ART AND CULTURE

Santhali used for the first time in Rajya Sabha

GS PAPER - 01 ART AND CULTURE - Indian culture will cover the salient aspects of Art Forms, Literature and Architecture from ancient to modern times.

Context :

Recently, Santhali language has been spoken for the first time in the Rajya Sabha.

Santali language :

Santhali is the language from the North Mundari group of the Austro asiatic Munda family.
Santhali is written in Ol Chiki script which was created by Pt. Raghunath Murmu in 1925.
The language is primarily spoken in India (Jharkhand, West Bengal, Odisha and Assam), Bangladesh and Nepal.
By 92nd Constitutional Amendment Act, 2003, Santhali along with Bodo, Maithili and Dogri were added to the 8th Schedule of the Indian Constitution.
In August 2018,Santhali language got its own Wikipedia edition in its own script.

Santhal Tribe :

Santhals forms the third largest tribal group in India.They call themselves Hor ko(Man) or Horhopon ko(sons of Man).
Santhals follow the Sarna religion.
- Their God and Goddess are Marangburu, Jaheraera, and Manjh.
Sohrai is the principal festival of Santal community.Besides that Baha, Karam, Dansai, Sakrat, Mahmore, Rundo and Magsim are important festivals.
Chadar Badar,a form of puppetry known also as Santal puppetry is a folk show involving wooden puppets placed in a small cage which acts as the stage.

Source :- The Hindu

POLITY AND GOVERNANCE

After glut, Lok Sabha Speaker caps private member bills

GS PAPER - 02 POLITY - Functions and responsibilities of the Union and the States, issues and challenges pertaining to the federal structure, devolution of powers and finances up to local levels and challenges therein.

Context :

Lok Sabha Speaker has limited to three the number of private members bills that an MP can introduce in a session of Parliament.

Private members bill:

A Member of Parliament who is not a Minister or not a member of the Government is regarded as a Private Member.
A Bill introduced in either house of Parliament by any such Member of Parliament is called a Private Members Bill.Bills introduced by Ministers are called Government Bills.

Introduction of Private members bill:

The government bills can be introduced and discussed on any day but private member’s bills can be introduced and discussed only on Fridays.
The admissibility of a private member’s Bill is decided by the Rajya Sabha Chairman or the Lok Sabha Speaker.
The Member must give at least a month’s notice before the Bill can be listed for introduction; the House secretariat examines it for compliance with constitutional provisions and rules on legislation before listing.
Its rejection by the House has no implication on the parliamentary confidence in the government or its resignation.
Upon conclusion of the discussion, the member piloting the bill can either withdraw it on the request of the minister concerned, or he may choose to press ahead with its passage.
The last time a private member’s bill was passed by both Houses was in 1970.
- The bill was the Supreme Court (Enlargement of Criminal Appellate Jurisdiction) Bill, 1968.

Source :- Times of India

SC/ST creamy layer quota

GS PAPER - 02 POLITY - mechanisms, laws, institutions and Bodies constituted for the protection and betterment of these vulnerable sections.

Context :

The Centre urged the Supreme Court to refer its last year's verdict excluding the creamy layer within the SC/ST community from reservation benefits to a 7-judge bench for a review.

What’s all about :

In Jarnail Singh vs Lachhmi Narain Gupta (2018), the court dealt with a batch of appeals relating to two reference orders, first by a two-judge Bench and then by a three-judge Bench, on the correctness of the Supreme Court’s judgment in M Nagaraj & Others vs Union of India (2006).
The Nagaraj case, in turn, had arisen out of a challenge to the validity of four Constitution amendments, which the court eventually upheld.

What were these amendments?

77th Amendment Act,1995:
- It introduced Clause 4A to the Constitution empowering the state to make provisions for reservation in matters of promotion to SC/ST employees if the state feels they are not adequately represented.
81st Amendment Act,2000:
- It introduced Clause 4B, which says unfilled SC/ST quota of a particular year, when carried forward to the next year, will be treated separately and not clubbed with the regular vacancies of that year to find out whether the total quota has breached the 50% limit set by the Supreme Court.
82nd Amendment Act,2000:
- It inserted a proviso at the end of Article 335 to enable the state to make any provision for SC/STs for relaxation in qualifying marks in any examination or lowering the standards of evaluation for reservation in matters of promotion to any class or classes of services or posts in connection with the affairs of the Union or of a State.
85th Amendment Act,2001:
- It said reservation in promotion can be applied with consequential seniority for the SC/ST employees.

Background:

Last year, a five-judge Constitution Bench refused to refer the Nagaraj verdict to a larger bench.
- However, it held as “invalid” the requirement laid down by the Nagaraj verdict that states should collect quantifiable data on the backwardness of SCs and STs in granting quota in promotions, but said they will have to back it with data to show their inadequate representation in the cadre.
- It said that the creamy layer principle — of excluding the affluent among these communities from availing the benefit —will apply.
- The whole object of reservation is to see that backward classes of citizens move forward so that they may march hand in hand with other citizens of India on an equal basis. This will not be possible if only the creamy layer within that class bag all the coveted jobs in the public sector and perpetuate themselves, leaving the rest of the class as backward as they always were,” the Bench said.

Source :- Indian Express

2.3 Million Indian Children Not Vaccinated for Measles, Second Highest After Nigeria

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE - Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.

Context :

According to new estimates released by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Center for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC) on behalf of the Measles and Rubella Initiative, says India has the second highest number of children(2.3 million) who are not vaccinated against meas

Measles :

Measles virus is an enveloped, ribonucleic acid virus of the genus Morbillivirus.
Measles is highly contagious, and an infected person often transmits the virus to over 90% of unprotected close contacts.
The virus infects the respiratory tract, then spreads throughout the body. Measles is a human disease and is not known to occur in animals.
Measles can be entirely prevented through a two-dose vaccine and had been officially eliminated in many countries with advanced healthcare systems.
- The first dose of measles vaccine was introduced in the 1990s in India.
- India introduced the second dose from 2010 onwards. India was one of the last countries to add a second dose of measles vaccine.

Key Highlights :

In 2018, measles caused an estimated 10 million cases and 1,42,000 deaths globally, according to a report published.
- Children under the age of five accounts for most of the deaths from measles in 2018.
In 2017, 2.9 million children in India under one year of age had not been vaccinated with the first dose, according to UNICEF.
- In 2018, the number of unvaccinated children in India had reduced from 2.9 million to 2.3 million.
With 2.4 million, Nigeria has the most number of unvaccinated children.
- The corresponding reduction in the case of Nigeria has been much more — from nearly 4 million unvaccinated children in 2017 to 2.4 million in 2018.
The other four countries with the most number of unvaccinated children are Pakistan (1.4 million), Ethiopia (1.3 million), Indonesia (1.2 million) and the Philippines (0.7 million)

Steps taken by India :

India initiated one of the world’s largest measles-rubella campaigns to eliminate measles and control rubella in the country.
By November 2019, more than 324 million children and adolescents between 9 months to 15 years of age have been vaccinated with one dose of MR vaccine in India.
In India, the first dose of measles vaccine is given at nine-12 months of age and the second dose is given at 16-24 months of age through the national immunisation programme.
India was one of the last countries to add a second dose of measles vaccine as recommended by the WHO.
The first mass immunisation campaigns for the second dose of measles vaccine were launched in 2010 in 14 States where the coverage for the first dose was below 80%.

Source :- The Hindu

ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY

Carbon markets

GS PAPER - 03 ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY - Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment

Context :

‘Carbon Markets’ has become a contentious issue at the Conference of Parties 25 (CoP 25), being held in Madrid (Spain) from 2nd-13th December, 2019.
- Carbon markets, which allow for buying and selling of carbon emissions with the objective of reducing global emissions, is an unfinished agenda from last year’s meeting in Katowice, Poland.

Carbon Market :

Carbon markets also existed under the Kyoto Protocol, which is being replaced by the Paris Agreement in 2020.
The market mechanisms being proposed under the Paris Agreement are conceptually not very different, but are supposed to have more effective checks and balances, and monitoring and verification processes.
Article 6 of the Paris Agreement established the Sustainable Development Mechanism (SDM) as a new carbon market instrument for the period after 2020.
It aims to deliver an overall mitigation in global emissions. It seeks to achieve the twin objectives of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees, and the Sustainable Development Goals laid out in the UN 2030 Agenda.
The provisions relating to setting up a new carbon market are described in Article 6 of the Paris Agreement.
- Article 6.2 enables bilateral arrangements for the transfer of emissions reductions while ensuring that they do not double-count the reductions.
- Article 6.4 talks about a wider carbon market in which reductions can be bought and sold by anyone.
- Article 6.8 provides for making ‘non-market approaches’ available to countries to achieve targets.

Contentious : The main tussle is over two or three broad issue

Developing countries have several million unsold CERs (certified emission reductions), each referring to one tonne of carbon dioxide-equivalent emission reduced, from the Kyoto regime.
- Under the Kyoto Protocol, only developed countries had the obligation to reduce emissions.
- In the initial phase, some of these were interested in buying CERs from projects in India or China, which were not obliged to make reductions.
In the last few years, several countries walked out of the Kyoto Protocol, and those that remained did not feel compelled to fulfil their targets.
The second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol (2012-20) never came into force.
- As the demand for CERs crashed, countries like India were left with projects generating CERs with no one to buy them.

The new mechanism envisages carbon credits as commodities that can be traded multiple times among countries or private parties. It is important to ensure that in this process, credits are not counted at more than one place; whoever sells carbon credits should not simultaneously count these as emissions it has reduced.

Source :- Indian Express

Asian Elephant Specialist Group

GS PAPER - 03 ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY - Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment

Context :

The International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) 10th Asian Elephant Specialist Group (AsESG) Meeting has started at Kota Kinabalu in Sabah,Malaysia.

Key Issues Discussed :

National action plans for elephant conservation by Asian elephant range states
Best practices in managing human-elephant conflict
Mechanisms to involve group members in monitoring the illegal killing of elephants
Issues related to captive elephant welfare and sharing and learning from the African experience.
Emerging challenges to elephant conservation such as electrocution as well as solutions to deal with conflict such as early warning systems and mobile technologies.

Asian Elephant Specialist Group(AsESG):

The IUCN AsESG is a global network of specialists concerned with the study, monitoring, management, and conservation of Asian Elephants (Elephas maximus).
The overall aim of the AsESG is to promote the long-term conservation of Asia’s elephants and, where possible, the recovery of their populations to viable levels.
The AsESG acts as the Red List Authority for the Asian Elephant, carrying out Red List assessments for inclusion in the IUCN Red List
Group members have also helped in the development of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) system for Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) and The Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS).

Membership :

There are currently over 110 volunteer members from 18 countries led by the Chair Vivek Menon from India.
All AsESG members are actively involved in some aspect of elephant conservation and/or management.
Apart from the members, the Group also has Ex-officio officials from all Range States nominated by the Ministry looking after elephant conservation in the country.
Membership is reviewed and reappointed approximately every four years.

Source :- Down To Earth

The seas have less oxygen now than they used to. Why, and what does this mean?

GS PAPER - 03 ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY - Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment

Context :

International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has released a report titled “Ocean deoxygenation: Everyone’s problem”. It reports the scale and nature of the changes being driven by ocean deoxygenation

Key Highlights :

According to the findings of the study, the levels of oxygen in oceans fell by around 2 per cent from 1960 to 2010.
The deoxygenation of the oceans occurred due to climate change and other human activities (such as the nutrient runoff from farm fertilizers into waterways).

what can deoxygenation do to oceans?

Reduction in the habitat available for pelagic, mesopelagic, and benthic organisms.
Reduction in the abundance of fish population
Expansion of the volume of anoxic zones (Waters with totally depleted oxygen levels) since 1960
Alteration in the balance of marine life by favouring low-oxygen tolerant species (e.g. microbes, jellyfish and some squid)

Measures to be taken :

Reducing nutrient and carbon loads to coastal waters
Reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions through commitments in four areas- policy, technology, finance and patterns of consumption
Adaptation in the face of oxygen decline: This should be done through ecosystem-based management of fisheries, spatial planning enhance ecosystem resilience, actions that reduce local stress on ecosystems etc.

IUCN :

It is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources.
It was established in 1948 and is headquartered in Gland, Switzerland.
IUCN has an observer and consultative status at the United Nations.
It is best known for compiling and publishing the IUCN Red List, which assesses the conservation status of species worldwide.

Source :- Indian Express

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9th DECEMBER 2019 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS

ART AND CULTURE

Santhali used for the first time in Rajya Sabha

GS PAPER - 01 ART AND CULTURE - Indian culture will cover the salient aspects of Art Forms, Literature and Architecture from ancient to modern times.

Context :

Recently, Santhali language has been spoken for the first time in the Rajya Sabha.

Santali language :

Santhali is the language from the North Mundari group of the Austro asiatic Munda family.

Santhali is written in Ol Chiki script which was created by Pt. Raghunath Murmu in 1925.

The language is primarily spoken in India (Jharkhand, West Bengal, Odisha and Assam), Bangladesh and Nepal.

By 92nd Constitutional Amendment Act, 2003, Santhali along with Bodo, Maithili and Dogri were added to the 8th Schedule of the Indian Constitution.

In August 2018,Santhali language got its own Wikipedia edition in its own script.

Santhal Tribe :

Santhals forms the third largest tribal group in India.They call themselves Hor ko(Man) or Horhopon ko(sons of Man).

Santhals follow the Sarna religion.

Their God and Goddess are Marangburu, Jaheraera, and Manjh.

Sohrai is the principal festival of Santal community.Besides that Baha, Karam, Dansai, Sakrat, Mahmore, Rundo and Magsim are important festivals.

Chadar Badar,a form of puppetry known also as Santal puppetry is a folk show involving wooden puppets placed in a small cage which acts as the stage.

Source :- The Hindu

POLITY AND GOVERNANCE

After glut, Lok Sabha Speaker caps private member bills

GS PAPER - 02 POLITY - Functions and responsibilities of the Union and the States, issues and challenges pertaining to the federal structure, devolution of powers and finances up to local levels and challenges therein.

Context :

Lok Sabha Speaker has limited to three the number of private members bills that an MP can introduce in a session of Parliament.

More in the news :

The ceiling on the unlimited private member’s bills, “amendments” and “cut motions” has been brought about by new insertions in the “Directions by the Speaker” in the ongoing 17th Lok Sabha.

Private members bill:

A Member of Parliament who is not a Minister or not a member of the Government is regarded as a Private Member.

A Bill introduced in either house of Parliament by any such Member of Parliament is called a Private Members Bill.Bills introduced by Ministers are called Government Bills.

Introduction of Private members bill:

The government bills can be introduced and discussed on any day but private member’s bills can be introduced and discussed only on Fridays.

The admissibility of a private member’s Bill is decided by the Rajya Sabha Chairman or the Lok Sabha Speaker.

The Member must give at least a month’s notice before the Bill can be listed for introduction; the House secretariat examines it for compliance with constitutional provisions and rules on legislation before listing.

Its rejection by the House has no implication on the parliamentary confidence in the government or its resignation.

Upon conclusion of the discussion, the member piloting the bill can either withdraw it on the request of the minister concerned, or he may choose to press ahead with its passage.

The last time a private member’s bill was passed by both Houses was in 1970.

The bill was the Supreme Court (Enlargement of Criminal Appellate Jurisdiction) Bill, 1968.

Source :- Times of India

SC/ST creamy layer quota

GS PAPER - 02 POLITY - mechanisms, laws, institutions and Bodies constituted for the protection and betterment of these vulnerable sections.

Context :

The Centre urged the Supreme Court to refer its last year's verdict excluding the creamy layer within the SC/ST community from reservation benefits to a 7-judge bench for a review.

What’s all about :

In Jarnail Singh vs Lachhmi Narain Gupta (2018), the court dealt with a batch of appeals relating to two reference orders, first by a two-judge Bench and then by a three-judge Bench, on the correctness of the Supreme Court’s judgment in M Nagaraj & Others vs Union of India (2006).

The Nagaraj case, in turn, had arisen out of a challenge to the validity of four Constitution amendments, which the court eventually upheld.

What were these amendments?

77th Amendment Act,1995:

It introduced Clause 4A to the Constitution empowering the state to make provisions for reservation in matters of promotion to SC/ST employees if the state feels they are not adequately represented.

81st Amendment Act,2000:

It introduced Clause 4B, which says unfilled SC/ST quota of a particular year, when carried forward to the next year, will be treated separately and not clubbed with the regular vacancies of that year to find out whether the total quota has breached the 50% limit set by the Supreme Court.

82nd Amendment Act,2000:

85th Amendment Act,2001:

It said reservation in promotion can be applied with consequential seniority for the SC/ST employees.

Background:

Last year, a five-judge Constitution Bench refused to refer the Nagaraj verdict to a larger bench.

However, it held as “invalid” the requirement laid down by the Nagaraj verdict that states should collect quantifiable data on the backwardness of SCs and STs in granting quota in promotions, but said they will have to back it with data to show their inadequate representation in the cadre.

It said that the creamy layer principle — of excluding the affluent among these communities from availing the benefit —will apply.

Source :- Indian Express

2.3 Million Indian Children Not Vaccinated for Measles, Second Highest After Nigeria

GS PAPER - 02 GOVERNANCE - Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.

Context :

According to new estimates released by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Center for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC) on behalf of the Measles and Rubella Initiative, says India has the second highest number of children(2.3 million) who are not vaccinated against meas

Measles :

Measles virus is an enveloped, ribonucleic acid virus of the genus Morbillivirus.

Measles is highly contagious, and an infected person often transmits the virus to over 90% of unprotected close contacts.

The virus infects the respiratory tract, then spreads throughout the body. Measles is a human disease and is not known to occur in animals.

Measles can be entirely prevented through a two-dose vaccine and had been officially eliminated in many countries with advanced healthcare systems.

The first dose of measles vaccine was introduced in the 1990s in India.

India introduced the second dose from 2010 onwards. India was one of the last countries to add a second dose of measles vaccine.

Key Highlights :

In 2018, measles caused an estimated 10 million cases and 1,42,000 deaths globally, according to a report published.

Children under the age of five accounts for most of the deaths from measles in 2018.

In 2017, 2.9 million children in India under one year of age had not been vaccinated with the first dose, according to UNICEF.

In 2018, the number of unvaccinated children in India had reduced from 2.9 million to 2.3 million.

With 2.4 million, Nigeria has the most number of unvaccinated children.

The corresponding reduction in the case of Nigeria has been much more — from nearly 4 million unvaccinated children in 2017 to 2.4 million in 2018.

The other four countries with the most number of unvaccinated children are Pakistan (1.4 million), Ethiopia (1.3 million), Indonesia (1.2 million) and the Philippines (0.7 million)

Steps taken by India :

India initiated one of the world’s largest measles-rubella campaigns to eliminate measles and control rubella in the country.

By November 2019, more than 324 million children and adolescents between 9 months to 15 years of age have been vaccinated with one dose of MR vaccine in India.

9^th DECEMBER 2019 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS