Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 07 November 2015

:: National ::

Inclusive reforms will make life better, says PM

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that India's performance on all economic parameters, including inflation and foreign investments, was now better than when his government assumed office 17 months ago.
The question is reforms for what…is the aim just to achieve higher GDP growth rates or to bring about transformation of society…then the question is reforms for whom…to impress groups of experts or achieve higher ranks in inter-national league tables…theanswer is reforms which will help all citizens especially the poor…it should be sabkasath, sabka vikas…reform to transform.
Mr. Modi was the first Prime Minister to attend the Delhi Economics Conclave in its six-year history.
He also said the government had brought back as much as Rs. 10,500 crore of the black money stashed away abroad and that the JAM (Jandhan, Aadhar and Mudra) initiatives were all about “achieving maximum values for every rupee spent, maximum empowerment and maximum technology penetration among the masses.”
What we have done in the last 17 months is to bring one hundred and ninety million people into the banking system,Now these millions are part of our banking system, and words like ‘interest rate' have a meaning for them.
Under the Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana, he said, banks provided more than six mil-lion loans to small businesses for a total value of nearly Rs. 38,000 crore or six billion dollars. If one conservatively estimated that each loan created two jobs, he said, his government had already laid the foundation for 12 million new jobs.
“Even Rs. 2,00,000 crore invested in the corporate sector would not produce this many jobs.”

Now , 0.5% cess on services to support Swachh Bharat

The government on Friday imposed two new levies — a 0.5 per cent Swachh Bharat Cess on all services, now liable to service tax and a 2 per cent regional connectivity cess on international air travel and flights between metros and big cities.
The Swachh Bharat cess will be effective from November 15, said an official re-lease. The proceeds from this cess will be exclusively used for Swachh Bharat initiatives. The decision will in-crease the service tax outgo on insurance premiums, air fares and cell phone bills.
“This is not another tax but a step towards involving each and every citizen in making contribution to Swachh Bharat,” the government said.
The scheme provides for viability gap funding (VGF) from the government for operating small aircraft to small towns with a fare cap of Rs. 2,500 per hour of flying.
The government estimates that with the increased allocation for Swachh Bharat Abhiyan con-sequent to the collections from the cess, it will be able to prevent diseases. At present, an estimated Rs.6,700 crore or about Rs.60 per capita is spent annually on health.

Control room for daily review of air pollution

The Union Environment and Forests Ministry has announced that it will set up a control room in the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) immediately to undertake daily review of air pollution levels and monitor the air quality in Delhi-NCR.
The move, announced on Friday, comes in the wake of the thick smog that has engulfed the city in the past few days. The level of PM 2.5 — minute, toxic particles – in Delhi's air has been several notches higher than the safe permissible limits.
The Ministry has directed all State governments to submit three-month reports to the Centre on the steps taken to reduce air pollution and improve the ambient air quality.

Rail ticket cancellation charges hiked

The Indian Railways has again revised the re-fund rules, doubling the cancellation charges and reducing the window time for cancellation of tickets with effect from November 12.
As per the new rules, no re-fund would be granted for confirmed tickets if they are cancelled after four hours be-fore the scheduled departure of the train, as against the existing rule (June 25) of 50 per cent refund if the tickets were cancelled before two hours after the actual departure of the train, as per the Commercial Circular 64 issued by the Railway Board on Friday.
The minimum cancellation charges have been fixed at Rs. 240 for AC I/ Executive class (Rs. 120), Rs. 200 for AC II/First class (Rs. 100), Rs. 180 for AC III/ AC chair car (Rs. 90), Rs. 120 for sleeper class (Rs. 60) and Rs. 60 for second class (Rs. 30).
If reserved tickets are cancelled after 48 hours and up to 12 hours of the scheduled departure, 25 per cent of the fare is deducted while giving the refund while 50 per cent of the fare is deducted if ticketsare cancelled within 12 hours and up to four hours of the scheduled departure, both subject to minimum cancellation charges.

Greenpeace's registration cancelled

The Registrar has further accused the Executive Director of the society of making completely irrelevant and in-valid statements, aimed at procrastination.
It further stated that the decision had come at a time when several international leaders, including the United Nations Secretary General, upheld the importance ofcivil society in healthy democracies.
Greenpeace India, on its part, termed the notice as the latest assault on free speech in India.

:: International ::

Countries met only half of emissions target: UN report

The message from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Emissions Gap report launched on Friday in Geneva is clear. Only a dynamic Paris climate agreement in December can help keep global warming under the 2°C threshold, as the current levels of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to be cut by 2030 — 11 gigatonnes — is only about half of the total required.
This is even if all conditional and unconditional In-tended Nationally Deter-mined Contributions (INDCs) of countries submitted by October 1 are fully implemented, as emissions will still be 12 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (GtCO2e) beyond the level that gives a likely chance of limiting global temperature rise to 2°C this century.
Ahead of the U.N. climate meeting to commence in December, the UNEP report provides a sense of the scaleof the task lying ahead of countries to curb global warming. It shows that the 119 INDCs submitted so far represent GHG emission reductions in 2030 of 4 to 6 GtCO2e compared to what the emissions would be under the current policy trajectory.
The report notes that 2030 projections based on current policies are them-selves 5 GtCO2e lower than the estimate of 65 GtCO2e by the Inter-governmental Pan-el for Climate Change (IPCC) fifth assessment re-port, which assumed no additional climate policies, put in place after 2010.
The report has a special chapter on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+), a U.N. programme focussing on opportunity for climate change mitigation through forest-related actions in developing countries, and finds the theoretical potential of reducing forest loss and restoring forests could be as high as 9 GtCO2e/yr in Africa, Asia and the Pacific and Latin America and the Caribbean combined.

:: India And World ::

Putin halts Russian flights to Egypt

An analysis of black boxes from the Russian plane that went down in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula last Saturday point to a bomb attack, sources close to the probe said on Fri-day, even as Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to suspend all Russian flights to Egypt after a recommendation by his chief of intelligence.
The flight data and voice re-corders showed “everything was normal” until both failed at 24 minutes after takeoff, pointing to “a very sudden explosive decompression,” one source said. The data “strongly favours” the theory a bomb on board had brought down the plane, he added. Another source said the plane had gone down suddenly and violently.
The suspension, covering all of Egypt, is even more sweeping than that imposed by Britain, which had halted flights to Sharm el-Sheikh only. The U.S. and Britishleaders have stopped short of a categorical assignment of blame in the crash, but Prime Minister David Cameron said on Thursday it was “more likely than not” that the cause was a bomb.
The UN chemical weapons watchdog on Friday confirmed with “utmost confidence” that mustard gas was used in Syria in August during fighting between rebels and jihadists and “likely” killed a child.
Experts from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons also found toxic chemicals, including chlorine, were likely used as a weapon in an attack in Idlib province in March, the OPCW said in statement. Three reports have been sent by the head of the OPCW to the body's 192 members.

Trans Pacific trade pact text triggers fresh debate in U.S.

The release of the bulky text of the 12-nation Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement — it has 30 chapters and numerous annexure and related instruments — has triggered a fresh round of domestic de-bate in the U.S. on how it would impact the country.
Getting Congressional approval for the pact will be a challenge for Barack Obama, during his last year in White House, as dozens of lawmakers remain sceptical about it.
The TPP has implications for India, too, as experts have predicted the possibility of the proposed pact leading to trade diversions from India. TPP will cover 40 per cent of the global commerce, and will ease trade among the participant countries — Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the U.S. and Vietnam.
At least 10 presidential candidates are opposed to the deal, including Republican Donald Trump, who has de-scribed the deal as “horrible for America.” Hillary Clinton, who was initially a supporter, has turned critical in recent months. Neither Mr. Trump, nor Ms. Clinton commented after the text was released. Opponents and advocates of the deal have contradicting interpretations on how thiswill affect ordinary people.

:: Economy ::

‘Comfortable' with interest rates, says Rajan

India's central bank governor Raghuram Rajan said on Thursday that he was comfortable with current interest rates of 6.75 per cent but would stay ‘accommodative.'
Mr. Rajan was speaking in a televised debate with the government’s Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian, who prodded the RBI governor to take into account wholesale price inflation in monetary policy decisions.
Wholesale inflation fell for an 11th consecutive month in September, leading to calls for the RBI to cut interest rates even further after already easing them by 125 basis points to 6.75 per cent so far this year, including a larger than expected 50 bps cut in late September.
Mr. Rajan and the government have enjoyed a respectful relationship, although there have been differences between the two sides. The RBI is not statutorily independent from the government, although its central bankers enjoy broad autonomy.

SBI books 25 % rise in second quarter profit

State Bank of India (SBI), India's largest lender, beat expectations with a 25 per cent rise in quarterly standalone profit at Rs.3,879 crore against Rs. 3,100 crore in the year-ago period and a drop in its closely monitored bad debt ratio, predicting an improvement ahead.
The non-interest income jumped 35.58 per cent to Rs.6,197 crore from Rs.4,571 crore, primarily boosted by a hefty Rs.485 crore repatriation of profits from its foreign operations, which on an average con-tributes to a fourth of the bank's business.
Analysts in the sector have been watching for signs that credit quality is stabilising in India. State-owned banks that dominate the industry have been grappling with their worst bad debt burden in a decade, after years of liberal lending and slow credit growth. Friday's earnings provided room for optimism.
SBI, whichhas been tightening scrutiny of borrowers and increasing fund recovery efforts, said gross bad loans as a proportion of total loans dipped to 4.15 per cent in July-September from 4.29 per cent in the previous three months.
In a further sign of improvement, SBI said it saw a faster growth in mortgage and auto loan books, helping it offsetslower loan growth to small companies and bolstering its plans to hit a loan growth target of 14 per cent for the year ending in March.

:: Sports ::

Heena Sidhu wins thriller against Gundegmaa Otryad

Heena Sidhu pipped Olympic silver medallist Gundegmaa Otryad of Mongolia by 0.2 point for the women's air pistol gold in the Asian shoot-ing championship in Kuwait City on Friday.
Heena captured the gold in a thrilling fashion despite shoot-ing eight 9s on the last 10 shots of the final. It was the second successive gold for Heena following the Asian Air Gun championship last month. She also managed to push the London Olympics gold medallist Kim Jangmi of Korea to the bronze.
There were more gold medals for India through Angad vir Singh Bajwa in junior men's skeet. Angad along with the bronze medallist Anant Jeet Singh Naruka and fourth-placed Arjun Mann won the team gold, 27 points ahead of Kuwait.