Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 13 June 2016

:: National ::

India seeking help from Rusia for NSG

Back from his visits to Washington, Geneva and Mexico City to lobby for India’s entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is now asking Russia for help with the countries still holding out.
He is scheduled to meet with President Vladmir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the SCO summit later this month.
The outreach is particularly important as China continues to maintain that “NSG members remain divided” on the issue of membership, claiming that “many countries within the group share China’s stance.”
Officials expect a final decision may not come till the eve of the NSG meeting in South Korea on June 24, when the Prime Minister is expected to meet Mr. Xi at the SCO in Tashkent.

At least 50 people were killed by a gunman at a gay night club in Florida

At least 50 people were killed by a gunman at a gay night club in Orlando, Florida, in the worst mass shooting incident in the U.S.
The shooter, Omar Mateen, an American citizen of Afghan origin, used to live in Ft. Pierce, Florida, and was killed in the police operation that followed.
The 29-year-old may have been a radicalised Islamist and the investigation will probe that angle too, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
President Barack Obama termed the shooting an “act of terror” and an “act of hate.” Speaking at the White House, Mr. Obama said it’s a “sobering reminder” that an attack on any American is an attack “on all of us.”
According to a report quoting investigators, the shooter called the emergency helpline number 911 and pledged allegiance to Islamic State chief Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi before starting the carnage.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the shooting, the Amaq news agency tied to the group reported. But thus far there is no indication of a direct connection with the IS in terms of training or instruction to carry out the attacks.
Omar Mateen was earlier investigated by the FBI for suspected terror links. The targeted club being a known gathering place of the LGBT community, a homophobia angle too is suspected.

A renewed push for GST will be seen in this session

The portends of a stormy monsoon session of Parliament and a renewed push from the government for the passage of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill have become stronger after the BJP gained three extra seats.
The treasury benches are still short of numbers in the Rajya Sabha, where the Opposition has managed to hold its own.
The party had full numbers for only nine of the 12 seats that it won, but gained three seats (one each from Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Haryana) by working on Independents and non-Congress parties.
Party leaders and union ministers in Allahabad for the BJP’s national executive justified its aggressive poll strategy for these extra seats.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said on several public occasions, including a meeting with Japanese investors in Osaka this month, that he was “reasonably confident” of getting the constitutional amendment on GST through, since “every political party, including the Congress, favours the GST.
He had also said that “every other political party, from the Janata Dal (U) to the Trinamool to the Left in West Bengal and Kerala and the RJD in Bihar was in favour of the GST.”

:: Art and Culture ::

New details of cities hidden near Angkor Wat have been revealed

Unprecedented new details of medieval cities hidden under jungle in Cambodia near Angkor Wat have been revealed using lasers, shedding new light on the civilisation behind the world’s largest religious complex.
While the research has been going on for several years, the new findings uncover the sheer scale of the Khmer Empire’s urban sprawl and temple complexes to be significantly bigger than was previously thought.
Angkor Wat, a UNESCO World Heritage site seen as among the most important in south-east Asia, is considered one of the ancient wonders of the world.
It was constructed from the early to mid 1100s by King Suryavarman II at the height of the Khmer Empire’s political and military power and was among the largest pre-industrial cities in the world.
But scholars had long believed there was far more to the empire than just the Angkor complex.
The huge tranche of new data builds on scans that were made in 2012 that confirmed the existence of Mahendraparvata, an ancient temple city near Angkor Wat.
Much of the cities surrounding the famed stone temples of the Khmer Empire, Evans explained, were made of wood and thatch which has long rotted away.
The new data also maps out the full extent of Mahendraparvata, information that will make future digs much more accurate and less time consuming.
While the Khmer Empire was initially Hindu, it increasingly adopted Buddhism and both religions can be seen on display at the complex.

:: India and World ::

Shanghai Cooperation Agreement may provide route to NSG

The Shanghai Cooperation Agreement is a six-member Central Asian grouping seen as a counterpoint to the U.S.-European military bloc NATO.
Significantly, Mr. Modi called President Putin wishing him on Russia’s national day and confirming the meeting at the SCO.
In a statement, the Kremlin said: “The discussion focused on practical issues of the two countries’ cooperation, including preparations for the top-level contacts to be held shortly.”
While refusing to confirm whether “the practical issues” included India’s NSG membership, MEA sources said Russia has always been “very supportive” of India’s NSG aspirations.
But analysts say Mr. Modi may be hopeful of more: that Russia will use its influence with countries like Kazakhstan and Turkey, who are not yet convinced to back India, and most importantly, as a bridge with China, that has taken a tough position.
Since the Russia-India-China meet which External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj attended in Moscow in April, where the three hammered out an acceptable formulation on the contentious South China Sea.
Since then, India omitted the explicit reference to the South China Sea in the joint statement with the U.S. last week as well.

:: Business and Economy ::

Public sector banks have increased their presence across the country

Public sector banks have increased their presence across the country—in terms of ATMs and points of sale devices—far faster than private sector banks have, recent data released by the Reserve Bank of India shows.
The data—comparing private sector and public sector banks shows that public sector banks have steadily increased their share in most of these parameters over the last four years.
There are 27 public sector banks and 19 private sector banks in operation currently.
The data shows that there were 142,500 public sector banks (PSB) ATMs as of March 2016, which amounts to 72 per cent of the total number of ATMs in the country.
This is a vast improvement over the 58,000 PSB ATMs at the end of March 2012.
Private banks, on the other hand, only increased their number of ATMs from 30,300 in March 2012 to 55,600 at the end of March 2016, effectively seeing their share in the total fall 10 percentage points over the period.
One common view is that this increase in the number of ATMs by PSBs is due to the government-mandated rural financial inclusion programme.
The data supports this, with PSB ATMs making up 86 per cent of all rural ATMs at the end of March 2016, up from 77 per cent in March 2012.
Urban non-metro ATMs for PSBs grew from 62 per cent share in March 2012 to 72 per cent by end of 2015, while the share of private ATMs fell from 37 per cent to 27 per cent. Semi-urban India saw almost the same trend.
Private banks were the first-movers in POS devices (that allow card transactions), having issued 85 per cent of these as of March 2012.
This proportion saw a significant change over four years. PSBs added nearly four lakh POS devices to the market in that time, compared to an addition of about three lakh by the private banks.
This saw the share of public sector POS machines grow from 8 per cent in March 2012 to 34 per cent in March 2016. Private banks’ share fell to 62 per cent.
The issuance of credit cards and the share in credit card transactions are two areas where the private sector outshines the public sector.
There were 195 lakh credit cards in the country as of March 2012, 55 per cent of which were from private banks.
The PSBs increased the number of credit card they issued in this time, but the growth in their market share was only three percentage points, to 20.6 per cent.
Similarly, the private sector accounted for 45 per cent of credit card transactions as of March 2012, which grew to 55 per cent by March 2016.

Real Estate Investment Trusts

REITs are similar to mutual funds. While mutual funds provide for an opportunity to invest in equity stocks, REITs allow one to invest in income-generating real estate assets.
REITs raise funds from a large number of investors and directly invest that sum in income-generating real estate properties (which could be offices, residential apartments, shopping centres, hotels and warehouses).
The trusts are listed in stock exchanges so that investors can buy units in the trust. REITs are structured as trusts. Thus, the assets of an REIT are held by an independent trustee on behalf of unit holders.
The trustee has duties as laid out in the trust deed for the REIT. These typically include ensuring compliance with applicable laws and protecting the rights of unit holders as well.
The investment objective of REITs is to provide unit holders with dividends, usually generated from rental income and capital gains from the profitable sale of real estate assets.
Typically, the trust distributes 90 per cent of its income among its investors by issuing dividends.
REITs originated in the U.S. to give investors an opportunity to invest in income-generating real estate assets. After its introduction in the U.S., several countries such as Singapore, Australia and Hong Kong have implemented REITs.
REITs, as a concept, have been on the horizon for a while now. India’sregulations in 2014 for the sector have not been able to attract investor interest. REITs obtained exemption from dividend distribution tax in the Budget, a step towards making them attractive for the investors.
A report by real estate consultancy firm Cushman and Wakefield estimates that Indian commercial real estate (like office, retail assets) offers investment opportunities for REITs worth $43 billion – $54 billion (Rs, 2.88 lakh crore – Rs. 3.60 lakh crore) across top cities.
The current SEBI guidelines for REITs permitinvestments only in rent-yielding assets.
For investors who are averse to investing in physical purchase of property due to the risks involved, REIT is an alternative. Investors purchase units of REITs which are traded on the stock exchange, as against physical purchase of property.
Therefore, investors can buy and sell units of REIT on the stock exchange as and when required, making investment easier to liquidate compared to physical property transaction.
The minimum required to be put into an REIT is Rs.2 lakh. It could provide an opportunity for investors who, otherwise, do not get the opportunity to invest in commercial real estate because of high capital values.
Since 90 per cent of the profit generated needs to be distributed as dividend in REIT, it could provide a stable income for unit holders.
Short-term capital gain tax is applicable for unit holders at the rate of 15 per cent. While nterest is tax-exempt for REITs, it is taxable for unit holders.
The registration charges for every purchase and sale of property is still applicable. Saraf says such factors can impact the profitability and attractiveness of REITs in India.
REITs units are listed on, and are subject to the vagaries of the stock exchanges, resulting in negative or lower returns than expected.
As in mutual funds, retail investors in REITs have no control over investments and exits being made by the trust.

Exim Bank looking to disburse $10 billion to Africa in the next three years

The country’s premier export finance institution Exim Bank, which is looking to disburse $10 billion to Africa in the next three years.
This is a shift from Exim Bank’s credit disbursal strategy to Africa — which was mainly to help build infrastructure and industrial projects.
India’s strength is in services, especially in sectors such as healthcare, information technology, education and even agriculture-related services. So we want to help in increasing India’s services exports to Africa.”
The change in approach follows the government giving a greater say to Exim Bank in identifying India’s best interests while it promotes economic diplomacy.
Exim Bank has been extending credit to Africa through concessional Lines of Credit, Buyer’s Credit (meant to finance imports of overseas buyers, in this case African buyers, from India) and through other lending mechanisms.
Exim Bank’s new office in Ivory Coast is to service West Africa. It has an office in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) for the Eastern and Central African region, in addition to the one in Johannesburg to take care of the needs in Southern Africa.
Exim Bank has set up Kukuza Project Development Company (KPDC) in Nairobi (Kenya), along with IL&FS Group, African Development Bank and State Bank of India, to ensure greater Indian participation in infrastructure projects in Africa.
The aim now is to kick-start KPDC’s operations by the time Prime Minister Narendra Modi undertakes his African visit in July covering Kenya, South Africa, Mozambique and Tanzania, Mr. Mathur said.
Exim Bank has extended around $300 million to finance the setting up of electric transmission lines in West Africa and is ready to give another $200 million for the same, he said.
India-Africa goods trade in 2014 was around $75 billion with Africa exporting $40 billion to India and India exporting around $35 billion to that continent, according to International Trade Centre data.
This had fallen to about $60 billion in 2015 with Africa exporting $34 billion and India exporting $26 billion, data showed.