WBCS Current Affairs 18/07/2014 to 09/08/2014 Part 2

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61.India voted in support of a UN Human Rights Council resolution to begin an investigation of Israel’s offensive on Gaza.

62.The new NDA government led by PM Narendra Modi has designed a plan for re-orientation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act or MGNREGA which will now focus on sanitation projects to reduce open defecation, expanding green cover and emphasize on asset-creation.

63.The flagship carrier of the East African nation of Ethiopia has named its newest Boeing 787 Dreamliner after India’s most famous monument- the “Taj Mahal”. The air carrier hopes that it will strengthen already established ties with India with increasing number of Indian travellers.
This is the first time that the airline has named an aircraft of its Dreamliner fleet after a historical or heritage site outside of Africa.

64.The Union Government notified Public Servants (Furnishing of Information and Annual Return of Assets and Liabilities and the Limits for Exemption of Assets in Filing Returns) Rules, 2014.
The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) under Union Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions notified the rules under Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013.
Under the new rules, it has been made mandatory for all Government employees to file declarations of their assets and liabilities and those of their spouses and dependent children.

65.The Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013:
As per the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act 2013 which received President’s assent January 1, 2014, a Lokpal for the Union as well as Lokayuktas for the States will be established in order to inquire the corruption charges against Government officials.
As per this Act, a public servant shall furnish to the competent authority the information relating to the assets of which he, his spouse and his dependent children, jointly or severally, own. The Act also makes it mandatory for a government servant to declare his liabilities and that of his spouse and his dependent children, as per the Act.

66.Taking a significant step towards combating the black money menace, the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) unveiled ‘single global standard’ for automatic exchange of financial account information between jurisdictions.

67.As per the recommendations of a high-level committee set up by the Centre, wages under MNREGA should be equal to or higher than the minimum wage in the state.
According to the report submitted by the seven-member panel, headed by S Mahendra Dev, director of Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research:
The baseline for MNREGA wage indexation from 2014 may be the current minimum wage rate for unskilled agricultural labourers fixed by the states under the Minimum Wages Act or the ‘current MGNREGA wage rate’, whichever is higher.
MGNREGA wage rates must be revised every year on the basis of Consumer Price Index for Rural (CPI-Rural) as the appropriate index.
At present, wages under MNREGA are linked to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and the annual revision is based on the CPI-AL (Agriculture Labour).
The panel was set up to examine whether the Consumer Price Index for Agriculture Labour (CPIAL) is the suitable index for protecting the wages against inflation and what would be the appropriate index for revising MGNREGA wage rates every year.

68.India bagged their first Test victory at the historic Lord’s in nearly three decades as they rode on Ishant Sharma’s inspired spell of fast bowling to flatten England by 95 runs and take a 1-0 lead in the five match series being played in England.
The tall pacer, whose consistency has always been questioned, played a pivotal role as he grabbed a career-best 7 for 74 to bowl out the home team for a 223 chasing a competitive victory target of 319.

69.Prime Minister Narendra Modi has directed that the management of the PM’s National Relief Fund (PMNRF) should emulate the Gujarat model in selection of beneficiaries, giving priority to the poor and children.

70.On his three-day visit to India, the World Bank President Jim Yong Kim arrived in New Delhi. During his visit, he will meet PM Narendra Modi for understanding the development priorities in India. Kim is also scheduled to meet the Union Finance Minister, Arun Jaitley.

71.Contrary to the efforts across the globe to curb child labour, Bolivia has become the first nation to legalize it from age 10. Country’s Congress approved the legislation, and Vice-President Alvaro Garcia inked it into law in the absence of President Evo Morales, who was travelling.
As per the supporters and sponsors of bill, lowering the minimum work age from 14 simply acknowledges a reality: Many poor families in Bolivia have no other choice than for their kids to work. The bill also stipulates safeguards for working children.
Under the legislation, 10-year-olds will be able to work as long as they are under parental supervision and also attend school. The minimum age for a child to work under a contract has been set at 12. They also would have to attend school.
The legislation is also in support of the unionized young workers who marched on Congress to prevent it from ratifying a lower limit of work age of 14.

72.Philipp Lahm, the captain of Germany’s football team, announced his retirement from international football. His retirement announcement comes just five days after Germany led by him bagged its fourth football World Cup defeating Argentina in the final of the 2014 FIFA World Cup held in Brazil.

73.Even as the Philippines was trying to recover from the destruction caused by super typhoon Haiyan last year, another typhoon Rammasun smashed large parts of the Philippines killing one person and forcing hundreds of thousands to take shelter in evacuation centres. Typhoon Rammasun (also known as Glenda) hit south of Manila on the Philippine island of Luzon before moving west toward China’s Hainan Island.

74.In a tragic and shocking incident, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17/MAS17), a commercial aircraft on its scheduled flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, crashed in east Ukraine.
It is suspected to have been shot down with a BUK surface-to-air missile. The aircraft crashed near Hrabove (area under military control of Donbass People’s Militia) in Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine about 40 km (25 miles) from the Ukraine–Russia border.All 283 passengers and 15 crew on board the Boeing 777-200ER airliner died.

75.The Supreme Court has issued notice to all states and Union territories on a plea for legalizing passive euthanasia. The apex court issued the notice on a petition filed with it, saying the question of passive euthanasia (mercy killing) needs a comprehensive examination as there was no authoritative judicial pronouncement on the issue.
A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice RM Lodha, Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar, Justice J. Chelameswar, Justice AK Sikri and Justice Rohinton Fali Nariman issued the notice on a plea filed with it, saying the question of passive euthanasia (mercy killing) needs a comprehensive examination as there was no authoritative judicial pronouncement on the issue.

76.The business leaders of G20 countries held a meeting named Business 20 (B20) Australia Summit in Sydney. They issued a blueprint for G20 leaders to boost economic and job growth and make global economy more resilient to deal with any future impacts. The summit was chaired by Richard Goyder, Managing Director and CEO of Wesfarmers.

77.The 7th IBSA (India-Brazil-South Africa) Summit of 2015 will be hosted by India. The same was announced after a meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and South African President Jacob Zuma in Brazil. The two leaders met on the sidelines of the meetings between the BRICS leadership and leaders from Latin American countries.
Besides, New Delhi would also host the India Africa Forum to be held in December 2014.
IBSA is a trilateral forum of India, Brazil and South Africa with the objective to promote, inter-alia, South-South cooperation and exchange. The platform came into being following a meeting of the foreign ministers of the three nations in Brasilia in 2003, through the adoption of the Brasilia Declaration.

78.Former Rajya Sabha member and veteran leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Mr. Om Prakash Kohli was sworn in as Gujarat Governor. Mr. Kohli’s appointment follows the unceremonious exit of former Gujarat Governor Kamla Beniwal.

79.BRICS group of nations inked a pact to set up a new $100 billion development bank and emergency reserve fund. The agreement to create the bank was signed during the 6th BRICS Summit being held in Fortaleza, Brazil. BRICS group includes Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
To begin with, the bank will start operating with $50 billion in initial capital with the five BRICS contributing $10 billion each.
According to the pact, the capital of the bank will be divided equally among the five participating nations and the headquarters of the same will be in Shanghai, China. The chairmanship of the bank will be rotational and its first President will come from India for the first 6 years. The Bank will also have a regional office in Johannesburg, South Africa.
The governing body of the bank will be formed by BRICS Finance ministers or central banks’ governors to manage the CRA. The BRICS CRA will not be open to outsiders. Initially, the bank will focus on infrastructure projects in the BRICS countries.
Capital contribution from BRICS nations
China: $41 billion
Brazil, Russia and India: $18 billion each
South Africa: $5 billion
Future benefits of BRICS Development Bank:
The creation of the $100 billion development bank will help the developing countries to:
Effectively deal with short term liquidity pressures
Encourage further BRICS cooperation
Complement existing international arrangements
Consolidate the global financial safety net

80.With a view to strengthen bilateral relationship, India and Brazil signed three Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) during the 6th BRICS Summit in Fortaleza, Brazil. The agreement was inked by Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff.

81.After a being declared winner in the recently held and much criticized presidential polls, Bashar al-Assad has been sworn in for a third 7-year term as president of Syria.

82.Karkkidakam, the last month of the Malayalam Calendar is observed as Ramayana month. Temples in Kerala started observing Ramayana month on July 17, 2014. In Malayalam, the month is called the ‘Ramayana Masam’.

83.Russia has offered to host the BRICS Summit for year 2015 in the country’s city of Ufa after the grouping’s successful meeting in Brazil that witnessed a consensus being reached on setting up a development bank and a contingency reserve arrangement.

84.With a view to promote infrastructure development and affordable housing, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), exempted long-term bonds from the mandatory regulatory norms such as the Cash Reserve Ratio (CRR), the Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR) and Priority Sector Lending (PSL) if the money raised is utilized for financing of such projects. The easing of norms comes close on the heels of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s budget speech in which he had said that banks will be encouraged to provide long term loans to infrastructure sector with flexible structuring to absorb potential adverse contingencies, sometimes called as the “5/25 structure”.
As per RBI:
Banks issuing long-term bonds with a minimum maturity of 7 years to raise resources for lending to i) long-term projects in infrastructure sub-sectors, and (ii) affordable housing have been exempted from regulatory pre-emption, such as, the CRR, the SLR and Priority Sector Lending (PSL). Banks are required to keep a portion of deposits as CRR with the central bank and park certain portion in government securities known as SLR.
Banks may use the “5/25 structure” under which bank may fix longer amortization period for loans to projects in infrastructure and core industries sectors, suppose 25 years, with periodic refinancing, say every 5 years.
The objective of these instructions is to extenuate the Asset-Liability Management (ALM) problems faced by banks in providing project loans to infrastructure and core industries sectors, and also to relax the raising of long term resources for project loans to infrastructure and affordable housing sectors.
Banks should issue rupee denominated bonds in ‘plain vanilla form’ without call or put option with a fixed or floating rate of interest.
Affordable housing lending includes loans eligible under the priority sector, and loans up to Rs.50 lakh to individuals for houses costing up to Rs.65 lakh located in the 6 metropolitan cities. For other areas, it includes loans of Rs.40 lakh for houses costing up to Rs.50 lakh.
Realtors’ body CREDAI, appreciated the RBI’s move to ease norms for banks to raise long-term funds for financing affordable housing, saying this would lead to cheaper credit for such projects.
According to the RBI, while banks have been raising resources in a significantly, issuance of long-term bonds for funding loans to infrastructure sector has not gathered momentum at all. Infrastructure and core industries projects have long gestation periods and need large capital investments.
India seeks to invest $1 trillion in infrastructure sector by 2017, half of which is expected to come from the private sector.

85.The 6th BRICS Summit that was held in Fortaleza, Brazil concluded recently. The theme of the Summit was Inclusive Growth: Sustainable Solutions.
The participating nations Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa jointly issued the Fortaleza Declaration.
Fortaleza Declaration key points:
Next BRICS Summit in 2015 will be held in the city of Ufa in Russia.
South Africa to host the 4th meeting of BRICS Competition Authorities in 2015 to improve competition policy and enforcement.
BRICS Information Sharing and Exchange Platform will be set up to facilitate trade and investment cooperation.
Proposal to establish the BRICS Network University underscoring the strategic significance of education for sustainable development and inclusive economic growth.
Agreement for setting up the New Development Bank (NDB) with $100 billion corpus which will distribute the funds equally among all the BRICS nations for mobilizing resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS.
Pact for the setting up of the BRICS Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA) with an initial size of $100 billion to tackle short-term liquidity demands.
MoU on cooperation among BRICS Export Credit and Guarantees Agencies that will build a conducive atmosphere for increasing trade opportunities among BRICS countries.
Efforts will be made by National Institutes of Statistics and the Ministries of Health and Education of BRICS countries towards the development of joint methodologies for social indicators to be incorporated in the BRICS Joint Statistical Publication.
The BRICS pledged to contribute to the G20 goal of lifting our collective GDP by more than 2% over the coming 5 years.
Exploration of new approaches of cooperation in insurance and reinsurance market among BRICS countries will be done to realize the potential and pool capacities.
Cooperative approach on issues pertaining to tax administrations will be continued and cooperation in the international forums targeting tax base erosion and information exchange for tax purposes will be improved.
BRICS urged the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to find ways to implement the 14th General Review of Quotas without further delay so as to ensure enhanced representation of Emerging and developing countries.
The work on the next shareholding review at the World Bank will be initiated as soon as possible in order to meet the agreed deadline of October 2015.
BRICS Economic Cooperation Strategy and a Framework of BRICS Closer Economic Partnership which lay down steps to encourage intra-BRICS economic, trade and investment cooperation.
By the end of 2014 a post-Bali work program will be established for concluding the Doha Round, based on the progress already made and in keeping with the mandate achieved in the Doha Development Agenda, Public Stock-Holding for Food Security Purposes and implementation of the Agreement on Trade Facilitation.
Reaffirmation of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development’s (UNCTAD) mandate as the focal point in the UN system dedicated to consider the interrelated issues of trade, investment, finance and technology from a development perspective
BRICS called for a comprehensive reform of United Nations in line with the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document so as to make it more representative, effective and efficient.
To encourage the convening, at the earliest possible date, of the Conference on the establishment of a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction.
BRICS called for an inclusive and consensus-based multilateral consultations on a draft International Code of Conduct on Outer Space Activities
The proposal for the setting up an Anti-Drug Working Group presented.
Commitment of BRICS to the implementation of the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy has been reiterated.
BRICS also reiterated their commitment to the implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity and its Protocols, with special focus to the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 and the Aichi Targets.
Domestic and foreign bribery will be fought against, and international cooperation, including law enforcement cooperation, will be bolstered in accordance with multilaterally established principles and norms, especially the UN Convention Against Corruption.
South Africa has been congratulated and praised for the full implementation of the eThekwini Action Plan