TNPSC Current Affairs January 01, 2019

www.tnpsc.academy – TNPSC Current Affairs January 01, 2019 (01/01/2019)

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Topic: General Administration, Latest Diary of Events

Mohan Reddy Committee

A government committee headed by IIT-Hyderabad chairman B V R Mohan Reddy has submitted its report and that its suggestions are being considered by AICTE.

The committee was appointed to come up with a medium and short-term perspective plan for expansion in engineering education.

Important recommendations made by the committee:

Stop setting up new colleges from 2020 and review the creation of new capacity every two years after that.

No additional seats should be approved in traditional engineering areas such as mechanical, electrical, civil and electronics and institutes should be encouraged to convert current capacity in traditional disciplines to emerging new technologies.

For approving additional seats in existing institutions, the AICTE should only give approvals based on the capacity utilisation of concerned institute.

Introduce undergraduate engineering programmes exclusively for artificial intelligence, blockchain, robotics, quantum computing, data sciences, cybersecurity and 3D printing and design.

What necessitated this?

More than half the engineering seats fall vacant every year. There were no takers for 51% of the 15.5 lakh B.E/B.Tech seats in 3,291 engineering colleges in 2016-17.

Besides, current capacity utilisation in traditional disciplines is just 40% as opposed to 60% seat occupancy in branches such as computer science and engineering, aerospace engineering and mechatronics. There were glaring gaps in regulation, including alleged corruption; a vicious circle of poor infrastructure, labs and faculty; non-existent linkages with industry; and the absence of a technical ecosystem to nurture the classroom. All this accounted for low employability of graduates.

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Topic: Awareness in Space, International Diary of Events

NASA’s OSIRIS-Rex

NASA’s OSIRIS-Rex spacecraft has set a new milestone in cosmic exploration by entering orbit around an asteroid, Bennu, the smallest object ever to be circled by a human-made spaceship.

Significance:

OSIRIS-Rex is the first-ever US mission designed to visit an asteroid and return a sample of its dust back to Earth. The $800 million (roughly Rs. 5,600 crores) unmanned spaceship launched two years ago from Cape Canaveral, Florida and arrived December 3 at its destination, some 70 million miles (110 million kilometres) away.

About the mission:

OSIRIS-Rex stands for Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer.

OSIRIS-REx is the third mission in NASA’s New Frontiers program, which previously sent the New Horizons spacecraft zooming by Pluto and the Juno spacecraft into orbit around Jupiter.

Why was Bennu chosen?

Bennu was selected for a the OSIRIS-REx mission from over 500,000 known asteroids, due to it fitting a number of key criteria. These include:

Proximity to Earth: In order for OSIRIS-REx to reach its destination in a reasonable timeframe, NASA needed to find an asteroid which had a similar orbit to Earth.

Size: Small asteroids, those less than 200m in diameter, typically spin much faster than larger asteroids, meaning the regolith material can be ejected into space. Bennu is around 500m in diameter, so rotates slowly enough to ensure that the regolith stays on its surface.

Composition:

Bennu is a primitive asteroid, meaning it hasn’t significantly changed since the beginning of the Solar System (over 4 billion years ago). It is also very carbon-rich, meaning it may contain organic molecules, which could have been precursors to life on Earth.

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Topic: Awareness in Space, International Diary of Events

NASA New Horizons

On January 1, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft became the first explorer to fly past the mysterious object- Ultima Thule, located some 4 billion miles from Earth.

This is a historic flyby of the farthest, and quite possibly the oldest, cosmic body ever explored by humankind.

Key facts- Ultima Thule:

Ultima Thule is located in the Kuiper belt in the outermost regions of the Solar System, beyond the orbit of Neptune. It measures approximately 30 km in diameter, and is irregularly shaped.

Ultima Thule has a reddish color, probably caused by exposure of hydrocarbons to sunlight over billions of years.

Ultima Thule belongs to a class of Kuiper belt objects called the “cold classicals”, which have nearly circular orbits with low inclinations to the solar plane.

Background:

New Horizons was launched on 19 January 2006, and has been travelling through space for the past nine years. New Horizon’s core science mission is to map the surfaces of Pluto and Charon, to study Pluto’s atmosphere and to take temperature readings.

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Topic: Awareness in Space, International Diary of Events

Space Activities Bill, 2017

The government is likely to introduce the Space Activities Bill, 2017, which will allow commercial use of space, in the budget session of 2019.

Features of Space activities bill 2017:

It is a proposed Bill to promote and regulate the space activities of India. The new Bill encourages the participation of non-governmental/private sector agencies in space activities in India under the guidance and authorisation of the government through the Department of Space.

The provisions of this Act shall apply to every citizen of India and to all sectors engaged in any space activity in India or outside India.

A non-transferable licence shall be provided by the Central Government to any person carrying out commercial space activity.

The Central Government will formulate the appropriate mechanism for licensing, eligibility criteria, and fees for licence.

The government will maintain a register of all space objects (any object launched or intended to be launched around the earth) and develop more space activity plans for the country.

It will provide professional and technical support for commercial space activity and regulate the procedures for conduct and operation of space activity.

It will ensure safety requirements and supervise the conduct of every space activity of India and investigate any incident or accident in connection with the operation of a space activity.

It will share details about the pricing of products created by space activity and technology with any person or any agency in a prescribed manner.

If any person undertakes any commercial space activity without authorisation they shall be punished with imprisonment up to 3 years or fined more than ₹1 crore or both.

Need for a legislation on outer space:

There is a need for national space legislation for supporting the overall growth of the space activities in India. This would encourage enhanced participation of non-governmental/private sector agencies in space activities in India, in compliance with international treaty obligations, which is becoming very relevant today.

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Topic: India’s Foreign Policy, International Diary of Events

Indo – US 2+2 Dialogue

Recognizing their two countries are strategic partners, major and independent stakeholders in world affairs, the Ministers committed to work together on regional and global issues, including in bilateral, trilateral, and quadrilateral formats.

The two sides further decided to establish secure communication between the Minister of External Affairs of India and the U.S. Secretary of State, and between the Minister of Defence of India and the U.S. Secretary of Defense, to help maintain regular high-level communication on emerging developments.

Strengthening the Defense and Security Partnership:

The Ministers welcomed the inclusion of India by the United States among the top tier of countries entitled to license-free exports, re-exports, and transfers under License Exception Strategic Trade Authorization (STA-1) and committed to explore other means to support further expansion in two-way trade in defense manufacturing supply chain linkages.

They welcomed the signing of a Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA), facilitate access to advanced defense systems and enable India to optimally utilize its existing U.S. origin platforms.

The Ministers announced their readiness to begin negotiations on an Industrial Security Annex (ISA) that would support closer defense industry cooperation and collaboration.

The Ministers announced to increase information-sharing efforts on known or suspected terrorists and to implement UN Security Council Resolution 2396 on returning foreign terrorist fighters.

Partners in the Indo-Pacific and Beyond:

The Ministers reaffirmed their shared commitment to a united, sovereign, democratic, inclusive, stable, prosperous, and peaceful Afghanistan. The two sides expressed their support for an Afghan-led, Afghan-owned peace and reconciliation process.

India welcomed the recent U.S. – North Korea summit. The two sides pledged to work together to counter North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction programs and to hold accountable those countries that have supported them.

The United States welcomed India’s accession to the Australia Group, the Wassenaar Arrangement, and the Missile Technology Control Regime and reiterated its full support for India’s immediate accession to the Nuclear Suppliers Group.

The next 2+2 meeting is to be held in the United States in 2019.

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Topic: Latest Diary of Events

India’s ranking on major global indices in 2018- a quick recap

In World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business rankings portray, we rank 77th on a list of 190 economies that are doing well for businesses. India improved its rank substantially on the Ease of Doing Business index from 132 in 2016, to 100 in 2017, and further to 77 in 2018.

In the Human Development Index (HDI), compiled by the United Nations Development Program, taking parameters like education, health and income into account, India has done slightly better than the previous year as it climbed up a spot from 131 to 130 out of 189 nations.

In Happiness Index, India slipped 11 spots from 122nd rank of 2017 to become the 133rd happiest nation in the world. It is an annual publication carried out by United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network since 2012.

In the Global Peace Index, India has performed poorly and has done just a shade better than its previous performance of 137 as we rank 136 this time. Iceland, New Zealand, Austria, Denmark and Canada are the most peaceful countries, according to GPI.

Global Hunger Index has also shown a fall in India’s ranking from the past year. While India ranked 100th in a list of 119 countries last year, the 2018 performance is worse as now it is on 103rd spot. According to the report, “a ranking below 100 shows that a country’s undernourishment, child wasting, child stunting, and child mortality levels are at the highest level.”

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Topic: New Appointments, Persons in News

The next Ambassador of India to the Slovak Republic

Shri Vanlalhuma, presently Additional Secretary in the Ministry has been appointed as the next Ambassador of India to the Slovak Republic.

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Topic: Books and Authors, Latest Diary of Events

Book on jurist Habibulla Badsha – “When Mercy Seasons Justice”

The book ‘When Mercy Seasons Justice’ – The Life and Times of Habibullah Badsha authored by historian V. Sriram, has been released recently.

He was a former Advocate General of Tamil Nadu and Public Prosecutor of Madras High Court.