Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

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Maldives seeks scaling back of Indian presence as it woos China

News

• The Maldives wants India to withdraw military helicopters and personnel posted there following the expiry of an agreement in June, its envoy said, the latest snub to New Delhi by President Abdulla Yameen’s China-backed government.

Beyond News

• India and China are going head to head in the Maldives, the Indian Ocean island chain where Beijing is building roads, bridges and a bigger airport, upstaging India which has been the country’s prime provider of military and civilian aid for decades.
• India has opposed Yameen’s crackdown on political rivals and the imposition of an emergency this year and some of the president’s rivals have called on New Delhi for military intervention, creating worries in the Maldivian government.
• The tensions are impacting aid programmes such as security assistance that New Delhi has given to smaller countries in the region to help them protect exclusive economic zones, carry out surveys and combat piracy.
• India and the Maldives are still conducting joint patrols in the islands’ exclusive economic zone every month. The Maldives, 400 km (250 miles) to the southwest of India, is close to the world’s busiest shipping lanes, between China and the Middle East.
• Along with the helicopters, India had stationed around 50 military personnel, including pilots and maintenance crew, and their visas had expired. But New Delhi has not yet withdrawn them from the island chain.
• India has been demanding that Yameen free political rivals including former President Abdul Gayoom and Supreme Court justices. It also criticised Yameen’s decision to hold elections in September saying the rule of law should be restored before embarking on such an exercise.
• China, which opened an embassy in the Maldives in 2011, has rapidly built ties with the tropical island chain as part of its Belt and Road Initiative. It says it is opposed to any country interfering in the internal affairs of the Maldives.
• Providing helicopters and patrol boats and satellite assistance to countries such as the Maldives, Mauritius and the Seychelles has been part of India’s naval diplomacy to retain influence in the Indian Ocean.
• But in recent years China has moved in, building ports and roads backed by loans. In the Maldives, Beijing Urban Construction Group Company Limited took over a project to expand the airport servicing the capital Male, after the government cancelled a $511 million deal with India’s GMR Infrastructure.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

Widening elephant corridors via compensatory afforestation

News

• In a move that could augur well for the future of elephants, the Forest Department in Karnataka is set to procure large swathes of revenue land abutting identified elephant corridors to facilitate their free movement at critical links along the established migratory path.

Beyond News

• The focus area will be around the M. Hills Wildlife Sanctuary and the Biligiriranga Tiger Reserve, where companies will purchase private land and transfer it to the Forest Department.
• It was being promoted under the compensatory afforestation scheme in which industries allotted land, anywhere in the State, have to compensate for it by procuring private land abutting forest boundaries.
• The thrust is on procuring land abutting forest corridors to ease wildlife migration and reduce human-animal conflict on the fringes.
• About 125 acres of land at Badarayanahalli have already been procured by a private firm and the process of transferring it to the Department is on.
• In all, nearly 1000 acres have been identified for procurement in the long run.
• The Edayarahalli-Doddasampige corridor is also set for expansion for which the authorities have planned to procure 150 acres of land.
• The corridor connects the Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple and MM Hills wildlife sanctuaries and is at present around 1.5 km in length. They plan to extend it by another 500 metres and widen the existing corridor to 2 km.
• Of the 150 acres proposed, around 100 acres will be on the MM Hills side close to Budipadaga village.
• Incidentally, an NGO, Wildlife Trust of India, procured nearly 25 acres of land from farmers and handed it over to the State government to secure the Edayarahalli-Doddasampige corridor some years ago and the same was poised for expansion.
• The bulk of the proposed acquisition will be in Chamarajanagar district which is home to Bandipur, BRT Tiger Reserve, MM Hills Wildlife Sanctuary and Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary, which support nearly 3,000 elephants and the land acquisition will widen their migratory path and ease their movement.

Rajnath assures Kerala CM all help to deal with the floods

News

• The Centre assured the Kerala government of all possible help in rescue and relief operations in the wake of rains and floods, which so far have claimed 26 lives in the State.

Beyond News

• The assurance was given by Home Minister to Kerala Chief Minister during a telephonic conversation.
• Spoke to Kerala CM and discussed the prevailing flood situation in the state. Home Minister have assured all possible assistance from the Centre to the state government. The relief and rescue ops are going on. MHA is closely monitoring the flood situation.
• The South-West monsoon has been vigorous over Kerala, resulting in heavy rains in various parts of the state for the last two days.

Indian telescope spots distant radio galaxy

News

• Astronomers have used an Indian telescope to discover the most distant radio galaxy ever known, located at a distance of 12 billion light-years.

Beyond News

• The galaxy, from a time when the universe was only 7% of its current age was found using the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (GMRT) in Pune.
• GMRT is an array of thirty fully steerable parabolic radio telescopes of 45-metre diameter. It is operated by the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics.
• The distance to this galaxy was determined using the Gemini North telescope in Hawaii and the Large Binocular Telescope in Arizona.

Radio galaxy

• Radio galaxies are very rare objects in the universe. They are colossal galaxies with a supermassive black hole in their centre that actively accretes gas and dust from its surroundings.
• This activity initiates the launch of high-energy jet streams, which are capable of accelerating charged particles around the supermassive black hole to almost the speed of light.
• The discovery of such galaxies at extremely large distances is important for our understanding of the formation and evolution of galaxies.

UAE top source of inward remittances in 2016-17: RBI

News

• The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has emerged as the top source of inward remittances, while Kerala has received the maximum funds sent from abroad, according to the Reserve Bank of India’s survey of inward remittances for 2016-17.

Beyond News

• UAE’s share in total remittances was 26.9%, followed by the United States (22.9%), Saudi Arabia (11.6%), Qatar (6.5%) and Kuwait (5.5%).
• According to the survey, 82% of the total remittances received by India originated from eight countries UAE, the U.S., Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, the United Kingdom and Malaysia.
• Among destinations, Kerala has the highest share with 19%, followed by Maharashtra (16.7%), Karnataka (15%), Tamil Nadu (8%) and Delhi (5.9%).
• Kerala, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu together received 58.7% of total remittances.
• More than half of remittances received by Indian residents were used for family maintenance, i.e., consumption (59.2%), followed by deposits in banks (20%) and investments in landed property and shares (8.3%), the survey said.
• The rupee drawing arrangement (RDA) is the most popular channel of remittances which accounts for 75.2% of remittances, followed by SWIFT (19.5%), direct transfers (3.4%) and cheques and drafts (1.9%).
• Private banks got the lions share in total remittances with 74.1%, while public sector banks share was 17.3% and the remaining with foreign banks.

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