About: 

• Mandate: It is an independent Regulator for pricing of drugs and to ensure availability and accessibility of medicines at affordable prices. 
  
  
• History: It was constituted by a Government of India Resolution in 1997.
  
  
• Parent Ministry: It is as an attached office of the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP), Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers.
  
  
• DPCO: The NPPA regularly publishes lists of medicines and their maximum ceiling prices under the Drug Price Control Orders (DPCO).
  
  
• Headquarters: New Delhi.
  
  

About: 

• What is it? Alzheimer's disease is a progressive disorder that causes brain cells to waste away (degenerate) and die.
  
  
• Causes: The exact causes of Alzheimer's disease aren't fully understood. Scientists believe that for most people, Alzheimer's disease is caused by a combination of genetic, lifestyle and environmental factors that affect the brain over time.
  
  
• Symptoms: The early signs of the disease may be forgetting recent events or conversations. As the disease progresses, a person with Alzheimer's disease will develop severe memory impairment and lose the ability to carry out everyday tasks.
  
  
• Health effects:
  • Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia — a continuous decline in thinking, behavioural and social skills that disrupts a person's ability to function independently.
    
    
  • In advanced stages of the disease, complications from severe loss of brain function — such as dehydration, malnutrition or infection — result in death.
    
    
  
  
  
• Treatment: There is no treatment that cures Alzheimer's disease or alters the disease process in the brain. Current Alzheimer's disease medications may temporarily improve symptoms or slow the rate of decline.
  
  

About: 

• Features: The wearable energy storage device can be stitched on to any fabric. It can deliver power ranging from microwatt to milliwatt. 
  
  
• Mechanism: 
  • The idea is when the supercapacitor is integrated with a piezoelectric energy generator then it will become completely self-sustaining. 
    
    
  • The electrode of the supercapacitor was fabricated by uniformly coating cotton yarn with carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The coating converts the electrical insulating yarn into a metallic conductor thereby behaving like an electrode. 
    
    
  
  
  
• Application: The energy stored in the device can power GPS location-based transmitters or a 1.8 volt LED. When stitched to the fabric, the supercapacitor can be used for powering GPS location based devices or a LED lamp or even charge small electronic devices.
  
  

Recent study:

• The study was carried out by researchers from Nature Conservation Foundation, Mysore.
  
  
• Among the different bird species, hornbills were found to be the most effective seed dispersers. They were found to swallow and disperse most of the fruits they handled. They also removed maximum number of fruits — and therefore seeds — in every visit to a fruiting tree.
  
  
• They swallow the fruit as a whole causing no damage to the seed. They are known to disperse seeds far away from the parent plant (up to 13 km).
  
  
• Plants depend on frugivore birds to disperse the seeds at favourable sites, which have low competition and predation pressures, to expand their geographic range. And so the decline of frugivores could severely affect the ecosystem.
  
  

Pakke Tiger Reserve: 

• Names: Pakke Tiger Reserve, also known as Pakhui Tiger Reserve, is a Project Tiger reserve.
  
  
• Location: It is located in the East Kameng district of Arunachal Pradesh.
  
  
• Neighbouring areas and rivers: Towards the south and south-east, the sanctuary adjoins Nameri National Park of Assam. To the east lies the Pakke River and to the west, the park is bounded by the Bhareli or Kameng River.
  
  

About: 

• It places a near-total ban on the termination of pregnancy — even in cases of rape and incest.
  
  
• Abortions would only be legal if the life of the mother is in danger or the foetus has a fatal condition.
  
  
• Performing an abortion is a crime that could land doctors who perform it in prison for 10 to 99 years.
  
  
• Unlike the doctors carrying out the procedures, women who undergo abortions would not be prosecuted.
  
  

Comment:

• It is the most restrictive abortion Bill in the U.S. 
  
  
• The largest human rights defence organisation in the United States, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), promised to file a lawsuit to block its implementation.
  
  
• But, the Bill’s backers have expressly said they want to bring the case to the Supreme Court. Some Republicans want to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that recognised women’s right to abortion.
  
  
• Several other conservative States are weighing or have recently implemented harsh anti-abortion laws.
  
  

About: 

• Divergence takes place when the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) finds that a lender has under-reported (or not reported at all) bad loans in a particular year and hence asks the lender to make disclosures if under-reporting is more than 10% of bad loans or the provisioning. 
  
  
• Three state-run banks — Union Bank of India, Indian Bank and Central Bank of India — had reported divergence in bad loan recognition while announcing the results. 
  
  
• In all these banks, divergence was spotted for the financial year 2017-18. Higher provisioning for divergence was one of the reasons for them to report losses for the quarter. 
  
  
• Interestingly, divergence was identified not because these banks hadn’t classified the loan as non-performing assets (NPA) but because they were late in classifying them. 
  
  

Background: 

• Climate change is already impacting economies around the world. Several reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warn of risk to economies but so far there’s been no specific assessment of how companies can account for such risks. 
  
  
• In this background, this investor guide was made in line with recommendations by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), a 32-member board formed as a result of an agreement at a G20 summit in London, 2009. 
  
  
• This board consisted of representatives from large banks, insurance companies, asset managers, pension funds, large non-financial companies and credit rating agencies. 
  
  

Key findings of the report: 

• The 1.5°C scenario, exposes companies to a significant level of transition risk, affecting as much as 16% of overall portfolio value of investors which would represent a value loss of $10.7 trillion. 
  
  
• Utilities, transportation, agriculture as well as mining and petroleum refining sectors are at high levels of policy risk. 
  
  
• On the bright side, there was potentially $2.1 trillion as ‘green profits’. However, green revenues generated from the sale of low carbon technologies, which support the transition, will help companies offset costs from complying with greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction policies. 
  
  
• Finally, if governments delay action to enact climate policies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the 30,000 companies in the universe faced a further cost of $1.2 trillion. 
  
  

About: 

• Location: Ultima Thule is a trans-Neptunian object located in the Kuiper belt.
  
  
• Timeline:
  • It was discovered in 2014 by astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope as part of a search for a Kuiper belt object for the New Horizons mission
    
    
  • With the New Horizons space probe's flyby on 1 January 2019, 2014 MU69 became the farthest object in the Solar System visited by a spacecraft.
    
    
  
  
  
• Nomenclature: Its scientific name is (486958) 2014 MU69. It is nickname, Ultima Thule (a Greco-Latin term for a place beyond the known world) was chosen as part of a public competition in 2018.
  
  
• Features of the object:
  • It is a contact binary 31 km long, composed of two joined bodies 19 km and 14 km across that are nicknamed "Ultima" and "Thule", respectively.
    
    
  • With an orbital period of 298 years and a low inclination and eccentricity, it is classified as a classical Kuiper belt object.
    
    
  • It is believed to be the most primitive object in the Solar System, both bodies being planetesimal aggregates of much smaller building blocks.
    
    
  • In color and composition, Ultima Thule resembles many other objects found in its area of the Kuiper Belt. It’s very red – redder even than Pluto. Its reddish hue is believed to be caused by modification of the organic materials on its surface.
    
    
  • There is evidence for methanol, water ice, and organic molecules on Ultima Thule’s surface – a mixture very different from most icy objects explored previously by spacecraft.
    
    
  
  
  

Key findings of the report:

• Sending 1 MB e-mail takes around 25 watts per hour, representing 20 gm of carbon dioxide emissions. It is expected that 293 billion emails will be sent every single day this year and the power will be mostly generated from fossil fuels.
  
  
• The share of greenhouse gas emissions from information and communication technologies (ICT) will rise from 2.5% in 2013 to 4% in 2020. That makes the sector more carbon-intensive than civil aviation (a 2% share of emissions in 2018) and on track to reach automobiles (8%).
  
  
• Apps can quickly drain and shorten the life of phone batteries.
  
  
• Then there are the server farms which require huge amounts of electricity both to run and to power air-conditioning which keeps the equipment from getting too hot.
  
  
• The surge in Video streaming services poses a challenge. In 2017, Greenpeace estimated that the viral K-pop sensation Gangnam Style, viewed more than 2.7 billion times, had consumed a year’s worth of production from a small nuclear power plant.
  
  

About: 

• Names: The South Pennar River is known as Thenpennaiyaru in Tamil and Dakshina Pinakini in Kannada. It is also referred as Ponnaiyar. 
  
  
• Route: 
  • The river originates from the South-Eastern side of the Chennakesava hills and the North-Western side of the Nandi Hills or Nandidurg in the Chikkaballapur district of Karnataka state. 
    
    
  • It flows for a distance of about 85 kilometres within Karnataka, to the north of Bangalore. 
    
    
  • Just before the interstate border, excess water from Bellandur and Vartur lakes in Bangalore flows into the river and then it flows towards south east and enters Tamil Nadu at a distance of 4 kilometres to the west of Pagalur. 
    
    
  • It flows 400 kilometres (km) from its point of origin before joining the Bay of Bengal at Cuddalore district of Tamilnadu. 
    
    
  
  
  
• Chief Tributaries: En route, its chief tributaries are the Chinnar (Markanda nadhi), Vaniyar and Pambaru rivers. 
  
  

Background: North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

• NAFTA is an agreement signed by Canada, Mexico, and the United States, creating a trilateral trade bloc in North America.
  
  
• The agreement came into force on January 1, 1994.
  
  
• According to Donald trump, NAFTA is the “worst trade deal ever made by United States”. Thus, he initiated negotiations to replace it.
  
  
• In 2018, Canada and the U.S. signed on a new free trade pact named USMCA that will include Mexico and will replace the 25-year-old NAFTA. Each country must now follow its domestic procedures before the agreement can be ratified and thus take effect.
  
  

U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA): Salient Features

• USMCA is intended to last 16 years and will be reviewed every 6 years.
  
  
• USMCA gives the U.S. greater access to the dairy markets of Canada. Tariffs of up to 275% have kept most foreign milk out of the Canadian market.
  
  
• If the U.S. imposes a 25% global tariff on car imports, Canada and Mexico will have a quota of 2.6 million cars they can export to the U.S. as a protection for their car industry.
  
  
• Canada managed to preserve the dispute-settlement mechanism as a protection for its wood industry.
  
  
• It also includes stronger protections for workers, tough environmental rules, updates the trade relationship to cover the digital economy and provides tougher intellectual property protections.
  
  
• it also adds provisions to prevent “manipulation” of the trade rules, including covering currency values, and controls over outside countries trying to take advantage of the duty-free market.
  
  

Key findings of the survey:

• The beaches on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands are littered with 238 tonnes of plastic. There are an estimated 414 million pieces of plastic including nearly one million shoes and 370,000 toothbrushes on the beaches of island.
  
  
• As a result of the growth in single-use consumer plastics, it's estimated there are now 25 trillion pieces of ocean plastic debris.
  
  
• The scale of the problem means cleaning up our oceans is currently not possible, and cleaning beaches, once they are polluted with plastic, is time consuming and costly.
  
  
• The only viable solution is to reduce plastic production and consumption while improving waste management to stop this material entering our oceans in the first place.
  
  

Comment:

• According to Jennifer Lavers from the University of Tasmania, Australia, remote islands which do not have large human populations depositing rubbish nearby are an indicator of the amount of plastic debris circulating in the world's oceans.
  
  
• Her research in 2017 revealed that beaches on remote Henderson Island in the South Pacific had the highest density of plastic debris reported anywhere on Earth.
  
  

About: 

• What is it? OPCW is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention, which entered into force on 29 April 1997. It oversees the global endeavour to permanently and verifiably eliminate chemical weapons. 
  
  
• Established in: 1997. 
  
  
• Headquarters: The Hague, Netherlands. 
  
  
• Member states: 193 (All states party to the CWC are automatically members. 4 UN Member States are non-members: Egypt, Israel, North Korea and South Sudan. Of these Israel signed CWC but didn’t ratified it, rest 3 are non-signatories). 
  
  
• Nobel Peace Prize: The organisation was awarded the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize "for its extensive efforts to eliminate chemical weapons with most recent being in Syria civil war". 
  
  
• The OPCW–The Hague Award: It is an annual award founded by the OPCW as a result of their being presented with the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize. The Award honours individuals and institutions that have significantly contributed towards the goal of a world free of chemical weapons. 
  
  

Chemical Weapons Convention: 

• It entered into force on 29 April 1997. 
  
  
• The Convention contains four key provisions: 
  • Destroying all existing chemical weapons under international verification by the OPCW. 
    
    
  • Monitoring chemical industry to prevent chemical weapons from re-emerging. 
    
    
  • Providing assistance and protection to States Parties against chemical threats. 
    
    
  • Fostering international cooperation to strengthen implementation of the Convention and promote the peaceful use of chemistry. 
    
    
  
  
  

About: 

• The drought advisory is issued to states when the water level in reservoirs is 20 % less than the average of live water storage figures of the past 10 years. 
  
  
• Water falls under the state list and the advisory recommends states to use water for drinking purpose only till the dams are replenished. 
  
  
• Central Water Commission (CWC) monitors water storage available in 91 major reservoirs across the country. According to the recent figures released, the total water storage available is 22 % of total storage capacity of these reservoirs. 
  
  
• Recent advisory: The Union Government has issued a drought advisory to 6 states namely Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Tamil Nadu. 
  
  

About: 

• Key stakeholders: Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) Hyderabad, a DRDO Lab, has jointly developed this missile in collaboration with Israel Aerospace Industries. The MRSAM has been manufactured by Bharat Dynamics Limited, India. 
  
  
• Features: These Surface to Air Missiles are fitted onboard the Kolkata Class Destroyers and would also be fitted on all future major warships of the Indian Navy. 
  
  
• Recent trials: The recent firing trial was undertaken on the Western Seaboard by Indian Naval Ships Kochi and Chennai wherein the missiles of both ships were controlled by one ship to intercept different aerial targets at extended ranges. 
  
  
• Significance: 
  • With the successful proving of this cooperative mode of engagement, the Indian Navy has become a part of a select group of Navies that have this niche capability. 
    
    
  • This capability significantly enhances the combat effectiveness of the Indian Navy thereby providing an operational edge over potential adversaries. 
    
    
  
  
  

About: 

• Mandate of Panel: In January, the RBI had set up the five-member panel on deepening digital payments with a view to encouraging digitisation of payments and enhance financial inclusion through digitisation. 
  
  
• Members: Besides Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani, former RBI deputy governor H R Khan, former MD and CEO of Vijaya Bank Kishore Sansi, former secretary in ministries of IT and steel Aruna Sharma and Sanjay Jain, chief innovation officer, Centre for Innovation, Incubation & Entrepreneurship (CIIE), IIM Ahmedabad were also member of the panel. 
  
  
• Way ahead: The RBI will examine the recommendations of the committee and will link the action points, wherever necessary, in its Payment Systems Vision 2021 for implementation. 
  
  

About: 

• Scientific name: Gazella bennettii. 
  
  
• Common name: Chinkara; Indian gazelle. 
  
  
• Distribution: It is native to Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Around 60% of the global population of Indian gazelles is presently found in western Rajasthan. 
  
  
• Habitat: Chinkara live in arid plains and hills, deserts, dry scrub and light forests. They can go without water for long periods and can get sufficient fluids from plants and dew. 
  
  
• Physical Description: 
  • It has a reddish-buff summer coat with smooth, glossy fur. In winter, the white belly and throat fur is in greater contrast. 
    
    
  • Horns are found on both males and females, although they are relatively shorter in females. 
    
    
  
  
  
• IUCN Red List Status: Least Concern. 
  
  

About: 

• Timeline: He was born on May 18, 1048, in Iran’s Nishapur into a family of tent-makers (Khayyam). He died on December 4, 1131, and was buried in the Khayyam Garden. 
  
  
• Name: His full name was Abu’l Fath Omar ibn Ibrāhīm al-Khayyām. 
  
  
• Political advisor: One of the most renowned scholars of his time, Khayyan worked as an advisor and court astrologer to Malik Shah I in Khorasan province. 
  
  
• Poet: Khayyam was famous for his poetry and verses. He wrote more than a thousand ‘Rubaiyat’ or verses. ‘Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam’, a section of work translated by Edward Fitzgerald, became popular in the West centuries after his death.
  
  
• Astronomer: As an astronomer, he designed the Jalali calendar, a solar calendar with a very precise 33-year intercalation cycle. This later became the base of several other calendars.
  
  
• Mathematician:
  • As a mathematician, Khayyam is known for his work on the classification and solution of cubic equations, where he provided geometric solutions by the intersection of conics. He was the first to give a general method for solving cubic equations.
    
    
  • Khayyam also contributed to the understanding of the parallel axiom.
    
    
  • Khayyam also made major contributions to algebra, including penning down ‘Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra’.
    
    
  • He discovered a triangular array of binomial theorem the nth root of natural numbers — his works on this have been lost.
    
    
  • He also wrote ‘Problems of Arithmetic’, a book on music and algebra.
    
    
  
  
  

Recent Research: 

• Brainwaves, specifically, ones called sleep spindles, are fast bursts of electrical activity produced by neurons mainly during Stage 2 sleep, prior to deep sleep.
  
  
• Using medical imaging machines, researchers were able to assess brain activity related to these waves.
  
  
• It's hypothesised that sleep spindles play an important role in transferring information from the hippocampus to the neocortex. This has the effect of increasing the strength of memories.
  
  

Sleep spindles?

• Sleep spindles are sudden bursts of oscillatory brain activity generated in the reticular nucleus of the thalamus that occur during stage 2 of light sleep.
  
  
• Sleep spindles may also be referred to sigma bands or sigma waves.
  
  
• These brainwaves are called sleep spindles because of how they look when printed out on an electroencephalographic (EEG) reading.
  
  
• The EEG shows voltage difference fluctuations, and the lumping together in a close time of a flurry of fluctuations suggests something going on in the brain like a transfer of electrical energy.
  
  
• Researchers believe sleep spindles represent periods of time where the brain inhibits mental processing in order to keep the person in a tranquil state.
  
  

About: 

• The Seshachalam Hills are hilly ranges part of the Eastern Ghats in Andhra Pradesh. In 2010 it was designated as Biosphere Reserve. Seshachalam biosphere is spread over Chittoor and Kadapa districts. 
  
  
• Tirupati, a major Hindu pilgrimage town and the Srivenkateshwara National Park are located in these ranges. 
  
  
• It is home to a number of endemic species including the famous Red Sanders and Slender Loris. 
  
  
• The native population of the reserve includes the tribes of Yanadis.
  
  

About: 

• Under a tripartite agreement, India has agreed to purchase the attack helicopters from Belarus and supply them to Afghanistan. 
  
  
• Earlier, India had gifted four Mi-24 attack helicopters drawn from the inventory of the Indian Air Force and three Cheetal utility helicopters manufactured by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). 
  
  

Comment on bilateral defence relations: 

• According to a US Congressional report on Afghanistan published this month, India has been the largest regional contributor to Afghan reconstruction but has not shown an inclination to pursue a deeper defence relationship with Afghanistan. 
  
  
• US President Donald Trump in his South Asia speech in 2017 encouraged India to play a greater role in Afghanistan's economic development. He, however, never requested any active military assistance from India. 
  
  
• Neither has Afghanistan ever asked for active military support. They have requested for military assistance in terms of training and equipment but never for Indian Forces or Troops in Afghanistan.
  
  
• While Active Military Support in the form of sending troops to Afghanistan by India might seem Strategically Desirable, it is also Logistically Challenging and Tactically it may be a Nightmare initially.
  
  
• Thus other Forms of Military Assistance can be provided by India in the following ways :-
  • Supply of more lethal equipment.
    
    
  • Training of a Special Forces Brigade of Afghanistan.
    
    
  • Training for Afghan Army doctors and medics in the field.
    
    
  • Training of Afghan Women Police.
    
    
  • Increased cooperation in intelligence sharing.
    
    
  • Maintenance of off-road Russian equipment for both Afghan Army and Air Force.
    
    
  
  
  

About: 

• Birth: Iswarchandra Bandopadhyay was born in 1820, in Midnapore district in present day West Bengal a poor Brahmin family. 
  
  
• Education: He studied Sanskrit grammar, literature, Vedanta philosophy, logic, astronomy, Hindu law, English literature and philosophy and received the title of Vidyasagar — Ocean of Learning — at age 21. At the age of 30, he was appointed principal of Calcutta’s Sanskrit College. 
  
  
• Compassion towards poor: He was also the “Daya’r Sagar” — Ocean of Compassion — who literally wept at the sight of the poor and destitute, and is said to have spent his salary and scholarships on their welfare. 
  
  
• Bengali alphabet and language reconstruction: 
  • He reconstructed the Bengali alphabet and simplified Bengali typography so as to reflect contemporary pronunciation. 
    
    
  • His work, Borno Porichoy ("Character Identification"), the Bengali primer, remains even now almost every child’s introduction to learning and writing the language.
    
    
  
  
  
• Campaign against Child Marriage: In a paper written in 1850, Vidyasagar launched a powerful attack on the practice of marrying off girls aged 10 or even younger, pointing to social, ethical, and hygiene issues, and rejecting the validity of the Dharma Shastras that advocated it.
  
  
• Campaign for Widow Remarriage:
  • In 1855, he wrote his two famous tracts on the Marriage of Hindu Widows, showing that there was no prohibition on widows remarrying in the entire body of ‘Smriti’ literature (the Sutras and the Sastras).
    
    
  • On July 16, 1856, The Hindu Widows’ Remarriage Act, known as Act XV, was passed.
    
    
  • Inspired by Vidyasagar, a number of literary men produced dramas advocating the remarriage of widows, in Bengal and elsewhere, especially in Maharashtra.
    
    
  
  
  
• Campaign against polygamy: In 1857 and again in 1866, he petitioned the government for the prohibition of polygamy among Kulin Brahmins. He argued that since polygamy was not sanctioned by the sacred texts, there could be no objection to suppressing it by legislation.
  
  

About: 

• What is it? Skimming is a procedure in which criminals clone ATM cards with stolen data. 
  
  
• The method: 
  • A skimmer is a device designed to look like and replace the card insertion slot at an ATM. 
    
    
  • The skimmers have circuitry that read and store the data on the magnetic strip of an ATM card even as the ATM processes the same data. 
    
    
  • Typically, fraudsters also install pinhole cameras in inconspicuous places like the top of the cash dispenser or just above the keyboard to steal the PIN for the card. 
    
    
  • Days after installation, criminals recover the skimming machines and cameras and collect the stolen data, and decode the PIN for a card. Using stolen data, the criminals clone ATM cards and use it. 
    
    
  
  
  
• Ways to prevent it? Prevention of skimming is possible with – 
  • the alertness of people who load cash in ATMs and bank officials who can spot any illegal devices planted in ATMs; 
    
    
  • posting guards at ATMs; 
    
    
  • installing machines that do not facilitate installation of cameras and skimmers; and 
    
    
  • use of new high-security bank cards that have facilities against theft of data through skimming. 
    
    
  
  
  

Features: 

• Under the proposed merit-based immigration system, permanent legal residency would be given based on points for their age, knowledge, job opportunities and civic sense.
  
  
• The proposals significantly increase the quota for skilled workers from the existing nearly 12% to 57%.
  
  
• Besides, immigrants will be required to learn English and pass a civics exam prior to admission.
  
  
• He proposed moving away from the current system that favours applicants with family ties to the US. He said border security would be beefed up and a tougher line taken on asylum seekers.
  
  
• Under this, foreigners, including hundreds and thousands of Indian professionals and skilled workers, waiting to get Green Cards or permanent legal residency stand to benefit.
  
  

Way ahead: View of Critiques and Experts

• The proposals would have to be approved by Congress where Democrats currently control the lower house.
  
  
• Senior Democrats dismissed his ideas as "dead-on-arrival". They say the proposed new system fails to offer a route to citizenship for so-called "Dreamers" - hundreds of thousands of people brought to the US as children but who still have no legal right to remain.
  
  
• Many business groups are unlikely to be enthusiastic about the proposals because they do not help farmers and other seasonal employers recruit more temporary workers.
  
  
• The White House's plans are also unlikely to satisfy many Right-wing politicians who want an overall drop in immigration numbers.
  
  

Background: Trump’s view on Immigration

• President Trump has always taken a hard line on immigration and during his election campaign made the building of a wall along the Mexican border a key pledge.
  
  
• Earlier this year he declared a national emergency on the US southern border, claiming he needed special powers to build the wall to halt all illegal migration.
  
  

About: 

• Objective of WTISD: To help raise awareness of the possibilities that the use of the Internet and other information and communication technologies (ICT) can bring to societies and economies. 
  
  
• Date of observance: It has been celebrated annually on 17 May since 1969, marking the founding of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the signing of the first International Telegraph Convention in 1865. 
  
  
• 2019 Theme: Bridging the standardization gap. 
  • ITU standards help accelerate ICTs for all Sustainable Development Goals. 
    
    
  • The 2019 theme will allow participation of developing countries in ITU's standards-making process. 
    
    
  
  
  

About: 

• Vesak is an important day for Buddhists around the world. 
  
  
• Other names: It is also known as Buddha Purnimaand Buddha Day. 
  
  
• Significance: The day commemorates birth, enlightenment and Death (or Parinirvana) of Lord Buddha, the founder of Buddhism, all of which is said to take have taken place on the same day. 
  
  
• Date of observance: Vesak, falls on the full moon day (Purnima) of the month Vaishakha (May), hence the occasion is referred to as Buddha Purnima in India. 
  
  
• Recognition by United Nations (UN): The General Assembly, by its resolution in 1999, recognized internationally the Day of Vesak. It was done to acknowledge the contribution that Buddhism made to humanity. 
  
  

About: 

• The 14^th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to Basel Convention was held along with the 9^th meeting of the COP to Rotterdam Convention and the 9^th meeting of the COP to Stockholm Convention in Geneva, Switzerland, from 29 April to 10 May 2019. 
  
  
• The theme of the meetings this year was “Clean Planet, Healthy People: Sound Management of Chemicals and Waste”. 
  
  
• Under the “Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movement of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal”, two important issues were discussed and decided, i.e. technical guidelines on e-waste and inclusion of plastic waste in the Prior Informed Consent (PIC) procedure. 
  
  
• Under the “Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants”, the COP decided to list “Dicofol” in Annex A without any exemption. The “PFOA” was also listed with some exemptions in the Annex A of the Stockholm Convention. 
  
  
• Under the “Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides in International Trade”, two new chemicals (Phorate and HBCD) were added in the list for mandatory PIC procedure in international trade. 
  
  

About: 

• Bodies involved: It is Jointly organized by United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) and the Nippon Foundation. 
  
  
• Objective: The Award recognizes individuals, organizations and initiatives that have contributed to ensure inclusive participation in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) activities for all sections of society, especially the poor.
  
  
• Cash Prize: The Sasakawa Award will give a maximum of US $50,000 to one or more winners. 
  
  
• History: In 1986 the founding Chairman of the Nippon Foundation, Mr. Ryoichi Sasakawa, established the following three prizes –
  • The World Health Organization Sasakawa Health Prize,
    
    
  • The UN Environment Programme Sasakawa Environment Prize and
    
    
  • The United Nations Sasakawa Award for Disaster Reduction.
    
    
  
  
  
• Theme: The theme of the 2019 Sasakawa award was “Building Inclusive and Resilient Societies”.
  
  

Key highlights of the survey: 

• Bullying and sexual harassment are very common in the legal profession. A third of the female respondents and one in 14 men said they had experienced sexual harassment in a work-related context.
  
  
• Sexist and sexually suggestive comments were the most common forms of harassment, while 22 % of sexually harassed respondents had been subject to physical approaches.
  
  
• The US, Canada, Australia, South Africa and Nigeria were the worst countries for sexual harassment, with between 24 and 35 % of respondents saying they had experienced work-related problems. Cultural norms could influence the results, making respondents from countries with a greater awareness more likely to report incidents.
  
  
• 75% of who reported abuse in the survey did not file a complaint.
  
  
• Workplace training is having little or no effect on tackling the issues.
  
  
• The scale of sexual harassment in the legal sector has become clear in recent months, with cases coming to light in countries including the UK, US, India, New Zealand and South Korea.
  
  
• Recently, an in-house committee constituted by Supreme Court of India cleared Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi of sexual harassment charges levelled against him.
  
  

About: 

• What is it? 
  • A sub-solar point is when the sun is directly overhead at a particular latitude. 
    
    
  • When the sun is at the zenith (the highest point in the sky) its rays will be hitting a particular point exactly perpendicular to the surface. 
    
    
  • This will make the shadow of that person/object exactly under him/her/it, making it look like there are no shadows. 
    
    
  
  
  
• When and where observed? 
  • There are two zero shadow days every year in May and July/August, observed in places that lie between tropic of cancer and tropic of Capricorn.
    
    
  • One falls during the Uttarayan (when the Sun moves northwards), and the other is during Dakshinayan (when the Sun moves southwards).
    
    
  
  
  
• How long does it lasts? This phenomenon lasts for a small part of a second, but the effect can be seen for a minute to a minute-and-a-half.
  
  

About: 

• What is it? It is an Indian Public health centre recognized for its pioneering studies on various aspects of nutrition research, with special reference to protein energy malnutrition (PEM). 
  
  
• Parent body: Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). 
  
  
• Location: Hyderabad (On the campus of Osmania University). 
  
  
• Timeline: 
  • National Institute of Nutrition (NIN) was founded by Sir Robert McCarrison in the year 1918 as ‘Beri-Beri’ Enquiry Unit at the Pasteur Institute, Coonoor, Tamil Nadu. 
    
    
  • Later in 1928, it emerged as full-fledged "Nutrition Research Laboratories" (NRL). 
    
    
  • It was shifted to Hyderabad in 1958. 
    
    
  • At the time of its golden jubilee in 1969, it was renamed as National Institute of Nutrition (NIN). 
    
    
  
  
  
• Wings of NIN: The following centres also started functioning at NIN in later years: 
  • Food And Drug Toxicology Research Centre (FDTRC) in 1971. 
    
    
  • National Nutrition Monitoring Bureau (NNMB) in 1972. 
    
    
  
  
  

About: 

• Number of deaths: While India reduced annual mortality among children under five from 2.5 million in 2000 (90.5 per 1,000 live births) to 1.2 million in 2015 (out of 2.5 million live births, or 47.8 per 1,000), it was still the highest in the world. 
  
  
• Disparities among states: There exists large disparities in the child mortality rate between richer and poorer states. 
  • Among the states, the highest mortality rate, in Assam at 73.1 per 1,000, was more than seven times that in Goa’s 9.7. 
    
    
  • Among the regions, the mortality rate ranged from a low of 29.7 per 1,000 (South) to 63.8 (Northeast). 
    
    
  
  
  
• Reasons: Although most under-5 deaths were due to preterm complications, preventable infectious diseases featured prominently as causes of death in higher-mortality states. 
  
  
• Recommendations: India can accelerate its reduction of under-five mortality rates by scaling up vaccine coverage and improving childbirth and neonatal care, especially in states where mortality rates remain high. 
  
  

Key highlights of the study: 

• 1 in 7 babies worldwide are born with a low birthweight. 
  
  
• Rate of decline:
  • Worldwide low birthweight prevalence fell slightly from 17.5% in 2000 to 14.6% in 2015.
    
    
  • At the current rate of progress the world will fall short of the WHO target of a 30% reduction in prevalence between 2012 and 2025.
    
    
  
  
  
• Geographical spread:
  • More than 20 million babies were born with a low birthweight (less than 2500g; 5.5 pounds) with almost three-quarters born in Southern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.
    
    
  • Southern Asia still has almost half of the world’s low birthweight livebirths, with an estimated 9.8 million in 2015.
    
    
  • The problem of low birthweight also remains substantial in high-income countries in Europe, North America, and Australia and New Zealand.
    
    
  
  
  
• Indian scenario: The researchers were unable to arrive at national estimates for India because only partial data were available. However, India has made progress in improving newborn care by building 834 newborn care units in the last decade.
  
  
• Cause:
  • Low birthweight is due to being born too soon (preterm or before 37 weeks of pregnancy) or too small (growth restricted in utero) or both.
    
    
  • Underlying causes include maternal age, both adolescents and older women, infections, obesity or undernutrition, smoking and environmental exposures, as well as multiple pregnancies and non-medically indicated Caesarean sections.
    
    
  
  
  
• Impact of low birthweight: More than 80% of the world’s 2.5 million newborns who die every year are low birthweight. Low birthweight babies who survive have a greater risk of stunting and poor development. 
  
  

About: 

• Features: It is an illustrated codex written in an extinct language. It is written on vellum (240 pages intact, others missing) with text and illustrations. 
  
  
• Timeline: 
  • The Voynich Manuscript was carbon-dated to the 15th century (1404-38). 
    
    
  • The manuscript is named after Wilfrid Voynich, a Polish-Samogitian book dealer who purchased it in 1912. 
    
    
  • It has been with Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library since 1969. 
    
    
  
  
  
• Decoding: 
  • Gerard Cheshire, a researcher at the University of Bristol, has decoded it to identify the language and writing system. 
    
    
  • Reporting his findings in the journal Romance Studies, Cheshire called it the only known example of proto-Romance language (The language used was in use in the Mediterranean during the Mediaeval period). All of the letters are in lower case and there are no double consonants. 
    
    
  • Cheshire found the manuscript was compiled by Dominican nuns as a source of reference for Maria of Castile, Queen of Aragon — an autonomous community in Spain.
    
    
  
  
  
• Way ahead: The next step is to use this knowledge to translate the entire manuscript and compile a lexicon.
  
  

About: 

• Full name: Smart Performance Appraisal Report Recording Online Window (SPARROW). 
  
  
• Implementing agency: The Directorate General of Human Resource Management (DGHRM), the HR arm of Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs (CBIC) is the implementing it. 
  
  
• What is it? It is a project for online writing of Annual Performance Appraisal Report (APAR) for Officers of CBIC. 
  
  
• Officers covered: 
  • Online writing of APARs in SPARROW for IRS (C&CE) Officers has already been implemented w.e.f. 2016-17. 
    
    
  • Now, online writing of APARs in SPARROW has now been launched for over 46,000 Group B & C officers of CBIC. 
    
    
  
  
  
• Significance: This Project leverages modern technology for enhancing the overall efficiency and morale of the huge workforce working in Central GST and Customs formations of CBIC. It is an important milestone in the journey towards digitisation and paper less working. 
  
  

GDS 2019: Global trends 

• Alcohol and tobacco apart, the most used drugs globally were cannabis, MDMA (or Ecstacy), cocaine, amphetamines, LSD (or ‘acid’), magic mushrooms, benzodiazepines, prescription opioids, ketamine, nitrous oxide. 
  
  
• Globally approximately 14% (11,000) reported being taken advantage of sexually while intoxicated in their lifetime. There were no figures from India available. 
  
  

GDS 2019: Findings for India 

• For the first time it polled respondents from India. 
  
  
• Alcohol, tobacco and cannabis were the most common stimulants used by Indians. 
  
  
• Indians reported ‘being drunk’ on an average of 41 times in the last 12 months — behind the U.K., the U.S., Canada, Australia and Denmark in that order but well above the global average of 33 times. 
  
  
• Indians — more than from other nationalities — are seeking help to reduce their alcohol intake. 51% of the respondents wanted to ‘drink less’ in the following year.
  
  
• While 43% of Indians surveyed reported using cannabis but, similar to alcohol use, 51% said they wanted to use ‘less cannabis’ in the following year; more than any other nationality.
  
  

About: 

• Names: The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant - Khorasan (ISIL-K) is known as ISIS-K, ISIS South Asia Branch, Islamic State's Khorasan Province' and 'South Asian Chapter of ISIL'. 
  
  
• Timeline: ISIS-Khorasan (ISIS-K) is a terror group which was formed in 2015 by a Pakistani national and a former commander of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. 
  
  
• Present Status: ISIS-K has links with Al-Qaeda and has been involved in several attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The group has killed over 150 people. 
  
  
• Recent development: The United Nations Security Council's 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee has imposed sanctions on ISIS-K. ISIS-K is now subject to the assets freeze, travel ban and arms embargo. 
  
  

About: 

• Name of the vision document: Payment and Settlement Systems in India: Vision 2019 – 2021.
  
  
• Implementation Period: The bank will implement the approach outlined in this Vision during the period 2019 - 2021. 
  
  
• Core theme of document: Empowering Exceptional E-payment Experience. 
  
  
• Key vision of document: It envisages to achieve "a highly digital and cash-lite society" through the goal posts of competition, cost-effectiveness, convenience and confidence (4Cs). 
  
  
• Background: 
  • The move comes as the RBI expects the number of digital transactions to increase more than four times to 8,707 crore in December 2021. 
    
    
  • Payment systems like UPI and IMPS are likely to register average annualised growth of over 100%, and NEFT at 40%, over the vision period. 
    
    
  
  
  
• Strategy to be adopted:
  • The document talks about creating customer awareness, setting up a 24X7 helpline and self-regulatory organisation for system operators and service providers, among others. 
    
    
  • The 'no-compromise' approach towards safety and security of payment systems remains a hallmark of the vision. 
    
    
  • The approach of the RBI will continue to be of minimal intervention in the pricing of charges to customers for digital payments. 
    
    
  • Interestingly, no specific target has been considered for reducing cash in circulation.