Current Affairs For SSC CGL Exam - 28 January, 2014

Current Affairs For SSC CGL Exam

The escalating political crisis in Ukraine has cast a deep shadow over Russia’s relations with Europe.
In a blunt display of their irritation with Moscow, the European leaders have curtailed their summit with President Vladimir Putin, truncated its agenda and cancelled a traditional dinner for the Russian leader.
What was to be a two-day biannual summit in Brussels has been cut to just three hours of talks , with Mr. Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov sitting across the table from European Council president Herman Van Rompuy, European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso and EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton.
Russia and the EU have blamed each other for the crisis in Ukraine, triggered by the decision of President Viktor Yanukovych to ditch an EU free trade and association pact last November in favour of building closer ties with Russia.
After two months of largely peaceful protests against Ukraine’s U-turn, violent clashes erupted in the capital Kiev last week, leading to the death of at least three protesters and one police officer.

Right-wing and left, opponents to the Aadhaar project appear bunched together in two distinct formations as they separately seek to scuttle a project that aims at providing every citizen a unique identity number for targeted benefits from the government.
Six groups have filed cases in the Supreme Court against UIDAI, the unique identification authority. These have been filed during the last one year; the UPA-II government had set up UIDAI in 2009 and issued the first Aadhaar numbers in September 2010.
Several of the arguments overlap but what sets two petitions apart from the remaining four is that the former’s objections are based on right-wing principles and the latter’s on left-wing ones.
A petition by Justice (retired) Puttaswamy and Parvesh Khanna, and another by Maj. Gen. (retired) S G Vombatkere and Bezwada Wilson, both raise an objection identical to what the the BJP has been raising — that the project has no preventive to block illegal immigrants or non-citizens from getting an Aadhaar number.

The Supreme Court is going to take up petitions filed by Centre and rights activists seeking review of its verdict declaring gay sex an offence punishable up to life imprisonment.
A bench of justices HL Dattu and SJ Mukhopadhaya will take up the petition in chamber to decide whether the verdict needs to be re-looked or not. Seeking stay on the operation of the judgement, gay rights activists, including NGO Naz Foundation, said thousands from the LGBT community became open about their sexual identity during the past four years after the high court decriminalised gay sex and they are now facing the threat of being prosecuted.
They submitted that criminalizing gay sex amounts to violation of fundamental rights of the LGBT community. The NGO submitted there are a number of "grave errors of law" and "wrong application of law" in the judgement which needs to be corrected.
Amid huge outrage against the judgement, the Centre also filed a review petition in the apex court. The Centre sought review to "avoid grave miscarriage of justice to thousands of LGBT" persons who have been aggrieved by the apex court judgement contending it is "unsustainable" as it "suffers from errors". While setting aside the July 2, 2009 judgement of the Delhi High Court, the apex court had held that Section 377 (unnatural sexual offences) of the IPC does not suffer from the vice of unconstitutionality and that the declaration made by the high court is legally unsustainable.

India turned the match on its head in the last two minutes to secure a cherished gold in basketball at the Lusofonia Games 2014.
Tied 67-67 against Angola and with just two minutes on the clock, India left the visitors gasping for breath with some inspiring play as they finished 77-70 at the Shyam Prasad Mukherjee Indoor Stadium in Taleigao.
India deserved every bit of the gold, the country's first involving teams from outside the sub-continent for as long as anyone can remember. They dominated three quarters of the match, and after being down 50-53 going into the final quarter, the hosts overcame weariness, both physical and mental, to emerge champions.
Joginder, India's big-shots player, was the star of the day, accumulating 18 points, 15 of them through three-pointers. Then there was Bhriguvanshi, whose 17 points came at a time when the team needed it the most.
In the women's category, Mozambique were in a league of their own as they thumped Angola 73-49 to clinch the gold medal. India, who lost to both Angola and Mozambique in the group stage, had to settle for the bronze medal, finishing just ahead of bottom-placed Macau.

South Korea's Olympic badminton gold medallist Lee Yong-dae has been hit with a one-year ban for missing doping tests, said the Badminton World Federation (BWF) .
The 25-year-old won mixed doubles gold at the 2008 Games in Beijing and a bronze medal in the men's doubles in London four years later. Another Korean player, Kim Ki-jung, was also banned for one year.
The ban was effective until Jan. 23, 2015, the federation said in a statement, meaning the players would miss the Asian Games in Incheon later this year.

Former Indian cricket captain Rahul Dravid announced his association with GoSports Foundation with an aim to contribute towards the development and mentorship of Indian junior Olympic and Paralympic athletes.
Dravid will join the Board of Advisors of sports non-profit organisation and will also institute the 'Rahul Dravid Athlete Mentorship Programme'.
The mentorship will involve Dravid and his team of experts personally advising select high-potential athletes at key phases in their careers, and also providing them access to scientific expertise, performance and injury management, and allied professional services, so as to provide specific and meaningful support to their young careers.
Dravid joins 2008 Olympic gold medallist Abhinav Bindra on the Foundation's Board of Advisors.