Current Affairs legalIssues:

Every sexual crime incident is an interesting news item for media- both print and electronic. When an international school principal is involved as an accused in such a crime where he was arrested for alleged rape of a 11th class student of 17 years, the TV channels showed building shots of all the international schools of Hyderabad unmindful of the fact they are suggesting that those schools also are dangerous for the girls. A case of rape and criminal intimidation has been booked against Salahuddin Ayub, Principal of Parkwood International School at Manneguda near Vikarabad on the outskirts of Hyderabad (Times of India, Hyderabad Newsreport, 22nd July, 2010). While the parents of the girl from Mumbai alleged that she was repeatedly raped by the principal during the last one year, the school authorities denied claimed that they were aimed at defaming their popular school, which has branches in the Middle East.

Clarification in the matter of registration of a political party (YSR Congress Party) under section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951

NIRVACHAN SADAN, ASHOKA ROAD, NEW DELHI – 110001

No.ECI/PN/25/2010                                                            Dated:9th July, 2010

Subject: Clarification in the matter of registration of a political party (YSR Congress Party) under section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

Attention of the Commission has been drawn to reports in some section of media that a new party by the name of ‘YSR Congress Party’ has filed an application with the Commission for its registration as a political party. It is clarified that an application in the name of ‘YSR Congress Party’ for its registration under section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 by one Shri Mahaboob Basha was received in the Commission on 13.11.2009. Shri Mahaboob Basha is mentioned as the president of the proposed party and the address of the proposed party is D.No.7/2(A), Chila Kala, Bavi Street, Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh – 516001. According to the application the party (association) was formed on 18.09.2009. Registration as a political party is granted under section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. As per sub-section 2(b) of aforesaid section 29A, the application shall be made within 30 days next following the date of formation of the association or body.

Current Affairs India and world:

India and the US have signed an agreement on reprocessing of American nuclear spent fuel by India, marking the final steps in terms of implementation of the landmark civil nuclear deal between the two countries.

Upon entry into force, the arrangements and procedures will enable reprocessing by India of the US obligated nuclear material at a new national reprocessing facility to be established by India, dedicated to the reprocessing of safeguarded nuclear material under International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. The agreement in this regard was signed Friday by the US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs William Burns and Indian Ambassador to the US Meera Shankar, at the Foggy Bottom headquarters of the State Department.

The reported payment of big sums of money by the Commonwealth Games Organising Committee to an obscure British based company seems to be a case of high level corruption. The Organising Committee is reported to have paid around Rs. 1.68 crore (2,47,467 pound) to a company, A. M. Films. It is further alleged that this company is receiving 25,000 pounds every month.   More than Rs. 3 crore  has so far been paid to this company. The British government has already pointed out various irregularities in the contract with the company.

Q1. What is an Electronic Voting machine? In what way its functioning is different from the conventional system of voting?

Ans. An Electronic Voting Machine consists of two Units – a Control Unit and a Balloting Unit – joined by a five-meter cable. The Control Unit is with the Presiding Officer or a Polling Officer and the Balloting Unit is placed inside the voting compartment. Instead of issuing a ballot paper, the Polling Officer in-charge of the Control Unit will press the Ballot Button. This will enable the voter to cast his vote by pressing the blue button on the Balloting Unit against the candidate and symbol of his choice.

Lalu Prasad’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has been derecognized as a national party by the Election Commission, a decision that comes ahead of the Assembly polls in Bihar. Five other parties also lost their recognition as a State party.

Election Commission sources said on Friday that while the parties may retain their symbol, they would lose facilities like utilizing All India Radio and Doordarshan for poll-eve broadcasts and free copies of electoral rolls. The RJD which is a recognised party in Bihar, Jharkhand, Manipur and Nagaland lost its national party recognition following its poor showing in Jharkhand where the party has been derecognized.

TRS candidates emerged victorious in eleven of the twelve assembly constituencies in Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh where the by-polls were held recently and the BJP retained the lone seat held by it.

The TRS nominees won from the five assembly constituencies whose results were announced in the early hours Saturday. In Huzurabad, TRS candidate E Rajendra defeated his nearest TDP rival by a margin of 55,360 votes. In Koreatla, TRS candidate K Vidyasagar Rao won by a margin of 45,895 votes against his Congress rival J Ratnakar Rao.

Speech of Dr. S.Y. Quraishi, Election Commissioner of India at the Seminar on Paid News organized by EGI and IWPC on 13th March, 2010

“Like most of you I too have grown with news. I have found news as essential in the conduct of my professional and personal life. Over the decades, the approach to news both from providers and receivers has changed quite a bit. But these changes have largely related to presentation and formats. But news has remained news. In the increasingly competitive world of media, we have come across terms like morning news, evening news, prime-time news, headline news, latest news and more recently breaking news. But, paid news? This coinage does not fall within the nationality of news even by the farthest stretch of imagination. In fact, it represents the epitome of anti-news. If you allow me to remove the layer of politeness provided by English language, the Hindi equivalent could be “ Kharidi Hui Khabar”, or “Bikau Khabar” or even something more outrageous, depending on the accuracy that a better translator can bring in. Paid news is downright unethical, and sinister.

CRYING NEED TO CUSTOMISE AVAILABLE TECHNOLOGIES FOR HOMELAND SECURITY

Current Affairs Technology :

As low intensity conflicts, terrorism and Insurgency take centrestage as the wars of the future, there is a crying need to customize technology and products already on the shelf to meet the needs of homeland security. New R&D initiatives in collaboration with the academia and industry with the government (user) need to be taken expeditiously to bridge the technology gaps to counter the emerging threats, Dr. V K Saraswat, Scientific Advisor to Raksha Mantri & Secretary, Defence R & D, declared.

funds allocated for Commonwealth Games:Current Affairs Sports

The details of funds allocated for Commonwealth Games till date by  the

Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports are:

Current Affairs Foreign Affairs

A 45 million Pound partnership between Department of Bio-Technology, Government of India and Wellcome Trust, UK has been announced to support the development of innovative healthcare products at affordable costs. Two other new India-UK joint research projects – “Bridging the rural/urban divide” to provide technological solutions to improve the quality of life of rural inhabitants in both countries and multi disciplinary research partnerships to develop the next generation of environmentally friendly fuel cell technologies were also discussed when Sh. Prithviraj Chavan, Minister for Science and Technology met David Willets, Minister of State for Universities and Science, UK, in New Delhi last evening.

Current Affairs Foreign Affairs

Union Minister of Power, Shri Sushilkumar Shinde, and the Minister of State for Energy and Climate Change of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Mr Greg Barker, met today in New Delhi for bilateral discussions.  Among other issues of mutual interest, they discussed the question of industrial energy efficiency, and considered areas where bilateral collaboration could help inform analysis and future work on both sides.  They agreed that officials from their respective ministries should take forward enhanced cooperation in the following areas:

Current Affairs India

Forecasting oceanographic parameters (both in surface and subsurface) at different time scales is extremely important for a wide spectrum of users ranging from the weathermen to fishermen, and from the navy to the off-shore industries.  Currently, Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) is forecasting the waves in the Indian waters as well as over the Indian Ocean.  Recently, INCOIS has brought up a new system for the forecasting of the dynamic and thermodynamic features of the Indian Ocean. The new Indian Ocean Forecasting System (IOFS) is the first of its kind in the country and the set-up of the system is being developed indigenously at INCOIS. Initially the 6 hourly forecasts of SST, surface currents, MLD and depth of 20oC isotherm (as an indicator of thermocline depth) will be made available for 5 days in advance.

Current Affairs Technology

Apple Computers has emerged as the world’s most valuable brand in the 50 Top valuable brand list of the Forbes magazine. “This (Apple) is a company that has faced setbacks before and bounced back to become the world’s most valuable brand–worth USD 57.4 billion,” Forbes said, explaining the company’s number 1 position in its Top 50 world’s most valuable brands 2010 list.

Current Affairs Industry

The production of crude steel in  India has increased in the year 2009-10 in comparison to the year 2008-09. However, percentage of growth of steel has declined marginally in the year 2007-08 and 2008-09 in comparison to the year 2006-07. Following is the details of production of crude steel in the country: -

Current Affairs Technology.

The Government has come to know through Telecom Service Providers that approximately 2150 cases of misuse of mobile cloning through duplication of subscriber identity in different parts of country have come to their notice during 2009-10. Cloning of subscriber identity takes place by duplication of SIM (Subscriber Identity Modules) in GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) and R-UIM (Removable User Identity Module)/ESN (Electronic Serial Number) & MIN (Mobile Identification Number in CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) Networks, which gives the subscriber an identity and telephone number.

currentAffairs Infrastructure

So far, 281 major/medium projects have been funded under Accelerated Irrigation Benefits Programme (AIBP) of which, 121 projects are reported as completed, 5 projects have been deferred by the State Governments and remaining 155 are ongoing by the various State Governments. Apart from above, so far 10808 surface water Minor Irrigation Schemes of various States have been funded under AIBP of which, 7898 schemes are reported as completed and remaining schemes are ongoing by various State governments.

Current Affairs Social Issues

The National Policy on Older Persons (NPOP), 1999 envisages State support to ensure financial and food security, health care, shelter and protection of life and property of senior citizens.

The Government also enacted the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007 which provides for maintenances of parents/senior citizens by children/relatives, establishment of old age homes for indigent senior citizens, adequate medical facilities and protection of life and property of senior citizens.

Current Affairs Overseas Indians

Indian workers emigrate for seeking employment in all categories of work ranging from low skilled to high skilled professional jobs.  Data is available only for ECR (Emigration Check Required) category of workers going abroad.  This category includes those workers who have not passed class 10 level school certificate and are emigrating to 17 notified countries.  The details of ECR Category workers who emigrated to 17 notified countries during 2008, 2009 and 2010(upto30.6.2010) are at Annexure-I.  As regards ECR category of workers emigrating from the State ofOrissa, the details are at Annexure-II.

Currenta Affairs International

On the 22 of April, ironically being observed world over as Earth Day, the Deepwater Horizon rig drilling in Gulf of Mexico, blew up killing 11 workers and creating one of the worst oil spills in history. The oil well being drilled off the coast of Louisiana was owned British Petroleum (BP). The well which has been temporarily capped now, spilled an estimated 5-9 million barrels or an equivalent of one Exxon Valdez every 3-5 days. Exxon Valdez was the tanker, which had sunk off the Alaskan coast in 1989 and is held as the benchmark on oil spills in the oceans. The only other oil spill in open seas that is bigger than Deepwater was the one in Persian Gulf during the Iraq War.The record of Big Oil on spills have been dismal – from Nigeria to Ecuador – oil spill has been more the norm than the exception.