissue.
Dr Wright said that traumatic brain injury is a com-
plex condition - there's swelling, and neuronal
death and damage occurring all at the same time.
The beauty of progesterone is that it seems to work
on all of those things.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
In earlier tests, the Emory University researchers
found that progesterone reduced the risk of death
in patients with brain injuries.
Dr Wright hopes that, following this trial, proges-
terone will become the first drug treatment in 30
years to be approved specifically for severe trau-
matic brain injury.
The Army’s military doctrine is being
reviewed and it will now include an added thrust
in five key areas that will propel the doctrine. This
includes wars in faraway lands, besides strategy on
how to face future challenges posed by China and
Pakistan.
The key areas include preparation for a two-
pronged war with China and Pakistan. Both coun-
tries will have to be looked at separately and also
collectively. The nature of conflict, if ever, with
both countries will vary greatly in terms of terrain
and use of weapons and fire-power.
The Army, which is involved in fighting insur-
gency in J&K and the North-East, is also looking
to optimise capabilities to fight asymmetric war
waged by both State and non-State actors, such as
terror attacks and proxy wars. This will include
cyber and electronic warfare.
The doctrine will look at ways to enhance the stra-
tegic reach of the Army and joint operations with
the Navy and the Air Force. Countries like the USA
already have airborne division while China has
capability of rapid induction of troops. The re-
viewed doctrine will also touch upon space-based
capability and methods to achieve technological
edge over the enemy. The doctrine is reviewed
every five years by the Army’s Shimla-based Train-
ing Command.
The 13th Finance Commission, which
makes recommendations on sharing of tax revenues
by the Centre and States, has suggested a new path
for fiscal prudence in its report submitted to Presi-
dent Pratibha Devi Singh Patil on December 30,
2009.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The Commission was headed by Vijay Kelkar.
Other members of the Commission were B.K.
Chaturvedi, Indira Rajaraman, Atul Sarma and
Sanjiv Misra.
The government had consigned the Fiscal Respon-
sibility and Budget Management (FRBM), the self-
imposed fiscal prudence guidelines, to the back-
burner in 2008 when it stepped up official spend-
ing beyond its means in order to insulate the
economy from the global financial meltdown. The
country’s fiscal deficit, a reflection of government
borrowings, is estimated to touch 6.8 per cent in
2009-10, up from 6.2 per cent in the previous fis-
cal, mainly on account of the stimulus measures.
The recommendations of the 13th Finance Com-
mission, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said
“would get reflected in the 2010-11 Budget”.
The report, Kelkar said, dealt with the sharing of
tax revenue between the Centre and States, distri-
bution of funds among States and support to local
bodies. The Finance Commission report assumes
significance in view of the ongoing reforms in in-
direct and direct taxes, which will have a bearing
on the tax collections.
Currently, the States and Union Territories get Rs
1.64 lakh crore in a year, or around 30 per cent of
the shareable taxes collected by the Centre. The
12th Finance Commission had recommended that
30.5 per cent of the shareable Central taxes should
be shared among the States and Union Territories.
The shareable central taxes include corporation tax,
income tax, wealth tax, customs, excise duty and
service tax.
China has found a one-billion tonne iron
ore deposit, which is the biggest discovery of the
mineral since 1980’s. This is bound to cause some
worries in India as iron ore accounts for nearly half
of Indian exports to China.
The latest discovery is a 6-km long deposit with
thickness ranging between 41.43 and 108.95
meters. It lies 100 to 600 meters deep underground
in Luannan County in the northern province of
Hebei.
45
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
It will be some time before the new deposit will
begin to yield iron ore, but the discovery will defi-
nitely enable China to make long-term plans on
steel production and strengthen its hands in price
negotiations. The discovery gives a new boost to
China’s ongoing efforts to reduce its dependence
on major world suppliers and avoid getting caught
in price fluctuations of the spot market. Indian
suppliers mostly deal in the spot market and refuse
to enter into long-term supply contracts.
The Union government has launched the
Maulana Abul Kalam Azad National Fellowship
Scheme for minority students and another one to
computerise State Wakf Boards.
Under the scheme, 756 fellowships (30 per cent to
be reserved for women) will be offered per year to
minority students wishing to pursue higher stud-
ies. The objective is to grant integrated five-year
fellowships in form of financial assistance to stu-
dents from minority communities as notified by
the Central government to pursue MPhil and PhD.
The scheme will cover all universities or institu-
tions recognised by the UGC under Section 2 (f)
and Section 3 of the UGC Act and will be imple-
mented by the Ministry of Minority Affairs
through UGC for students belonging to minori-
ties.
The fellowships will be on the pattern of UGC fel-
lowships awarded to research students pursuing
regular and full time MPhil and PhD courses. Hold-
ers of the new fellowship will be called MoMA
scholars.
Jharkhand Mukti Morcha chief Shibu
Soren has been elected as the Chief Minister of
Jharkhand after successful conclusion of the As-
sembly pools in December 2009. The JMM, which
won 18 seats, garnered the support of the BJP-
JD(U), the All Jharkhand Students Union and
Jharkhand Janadhikar Manch led by Bandhu
Tirkey, taking up the tally to 44 MLAs in a house
of 80.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The BJP won 18 seats and the JD(U) 2 seats, All
Jharkhand Students Union has 5 MLAs and the
Jharkhand Janadhikar Manch has one MLA.
The Gujarat Assembly has passed a land-
mark Bill which makes, for the first time in the
country, voting mandatory in local body polls. The
Gujarat Local Authorities Laws (Amendment) Bill,
2009, which also seeks to raise the reservation of
seats for women in local self governance bodies
from 33 to 50 per cent, was passed by voice vote.
Under the Bill, if a voter fails to vote for the rea-
sons other than prescribed in the rules, he may be
declared a “defaulter voter” and would face conse-
quences for which rules will be framed and placed
before the Assembly for its approval later.
Authors of musical, cinematographic and
literary works may now be entitled to royalty in
case their works are used for commercial purposes,
a benefit denied to them so far. This can be pos-
sible because of certain amendments in the Copy-
right Act of 1957, which has been approved by the
Union Cabinet for introduction in Parliament.
The amendment is proposed to give independent
rights to authors of literary and musical works in
cinematography of films, which were hitherto
denied and wrongfully exploited by producers and
music companies.
Another amendment ensures that the authors of
the works, particularly songs included in the cin-
ematography of films or sound recordings, receive
royalty for commercial exploitation of such work.
The curtain came down on L.K. Advani’s
tenure as Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha on
December 18, 2009. And while he made way for
Sushma Swaraj, the 82-year-old veteran BJP leader
said he saw a new chapter opening in his political
career.
After a meeting of BJP parliamentary party
amended its constitution, Advani was elected chair-
46
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
man, a post that has been created for him. The
assembled party MPs then elected Swaraj as leader
of the party in LS, the first woman to hold the
post in BJP.
The next act in the generational change was played
out on December 19, when Rajnath Singh stepped
down as BJP President and Maharashtra unit chief
Nitin Gadkari took charge. The change of guard
completed a process that had been in the works
since the party lost its bid for power in 2009 na-
tional elections.
Sushma Swaraj, at 57, clearly marks a generational
change as does 52-year-old Gadkari. Advani is ex-
pected to play a role as mentor and the amended
constitution says he will appoint the two leaders
of Opposition.
Nitin Gadkari is the youngest BJP president. His
elevation marks the culmination of the exercise to
effect a generational shift at the top in the party
hierarchy—both in its organisational and parlia-
mentary wings.
Mr Gadkari assumes his new responsibility at a very
crucial time. After tasting defeat in a series of elec-
toral battles, cadre morale is low. The party was
also bogged down by a debilitating infighting
among the so-called second generation leaders. The
BJP has also failed to keep pace with the changing
times, and lost the trust of the youth and the bur-
geoning urban middle class in the process.
Mr Gadkari, who hails from Nagpur and over the
years cultivated the image of an honest, hard-work-
ing leader who has toiled his way to the top, thus
has task cut out.
On December 2, 2009, India expressed
its gratitude to Bangladesh for taking speedy ac-
tion to foil a conspiracy by the LeT to attack the
Indian mission in Dhaka recently as the two coun-
tries finalised three key agreements to combat ter-
rorism. The agreements were signed during the
visit of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina
to New Delhi.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The two sides arrived at an agreement on: Mutual
legal assistance in criminal matters, combating in-
ternational terrorism, organised crime and illicit
drug trafficking; and agreement on transfer of sen-
tenced persons. However, the two sides have not
yet been able to resolve differences over a bilateral
extradition treaty.
The finalisation of the three accords marks a ma-
jor confidence-building measure (CBM) to address
the issue of Indian insurgents taking shelter in
Bangladesh, which had marred ties between the
two nations in recent years. New Delhi, however,
is quite happy over the manner in which the
Sheikh Hasina government has been cooperating
with it in checking the activities of these insur-
gents.
Increasing the pace of cooperation in the
hydro-power sector, India and Bhutan have signed
four agreements to conduct technical surveys for
hydro-power projects. The four MoUs related to
the hydro-power sector were part of 12 agreements
that were signed after discussions between Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and visiting Bhutanese
King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, who was
on his first foreign visit in December 2009, since
his coronation in 2008.
India and Bhutan have decided to prepare detailed
project reports for the Kuri Gongri,
Chamkharchhu-1 and Kholongchhu hydro-power
projects and Amochu reservoir project. The Kuri
Gongri project is proposed to generate 1,800-mw
power, the Chamkharchhu-1 670 mw and the
Kholongchhu 670 mw. Further, the two sides have
also agreed to conclude implementation agree-
ments for Punatsangchhu-2 project
Bhutan uses 400 mw and has an installed capacity
of 1,500 mw of power. The entire surplus comes
to India which is helping Bhutan increase its ca-
pacity to 10,000 mw till 2020. .
Prime Minister Yokio Hatoyama of Ja-
pan visited New Delhi in end-December 2009.
47
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
During the high-level talks, Japan urged India to
sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT),
but Prime Minister Manmohan Singh put the onus
for its ratification on China and the US.
The issues of nuclear disarmament and non-pro-
liferation were discussed with both sides agreeing
to the need for an early start to the Fissile Material
Cut-off Treaty negotiations. But on the issue of the
non-proliferation treaty both sides agreed that
there was a difference of perception. Mr Singh re-
iterated that India is “deeply interested in work-
ing with Japan and other like-minded countries to
promote the cause of universal, verifiable and non-
discriminatory disarmament”.
Two years after it was submitted to the
government, report of the National Commission
on Religious and Linguistic Minorities is ready to
be tabled in the Parliament.
Constituted to assess the status of minorities and
suggest ways of improving their lot, the Commis-
sion, headed by Justice Ranganath Misra, has rec-
ommended 15 per cent reservation in non-minor-
ity educational institutions and Central and State
government jobs for all religious and linguistic
minorities.
Out of the 15 per cent earmarked seats in educa-
tion institutions, Muslims should be given 10 per
cent reservation (commensurate with their 73 per
cent share in the total minority population in In-
dia) and the remaining 5 per cent to other minori-
ties, states the report.
It adds that if Muslim candidates are not available
to fill 10 per cent seats, the remaining vacancies
should go to other minorities and in “no case to
the majority community.”On employment front,
the report argues that since the minorities, espe-
cially Muslims, are much under-represented in
government jobs, “we recommend they should be
regarded as backward in this respect within the
meaning of that term as used in Article 16 (4) of
the Constitution.”
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Accordingly, the recommendation is to reserve 15
per cent of posts in all cadres and grades under the
Central and State governments for the religious and
linguistic minorities. Of this, 10 per cent quota is
recommended for Muslims and the rest for other
minorities.
The report, co-authored by Tahir Mahmood, also
recommends the inclusion of Muslim and Chris-
tian Dalits in SC list, something the National Com-
mission for Minorities has also been supporting.
On December 16, 2009, the Supreme
Court of Pakistan declared the National Reconcili-
ation Order (NRO) null and void. Lawyers termed
the decision as a landmark judgement and de-
manded that President Asif Ali Zardari step down
from his post. The Court ruled that the decree pro-
tecting Zardari and his allies against charges of
corruption was illegal and against the constitution.
The Supreme Court further ruled that all cases
under investigation or pending enquiries and which
had either been withdrawn or where the investi-
gations or enquiries had been terminated on ac-
count of the NRO shall also stand revived and the
relevant and competent authorities shall proceed
in the matter in accordance with law.
The NRO, issued by former President Pervez
Musharraf, had scrapped all corruption cases
against politicians and bureaucrats filed between
January 1986 and October 1999, on the grounds
that they may have been politically motivated. The
ordinance had allowed Benazir Bhutto and her
husband Zardari to return to Pakistan.
In the first fallout of the Supreme Court ruling ar-
rest warrants were issued against Pakistan Inte-
rior Minister Rehman Malik and Defence Minis-
ter Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar on December 18,
2009. Both were also barred from going abroad on
an official visit.
The National Accountability Bureau, Pakistan’s
main anti-corruption agency, also banned 250 other
officials from going abroad following the order.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Japan’s government has unveiled $81 bil-
lion of new stimulus spending to keep the world’s
second-biggest economy from lurching back into
recession.
Despite shrinking tax revenue, Prime Minister
Yukio Hatoyama and his Cabinet agreed to 7.2 tril-
lion yen ($80.6 billion) in new spending after days
of negotiations with coalition partners.
The largesse underlines that the world’s biggest
economies are still too fragile to get by without
government life support even as a recovery from
the global recession takes shape. In export-reliant
Asia that’s partly because demand from Europe and
the US is improving only tepidly and efforts to re-
duce dependence on trade by boosting consumer
spending will take several years to fully bear fruit.
Japan also faces falling prices while brand-name
exporters like Toyota Motor and Sony are losing
record amounts of money as a galloping yen adds
to their woes.
The Copenhagen Accord, the first global agreement
of the 21st century to comprehensively influence
the flow and share of natural resources, was agreed
upon by 26 most influential countries in the wee
hours of December 19, 2009, in the capital of Den-
mark. The US led the pack of architects with the
BASIC four—China, India, Brazil and South Af-
rica (in that order)—working as sometimes reluc-
tant and sometimes willing, but always key part-
ners in framing the agreement.
The accord demands that increase in global tem-
peratures be kept below 2 degrees on the basis of
equity. It requires global emissions as well as all
national emissions to peak at a certain time but is
mindful of concerns of economic development. It
asks industrialized countries, except the US, to take
emission cuts in future, but not necessarily under
the Kyoto Protocol. It lays out up to $30 billion of
quick-start finance and $100 billion starting 2020,
using all the routes of transfer possible. It requires
mitigation actions from developing countries for
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
the first time to be listed in an international agree-
ment.
The rules of multilateral engagement got re-writ-
ten as new alignments created a coterie of the pow-
erful that brokered deals in closed rooms: each
working at the end to preserve, if not improve its
immediate economic status.
The pact they forged did cause heartburn as less
powerful economies felt left out. Tuvalu and Sudan
said it was too weak, while Venezuela and Bolivia
were upset because it had not been negotiated in
the open by all the 192 countries attending the
UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) conference. The low-ambition deal was
seen as a triumph of the US which defied estimates
to influence the outcome. But the negotiations also
saw the Chinese leveraging their clout in the re-
source-rich African continent, at a multilateral
forum.
For India though, the Accord came out of hard
bargaining lasting almost 20 hours among Heads
of governments of some of the most influential
countries in the world. At the end of the day, when
the battle was over, India appeared to have ceded
ground on some issues but blocked intrusion on
other red lines.
With stakes too high and the rich countries mak-
ing abjectly clear that they were not playing to
the rules, but to change the rules altogether, the
four emerging economies decided to instead scratch
up a low-ambition deal—a pact that would lower
the pressure on them by lowering the demands off
the rich countries in parallel.
Finally the Copenhagen Accord take a morphed
form of the US-backed schedules approach of
‘pledge and review’. The Copenhagen Accord is not
what the US or Europe would have wanted it to
be, but it still contains some elements India would
have to, at best, fight to defend again in coming
years or those that could be titled a lost battle by
the end of the talks.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
India, along with the other three emerging coun-
tries, fought hard and won the battle to retain the
reference principle of common but differentiated
responsibility which creates the firewall between
the commitments of the rich countries and the
actions of rest. India was also able to wrest the cre-
ation of a green climate fund as well as fight back
the attempt to force emission cuts through the
back-door.
But fighting a defensive battle, evidently wanting
not to be labelled obstructionist by the US, India,
along with the other three partners loosened up
its stance on some key issues. This loosening of
stance may not hit home immediately but it left
the window open for growing inequitable burden
falling on India’s head to prevent climate change.
The US Environmental Protection
Agency has cleared the way for regulation of green-
house gases without any new laws being passed by
Congress, reflecting President Barack Obama’s
commitment to act on climate change. The agency
can now begin to make rules to regulate emissions
from vehicle tailpipes, power utilities and heavy
industry under existing laws.
The EPA ruling applies to six gases scientists say
contribute to global warming, including the main
one, carbon dioxide.
The UN climate summit finally passed the
Copenhagen accord Saturday after two days of in-
tense negotiations and back-room manoeuvres. The
accord, proposed by India and four other countries,
is now “operational”, a relieved UN chief, Ban Ki-
Moon, said. The accord that is meant to be a first
step towards fighting the climate change that is
affecting millions worldwide was still held up for
hours by four countries.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin
inaugurated the East-Siberia-Pacific Ocean oil
pipeline on December 28, 2009, which will enable
Moscow to enter markets in Asia- Pacific region
and reduce dependency on European customers.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The project is designed to pump up to 1.6 million
barrels (220,000 tonnes) of crude per day from Si-
beria to Russia’s far east and then on to China and
the Asia-Pacific region. The project’s first leg en-
visages the construction of a 2,757-kilometre sec-
tion with annual capacity of 220.5 million barrels
of crude. It will link Taishet, in East Siberia’s
Irkutsk Region, to Skovorodino, in the Amur Re-
gion, in Russia’s far east. The second stretch will
run 2,100 kilometres from Skovorodino to the Pa-
cific Ocean.
Currently the crude beyond Skovorodino goes by
rail to China and the Pacific coast.
India has floated a concept paper among
the SAARC countries to start a container train on
a pilot basis, running from Bangladesh to Pakistan
via India and Nepal, in a bid to give a big boost
intra-regional trade. The possible corridor for run-
ning the train is from Chittagong Port in
Bangladesh to Katihar in India, Birgunj in Nepal
and to Lahore in Pakistan.
The proposal being considered could unify the
entire region and will lead to a seamless, border-
less trade.
At present, India operates one passenger train each
to Pakistan and Bangladesh for the benefit of the
citizens on the either side of the border. While
the train to Pakistan operates between Delhi and
Lahore, the other to Bangladesh operates between
Kolkata and Dhaka.
David Coleman Headley aka Daood
Gilani, has been formally charged for conspiracy
in the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai in 2008. After
an intensive probe, the FBI has said that Headley
delivered, placed, discharged and detonated explo-
sives and other lethal devices in, into, and against
places of public use in India.
The FBI has indicted Headley on six counts. Sig-
nificantly, the FBI has also formally charged a re-
tired Major of the Pakistan army, Abdur Rehman
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Hashim Syed, for the plot against a Danish news-
paper that Headley wanted to attack for the publi-
cation of cartoons of Prophet Mohammad. Indian
officials said Rehman was closely linked to the ISI.
He has been arrested by Pakistan; if the charges
are upheld during the trial, it would be the first
smoking gun that the ISI is involved in exporting
terror.
US President Barack Obama, who un-
veiled his administration’s Af-Pak policy on De-
cember 2, 2009, ordered a surge of 30,000 US troops
in Afghanistan and a “transfer of forces out” to
begin in July, 2011.
The strategic and security communities are uneasy
over the President’s withdrawal plans. While The
Washington Post called it a “surge, then leave”
policy, security experts are of the view that with-
drawal decisions must be determined by the con-
ditions on the ground and not by arbitrary dead-
lines. “The Obama administration has no exit strat-
egy, it has only exit timeline,” said Republican
opponents.
As the speech clearly rejected the counter-insur-
gency principle of “clear, hold and build,” there
are fears that any setback would only invigorate
the jihadist cause and put untenable pressure on
Pakistan and India. But President Obama appears
to be keen on winding down the war when he
enters the political build up to the 2012 Presiden-
tial election.
In his address, President Obama described Pak-
Afghan border as the epicentre of the violent ex-
tremism practised by Al-Qaeda. “It is from here
that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here
that new attacks are being plotted as I speak. “The
people and governments of both Afghanistan and
Pakistan are endangered. And the stakes are even
higher within a nuclear-armed Pakistan, because
we know that Al Qaeda and other extremists seek
nuclear weapons, and we have every reason to
believe that they would use them.”
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
In his address, President Obama said the US will
deny Al Qaeda a safe haven and will reverse the
Taliban’s momentum and crush its ability to over-
throw the government. “We’re in Afghanistan to
prevent a cancer from once again spreading
through that country. But this same cancer has also
taken root in the border region of Pakistan. That’s
why we need a strategy that works on both sides
of the border,” he said justifying inclusion of Paki-
stan in his Afghan policy.
Stating that this was an international effort, Presi-
dent Obama sought the same war escalation mea-
sures from his allies. “Some have already provided
additional troops, and we are confident that there
will be further contributions in the days and weeks
ahead. Our friends have fought and bled and died
alongside us in Afghanistan. Now, we must come
together to end this war successfully. For what’s
at stake is not simply a test of NATO’s credibility;
what’s at stake is the security of our allies, and the
common security of the world,” he said.
On December 27, 2009, US Federal offi-
cials brought criminal charges against a Nigerian
man suspected of trying to destroy a Northwest
Airlines aircraft on December 25, 2009 as it ap-
proached the airport in Detroit, Michigan.
The US Department of Justice said that Umar
Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, had boarded the plane
in Amsterdam, Netherlands, and tried near the end
of the nine-hour-flight to set off an explosion us-
ing PETN, also known as pentaerythritol, a high
explosive.
Fellow passengers rushed to subdue the terror sus-
pect after they heard popping sounds and saw
smoke and fire coming from Abdulmutallab's seat.
Even though the US authorities are yet to confirm
the Yemen connection of the 23-year-old Nige-
rian man's plot to blow up a Detroit-bound air-
liner on Christmas Day, they see Umar Farouk
Abdulmutallab's account that Al-Qaida had sup-
plied explosive powder to him in Yemen "highly
plausible."
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
The suspect, reportedly, told US investigators that
he had obtained explosive chemicals and a syringe
that were sewn into his underwear from a bomb
expert in Yemen associated with Al-Qaida, as part
of a "mission to bring down a jet on US soil".
Britain has now emerged as the "terror
capital of the West" as whenever a major terrorist
attack is attempted, suspicion swings on this coun-
try, according to a media report.
“It comes as no surprise to learn that the Nigerian
accused of blowing up the US airliner is said to
have been living here. We have become the num-
ber one source of terrorism in the Western world.
We shelter foreign jihadis, and even grow our
own… For years now, Islamic extremists wanted
on terror charges in their own country have taken
sanctuary in Britain… Our judges (not our politi-
cians) say it would be cruel to send them back to
their own countries, in case they're tortured,” the
'News of the World' quoted the Editor of Spec-
tacle, Fraser Nelson, as saying.
"Londonistan".
India’s total external debt rose by 8.1%
to $242.8 billion at the end of September 2009,
from $224.6 billion at March-end 2009. The long-
term debt increased by 10.6% to $200.4 billion,
while short-term debt declined by 2.3% to $42.4
billion. Most of the increase in the debt ($8.3 bil-
lion or 45.6%) is due to depreciation of dollar
against major global currencies, out of total increase
of $18.2 billion.
East and South-East Asian countries have
decided to launch a $120-billion emergency fund
in March, 2010, the first such alliance in the re-
gion, to shield themselves from a financial crisis.
Under the scheme— known as the Chiang Mai
Initiative Multilateralization (CMIM)—Japan,
China, South Korea, Hong Kong and the 10 mem-
bers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
(ASEAN) can swap their own currency into US
dollars in case of a liquidity crunch.
India’s share in the global flow of FDI
almost doubled to 2.45% in 2008 compared to the
previous year, according to Union Commerce Min-
ister Anand Sharma. Among developing countries,
India ranked fourth in terms of FDI inflows in 2008
as per figures published in UNCTAD World In-
vestment Report (WIR) 2009. During 2008-09,
India attracted FDI inflows worth $35.17 billion.
Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was
founded by the G-7 countries in 1989 to develop
and promote national and international policies to
combat money laundering and terror financing.
The membership of the FATF is limited to 35 coun-
tries at present. India has an observer status. India
is a member of the Asia-Pacific Group, a FATF-
style regional body. Membership of FATF will al-
low India easy access to real-time information on
money laundering and terror financing and help
to raise the diplomatic pitch against perpetrators.
It will also make India more attractive in the eyes
of global investors.
Every third Indian is living below pov-
erty line, says an expert group headed by Suresh
Tendulkar, former chairman of PM’s Economic
Advisory Council. The report puts the incidence
of poverty in India at a high 37% of population, 10
percentage points more than estimated earlier.
Among the States, Orissa and Bihar are at the bot-
tom, while Nagaland, Delhi and J&K have the least
number of poor. As much as 41.8% of the rural
population survives on a monthly per-capita con-
sumption expenditure of Rs 447, spending only so
much on bare necessities such as food, fuel, light,
clothing and footwear. Among urban population,
25.7% are poor, who spend only Rs 578.8 on es-
sential needs. The expert group was set up follow-
ing criticism of the existing official estimates of
poverty released by the Planning Commission in
2007.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
History is being created inside a hangar
at Dubendorf Air Base (Switzerland) that will radi-
cally change the way an aircraft flies. The proto-
type of an aircraft, to be propelled entirely by so-
lar power even at night, has already been success-
fully tested for a ‘flea hop’ or a short flight at this
airbase.
Scientists and engineers are working full-steam to
fly the aircraft around the world for 36 hours
through day and night in the spring or summer of
2010.
Indian engineers and students have also shown a
keen interest in being part of this historic feat but
are yet to become part of the 70-member team
which is working on making the project a reality.
The aircraft, bearing call sign HB-SIA, has a weight
of only 1,600 kg but has a wingspan of 63 metre,
length of 21.85 metre and 6.4 metre height. Its
weight can be compared to a family car and the
engine power to a scooter’s. It generates power
from 11,628 photovoltaic solar cells spread over
the wings having a span of an Airbus A-340.
The aircraft is expected to be flown about 8,000
km each in five legs, having five stops in five con-
tinents. The stoppages would be in Europe, the US,
Pacific (probably Hawaii), the Emirates and China.
The idea is to take off an hour before sunrise, climb
to the maximum altitude of 8,000 metres and not
use energy stock in the battery. When the sun goes
down, the aircraft would go down to an altitude of
about 1,000 meters to use lesser energy.
The aircraft has been designed for short take-offs
and landings. Its Version-II, to be called HB-SIB,
would be built by 2013 to undertake a Trans-At-
lantic flight.
Bertrand Piccard is the force behind the project
and its test-pilot, which probably means taking
forward a family tradition of innovation and ad-
venture. His grandfather went in a balloon to the
stratosphere and his father reached the bottom of
the ocean in one of the first submarines
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The first four Russian-made MiG-29K
fighters to be deployed on the aircraft carrier INS
Vikramaditya, formerly the Admiral Gorshkov,
when it is inducted into the Indian Navy have been
received in a knocked-down condition and will
now be assembled in this country. The jets arrived
in the country on December 4, celebrated as Navy
Day.
The jets were purchased by the Navy as part of a
$1.5 billion deal signed with Russia in January 2004
for the Admiral Gorshkov. Of this $740 million
was meant for the aircraft and the balance for the
refitting of the carrier. Russians have now upped
the price to between $2.2 billion and $2.9 billion.
The Navy will eventually be getting 12 MiG-29K
single-seater aircraft and four MiG-29KUB twin-
seat trainer aircraft, some in flyaway condition.
The Navy has named its MiG-29K squadron the
Black Panthers. As the 45,000-tonne Kiev class air-
craft carrier is scheduled to be delivered by 2012,
the jets will undertake shore-based sorties from
Goa.
For 38 days, Reena Kaushal
Dharmshaktu, a mountaineer and outdoor instruc-
tor based in Delhi, along with seven other women
skied for eight to 10 hours a day, traversing a 915
km path through one of the coldest and most deso-
late regions of the world. At 11.09pm on Decem-
ber 30, 2009, Reena reached the trademark mir-
ror-ball in the middle of nowhere that marks the
geographic South Pole, becoming the first Indian
women to ski to the southern-most tip of the Earth.
She was part of the Kaspersky Commonwealth
Antarctic Expedition mounted to mark the 60th
anniversary of the Commonwealth.
For 38-year-old Reena, who had edged out 116
compatriots to get the right to represent India in
the expedition, it marked a unique achievement.
Her mountaineer husband, Love Raj Singh
Dharmshaktu, climbed Mt Everest in May 2009.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
“That is the highest point on Earth and I will be
skiing to South Pole, the lowest point on Earth,”
Reena had written in the expedition’s web-page.
It was an arduous journey through the incredibly
cold, all-white expanse of the continent, where the
team had to negotiate hundreds of metres deep
crevasses. The expedition left behind nothing in
the icy wilderness, even carrying back human
waste on 80 kg sledges that each member towed.
India will create a five million tonne stra-
tegic petroleum reserve by 2012, raising the
country’s total storage capacity to 8.5 million
tonnes—enough to meet 90-days consumption.
“To cater to situations like wars and natural ca-
lamities, we have established an SPV (special pur-
pose vehicle) called Indian Strategic Petroleum
Reserve Limited (ISPRL) that will create a storage
facility of five million tonnes by 2012,” according
to Minister of State for Petroleum Jitin Prasada.
ISPRL says it would create the storage facilities at
Visakhapatnam, Mangalore and Padur (near
Udupi). The proposed storages would be in under-
ground rock caverns near the east and west coasts
so that they are readily accessible to the refining
sector. Underground rock caverns are considered
the safest means of storing hydrocarbons.
On December 22, 2009, Reliance Indus-
tries (RIL) announced its third successive discov-
ery of natural gas in 2009. All three finds have been
in the Krishna-Godavari (KG) basin off India’s east-
ern coast.
The commercial potential of the discovery in the
block, known as KGD3, was being evaluated by
gathering more data, RIL said in a statement. RIL
holds a 90% equity stake in the block, which cov-
ers 3,288 square kilometres, and UK-based Hardy
Oil holds the rest.
Reena Kaushal Dharmshaktu, a moun-
taineer and outdoor instructor based in Delhi
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
reached the trademark mirror-ball in the middle
of nowhere that marks the geographic South Pole,
on December 30, 2009, becoming the first Indian
women to ski to the southern-most tip of the Earth.
She was part of the Kaspersky Commonwealth
Antarctic Expedition mounted to mark the 60th
anniversary of the Commonwealth.
38-year-old Reena did her mountaineering train-
ing from the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute
in Darjeeling and has been on IMF expeditions to
Gangotri 1, the first ascent of Argan Kangri, Fluted
Peak, Stock Kangri, Phawararang, Mt Nun and
others.
She is currently a freelance instructor with the US-
headquartered National Outdoor Leadership
Schools (NOLS) that teaches outdoor skills to
people. Her father was an Armyman and during
his posting in Darjeeling, Reena fell in love with
the mountains. “Being from an Army background,
we used to go for long walks with our father which
set the groundwork for my tilt towards mountain-
eering,” said Reena, who now wants to spread
awareness about conserving the environment.
The 77th birth anniversary of late
Dhirubhai Ambani, on December 28, 2009, was
chosen by Anil Dhirubhai Ambani group (ADAG)
to switch on its Rosa Power plant in Uttar Pradesh.
After synchronising with the State grid, it became
northern India’s first thermal power plant in the
private sector to do so.
The total capacity of the project, costing Rs 6,000
crore, is going to be 1,200 MW. The first unit of
300 MW would get fully operational by April 2010.
The second stage of 600 MW is likely to get opera-
tional by March 2012.
What makes the project significant for UP is that
900 MW would be supplied to the UP Power Cor-
poration Limited (UPPCL). The rest 300 MW
would be used as ‘merchant capacity’— company
can sell it to others.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Spreading over an area of around 1,500 acres, the
construction of the project started in June 2007.
The plant would take water from Garrah river
which flows nearby. Around 75 cubic metres of
water taken in would then be heated into steam to
turn turbines of over 250 tonnes at a pace of 3,000
rotations per minute in order to generate the req-
uisite power.
The sun virtually rose in the border belt
of Punjab with Union Minister for New and Re-
newable Energy Farooq Abdullah inaugurating
India’s first-ever 2-MW solar power plant at Awan,
near Amritsar, Punjab, on December 15, 2009.
The plant, set up by US company Azure Power in
the independent power producers (IPP) mode in
this sleepy village, started functioning as Dr
Abdullah switched on its button. The 2MW plant
will subsequently be expanded to enable it to pro-
duce 5 MW of power.
Scientists have identified all the changes
in cells of two cancers to produce the first entire
cancer gene maps, calling the findings a “transform-
ing moment” in their understanding of the disease.
The mapping of the complete genetic codes of
melanoma skin cancer and lung cancer will set the
stage for a medical revolution in which every tu-
mour can be targeted with personalized therapy.
The studies by international scientists and Britain’s
Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Cambridge are
the first comprehensive descriptions of tumour cell
mutations and lay bare all the genetic changes be-
hind the two cancers. Such a detailed picture of
the fundamental causes of the disease will lead to
earlier detection, new breeds of drugs and better
understanding of what causes the disease, scien-
tists claim.
The scientists sequenced entire DNA from both
tumour tissue and normal tissue from a melanoma
patient and a lung cancer patient, using a technol-
ogy called massively parallel sequencing. By com-
paring the cancer sequences with the healthy ones,
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
they were able to pick up all changes specific to
cancer.
The lung tumour carried more than 23,000 muta-
tions and the melanoma had more than 33,000. A
smoker develops one mutation for every 15 ciga-
rettes smoked.
Scientists now have to track specific mutations that
lead to cancer. This would help in producing drugs
to suppress these mutations. By about 2020, can-
cer patients could have their tumours analysed to
find the genetic defects that drive them.
· The tiny tea tablet developed by scientists in
Tocklai Experimental Station (TES) of the Tea Re-
search Association (TRA), located amid lush green
tea gardens in Jorhat in Upper Assam, may soon
become an alternative for the age-old tea bag, a
favourite with tea drinkers all over the world.
Tea tablets can be chewed or added to a cup of hot
water for a cup of tea. Chewing a tablet will freshen
and cheer up a person with nearly the same effect
as having a hot cup of brewed tea.
The tea pill is one of the innovations of the TES in
Jorhat, the oldest and the largest research station
of its kind in the world. Since its inception in 1911,
TES has become synonymous with the research
on its scientists have developed many technolo-
gies for boosting the tea production, especially in
the North-east India.
Some of major contributions of the TES to the tea
industry include technique for vegetative propa-
gation of tea by inter-nodal cuttings, development
of 30 high-yielding and better quality clones and
l4 hybrid seeds, selecting 154 region specific clones.
TES also takes up collaborative projects with some
leading research institutes of the country, which
include making tea manufacture a continuous pro-
cess by an integrated monitoring system, studies
on the pharmacological, physiological and medici-
nal values of tea, tissue culture.
· European researchers have drawn up the first
full map of the Earth gravity field on the basis of
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
information supplied by the GOCE probe of the
European Space Agency (ESA). The research ve-
hicle was launched from Russia's Plesetsk space-
port in March 2009 with a Rokot rocket.
The map confirmed earlier hypothesis that the
gravity force is not constant throughout the plane
due to geological and other peculiarities. For in-
stance, St Petersburg is the area with largest grav-
ity in the European part of Russia.
A team of scientists of the CSIR have
declared success in decoding the genome sequenc-
ing of an Indian citizen, a move that opens vistas
for low-cost health care and predictive medicine
for the masses.
The sequencing of the genome puts India in a se-
lect group of countries, including the USA, the UK,
Canada, Korea and China, which have demon-
strated such capability.
The Indian genome sequence, achieved in about
nine weeks, was among sequences of 14 persons
available worldwide. The first genome sequencing
was a global effort achieved by several scientists
across the world over a period of 13 years, begin-
ning in 1990.
The sequencing opens up vistas for accurate treat-
ment of individuals or a group of population whose
genome has been mapped.
Scientists at the CSIR could achieve this feat by
adopting new technology and by effectively inte-
grating complex computational and bio-informatics
tools with high throughput analytical capability
using super-computers.
Russia is considering sending a space-
craft to a large asteroid, Apophis, to knock it off its
path and prevent a possible collision with Earth.
When the 270-m asteroid was discovered in 2004,
astronomers estimated the chances of it smashing
into Earth in its first flyby in 2029 were as high as
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
1-in-37, but have since lowered their estimate.
Further studies ruled out the possibility of an im-
pact in 2029, when the asteroid is expected to come
no closer than 29,450 kilometers above Earth’s sur-
face, but they indicated a small possibility of a hit
on subsequent encounters. According to NASA,
another close encounter in 2068 will involve a 1-
in-330,000 chance of impact.
Calculations show that it’s possible to create a spe-
cial purpose spacecraft within the time on hand,
which would help avoid the collision without de-
stroying the asteroid and without detonating any
nuclear charges.
· US astronomers have detected the second
smallest exo-planet ever discovered with a mass
just four times heavier than the Earth, adding to a
growing number of low-mass planets dubbed “su-
per-Earths.”
The exo-planet, a name given to planets outside
our solar system, has been dubbed HD156668b, and
is located around 80 light years from Earth in the
direction of the Hercules constellation. A light year
is rough 9,460 billion kilometres.
The planet orbits around its parent star in just over
four days.
The smallest exo-planet previously discovered by
astronomers was Gliese 581 e, detected by a Swiss
astronomer in April 2009 some 20.5 light years
from Earth in the Balance constellation. But it or-
bits much closer to its star, making its tempera-
ture much higher than that on Earth.
Some 423 exo-planets have been identified by as-
tronomers so far, according to specialist site
exoplanet.eu, but none appear to be similar to Earth
or capable of supporting life.
However, astronomers generally express confi-
dence that either the Kepler telescope or the Eu-
ropean Corot telescope will eventually find exo-
planets like Earth.
56
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Astronomers have discovered one of the
fieriest stars in the galaxy which is 35 times hotter
than the sun. The dying star which has a surface
temperature of 200,000 degrees was captured by
astronomers at Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophys-
ics in the University of Manchester by using the
recently refurbished Hubble Space Telescope
(HST).
The star was located at centre of the Bug Nebula
which is about 3,500 light years away in the con-
stellation Scorpius. This is the first time the star
has been pictured.
“This star was so hard to find because it is hidden
behind a cloud of dust and ice in the middle of the
nebula,” explained Prof Albert Zijlstra from the
University of Manchester.
Imagine zipping between Mumbai and
Delhi in four hours flat on a superfast train. Well,
Indians may have to dream about it for a long time
to come but China, on December 26, 2009,
launched what it described as the world’s fastest
train, one that can travel at an average speed of
350 kph.
On its inaugural run, the train covered the 1,068
km between Wuhan in central China and
Guangzhou in the south in two hours 45 minutes.
By comparison, the average for high-speed trains
in Japan is 243 kph while in France it is 277 kph.
The high speed line will use technology developed
in co-operation with companies such as Siemens,
Bombardier and Alstom.
China’s new rail service is expected to act as a cata-
lyst in the development of central parts of the coun-
try by linking it to highly developed industrial hubs
in the south.
The Chinese government has also announced plans
to build 42 high-speed lines by 2012 in order to
spur economic growth amid the global downturn.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The goal is to take the rail network from the cur-
rent 86,000 km to 120,000 km.
Indian citizens can now fly the national
flag even at night, provided the flagpole is above
100 feet and the flag is well-illuminated. The
Home Ministry took the decision following a pro-
posal by industrialist and Congress MP Naveen
Jindal, who had earlier won a court battle to make
flying the Tricolour a fundamental right for every
citizen.
In a representation to the Ministry in June 2009,
Jindal had sought permission to fly a mammoth-
sized national flag on huge flagpoles at night. Jindal
had said the national flag is to be flown “as far as
possible between sunrise and sunset” as per Flag
Code of India, but it was a common practice world-
wide for massive national flags to be flown day and
night on flagpoles of 100 feet and above in height.
Citing the example of countries like Malaysia,
Jordon, Abu Dhabi, North Korea, Brazil, Mexico
and Turkmenistan where monumental flags are
flown at night, Jindal proposed that such flags to
be flown in India also.
The Ministry said that such flagpoles could be in-
stalled, provided there was adequate arrangement
for proper illumination of flags at night with
backup in case of power failure and the flags are
replaced immediately as soon as they get damaged
due to vagaries of nature.
Scientists, on December 9, 2009, unveiled
a Dow Jones-style “climate-change index” aimed
at showing in user-friendly form the perils posed
by man-made global warming. The index takes a
basket of complex factors—carbon dioxide (CO2),
temperature change, sea level and sea ice—and
distils them into a single figure that is more easily
understandable for the public, they said.
In 1980, the index stood at 34, its creators, the In-
ternational Geosphere-Biosphere Programme at
the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, said.
57
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)

But from 1997, the barometer leapt suddenly, add-

ing dozens of points each year as evidence of cli-
mate change accumulated. As of 2007, the index
stood at 574.

S.C. Sinha has been appointed Director-

General of the National Investigation Agency. He
succeeds the first chief of the agency, Radha Vinod
Raju, whose tenure ended last month.
· Bhairavi Jani has taken over as National Chair-
man of CII’s Young Indians (Yi) for 2010-11.
Bhairavi Jani, Director, SCA Group of Companies,
and Executive Director, TranSmart, is a fourth gen-
eration entrepreneur. Shankar Vanavarayar has
taken over as National Vice Chairman of Yi.

Actor Aamir Khan withdrew his resig-

nation from the copyright committee, set up by
Minister for Human Resource Development Kapil
Sibal to bridge differences between film producers
and creative personnel over the proposed amend-
ments to the copyright law.

In his communication to Mr. Sibal, Mr. Khan said

he would return to the committee in view of the
Minister’s intervention and the reiteration of faith
in him by other committee members.

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58
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Physicists smashed sub-
atomic particles into each
other with record energy, cre-
ating thousands of mini-Big
Bangs like the primeval explo-
sion that gave birth to the uni-
verse 13.7 billion years ago.
Scientists and engineers in control rooms across
the sprawling European Centre for Nuclear Re-
search (CERN) near Geneva burst into applause as
the $9.4 billion project to probe the origins of the
cosmos scored its first big success.
"This opens the door to a totally new era of dis-
covery," said CERN's director of research Sergio
Bertolucci. "It is a step into the unknown where
we will find things we thought were there and
perhaps things we didn't know existed."
"It just shows what we can do in pushing knowl-
edge forward on where we came from, how the
early universe evolved," CERN Director-General
Rolf Heuer said, speaking, like Bertolucci, on a
video relay from Tokyo.
Colourful images of the collisions, at the centre of
the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) project which
will continue for over a decade, were flashed onto
screens across CERN.
CERN scientists say the images reflect what hap-
pened a fraction of a second after the Big Bang as
matter and energy was spewed out, leading to the
formation of galaxies stars and planets, and even-
tually the appearance of life.
Over the coming months and years some 10,000
researchers in laboratories around the globe, as well
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
as at CERN, will analyse the huge volumes of data
that will be produced from billions of LHC par-
ticle collisions to see how that happened.
Among stuff of the universe they hope to track
down are invisible dark material making up 25
percent of the cosmos, a particle dubbed the Higgs
boson that gives mass to matter, and perhaps new
dimensions to add to the four already known.
Soon after 1100 GMT on Tuesday, and after two
efforts earlier in the day were aborted due to tech-
nical glitches, the LHC slammed beams of particles
together at a collision energy of 7 TeV, or 7 mil-
lion million electron volts.
This was three and a half times more than ever
achieved in a particle accelerator. The particle
beams were travelling at a fraction under the speed
of light when they hit each other in a tunnel 100
metres (330 feet) under the Swiss-French border.
Oliver Buchmueller, a German physicist on the
project, said hard information on what the many
billions of collisions over the coming years reveal
would emerge only slowly.
"But by the end of 2010 we think we will find evi-
dence of dark material," he added. The Higgs bo-
son was likely to prove more elusive, and perhaps
appear only after 2013, when the collider is boosted
to collision energy of 14 TeV.
The boson is named after Scottish physicist Peter
Higgs, who proposed it three decades ago to ex-
plain how the disparate matter produced by the
Big Bang was converted to mass.
The earlier delays were due to problems with the
power supply and an over-sensitive magnet safety
31
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
system. This led the physicists to suspend the mega-
power particle collisions.
CERN officials insisted it was not a repeat of a major
incident in September 2008 that seriously damaged
parts of the LHC and delayed the full launch of
the project until now.
They also dismissed suggestions from some out-
side scientists -- echoed by doomsday theorists --
that the fleeting mini-black holes that the project
is likely to produce could sooner or later swallow
up the Earth.
Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh on March 01, 2010 con-
cluded a historic three-day visit to
Saudi Arabia during which 10 bi-
lateral agreements were signed
and the Riyadh Declaration was
issued to strengthen ties between
India and the influential oil-rich nation.
In a rare honour accorded to a foreign dignitary,
Singh was invited to address the Majlis-ash-Shura,
the Saudi parliament, where he not only sought
investments from the Islamic kingdom but also
pressed the need for Pakistan to "act decisively
against terrorism". He said that India would grow
at the rate of 9 to 10 percent for the next 25 years.
Manmohan Singh said the challenge of terrorism
was immense in Afghanistan, where a Taliban sui-
cide attack Friday in Kabul left 17 people dead,
including nine Indians.
The prime minister visited the King Saud Univer-
sity where an honorary doctorate was conferred
on Manmohan Singh, an economist turned politi-
cian. The prime minister left the Saudi capital for
home after attending a function at the Indian em-
bassy where he met representatives of the 1.8 mil-
lion Indian expatriate community.
This was the first Saudi visit by an Indian prime
minister after Indira Gandhi's in 1982, was aimed
at forging a strategic relationship with Saudi
Arabia.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The prime minister and Saudi King Abdullah Bin
Abdul Aziz signed the 'Riyadh Declaration - A New
Era of Strategic Partnership' to put their seal on
steadily growing ties. This is expected to cover se-
curity, economy, defence, technology and politi-
cal areas as well as ways to combat terrorism.
Bharti Airtel clinched a deal
to buy most of the African op-
erations of Kuwait's Zain for $9
billion, making it the No.2 cel-
lular firm on the African con-
tinent and setting India's biggest carrier a tough
financial and management challenge.
The two companies, which entered exclusive talks
in mid-February, signed a legally binding defini-
tive agreement in Amsterdam, where Zain's Af-
rica subsidiary is based, Bharti said in a statement.
Bharti said the acquisition -- the second biggest
overseas purchase by an Indian company after Tata
Steel's $13 billion purchase of Corus in 2007 --
would make it the world's fifth-largest wireless
company with operations across 18 countries and
with a total customer base of about 179 million.
Zain said in a separate statement that it intended
to distribute a large proportion of the upfront net
proceeds from the deal to shareholders in the form
of dividends, subject to approval and the repay-
ment of its $4 billion revolving credit facility.
The transaction allows Zain to focus on its highly
cash generative operations in the Middle East and
to substantially improve its balance sheet.
Bharti, which is 32 percent owned by Singapore
Telecommunications, selected Zain as its second
choice for building a major presence in Africa af-
ter it twice failed to finalise tie-ups with South
Africa's MTN, the continent's biggest operator.
The Indian company is facing ferocious competi-
tion at home and betting that the opportunities in
Africa are worth the risks of operating there and is
paying what many regard as a full price, at 10 times
enterprise value to earnings before interest, tax,
depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) as a cost
of entry.
32
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
The deal will give Bharti 42 million subscribers in
15 African countries, but still needs regulatory
clearances.
In a sign of the challenges Bharti may face, the
government of the small central African nation of
Gabon on Monday weighed in against the deal,
saying Zain Gabon had not complied with regula-
tions and that it reserved the right to take "all nec-
essary measures".
South Africa-based Econet Wireless Holdings,
which owns 5 percent of Zain's Nigerian assets, is
seeking to overturn a 2006 deal by Zain -- then
called Celltel -- in which it bought a majority stake
in Nigerian mobile operator Vee Networks Ltd,
now called Zain Nigeria.
The Supreme Court has
ruled that a citizen has no
fundamental right to en-
gage in the sale of liquor as
government alone has the
right to regulate the busi-
ness in public interest.
A bench of Justices R V Raveendran and Surinder
Singh Nijjar said the government also has the right
to consider grant of licenses as per the rules in force
and not at the time when the applications are made
for running the business.
"Having regard to the fact that the state has exclu-
sive privilege to manufacture and sale of liquor and
no citizen has a fundamental right to carry on trade
or business in liquor, the applicant did not have a
vested right to get a license.
The apex court passed the order while dismissing
a bunch of appeals filed by resort and hotel own-
ers in Kerala challenging the state government's
decision not to grant them licenses for sale of li-
quor.
The state had refused to grant the licenses as the
applicants did not conform to the stipulations of at
least being a two-star hotels as per the tourism
policy evolved by the government.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
BSNL on 27 Feb, 2010
commercially launched the
country's first mobile broad-
band fourth generation
Internet access network--
Mobile WiMAX in Kerala. Union minister of state
for Agriculture and Consumer Affairs K V Tho-
mas, launched the facility. BSNL is also the first
operator in the country to launch the service, for
which technology has been provided by AVIAT,
formerly Harris Stratex.
WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability for Micro-
wave Access) technology, can provide a speed of
up to 37 mbps. It is being deployed in Kerala with
900 BTS (Base Transmitting Stations) to cover the
entire state. In the first phase, 450 BTS would be
set up to cover all major cities, district headquar-
ters and important towns at a project cost of about
Rs 100 crore.
In the second phase, another 450 BTS would be
commissioned to cover the remaining towns. The
technology will provide access to broadband at a
cost performance ratio that is far better than any
other technology. It provides features like high
speed broad band connectivity anywhere, anytime
for devices like Desktop, Laptop on wireless.
It has two tariff plans - Home Plan with a fixed
monthly charge of Rs 999 while the Business plan
is Rs 1,999 for a band width 512 to 2 mbps.
Faced with vehement protests by farmer groups
and the green lobby, as also some States, the Union
government has decided to freeze the introduc-
tion of Bt Brinjal in the country till independent
scientific studies established health and environ-
ment safety of the product to the satisfaction of
both public and experts.
Although India’s biotechnology regulator, the Ge-
netic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC),
has cleared Bt brinjal for regular agriculture pur-
poses, the detractors say that the variety may have
passed the yield test and the pest-resistance analy-
33
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
sis, but its edibility is yet to be confirmed.
Three major brinjal producing States, West Ben-
gal, Bihar and Orissa, which account for nearly 60
per cent of the produce, have also refused to en-
dorse the product. The governments of Madhya
Pradesh and Chhattisgarh also specified that they
would not have Bt Brinjal in their States.
The variety has been developed by Maharashtra
Hybrid Seeds. It has been created by inserting gene
from the soil bacterium bacillus thuringiensis into
brinjal, which is said to give the plant resistance
against insect pests.
On april 1, 2010
India has reached
a historic mile-
stone in country's
struggle for
children's right to education. The Constitution
(86th Amendment) Act, 2002, making elementary
education a Fundamental Right, and its consequen-
tial legislation, the Right of Children to Free and
Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, comes into
force. The enforcement of this right represents a
momentous step forward in 100-year struggle for
universalising elementary education.
Over the years, the demand for children's educa-
tion has grown by leaps and bounds everybody,
from the poorest of the poor to the well off, ac-
knowledges the value of education in the overall
development of children. For many years now, the
discourse on elementary education has been con-
ducted at many levels. Administrators focus on
enrolment, availability of schools within walking
distance, provisioning for infrastructure, and de-
ployment of teachers. Educationists are concerned
about whether and how children learn, and the
burden of the syllabi, which is passed on to tuition
centres or parents.
Development professionals discuss the impact of
the number of years of schooling, for example, on
the age of marriage and family size. Economists
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
talk about the economic returns on investment in
education. Parents too have expectations from the
education system that it should equip their chil-
dren for gainful employment and economic well-
being. The enforcement of the Fundamental Right
to Education provides us a unique opportunity to
mount a mission encompassing all the above dis-
courses, to fulfil our goal of universal elementary
education.
There is a shift in RBI’s mon-
etary policy stance to managing
the revival of the economy from
managing the crisis. In its re-
view on January 29, 2010, the
central bank has accepted a
7.5% growth with 8.5% inflation.
RBI is worried about the high inflation rate but its
governor D. Subbarao pointed out that it is mainly
on account of supply side constraints. The condi-
tion could further deteriorate. "With growth ac-
celerating in the second half of 2009-10 and ex-
pected to gain momentum over the next year, ca-
pacity constraints could potentially reinforce sup-
ply side inflationary pressure," the review docu-
ment said.
Therefore, the Reserve Bank's new shift in the
policy stance from managing the risk to managing
the recovery made it to take a relatively milder
action to increase the cash reserve ratio by 0.75
percentage point to take out Rs 36,000 crore from
the system. Besides that, it did not take any harsh
measure.
On the food inflation front, the central bank pinned
its hope on good rabi crop and good monsoon in
2010. Assuming a normal monsoon, it expected
inflation to moderate from July 2010 onward.
At the same time, RBI expressed its worry over
the industrial growth, as it is not broad based, and
underlined the need for consolidating it. The RBI's
document on macro-economic development
showed that while industries like food products,
34
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
beverages, tobacco and related products showed a
negative growth, industries like basic metals & al-
loys and paper & paper products were still decel-
erating. On the other hand, the RBI document
showed industries like transport equipment, rub-
ber, petroleum, textile products and a host of other
industries were growing.
The Minister of External
Affairs of India, H.E. Mr. S.M.
Krishna paid an official visit
to Nepal from January 15 – 17,
2010 at the invitation of
Hon’ble Ms. Sujata Koirala,
Deputy Prime Minister and
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Nepal.
During his visit, the Minister of External Affairs
of India called on Rt. Hon. Dr. Ram Baran Yadav,
President of Nepal and Rt. Hon’ble Mr. Madhav
Kumar Nepal, Prime Minister of Nepal. He con-
veyed to them the greetings of the Indian leader-
ship and reiterated that India attaches the highest
priority to its relations with Nepal. The Minister
of External Affairs said that a warm welcome awaits
the President of Nepal during his forthcoming State
Visit to India. The Prime Minister of Nepal ex-
pressed his deep appreciation for India’s consistent
support and assistance to Nepal and at the progress
made on the decisions taken during his visit to In-
dia in August 2009. He reiterated his invitation to
the Prime Minister of India to visit Nepal at an
early date.
The Minister of External Affairs of India called on
Rt. Hon’ble Mr. Subas Chandra Nembang, Chair-
man of the Constituent Assembly and held an in-
teractive discussion with Parliamentarians repre-
senting the different political parties in the Con-
stituent Assembly. He also met senior political lead-
ers representing various political parties of Nepal.
During his visit the Minister of External Affairs of
India held official talks with the Deputy Prime
Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs of Nepal
on all aspects of bilateral relations and issues of
mutual interest. The Deputy Prime Minister and
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Nepal hosted a ban-
quet in honour of the Minister of External Affairs
of India.
Agriculture sector in India
continues to suffer, save for
sharp growth in some years.
The expert group to review
the methodology for estima-
tion of poverty, chaired by
Suresh Tendulkar, has now
suggested that the poverty ratio at the all India
level was actually 37.2% in 2004-05.
Rural poverty was projected at 41.8% and urban
at 25.7% by the committee, as against official esti-
mates of 28.3% and 25.7% for rural and urban
population, respectively.
In the past, the poverty line was defined in terms
of per capita consumer expenditure at 1973-74
market prices and adjusted over time and across
States for changes in prices keeping unchanged the
original 1973-74 reference poverty line baskets of
goods and services. The all-India rural and urban
poverty line baskets were derived separately, as-
suming per capita daily calorie intake of 2,400 for
rural people and 2,100 for urban population.
The Tendulkar panel has made four major depar-
tures from the past practices. It moved away from
the calorie intake criteria for determining poverty
line. Instead, it tests for adequacy of actual food
expenditure near the poverty line to ensure aggre-
gate nutrition, rather than just calories.
Two, it has recommended adoption of uniform PLB
for the urban and rural population, breaking away
from the past practice of two separate baskets. This
has been done to get rid of the problem of out-
dated PLB, a major criticism of the existing pov-
erty line.
Three, it has suggested a new price adjustment
procedure based in the same data set as the one
used for poverty estimation, rejecting the earlier
35
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
practice of using price indices that are generated
externally, specific to population segments and
were outdated.
And four, it incorporates explicit provision in the
price expenditure on health and education, which
in any case has been rising. The official poverty
estimate, in contrast, assumes basic health care and
education services would be provided by the State,
and although the 1973-74 base takes note of the
private expenditure on these items, it does not take
into account the increase in the proportion for to-
tal expenditure over the years.
The Tendulkar panel has also recommended that
365-day mixed reference period be used to collect
data instead of the past practice of using 30-day
uniform reference period. The advantage of using
MRP is that data integrity is better when respon-
dents are asked about their expenditure in the 365
days prior to the survey, particularly on items of
low frequency consumption such as clothes, foot-
wear and durables, than when they are questioned
on expenditure on the preceding 30 days.
The Union government has ap-
proved the Nutrient Based Fertiliser
Subsidy (NBS) plan with effect from
April 1, 2010. This is likely to have
positive sentimental impact on share
prices of fertiliser companies. Under
the new policy, the companies can
fix retail fertiliser prices. However the urea prices
will be increased by Rs 483 per tonne or 10 per
cent.
“The hike in urea prices is not going to impact the
bottom-line or EPS of fertiliser companies as extra
10 per cent will go from farmer’s pocket directly.
However, looking at the shift in policy, it’s a big
positive for the industry,” said an analyst.
Fertilisers are sold at government-fixed prices,
which are lower than their costs of production or
import. The difference is met through subsidy. The
NBS does away with maximum retail price. It pro-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
poses to replace the current system of giving sub-
sidy to the industry with direct assistance to farm-
ers.
Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh launched India’s Solar
Energy Mission (named
Jawaharlal Nehru National
Solar Mission) on January 11,
2010. The main aim of the
mission is to help generate 20,000 MW of solar
power by 2022.
The Prime Minister urged the industry to create
‘Solar Valleys’ on the lines of Silicon Valleys and
asked business houses to view the Solar Energy
Mission as a business opportunity. He added that
the success of the mission had the potential of
transforming India’s energy prospects while con-
tributing to national and global efforts to combat
climate change.
The solar mission assumes important because it
holds the centre-stage of the country’s activities
to combat climate change. The mission is an im-
portant part of the country’s National Action Plan
on Climate Change and is trying to establish the
country as a global leader in solar energy, not just
in terms of solar power generation but also in solar
manufacturing and generation of this technology.
The mission targets 1,100 MW grid solar power, 7
million sq meter solar collectors and 200 MW off
grid solar applications in first phase by 2013, and
20,000 MW grid solar power, 20 million sq m solar
collectors and 2,000 MW off grid solar applications
by the year 2022.
The Union government has chosen 19 States to
start adult literacy classes under the all-new
Sakshar Bharat Mission, which the Prime Minis-
ter launched in September 2009.
The mission, with a whopping budgetary support
of $1 billion, seeks to educate 70 million illiterates
by 2012; 60 million being women. Its first phase
36
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
began on January 15, 2010 in 167 districts of 19
States, which have, in the past, displayed commit-
ment to adult literacy.
The selected States are the ones that continued to
stress adult literacy even after the old National Lit-
eracy Mission (NLM) was disbanded. Some States
like Punjab and Himachal neglected the sector,
with none having any ongoing adult literacy com-
ponent or programme.
The mission aims to achieve 100 per cent literacy
in 365 low literacy districts where adult female
literacy rate is 50 per cent less as per the 2001 cen-
sus. The final goal, however, is to take national
literacy level from 64 per cent to 80 per cent by
2017, and reduce the gender gap from 21 to 10 per
cent. In the first phase, Rajasthan has clinched the
maximum number of projects for 31 districts. Close
behind is Uttar Pradesh with projects for 26 dis-
tricts, Andhra Pradesh 18, Gujarat 13 and
Uttarakhand five.
The focus will be on learning beyond reading, writ-
ing and arithmetic to include life skills and em-
ployment as part of adult literacy. The idea is to
retain learners and not lose them to lack of post-
literacy avenues.
Another thing that sets the Sakshar Bharat Mis-
sion apart from the NLM is its complete owner-
ship with the Gram Panchayat. The past
programme was controlled by districts, which used
to get certificates for compliance. Now the
programme will be run and monitored by
Panchayats and learners will be the king.
With over 40 per cent of people in
India still living on less than $1.25
(around Rs 60) a day, India now stands
third in terms of the highest propor-
tion of extremely poor people in South Asia, next
only to Nepal and Bangladesh, with correspond-
ing percentages at 54.7 and 50.5, respectively. The
latest UN Report on the World Social Situation
2010, places India below Pakistan, Myanmar and
Sri Lanka in terms of extreme poverty. Pakistan is
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
the only nation in the sector to have achieved the
Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of cutting
poverty by half between 1990 and 2015. It had 73
per cent of the people in ‘extreme poverty’ 15 years
ago; it now has 22.6 per cent as against its MDG
target of 29.3 per cent.
India is lagging on the front, and must have an
annual poverty reduction rate of 4.7 per cent (be-
tween 2005 and 2015) against 1.4 between 1990
and 2005 if it wants to meet the MDG target of 27
per cent; so far it has touched only 41.6 per cent.
Rural India has 43.8 per cent of the people in ex-
treme poverty as against 36.2 per cent in urban
areas.
This underlines the need for inclusive growth in
India, as stated by the UN report, which credits
China, and to some extent India, for reduced glo-
bal poverty in the past two decades when the num-
ber of people living on less than $1.25 a day came
down from 1.9 billion to 1.4 billion.
The HRD Ministry has de-
cided to de-recognize as many
as 44 "Deemed Universities",
spelling uncertainty for
nearly two lakh students who
are enrolled with them. The Ministry's decision
amounts to an acknowledgement of irregularities
in conferring the "deemed" tag to these institutions
under the first UPA government in which Arjun
Singh was the HRD minister.
These deemed Universities were found deficient
on many grounds—ranging from lack of infrastruc-
ture to lack of evidence of expertise in disciplines
they claim to specialize in.
The HRD Ministry emphasized that the affected
students would be taken care of. The Ministry's
task force has recommended that institutions not
found fit for deemed University status "revert to
status quo ante as an affiliated college of the State
University of jurisdiction so that students would
be able to complete their ongoing courses and ob-
tain degree from the affiliating University." Simi-
37
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
larly, medical and dental colleges not found suit-
able can affiliate to State University or State medi-
cal University.
In case, the institution is unable to obtain affilia-
tion, efforts would be made to facilitate the mi-
gration/re-enrolment of the affected students in
other institutions. Doctoral students will have to
re-register in affiliating Universities and those in
distance education should either go to IGNOU or
State open Universities. While these safeguards
have been recommended, the students are none-
theless likely to go through a phase of uncertainty
as they move from one University to another.
Tamil Nadu has the distinction of having 16 of the
44 de-recognized deemed Universities, 15 of them
private and one government-sponsored.
Karnataka has six de-recognized deemed Univer-
sities; Uttar Pradesh four; Haryana, Uttarakhand,
Rajasthan and Maharashtra three each; Gujarat,
Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Bihar, one each.
The three government-run institutions to be de-
recognized are: Nava Nalanda Mahavira in Bihar,
Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Devel-
opment, Tamil Nadu, and National Museum Insti-
tute of the History of Art, Conservation and Musi-
cology, New Delhi.
The Union government has
approved the setting up of a
National Knowledge Network
(NKN) that will connect all
major educational institutions
like the IITs, the IIMs and top universities for ex-
change of information and research.
One of the important recommendations of the
National Knowledge Commission (NKC) is to in-
ter-connect all knowledge institutions through
high speed data communication network. This
would encourage sharing of knowledge, specialised
resources and collaborative research. The
government’s decision to set up such a network
was announced in 2008-09 and an initial amount
of Rs.100 crore was allocated to the Department
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
of Information Technology, Ministry of Commu-
nications and IT for this.
The architecture of the NKN will be scalable and
the network will consist of an ultra-high speed core
(multiples of 10Gbps and upwards) to provide a
nationwide ultra high-speed data-network high-
way. The IT mesh will connect around 1,500 in-
stitutions and the setting up of core network is
expected to be completed in a span of two years.
The network will enable scientists, researches and
students from diverse spheres across the country
to work together for advancing human develop-
ment in critical and emerging areas.
Health, education, grid computing, agriculture and
e-governance are the main applications identified
for implementation and delivery on NKN.
On January 30, 2010, the Union government
approved model rules for the Right to Education
Act 2009, which requires State governments to
make free and compulsory elementary education
a right of every child between 6 and 14 years of
age.
The model rules, list priorities for States, which
would have to conform to the standards under the
Act within three years of its commencement; non-
conformation could bring de-recognition. The Act,
passed by the Parliament in August 2009, is yet to
be officially notified though.
To begin with, the rules ask school management
committees or the local authorities to identify chil-
dren, who have never been to school or not man-
aged to complete elementary education, and ar-
range for their special training in appropriate classes
so that they can ultimately be integrated into the
system. Any child above 6 years of age will be en-
titled to free special training either at school or
residential facility, before he/she is ready to enter
school at a convenient level. Such children would
be allowed to complete elementary education even
after they have attained 14 years, for the obvious
reasons that they enter the school late.
38
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
At least one primary school (class I to V) must be
located within a km of walking distance of the
neighbourhood; for schools with classes VI to VIII,
this distance would be three km. States need to
provide more neighbourhood schools in highly
populated areas and ensure safety of students in
areas with tough terrains.
But before a school comes up, the States would
have to undertake a mapping to identify all chil-
dren in remote areas, including those from disad-
vantaged groups. This must be done in a year and
the data updated every year.
For the first time, the law mandates maintenance
of records of all children from birth to 14 years of
age through a household survey to be updated ev-
ery year. The rules further prescribe strict norms
for non-segregation of students and safe transport
for disabled children to ensure that they attend
school.
Also, there is flexibility on birth certificate for ad-
mission. If formal birth record is not available, an
affidavit would suffice, so would a hospital/ANM
or anganwari record.
Adequate qualification for teachers has been
stressed upon, with the academic authority (to be
set up under the Act) to enlist the qualifications
for teachers, who would get five years to upgrade
their skills. An important part of the rules pertains
to specifications on recognition of elementary level
schools. The Act will, for the first time, mandates
recognition of such schools within three years of
the commencement.
On January 30, 2010, India sub-
mitted its proposed emission in-
tensity cut targets by 20-25 per
cent by 2020 to the UN, a day be-
fore the world body’s January 31 deadline for sub-
mitting the climate change mitigation steps under
the Copenhagen Accord.
However, it made it clear to the Secretariat of the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Change (UNFCCC) that all its domestic mitigation
actions were entirely voluntary in nature and not
legally binding, a position India had maintained at
Copenhagen Summit in Denmark.
Though agriculture sector contributes around 14
per cent of the total GHG emissions, India has kept
it out of the purview of the mitigations actions in
its blueprint submitted to the UN to ensure food
security.
In an unusual display of checks and balances
within the judiciary, the Delhi High Court, on
January 12, 2010, rejected the contention of the
Supreme Court that the office of the Chief Justice
of India was beyond the ambit of the Right to In-
formation Act.
A full bench of the High Court, comprising Chief
Justice A.P. Shah, Justice Vikramjit Sen and Jus-
tice S. Muralidhar, unanimously dispelled the fear
raised by the apex court that the extension of RTI
to the CJI’s office would undermine judicial inde-
pendence.
Referring to a resolution adopted by Supreme Court
judges in 1997, a resolution adopted by a confer-
ence of Chief Justices in 1999 and the UN-spon-
sored 2001 Bangalore principles of judicial conduct,
the HC said, ‘‘Well defined and publicly known
standards and procedures complement, rather than
diminish, the notion of judicial independence.’’
The HC verdict came in the context of the pro-
longed controversy over whether the declarations
of assets made by judges should be put in the pub-
lic domain.
In a significant ruling,
a three-judge bench of
the Bombay High Court
has held that in India
criticism of any religion—
be it Islam, Hinduism, Christianity or any other—
is permissible under the fundamental right to free-
dom of speech and that a book cannot be banned
on those grounds alone.
39
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
However, the criticism must be bona fide or aca-
demic, said the Court, as it upheld a ban issued in
2007 by the Maharashtra government on a book
titled “Islam—A Concept of Political World Inva-
sion by Muslims.” The book contained an “aggra-
vated form of criticism made with a malicious and
deliberate intention” to outrage the feelings of
Muslims, the Court said.
Delivering the landmark verdict, the Court upheld
the State’s ban on a book but at the same time
brought joy to civil rights activists when it held
that, “in our country, everything is open to criti-
cism and religion is no exception. Freedom of ex-
pression covers criticism of religion and no person
can be sensitive about it.”
The Court also found “totally unacceptable” the
author’s argument that banning the book in the
age of the internet is passe and pointless.
The Union government has noti-
fied the rules to operationalise the
India-ASEAN free trade agreement,
which came into effect from Janu-
ary 1, 2010. The rules specify that
products having more than 35 per
cent of local content will get pref-
erential tax treatment under the free-trade treaty.
The rules also specify the methodology for calcu-
lation of the cost of products to be traded between
India and the Association of South East Asian Na-
tions (ASEAN).
New Delhi had signed the an agreement on Au-
gust 13, 2009, in Seoul with ASEAN for duty-free
import and export of as many as 4,000 products
ranging from steel to apparel to sugar and tobacco
over a period of eight years.
While the pact opens the 1.7-billion consumer
market to each other, it also eliminates duties on
80 per cent of goods traded between the two re-
gions by 2016.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna
visited Kathmandu on January 15, 2010. During
his meetings with his counterpart Sujata Koirala
he gave positive gesture to Nepal to the latter’s
long-standing proposal to review the Nepal-India
Peace and Friendship Treaty-1950.
In return, Nepal sought to address India's concerns
with regard to fake currency being smuggled from
here, pledging that it would not allow its territory
to be used against its neighbour.
India and Nepal also agreed to “cooperate closely”
to end the menace of terrorism and extremism,
including human trafficking, smuggling of arms
and fake Indian currency.
During the meeting, Nepal raised serious concerns
over the highly controversial issues on border en-
croachment from the Indian side whereas the In-
dian officials urged Nepal to cooperate with India
by signing the much-awaited Extradition Treaty
that Nepal had been dilly dallying to sign.
Five MoUs regarding the construction of Terai
roads with Indian assistance at an estimated cost
of Rs 805 crore, a project worth Rs 9.2 crore for
the Nepal Stock Exchange Ltd and Central Deposi-
tory Services (India) Ltd, Rs 6.3-crore electrifica-
tion project, and construction of a Science Learn-
ing Centre with India’s assistance of Rs 16.6 crore,
were signed during the visit.
During his meeting with Unified Communist Party
of Nepal-Maoists chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal,
alias Prachanda, Mr Krishna expressed disappoint-
ment on their ongoing anti-India movement.
However, just a day after he met with Krishna
when he had said he received positive response
from him to address their concerns, Prachanda, in
his address to party cadres in Khotang district,
criticised India and said it has played negative role
by backing up other political parties to uphold ci-
vilian supremacy in Nepal.
40
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
· The 20th Commonwealth Speakers’ Confer-
ence was held in New Delhi from January 5, 2010.
It was inaugurated by Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh.
Describing the growth of regional parties as a chal-
lenge for governance and conduct of parliamen-
tary democracy, Mr Manmohan Singh said:
“Though the aspirations of smaller parties may of-
ten be anchored in narrow considerations, they
carry great weight for their constituents. In the
end, democracy must respond to everyday concerns
of the common man and Parliament should be the
forum to address such concerns.” The remark was
in obvious reference to the growing influence of
sub-regional parties in coalition politics and Par-
liament.
Presiding officers from 42 Commonwealth nations
were present (some in traditional Speaker robes).
The Conference discussed, among other things, the
Speaker’s role as a mediator and administrator of
Parliament and use of technology in disseminat-
ing information on Parliamentary proceedings.
The forum also saw India voicing the aspirations
of developing nations on climate change.
A one-day international conference on Afghani-
stan was held on January 27, 2010 in London. Sev-
enty Foreign Ministers and officials of international
organisations attended the convention at the 185-
year-old Lancaster House.
British Prime Minister Gordon
Brown, hosting the conference
with Afghan President Hamid
Karzai and UN Secretary General
Ban Ki Moon, announced in his
opening address the establishment
of a $500 million 'trust fund' to buy
"peace and integration" with warriors who are en-
gaged in violence for economic rather than ideo-
logical reasons. A whopping $140 million has been
pledged already for 2010.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
During his pre-conference discussion with the Brit-
ish Foreign Secretary David Miliband, External
Affairs Minister of India, S.M. Krishna, specifically
said, “there should be no distinction between a good
Taliban and a bad Taliban.” But this clearly fell on
deaf ears. The participants rejected India's argu-
ment that there were no degrees of Talibanism.
It was also unclear w hether remnants of
Afghanistan's Northern Alliance, once cultivated
by India, would be accommodated in any way.
There was also no reference to the erstwhile For-
eign Minister, Abdullah Abdullah, who put up a
spirited fight in the first round of the recent con-
troversial Presidential election and exposed fraud
before withdrawing from the contest.
Pakistan supports a differentiation between Taliban
segments, including being generally soft towards
the Afghan Taliban, which was sponsored by the
Pakistani Army's Inter-Services Intelligence.
As a goodwill gesture, the conference was preceded
by a lifting of United Nations sanctions on five lead-
ers of the obscurantist Taliban regime, which was
ousted by armed forces led by the United States
after the 9/11 attack on New York by the Afghani-
stan-based Al Qaida. Among the beneficiaries is a
former foreign minister Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil.
In keeping with United States President Barack
Obama's plan to start withdrawing American
troops in a little over 18 months, Brown also de-
clared that to fill the breach the strength of the
Afghan army would be increased to 134,000 by
October 2010 and to 171,600 by October 2011.
Corresponding enlargements would also occur in
respect of the Afghan police. The template for Af-
ghanistan is similar to the one utilised in Iraq.
The Taliban central leadership rejected the Lon-
don declaration on Afghanistan while several top
Pakistani leaders said they support dialogue with
the Taliban to end the conflict.
The statement by the Leadership Council of the
Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan issued in Pashto
41
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
said: “The US and its allies should have freed all
prisoners from jails in Guantanamo Bay, Afghani-
stan, Pakistan and elsewhere, removed the names
of all Taliban members from the UN ‘blacklist’ and
refrained from sending more troops if they really
meant to take the proper steps for ending the Af-
ghan conflict.”
The statement argued that the ‘Mujahideen’ were
not fighting for money or to grab power. Describ-
ing as baseless that most Taliban fighters were not
ideologically committed, it claimed that nobody
compelled the ‘Mujahideen’ to take up arms and
fight the invaders.
On January 27, 2010, Mahinda
Rajapska emerged victorious in
the bitterly-fought first post-
LTTE era Presidential elections.
He won fighting against former
army chief Sarath Fonseka, secur-
ing nearly 60 per cent of the total votes polled.
On 59-year-old Fonseka's charges of poll rigging,
the sources said it was "absolutely untrue" and
pointed out that even former Prime Minister and
opposition UNP chief Ranil Wicremasinghe had
given a clean chit on the issue.
An international protocol on biodiversity has
become the new bone of contention between the
developed and developing countries. The rich
countries are opposing an international legal frame-
work for use of biological resources.
The agreement will deal with the issue of bio-pi-
racy, which is a cause of concern for countries like
India. Negotiations are on to finalise the protocol
that is expected to be adopted at Nagoya, Japan, in
October 2010.
India and other developing countries are pushing
for a protocol on access and benefit sharing (ABS).
Bio-piracy is an important issue for India, which is
keen on the adoption of the Nagoya Protocol.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The Convention on Biological Diversity, adopted
at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, is
the first comprehensive global agreement address-
ing all aspects of biodiversity. The convention re-
affirms sovereign rights of nations over their bio-
logical resources. It has three main goals — the
conservation of biological diversity, sustainable use
of its components and fair and equitable sharing of
the benefits from the use of genetic resources.
While an international legal framework appears
to be a distant possibility, India has been taking
steps at the national and bilateral level to protect
its biodiversity. Besides the Biological Diversity
Act, 2002, and the national Biodiversity Author-
ity, India has also put in place a traditional knowl-
edge database — the Traditional Knowledge Digi-
tal Library (TKDL). Managed by the CSIR, TKDL
is a computerised database of documented infor-
mation available in Indian texts, relating to Indian
systems of medicine. Over 10 years, more than 2
lakh formulations of Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani and
Yoga have been documented under the TKDL.
The United Nations climate
science panel, Intergovern-
mental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC), faces a new
controversy for wrongly linking global warming
to a rise in natural disasters such as hurricanes and
floods. It based the claims on an unpublished re-
port that had not been subjected to routine scien-
tific scrutiny and ignored warnings from scientific
advisers. The report's author later withdrew the
claim because the evidence was too weak.
The link was central to demands at Copenhagen
climate summit by African nations for compensa-
tion of $100 billion from the rich nations blamed
for creating the most emissions. According to The
Sunday Times the IPCC knew in 2008 that the link
could not be proved but did not alert world lead-
ers.
The latest criticism came less than a week after
42
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
IPCC was forced to retract claims that the Hima-
layan glaciers would be largely melted by 2035. It
turned out the claim had been lifted from a news
report published in 1999 by New Scientist maga-
zine.
Two scientific reviewers who checked drafts of the
IPCC report urged greater caution in proposing a
link between climate change and disaster impacts,
but were ignored.
The paper at the centre of the latest questions was
written in 2006 by Robert Muir-Wood, head of
research at Risk Management Solutions, a London
consultancy, who became a contributing author
on the IPCC report on climate change impacts. In
the research, Muir-Wood looked at a wide range
of hazards, including tropical cyclones, floods and
hurricanes. He found from 1950 to 2005 there was
no increase in the impact of disasters once growth
was accounted for. For 1970 to 2005 he found a
2% annual increase that "corresponded with a pe-
riod of rising global temperatures," but said almost
all of it was due to strong hurricane seasons in 2004
and 2005. Despite such caveats, the IPCC report
used the study in its section on disasters and haz-
ards, but cited only the 1970-2005 results.
On January 13, 2010,
Google threatened to shut
down its operations in
China after uncovering
“highly sophisticated” hacking attempts into e-mail
accounts of Chinese human rights activists.
“These attacks and the surveillance they have un-
covered, combined with the attempts over the past
year to further limit free speech on the web, have
led us to conclude that we should review the fea-
sibility of our business operations in China,” David
Drummond, senior V-P of corporate development
and chief legal officer, said in a blog post.
“We have decided we are no longer willing to con-
tinue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so
over the next few weeks we will be discussing with
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
the Chinese government the basis on which we
could operate an unfiltered search engine within
the law, if at all,” he said.
Evidence indicated that the attackers were trying
to get access to mail accounts of Chinese human
rights activists, according to Drummond. At least
20 other large companies, including finance,
Internet, media and technology were similarly at-
tacked, according to Google.
A northwest Pakistani vil-
lage that tried to resist Taliban
infiltration mourned on Janu-
ary 2, 2010 the victims of an
apparent revenge suicide
bombing that killed 96 residents during a volley-
ball game. The attack on the outskirts of Lakki
Marwat city was one of the deadliest in recent
Pakistani history and sent a bloody New Year’s
message to Pakistanis who dare take on the armed
Islamic extremists.
Lakki Marwat district is near South Waziristan, a
tribal region where the army has been battling the
Pakistani Taliban since October 2009.
Across Pakistan’s north-west, where the police
force is thin, underpaid and under-equipped, vari-
ous tribes have taken security into their own hands
over the past two years by setting up citizen mili-
tias to fend off the Taliban. The government has
encouraged such “lashkars”, and in some areas they
have proven to be a key to reducing militant ac-
tivity. Still, tribal leaders who face off with the
militants do so at high personal risk. Several sui-
cide attacks have targeted meetings of anti-Taliban
elders, and militants also often go after individu-
als. One reason militancy has spread in Pakistan’s
semi-autonomous tribal belt is because insurgents
have slain dozens of tribal elders and filled a power
vacuum.
In a candid assessment of the fragile relation-
ship of USA with Pakistan, a US State department
policy paper has admitted that there is a degree of
43
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
mistrust between Washington and Islamabad, but
democratic rule in Pakistan has created a window
of opportunity. The report makes a point of not-
ing that while the US military presence in the re-
gion is not open-ended, its non-military commit-
ment would be a long-term one.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton unveiled the
Obama administration's strategy to stabilise Paki-
stan and Afghanistan, noting that the challenge in
both countries is immense.
US officials have expressed concern over Pakistan's
selective war on extremists within its borders, not-
ing the Pakistani army's offensive ignores deadly
terrorist groups such as the Haqqani network, re-
sponsible for attacks against US troops in Afghani-
stan.
The State department report outlines US objectives
in Pakistan and Afghanistan. "While our combat
mission in Afghanistan is not open-ended, we will
remain politically, diplomatically and economically
engaged in Afghanistan and Pakistan for the long-
term to protect our enduring interests in the re-
gion," it says. On Pakistan, it lays out the inten-
tion of USA to lead the international community
in helping Pakistan overcome the political, eco-
nomic and security challenges that threaten its sta-
bility, and in turn undermine regional stability.
"And we seek to build a long-term partnership with
Pakistan based on common interests, including a
recognition that we cannot tolerate, a safe haven
for terrorists whose location is known and whose
intentions are clear," it added.
"Achieving progress will require continued sacri-
fice not only by our military personnel, but also
by more than the 1,500 US government civilians
serving in Afghanistan and Pakistan," Clinton said,
pointing out that for the first time since this con-
flict began, the US has a true whole-of-govern-
ment approach. She said the Obama
administration's policy, rather than being an exer-
cise in nation-building, was aimed to achieve real-
istic progress in critical areas, and that Afghan and
Pakistani governments had endorsed this strategy.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
On January 1, 2010, China and 10 South-east
Asian nations ushered in the world’s third-largest
free-trade area. While many industries are eager
for tariffs to fall on things as diverse as textiles,
rubber, vegetable oils and steel, a few are nervously
waiting to see whether the agreement will mean
boom or bust for their businesses.
Trade between China and the 10 countries that
make up the Association of Southeast Asian Na-
tions, also known as ASEAN, has soared to $192.5
billion in 2008, from $59.6 billion in 2003. The new
free-trade zone, which will remove tariffs on 90%
of traded goods, is expected to increase that com-
merce still more.
The zone ranks behind only the European Eco-
nomic Area and the North American Free Trade
Area (NAFTA) in volume. It encompasses 1.9 bil-
lion people. The free-trade area is expected to help
ASEAN countries increase exports, particularly
those with commodities that resource-hungry
China desperately wants.
The China-ASEAN free trade area has faced less
vocal opposition than the European and North
American zones, perhaps because tariffs were al-
ready low and because it was unlikely to alter com-
merce patterns radically. However, some manu-
facturers in Southeast Asia are concerned that
cheap Chinese goods may flood their markets, once
import taxes are removed, making it more diffi-
cult for them to retain or increase local market
shares.
Decline in oilseeds production, appreciation of
rupee against dollar and zero import duties during
most of 2009 has made India the largest edible oil
importer in 2009, a slot it took surpassing China.
Import of crude edible oil to India saw a huge jump
of 35% to a record 8.4 million tonne (mt) in 2009.
India's edible oil imports comprise almost 80% of
palm oil.
Reserve Bank of India, along with the Securi-
ties and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has al-
44
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
lowed recognised stock exchanges to launch fu-
tures currency trading in euro-rupee, pound ster-
ling-rupee and yen-rupee. Futures trading in dol-
lars-rupee was already allowed.
With an economic freedom score of 53.8, India
has been rated the 124th freest economy in the
world, according to the 16th Annual Index of Eco-
nomic Freedom, released by The Heritage Foun-
dation and The Wall Street Journal. Hong Kong
and Singapore finished 1st and 2nd in the rankings
for the 16th straight year. With Australia in 3rd
place and New Zealand moving up to number 4,
the Asia-Pacific region boasts a clean sweep at the
top. Europe registered three top 10 placements:
Ireland, Denmark and Switzerland. The United
Kingdom dropped out of the top 10 for the first
time in Index history. The United States also
dropped significantly, to 8th place.
The fiscal deficit for 2009-10 was budgeted at a
16-year high of 6.8% of GDP. The high fiscal defi-
cit is blamed on the measures the government took
to address the demand slump that followed the
global financial crisis. The high fiscal deficit is a
concern as high government borrowing to meet
the expenditure in excess of revenues creates com-
petition for funds and interest rates going up due
to this. High interest rates hurt rate sensitive sec-
tors such as autos, real estate and consumer goods.
Investment activity also then slows down, depress-
ing the overall economy. At macro level, inflation
goes up, currency weakens and growth is de-
pressed. Increased interest payments leave less
money with the government to make productive
expenditure.
The International Lunar Geographic Society, a
New York-based organization devoted to the study
of the moon, has declared that a lunar crater in
the moon's Sea of Tranquillity has been christened
after Shah Rukh Khan. This has been approved by
the International Astronomical Union, which has
a final say with regard to the naming of craters on
the moon. With a crater named after him, Shah
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
Rukh now joins the ranks of eminent personalities
like Nobel laureate C.V. Raman, father of the In-
dian space programme Vikram Sarabhai, father of
the Indian nuclear programme Homi Bhabha and
other luminaries like Meghnad Saha after whom
craters have been named.
India and China rank
123rd and 121st in pollution
control, respectively, re-
flecting the strain rapid eco-
nomic growth imposes on
the environment, according
to the 2010 Environmental Performance Index
(EPI). Iceland leads the world in addressing pollu-
tion control and natural resource management
challenges, according to the index produced by a
team of environmental experts at Yale University
and Columbia University. The EPI ranks 163 coun-
tries on their performance across 25 metrics ag-
gregated into ten categories including environmen-
tal health, air quality, water resource management,
biodiversity and habitat, forestry, fisheries, agri-
culture, and climate change. Occupying the bot-
tom five positions are Togo, Angola, Mauritania,
the Central African Republic, and Sierra Leone—
countries that lack basic environmental amenities
and policy capacity. The US ranks 61st, significantly
behind other industrialised nations like Britain
(14th), Germany (17th), and Japan (20th).
Recovery from the global economic downturn
is faster in India compared with other countries in
the world as consumers here are more willing to
spend, according to the Nielsen Global Consumer
Confidence survey. India ranked second with 117
points in the fourth quarter of 2009, behind Indo-
nesia, which has 119 points. Globally consumer
confidence has remained stable at 87 per cent.
Apart from India and Indonesia, Hong Kong,
China, Singapore and Brazil are where recovery is
accelerating. About 17 per cent Indians think that
job prospects in the country would be 'excellent'
and 66 per cent think that it would be 'good' in
the next 12 months.
45
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar mission has
been set-up to create an enabling policy framework
for the deployment of 20,000 MW of solar power
in 2020. The other objectives are: (a) Promote
programmes for off-grid applications, reaching
1000 MW by 2017 and 2000 MW by 2020; (b) to
create favourable conditions for solar manufactur-
ing capability for indigenous production and mar-
ket leadership; (c) to achieve 15 million sq metres
solar thermal collector area by 2017 and 20 mil-
lion by 2022; (d) to deploy 20 million solar light-
ing systems for rural areas by 2022.
India’s human and gender development record
is improving, with the latest government report
showing a significant increase in country’s posi-
tion on human (HDI) and gender related develop-
ment indices. India’s HDI, which was 0.530 in
1996, rose to 0.605 in 2006, while GDI score im-
proved from 0.514 in 1996 to 0.590 a decade later.
A concern, however, is the country’s Gender Em-
powerment Measure (GEM) score, which judges
women’s participation in politics and decision-
making, their representation in Parliament and
legislatures and their control over economic re-
sources. Gendering Human Development Index in
India, released by Women and Child Development
Ministry, claims GEM score of 0.497 in 2006 against
0.416 in 1996. Delhi has the highest GEM score
and Nagaland the lowest. The highest GEM scor-
ers in India are Andaman and Nicobar, Puducherry,
Goa, Andhra and Himachal. The best performers
on political participation of women are Punjab,
Andaman and Nicobar, Himachal and Haryana. On
economic empowerment of women, Chandigarh,
Goa, Delhi and Punjab are the best, but in terms of
control of economic resources, Meghalaya stands
on top.
The Indian School
of Business (ISB) is the
only one from India to
find a place on the list
of top 20 B-schools in the world, published by the
Financial Times. ISB has improved its position to
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
bag the 12th spot on the list of top 100 B-Schools
across the globe in 2010. The London School of
Business topped the list, followed by the Univer-
sity of Pennsylvania and Harvard Business School.
Stanford University GSB and Insead have been
ranked at the fourth and fifth positions, respec-
tively.
The revised estimates of the national income
that took into account 2004-05 prices have calcu-
lated the per capita income of India at Rs 40,14,1
in 2008-09. The old method of income calculation
had pegged per capita at 37,490 for 2008-09. On
an annual basis the new per capita income rose
13.3 per cent compared to the previous year (2007-
08). The new series of calculating the national in-
come changed the base year to 2004-05 from 1999-
2000 earlier.
Google has introduced a mandatory secure en-
cryption for all users of its free email service Gmail,
which will make it more difficult for hackers to
break into the email accounts.
Gmail will now be accessible through what is
known as the hypertext transfer protocol secure
or HTTPS on internet, instead of the HTTP proto-
col which it was using earlier.
Under the new protocol, email data travelling be-
tween a user’s browser and Google computer server
will be encrypted, making it tougher for the hack-
ers sitting on unprotected Wi-Fi to break into the
user’s accounts.
For users, the new encryption would result in
higher level of security, similar to an online bank-
ing transaction. Hackers would also find it more
challenging to steal credit card and bank statements
stored by Gmail users in their mailboxes.
Thousands of users in the government departments
and corporate sector across the world use Gmail
for transferring official emails or storing bank con-
fidential information. With this enable-ment, loss
of such information or hacking of Orkut or Gmail
46
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
accounts is likely to become less frequent. Many
government of India documents also get exchanged
through Gmail. The ministry of external affairs has,
however, banned use of such private email pro-
viders for official use.
India is set to buy 10 C-17 Globemaster-III gi-
ant strategic aircraft, each of which comes for about
$220 million. The four-engine C-17 is capable of
carrying payload of up to 78 tonnes, transport tanks
and air-drop more than 100 combat-ready para-
troopers directly into a battle-zone.
It can cover 2,400 nautical miles at a stretch and
with mid-air refueling it can go even longer dis-
tances. The plane has the capability to take off and
land on 3,000 feet or less runway, as also on a semi-
prepared runway.
On January 11, 2010, an Indian team set sail on
the first Southern Ocean expedition after the
Copenhagen meet — the fourth to be taken up by
the National Centre for Antarctic & Ocean Re-
search (NCAOR), Goa — to study, among other
things, climate change and its impact on life.
It will also be the first time Indian scientists will
be crossing the 55 degrees South latitude to go al-
most up to the polar region on an Indian vessel.
Sagar Nidhi, the only Indian vessel that can cut
through ice, left Goa with 25 scientists for
Mauritius and head farther southwards on a voy-
age that will last till April 2010.
The scientists will take up about 20 studies in the
ocean between 35 and 66 degrees South latitudes.
Prominent among them would be paleo-climatic
studies that involve collecting samples from the
ocean bed at a depth of up to six kilometres.
Changes in sediment formation, water mass and
other parameters would be compared with previ-
ous data to ascertain the impact of climate change.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
V. K. Murthy is the first cin-
ematographer, and second
Kannadiga after Kannada movie
icon Dr Raj Kumar, to get the
Dada Saheb Phalke award for his
contribution to the film industry.
He is known for his work in most Guru Dutt films
like Sahib Biwi Aur Ghulam, Kaagaz Ke Phool and
Pyaasa.
Besides Guru Dutt, Murthy also worked with
Pramod Chakravarthy (Naya Zamana, Jugnu),
Kamal Amrohi (Pakeezah) and Shyam Benegal
(Bharat Ke Khoj, a television series).
He also shot India’s first cinema-scope movies,
Kagaz ke Phool and is also one of the pioneers of
colour cinematography.
Gen Vijay Kumar Singh has been
appointed as the chief of Indian
Army. He was born on May 10,
1951, in Bapada village of Haryana.
His grandfather—Mukh Ram—
was also a soldier, who rose to the
rank of Risaldar Major. His father Jagat Singh also
joined the Army and retired as a Colonel.
Gen V.K. Singh, an infantry man, was commis-
sioned into the Rajput Regiment in 1970. During
his long career he has participated in the 1971 op-
erations against Pakistan and the IPKF operations
in Sri Lanka in 1988. His last posting before taking
over as army chief was as the Eastern Army Com-
mander, Kolkata. Prior to that, he commanded vi-
tal Ambala-based 2 Strike Corps of the Army.
He is also an honours graduate of the US Army
Infantry School, Georgia. He studied at the De-
fence Services Staff College, the Army War Col-
lege and the US Army War College, Carlisle.
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Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Burj Khalifa on January 4,
2010, blazing fireworks and
dazzling lights marked the
opening of the world's tallest
tower, Burj Khalifa, formerly
known as Burj Dubai. The $1.5
billion, 818 metres (2,684 feet)
high structure is an “unprec-
edented” engineering marvel.
Burj Khalifa has been designed to be the
centrepiece of a large-scale, mixed-use develop-
ment that will include 30,000 homes, nine hotels,
7.4 acres of parkland, at least 19 residential tow-
ers, the Dubai Mall, and the 30-acre man-made
Burj Khalifa Lake.
Tallest building in the world
Tallest free-standing structure in the world
Highest number of stories in the world
Highest occupied floor in the world
Highest outdoor observation deck in the world
Elevator with the longest travel distance in the
world
Tallest service elevator in the world
Not only is Burj Khalifa the world’s tallest build-
ing, it has also broken two other impressive records:
tallest structure, previously held by the KVLY-TV
mast in Blanchard, North Dakota, and tallest free-
standing structure, previously held by Toronto’s
CN Tower. The Chicago-based Council on Tall
Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) has estab-
lished three criteria to determine what makes a
tall building tall. Burj Khalifa wins by far in all
three categories.
The building has returned the location of Earth's
tallest free-standing structure to the Middle East
— where the Great Pyramid of Giza claimed this
achievement for almost four millennia before be-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
ing surpassed in 1311 by Lincoln Cathedral in En-
gland.
In a breakthrough, Australian scientists have
developed a drug that prepares the immune sys-
tem to effectively fight all cold and flu infections,
including swine flu virus. The Veldona lozenge,
which tastes like a sweet and dissolves in the
mouth, prepares the immune system to attack ev-
ery cold and flu virus.
The drug, that could be taken once a day before
breakfast, would prevent everyday sniffles in oth-
erwise healthy people and life-threatening infec-
tions in the elderly.
NASA has published the
first images from its Wide-
field Infrared Survey Ex-
plorer, or WISE, which has
been scanning the skies since
January 2010.
The images include a comet, a "star factory" 20,000
light years away in our Milky Way galaxy and our
nearest large neighbour, the Andromeda spiral
galaxy.
Wise will search on until October when its sup-
plies of frozen coolant for chilling instruments will
run out.
The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (Wise)
had blasted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base
in December 2009. The probe is expected to un-
cover objects that have never seen before, includ-
ing some of the coolest stars and the most lumi-
nous galaxies.
The $320m mission will do this by scanning the
entire sky in infrared light with sensitivity hun-
dreds of times greater than ever before.
Human habitation or a permanent base on the
Moon could soon be a reality. After the discovery
of water, scientists analysing the data of
48
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
Chandrayaan-I have now found a large cave on the
lunar surface, which could possibly act as a natural
shelter for humans.
This is an empty volcanic tube, measuring about
two kilometre in length and 360 meters in width.
Such wide tunnels could sustain underground lu-
nar outposts, while the ceilings could help protect
astronauts from space radiation, meteoroid impacts
and wild temperature fluctuations (up 300 degree
centigrade) that is commonplace on the lunar sur-
face.
There are similar lava tubes on Earth. They are
formed when molten rock, flowing from a volca-
nic eruption, cools and hardens on top while the
lava underneath continues to flow. If the lava
drains completely, a cavern is left. Scientists had
long suspected that such rock formations existed
on the moon, but lacked evidence until now.
The findings happened while the data from the
TMC (Terrain Mapping Camera) was being
analysed. The TMC was one of the five Indian pay-
load that was on-board Chandrayaan-I.
The rising number of brokerages with algorithm,
or computer programme-driven trading, may turn
out to be a second turning point in Indian markets
after the introduction of electronic trading a de-
cade-and-a-half ago, which closed about 20 stock
exchanges and many local brokerages, but ex-
panded the trading community and volumes by
leaps and bounds.
The National Stock Exchange, which controls more
than three-fourths of the trading volumes, has ap-
proved applications of 200 of its members, roughly
a fourth, to trade using algorithms.
Algorithmic trading refers to automated trades
executed through software programs which do not
require humans to place orders. There could be
thousands of programs written to buy or sell a se-
curity, currency or commodity at a particular level
when one or more factors emerge. Those programs
are so fast that people who look at various devel-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
opments and decide trade would be left way be-
hind because a machine has done it in millisec-
onds.
For example, a program could be to sell the stock
futures of a particular company and buy the stock
if the futures price is x% higher than the stock
price. Also, it could be to compare a set of vari-
ables—if rupee is more than 45 to the dollar, and
crude oil is less than $60 per barrel—then the soft-
ware would sell Infosys futures and buy HPCL
shares.
Other than investors who buy for a long term and
traders who buy and sell on a daily basis to profit
from minor movements, there’s a section, called
arbitrageurs, which looks to benefit from distor-
tions in prices despite public information.
Profits from arbitrage have slumped in the past
decade as investors across the country have access
to same stock prices unlike in the past where vari-
ous cities had different prices at a given time for
the same share. Also, the common trading cycles
between the National Stock Exchange and the
Bombay Stock Exchange shrank arbitrage.
Now, with software programs taking over trading,
it may well just disappear.
While trading volumes could surge as fat-cat bro-
kerages hire maths wizards from the best of insti-
tutions, it could lead to severe disturbances in the
market as was the case during the credit crisis.
Some experts have said the credit crisis was accen-
tuated by algorithmic trading which triggered mil-
lions of trades due to fast-evolving developments.
However, some like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan,
with superior programs, have reportedly benefited
through trading even during the crisis.
Algorithmic trading can create a class conflict too
between haves and have-nots of technology. There
could be charges of discrimination if two mem-
bers of the same exchange are not on an equal foot-
ing. Even some US legislators are planning to re-
strict high-speed trading.
49
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)
In India it may not immediately lead to a surge in
volumes since Indian markets still don’t have the
depth of the western markets and related markets,
such as commodities and currency are controlled.
On January 28, 2010, Vishal
Mehta announced the Infibeam
Pi, an e-book reader that looks
like the Amazon Kindle, has the
same e-Ink screen that the
Kindle sports, and has a rights ar-
chitecture that is more open
than the Kindle. The Infibeam
Pi, which can be ordered online and is priced at Rs
10,000. The Amazon Kindle, when shipped to In-
dia, costs about Rs 18,000. The Pi reader has no
wireless connectivity, however.
The Pi supports 13 Indian languages and has a mi-
cro USB port to connect to a PC. Users will need
to create an account with Infibeam.com, register
the device and then download the ebooks. The
ebooks can be read on the PC as well as on the Pi.
The Pi can also be used to read any document (word
or pdf, for instance). It can store about 600 ebooks
in its internal memory. It also has space for a 4GB
card—that means about 3,000 ebooks can be car-
ried around. Pi can play music as well.
Reinventing the wheel was not exactly what
Myshkin Ingawale had in mind when he set out
from NIT-Bhopal towards MIT-Massachusetts,
with a stop-over at IIM Calcutta. The 27-year-old’s
Copenhagen Wheel, named after the Danish capi-
tal after it was unveiled during the climate sum-
mit in December 2008, could be about to do just
that.
A smart disc that can be retrofitted on any bicycle,
the device can boost the cycle’s power and can also
keep track of friends, fitness, smog and traffic. And
if someone tries to steal the bike while its owner
happens to be away, the device will send out an
alert via a text message.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The Danish capital is set to embrace it whole-
heartedly in its attempt to become the world’s first
carbon-neutral capital city by 2025.
Ingawale began working on the device in 2003,
when he started fitting bicycles with electric mo-
tors. An early version of the device was made dur-
ing his time at the National Institute of Technol-
ogy campus in Bhopal, where he studied for a
B.Tech in electrical engineering.
The big leap for the device and Ingawale came
about when he got in touch with a team from the
prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) in the US, which was working on ways to
make bikes efficient and green.
“From the days of the horse-drawn carriage, all
we have done is replaced the horse with a beast of
a different kind. Can we be creative, can we make
something that radically improves things for the
better? This was the motivation and thought pro-
cess of the team,” he says.
Naveen Jindal, MP from
Kurukshetra who fought a
long legal battle to ensure that
individuals can hoist the na-
tional flag too, will put up
monumental flag poles with
flags about 3,500 square feet in
size and hoisted on 206-feet-
high steel poles—all across the country.
After putting up five monumental flag poles in his
own constituency, Jindal now has plans to set up
many more to create awareness and generate re-
spect for the national flag in every Indian.
Jindal's Flag Foundation of India, set up after he
won the legal battle in 2005 against the govern-
ment diktat that only institutions can hoist the
national flag, will work with local bodies to set up
these poles. He has even had the government
amend the Flag Code to allow these massive flags
to fly even at night, with proper illumination.
50
Section -3 (Current Relevant Facts)

The first monumental flag pole outside
Kurukshetra will come up in Angul, a tribal dis-
trict in Orissa, followed by Hyderabad, Mumbai
and Kanyakumari. Each project will cost Rs 40 lakh,
with the pole, made of high tension steel, weigh-
ing 12.5 tonnes, and the flag, made of knitted poly-
ester, weighing 28 kg and costing Rs 60,000.
Sixty years after it became a
Republic, India is about to share
with its people the first authen-
ticated list of martyrs, who
helped it realise the dream of freedom. The list
would, for the first time, cover the martyrs of 1857,
recognised now as the watershed in the struggle
for India’s Independence.
Also, the list’s focus would be the nation to avoid
accusations that the existing works on martyrs are
heavily tilted in favour of the North.
Till date the country had no National Register of
Martyrs which could be taken as the basis of fu-
ture historical research on the subject. Names that
do exist in scattered works, including “Who’s Who
of Indian Martyrs’ published by the Education
Ministry in 1969, are the ones that figured in the
national movements of the late 19th and 20th cen-
turies.
up by the Department of Civil Aviation, Haryana,
in collaboration with the Aero Club of India.
Union Commerce and In-
dustry Minister Anand
Sharma on March 31, 2010
released the final document of
FDI Policy Framework that
would now comprise the
single document on FDI policy and mark the in-
ception of a whole new chapter on FDI policy.
Mr. Sharma said the current exercise had been ini-
tiated with the aim of integration of all prior regu-
lations on FDI, contained in Foreign Exchange
Management Act (FEMA), RBI circulars, and vari-
ous Press Notes into one consolidated document,
so as to reflect the current regulatory framework.
Having a single policy platform would also ease
the regulatory burden for Government. The inten-
tion of this exercise is not to make changes in the
extant guidelines, but to deal with them compre-
hensively.

However, the existing names of martyrs lacked

historical referencing and could be dismissed as
claims unless proved otherwise by evidence in pri-
mary sources like judicial records and jail files.

But now, thanks to experts under the Indian Coun-

cil of Historical Research which is in charge of the
project, India will soon have its first historically-
tested list of martyrs.

Narnaul, a non-descript village located in the

backwaters of Haryana has got India’s first aero
sports centre, which was inaugurated by Chief
Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, at the local air-
strip on January 31, 2010. The centre, named after
the late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, has been set

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Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
Medical Council of India president
Ketan Desai and three others were
arrested by CBI in connection with
permitting a medical college in
Punjab to admit students despite lack
of infrastructure, by allegelly taking
Rs. two crore as bribe.
Besides Dr. Desai, the others arrested were the al-
leged middleman Jitendar Pal Singh, a faculty mem-
ber of Patiala-based Gyan Sagar Medical College
Kamaljeet Singh and the college’s Vice Chairman
Sukhvinder Singh, CBI said.
The four accused were booked under various provi-
sions of Prevention of Corruption of Act, dealing
with inducing a public servant to accept bribe, crimi-
nal misconduct and payment of money.
Singapore has developed expertise in a whole range
of urban solutions such as water, sewage or waste
management, low-cost public housing and transport
systems management, all of which may be relevant
to Tamil Nadu or Chennai, according to S. Iswaran,
Singapore's Senior Minister of Trade, Industry and
Education.
In his interaction with senior journalists at the head-
quarters of The Hindu group of publications, Mr.
Iswaran referred to the collaborative venture on the
Cooum river restoration project, for which the
Chennai Rivers Restoration Trust and the Singapore
Cooperation Enterprise of the Singapore government
signed a memorandum of understanding last month.
In such areas, the two sides could share their expe-
riences and derive benefits mutually, the Minister
said, adding that the “long historical, cultural and
linguistic ties” between Tamil Nadu and Singapore
created a “natural opportunity” to work together.
Following Deputy Chief Minister M.K. Stalin's visit
to Singapore last year on his invitation, the frame-
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
work for the collaboration was worked out. (Ac-
cording to the Tamil Nadu government's official
documents, the MoU was signed for the prepara-
tion of a comprehensive master plan for the river
restoration and the provision of technical assistance
and training during implementation.)
Terming the goodwill and political relationship
between Singapore and India very strong, Mr.
Iswaran said the Comprehensive Economic Coop-
eration Agreement (CECA) between the two coun-
tries had created a base that facilitated a lot of
growth in trade and investment flows in both direc-
tions. There had been significant deals such as Tata
Steel coming and buying over Natsteel in Singapore.
About 3,000 Indian businesses small and medium
sized were incorporated and operating out of the
south-east Asian country.
Navies of India and the United
States have begun annual war exer-
cises involving anti-submarine war-
fare surface firings, visit board,
search and seizure and submarine
operations on April 23, 2010.
The 14th edition of MALABAR in the
Arabian Saw frontline units of the U.S. Navy's 7th
Fleet and Indian Navy's Western Fleet taking part
in the 10-day exercise.
The regular India – U.S. interaction over the years
has resulted in an increase in the complexity and
professional content of the bilateral exercise.
The exercise was primarily aimed at deriving mu-
tual benefit from each others experiences. The
interoperability achieved over the years as a result
of such exercises has proved to be operationally ben-
eficial particularly during the ongoing Anti-Piracy
Operations in the Gulf of Aden as also during Hu-
manitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR)
operations such as the tsunami of 2004.
39
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
During MALABAR CY10, the U.S. Navy repre-
sented by ships from CTF 70 of its 7th Fleet, based
at Yokosuka, Japan. The CTF included the Cruiser
USS Shiloh (CG 67), Destroyers USS Chaffee (DDG
90), USS Lassen (DDG 82) and Frigate USS Curts
(FFG 38).
Government on April 23, 2010 said
it will continue to follow its two-
pronged approach of development
and well-planned police action to
check Naxal menace but pointed out
that Central funds meant for projects
for betterment of such regions were not being well
used.
This was the first time the Committee met after the
Naxal ambush that claimed lives of 76 securitymen
in Dantewada in Chhattisgarh earlier this month.
The subject of the meeting was ‘Left Wing Extrem-
ism.’
Drawing attention to anti-development activities of
Naxalites, Mr. Chidambaram said they have been
destroying school buildings, roads and telephone
towers among others because development will
wean away poor tribals from the grip of the ultras.
He pointed out in 2009 alone, Naxals destroyed 71
school buildings, the re-building of which may take
years, depriving tribal children of education.
Mr. Chidambaram said huge amount of money is
being given to state governments for bringing about
development in the 34 worst-affected Naxal districts
under various programmes.
Expressing dissatisfaction over proper utilisation of
money, he called for proper utilisation of the funds
provided by the Centre for development of the
Naxal-affected areas.
Taking part in the discussions, the Committee mem-
bers supported the government’s two-pronged policy
and suggested a visit by an all-party Parliamentary
delegation to the Naxal-affected areas to win the
trust and goodwill of tribal people, an MHA state-
ment said.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
They also pointed out the need for good coordina-
tion between local police and Central paramilitary
forces and availability of actionable intelligence at
the ground level.
The discussions remained inconclusive and another
meeting of the Consultative Committee would be
held soon to continue discussions on the same sub-
ject, to enable more members to participate, the state-
ment read.
The Committee members comprise MP’s from the
Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.
NATO agreed on April 23, 2010
to begin handing over control of Af-
ghanistan to the Afghan government
this year, a process that if success-
ful would enable President Barack
Obama to meet his target date of July 2011 for start-
ing to bring U.S. troops home.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
warned of a rocky road ahead, but said she was
pleased with progress towards eliminating the
shortage of allied trainers for the Afghan army and
police. She offered a generally sunny outlook for
Afghanistan and said the government of much—
criticized President Hamid Karzai gets too little
credit for progress in building a viable democracy.
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen
said the 28 nation alliance is on track with its new
strategy for winding down the war in Afghanistan,
despite security setbacks and a continuing shortage
of foreign trainers for the fledgling Afghan police
and army.
He said a meeting of NATO foreign ministers, in-
cluding Hillary Clinton, agreed on what it will take
to create conditions enabling Afghans to assume
control of their own country. He was not specific
about what those conditions will be, but said
progress in that direction is important in order to
avoid further erosion of public support for the war
effort.
40
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
India slashed its holdings of
American debt by a little over $ 1
billion in February while China,
which is locked in a currency row
with the U.S., trimmed the holdings by $ 11.5 bil-
lion during the same period.
According to the U.S. Treasury Department, India
has slashed its holdings to $ 31.6 billion in Febru-
ary, while it was at $ 32.7 billion in January.
China, which is also the largest holder of U.S. Trea-
sury bonds, has cut its holdings to $ 877.5 billion in
February, one of the lowest levels in nearly nine
months. In January, China’s holdings stood at $ 889
billion.
Both the U.S. and China are locked in a row over
the issue of revaluation of Chinese currency yuan.
In recent months, American authorities have been
stepping up pressure on the latter to revalue yuan.
Going by official statistics, China has been trim-
ming its holdings continuously since October last
year, when the same was at $ 938.3 billion.
Meanwhile, India’s holdings have come down by
more than $ 10 billion since June last year. At that
time, India held Treasury bonds worth $ 42.2 bil-
lion.
As per the Treasury data, Japan held bonds worth $
768.5 billion, making it the second largest holder
of American debt after China.
Among the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China)
nations, the second largest holder of American debt
is Brazil, followed by Russia and India.
As in February, Brazil held Treasury bonds to the
tune of $ 170.8 billion, while Russia held American
debt worth $ 20.2 billion.
The U.S. economy grew 5.6 per cent in the last three
months of 2009, shrugging off the adverse impact
of the financial meltdown.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
A memo from Defence Secretary
Robert Gates to the White House
warned that the United States lacks
a nimble long term plan for deal-
ing with Iran’s nuclear program,
according to a published report.
Mr. Gates wrote the three page
memo in January and it set off efforts in the Penta-
gon, White House and intelligence agencies to come
up with new options, including the use of the mili-
tary.
White House officials strongly disagreed with the
comments that the memo caused a reconsideration
of the administration’s approach to Iran.
The U.S. is pressing for new international sanctions
against Iran. The memo contemplates a situation in
which sanctions and diplomacy fail to dissuade Iran
from pursuing nuclear capability.
Obama set a deadline of the end of 2009 for Iran to
respond to his offer of dialogue to resolve concerns
about Iran’s accelerated nuclear development.
Iran spurned the offer, and since then the adminis-
tration has pursued what it calls the “pressure track,”
a combination of stepped up military activity in
Iran’s neighbourhood and a hard push for a new
round of international sanctions that would pinch
Iran economically.
Gates and other senior members of the administra-
tion have issued increasingly stern warnings to Iran
that its nuclear program is costing it friends and
options worldwide, while sticking to the long held
view that a U.S. or Israeli military strike on Iranian
nuclear facilities would be counterproductive.
Mr. Obama and other administration figures have
drawn a line that says Iran will not be allowed to
become a nuclear state, but they have not spelled
out what the United States would do if Iran gained
the ability to produce a weapon but does not actu-
ally field one.
41
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
India on April 13, 2010 made a strong pitch for
global disarmament with Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh telling the Nuclear Security Sum-
mit that the abolition of nuclear weapons would be
the “best guarantor of nuclear security.
The dangers of nuclear terrorism make the early
elimination of nuclear weapons a matter of even
greater urgency.
Recounting India’s efforts in this regard from
Jawaharlal Nehru to Rajiv Gandhi, the Prime Min-
ister said non-proliferation efforts at the global level
could only succeed if they were universal, compre-
hensive and non-discriminatory and linked to the
goal of complete nuclear disarmament.
He welcomed the agreement between the United
States and Russia to cut their nuclear arsenals as a
step in the right direction and called upon all coun-
tries “with substantial nuclear arsenals” the phrase
is ambiguous but certainly excludes India “to fur-
ther accelerate this process by making deeper cuts
that will lead to meaningful disarmament”.
The Prime Minister said India is “encouraged” by
the Nuclear Posture Review announced by Presi-
dent Obama, though he did not identify any of its
elements that he considered positive. India wants
the negotiation of a Nuclear Weapons Convention
and supports the universalisation of the policy of
“No First Use”, he said. “The salience of nuclear
weapons in national defence and security doctrines
must be reduced as a matter of priority”.
Dr. Singh also drew attention to India’s work on
developing nuclear systems that were safe, secure
and proliferation resistant.
India and China on April 7, 2010
signed an agreement to set up a hot
line to open up direct communication
between their Prime Ministers, but
appeared to continue to speak in dif-
ferent languages on key issues that
continue to challenge the bilateral relationship.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
In talks with Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi
and Premier Wen Jiabao, External Affairs Minister
S.M. Krishna called for China to review its position
on India's bid for a permanent seat on the United
Nations Security Council (UNSC). He also voiced
India's concerns over Chinese support to develop-
ment projects in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and the
issuing of stapled visas to Indian citizens from
Jammu and Kashmir.
Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao told that China
reiterated its earlier position on the UNSC, voiced
during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to
China in 2008, that China “understands and supports
India's aspirations to play an active role in the U.N.
and international affairs.”
This is the same position China has held since Mr.
Wen's visit to India in 2005, suggesting there was
little or no progress on this front.
The reported hacking attacks by China-based hack-
ers on India's Ministry of Defence and several em-
bassies did not figure in talks, though Ms. Rao said
India was “concerned” by the reports. “Cyber secu-
rity is of paramount importance and we will of
course take all necessary steps to safeguard our as-
sets against such attacks.”
Iran's recent hyper-activism in
neighbouring Afghanistan and Pa-
kistan has caused considerable con-
sternation in large parts of the globe.
In media circles, think-tanks and
world chanceries, high-browed
mandarins and their well-healed affiliates are try-
ing to make sense of the latest, seemingly inscru-
table piece of the Persian puzzle.
Yet Iran's deft moves in an area that the Persians
have known well for thousands of years originate
from deeply deliberated and well-grounded funda-
mentals. Ever since the 1979 Islamic revolution, Iran
has been ceaselessly battling the threat of a direct
American attack or an invasion by a third country
that is backed by the United States.
42
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
It is in this larger context of regionalising the geo-
political space that President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad set foot on Afghan soil on March 10.
Afghanistan's President Hamid
Karzai who fought running
battles with the Americans
who were more inclined to
favour his rival Abdullah
Abdullah during the recent Afghan elections received
the Iranian President warmly. Like the Iranians, Mr.
Karzai has concluded that the Americans are tiring
in Afghanistan and that the time has come to ex-
plore deeper alignments in an alternative camp that
includes Iran, and has China, Pakistan, Central Asian
republics and Russia as potential allies.
While engaging the Afghans on a new footing, the
Iranians have also begun to cultivate Pakistan. A
major shift in the contours of their relationship can
be traced to October 2009, when the Pakistan-based
Jundallah group, led by Abdolmalek Rigi, killed
Nour-Ali Shoushtari, and other senior commanders
of the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC).
Incensed by these high-profile assassinations, in the
Pishin area of the Sistan-Balochistan province, the
Iranians sent a few days later their Interior Minis-
ter Mostafa Mohammad Najjar to Islamabad, with
the demand for Rigi's handover. Subsequently, Rigi
was nabbed in a dramatic fashion when the Iranians
forced a Kyrgyzstan airlines plane in which he was
travelling from Dubai to Bishkek, to land in the Ira-
nian port city of Bandar Abbas. Influential voices in
Pakistan say that Islamabad gave the vital tip off
that led to Rigi's arrest. The Iranians, however, in-
sist that the arrest was possible on account of their
meticulous intelligence work, without any foreign
involvement whatsoever.
Since the 2009-10 winter war in Gaza, during which
Turkey openly distanced itself from Israel, the rela-
tionship between Tehran and Ankara has been warm-
ing up. Political goodwill is being translated into
significant energy cooperation and both sides, de-
spite resistance from several influential quarters, are
looking at participating in the Nabucco pipeline,
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
which will carry huge quantities of gas to Europe.
As the geopolitical alignments ahead of the U.S.
pullout begin to emerge, India's absence is glaring.
Piqued by India's high profile in Kabul, Pakistan's
military establishment has been looking for open-
ings that would allow it to achieve its maximalist
objective of seeking India's hasty, and preferably
unseemly, exit from Afghanistan.
However, two major hurdles have been impeding
Pakistan's path so far. First, the rapid improvement
in Indo-U.S. ties during the Bush presidency firmly
deterred it from taking India head-on in Afghani-
stan. Second, the Afghan presidency, closely tied to
New Delhi since 2001, was hostile to Islamabad.
However, the scenario changed dramatically with
the exit of the Bush administration and the emer-
gence of Barack Obama. Focussed on an exit strat-
egy from Afghanistan, the Americans deepened their
security dependence on the Pakistanis in the hope
of achieving rapid success. As a result, the Indian
fortress in Afghanistan which looked impregnable
during the Bush era was breached. Pakistan utilised
this opportunity to the hilt.
A staunch ally of India for several years, President
Karzai after his re-election last year began to ex-
hibit unusual warmth towards Pakistan. His descrip-
tion of India as a friend and Pakistan as a conjoined
twin during his visit to Islamabad was widely seen
as a demonstration of his waning affection towards
New Delhi.
There has been a significant de-
terioration in India-Iran ties
since New Delhi voted against
Tehran at the International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
on the Iranian nuclear programme. In fact, the day
India voted against Iran, it seriously jeopardised its
project in Afghanistan. Without a geographically
contiguous border, India can extend its reach into
Afghanistan only through the Iranian corridor.
With its back to the wall, how does India propose
to get back into the great game of realignments be-
43
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
ginning to unfold in and around Afghanistan? It can
draw some inspiration from its diplomatic conduct
in the past — when it worked successfully with the
Iranians, Russians and Central Asians, especially the
Tajiks to unroll the Northern Alliance against the
Taliban in 2001. With the recent visit of Russian
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to New Delhi where
discussions on Afghanistan took place, India has
taken its first major step in the right direction.
Mending fences with Iran has to be India's next
major undertaking. However, in trying to rework
its relations, India is left with only one weighty card,
which it can play with good effect provided it be-
gins to view its national interests independently and
not through the tinted glasses of the U.S. With its
huge requirements of energy, India needs to get back
to the Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) gas pipeline project.
But in doing so, it has to substantially modify the
arrangement and turn it around to suit its core long-
term interests.
Iran would, with considerable enthusiasm, welcome
India's participation in this project, as is evident
from the provisions included in the gas deal that
was signed by Iran and Pakistan in Istanbul in March.
Therein lies the opportunity for India to claw back
into the arrangement and take it forward from there.
Instead of waiting for others like Pakistan to seize
the initiative, India can benefit substantially by
boldly and formally initiating the introduction of
two significant players — Russia and China — into
this tie up. The Russian gas giant Gazprom has al-
ready expressed its keen interest to participate in
IPI. Gazprom's representative in Tehran, Abubakir
Shomuzov, has called for the extension of IPI to
China, in an arrangement that would tie Russia,
China, India, Pakistan and Iran together in a giant
project.
Russia's participation in the IPI
would be crucial for India. With
Russia firmly on its side, India
can, with greater ease and confi-
dence, engage with China in this cooperative enter-
prise. In the debate on the extension of IPI to China,
the route that this pipeline can pursue would be of
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
vital importance. If India has to take advantage of
this extension, it has to insist that the pipeline pass-
ing through Iran and Pakistan should go through an
Indian transit corridor and no other alternative route
before entering China.
Such an arrangement would greatly help in making
the IPI-plus arrangement more stable and workable.
With China, Pakistan's all-weather friend as the fi-
nal beneficiary, Islamabad would find it impossible
to block supplies to India. In other words, the rout-
ing of the pipeline to China via India, and the inter-
dependence that it would generate among the vari-
ous stakeholders would become New Delhi's insur-
ance policy for obtaining assured gas supplies from
Iran via Pakistan.
There is a final diplomatic dimension which needs
to be added if IPI-plus is to succeed. Critics of the
IPI rightly point to the security problems that this
project, in the current circumstances, is bound to
encounter during the pipeline's passage through the
turbulent province of Balochistan. A comprehensive
dialogue may therefore be the way forward to re-
solve this problem.
India, which in recent years has gone into a diplo-
matic shell, can take the high-ground and propose a
comprehensive six-party process. Besides itself,
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia, China and Iran can
become the core participants of this arrangement.
Such a forum, carefully constructed, adequately
resourced and energetically led can take head-on not
only the question of Baluchistan, but all other is-
sues that may stand in the way of a lasting trans-
national energy partnership.
Several among the 70 known spe-
cies of mangroves are at high risk of
extinction and may disappear well be-
fore the next decade if protective mea-
sures are not enforced, warns the first
global study by U.S. researchers.
Eleven of these have been placed on the red list of
threatened species kept by the International Union
for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
44
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)

The study, led by Beth A. Polidoro attached to the
Global Marine Species Assessment unit based at Old
Dominion University, Virginia, shows that about
80 per cent of the mangrove areas in India and South-
east Asia have been lost over the past 60 years.
In India alone, over 40 per cent of the mangrove
area on the west coast has been destroyed for aquac-
ulture, agriculture, coastal development and urban
development.
The global mangrove area loss since 1980 stands at
between 20 and 35 per cent. The areas are disap-
pearing at 2-8 per cent per year and the rates are
expected to continue unless mangrove forests are
protected as a valuable resource, says the study re-
cently published in PloS One, journal published by
the Public Library of Science.
In addition, 40 per cent of the animal species that
are restricted to mangrove habitat are at an elevated
risk of extinction due to extensive habitat loss.
Given the accelerating rate of loss, mangrove for-
ests may at least functionally disappear in around
100 years, the study states.
Mangrove forests are the economic foundations of
many tropical regions providing at least $1.6 bil-
lion per year in ecosystem services worldwide.
It is also estimated that almost 80 per cent of the
global fish catches are directly or indirectly depen-
dent on mangroves. These are provided by man-
groves, occupying only 0.12 per cent of the world's
total land area.
Implementation of conservation plans for man-
groves have largely been done in the absence of spe-
cies-specific information, says the study. Tree fell-
ing, aquaculture and overexploitation of fisheries in
mangrove areas are expected to be the greatest threats
to mangrove species over the next 10-15 years.
Unlike other forests, mangrove forests consist of a
relatively few species with 30-40 in the most di-
verse sites. Another big threat to mangroves is cli-
mate change, says the study.
Kerala has been adjudged the best
State in the country in devolving pow-
ers to local self-government institu-
tions. State received the recognition
following an evaluation done by the
Union Panchayati Raj Department.
The evaluation covered the performance of the States
in 2009-10. Minister for Local Administration
Paloli Mohammed Kutty would receive the award
from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at a func-
tion in New Delhi. Kerala received an aggregate of
74.74 points. Karnataka with 69.45 points and Tamil
Nadu with 67.06 points came second and third re-
spectively.
The Union Cabinet on Apr 23,
2010 approved a capital infusion
of Rs.15,000 crore in public sec-
tor banks (PSBs) during the cur-
rent fiscal to facilitate an increase
in their lending capacity by about
Rs.1.85 lakh crore.
According to cabinet decision a sum of Rs.15,000
crore already provided for in the budget for 2010-
11 is to be infused in Tier I capital instruments of
the PSBs.
The exact amount, the mode of capitalisation and
other terms and conditions would be decided in con-
sultation with the banks at the time of the infusion.
For the next fiscal (2011-12), additional capital re-
quirements, if any, is to be worked out in consulta-
tion with the PSBs based on their third quarter re-
sults for 2010-11 to ensure that they maintain a
minimum 8 per cent Tier I capital to meet the credit
requirements of the economy and accelerate growth.
The infusion of Rs.15,000 crore in Tier I capital in-
struments of PSBs would enable them to expand their
credit growth by about Rs.1.85 lakh crore.
This additional availability of credit is likely to
benefit employment oriented sectors, especially
agriculture, micro & small enterprises, export and
entrepreneurs, in promotion of their economic ac-
tivities which would in turn contribute substantially
to the growth of the economy.

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45
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
The government decided on capital infusion of PSBs
to ensure that the banking system does not suffer
from capital adequacy constraints and the credit
growth needed to sustain the economic momentum
in 2010-11 is maintained. The capital infusion
would enhance the lending capacity of PSBs that are
expected to continue meeting credit requirements
of the economy in order to maintain and accelerate
economic growth.
For this purpose, it may be recalled that in the wake
of the recent global financial crisis, the government
had negotiated with the World Bank for two ‘Bank-
ing sector support loans (BSSL)' amounting to $3.2
billion. Formalities in respect of the first tranche of
$2 billion loan have already been completed.
Our country is first among
the ten countries with the
highest degree of malicious
activity on the Internet. That
dubious “leadership” India has
achieved 5th position for ma-
licious activities for about (4%)
compared with the 11-m (3%)
in 2008
Symantec annually prepares top online dangers in
the world. According to experts, the growth of simi-
lar processes taking place in India against the world-
wide trend to the growing influence of developing
countries in the Internet space.
Specialists of Symantec argues that malicious
Internet activity originating from countries such as
China, India, Brazil, Poland and Russia will grow
in direct proportion to the increase in points of a
broadband network. According to them, encourage
dangerous trend was the launch of 3G services in
India and a number of mergers between key indus-
try players, which led to the development of Internet
infrastructure.
As per the annual report by Symentic In 2009, Rus-
sia accounted for about 3% are malicious activity
against 2% in 2008 year. The leaders left the United
States and China, but the percentage of their posi-
tion weakened. Share attacks emanated from the
U.S., declined to 19% from 23% in 2008.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
In China, it were reported 8% of the total number of
cases of malicious activity against 9% in 2008. Bra-
zil has risen from 5th (4%) on the third (6%) place,
India won the 5 th place (4%) compared with the
11-m (3%) in 2008.
The Chhattisgarh police did
not fully support the central
paramilitary troopers, thus fail-
ing to prevent the April 6 Maoist
attack in which 76 security per-
sonnel were killed, a govern-
ment-appointed committee probing the Dantewada
massacre has found, well informed sources said on
Apr 26, 2010.
The probe by the E N Rammohan Committee has
highlighted Chhattisgarh police's lack of cohesive-
ness and their alleged failure to support the central
paramilitary forces in anti-Maoist operations in the
state.
According to sources, top police official in
Dantewada may be summoned by the Union Home
Ministry to Delhi for the "lapses".
It has been found that the police support to the (Cen-
tral Reserve Police Force) CRPF personnel (who
were targeted in the April 6 ambush) was was less
than desired.
There is evidence in the report suggesting that the
CRPF team (of 62 Battalion that came under attack)
diverted from the earmarked patrol task within a
specific grid and moved in and around the area on
its own where they were attacked by the Naxals.
The report, submitted to the home ministry, has
suggested a re-look into "tactical" security opera-
tions against Maoist rebels.
Rammohan was appointed as a one-man panel to
probe the Dantewada massacre two days after the
attack.
The panel's terms of reference included determin-
ing the sequence of events leading to the massacre
and analysing and establishing the command struc-
ture of the security personnel there.
46
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
India and Afghanistan on 26 Apr 2010 reiterated
their commitment to the strategic partnership and
expressed satisfaction at the progress in their rela-
tions.
Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai on his first
official visit after his second term Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh and President Pratibha Devisingh
Patil.
Singh, during his talks, cautioned Karzai against a
plan to integrate the Taliban opposed to the emer-
gence of ‘‘a strong, independent and pluralistic Af-
ghanistan’’.
At a joint press interaction with Karzai, who arrived
in India in the morning en route to the South Asian
Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC)
summit in Thimphu,
Singh underlined India’s unwavering commitment
to continuing reconstruction works in Afghanistan
and said repeated attacks on Indians would not de-
ter it from carrying on with this process. India has
pledged $1.3 billion for a slew of reconstruction and
infrastructure projects in Afghanistan.
A vital study cited by Environment Minister
Jairam Ramesh to justify his decision to disallow
the commercial cultivation of Bt brinjal in India is
flawed, claim top European scientists. Mr Ramesh
had referred to the findings of France-based Caen
University professor Gilles-Eric Séralini and his
team, which had branded Bt brinjal—India’s first
genetically modified (GM) food crop—“unsafe”.
Experts claim that Séralini was unduly influenced
by the renowned international NGO Greenpeace—
with its aggressive green agenda—which sponsored
the study, and never carried out a peer-reviewed
laboratory study on GM crops he called hazardous,
including Bt maize and Bt brinjal, its gene or seeds.
The European Food Safety Association, a risk as-
sessment body, has trashed Séralini’s findings on
Monsanto’s MON 863, a variety of Bt maize.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
On February 9, 2010, the Union government decided
to freeze the introduction of Bt Brinjal in India till
independent scientific studies established health and
environment safety of the product to the satisfac-
tion of both public and experts.
Bt Brinjal is a genetically modified vegetable that
is infused with Cry1Ac gene from a bacterium, ba-
cillus thuringiensis, to make the plant resistant to
fruit and shoot borers and certain pests.
The Environment Ministry has appointed a Genetic
Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) to regu-
late research, testing and commercial release of ge-
netically modified crops, foods and organisms. The
GEAC had cleared Bt Brinjal for commercial release
in October 2009. According to GEAC Bt Brinjal
would reduce farmers’ dependence on pesticides and
enable higher yields.
From the 2011 academic ses-
sion, students of Classes XI and
XII across the country will
study a uniform science and
math curriculum. Currently,
course content of these critical subjects varies with
the State school board an institution is affiliated to.
The idea is to have for every student a level playing
field for entry to professional colleges. The govern-
ment has also received the approval of all school
boards—including State boards—to work towards
a single, national-level entrance exam for all engi-
neering and medical courses in India from 2013.
Gradually, such an exam would be extended for en-
try to colleges of other disciplines, such as law.
One test would mean the end of plenty like IIT-JEE,
AIEEE and State exams for engineering colleges and
various State-level PMTs, beside national level
PMT, which the CBSE conducts. This, the Human
Resource Development (HRD) Ministry believes,
would lessen the burden on students, who have to
prepare for different exams, which bring their own
levels of stress.
47
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
India will spare no efforts to con-
tribute to the success of post-
Copenhagen process, Prime Minis-
ter Manmohan Singh declared on
February 6, 2010, as he announced the launch of a
National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency,
aimed at cutting carbon emissions by 99 million
tonnes. Within the ambit of our National Action
Plan on Climate Change, India has already unveiled
one of the world's most ambitious plans for pro-
moting solar energy, targeting an installed capacity
of 20,000 MW by the year 2022. The initiative is
expected to lead to avoidance of capacity addition
of nearly 20,000 MW and reduce carbon dioxide
emissions of almost 99 million tonnes.
On February 17, 2010, the
Supreme Court upheld the
constitutional validity of
courts’ powers to order CBI
probe without the consent of
State governments but with a
rider: the powers should be used cautiously and spar-
ingly. The five-judge Constitution Bench, headed by
Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan, said that such pow-
ers have to be used sparingly in exceptional and ex-
traordinary circumstances in cases having national
and international ramifications. Otherwise, the CBI
will be flooded with such directions in routine cases.
Such powers are vested with the apex court and High
courts to ensure protection of fundamental rights of
citizens under Article 21 of the Constitution, it said.
The proposed Judicial Standards and Accountabil-
ity Bill, which will replace the four decade-old
Judges Inquiry Act, has laid down 14 guidelines for
judges. These guidelines will be called judicial stan-
dards.
No judge shall give an interview to the
media in relation to any of his judgement delivered,
or order made, or direction issued, by him in any
case adjudicated by him.
No judge shall enter into a public debate
or express his views in public on political matters,
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
except views expressed by a judge in his individual
capacity on issues of public interest, other than as a
judge during a private discussion or at an academic
forum.
The Bill bars the judges from allowing
any member of his family, who is a practising law-
yer, from using the residence in which the judge
actually resides or use of any other facilities pro-
vided to the judge, for professional work of any fam-
ily member.
The proposed law expects judges not to
delay delivering a judgement beyond three months
after conclusion of arguments and have bias in judi-
cial work or judgements on the basis of religion,
race, caste, sex or place of birth.
Any wilful breach of judicial standards
could be treated as misbehaviour and lead to a dis-
ciplinary panel initiating proceedings against the
erring judge.
A complaint alleging misbehaviour or cor-
ruption would be referred to a scrutiny panel com-
prising three judges. If the panel finds merit in any
complaint, it would be forwarded to an Oversight
Committee, which after investigating the matter can
refer it to the President for initiating action against
the judge.
In an important step towards the imple-
mentation of the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal, the
Union government is to introduce a Bill to facili-
tate the entry of American companies in the nuclear
sector. The Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill,
2009 is commonly known as the nuclear liability
Bill.
The Bill aims at limiting the liability of a nuclear
plant operator to Rs 300 crore in the eventuality of
an accident and provides for appointing a claims
commissioner with powers of a civil court to arbi-
trate such cases. It also provides for the penalty to
be paid by the operator and not the supplier compa-
nies, which would mainly be American in this case.
The operator would not be liable for any nuclear
damages if the incident is caused by “grave national
disaster of exceptional character”, armed conflict or
an act of terrorism and is suffered by the person on
account of his own negligence.
48
Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
The Bill also provides for the establishment of the
Nuclear Damage Claims Commission, which will
have one or more claims commissioners for a speci-
fied area. The claims commissioner shall have all
the powers of a civil court for the purpose of taking
evidence on oath, enforcing attendance of witnesses,
compelling the discovery and production of docu-
ments and other material objects.
Environment activists have described the attempt
to cap the level of compensation for victims of a
nuclear accident as a violation of fundamental rights.
Currently, the Atomic Energy Act, 1962, allows the
government-owned Nuclear Power Corporation of
India to operate nuclear power plants in the coun-
try.
The Union government has ac-
cepted most of the recommenda-
tions of the Thirteenth Finance
Commission headed by former Fi-
nance Secretary Vijay Kelkar.
The Commission has told govern-
ments at the Centre and States to set their fiscal house
in order, even as it raised the share of taxes that the
States would be entitled to receive over the next five
years by 1.5 percentage points.
In addition, the Commission, a Constitutional body
that is appointed every five years to recommend a
tax-sharing formula between the Centre and States,
has suggested a roadmap for the introduction of a
single-rate goods and services tax (GST), the key
indirect tax reform to create a common market in
India.
Its stringent new roadmap for fiscal responsibility
suggests, among other things, that the overall debt
of the Centre and States be capped at 68 per cent of
gross domestic product (GDP) from the current 82
per cent, and 75 per cent recommended by the
Twelfth Finance Commission.
The Finance Commission has recommended that the
Centre reduce debt to 45 per cent of GDP by March
2015, against 54.2 per cent at present. For States the
reduction in debt is recommended at 2 percentage
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
points to 25 per cent. The relatively less stringent
condition for States comes with the rider that the
Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act
allows the Centre to borrow on behalf of the States
to help them counter macro-economic shocks. Dur-
ing the financial crisis, the Centre had relaxed the
cap on the fiscal deficit.
The Finance Commission has said the Centre should
transfer 32 per cent of the taxes it collects to States,
against 30.5 per cent at present. The overall ceil-
ing— including transfers to local bodies—on trans-
fers from the Centre’s gross revenue has been raised
from 38 to 39.5 per cent.
Among proposals that provide a thrust to fiscal fed-
eralism, the commission has recommended that lo-
cal bodies receive up to 2.5 per cent of the divisible
tax pool. Of this, up to 1 per cent can be incentive-
linked.
While there is more reason for the States to cheer
since the commission proposes an increase in grants,
much of it is tied to specific spending programmes
such as those for elementary education and envi-
ronment. There is, however, a performance incen-
tive of Rs 1,500 crore for Assam, Sikkim and
Uttarakhand and a grant of Rs 51,800 crore to meet
the deficits of Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh
and the north-eastern States (excluding Assam).
Like its predecessor, the Thirteenth Finance Com-
mission has recommended a debt relief scheme for
the States. The first element is to cap the interest
rate on a part of the loans from the National Small
Savings Fund at 9 per cent from up to 10.5 per cent.
This will translate into a benefit of Rs 28,360 crore
to the States. In addition, there is a Rs 4,506 crore
benefit with the government accepting the sugges-
tion to write off central loans that are not adminis-
tered by the finance ministry but were outstanding
at the end of 2009-10.
Including the higher grants-in-aid, Madhya Pradesh,
Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra would be the big-
gest beneficiaries in terms of share of transfers.
Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Jammu and
Kashmir would be the top losers.
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Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
The Finance Commission has projected that tax re-
ceipts would see a compounded annual growth rate
of over 17 per cent between March 2010 and March
2015, while nominal GDP growth is estimated at
13.2 per cent.
Prescribing a zero revenue deficit as the golden rule,
the Commission has recommended that the endeav-
our for all States should be to reach that level by
2014-15.
On February 18, 2010, the Union
government decided to raise urea
prices by 10 per cent. It also allowed
the industry to fix retail prices of other
subsidised fertilisers, while limiting
the government’s subsidy burden un-
der a new policy that will determine
the subsidy on phosphorus and potash based on their
nutrients.
The decision, to take effect from April 1, 2010, will
help the government reduce its fertiliser subsidy bill,
estimated at Rs 50,000 crore for 2009-10. But, the
move will hit farmers, even as fertiliser companies
will stand to gain. The latest decision does away
with the practice of government fixing a maximum
retail price and aims at replacing the current sys-
tem of giving subsidy to the industry with direct
assistance to farmers.
The switch to the nutrient-based fertiliser plan is
significant as companies will now be able to change
retail prices of only nutrient-based fertilisers (ni-
trogen, phosphorus, potash and sulphur), which will
help the government cap the subsidy on these
fertilisers. The move is also expected to attract fresh
investment in the fertiliser industry.
The government’s annual subsidy bill on fertilisers
in 2008-09 was estimated at Rs 75,849 crore, which
was expected to be brought down to Rs 49,980 crore
in 2009-10. The bulk of the increase in the fertiliser
subsidy is on account of the sale of decontrolled
fertiliser with concession to farmers. Urea accounts
for about 30 per cent of the total fertiliser subsidy
burden.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
The Union government has set-up a five-member
committee headed by Justice B.N. Srikrishna to look
into the modalities of forming the separate State of
Telangana. The committee has been given time till
December 31, 2010 to consult all sections of the
society and submit report. The terms of reference
of the committee are:
Examine the situation in Andhra Pradesh with ref-
erence to demand for separate Telangana State, as
well as the demand for maintaining the present sta-
tus of a united Andhra Pradesh.
Review developments in the State since its forma-
tion and their impact on the progress and develop-
ment of different regions of the State.
Examine the impact of recent developments in the
State on different sections of people such as women,
children, students, minorities, OBCs, SC and STs.
Consult all sections of people, especially political
parties and elicit their views on a range of solutions
that would resolve the present difficult situation.
Identify the key issues that must be addressed.
Consult organisations of other civil societies such
as industries, trade unions, farmer organisations,
women students.
Make any other suggestion and recommendations
that the committee may deem appropriate.
The protagonists of separate State, however, rejected
the terms of reference of the Justice Srikrishna com-
mittee and vowed to intensify their agitation. The
Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), which has been
spearheading the statehood agitation, struck a bel-
ligerent note and announced that its MPs, MLAs and
MLCs would resign in protest.
Rejecting the terms of reference and the ten-month
time frame given for the committee, the TRS chief
said the Centre had once again cheated the people of
Telangana by backtracking on its December 9, 2009
statement announcing initiation of the process for
formation of separate State.
Taking serious objection to the inclusion of the de-
mand for continuation of united Andhra Pradesh
among the terms of reference, he said: “what is the
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Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
point in looking into the demand for united Andhra
Pradesh when it already exists now? There is only
one popular movement going on in the State and
that is for separate Telangana State.”
However, the leaders from coastal Andhra and
Rayalaseema regions found comfort in the open-
ended nature of the panel’s terms. “We welcome the
terms of reference, which are fairly balanced. It will
give an opportunity for a thorough assessment of
the ground situation,” a ruling Congress MP from
coastal Andhra region said.
India's candidacy for a non-permanent seat in the
Security Council has been endorsed by all 53 mem-
ber States of the Asian group in the UN General
Assembly. Nineteen countries, including Nepal, Sri
Lanka, Afghanistan and Bangladesh, spoke in favour
of giving India a slot on the Security Council table
from January 2011.
In January 2010, India's path to a non-permanent
seat got cleared after its sole competitor from Asia,
Kazakhstan, backed out of the race.
The Security Council is made up of 15 States—five
permanent members who have the veto power and
15 non-permanent members elected for a two-year
term. To win, India needs two-thirds of the General
Assembly vote, which adds up to about 128 coun-
ties saying yes to India's presence in the Council.
Running after more than a decade, India orchestrated
a year-long campaign led by India’s envoy to the
UN Hardeep Singh Puri, who campaigned in New
York and at multilateral events at the United Na-
tions.
The last time India had a seat at the Council was in
1992. In 1996, Japan won with India trailing behind
with approximately 40 votes.
In a major setback to the Andhra Pradesh
government’s Muslim reservation policy, the High
Court, on February 8, 2010, struck down a legisla-
tion providing four per cent quota for the minority
community in jobs and educational institutions.
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
A seven-member constitutional bench headed by
Chief Justice A.R. Dave found fault with the way
the survey was conducted by the Backward Classes
Commission, whose recommendations had formed
the basis for quota policy.
The State Assembly had passed the legislation in
July 2007 providing four per cent reservation for
socially and educationally backward Muslims by
including them among backward classes. The quota
was made applicable to 15 Muslim groups identi-
fied by the Andhra Pradesh Backward Classes Com-
mission as socially and educationally backward.
These were categorised as BC-E Group for the pur-
pose of providing reservation.
Acting on a bunch of writ petitions filed by several
individuals and organisations challenging the leg-
islation, the court—in a majority verdict—termed
the commission’s survey as “irrational and unscien-
tific” and held the legislation as “unsustainable”.
Maharashtra and West Bengal,
which have been hit by terrorist
and Maoist violence, are among
the seven States that have fared
poorly in modernising their po-
lice force. According to official
documents, put together by the
Home Ministry, Maharashtra and West Bengal have
been labelled as “poor performing States” as they
failed to use the funds sanctioned to them by the
Centre for upgrading their police force and intelli-
gence apparatus.
The Centre earmarked Rs 1,230 crore for 2009-10
for the scheme for modernisation of the State police
forces (MPF), which is meant primarily to equip
State governments to deal with emerging challenges
to internal security like terrorism and naxal vio-
lence.
The poor performing States have outdated and ob-
solete weapons and even the extremist-prone police
stations are often not supplied with modern weap-
ons, and even when it is supplied police personnel
are not trained to use them. Their police communi-
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Section -3 Current Affairs (Current Relevant Facts)
cation network does not function efficiently, they
do not have enough vehicles and their forensic labo-
ratories lack proper infrastructure.
The Basic Capabilities Index (BCI), 2009, has found
that South Asia will get 80 points on the index by
2015, 10 points higher than the present value of 70.
India received 68 points in the index, an increase of
meagre four points since 2004.
The global NGO Social Watch’s index of 130 coun-
tries says 100 points defines well-being of the citi-
zens based on children getting education till pri-
mary level, child mortality rate and percentage of
births attended by skilled labourers. The BCI does
not use income as an indicator.
According to the index, South Asia, a region with
worst BCI in 2004, has been making fast progress,
but the situation is still “extremely critical”. Since
2004, the report said, one-third of the countries
failed to raise their BCI value by more than one per
cent and only one out of six countries showed sig-
nificant progress.
The index also tells about the increasing gap in liv-
ing standards of rich and poor in the world. The high-
est BCI is 97 of Iran and lowest is 44 of Chad in
Africa, followed by Afghanistan, Ethopia,
Bangladesh and Nepal.
Retaining its position as the
world's second largest economy,
the Japanese economy grew at a
faster-than-expected pace of 1.1
per cent in the last three months
of 2009.
China, the fastest-growing large economy, clocked
a growth of 10.7 per cent in the December 2009
quarter, bringing it at a sniffing distance to surpass
Japan as the second largest economy in the world.
Japan’s economy, which is primarily exports-driven,
rose 1.1 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2009. On
an annual basis, GDP expanded a much higher pace
at 4.6 per cent. For the whole of 2009, the Japanese
Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM
economy shrank 5 per cent and is valued at 474.92
trillion yen (about $5.1 trillion). The better-than-
expected Japanese growth in the December 2009
quarter was mainly driven by better exports and ef-
fects of stimulus measures. To bolster the recession-
hit economy, Japan had unveiled stimulus measures
worth over $130 billion.
Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad declared on Feb-
ruary 11, 2010, that Iran had pro-
duced its first batch of 20 per
cent enriched uranium, amidst a
growing view in the West that Tehran is bluffing.
“Iran was now a nuclear State,” Ahmadinejad told a
huge rally of supporters on the 31st anniversary of
the Islamic Revolution. Experts say that once Iran
can enrich uranium to 20 per cent it should move
relatively quickly toward 90 per cent purification,
weapons-grade fuel.
Former U.S. officials and independent nuclear ex-
perts say continued technical problems could de-
lay—though probably not halt—Iran’s march to-
wards achieving nuclear-weapons capability, giv-
ing the US and its allies more time to press for a
diplomatic solution.
While Iran says its nuclear program is entirely
peaceful, Western nations suspect that the country
is intent on developing an atomic bomb.
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