Prelims Current Affairs 16-01-2018

Prelims Current Affairs 16-01-2018

Aadhaar Face Authentication

• The Unique Identification Authority of India has decided to enable Face Authentication for validating Aadhaar cards from July 2018.
• Currently, the UIDAI provides two modes of biometric verification: fingerprint authentication and iris authentication.
• Face authentication will be allowed only in fusion mode along with one more authentication factor either fingerprint or iris or aOTP to authenticate an Aadhaar number holder.
• Face authentication will only be allowed on a “need” basis.

Orange Passports

• Ministry of External Affairs has decided to offer orange coloured passport to the travellers who require an emigration check.
• By this ECR status would be issued a passport with an orange-coloured, non-ECR status will continue to get blue passports.

ECR status

• As per the Emigration Act, 1983, certain categories of Indian passport holders require obtaining an ‘Emigration Clearance’ for going to certain countries.
• Emigration, as per the Act, means the leaving of India by any Indian citizen with the intent of taking up employment in certain foreign countries.
• Persons who don’t have a minimum educational qualification of 10th standard (SSC, Matriculation) will come under ECR category.
• The idea behind the ‘ECR’ is to ensure the safety of uneducated and unskilled Indian citizens, from the most deprived socio-economic strata, against prevailing legal conditions in certain foreign countries.

Types of passports issued in India

• Regular Passport - This has a navy blue cover; it is issued to citizens for ordinary travel like vacations and business trips.
• Diplomatic Passport - This has a maroon cover; it is issued to Indian diplomats, top-ranking government officials (joint secretary and above) and diplomatic couriers.
• Official Passport - This has a white cover; it is issued to individuals representing the Indian government on official business.

FDI in single brand retail

• Union government has decided to allow 100 per cent Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in single-brand retail trading through the automatic route last week.
• Single-brand retail chain is expected to sell all its products under only one label across its store, example Burger King, KFC, Levis.
• If an MNC operates a single-brand retail chain, the product must also be sold under the same brand name globally.
• The MNC must also source 30 per cent of its purchases for the business from India.
• Now this rules are slightly relaxed to allow an MNC to set off any local sourcing for its global business, against this 30 per cent quota.

FDI

• Foreign direct investment (FDI) is an investment made by a company or individual in one country in business interests in another country.
• Foreign direct investments are distinguished from portfolio investments in which an investor merely purchases equities of foreign-based companies.
• FDI comes to India with two routes through automatic and Government route.
• Automatic route-under this route the foreign companies do not need a prior approval for investment either by the Government or the Reserve Bank of India.
• The investors are only required to intimate the Regional office concerned of the Reserve Bank within 30 days of receipt of inward remittance.
• Government route - Certain activities that are not covered under the automatic route and that require prior Government approval comes under this route.
• Earlier Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) issued permissions for such foreign investments.
• Recently FIPB was scrapped and now concerned government department can clear such procedures.

Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act (1958)

• Union government has tabled amendments to Ancient monuments and archaeological sites and remains act in the parliament.
• The Lok Sabha passed the amendments to the Act, the Bill is yet to be cleared by the Rajya Sabha.

• The Act was originally instituted conservation measures and banned construction activities near protected monuments.
• The amendment now allows to carry out public works within the 100 m prohibited zone.

UMANG App

• UMANG (Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance) is envisaged to make e-governance.
• It is developed by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) to drive Mobile Governance in India.

• It provides a unified approach where citizens can install one application to avail multiple government services.
• The app services include Aadhaar, DigiLocker, and Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS). Etc.

Farthest known galaxy

• NASA has spotted the farthest known galaxy in the universe, a primitive cluster of stars just 500 million years old.
• The galaxy was named SPT0615-JD.
• Preliminary analysis suggests that the galaxy is less than 2,500 light-years across.

Purandara Dasa

·         Purandara Dasa (1484–1564) was a Haridasa, great devotee of Lord Krishna (an incarnation of Lord Vishnu) and a saint. He was a disciple of the celebrated Madhwa philosopher-saint Vyasatirtha, and a contemporary of yet another great Haridasa, Kanakadasa.

·         Purandaradasa was the pioneer who blended the rich musical streams, namely the Dravidian and Aryan music, into a single stream known as Carnatic music. In honor of his significant and legendary contributions to Carnatic Music, he is widely referred to as the Pitamaha of Carnatic Music.

INTACH:

·         INTACH is an autonomous non-governmental Indian non-profit society that seeks to preserve Indian culture and heritage. It was founded in 1984.

Mahanadi River

• The 850km length of the Mahanadi River is divided almost equally between Chhattisgarh, where it is born, and downstream Odisha.
• Mahanadi rises from Raipur district of Chhatisgarh and flows for about 851 km before its outfall into the Bay of Bengal. Its main tributaries are the Seonath, the Jonk, the Hasdeo, the Mand, the ib, the Ong and the Tel.
• Near the city of Sambalpur, it is dammed by the largest earthen dam in the world, the Hirakud Dam.

Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE):

·         Highest advisory body to advise the Central and State Governments in the field of education. The Central Advisory Board of Education, the oldest and the most important advisory body of the Government of India in education was first established in 1920 and dissolved in 1923 as a measure of economy. It was revived in 1935 and has been in existence ever since.

The functions of CABE would be:

• To review the progress of education from time to time.
• To appraise the extent and manner in which the education policy has been implemented by the Central and State Governments, and other concerned agencies, and to give appropriate advice in the matter.
• To advice regarding coordination between the Central and State Governments/UT Administrations, State Governments and non-governmental agencies for educational development in accordance with the education policy.
• To advise, suo motu, or on a reference made to it by the Central Government or any State Government or a Union Territory Administration or any educational question.

Facts for Prelims:

• The idea that there should be a central Advisory Board of Education was first put forward by the Calcutta University Commission (1917-19).
• Chairman of the board shall be Union Minister of Human Resource Development. Minister of State for Human Resource Development shall be the Vice- Chairman.
• The tenure of office of members of the Board, other than the ex-officio members, shall be three years.

BBIN Motor Vehicles Agreement

Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal (BBIN) had signed a framework MVA in June 2015 to enable movement of passenger and cargo vehicles across borders among the four countries. Bhutan has not yet ratified the pact for its entry to come into force. However, Bhutan has given its consent for the BBIN MVA to enter into force amongst the other 3 countries i.e. Bangladesh, India and Nepal, who have already ratified it.

About BBIN MVA:

The landmark MVA was signed by Transport Ministers of the BBIN countries in Thimphu, Bhutan on 15 June 2015. As per the agreement, member countries would allow vehicles registered in the other countries to enter their territory under certain terms and conditions. Customs and tariffs will be decided by the respective countries and these would be finalised at bilateral and trilateral forums.

Objective: The main objective of the agreement is to provide seamless people-to-people contact and enhance economic interaction by facilitating cross border movement of people and goods.

Assistance from ADB: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has been providing technical, advisory, and financial support to the BBIN MVA initiative.

National Knowledge Network

NKN is a multi-gigabit pan-India network which facilitates the development of India’s communications infrastructure, stimulates research and creates next generation applications and services.

Aim: With its multi-gigabit capability, NKN aims to connect all universities, research institutions, libraries, laboratories, healthcare and agricultural institutions across the country to create “country-wide virtual classrooms”.

What it does? It enables collaboration among researchers from different educational networks such as TEIN4, GARUDA, CERN and Internet2. It also enables sharing of scientific databases and remote access to advanced research facilities. The leading mission oriented agencies in the fields of nuclear, space and defence research are also part of NKN.

‘Vajra Prahar’

·         Vajra Prahar’ is a Indo-US Special Forces joint training exercise conducted alternately in India and the US.

·         2018 edition will be held in Seattle, USA. The exercise will mainly focus on special operations in urban areas.

·         The aim of the exercise is to promote military relations between the two countries by enhancing interoperability and mutual exchange of tactics between Special Forces. 

Began in 2010, there was a gap of three years between 2012 and 2015. The last edition was held in Jodhpur in March 2017. This edition’s Indian Army team is from the Pune-headquartered Southern Command.