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Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 10 October 2020

::NATIONAL::

Supreme court questions repatriation of children by NCPCR
The Supreme Court on Friday sought a response from the country’s apex child rights body, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR), to its request to eight States to “produce” children living in care homes before the local child welfare committees for their “immediate repatriation” with their families.

The NCPCR reportedly wrote to Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Mizoram, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra and Meghalaya in this regard. These States together have 1.84 lakh children in care homes. This accounts for over 70% of the children in care homes.

The NCPCR, in a letter on September 24, explained the need for a child to grow up in a familial environment. In an April 6 order, the court directed juvenile authorities to “proactively consider whether a child or children should be kept in the child care institutions considering the best interest, health and safety concerns”.

PM to launch physical property cards under SVAMITVA scheme

Prime Minister NarendraModi will launch the physical distribution of Property Cards under the SVAMITVA Scheme tomorrow through video conferencing to transform rural India and empower millions of people.

The SVAMITVA scheme, which was launched in April this year, aims to provide the record of rights to village household owners in rural areas and issue Property Cards.

The launch will enable around one lakh property holders to download their Property Cards through the SMS link delivered on their mobile phones. This would be followed by physical distribution of the Property Cards by the respective State governments.

These beneficiaries are from 763 villages across six States including 346 from Uttar Pradesh, 221 from Haryana, 100 from Maharashtra, 44 from Madhya Pradesh, 50 from Uttarakhand and two from Karnataka.

::ECONOMY::

RBI announces no change in policy rates

The Reserve Bank of India in its bi-monthly Monetary Policy statement issued today has maintained a status quo keeping the key interest rates unchanged.The reverse repo rate remains unchanged at 3.35 per cent, the repo rate at four per cent.
The Monetary Policy Committee has also decided to maintain its accommodative stance as long as necessary at least through the current financial year and next year as Indian economy is entering into decisive phase in its fight against coronavirus.
In major announcements today, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das proposed that the RTGS system for real time fund transfer to become 24X7 from December 2020.
He said, the RBI stands ready to undertake further measures as necessary to assure market participants of access to liquidity and easy finance conditions.The new housing loans risk weights to be linked to Loan-to-value ratio and also rationalize risk weights for all new housing loans until March 31, 2022.

RBI decides to discontinue system-based automatic caution-listing of exporters

In an effort to provide flexibility to exporters in the realisation of export proceeds, the Reserve Bank has decided to discontinue the system-based automatic caution-listing of exporters.
Addressing a virtual press conference today, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said the decision will also empower exporters to negotiate better terms with overseas buyers.
As part of automation of the Export Data Processing and Monitoring System, the 'Caution/De-caution Listing' of exporters was automated in 2016. Accordingly, the exporters were to be caution-listed automatically, if any shipping bill against them remained outstanding for more than two years.
After contracting for six months in a row, India's exports grew by 5.27 percent year-on-year to 27.4 billion dollars in September while the trade deficit narrowed to a three-month low of 2.91 billion dollars.

::INTERNATIONAL::

UNWFP wins Nobel peace prize

The United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP) won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for its efforts to combat hunger around the world and improve conditions for peace in areas affected by conflict.
“The need for international solidarity and multilateral cooperation is more conspicuous than ever,” Berit Reiss-Andersen, chairwoman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, told a news conference.
She called the WFP a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict, and said the COVID-19 pandemic, which the WFP says could double hunger worldwide, had made it even more relevant.
WFP runs a logistics service that has dispatched medical cargoes to over 120 countries throughout the pandemic to help governments and health partners fighting COVID-19.

Kyrgyz opposition topples government and grabs power

The Central Asian nation of Kyrgyzstan slid deeper into chaos today, as rival opposition factions made grabs for power.
Earlier, the Kyrgyz Central Election Commission declared the results of the parliamentary elections held on October 4 void, amid violent protests.
Meanwhile, United Nations has said that UN Secretary General is closely monitoring the situation in the Kyrgyz Republic, where protests erupted in the aftermath of the October 4 parliamentary elections, reportedly leaving one person dead and over one hundred injured.
The Secretary-General regretted the loss of life and urged all parties to exercise the utmost restraint and refrain from violence.
He urged all Kyrgyz actors to engage in dialogue and agree on a way forward within the constitutional framework.

::SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY::

Genome editing technology wins Nobel prize in chemistry

Two women named Emmanuelle Charpentier of France, and American Jennifer Doudna have been award with the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Charpentier and Doudna were working to develop the technology of genome editing.
The Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) is a technology for genome editing which makes a natural defence mechanism in bacteria in order to get protection from virus attacks.
Cas9 or the ‘genetic scissor’ protein is used to remove the problematic sequence in the DNA strand that is identified through programmed RNA.
But, with this method, problematic sequence might regrow because of auto-repair properties of DNA strand. So, under the CRISPR technology, genetic codes are supplied while the DNA Strand is repairing itself.
The CRISPR technology is not 100 percent accurate so it can alter the genome. Further, there is no any regulatory permission or oversight to regulate the technology. Thus, the technology can be misused.
In that regard, Jennifer Doudna has been campaigning for the development of internationally rules and guidelines for the use of CRISPR technology.

::SPORTS::

Argentina wins over Ecuador in world cup qualifier

Argentina got its World Cup qualifying campaign off to the perfect start on Thursday when Lionel Messi’s early penalty gave it a 1-0 win over Ecuador in a lacklustre match in Buenos Aires.
The Argentine FA piped fan noise around the empty Bombonera stadium and the chants of “Messi! Messi!” were vindicated as early as the 12th minute when he put Argentina ahead from the spot after Lucas Ocampos was fouled inside the penalty area.