Thursday, December 12, 2019
Wednesday, December 11, 2019
Daily Current Affairs, 11th December 2019
VisionIAS
16:11
1) International Mountain Day: 11 December
•International Mountain Day is a chance to highlight that for rural youth, living in the mountains can be hard. Migration from the mountains leads to abandoned agriculture, land degradation and a loss of ancient cultural traditions. Education and training, market access, diverse employment opportunities and good public services can ensure a brighter future for young people in the mountains. This year, youth will take the lead and demand that mountains and mountain peoples become central in the national and international development agendas; receive more attention, investments and tailored research.
2) Delhi will host 6th Indian Ocean Dialogue and Delhi Dialogue XI
•The external affairs ministry is organising the 6th Indian Ocean Dialogue and Delhi Dialogue XI in New Delhi during December 13-14. For the first time, these two events will be held consecutively. The theme for the Indian Ocean Dialogue is “Indo-Pacific: Re-imagining the Indian Ocean through an Expanded Geography”, while the theme for the Delhi Dialogue is “Advancing Partnership in Indo-Pacific”. The themes are intended to build on the ‘growing recognition of the Indo-Pacific concept in strategic and academic circles within the region and beyond.
3) Odisha to set up 45 new fast track courts
•45 new fast track courts will be set up in Odisha. The 21 courts would be dedicated to cases of rape and sexual harassment of women. The remaining 24 fast track courts will specifically deal with Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) cases. The State government’s action comes after Centre’s decision to formulate a scheme for setting up 1,023 fast track special courts for expeditious trial and disposal of rape cases.
4) ISRO to launch earth observation satellite, RISAT-2BR1
•PSLV-C48, which is the 50th mission of PSLV, will also carry 9 customer satellites of Israel, Italy, Japan and USA as co-passengers. These international customer satellites are being launched under a commercial arrangement with NewSpace India Limited.
5) India among top 10 countries with higher climate performance
•India, for the first time, ranks among the top 10 in this year’s Climate Change Performance Index (CCPI) at the COP25 climate summit in the Spanish capital Madrid. The current levels of per capita emissions and energy use in India ranked 9th in the high category showing that emissions are still comparatively low. However, despite a high rating for its Climate Policy performance, experts point out that India has yet to develop a roadmap to phase-out fossil fuel subsidies and reduce the country’s high dependence on coal.
•The authors of the report noted that while the country receives an overall medium rating in the renewable energy category, India’s 2030 renewable energy target is rated very high for its well-below 2 degrees Celsius compatibility. They noted that as none of the countries assessed is already on a path compatible with the Paris climate targets, the first three places of the ranking remain unoccupied. While some EU countries such as Sweden (4th) and Denmark (5th), one of the best climbers, achieve overall high or very high ratings, the performance of EU countries varies largely. While only two G20 countries, the UK (7th) and India (9th), are ranked in the high category, eight G20 countries are remaining in the worst category of the index. Australia (56th out of 61), Saudi Arabia and above all the US perform particularly poor. The index is jointly presented by Germanwatch, NewClimate Institute and Climate Action Network. China, the largest global emitter slightly improves its ranking in the index to 30th place.
6) Ethiopia’s PM receives Nobel Peace Prize
7) India ranks 129th in Human Development Index 2019
•India has been ranked 129th among 189 countries in the Human Development Index 2019 released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). India was ranked 130th last year in the index. Norway, Switzerland, Ireland occupied the top three positions in the index. According to the report, South Asia was the fastest growing region in human development progress showing a 46% growth over 1990-2018, followed by East Asia and the Pacific at 43%.
8) India’s R. Praggnanandhaa wins London Chess Classic
•R. Praggnanandhaa from India has won the FIDE Open category of the London Chess Classic held in London. He won the tournament with a tally of 7.5 points out of nine rounds. The 14-year-old Indian chess player finished joint first with Anton Smirnov of Australia both scoring 7.5 points.
9) Suniel Shetty signed as anti-doping brand ambassador NADA
•This is not a welcome sign with less than eight months to go for the Tokyo Olympic Games. The suspension of National Anti-Doping Laboratory by the WADA earlier this year is another issue facing the country now that dope samples collected by the National Anti-Doping Agency from the athletes will have to be tested outside India.
10) 13th South Asian Games concluded in Nepal
The HINDU Notes – 11th December 2019
VisionIAS
15:48
📰 Supreme Court flags delay in appointment of judges
Bench seeks details on 213 names cleared by Supreme Court Collegium but pending with government.
•Two hundred and thirteen names recommended for appointment to various High Courts are pending with the government/Supreme Court Collegium, the Supreme Court said in a judicial order.
•At least the names on which the Supreme Court Collegium, the High Courts and the governments had agreed upon should be appointed within six months, the order said.
•“If recommendations of the High Court Collegium meet with the approval of the Supreme Court Collegium and the government, at least their appointments must take place within six months. This is not to say that in other cases the process should not be completed within six months,” a Bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and K.M. Joseph said in an order dated December 6 and made available on Tuesday.
•It emphasised that the appointments required “a continuous, collaborative and integrated process, where the government is an important consultee”.
•The order is significant, coming at a time when inordinate delays in the appointment of High Court judges and depleting numbers in the higher judiciary threaten to affect the justice delivery mechanism.
•The court has asked for a list with details of the 213 names, including when their files were forwarded to the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and the time taken by the Law Ministry to forward them to the PMO.
•On the Supreme Court collegium clearing the recommendees, the Union Law Ministry has to put up within three weeks the recommendations to the Prime Minister who would advise the President on the appointment. However, no time limit has been prescribed for action by the Prime Minister and the President.
•The Bench directed that the list, which has to be vetted by Attorney General K.K. Venugopal, to also have other details of the 213 pending names, including the date when each recommendation was made by the High Court collegium concerned; date when the recommendation was forwarded to the collegium after consulting with the State government by the Law Ministry; the time period between these two dates; the date when the collegium cleared the names; the time period, etc.
•The Bench observed in the order that the number of judges appointed to the High Courts has steadily dipped since 2017. Judicial appointments to High Courts have nearly halved in 2019 compared to 2017 and 2018.
•Only 65 judges have been appointed to High Courts in 2019. It was 115 in 2017 and 108 in 2018.
•The High Courts are functioning at nearly 50% of their sanctioned judicial strength. Of a total 1,079 judges sanctioned in the High Courts, there are 410 vacancies. Only 669 judges are working in the courts.
•In 2019, only 65 judges were stated to have been appointed to the High Courts as on 2.12.2019 as against 115 in 2017 and 108 in 2018.
•If the judicial strength in the High Courts continued to wither away, the Bench said, “we would have less High Court judges adoring to the Bench on January 1, 2020 than on January 1, 2018!”
•The Bench, in its seven-page order, noted that the various High Courts’ collegiums were yet to send recommendations for 197 vacancies.
•The Supreme Court said filling up vacancies in the subordinate judiciary while the High Courts grow thinner would only create a logjam of cases.
📰 A patently unconstitutional piece of legislation
UPSC papers in 15 languages
VisionIAS
07:19
Government has taken up with the Union Public Service Commission the question of preparing question papers for its examinations in all the 15 languages mentioned in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution. Replying to Mr. S. S. Bhandari and other Jan Sangh members in Rajya Sabha to-day [December 10, New Delhi], Mr. V. C. Shukla, Minister of State for Home Affairs, said that the use of 15 languages, in addition to English, had been permitted for two subjects in the combined competitive examination conducted by UPSC this year. Mr. Shukla said UPSC had pointed out certain difficulties in setting the question papers in all the 15 languages but they were trying to overcome these difficulties. The Jan Sangh members had demanded that Hindi should be introduced with English in question papers of UPSC competitive examination and for interviews. Mr. Shukla said it was not at present possible to indicate when Hindi would be permitted to be used, in addition to English, for the interviews or for the use of all regional languages for all subjects in UPSC examinations.
THE HINDU NEWSPAPER IMPORTANT ARTICLES 11.12.2019
VisionIAS
07:15
