Current Affairs of 13th June For IAS And WBCS Examination

Indian Geography

Lower Subansiri Hydroelectric Power Project

• Context: The state-owned hydropower operator NHPC Ltd. will begin trial runs for the Lower Subansiri project soon.
• Lower Subansiri Hydroelectric Power Project:
• It is the largest hydroelectric project ever constructed in India.
• It is a run-of-the-river system on the Subansiri River.
• The project is located near North Lakhimpur on the Arunachal Pradesh-Assam border.
• Capacity:2000MW
• It is a concrete gravity dam that stands 116 meters above the riverbed.
• The National Hydro Power Corporation (NHPC) is in charge of its development.
• The following are the most important facts regarding the Subansiri River:
• It is the main tributary of the Brahmaputra River and originates on the Tibetan Plateau.
• Because of its high topographic variety, this river could be used to generate hydropower.
• Gravity dam:
• Gravity dams are constructed of concrete or stone masonry. By using only the weight of the material and its resistance against the base to oppose the horizontal pressure of water pushing against it they are built to hold backwater.
• These are built to be stable and independent of the rest of the dam.

Mayon volcano

• Context: Approximately 13,000 people have recently been evacuated from the northeast Philippines as the country’s most famous volcano, Mayon, continues to erupt with lava.
• Mayon Volcano:
• It is an active volcano in southeastern Luzon, Philippines.
• Because of its symmetry, it is known as the world’s most perfect volcanic cone.
• It is located in the Pacific Ring of Fire zone, which is a huge area in the Pacific Ocean basin where many earthquakes and volcanic eruptions occur.
• Ring of Fire:

• The Ring of Fire, also known as the Circum-Pacific Belt, is a path along the Pacific Ocean that has been characterised by active volcanoes and frequent earthquakes.
• It is primarily caused by Plate Tectonics, in which the enormous Pacific Plate interacts with less dense plates surrounding it.
• The majority of Earth’s volcanic eruptions and earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire. The Alpide belt (which spans from the Mediterranean region eastward through Turkey, Iran, and northern India) is the next most seismically active region (5-6% of earthquakes).
• Geographical Stretch of Ring of Fire:
• The Ring of Fire stretches for approximately 40,000 kilometers (24,900 miles), along the boundary of numerous tectonic plates, including the Pacific, Juan de Fuca, Cocos, Indian-Australian, Nazca, North American, and Philippine Plates.
• The chain stretches across the western coasts of South and North America, across the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, down the eastern coast of Asia past New Zealand, and into Antarctica’s northern  coast.
• Some of the important places in the ring of fire include Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico, the United States, Canada, Russia, Japan, the Philippines, Australia, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, New Zealand, and Antarctica.
• Features:
• Active volcanoes: More than 450 active and dormant volcanoes (75% of Earth’s total volcanoes) form a semicircle or horse shoe around the rim of the Pacific Ocean in the Ring of Fire. The majority of the Ring of Fire’s active volcanoes are found on its western edge, from Russia to New Zealand.Name of some important volcanoes:
• The Mount Tambora of Indonesia
• Mount Ruapehu in New Zealand ,
• Krakatoa, an island volcano
• Mount Fuji, Japan’s tallest and most famous mountain, is an active volcano in the Ring of Fire.
• Mount St. Helens, in the U.S. state of Washington,
• Earthquakes:
• 90% of earthquakes occur along its path, including the most powerful and dramatic seismic events on the world.
• The Ring of Fire has been the site of some of the most deadly earthquakes in recorded history, including the 1960 and 2010 Chile earthquakes, the 1964 Alaska earthquake, the 2011 Japan earthquake, and the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
• Island Arcs:
• Island Arcs are long, curved chains of oceanic islands linked by significant volcanic and seismic activity as well as orogenic (mountain-building) activities.On its concave side, an island arc usually has a land mass or a partially enclosed, unusually shallow water.
• Trenches:
• Ocean trenches are deep depressions in the ocean where an old ocean crust from one tectonic plate is pushed beneath another, creating mountains, causing earthquakes, and forming volcanoes on the seafloor and on land.
• The Mariana Trench, the deepest ocean trench, is located within the ring of fire. It’s a 7-mile-long trench.
• The Philippine Trench, Challenger Trench, Kuril-Kamchatka Trench, Peru-Chile Trench, and Tonga Trench are among the other trenches in the region.
• The following are the causes of frequent earthquakes and volcanism:
• The Ring of Fire is formed by tectonic plates, which are massive slabs of the Earth’s crust that fit together like pieces of a puzzle.
• These moving plates sometimes collide, move apart, or slide next to one other, resulting in the establishment of convergent, divergent, or transform borders (respectively).
• This ongoing collision, diversion, or sliding-past-each-other movement of tectonic plates causes deep ocean trenches, volcanic eruptions, and earthquake epicenters along fault lines, which are the boundaries where the plates meet.
• Volcanoes are formed by the process of subduction, and the majority of the planet’s subduction zones are located in the Ring of Fire.
• The boundary between the Pacific and North American Plates is a notable exception. This section of the Ring of Fire is a transform boundary, which means that plates move sideways past one another. As strain in the Earth’s crust builds up and is released, this type of boundary causes a huge number of earthquakes.

Art and Culture

Menhir and Megalithic burial sites

• Context: The Tamil Nadu Department of Archaeology recently recognized five’menhir’ (single stone) and megalithic burial sites in Kodumanal in Erode district as protected monuments.
• The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) began the first dig at Kodumanal in 1961, which is located on the northern banks of the Noyyal. In the 2021 Budget, the State government announced that Kodumanal would be declared a protected archaeological site.
• Findings:
• Potsherds containing names inscribed in Tamil-Brahmi script were found in a large number, apart from Roman silver coins, precious stones and quartz.
• Semi-precious stone beads, bangles, copper, silver, iron, and terracotta are among the items unearthed during the excavations.
• Megalith:
• A megalith is a massive stone used to build an ancient construction or monument, either alone or  together with other stones.
• Megaliths were built as burial sites or as commemorative (non-sepulchral) memorials.
• The former are sites with actual burial remains, such as dolmenoid cists (box-shaped stone burial chambers), cairn circles (stone circles with defined peripheries) and capstones (distinctive mushroom-shaped burial chambers found primarily in Kerala).
• The urn or the sarcophagus containing the mortal remains was usually made of terracotta. Memorial sites such as menhirs are examples of non-sepulchral megaliths.
• Archaeologists in India trace the majority of the megaliths to the Iron Age (1500 BC to 500 BC), though some sites precede the Iron Age, extending up to 2000 BC.
• Megaliths can be found all throughout the Indian subcontinent. The majority of megalithic sites are found in Peninsular India, primarily in Maharashtra (primarily in Vidarbha), Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana.
• Different Types of Megalithic Structure:
• Stone Circles: Stone circles are commonly called “cromlechs” (a word in the Welsh language)
• Dolmen: A dolmen is a megalithic structure formed by placing a massive  capstone on two or more support stones, forming a chamber below, that is occasionally closed in on three sides. It is often utilized as a tomb or burial chamber.
• Cist: A cist is a small stone-built coffin-like box or ossuary used to store the dead’s bodies. Burials are megalithic structures that are structurally similar to dolmens. There were single- and multiple-chambered cists.
• A monolith is a single standing stone from prehistoric periods. Sometimes  synonymous with “megalith” and “menhir”; for later periods, the term monolith is more likely to refer to single stones.
• Capstone style: Single megaliths set horizontally, often over burial chambers, with no support stones.

Defence News

Exercise Ekuverin

• Context: The joint military exercise “Ekuverin” between the Indian Army & the Maldives National Defence Force has commenced at Chaubatia, Uttarakhand from 11 to 24 June 2023.
• Exercise Ekuverin:
• It is the 12th edition of an India-Maldives joint military exercise.
• Ekuverin which means ‘Friends’ is a bilateral annual exercise held alternatively in India and Maldives.
• The exercise aims to improve interoperability in UN-mandated counter-insurgency/counter-terrorism operations, as well as cooperative humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations.
• The goal is to share best practices and improve tactical coordination and collaboration between the two forces.
• The defence cooperation between the two countries extends from joint exercises to supporting the Maldives with defence training and equipment requirements.
• In economic, cultural, and military collaboration, both countries enjoy very close and friendly relations.
• ‘Ex Ekuverin’ will help to strengthen these ties between the two countries.

Government Scheme

Poshan Tracker App

• Context: Using the Poshan Tracker App for mobile phones, almost 57,000 migrant workers have enrolled for the special one nation, one Anganwadi program.
• Poshan Tracker App:
• This program provides a 360-degree view of Anganwadi Centre (child care centers) activities, service delivery by Anganwadi Workers, and complete beneficiary management for pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers, and children under the age of six.
• It also digitizes and automates physical registers used by workers to improve work quality.
• For efficient service delivery, Anganwadi personnel are given cellphones purchased through the Government e-Market (GeM).
• A nodal person has also been assigned to provide technical help and resolve any issues with downloading and using the new Poshan Tracker application in each state.
• According to the sources, any migrant worker who had registered in their current state could go to the nearest Anganwadi in their present location and take use of the initiatives and services available.
• The Ministry of Women and Child Development (MoWCD) launched it.
• Poshan Abhiyaan:
• It was inaugurated by India’s Prime Minister on March 8, 2018, and has been essential in ensuring public engagement and bringing the nutrition discourse to the forefront.
• It was introduced to promote nutritional outcomes in a holistic manner.
• The Abhiyaan aims to eliminate stunting, undernutrition, anemia (among early children, women, and teenage girls), and low birth weight by 2%, 2%, 3%, and 2% every year.
• POSHAN Abhiyaan strives to ensure service delivery and interventions by the use of technology, behavioral change through convergence, and the establishment of specified targets to be met across several monitoring parameters.
• Abhiyaan focuses on the nutritional status of adolescent females, pregnant women, breastfeeding moms, and infants aged 0 to 6.
• The initiative attempts to minimize the amount of stunning, undernutrition, anemia, and low birth weight in children by the use of technology, convergence, and community involvement with a focused strategy.

Social Issues

Global Slavery Index 2023

• Context:According to the Global Slavery Index 2023, as many as 50 million people were living in “modern slavery” on any given day in 2021.
• Global Slavery Index 2023:
• It is the fifth edition of the Global Slavery Index, and it is based on estimates for 2022.
• The index depicts modern slavery on a worldwide scale.
• It is constructed by Walk Free, a human rights organisation and is based on data provided by the Global Estimates of Modern Slavery, which, in turn, is produced by the International Labour Organization (ILO), Walk Free, and International Organization for Migration (IOM).
• Key highlights:
• According to the Global Slavery Index 2023, an estimated 50 million people were living in modern slavery on any given day in 2021, a ten million-person increase from 2016.
• This indicates that one out of every 160 individuals worldwide is a victim of modern slavery.
• It assigns a ranking to 160 nations based on the estimated prevalence of modern slavery per 1,000 people.
• The countries with the highest prevalence : North Korea (104.6), Eritrea (90.3), and Mauritania (32.0), where modern slavery is widespread and often state-sponsored.
• The countries with the lowest prevalence : Switzerland (0.5), Norway (0.5), and Germany (0.6), where strong governance and effective responses to modern slavery are evident.
• Asia and the Pacific have the most people in modern slavery. (29.3 million)
• India has the prevalence of 8. (Estimated proportion of population living in modern slavery per thousand people).
• Modern slavery:
• It refers to exploitative situations in which a person is unable to refuse or leave due to threats, violence, coercion, deception, or abuses of power.
• It is an umbrella term and includes a whole variety of abuses such as forced labour, forced marriage, debt bondage, sexual exploitation, human trafficking, slavery-like practices, forced or servile marriage, and the sale and exploitation of children.

Science and Technology

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe

• Context: NASA’s Parker Solar Probe discovered that “coronal holes” in the sun’s atmosphere are the source of fast solar wind, which is generated during rapid realignment of magnetic fields.
• Findings:
• The probe discovered that coronal holes, which are darker, cooler regions that open in the sun’s outer atmosphere, are shaped like “showerheads” made up of mostly evenly spaced material funnels.
• The rapid solar wind is produced by magnetic reconnection within funnel structures in coronal holes.
• The significance of the discovery is that scientists can now better predict solar storms that might disrupt Earth’s communication and power infrastructure by tracking the solar wind back to its origin.
• Solar storm:
• A solar storm is a disruption on the Sun that causes a substantial quantity of energy to be released in the form of solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), or high-speed solar winds. These occurrences have the potential to disrupt the Earth’s magnetosphere, resulting in geomagnetic storms that affect communication networks, power grids, and satellite operations.
• Parker Solar Probe:
• Parker Solar Probe is a historic mission, flying into the Sun’s atmosphere (or corona) for the first time.
• It is set to fly into the sun’s corona at a distance of 3.8 million miles from the surface, which is seven times closer than any other mission.
• Coming closer to the Sun than any previous spacecraft, Parker Solar Probe will employ a combination of in situ measurements and images to achieve the mission’s principal scientific goal: to understand how the Sun’s corona is heated and how the solar wind is accelerated.
• This mission will transform our understanding of the formation and evolution of the solar wind.
• The mission’s primary scientific goals:
• To monitor the flow of energy, analyze the heating of the solar corona, and explore what accelerates the solar wind.
• Determine the structure and dynamics of the plasma and magnetic fields at solar wind sources.
• Study the role of dusty plasma near the Sun in the generation of solar wind and solar energetic particles.
• Explore strategies for accelerating and transporting energetic particles.
• Significance of the Study:
• The Sun, as a dynamic and magnetically active star, is far more complex than meets the eye.
• The Sun’s atmosphere constantly emits magnetized material, which encircles the Solar System far beyond Pluto’s orbit and affects every country along the way.
• Solar wind, a continuous flow of charged particles that penetrates the solar system, is generated by the corona.
• Unpredictable solar winds disrupt our planet’s magnetic field and can disrupt communications systems on Earth.
• The results of the mission will allow scientists to predict changes in the Earth’s space environment.

Important One-Liner:

• International Albinism Awareness Day is observed yearly on June 13th to raise awareness about Albinism, a genetic skin disorder, and to promote Albinism rights and regulations on a global scale. This year’s theme is “Inclusion is Strength,”.
• The 12th edition of the “Ex Ekuverin” joint military exercise between the Indian Army and the Maldives National Defence Force has begun in Chaubatia, Uttarakhand. This bilateral annual exercise, which translates as “Friends” in Maldivian, aims to improve interoperability in Counter-Insurgency/Counter-Terrorism Operations under UN mandate.
• Uruguay beat Italy 1-0 to win its first Under-20 World Cup title held in Argentina.
• Silvio Berlusconi, the billionaire media mogul who served as Italian prime minister multiple times between 1994 and 2011, has died.
• Among India’s 550 Parliamentary Constituencies, Udhampur-Doda Parliamentary Constituency stands out as one of the most developed. The constituency is a brilliant example of development, with its exceptional improvement and comprehensive growth.The constituency is a model for success because of its notable achievements in infrastructure, education, healthcare, and economic growth.
• In terms of both value and volume of transactions, India has emerged as the global leader in digital payments for the year 2022. The data from MyGovIndia, the government’s citizen engagement portal, reveals India’s dominant position in the digital payment landscape, highlighting the country’s robust payment infrastructure and extensive usage of digital modes.
• Since May 2021, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B) in India has cracked down on over 150 websites and YouTube-based news stations. These steps were taken in response to the creation of “anti-India” content that violated Section 69A of the Information Technology (IT) Act. The Ministry aims to combat misinformation and safeguard India’s sovereignty and integrity.
• The Indian government and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) have signed a $130 million loan deal to assist efforts in Himachal Pradesh targeted at raising agricultural production, expanding irrigation access, and promoting horticulture agribusinesses. In seven regions across the state, the project aims to increase farmers’ income and resilience to climate change.
• Moody’s Investors Service has forecasted a growth rate of 6-6.3% for India’s GDP in the June quarter.
• A documentary named ‘When Climate Change Turns Violent’ won a special prize in the ‘Health for All’ category at the 4th Annual Health for All Film Festival, which was hosted at the World Health Organization headquarters in Geneva. Vandita Saharia of Rajasthan directed the documentary.
• The Ministry of Finance announced that the Central government had given the state governments the third installment of tax devolution totaling Rs. 1,18,280 crore.
• In collaboration with the NITI Aayog, World Bank, Korean-World Bank, and Korean Economic Development Cooperation Fund (EDCF), the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) announced the launch of mission EVOLVE (Electric Vehicle Operations and Lending for Vibrant Ecosystem) to provide financial support for micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) involved in the electric vehicle space.
• The Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is set to move from associate member to affiliate member of the International Social Security Association (ISSA). Now the EPFO will get access to professional guidelines, expert information, services, and assistance for its pension subscribers .
• The Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education (HBCSE) in Mumbai has launched Vigyan-Vidushi – 2023, an effort targeted at establishing gender parity in the area of Physics at the PhD level. This program brings together 40 female students from various institutes across India who have just finished their first year of an MSc in Physics. The program’s goal is to provide them to advanced physics courses and inspire them to conduct innovative experiments.