Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 03 May 2017

:: National ::

Taking fingerprints is not invasion of citizen’s body says Govt

Taking fingerprints and iris impressions for Aadhaar is not an invasion of a citizen’s body as the right of a person to his own body is not absolute, the government told the Supreme Court.
Bench of Justices A.K. Sikri pointed out that a state can extinguish a person’s life only after following due process of law.
“The state has the duty to maintain the liberty of an individual. The state has, more importantly, the obligation to maintain the dignity of an individual. Dignity is an individual right,” Justice Sikri addressed the Attorney-General.
Mr. Rohatgi defended the legality of a newly-included Section 139AA of the Income Tax Act making Aadhaar mandatory for filing income tax returns and PAN card, saying if one has to live in a collective called the ‘state’, one has to submit to its laws.
The AG was replying to arguments made earlier by senior advocate Shyam Divan that the state does not have the right to force a citizen to part with biometric details without free, informed and voluntary consent.
Mr. Rohatgi said the criticism against the biometric system of identification used in Aadhaar enrolment was based on the “myopic viewpoint of the rich who do not anyway use the public distribution system”.
He said the 113.7 crore Aadhaar cards produced so far were proof that people were eager to enroll. He said even in PAN, though 29 crore PAN cards were produced, there were only five crore assessees.
The rest 24 crore PAN card holders had taken PAN to use it as a unique identity proof.He said duplication of Aadhaar is “non-existent” unlike in PAN.
Mr. Rohatgi submitted that the mandatory linkage of PAN with Aadhaar was a step towards a “more orderly world”.“It is to ensure that tax money goes to serve the poor and will create a better world,” he said.

PM concerned over Changes in Australian visa regulations

PM expressed concern about the possible impact of the recent changes in Australian regulations for the skilled professionals’ visa programme. The two PMs agreed that officials from both sides will remain in close touch on the issue.
This was the first telephone conversation since Mr. Turnbull’s visit to Delhi in the first fortnight of April after which he announced the scrapping of the “457” visa policy that benefited skilled Indian IT workers.
As part of the new policy, the tenure of the visas was to be reduced from four to two years. The notification also announced an increase of visa fees.
Soon after the announcement, India had indicated that the move which came almost simultaneously with a similar step by the U.S. government on the H-1B visas, would impact talks on a trade pact.
Mr. Modi and Mr. Turnbull also discussed the follow-up action taken after the visit of the Australian Prime Minister and the steps required to further strengthen the bilateral ties.

Centre planning to strengthen data protection for Aadhaar

Centre is in the process of educating government agencies that sensitive data must not be made public, and is drafting amendments to the Information Technology (IT) Act to strengthen provisions for data protection and security.
Apart from privacy issues, the new IT law will quell security concerns related to digital payments.
Close to 135 million Aadhaar numbers and 100 million bank account numbers could have leaked from official portals dealing with government programmes of pensions and rural employment.
With Aadhaar being used to authenticate and authorise transactions, the financial risks presented by the disclosure of such data are greatly exacerbated.
As per the CIS report, the data in question has not been treated as confidential at all in several cases and the government agencies in question have, in fact, taken pains to publish them.
Some of the amendments we are bringing to the IT Act should take care of the rest of the (privacy and data protection) concerns relating to Aadhaar,” Ms. Sundararajan said.
The key focus of these amendments being drafted, she said, is strengthening data protection provisions and security, particularly in relation to digital payments.

Extradition process of Mallya started by Govt

A team of senior Central Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement Directorate officials has reached London to brief the British Crown Prosecution Service on the criminal cases pending against industrialist Vijay Mallya.
Mr. Mallya, who has been declared a proclaimed offender by a Mumbai court in a money-laundering case against him, was arrested by the U.K. police in April and released by a court on bail, in accordance with the rules, after a preliminary hearing.
The court fixed May 17 as the next date of hearing, extending an opportunity to the prosecution wing to prima facie prove his involvement in the cases against him in India, as per the provisions of the Extradition Act, 2003.
The CBI has filed two FIRs against Mr. Mallya for alleged wilful default of loans, while the ED has registered a money laundering case and attached assets worth over Rs. 9,600 crore.
The Indian agencies moved a formal request for Mr. Mallya’s extradition on February 8, after the CBI filed a charge sheet against him in connection with the Rs. 900-crore IDBI Bank loan default.
The External Affairs Ministry cancelled the passport on the ED’s request, following which a request for his deportation was made.However, the U.K. turned down the request stating that he had entered the country on valid travel papers.

:: International ::

Hamas has softened its stance on Israel

Hamas has softened its stance on Israel after long calling for its destruction, but the Palestinian movement must do more to convince the world to end its isolation, analysts and diplomats said.
The Islamist movement, which runs the Gaza Strip, unveiled a new policy document on Monday night ahead of a first face-to-face meeting between U.S. President and Palestinian President, whose Fatah party remains at loggerheads with Hamas.
While still attacking Israel, the document accepts for the first time pre-1967 armistice lines as a matter of “national consensus” — in what many interpreted as implicitly accepting the existence of Israel.
Hamas officials, however, said that it did not amount to a recognition of Israel as demanded by the international community.
The document also says its struggle is not against Jews because of their religion but against Israel as an occupier.

:: Science and Technology ::

Large Hadron Collider started again

The world’s largest and most powerful particle smasher Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has restarted circulating beams of protons for the first time this year, following a 17-week-long extended technical stop, CERN said.
Each year, the machines shut down over the winter break to enable technicians and engineers to perform essential repairs and upgrades, but this year the stop was scheduled to run longer, allowing more complex work to take place.
Work this year included the replacement of a superconducting magnet in the LHC, the installation of a new beam dump in the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) and a massive cable removal campaign.
Among other things, these upgrades will allow the collider to reach a higher integrated luminosity — the higher the luminosity, the more data the experiments can gather to allow them to observe rare processes.
Last year, the machine was able to run with stable beams — beams from which the researchers can collect data — for around 49% of the time, compared to just 35% the previous year.
The challenge the team faces this year is to maintain this or increase it further. The team will also be using the 2017 run to test new optics settings — which provide the potential for even higher luminosity and more collisions.

:: Business and Economy ::

Tarang sanchar portal to allay fears due to mobile phone towers emissions

The Telecom Department opened a web portal — ‘tarangsanchar’ — to allay misconceptions and fear of health issues due to Electro-Magnetic Fields (EMF) emissions from mobile phone towers.
Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha said, “some people have been propagating myths and misconceptions” about EMF emissions, adding that the Centre had been making efforts to dispel such myths.
One can check any tower and its EMF signal compliance status, he said.

Fitch kept India’s rating at BBB-

Citing weak fiscal position, U.S.-based agency Fitch kept India’s sovereign rating unchanged at ‘BBB–’, the lowest investment grade with stable outlook assigned to the country more than a decade ago.
The leading rating agency, however, expects India’s growth rate to accelerate to 7.7% in fiscals 2017 and 2018, from 7.1% in fiscal 2016.
The government and some commentators in India have been questioning ratings assigned by global agencies arguing the country’s fundamentals have improved significantly over the last few years, but this had not been taken into account by the rating firms.

Manufacturing activity improved for the fourth straight month

The country’s manufacturing activity improved for the fourth straight month in April on stronger growth of new orders and buoyant domestic demand, but the reading remained unchanged from March.
The headline Nikkei India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index — an indicator of the sector’s performance — showed that the performance in April matched March’s reading of 52.5.
Job seekers in the sector were presented with further employment opportunities, while firms also continued to engage in purchasing activity and scaled up production again. Consumer goods producers registered the steepest expansion.

New IIP series to be used by India

India will unveil a new series of Index of Industrial Production with a base year 2011-12 on May 9 with an aim to map economic activities more accurately.
The new series for Index of Industrial Production (IIP), which captures industrial activities on monthly basis, will be launched.
A high-level panel had firmed up the methodology for the IIP with new base year of 2011-12. Currently, the IIP is calculated on base year of 2004-05.
The change in baseline for the IIP is expected to bring in more accuracy in mapping the level of economic activity and calculating other numbers like national accounts.