National Portal for Transgender Persons.
Union
Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment e-launched a National Portal for
Transgender Persons.
About the portal:
The
National Portal for Transgender Persons has been developed within 2 months of
Notification of Transgender Persons (Protectionof Rights) Rules, 2020 on 29
September, 2020.
The
Portal would help a transgender person in applying for a Certificate and Identity
card digitally from anywhere in the country.
The
most important benefit is that it helps the transgender person to get the
I-Card without any physical interface and without having to visit any
office.Through the Portal, they can monitor the status of their application
that ensures transparency in the process.
Getting
Transgender Certificate and Identity Cards as per their self-perceived identity
which is an important provision of The Transgender Persons (Protection of
Rights) Act, 2019.
Garima Greh. Greh.
Union
Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment e-inaugurated a Garima Greh:a
Shelter Home for Transgender Persons’ in Vadodara, Gujarat.
About:
The
Scheme of ‘Shelter Home for Transgender Persons’ includes shelter facility,
food, clothing, recreational facilities, skill development opportunities, yoga,
meditation/prayers, physical fitness,
library
facilities, legal support, technical advise for gender transition and
surgeries, capacity building of trans-friendly organizations, employment and
skill-building support, etc.
The
Nodal Ministry has taken the first step in improving the conditions of
Transgender persons and has identified 10 cities to set up the 13 Shelter Homes
and extend the facilities to Transgender persons, in association with selected
13 CBOs in the country on pilot basis.
The
cities include Vadodara, New Delhi, Patna, Bhubaneswar, Jaipur, Kolkata,
Manipur, Chennai, Raipur, Mumbai, etc.
The
scheme will rehabilitate a minimum of 25 transgender persons in each homes
identified by the Ministry.
This
is a pilot project, and on its successful completion, similar schemes will be
extended to other parts of the country.
Virtual court and the e-challan project launched in
Assam.
Recently,
the Virtual Court (traffic) and the e-Challan project has been launched in
Assam.
•
Currently, 9 Virtual courts are functioning in India.
•
Maharashtra's 2nd virtual court called “NyayKaushal” was recently inaugurated.
•
E-challan solution is an initiative of the Union Ministry of Road Transport and
Highways(MoRTH) whereas the software has been developed by National Informatics
Centre (NIC).
•
It will replace the present concept of manual challan with an electronically
generated Digital Challan.
Virtual Courts:
•
Virtual Court is an online court being managed by Virtual Judge (which is not a
person but an algorithm) whose jurisdiction can be extended to the entire state
and working hours may be 24X7.
It
is an initiative of E-Committee of Supreme Court along with the Department of
Justice, Ministry of Law& Justice, Government of India.
•
In a trial by Virtual Court, neither the litigant nor the judge shall come to
the court.
•
The communication may only be in electronic form and the sentencing and further
payment of fine or compensation will also be online.
•
Only a single process is allowed and there can be no argument.
•
The case is disposed off upon payment of the fine.
•
Currently, virtual courts are dealing with only with Traffic Challan cases.
Benefits:
•
Increased productivity of citizens as well as Judicial Officers.
•
Citizen need not wait in lines in courts.
•
Promote greater accountability and less corruption.
•
Address locational and Economic Disparities in Accessing Justice.
Concerns
of Virtual Courts:
•
Requires extensive training for all stakeholders.
•
Cross-examination of the witness may not be effective when compared to an open
court hearing.
•
Prone to connectivity issues, glitches like poor broadband speeds etc.
India, US extend nuclear energy partnership by another
decade.
India
and the US have extended the memorandum of understanding for cooperation on
nuclear energy by another decade.
This
was announced in a joint statement issued to mark 10 years of cooperation of
the Global Centre for Nuclear Energy Partnership (GCNEP) between the two
countries.
The
joint statement recognised India’s commitment in November 2010 to establish the
GCNEP with a vision to promote safe, secure, and sustainable nuclear energy for
the service of mankind through global partnership.
It
also acknowledged the importance of nuclear security, including the security of
radioactive sources, and called for actions to address continuing and evolving
nuclear security challenges.
This
is with the objectives of advancing implementation of nuclear security
commitments and building a strengthened, sustainable and comprehensive global
nuclear security architecture.
Nuclear materials and facilities:
The
importance of security of nuclear materials and facilities was highlighted in
the joint statement.
This
includes protection of radioactive sources including during transportation,
combating illicit trafficking, nuclear forensics, nuclear security culture,
information security, international cooperation, and synergy between nuclear
safety and security.
The
central role of the International Atomic Energy Agency in strengthening the
nuclear security framework globally was also emphasised upon.
Examining the Climate Finance Gap for Small-Scale
Agriculture Report.
A
report titled Examining the Climate Finance Gap for Small-Scale Agriculture was
Released Recently.
•
It was prepared by the UN’s International Fund for Agricultural Development
(IFAD) and the Climate Policy Initiative (CPI).
What is Climate Finance?
•
Climate finance aims at reducing emissions and enhancing sinks of greenhouse
gasses and aims at reducing vulnerability and maintaining and increasing the
resilience of human and Ecological Systems to negative Climate Change Impacts.
Highlights:
•
Only 1.7 per cent of climate finance goes to small-scale farmers in developing
countries.
•
Small-scale farmers in developing countries are disproportionately experiencing
the effects of climate change and variability and are at risk of external
shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic
•
Small scale farmers face technical, political and commercial barriers to access
climate finance.
•
Political Barriers:
✓ Aspects related to
governance and legal framework, the legitimate actions
✓ of governmental
institutions to implement their regulatory powers through policy.
•
Technical Barriers:
✓ They can include
physical aspects related to technology and weather-related risks, as well as
aspects related to technical capacity and knowledge.
•
Commercial and Financial barriers:
✓ These barriers
originate in the economic context and are related to the availability and cocost
of capital, investment real and perceived risks, the profitability of financial
service providers, and the investment readiness of agricultural businesses.
✓ Third-party research
places the agricultural and household-related financial needs of smallscale
farmers at approximately USD 240 billion per year globally.
•
Low GHG emission and climate-resilient infrastructure received the largest
share of funds (36%), followed by investments to improve agricultural
production at farm level (14%), and improvement of livelihoods of rural
communities in general (also 14%).
•
India’s governmental support for agriculture was estimated in the early 2010s
at $85 billion per year, of which only around $3 billion directed to the soil,
water conservation, forestry, and wildlife.
There
are around 21.6 crore small and marginal farmers (or 4.3 crore families) who
are reeling under distress due to cycles of unseasonal rains and droughts.
Recommendations:
•
Promote better information on measuring progress towards climate adaptation and
mitigation for small-scale agriculture.
•
Enhance collaboration between the public and private sectors to mitigate the
risk associated with investments in the agricultural sector and leverage
financial resources.
•
Governments should make more effective use of public resources and policies
targeting risk management and capacity building for climate-related finance
while incentivizing conservation efforts at the local level.
•
International and domestic climate flows should stimulate the transition of
agribusinesses and finance service providers towards low emission supply
chains.
•
Build consistent tools to report and track international climate finance
towards smallscale agriculture.
•
Recipient governments should track progress through domestic climate finance
tracking in small-scale agriculture to support their policy-making processes.
Desalination plants .
In
worldwide desalination is seen as one possible answer to stave off water
crisis.
Maharashtra
announced the setting up of a desalination plant in Mumbai,becoming the fourth
state in the country to experiment with the idea.
What are desalination plants?
A
desalination plant turns salt water into water that is fit to drink.
The
most commonly used technology used for the process is reverse osmosis where
anexternal pressure is applied to push solvents from an area of
high-soluteconcentration to an area of low-solute concentration through a
membrane.
The
microscopic pores in the membranes allow water molecules through but leave
saltand most other impurities behind, releasing clean water from the other
side. Theseplants are mostly set up in areas that have access to sea water.
How widely is this technology used
in India?
Desalination
has largely been limited to affluent countries in the Middle East and has
recently started making inroads in parts of the United States and Australia.
In
India, Tamil Nadu has been the pioneer in using this technology, setting up two
desalination plants near Chennai in 2010 and then 2013.
The
two plants supply 100million litres a day (MLD) each to Chennai. Two more
plants are expected to be setup in Chennai.
The
other states that have proposed these plants are Gujarat, whichhas announced to
set up a 100 MLD RO plant at the Jodiya coast in Jamnagar district.
There
are also proposals to set up desalination plants in Dwarka, Kutch,Dahej,
Somnath, Bhavnagar and Pipavav, which are all coastal areas in Gujarat.Andhra
Pradesh, too, has plans of setting up a plant.
Is it ecologically safe?
The
high cost of setting up and running a desalination plant is one reason why the
Maharashtra government has over the last decade been hesitant in building such
a plant.
Desalination
is an expensive way of generating drinking water as it requires a high amount
of energy.
The
other problem is the disposal of the by-product highly concentrated brine of
the desalination process.
While
in most places brine is pumped back into the sea, there have been rising
complaints that it ends up severely damaging the local ecology around the
plant.
Diego Maradona
.
Legendary
Argentine footballer, Diego Maradona, widely regarded among the greatest
football players of all time passed away following a heart attack.
The
60-year-old had been hospitalised at the start of November, days after
celebrating his birthday.
Maradona
was hospitalised after he complained of regularly being fatigued.
His
tests at the La Plata clinic revealed a blood clot in Maradona's brain, which
doctors later revealed was operated on successfully.
About:
Diego
Armando Maradona (30 October 1960 – 25 November 2020) was an Argentine
professional football player and manager. He is widely regarded as one of the
greatest players of all time, he was one of the two joint winners of the FIFA
Player of the 20th Century award.
Maradona's
vision, passing, ball control and dribbling skills were combined with his small
stature (1.65 metres (5 ft 5 in)), which gave him a low centre of gravity
allowing him to maneuver better than most other football players; he would
often dribble past multiple opposing players on a run.
His
presence and leadership on the field had a great effect on his team's general
performance, while he would often be singled out by the opposition.
In
addition to his creative abilities, he possessed an eye for goal and was known
to be a free-kick specialist.
Maradona
was given the nickname "El Pibe de Oro" ("The Golden Kid"),
a name that stuck with him throughout his career.
Focus
on mains :
One Health Global Leaders Group on Antimicrobial
Resistance.
In
the wake of rising antimicrobial resistance (AMR), a global group called ‘One
Health Global Leaders Group on Antimicrobial Resistance’ was launched by Food
and Agriculture Organization (FAO), World Organization for Animal Health (OIE)
and the World Health Organization (WHO).
One Health Global Leaders Group on
Antimicrobial Resistance:
•
Composition:
✓ This 20-member group
comprises heads of states, current and former ministers of different countries,
leaders from the private sector and civil society.
✓ It is co-chaired by
the Prime Ministers of Barbados and Bangladesh.
✓ The heads of FAO, OIE
and WHO are ex-officio members of the Group.
✓ The Group will meet
twice a year.
Functions:
✓ The group has to
monitor the global response to antimicrobial resistance.
✓ Maintain public
momentum on the issue.
✓ Advocate for the
inclusion of AMR ‘lens’ in investments on agriculture, health, development,
food and feed production, etc.
Antimicrobial Resistance:
•
AMR is the resistance acquired by any microorganism (bacteria, viruses, fungi,
parasite, etc.) against antimicrobial drugs (such as antibiotics, antifungals,
antivirals) that are used to treat infections.
•
As a result, standard treatments becomes ineffective, infections persist and
may spread to others.
•
Microorganisms that develop antimicrobial resistance are sometimes referred to
as “superbugs”.
•
AMR is now regarded as a major threat to public health across the globe.
How does it Occur?
•
It occurs naturally but is facilitated by the inappropriate use of medicines,
for example using antibiotics for viral infections such as cold or flu, or
sharing antibiotics.
•
Low-quality medicines, wrong prescriptions and poor infection prevention and
control also encourage the development and spread of drug resistance.
•
Lack of government commitment to address these issues, poor surveillance and a diminishing
arsenal of tools to diagnose, treat and prevent also hinder the control of
antimicrobial drug resistance.
What is the Difference between
Antibiotic and Antimicrobial Resistance?
•
Antibiotic resistance occurs when bacteria change in response to the use of
antibiotics used to treat bacterial infections (such as urinary tract
infections, pneumonia, bloodstream infections) making them ineffective.
•
Antimicrobial resistance is a broader term, encompassing resistance to drugs
that treat infections caused by other microbes as well, such as parasites (e.g.
malaria or helminths), viruses (e.g. HIV) and fungi (e.g. Candida AMR in India:
•
AMR is of particular concern in developing nations like India where the burden
of infectious disease is high and healthcare spending is low.
•
India is among the nations with the highest burden of bacterial infections.
•
The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare identified AMR as one of the top 10
priorities for the ministry’s collaborative work with WHO.
•
India’s Red Line Campaign demands that prescription-only antibiotics be marked
with a red line, to discourage the over-the-counter sale of antibiotics.
•
The government has also capped the maximum levels of drugs that can be used for
growth promotion in meat and Meat Products.
Radicalisation in India.
Recently,
the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has approved a research study on ‘status of
radicalisation’ in the country, for the first time.
Highlights:
•
The Study will be conducted by G.S. Bajpai, Director of the Centre for
Criminology and Victimology, National Law University, Delhi.
•
It will attempt to legally define ‘radicalisation’ and suggest amendments to
the Unlawful
Activities
(Prevention) Act, 1967. Radicalisation is yet to be defined legally, this leads
to misuse by the police.
•
The Aggressive policing measures could be counter-productive as the youth who
were radicalised were “misguided” and not the culprits.
•
A huge local population engulfed by systematic radicalisation can create a
major security challenge for the state.
•
The United Nations’ 26th report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
Monitoring Team concerning the IS (Islamic State), al-Qaeda and associated
individuals and entities had pointed out “significant numbers” of the IS and al-Qaeda
members in Kerala and Karnataka.
About Radicalisation in India:
•
The Cases have revealed instances of internet-facilitated indoctrination and
active radicalisation in multiple states.
•
Instances of Left Wing Extremism (LWE) have grown despite the continued
government intervention. Encounters, ambushes and arrests still occur with
regular frequency in the red corridor districts.
•
Increased incidents of mob lynching, cow vigilantism and the string of
assassinations of rationalists such as Narendra Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and
Gauri Lankesh point towards rising extremism in the right wing cadres.
About Maharashtra Model:
•
The Maharashtra Government has rolled out a Deradicalisation Programme for the
minority community to counter both home-grown extremism and the global Islamic
State (IS) threat.
•
The plan has been chalked out by the State Home Department that includes a
50-point socio-economic strategy.
•
The Deradicalisation is a process in which people reject the ideology they once
embraced. This is a step further than disengagement, characterised by a change
in behaviour (leaving the radical group, stopping violence) without giving up.
About Radicalisation:
•
The word “radical” refers to change in the fundamental nature of something,
thus Radicalism is a set of beliefs or actions of people who advocate thorough
or complete political or social reform.
•
It refers to the process of an individual’s transformation from a moderate, law-abiding
citizen into an active, anti-state, violent extremist.
Types of Radicalisation are:
•
Right-Wing Extremism is characterized by the violent defence of a racial,
ethnic or pseudo-national identity, and is also associated with radical
hostility towards state authorities, minorities, immigrants and/or left-wing
political groups.
•
Politico-Religious Extremism results from political interpretation of religion
and the defence, by violent means, of a religious identity perceived to be
under attack (via international conflicts, foreign policy, social debates,
etc.). Any religion may spawn this type of violent radicalization.
•
Left-Wing Extremism focuses primarily on anti-capitalist demands and calls for
the transformation of political systems considered responsible for producing
social inequalities, and that may ultimately employ violent means to further
its cause.
•
It includes anarchist, maoist, Trotskyist and marxist–leninist groups that use
violence to advocate for their cause.
Reason behind Radicalisation:
•
Individual socio-psychological factors, which include grievances and emotions
such as alienation and exclusion, anger and frustration and a strong sense of
injustice.
•
Socio-economic factors, which include social exclusion, marginalisation and discrimination
(real or perceived), limited education or employment etc.
•
Political factors, which include weak and non-participatory political systems
lacking good governance and regard for civil society.
•
Social media, which provide connectivity, virtual participation and an
echo-chamber for like-minded extremist views, accelerates the process of
radicalisation.
Way Ahead:
•
The success of Kerala and Maharashtra programmes of deradicalisation indicates
how community-based programmes may work in vulnerable states.
•
The disaffected youth with no real job prospects and limited futures are
vulnerable. The war on terror is to be countered more in the human mind, and
requires different skills and tactics.
•
The government needs to reinvest in educational institutions, at the primary
level. The aim should be to decrease prejudice, stereotyping and discrimination
and to increase knowledge about
democracy. Collective sports and citizen programmes based on exchanges have been found helpful.
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