About:

• The duration of the scheme will be five years,  from 2023-24 to 2027-28.
  
  
• The five categories of specialty steel which have been chosen in the PLI Scheme are:
  • Coated/Plated Steel Products
    
    
  • High Strength/Wear resistant Steel
    
    
  • Specialty Rails
    
    
  • Alloy Steel Products and Steel wires
    
    
  • Electrical Steel
    
    
  
  
  
• There are 3 slabs of PLI incentives, the lowest being 4 % and highest being 12% which has been provided for electrical steel (CRGO).
  
  

Need of the scheme

• With a budgetary outlay of ₹6322 crores, the scheme is expected to bring in investment of approximately ₹40,000 crores and capacity addition of 25 MT for speciality steel.
  
  
• It is expected that the speciality steel production will become 42 million tonnes by the end of 2026-27.
  
  
• Speciality steel has been chosen as the target segment because out of the production of 102 million tonnes steel in India in 2020-21, only18 million tonnes value added steel/speciality steel was produced in the country.
  
  

About:

• The scheme mainly emphasizes on exclusion of all synthetic chemical inputs and promotes on-farm biomass recycling with major stress on biomass mulching; use of cow dung-urine formulations; plant-based preparations and time to time working of soil for aeration.
  
  
• Under BPKP, financial assistance of Rs 12200/ha for 3 years is provided for cluster formation, capacity building and continuous handholding by trained personnel, certification and residue analysis.
  
  

About:

• The protocol aims to resolve one of the thorniest issues created by Brexit: what to do about the border between Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, and the Republic of Ireland, which remains part of the EU.
  
  
• The protocol sets out a plan to deal with this unique situation. It does so by effectively leaving Northern Ireland half inside the European system, and half inside the British one.
  
  
• The plan means more checks on goods entering Northern Ireland from mainland Britain, effectively creating a border down the Irish Sea and dividing the UK.
  
  

About:

• The institution of Gaon Bura in Assam dates back to the colonial era, when the British appointed the oldest person in the village as the head, who would oversee matters relating to land and revenue in a particular area.
  
  
• The position would usually go to the oldest, most knowledgeable man who had good personal ties with everyone in a village, or a cluster of small villages.
  
  
• In Arunachal Pradesh, too, the Gaon Buras (and Buris) are the most important village-level functionaries.
  
  
• Post-independence, the government continued with the institution and made the Gaon Bura a formal part of the Assam Revenue and Disaster Management department, increasing his responsibilities, and eventually introducing a small honorarium for the role.
  
  

Debate

• The government has reasoned that a number of young men (and women) become Gaon Buras, and thus, the word ‘Bura’ (meaning old in Assamese) is no longer appropriate.
  
  
• While it is yet to be notified, the move has been criticised by several in Assam as an imposition on the culture and language of the state.
  
  

About:

• The judgment relied heavily on the ‘dying declaration’ made by the victim prior to his death.
  
  
• The law presumes that no person will meet their maker with a lie in their mouth. So Section 32 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 deals with cases in which statement of relevant fact is made by a person who is dead or cannot be found.
  
  
• The general rule under Section 60 of the Act is that all oral evidence must be direct — he heard it, saw it or perceived it.
  
  
• The grounds of admission under a dying declaration have been based on two broad rules —
  • one, the victim being generally the only principal eye-witness to the crime; and
    
    
  • two, the sense of impending death, which creates a sanction equal to the obligation of an oath.
    
    
  
  
  

About:

• The US and Germany reached a deal on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline – which significantly increases Europe’s energy dependence on Russia– under which Berlin will respond to stop Moscow should the latter use the strategically critical gas system as political leverage.
  
  
• In 2015, the Russian energy major Gazprom and five other European firms decided to build Nord Stream 2, valued at around $11 billion.
  
  
• The 1,200-km pipeline will run from Ust-Luga in Russia to Greifswald in Germany through the Baltic Sea, and will carry 55 billion cubic metres of gas per year.
  
  
• The under-construction pipeline will run along with the already completed Nord Stream 1 system, and the two together will supply an aggregate of 110 billion cubic metres of gas to Germany per year.
  
  
• The pipeline falls in the territory of EU members Germany and Denmark, and is about 98% complete.
  
  

About:

• GIBs are the largest among the four bustard species found in India, the other three being MacQueen’s bustard, lesser florican and the Bengal florican.
  
  
• GIBs’ historic range included much of the Indian sub-continent but it has now shrunken to just 10 per cent of it.
  
  
• Among the heaviest birds with flight, GIBs prefer grasslands as their habitats.
  
  
• Being terrestrial birds, they spend most of their time on the ground with occasional flights to go from one part of their habitat to the other.
  
  
• They feed on insects, lizards, grass seeds etc.
  
  

About:

• The Cabinet also approved the creation of one post of Managing Director, for the corporation in the pay scale of Rs.1,44,200- Rs.2,18,200 level.
  
  
• The authorized share capital of the Corporation will be Rs.25 crore and recurring expenditure will be around Rs. 2.42 crore per year.
  
  
• It is a new establishment. Presently, there is no such similar organization within the newly formed UT of Ladakh.
  
  
• It is being developed on the lines of the Andaman & Nicobar Islands Integrated Development Corporation Limited (ANIIDCO), with an appropriate mandate to take up various developmental activities as per the specific needs of Ladakh.