Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 17 June 2016

:: National ::

RajasvaGyan Sangaminaugurated by PM

Inaugurating the two-day RajasvaGyan Sangam, Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked senior tax officials to aim for widening the tax net from the present 5.4 crore households to 10 crore households.
The PM’s message was clear: the approach has to be to make it very easy to pay taxes and very difficult to avoid paying them.
In his address, Mr. Modi gave a five-point charter to tax administrators embodied in the word ‘RAPID.’ These are: revenue, accountability, probity, information and digitisation.
He pointed out that while nearly 92 per cent of India’s tax revenue comes from self-assessments, advance tax payments and tax deducted at source, the 42,000 taxmen raise barely 8 per cent through assessments and scrutiny of returns.
Prime Minister asked the officers to ensure their behaviour is “soft” and “sober” and change their attitude so that the “fear of harassment” is erased from the minds of taxpayers.
Mr. Modi said the query “how to pay taxes in India” throws up seven crore responses on Google. Similarly, the search engine gives 12 crore responses to the query “how not to pay taxes in India.”

The three women are set to create history as India’s first women fighter pilots

The three women, in their early 20s, are set to create history as India’s first women fighter pilots when they will be commissioned.
Flight Cadets Avani Chaturvedi from Madhya Pradesh, BhawanaKanth from Bihar and Mohana Singh from Rajasthan are currently undergoing Stage-II training on Kiran Intermediate Jet Trainers at Hakimpet Air Force station in Hyderabad.
Once they pass out at the Combined Graduation Parade Spring Term 2016, the three will begin advanced training on advanced jet trainer Hawks.
It will take another 145 hours on the Hawks for almost a year before they would actually get into the cockpit of a supersonic fighter.
Last October, the government decided to open the fighter stream for women on an experimental basis for five years.

:: International ::

Brexit dominates Eurozone ministers meeting

Eurogroup head JeroenDijsselbloem said that the Eurozone was ready for any of the negative effects of a vote by Britain to leave the European Union.
But, he added: “We have the capacity to deal with any shocks that might occur.”
The 19 Eurozone ministers were meeting in Luxembourg for talks with IMF head Christine Lagarde, but the threat of a vote by Britain to leave the European Union dominated concerns.
French Finance Minister Michel Sapin warned that a British exit from the EU would mainly affect the British people.
The high-octave EU referendum campaign in the United Kingdom ground to a halt with news of the shocking murder of the charismatic Labour Member of Parliament, Jo Cox.
Ms. Cox, a first-time MP, was a vocal supporter of Britain remaining in the European Union (EU).

China criticised U.S. President Barack Obama for hosting the Dalai Lama

China criticised U.S. President Barack Obama for hosting the Dalai Lama at the White House, despite efforts to avoid irking Beijing by holding the meeting off-camera and out of the public eye.
Mr. Obama carried out what has become a political rite in Washington, spiriting the exiled Tibetan religious leader into the White House through the back door— and prompting the usual Chinese denunciations.
Since coming to office, Mr. Obama has hosted the Dalai Lama four times. Each time, Mr. Obama has tried to limit the fallout by holding the meeting behind closed doors. This latest confab took place in the Map Room, not the Oval Office.
In a statement after the meeting, the White House said Mr. Obama had “encouraged meaningful and direct dialogue between the Dalai Lama and his representatives with Chinese authorities to lower tensions and resolve differences”.
But some exiled Tibetans questioned the value of such meetings, urging bolder action from the U.S.

:: Business and Economy ::

Domestic IT spending is expected to reach $7 billion

Domestic information technology (IT) spending in the government sector is expected to grow 3.1 per cent in the year 2016, fuelled by a ‘Digital India’ initiative.
According to a report released by global IT research and advisory firm Gartner the government will spend about Rs.4,700 crore ($7 billion) for various IT products and services.
The forecast by the firm includes expected spending by various governments including State, Centre and local governments in the country.
The IT spending for the year includes internal services, software, IT services, data centres, devices and telecom services.
Gartner predicted that the growth of the software market will be led by growth in the infrastructure.

Regional connectivity subsidy subject to passenger loads

The subsidy provided by the Centre to airlines under the regional connectivity scheme (RCS) may be tapered if the passenger load factor increases to a decent level, according to the new civil aviation policy.
Continuance of VGF [viability gap funding] for a particular route will be subject to appropriate passenger load factor continuously for a prescribed period.
The Centre will subsidise the losses incurred by airlines by flying on the regional routes in a bid to allow them to charge Rs.2,500 to passenger for an hour’s flight.
The Centre will create a regional connectivity fund through a small levy on departure of each flight, as per the policy. While Centre will contribute 80 per cent for the viability gap funding, the rest 20 per cent will come from the states.
In a bid to boost the cargo volumes the freight industry has also been offered a slew of incentives such as zero airport charges and waiving off terminal navigation landing charges.
However, the cargo industry will not be entitled to viability gap funding from the government.
The aviation policy gives a level of comfort to the states by allowing them to charge service tax on 10 per cent of the ticket costs to passengers flying in and out of the airports falling under the scheme.
The draft policy had said that service tax on tickets will be exempted from the RCS.

The government’s draft policy for wind and solar hybrid plants

The government’s draft policy for wind and solar hybrid plants, released for public comments recently, is a good step, but restrictive as it puts a cap on the size of such units.
The policy, which is available on the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy’s website and is open for public comments till June 30, lacks in details relating to tariffs, according to experts.
The draft policy aims to facilitate hybridisation of existing solar or wind systems, besides new hybrid projects. However, it is restrictive in suggesting that hybrid capacity addition, for existing plants.
In wind farms with low turbine density, a significant solar potential could be tapped (even of the order of 500 kW to 1 MW, depending upon plant area), which would require additional transmission capacity.
The main aim of the policy is to lay a framework for promoting large grid connected wind-solar photovoltaic system.
This will be helpful for creating optimal and efficient transmission infrastructure and land, reducing the variability in renewable power generation to achieve better grid stability.
The goal of the policy is to reach a wind-solar hybrid capacity of 10 GW by 2022.
While hybrid systems are viewed as a good step forward for the renewable energy sector as they stand to facilitate the efficient use of both land and transmission infrastructure, the draft policy is not detailed enough when it comes to tariff structures and financial incentives.
The draft policy is not clear about the financial incentives for hybrid systems and merely refers to the existing incentives for solar and wind projects.
The superimposition of wind and solar resource maps shows that there are large areas where both wind and solar have high to moderate potential, according to the policy.

The current account deficit (CAD) for the January-March period narrowed to $ 0.3 billion

The current account deficit (CAD) for the January-March period narrowed to $ 0.3 billion, which is 0.1 per cent of the GDP as compared to $7.1 billion in the preceding quarter and $0.7 billion during the same period of the previous year.
The balance of payments surplus in January-March was $3.3 billion, compared to a surplus of $4.1 billion in October-December.The lower current account deficit is mainly due to contraction in trade deficit.
The contraction in CAD was primarily on account of a lower trade deficit ($ 24.8 billion) than in Q4 of last year ($ 31.6 billion) and $ 34.0 billion in the preceding quarter.
Net services receipts had declined on a year-on-year basis largely due to fall in exports of transport, financial services and telecommunication, computer and information services.
However, net foreign direct investment moderated to $ 8.8 billion in Q4’16 from $ 9.3 billion during the same period of the previous year.
Non-resident Indian (NRI) deposits, though, increased in Q4 of 2015-16 over their level in Q4 last year as well as the preceding quarter.
Portfolio investment recorded a net outflow of $1.5 billion in Q4 of 2015-16, as against a net inflow of $12.5 billion in the corresponding period of last year,primarily reflecting net outflow in the debt segment.
For the full financial year 2015-16, CAD narrowed to 1.1 per cent of GDP as compared to 1.3 per cent a year earlier.
For the full year, trade deficit narrowed to $ 130.1 billion in 2015-16 from $ 144.9 billion.
According to credit rating agency ICRA, the current account deficit could widen modestly from $ 22 billion in FY2016 to $25-30 billion in FY2017, though it will remain about 1.2-1.3 per cent of GDP.

:: Sports ::

Indian fate out of their own hands

India’s hopes of qualifying for the title clash hung in the balance after a 4-2 loss to world champion Australia in their last league outing of the Champions Trophy.
India’s goals came from V.R. Raghunath and Mandeep Singh, but it was too late to threaten Australia, which had gained a stranglehold through strikes from Trent Mitton, Aran Zalewski, Flynn Ogilvie and Tristian White.
Australia topped the league standings with 13 points from five matches, while India finished on seven points, and now awaits the result of the Great Britain-Belgium encounter to know if it will feature in the final or in the bronze-medal match.
Britain, on five points, will bag second spot if it beats Belgium while a victory for the latter will see it draw level with India on points. Then the goal difference will come into play.
A draw will leave the Indians in second place, giving them a place in the final.