Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 04 JULY 2020

SSC CGL Current Affairs

::NATIONAL::

To ensure sufficient availability of critical medical equipment for clinical management of COVID-19 in the country, the Union Health Ministry said on Friday that it had identified a list of critical medical equipment and had requested the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) to ensure its availability at affordable prices..
All the medical devices have been notified as drugs and have come under the regulatory regime of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 and Drugs (Prices Control) Order, 2013, with effect from April 1.
A stakeholders consultation with medical devices industry associations and civil society groups was held by the NPPA on July 1 wherein it was stressed that all the manufacturers and importers of critical medical equipment shall ensure sufficient availability of the same.
The NPPA told the industry that it was not “business as usual” and not the time to profiteer.

Union Power Minister R.K. Singh on Friday said India will not import power equipment from China, saying the sector, being strategic and essential, was vulnerable to cyberattacks.
At a virtual conference with the States, the Minister said equipment imports from China and Pakistan would not be permitted.The State power distribution companies should not place orders with Chinese firms for equipment.
Highlighting the need for self-reliance in the sector, Mr. Singh said the country’s power equipment import bill was about ₹71,000 crore during 2018-19, including purchases worth over ₹20,000 crore from China, even when the country had manufacturing facilities.
As the sector was vulnerable to cyberattacks, Mr. Singh said, the imported equipment would be checked for any malware like Trojan. The Minister said a lot had been achieved in the power sector, including capacity addition of 15,000 MW a year since 2014, and connecting the entire nation through one grid.
India’s grid system was one of the best, as demonstrated during the light-out event on April 5 when the grid handled the steepest fall and climb in demand in a short span of time, he said.

The government has said that buyers' organisations will have to pay one percent interest per month on late payment to vendors for purchases made on the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) platform.
Office of the Union Finance Minister NirmalaSitharaman in a tweet said that in order to promote greater discipline and timeliness in payment to vendors, especially Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises- MSMEs, the government has issued an order to levy interest on late payment.
This will be applicable for all procurements made from 1st of October this year. For procurement made on GeM, buyers are mandated to make payments within 10 calendar days after generation of Consignee Receipt and Acceptance Certificate (CRAC) on the GeM. The Government has been repeatedly emphasising the need for prompt payment to vendors specially MSME vendors.

India has accumulated the world’s fifth-largest foreign exchange reserves at more than $500 billion, making it a bright spot in an otherwise dismal economy.
A strong reserve buffer is a cushion against market volatility, and gives foreign investors and credit rating companies added comfort that the government can meet its debt obligations despite a deteriorating fiscal outlook and the economy’s first likely contraction in more than four decades.
The level of reserves is enough to cover 13 months of imports and is equivalent to nearly a fifth of the country’s gross domestic product. It’s also the fifth-largest in the world after China, Japan, Switzerland and Russia, according to the International Monetary Fund.The level of debt that foreigners are likely to hold, including sovereign bonds, is likely to go up as India works to open its debt market to non-residents. The country is aiming for a 7% weighting in indexes tracked by global investors, with an inclusion likely to attract billions of dollars at a time when public finances are deteriorating.

India and Bangladesh today signed an agreement for the formation of a 50:50 Joint Venture Company (JVC) for LPG business in Bangladesh.
The agreement was signed between the IOC Middle East FZE, Dubai, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and RR Holdings Ltd., Ras Al Khaimah, UAE, the holding company of Beximco LPG of Bangladesh. More from our Dhaka correspondent:
The new Joint venture company set up today takes further the ‘neighbourhood first’ policy of the government of India. The energy cooperation between India and Bangladesh has made big strides in the recent times.

US president Donald Trump has blamed Chinese aggression for the stand-off at the India-China border. Quoting Mr Trump, White House press secretary KayleighMcEnany said, China’s aggressive stance along the India-China border fits with a larger pattern of Chinese aggression in other parts of the world. She said, these actions only confirm the true nature of the Chinese Communist Party.
Mr Trump’s remarks come in the backdrop of Chinese actions both internally as well as across the Asian geopolitical theatre in the past few months.
The White House statement reflected a shaper position that had been evolving in the US administration, especially by secretary of state Mike Pompeo. Earlier on Wednesday, Mr Pompeo offered full-throated support for the Indian ban on Chinese apps.

A vaccine for COVID-19 from India is unlikely to be ready for public use by August 15 but early data on whether it is safe and the proof of its working could be available by then, say clinicians involved with the trial.
The vaccine candidate, called Covaxin, has been developed by the Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech India Ltd (BBIL) which got approvals from the Drug Controller General of India on June 29 for the phase-1 and phase-2 trials.
The trials are done on groups of people and are meant to test if the vaccine is safe on humans and produces protective antibodies. The potential vaccine in question is a SARS-CoV-2 strain sourced from the ICMR-National Institute of Virology.
However a paragraph in Dr.Bhargava’s letter suggested haste and presumption of the vaccine’s protective abilities. “It is envisaged to launch the vaccine latest by 15th August, 2020 after completion of all clinical trials. BBIL is working expeditiously to meet the target, however final outcome will depend on the cooperation of all clinical trial sites involved in this project.”

Sri Lankan police on Friday dropped a match-fixing investigation into the 2011 World Cup final saying they found no evidence of Sri Lankan players letting India win. “We questioned two players and the chief selector and are satisfied with their explanation. The inquiry is now closed,” said a top police official.