Current Affairs - 11 January 2016

General Affairs 

Scrapping Of Management Quota Will Ensure Transparent Admissions: Kejriwal

• NEW DELHI:  Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal today said his government harmed its own interest when it scrapped management quota in nursery-class admissions in private schools but he was confident the decision would "at least ensure a transparent admission process".
  
  Conceding that his government may have scored "a self-goal" by taking the decision, Mr Kejriwal, however, expressed confidence that the "admission process will now take place in a transparent manner without any recommendations".
  
  "We scrapped management quota. It was being misused by politicians, government functionaries and powerful people," he said while interacting here with a number of parents seeking admission for their respective wards.
  
  He said his government's step of scrapping management quota and 62 other types of criteria for preferential admission has opened 50 per cent extra seats for the common man.
  
  Mr Kejriwal refuted the allegation that his government was trying to interfere in the admission process of private school, and said the Delhi government had given time to the public schools to upload their admission criteria till December 31.
  
  He said some schools betrayed the faith the government had reposed in them and reserved up to 75 per cent seats under various criteria, including alumni, sibling and management quota.

Railways Choose Vibrant Colours For Semi-High Speed Train Coaches

• 

  NEW DELHI:  2017 may see brightly coloured trains in shades of grey, navy blue and yellow clocking speeds of 160-200 kmph on select routes.
  
  Indian Railway has selected 'Vitality', the colour scheme inspired by 'cheetah', the fastest moving animal, created by the National Institute of Design for the coaches of the semi-high speed trains the state-run transporter has proposed to launch. The coaches will be painted in grey and navy blue with yellow border.
  
  "We selected 'Vitality' out of total six colour schemes submitted to us by NID. The colour combination of grey, navy blue with yellow border was chosen keeping the speed factor in mind," said a senior Railway Ministry official.
  
  

  Railways have planned to reduce the travel time between major cities by running semi-high speed trains. The new coaches will be manufactured at Kapurthala Coach Factory (RCF).
       
  "A prototype coach with the new colour scheme will be ready by March this year and later on about 20 modern coaches will be manufactured in the next fiscal," the official said.
       
  According to the plan, railways will introduce trains that can clock speeds upto 200 kmph after strengthening the tracks and fencing off certain select routes including Delhi-Agra, Delhi-Kanpur, Chennai-Hyderabad, Nagpur- Secunderabad and Mumbai-Goa.
       
  Initially, the trains will run at 160 kmph which will be enhanced to 200 kmph.
       
  The long-awaited 160 kmph Gatimaan Express between Delhi and Agra is expected to start in February after the railways got conditional clearance from Commissioner Railway Safety.
  
  Trial runs of this train are being conducted. "The train will be flagged off in February after the foggy season ends," the official said.
      
  Semi-high speed trains can gather a maximum speed of 200 kmph, while faster ones in the category of high-speed or bullet trains can run between 250-350 km per hour.
  
  Indian Railway is planning a 'Diamond Quadrilateral' to connect top four metro cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai with a high-speed train network.

Targeting 50 Crore Internet Subscribers In 6-7 Months: Ravi Shankar Prasad

• MUMBAI:  The government plans to reach up to 50 crore internet subscribers in next 6-7 months, besides installing 2,500 Wi-Fi hotspots at 256 places by the next fiscal, Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said today.
  
  "Today mobile penetration is 100 crore, while internet penetration is 40 crore. It took more than 3-4 years to become from 20 to 30 crore. It took less than a year to become from 30 to 40 crore and I have fixed a target of 50 crore," Mr Prasad said at the launch of the Bombay Stock Exchange's (BSE) free public Wi-Fi service started in partnership with Tata Docomo.
  
  "God willing, we will cross 50 crore in coming 6-7 months," he said.
  
  The minister said the state-run BSNL aims to install 2,500 Wi-Fi hotspots at 256 places by the next fiscal.
  
  The Digital India programme includes projects which aim to ensure that the government services are available to citizens electronically and people benefit from information and communication technology.
  
  "Digital India will transform the country, and it is more for people like chaiwallas and paanwallas so that they can enhance their skills," Mr Prasad said.
  
  He also announced that the BSE, which is Asia's oldest stock exchange with 3 crore registered investors, would get its own postage stamp.
  
  "In acceding to your (BSE) request to have postal stamp, I am feeling happy as it is the official recognition of the work you are doing," he said.

Sonia Gandhi's Meeting With Mehbooba Mufti Fuels Suspense In Srinagar

• SRINAGAR:  Congress president Sonia Gandhi and union minister Nitin Gadkari had separate meetings with People's Democratic Party or PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti on Sunday to offer condolences on the death of her father and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed.
  
  The meetings are being seen as politically significant because Jammu and Kashmir is under governor's rule since Friday. Ms Mufti, who was earlier supposed to take oath as the state's first woman chief minister on Monday, had declined yesterday to take oath at the end of the four day mourning period after her father's death. Mr Sayeed had died in New Delhi on Thursday morning after remaining under critical care for days.
  
  

  She is not expected to take oath for the entire next week. The delay has set off speculation of political realignment in the state. Mr Sayeed headed a PDP-BJP coalition that formed the government last year.
  
  The PDP and the Congress were in alliance from 2002 to 2008.  Mrs Gandhi was accompanied by party leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ambika Soni, Saifuddin Soz and the party's state unit chief GA Mir. The Congress leaders spent 15 minutes with her. Mr Azad said the meeting was "just to offer prayers and condolences" to Ms Mufti. Sources in the Congress said the party chief's visit was personal in nature because Mr Sayeed "was face of Congress for decades in the state" and "there no politics in it."
  
  Mr Gadkari was accompanied by Nirmal Singh, who was Mr Sayeed's deputy in the government. "I assured Mehboobaji of all the help and fulfilment of expectations they have of the Government of India," he said after the meeting. "This is not the day for politics."
  
  Ms Mufti, who has been chosen by her party to lead the government, had met Mr Gadkari's party colleague Ram Madhav on Friday. She is said to have told him that the BJP should not rake up sensitive issues and asked for more central assistance for the state. Mr Madhav is one of the engineers of the PDP-BJP alliance.

Villages On The Moon Can Be Reality By 2030, Say Scientists

• LONDON:  Villages on the Moon, constructed through cooperation between astronauts and robotic systems on the lunar surface, may become a reality as early as 2030, scientists say.
  
  Moon villages could serve as a potential springboard for future human missions to Mars and potentially other destinations, a team of scientists, engineers and industry experts said at the European Space Agency's (ESA) symposium "Moon 2020-2030 - A New Era of Coordinated Human and Robotic Exploration," held in the Netherlands.
  
  In order for that vision to become a reality, scientists must first determine if the resources on the Moon are as significant as we think they are, said Clive Neal, from the University of Notre Dame in US.
  
  "We keep talking about lunar resources, but we still need to demonstrate they can be used, (that) they are, in fact, reserves," he said.
  
  "So ground truth verification of deposit size, composition, form and homogeneity requires a coordinated prospecting programme as a first step," Mr Neal said.
  
  "The next step would demonstrate extraction techniques followed by refinement of the product into usable commodity. A successful programme would then clearly demonstrate that lunar resources can enable solar system exploration," he said.
  
  Mr Neal said the ESA meeting highlighted technology development in terms of precision landing, robotic sample return, and cryogenic sampling, caching, return and curation.
  
  "Significant investments in the latter are required and starting to be made," he said.
  
  Mr Neal's research explores the origin and evolution of the Moon, focusing on the petrology and geochemistry of returned samples coupled with geophysics and other remotely sensed datasets; geophysical instrumentation and investigations of the moon; formation of impact melts; and more basalt petrogenesis.

Business Affairs 

Essel Infraprojects to develop Rs 4,000-cr infra projects in West Bengal

• Essel Infraprojects Limited (EIL), a part of Essel Group, on Friday said it will invest Rs 4,000 crore in West Bengal in various infrastructure projects, including building of highways.

  "EIL will be developing roads projects admeasuring 300 km connecting various cities across West Bengal. Apart from this MoU, the company also agreed to explore the possibilities of investment in Tourism and Intelligent Power City sectors after pre-feasibility study," EIL said in a statement. The commitment was made in the ongoing Bengal Global Business Summit on Friday.

  Speaking about the company's vision for West Bengal, Group Chairman Subhash Chandra said, "These MoUs provide a unique opportunity to enhance existing infrastructure and provide new paradigm to development of infrastructure in the state and we at Essel understand this as we have effectively demonstrated our implementation abilities in Urban Infrastructure space in various other parts of India."

  EIL's signing of Rs 4,000-crore worth pact is a part of Essel's vision to invest Rs 10,000 crore in West Bengal which was announced during 2015 edition of Bengal Global Business Summit. The company is targeting projects like toll roads with an investment of Rs 3,000 crore, sanitation and water treatment orders worth Rs 2,000 crore, over 500 TPD (tones per day) municipal solid waste project to convert waste to energy with an investment of Rs 2,000 crore and metro/monorails contract worth Rs 3,000 crore.

  As per the pacts signed on Friday, the company said the West Bengal government will facilitate obtaining of necessary permissions, registrations, approvals, clearances, both at state and central level. "The MoUs underlines Essel's commitment towards overall development of the state of West Bengal and apart from urban infrastructure projects we would also explore possibilities to invest in Tourism & Intelligent Power City sector," said Ashok Agarwal, Director & CEO, Essel Infra & Utilities business.

  EIL has completed around 2,100 km of roads and is constructing 2,500 kms of roads in Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.

New metro time limits from Monday to prevent loitering at stations

• The DMRC has set new travel time limits for commuter journey length to prevent loitering at stations, and failing to adhere to which will attract a penalty.

  Commuters traveling a distance for which the fare is up to Rs 18 (approximately 9 stations) would be allowed to stay inside the metro premises for 65 minutes.

  "The time limit is 100 minutes for traveling up to 14 stations (fare up to Rs 23) and 180 minutes for 15 and above (fare above Rs 23)," said a senior DMRC official. "This is aimed at controlling over crowding at stations. Also, it has come to our notice that several people loiter in station premises," said the official. The new time limits will come into force from Monday.

  The DMRC will make announcements regarding the same till January 31. The official said offenders will be penalized only from February 1. "From Monday to January 31, the travel cards or token of commuters staying beyond the stipulated time will show error numer 159. They will then have to report to customer care centres to make an exit without any penalty," the official said.

  The new time limits, the official said, have been arrived at after calculating the maximum possible time that a commuter could take to travel specific distances. At present, commuters are allowed to stay inside the metro premises for 170 minutes if they enter from one station and exit from another irrespective of the distance traveled.

  Every month, more than 1 lakh commuters are penalized for overstaying in the metro facility. "In December last year, 1,08,513 passengers were booked for overstaying in the system while 1,13,972 people were penalized in November. This contributes significantly to the problem of over crowding," the official said. The stations covered under the three time zones will be displayed at all stations. This will help commuters ascertain in how much time they should make an exit.

  For example, if a commuter is traveling from Barakhamba Road to Ramkrishna Ashram Marg, he would have to exit the system within 65 minutes as the destination would be within the first time zone (of about nine stations). "The list of stations covered under this zone and the subsequent zones would be displayed at the Barakhamba Road station itself," he explained.

  A penalty of Rs 10 per extra hour and maximum Rs 50 (as per DMRC business rules) will be imposed for any breach of the time limit from February 1.

After 40 years, govt set to re-open commercial coal mining to pvt firms

• The government is getting ready to open up commercial coal mining to private companies for the first time in four decades, with the aim of shifting the world's third-biggest coal importer towards energy self-sufficiency.

  Anil Swarup, the country's top coal bureaucrat, told Reuters on Friday the government has identified mines it plans to auction, and is now finalising other terms such as eligibility criteria for companies to take part and whether and how to set up revenue sharing.

  He said a plan should be ready in the 2-3 months, setting a clear timeline on a plan that has previously only been vaguely marked out.

  India has an ambitious plan to double its coal production to 1.5 billion tonnes a year by 2020, as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's push to bring power to 300 million people who live without electricity, and give a boost to manufacturing.

  It would also support the government's efforts to develop eastern parts of the country, which are resource-rich and hold most of the country's coal reserves but have lagged the western states in development.

  State-owned Coal India is on track to produce 1 billion tonnes a year by the end of this decade, and India is counting on private firms to produce the remaining 500 million tones - which may prove a tough target to achieve.

  As of now, only Coal India and a small government-owned company are allowed to mine and sell coal in India.

  "It's imperative that India opens up the sector so that private companies can bring in new technologies and the efficiencies that we keep talking about," said Dipesh Dipu at energy-focused Jenissi Management Consultants. "But I don't think private companies will be able to produce more than 100 million tonne this decade as the process has yet to start."

  The move is likely to attract coal block bids from Indian conglomerates such as the Adani Group and GVK, but the government may find it harder to lure big multinational miners such as Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton, Anglo American and Peabody Energy. Rio Tinto did not respond to requests for comment.

  Coal prices are at multi-year lows amid global oversupply, and foreign companies have faced obstacles to investing in India, such as problems in getting land and environmental approvals. Some private companies also worry that the best quality mines would be left for Coal India.

  FINALISING TERMS

  Swarup was handpicked by Modi to lead a turnaround in the coal sector soon after the prime minister came to power in 2014.

  Under Swarup's watch, Coal India has seen record production growth, and the government auctioned off a series of coal blocks successfully. Coal imports fell for a sixth straight month in December.

  Until last year, India spent around $16 billion a year importing foreign coal, even though it sits on the world's fifth-biggest reserves of more than 300 billion tonnes.

  Swarup said there were still some aspects of the plan to bring in private players that needed to be examined carefully.

  The government, for example, has to make sure that companies do not under-report sales if a revenue-sharing model is adopted, he said.

  Companies can do that by selling coal to their units at discounted rates, and by calculating the government's share based on that instead of the market price.

  Swarup declined to say where the identified mines were located. Most of country's coal is in Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh.

Yuan fall a worry, options open to check cheap imports: Nirmala Sitharaman

• The government on Friday said the devaluation of the Chinese currency is a worrying development which will make Indian exports expensive and asserted that necessary action, including anti-dumping duty, can be taken to check cheap imports from China.

  Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the devaluation of the yuan will make imports cheaper from China to India. "The depreciation of the yuan is definitely going to make imported goods (from China) cheaper... the fact is my deficit with China will (also) grow," Sitharaman told reporters after the first meeting of the Council for Trade, Development and Promotion.

  In 2014-15, the bilateral trade between the countries stood at $72.3 billion with the trade gap at $49 billion. The government and the Indian industry have time and again raised concerns about the widening deficit. "India has been pushing China to give greater market access to Indian products such as agri, IT and pharmaceuticals. It's going to make imports from China even more cheaper (to India). Our products are going to be more expensive. So, that is an immediate black-and-white kind of a situation which is developing," she said.

  Asked about an action plan to deal with the problem, the minister said imports from China have to be looked at product by product. "It is item by item we have to look at... and see which are the items that are causing injury to the Indian industry... and if that (injury) is established based on ground facts, then some anti-dumping duty or something can be brought in. But the fact remains (we) will be assessing it because our trade balance is adversely getting affected," she said.

  The statement assumes significance as China's central bank has devalued its currency by 0.51 per cent to 6.56 per cent against the dollar, the lowest since March 2011. India has already imposed anti-dumping duty on several products from China in sectors including chemicals and iron and steel. The Indian steel industry has asked the government to fix a minimum import price on steel to check cheap imports. On that, the minister said, "Although we have done the ground work on it, we are not rushing into it."

45 Indians in Forbes list of achievers under the age of 30

• Forty five Indians and Indian-origin people have made it to Forbes' annual list of achievers under the age of 30 who are changing the rules of the game or creating entirely new playbooks across varied fields.

  The Forbes fifth annual '30 Under 30' list features 600 women and men, who are America's most important young entrepreneurs, creative leaders and brightest stars and are changing the world across 20 varied sectors such as consumer technology, education, media, manufacturing and industry, law and policy, social entrepreneurs, science and art and science.

  In the past, youth was a handicap to professional success. Getting older meant more resources, more knowledge, more money. No more. Those who grew up in the tech age have way bigger ambitions perfectly suited to the dynamic, entrepreneurial and impatient digital world they grew up in. If you want to change the world, being under 30 is now an advantage, Forbes said.

  In the consumer tech segment is 22-year-old Ritesh Agarwal, the founder and CEO of OYO Rooms, billed to be the Airbnb of India. In a country that lacks a steady supply of budget hotel chains, Oyo has developed a network of 2,200 small hotels in 100 cities across India, Forbes said.

  Others in the field are 28-year old Gagan Biyani and Neeraj Berry who co-founded Sprig, a mobile app that lets one find and order healthy meals and have them delivered quickly and 25-year-old Karishma Shah, the youngest hire at Alphabet's Google X so-called moonshot factory, where the search giant places smart people to come up with far-out technologies that can be applied to world's big problems. In the Hollywood and entertainment field is 27-year-old Canadian Lily Singh, writer-comedian and part of a new generation of stars that has used YouTube to gain a following.

  Among the persons of Indian-origin is Nila Das, 27, is Vice President at Citigroup and is a mortgage bond trader running the bank's secondary trading in agency collatoralised mortgage obligations, overseeing billions of dollars in volume each day.

  The others making a mark in finance are 29-year-old Divya Nettimi, an investment analyst at Viking Global Investors, who co-managed Harvard Business School's Alpha Fund while getting her MBA, 29-year-old Vikas Patel, a senior analyst at hedge fund Millennium Management and 29-year-old Neel Rai an investment analyst at Caxton Associates where he is part of a three-person team managing USD 600 million portfolio at pioneering macro hedge fund.

  In the venture capital segment, notable persons of Indian-origin are 26-year-old Vishal Lugani, a senior associate at Greycroft Partners, and 27-year-old Amit Mukherjee, senior associate at New Enterprise Associates.

  Media stars include 27-year-old Nisha Chittal, manager of social media and community at MSNBC and Ashish Patel, 29, senior vice president of Social Media at NowThis Media.

  Leading the manufacturing segment is 28-year-old Sampriti Bhattacharyya, an MIT grad student who has developed underwater drones that are capable of autonomously communicating and working together to scan the ocean to look for lost planes, or measureoil spills or radiation under the sea and 29-year-old Saagar Govil, CEO of Cemtrex which produces environmental products and electronics solutions.

  Among the social entrepreneurs is 28-year-old Anoop Jain, Founding Director of Sanitation and Health Rights in India, which builds toilets, collects human waste and uses methane coming off that excrement to create clean water.

  In the law and policy field are 26-year-old Ashish Kumbhat, a monetary policy expert in the Federal Reserve Board, 27-year-old Dipayan Ghosh, privacy and public policy advisor at Facebook and 28-year-old Anisha Singh, the former lead of the international policy division of United Sikhs, where she founded national anti-bullying campaign and won a historic case against US Army requiring religious accommodation on behalf of a 19-year-old Sikh who'd been rejected from ROTC programs.

  In the science field is 29-year old Sanjam Garg, assistant professor, at University of California Berkeley.

General Awareness

“Laman Diva” is selected as “Make in India Week” logo

• • Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis unveiled“Laman Diva” as the logo of the first Make in India (MII) Week scheduled to be held in Mumbai between February 13 and 18, which will be inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

    • The Laman Diva or Nanda Deep has great relevance in Indian culture as it symbolizes auspicious beginning, peace, prosperity, growth.
    • This is also the logo of Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation. The only added elements are the cogs and parts of the Make in India Lion logo to signify the manufacturing potential of Maharashtra.
      
      
      

    Organizers of MII Week – The Make in India Week will be jointly organized by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Union ministry of commerce and industry, CII andMaharashtra government at Mumbai.

    Theme – Innovation, design and sustainability

    Participants – About 10,000 delegates from across the world are expected to visit the city during the Make in India Week. It will also feature participation from different Indian states through State Pavilions.

    Key Features of MII Week
    The Make in India Centre at Bandra Kurla Complex will feature an exhibition of most innovative products and manufacturing process in India. Several seminars on sectors like Medium and Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME), tourism, textiles, information and technology, non-conventional energy etc. will be organised.

    • The State pavilions will highlight India’s major manufacturing states, their achievements and investment potentials.
    • Time magazine will institute Time India awards for the first time at the MII Week.
    • The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation will provide hoardings and bus shelters to showcase Make in India Week.
    • On February 14, the DIPP and Maharashtra government will jointly host the Asia Business Forum and will followed by the Maharashtra Night which will showcase the State’s culture, arts and music.
    • On February 15, Maharashtra Investment Summit will held, which will be chaired by Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
    • On February 16, Make in Mumbai summit will be held with sessions on urban development and infrastructure of Mumbai following by the Elephanta cultural festival.

    Why Maharashtra has been picked up for MII?
    Maharashtra remained number one in FDI flows and with contributions of 13% to India’s GDPand 18% to national manufacturing output, it was the ideal State to host the first ever Make in India Week.