Comprehensive Current affairs 13 November 2020

Hunar Haat programme resumed.

Hunar Haat have been started after a gap of about seven months due to the Corona pandemic.

• Indian Minority Affairs Minister will inaugurate the Hunar Haat at Delhi Haat at Pitampura.

About:

‘Hunar Haat’, the flagship initiative by the Minority Affairs Ministry to generate employment for master craftspeople.

The theme of this event is Vocal for Local where indigenous exquisite products made from Mati (clay), Metal and Machiya (wooden and jute products) will be the major attraction.

The Minister has said that, it will showcase the rare exquisite products made from clay, different metals and wooden products, products made from cane-bamboo and mesmerising pottery work will be available for display.

The Hunar Haat will continue till 22nd of November.

The Minister said that every corner of the country has a traditional and ancestral legacy of indigenous products.

New Nursing Act proposed.

Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has finalised NMC to replace the Indian Nursing Council Act 1947.

• The draft bill replaces the Indian Nursing Council with a new representative body called National Nursing and Midwifery Commission.

• It would have representatives of Centre and states, would frame policies and regulate standards for the governance of nursing and midwifery education.

Key features:

A common entrance test held.

Mandatory registration and a temporary licence for foreign nationals who are qualified nurses and midwives to practice in India.

National Cybercrime Reporting Portal.

Recently, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has written to all States to examine and register First Information Reports (FIRs) based on the complaints received on National Cybercrime Reporting Portal.

• Only 2.5% of total complaints registered on the portal are converted into FIRs, as per Ministry of Home Affairs.

• The Government seeks to promote Cyber Crime Volunteers for identifying, reporting and removal of illegal/unlawful online content.

 • According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), the number of registered cybercrimes increased by 63.5% in the year 2019 compared to 2018.

• It helps in curbing rising cyber frauds, cyber bullying, child pornography etc. In consonance with the Digital India drive of the government as with rising digital footprint cybercrimes are bound to rise.

• It is massive digitalisation in the post-covid world in the sectors of education, health etc highlights the importance of cyber governance initiatives such as this.

About National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal:

• It is launched in 2019, it is a citizen-centric initiative enabling citizens to report cybercrimes online.

• It is specifically focuses on crimes against women, children, particularly child pornography, child sex abuse material, online content pertaining to rapes/gang rapes, etc.

• It also focuses on crimes like financial crime and social media related crimes like stalking, cyberbullying, etc.

• It will improve the capacity of law enforcement agencies to investigate the cases after successful completion by improving coordination amongst the law enforcement agencies of different States, districts and police stations.

About Budapest Convention:

• The Council of Europe’s (CoE) Cybercrime Convention, also known as the Budapest Convention is the sole legally binding international multilateral treaty on cybercrime.

• It coordinates cybercrime investigations between nation-states and criminalizes certain cybercrime conduct.

• The Budapest Convention is supplemented by a Protocol on Xenophobia and Racism committed through computer systems.

 • It was open for signature in 2001 and came into force in 2004. . India is not a party to it.

Armenia and Azerbaijan new peace deal.

Russia conducted a new peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

The two countries that have been in a military conflict for over six weeks over the disputed region of Nagorno -Karabakh in the South Caucasus.

During the course of the conflict, considered one of the most serious in recent years, over 1200 have lost their lives as per the Nagorno-Karabakh authorities, while thousands have been displaced.

The deal, which is meant to end the conflict between the two nations, was signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin, Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev and Armenian prime minister Nikol Pashinyan.

Since the conflict started in September, multiple ceasefire agreements have been signed between the two sides, but none so far have been successful.

What is the new peace deal?

As per the new peace deal, both sides will now maintain positions in the areas that they currently hold, which will mean a significant gain for Azerbaijan as it has reclaimed over 15-20 per cent of its lost territory during the recent conflict.

Under this agreement, all military operations are suspended, Russian peacekeepers will be deployed along the line of contact in Nagorno-Karabakh and along the Lachin corridor that connects the region to Armenia. These Russian peacekeepers with a force of roughly 2,000 will be deployed in the area for a period of five years.

Refugees and internally displaced persons will return to the region and the adjacent territories and the two sides will also exchange prisoners of wars and bodies.

 Significantly, a new corridor will be opened from Nakhchivan to Azerbaijan, which will be under Russian control.

First BRICS Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting held.

Indian Finance Minister participated in the meeting to discuss the BRICS Economic and Financial Cooperation agenda for 2020.

Key issues discussed:

Outcomes of G20 Saudi Presidency in 2020 including the G20 Action Plan in response to COVID-19. Expansion of the membership of the New Development Bank (NDB).

NDB is an initiative of BRICS (Brazil, Russia,India, China, South Africa) countries for mobilizing resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS and other emerging economies anddeveloping countries.

Virgin Hyperloop completes first human trial.

Virgin Hyperloop said it made history as the first people successfully travelled in a hyperloop pod at the DevLoop test facility in the United States.

• The testing will continue with Tanay Manjrekar, Virgin Hyperloop’s Power Electronics specialist and native of Pune, riding next.

•Josh Giegel, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer, and Sara Luchian, Director of Passenger Experience, were the first people in the world to ride on this new form of transportation.

Key findings:

The human testing was overseen by the industry-recognized Independent Safety Assessor (ISA) Certifer. Having undergone a rigorous and exhaustive safety process, the newly-unveiled XP-2 vehicle demonstrates many of the safety-critical systems that will be found on a commercial hyperloop system and is equipped with a state-of-the-art control system that can detect abnormal conditions and rapidly trigger appropriate emergency responses.

 Asteroid 16 Psyche found by NASA.

A Study at National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has recently found out asteroid 16 Psyche.

Highlights:

• Asteroid 16 Psyche is located 370 million kilometers away from earth between Mars and Jupiter and has a diameter of 140 miles.

• It orbits between Mars and Jupiter, could be made entirely of metal and is worth an estimated 10,000 quadrillion US dollars.

• It is discovered in the year 1853 by the Italian astronomer Annibale de Gaspard and was named after the ancient Greek goddess of the soul, Psyche.

• Unlike most asteroids that are made up of rocks or ice, scientists believe that Psyche is a dense and largely metallic object thought to be the core of an earlier planet that failed formation.

• Its shape is like a potato which takes about five earth years to complete one orbit of the sun but only a bit over 4 hours to rotate once on its axis.

• The latest study through the Hubble Space Telescope and ultraviolet observation gives a clearer picture of Psyche’s composition.

• It was found that Psyche could be a unique asteroid composed of iron and nickel almost completely which is similar to earth's core. The iron alone would be worth more than 10,000 quadrillion US dollars.

• Scientists noted that the manner in which Psyche reflected ultraviolet light was very similar to the way Iron Reflects Sunlight.

About Psyche Mission:

• The primary target of the Psyche mission to be launched in 2022 by NASA is to study this asteroid completely and confirm the assumptions being made by the scientists.

 • It will be the first mission to investigate this metallic asteroid. Psyche spacecraft will land on the asteroid in early 2026.

• As the composition of Psyche is very similar to earth’s own core, its study will also give an insight to earth’s violent history of collisions and accretion that created it.

Typhoon Goni .

Typhoon Goni has recently made landfall in the eastern Philippines. The Philippines is used to powerful storms - it is hit by an average of 20 storms and Typhoons a year.

Highlights:

• Goni is known as Rolly in the Philippines - is the most powerful storm to hit the country since Typhoon Haiyan killed more than 6,000 people in 2013.

• Typhoon Goni is the world’s strongest Typhoon in 2020. The Philippines was hit by Typhoon Molave.

• Another storm, Atsani, is gaining strength in the Pacific Ocean as it approaches the Philippines. Typhoon is a regionally specific name for a strong "tropical cyclone". Tropical cyclones are known as ‘typhoons’ in the northwest pacific ocean, hurricanes in the North Atlantic Ocean, Willy-willies in north-western Australia and Tropical Cyclones in the Indian Ocean Region.

• It is a generic term used by meteorologists to describe a rotating, organized system of clouds and thunderstorms that originates over tropical or subtropical waters and has closed, low-level circulation.

• It rotate counter clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere. These are measured by the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale.

• The Regional Specialized Meteorological Centre (RSMC) Tokyo - Typhoon Centre assigns a Tropical Cyclone a name from the five lists. The name ‘Goni’ is contributed by South Korea.

 Focus on mains;

Hike in GST Revinue .

According to the recent data released by the Finance Ministry, the gross Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenue collected in October 2020 was Rs. 1.05 lakh crore which is 10.25% higher than in 2019 and 10.1% more than the revenue garnered in September 2020.

About the News:

• The total revenue earned in October by the Central and State governments stood at Rs. 44,285 crore and Rs. 44,839 crore, respectively.

• GST cess collections, used to compensate the States for switching to the GST regime, rose to Rs. 8,011 crore, which is over 5% more than in 2019 and 12.5% higher than September 2020.

• October’s Revenues from import of goods were 9% higher, while domestic transactions (including import of services) yielded 11% higher revenues, on a year-on-year basis.

Status of the States:

• Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh recorded the highest 26% growth in GST collections in October year-on-year, followed by Jharkhand (23%) and Rajasthan (22%).

• The trend in the more industrially developed States was mixed, with 15% growth in Gujarat, 13% in Tamil Nadu and just 5% in Maharashtra.

Reasons for the Surge:

• The surge in October's GST inflows could be attributed to the festive demand and input tax credits as well as other reconciliations that were due for businesses in September.

• Many companies raised sale invoices in September by pushing out their finished products which they had planned in March itself. Input Tax Credit: The GST that a merchant pays to procure goods

or services (i.e. on inputs) can be set off later against the tax applicable on supply of final goods and services.

The set-off tax is called an input tax credit.

• India’s manufacturing sector activities started to show signs of growth in August and September, driven mainly by a pick-up in production along with improvement in customer demand.

Implications:

• GST inflows crossing the Rs. 1 lakh crore mark for the first time in the financial year (FY) 2020-21 is a clear sign of a recovery in the economy after its 23.9% contraction in the first quarter of 2020.

• The expected shortfall in GST compensation for the States could be lower than the current estimate of Rs. 2.35 lakh crore if this revenue momentum is maintained through the rest of 2020-21.

• According to the Consortium of Indian Associations, October’s GST inflows must not be considered a return to normalcy for businesses as these revenues normally relate to sales that occurred in September, when a majority of the economy, including public transport, was unlocked.

• The consortium of Indian Associations is an umbrella body of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME).

• November and December data has to be awaited before confidently saying that the economy has rebounded to pre-COVID-19 times.

About Goods and Services Tax:

• It is a comprehensive, multi-stage, destination-based indirect tax that is levied on every value addition.

• The Goods and Service Tax Act was passed in the Parliament on 29th March 2017 and came into effect on 1st July 2017.

• Under the GST Council and 101st constitutional amendment 2017, the tax is levied at every point of sale.

• GST is categorised into Central GST (CGST), State GST (SGST) and Integrated GST (IGST) depending on whether the transaction is intra-State or inter-State.

• Central GST: CGST is a tax levied on intra-State supplies of both goods and services by the Central Government and is governed by the CGST Act.

• State GST: SGST is also levied on the same intra-State supply but will be governed by the State Governments.

• This implies that both the Central and the State governments agree on combining their levies with an appropriate proportion for revenue sharing between them.

• However, it is clearly mentioned in Section 8 of the GST Act that the taxes be levied on all intra-State supplies of goods and/or services but the rate of tax shall not be exceeding 14%, each.

• Integrated GST: IGST is a tax levied on all inter-State supplies of goods and/or services and is governed by the IGST Act. It is applicable to any supply of goods and/or services in both cases of import into and export from India.