Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

Editorials are covered separately. HINDU NOTES are available free date wise| CLICK HERE

Myanmar to grant visa-on-arrival for Indian tourists

News

• In a bid to boost relations with India, Myanmar will provide visa-on-arrival for Indian tourists, President Ram Nath Kovind said as he began his five-day visit to the country.

Beyond News

• President Kovind’s visit to Myanmar will continue India’s high level engagements with Myanmar under the rubric of ‘Act East Policy’ and ‘Neighbourhood First Policy.’
• The landmark Land Border Crossing Agreement between India and Myanmar, signed on May 11 this year, was brought into effect in August with the simultaneous opening of international entry-exit checkpoints at the Tamu-Moreh and the Rihkhawdar-Zowkhawtar border between the two nations.
• Several agreements are expected to be signed during the President’s visit which comes amid China’s foray into the southeast Asian country with which it has signed a mega port deal.
• Prime Minister visited Myanmar last year, while Myanmar’s State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi visited India in January for the India-ASEAN Commemorative Summit.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

Shaktikanta Das appointed as RBI Governor

News

• A day after the sudden resignation of Governor Urjit Patel, administration appointed former bureaucrat Shaktikanta Das as the 25th Governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) at a time when the government and the central bankare apparently locked in a tussle over several important issues.

Beyond News

• A veteran bureaucrat who served as Secretary Revenue and subsequently Economic Affairs in the Ministry of Finance, Mr. Das is currently a member of the Fifteenth Finance Commission and represents India at the G-20 in a role of a sherpa.
• He is a 1980 batch IAS officer of the Tamil Nadu cadre.

Admiral Grigorovich-class frigates likely to be inducted in next three years

News

• The first of the four Admiral Grigorovich-class (Project 11356) guided missile stealth frigates is likely to be inducted into the Indian Navy in the next three years.

Beyond News

• Two of the frigates that are advanced version of the Indian Talwar-class guided missile frigates, will be built in Russia’s Baltic Coast Yantar Shipyard and the remaining two will be built at Goa Shipyard on technology transfer.
• It is learnt that the Admiral Grigorovich-class frigates will have an array of weapon system that include artillery guns, strike missile and radar-controlled air defence systems with provisions for torpedo tubes.
• Sources also said that the 4,000-odd tonne frigates can be armed with Brahmos cruise missile system.
• On Russia-India defence cooperation it is understood that right now two Sindhughosh-class submarines, reportedly Sindhukesari and Sindhuraj, are undergoing medium refit at a shipyard in Russia and post which the active operational lifespan of the subs will be enhanced for a further period of 7 to 10 years. The combat power of the Kilo-class diesel-electric submarines will also be enhanced substantially after the refit.
• It is also understood that a second Akula-class nuclear-powered attack submarine (SSN), may also be leased to India by the Russian Federation Navy. India already operates a leased Akula-class SSN, INS Chakra, which is based at Eastern Naval Command.

SC directs Centre to declare area around national parks as eco-sensitive

News

• The Supreme Court directed the Union Environment Ministry to declare 10 km area around 21 national parks and wildlife sanctuaries across the country as ‘eco-sensitive zones’.

Beyond News

• A Bench took the initiative after its amicus curiae informed the court that the State governments have taken no effort to protect the area around these sanctuaries and parks.
• The court recorded that the issue has been pending for the past 12 years.
• The court ordered the Centre to make the declaration “at the earliest”. Any plea for modification by the States concerned should be made to the Environment Ministry in two weeks.

A.P. to go ‘COSMIC’ to tackle disasters

News

• To deal better with disasters, Andhra Pradesh will soon have a customised, online decision making command centre to deal with natural disasters as well as other incidents.

Beyond News

• Called AP Critical Operations, Strategic Management and Incident Management (APCOSMIC), any information related to disasters or incidents like a fire, a road accident or flooding will first come to the command centre. From there, it will be conveyed to the department concerned.
• It will start functioning from March and will be fully functional in a year.
• Such systems are available only in Europe and the U.S.A.
• Training youth as volunteers in disaster risk management will be undertaken under the World Bank-funded Community-Based Disaster Risk Management Programme in Andhra Pradesh.
• Local youth would be selected and capacity building exercises will be undertaken for them so that they would be the first to react in case of a disaster.

Capturing drinking water from air

News

• Scientists have developed a simple device that can capture water from thin air, and release it when warmed by sunlight.

Beyond News

• The advance could provide a secure new source of drinking water in remote arid regions.
• The prototype device, makes use of a cheap, stable, nontoxic salt, calcium chloride.
• The salt has high affinity for water and will absorb so much vapour from the surrounding air that eventually a pool of liquid forms.
• Calcium chloride has great water-harvesting potential, but the fact it turns from a solid to a salty liquid after absorbing water has been a major hurdle for its use as a water capture device.
• To overcome the problem, the researchers incorporated the salt into a hydrogel which can hold a large volume of water while remaining a solid.
• They also added a small amount of carbon nanotubes, 0.42 per cent by weight, to ensure the captured water vapour could be released.
• If the prototype were scaled up to produce 3 litres of water per day the minimum water requirement for an adult the material cost of the adsorbent hydrogel would be as low as half a cent per day.

Water traces found on asteroid Bennu

News

• NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft has discovered ingredients for water on a nearby skyscraper-sized asteroid, a rocky acorn-shaped object that may hold clues to the origins of life on the earth, scientists said.

Beyond News

• OSIRIS-REx, which flew last week within a scant 19 km of the asteroid Bennu some 2.25 million km from the earth, found traces of hydrogen and oxygen molecules part of the recipe for water and thus the potential for life embedded in the asteroid’s rocky surface.
• The probe, on a mission to return samples from the asteroid to the earth for study, was launched in 2016. Bennu orbits the Sun at roughly the same distance as the earth.
• There is concern among scientists about the possibility of Bennu impacting the earth late in the 22nd century.
• Asteroids are among the leftover debris from the solar system’s formation some 4.5 billion years ago.
• Scientists believe asteroids and comets crashing into early earth may have delivered organic compounds and water that seeded the planet for life, and atomic-level analysis of samples from Bennu could provide key evidence to support that hypothesis.
• OSIRIS-REx will pass later this month just 1.9 km from Bennu, entering the asteroid’s gravitational pull and analysing its terrain. From there, the spacecraft will begin to gradually tighten its orbit around the asteroid, spiralling to within 2 meters of its surface so its robot arm can snatch a sample of Bennu by July 2020. The spacecraft will later fly back to the earth, jettisoning a capsule bearing the asteroid specimen in September 2023.

CLICK HERE TO SEE DATE WISE CURRENT AFFAIRS