Daily News Notes: 29th to 31st May, 2012

· The Cabinet have approved a new telecom policy, NTP 2012, that proposes to abolish roaming charges on mobile phones and allow users to retain the same number across the country without having to pay any extra charge. The thrust areas of NTP - 2012 are: [1.] Increase rural teledensity from the current level of around 39 to 70 by the year 2017 and 100 by the year 2020; [2.] Repositioning of Mobile phone- as an instrument of empowerment; [3.] Broadband –“'Broadband For All” at a minimum download speed of 2 Mbps; [4.] Domestic Manufacturing- Making India a global hub; [5.] Liberalisation of Spectrum- any Service in any Technology; [6.] Simplification of Licensing regime- Unified Licensing, delinking of Spectrum from License, Online real time submission and processing; [7.] Consumer Focus - Achieve One Nation - Full Mobile Number Portability and work towards One Nation - Free Roaming; [8.] Voice over Internet Protocol; [9.] Cloud Computing, Next Generation Network including IPV6; [10.] Resale of Services.
· Union Minister of State for Youth Affairs & Sports unveiled the exposure draft of the National Youth Policy, 2012. Key Features of Draft NYP 2012: [1.] It recognizes that Youth is not a homogenous group and has numerous differentials based on habitat, environment, socio-economic status of their families and their own life styles; [2.] It proposes to change the target age group from the existing 13-35 years to 16-30 years. This change is proposed mainly to realign the definition of Youth with the prevailing international definitions. The definition of Youth as per UN is 15-24 years and as per Commonwealth, it is 15- 29 years; [3.] The target groups identified are (i) Student Youth (ii) Migrant Youth (iii) Rural Youth (iv) Tribal Youth (v) Youth At Risk (vi) Youth in violent conflicts (vii) out of school/dropouts (viii) groups with social /moral stigma (ix) Youth in Institutional Care; [4.] Draft NYP 2012 plans to divide broad age bracket of 16-30 years into three groups- the first sub-group will be 16-20 years covering mostly youth who require educational facilities. The second sub-group is 20-25 years who require access to employable skills. The third sub-group 25-30 who require access to self employment and enterprenuerial skills; [5.] It aims at empowering youth through skill development for enhancing employability and providing entrepreneurship opportunities through convergence with other Ministries/Departments; [6.] It has monitorable indicators under five domains. Accordingly, Youth Development Index will include the indices viz. Youth Health Index, Youth Education Index, Youth Work Index, Youth Amenities Index, Youth Participation Index.
· The Union Cabinet approved the proposal for promulgation of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal Tribes) Amendment Regulation 2012 under Article 240 of the Constitution. Tourist establishments would be prohibited and other commercial establishments would be regulated in the 'Buffer Zone', which would protect the aboriginal tribes from the undesirable outside influences. Further, the stringent penal provisions would act as a deterrent to check the menace of unauthorized entry in the 'reserved area'. Background of this promulgation: “The UT Administration issued a notification on 30.10.2007 declaring an area upto 5 km. radius around the Jarawa Tribal Reserve, as a 'Buffer Zone' and prohibited any commercial and tourist activities within the Buffer Zone. However, the High Court of Calcutta quashed the aforesaid notification on the grounds, inter alia, that the principal Regulation only permits notification for 'reserved area', and has no provisions for declaring an area as ‘Buffer Zone’. Thus it had become necessary to promulgate this amendment.”
· General Bikram Singh, a veteran infantry officer, today took over as the 25th Chief of the Indian Army succeeding General V K Singh who retires today. He was the face of the Army during the Kargil war when he was serving in the Military Operations Directorate in New Delhi.
· Air Marshal DC Kumaria of Western Air Command, the most vital Operational Command of the IAF, would assume charge as the new Vice Chief of the Air Staff (VCAS) at Air Headquarters on 01 Jun 2012. He was awarded Vayu Sena Medal in 1983, Vishisht Seva Medal in 1996, Ati Vishisht Seva Medal in Jan 2007 and Param Vishisht Seva Medal in Jan 2012 .He was appointed as Honourary Aide De Camp (Air) to the Hon’ble President of India on 01 Sep 2011.
· The Centre has appointed a five member committee (headed by C Rangarajan) to look into the design of future Production Sharing Contracts (PSCs) in hydrocarbon exploration (oil and gas) in the country. It will also prepare structure and elements of the Guidelines for determining the basis or formula for the price of domestically produced gas, and for monitoring actual price fixation. The Committee will submit its recommendations by 31.08.2012
· India's economic growth rate slipped to 5.3% in the fourth quarter of 2011-12. This is the lowest in nearly 9 years due to poor performance of the manufacturing and farm sectors. GDP growth in the January-March quarter of 2010-11 was 9.2%. Further, the growth rate of eight infrastructure/core sectors (crude oil, natural gas, petroleum refinery products, fertilisers, coal, electricity, cement and finished steel, and have a weightage of 37.9 per cent in the Index of Industrial Production) in the country slowed down to 2.2 per cent in April because of poor performance of crude oil, natural gas, petroleum refinery products and fertilisers.
· In an endeavour to help wives deserted by their NRI runaway grooms, Punjab government is in the process of enacting a new comprehensive law by August, this year. Besides keeping a check over such unfortunate marriages, the proposed law would make it mandatory for NRIs to provide complete verification, compulsory registration of such marriages and verification of details from Indian consulates setup in the country from where the NRI belongs to. There are about 30,000 cases of deserted wives in India out of which around 15000 belong to Punjab. Doaba is the main region in the state where there are maximum such cases.
· The Planning Commission has given investment clearance for the scheme Mahi Right Bank Canal, Gujarat (New ERM). The project shall be completed by the financial year 2014-15. The State Finance Department would restrict the expenditure to the approved cost and no additional expenditure beyond approved cost may be permitted. Also, the State Government of Gujarat will implement the Micro Irrigation Systems (Sprinkler & Drip systems) in the command area of the project so that the irrigation water use efficiency may be enhanced significantly.
· Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution has set up Central Grain Analysis Laboratory (CGAL) in Krishi Bhawan, New Delhi to ensure food-grains being procured and distributed under PDS are of good quality. Random periodical check-up will be carried out by the lab and will have facilities for physical and chemical analysis of samples wheat and rice collected from procurement centers, FCI stores and Fair Price Shops. Quality monitoring cells have also been set up at Bangalore, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Lucknow and Pune to inspect food storage depots of FCI, CWC, State Government and other procurement storage agencies and fare-price shops. These cells take up the samples of foodgrains to analysis at CGAL, New Delhi.
· The Vice President of India Shri M. Hamid Ansari released a set of volumes on “The Role of Muslims in the Indian Freedom Struggle, 1857-1947” brought out by Institute of Objective Studies (IOS). The Study is region-wise. The project include the study of : (1) Delhi; (2) Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka; (3) Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra; (4) Bihar, Bengal, Orissa and Eastern Indian States; (5) Uttar Pradesh and (6) Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan and Gujarat. The focus of all the volumes is on the role of the Muslim freedom fighters in the respective regions. They cover the first war of Independence, Muslim Awakening during the British Rule and the Role of Muslims in various phases of the National Movement.
· Axis bank, the 3^rd largest private sector lender, has tied up with Bahrain's Ahli United Bank for inward remittances. With this, any person having an a/c with Bahrain’s Ahli United Bank can transfer money to a bank account holder in India using the Internet banking platform.
· The Ministry of Defence has started the process of bringing about amendments to The Works of Defence Act, 1903 to meet the requirements of the changed scenario. This act is a 109 year old and provides for imposing restrictions on use and enjoyment of land which are in proximity to Works of Defence in order to keep the land free from buildings and other obstructions. It has been observed that the Act of 1903 has proved problematic for those civilians living in vicinity to defence depots because of its stringent and restrictive provisions. Some of defence establishments especially the defence depots were set up over a century ago in deep jungles or vacant lands far away from human habitations. But due to increased human activity and expansion in habitations certain areas have come very close to the depots. Thus, the Defence Ministry has decided to modernize all depots and develop them by taking cognizance of the best practices followed in some of the advanced countries in the world.
· Provisional Accounts for 2011-12 were released today. As per the Provisional accounts: [1.] Fiscal deficit for 2011-12 is 5.76%; [2.] Revenue deficit for 2011-12 is 4.34% of GDP; [3.] Effective Revenue deficit for 2011-12 is 2.85 % of GDP.
· The Secretary, Department of Biotechnology announced that the Tomato Genome Consortium (TGC), a group of over 300 scientists from fourteen countries, has sequenced the genomes of the domesticated tomato and its wild ancestor, Solanum pimpinellifolium. This achievement is expected to lower costs and speed up efforts to improve the worldwide tomato production, making it better equipped to combat the pests, pathogens, drought and diseases that now plague growers. Further, he said that India contributed sequence of euchromatic region with emphasis on chromosome 5 of tomato and provided support to generate 5-fold sequence coverage of the entire tomato genome by Next Generation Sequence (NGS) technology. Indian Team also participated in performing annotation of all predicted proteins using international databases as a part of the International Tomato Annotation Group (ITAG). Simultaneously, Indian researchers have taken up analysis of specific genes/gene families related to ripening, nutrition, disease resistance and abiotic stress tolerance based on transcriptome data and comparative genomics. Also, the previous efforts have led to the sequencing of a number of other crop plants, including rice, corn, sorghum, poplar, potato, soybean, grape and arabidopsis thaliana, a plant widely studied as a model organism. The availability of tomato genome sequence will not only serve as a reference for other Solanaceous species but also help in comparative genomics among diverse taxa.
· The Secretary, Department of Biotechnology claimed to have made a significant stride in the field of improving public health with biotech researches. He said treating young children with suspected serious bacterial infection with zinc in addition to standard antibiotics significantly reduces the likelihood of treatment failure (measured as the need for secondary antibiotic treatment within 7 days, need for intensive care, or death within 21 days). In 2010, worldwide, infections were responsible for nearly two-thirds of deaths in children under 5, with around two-fifths of deaths occurring within the first month of life. Of the 1 million neonatal deaths that occur in India every year, more than a quarter are attributed to serious bacterial infections, such as pneumonia, sepsis, and meningitis. The study, led by Dr. Shinjini Bhatnagar, was conducted at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). He conclude: “Zinc syrup or dispersible tablets are readily available in the public and private health-care systems for treatment of acute diarrhoea in many countries of low and middle income and the incremental costs to make this intervention available for young infants with probable serious bacterial infection would be small.”
· The Secretary, Department of Biotechnology has invited the attention of all stakeholders in the field of Biotechnology Research to the ambitious scheme called Biotechnology Ignition Grant (Big). He said that BIRAC (Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council) endeavours to extend its support to entrepreneurs who have an exciting idea which may be in the nascent and planning stage in the form of BIG. He further stated that this scheme is designed to stimulate commercialization of research discoveries by providing very early stage grants for the development and maturation of those discoveries into marketable product or intellectual property (IP), in particular to help bridge the gap between discovery and invention.
· The Centre has agreed for a 35000 crore rupees debt restructuring package to support the Textiles industry in this time of crisis. The Textiles Minister said that there was agreement with the Ministry of Finance that the debt restructuring package would be considered on a case to case basis by Individual Banks. The Finance ministry would examine in consultation with Reserve Bank of India for a 2 year moratorium on term loans, special provision in NPA norms to avoid asset reclassification and working capital eroded to be converted into working capital term loans repayable over a period of 3-5 years.
· In Gujarat, under the National Food Security Scheme, the accelerated pulse production programme has been started in the border Kutch district. In the first phase of national food security scheme, 3000 hectares of land will be cultivated for pulse production and the farmers of this arid region will be encouraged for pulses farming. In spite of adverse climatic conditions of deserts and deficit of rain, the farmers of kutch region successfully producing Kesar Mango, Chiku, Water Melon, Pomegranate, Banana and Musk Melon under the National Horticulture Mission. The famous and mouth watering Kesar Mango, Pomegranate and vegetables are being exported to Middle-East and European countries by the farmers of this arid region.
· In Madhya Pradesh, the first Saharia community radio station will go on air in Sheopur district. The community radio station will raise the voice of primitive Saharia tribe. It will broadcast programmes in Saharia dialect and Hindi. The radio station will serve as a bridge between tribal people and the government. It will also ensure direct participation of tribal communities in administrative machinery. The community radios station will not only protect tribal art and culture, but will also lead to tribal’s social and educational progress.
· The President has choosen the Logo (by Govind Singh, J&K) for ROSHNI initiative, a green innovation for sustainable urban habitats. Roshni is not merely an environment management initiative, but combines it with empowerment of the community, especially women for livlihood security thereby demonstrating a holistic approach to the concept of sustainability. Started on July 25, 2008, the programme aims to make the President’s Estate a model in green, energy efficient and zero waste model township for all other habitats across India. Its Objectives: [1.]; Conserve water and promote its reuse and recycling [2.] Conserve energy and encourage use of new and renewable sources of energy; [3.] Improve waste management systems and to promote the 3 R's viz. Reduce, Reuse and Recycle; [4.] Control air & noise pollution; [5.] Expand Green cover and conserve biodiversity; [6.] Make residents of urban habitats more responsive to eco-friendly life styles.
· SAIEVAC Regional Meet on Ending Violence Against Children Begins in Colombo yesterday. The consultation is being organized by SAIEVAC, the South Asian Initiative to End Violence Against Children, an apex body of SAARC. SAIEVAC released reports on the status of corporal punishment in SAARC countries and launched the campaign against corporal punishment. The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Bill, 2012 of India evoked substantial interest among the participants. Further, the Indian delegation outlined the govt. policy to prevent child marriage, cash transfer schemes of many state governments, and the SABLA scheme of the Government of India which has several components to empower the adolescent girls. The Integrated Child Protection Scheme (ICPS) of WCD ministry for children in vulnerable conditions through measures such as Childline and open shelters for children, and initiatives taken for adoption of children such as web-based Child Adoption Resource Information and Guidance System (CARINGS) were also discussed. On the issue of Human Traffinking, it noted that Anti-Human Trafficking Units (ATHUs) have been established and are operational in 335 vulnerable districts in the country and Ujjawala scheme of the Ministry of Women and Child Development has been designed to address this menace.
· 'World No Tobacco Day' is being observed today. This Day is observed every year on May 31 to raise awareness about the lethal effects of tobacco and to encourage the public to abstain from all forms of tobacco consumption. As the country observes this day today, moves to make cancer a notifiable disease are making progress with two states Kerala and Punjab agreeing to such a proposal. Thus, Punjab and Kerala are already registering all cancer cases and are creating a database of all patients in their states.
· The United Nations has confirmed that the Sudanese troops have completed their withdrawal from the disputed region of Abyei which is also claimed by South Sudan. Sudanese forces seized the oil-rich region a year ago forcing one hundred thousand civilians to flee. The dispute brought the two countries to the brink of a war last month.
· US Defence Secretary has emphasised the importance of a strong US naval presence in Asia to ensure the security throughout the Western Pacific and the Indian Ocean. He said America is a maritime nation and they are returning to their maritime roots. Further, he said the US should strengthen existing ties with Japan, South Korea, Australia and the Philippines, and form robust partnerships with South East Asian nations. The Pentagon chief also spoke about the need to strengthen defence ties with China, even as its military is growing and modernising.
· Spain and Canada have expelled Syrian Ambassadors after the deaths of 108 people in the Syrian city of Houla. They also joined seven Western nations in expelling Syrian diplomats as part of a coordinated move to express outrage at the recent massacre in Syria. The United States, France, Britain and Germany called for harsher sanctions against the Syrian regime, but Russia says any new move at this stage will be counter- productive. World leaders have on several occasions called for the end to violence in Syria that has claimed an estimated 13,000 lives since anti-government protests began in March 2011.
· Iran reported substantial damage and huge data lost due to malicious software dubbed as Flame. It could be 3rdmost powerful virus after Stuxnet and Duqu viruses. Largest number of infected machines is in Iran, followed by the Israel/Palestine, then Sudan and Syria. Flame is capable of: [1.] gathering data files; [2.] remotely change settings on computers; [3.] turn on PC microphones to record conversations; [4.] take screen shots; [5.] log instant messaging chats. Thus it can steal sophisticated data from computers by exploiting flaws in the Windows O/S. Stuxnet: A computer worm. Basically spies on and subverts industrial systems. It is notorious for attacking and damaging centrifuges of an Iranian uranium enrichment facility in 2010. Duqu: Also a computer worm which is often related to the Stuxnet. It was named “Duqu” as it gives prefix "~DQ" to the names of files it creates.
· India bagged the top position (with 2 golds, 3 silvers, and 5 bronze) at the Hari Ram Grand Prix wrestling tournament held in New Delhi. India was followed by USA (2^nd position, with 1 gold, 5 silvers, 1 bronze) and Korea (3^rd position, with 1gold, 2 silvers, 3 bronze). India’s Gold was won by Praveen Rana, Rajneesh.
· The Prime Minister has congratulated Mr. Viswanathan Anand for winning the fifth World Chess Championship.